What’s Jewish about frogs? Passover, of course. (Passover isn’t for a while but this week’s Torah Parsha Vaera has 7 of the 10 Plagues). The second plague may be the most Disney-esque of them all, imagine the animation going into a visual like that. Unlike the other plagues, no one went thirsty, animals didn’t die, no one was hurt. But they were a big all-over-the-place annoying nuisance.
You know when you get a song playing in your head or when you see a meme that shows you something you can’t unsee? That’s how it is with a Talmud Midrash about the frogs, extolling their dedicated sacrifice in jumping anywhere – even into hot ovens (as the verse states). In fact, years later when Chananya Mishael and Azarya were given a choice to worship idols or to be thrown into a fiery furnace by an idolatrous Nevuchadnezzar, the inspiration of the frogs allowed them to make that sacrifice.
So what do the Egyptian plague frogs mean to you? Is it about nuisance or about sacrifice? What song plays in your head? What can’t you unsee?
So this week happened to be a challenging one for us. Nothing serious but we had a lot of physical failures. First our main office computer died (BSOD – Blue Screen of Death) though thankfully most data is backed up, then our tankless hot water heater gave up, and then we had a failure of a basement pump. Each of these is no big deal, but they’re expensive, a hassle, a nuisance. They need to be dealt with. And all in one week!
But there’s another side to pumping water in the basement with your wife at midnight: And that’s the sense of dedication and sacrifice you feel doing something like that together. Dealing with computer failure is stressful, no doubt; but going through all the steps and missteps together – adds a special dimension.
So when you think of the plague of frogs, what comes to mind? The nuisance or the sacrifice? The annoyance or the dedication? Often there’s this valuable, rich flipside, that gives the same experience a whole different dimension.