Darkness and the Plague of Darkness
– From the Torah of the Maharal and Other Commentators
By Eliakim Willner
Eliakim Willner is author of “Nesivos Olam – Nesiv HaTorah: An
Appreciation of Torah Study”, a translation with commentary of a work by the
Maharal of Prague, published by Artscroll/Mesorah. This article is adapted from
his forthcoming continuation of the Nesivos Olam series, “Nesivos Olam – Nesiv
HaAvodah: The Philosophy and Practice of Prayer”.
Introduction
What is “darkness”? The high
school science answer is that, of course, darkness is the absence of light.
Really, though, it’s not quite that simple, either from hashkafa or the
science standpoints. We will examine “darkness”, present two opposing points of
view on its nature from our Gedolim, attempt to gain a better
understanding of makas choshech, the plague of darkness, and demonstrate
how both points of view can be reconciled with science..
The Bracha of “Yotzer Ohr
U’Borei Choshech”
The first of the two
blessings that precede the Shachris Shma is Yotzer Ohr U’Borei
Choshech, Hashem, “forms light and creates darkness”. In Nesivos Olam,
Nesiv HaAvodah 7, the Maharal asks why it is that we mention an attribute
appropriate to night – that Hashem “creates darkness” – during the daytime.
Would it not be more fitting to mention daytime attributes before recitation of
the daytime Shma, and nighttime attributes before recitation of the
night Shma?
In answer to this question
the Maharal writes as follows:
…There is another reason,
and that is to make the point that Hashem, Who created them, is one. If we were
not to mention an attribute of night during the daytime, and an attribute of
daytime during the night, but would instead limit ourselves to treating daytime
and night as separate entities, the fact that they are different, and in fact
opposites, we would give the impression that we were, G-d forbid, tacitly
endorsing the position of some non-believers, who claim that there are two deities. They maintain that the diversity of created
things in the universe attests to the existence of multiple creators.
Therefore, if, when we
are about to declare Hashem’s oneness by reciting day-time Shma, we only
mentioned a daytime attribute and omitted a nighttime at-tribute, as if daytime
and night were independent of one another, we would be implying that, G-d
forbid, there were multiple creators.
Therefore we must mention an attribute of daytime during the night an
attribute of night during the daytime, to affirm that the daytime partners with
the night to form a single day unit. They are therefore not the result of separate
acts of creation and their Creator is one.
Not only does mentioning,
in the Shma blessings, the opposing part of the day, not contradict the concept of a single
Creator, but on the contrary, when two different things are shown to be part of
the same entity, it demonstrates that there is only one Creator. The one
Creator is the common thread that binds and unifies disparate things… This is
clear.
From the “standpoint” of Hashem,
as it were, the Maharal is saying, there really is no “diversity”. There are
merely different aspects of creation – a creation that is unified in that all
of creation emanates from a single Creator, and the diversity is apparent only
from our very limited perspectives.
A Cataclysmic Mistake
Why, though, would anyone
make the mistake of thinking that because there is diversity – because the
world has the apparent opposites of light and darkness, for example – there are
multiple creators? This erroneous doctrine, called polytheism, originated with
Enosh, son of Shes, grandson of Odom HaRishon. Rashi on Beraishis
4:26 explains that in the days of Enosh mankind began the process of deifying
objects. The Rambam, in Mishna Torah, Hilchos Avodas Kochavim 1,
writes that Enosh and his cohorts rationalized that since Hashem created the
heavenly bodies as intermediaries to conduct the affairs of the world, He would
presumably want us to praise and honor them. They would therefore praise the
rain intermediary in the hope of getting adequate rain, the sun intermediary in
the hope of getting enough sunlight, and so on. One thing led to another and
false prophets commanded that these bodies actually be worshiped. Ultimately,
Hashem Himself was forgotten and these objects became mankind’s sole objects of
worship. This degeneration continued until Avrohom came to recognize Hashem and
sought to restore belief in Hashem’s oneness to mankind.
Yisroel, the nation that
emanated from Avrohom, Yitzchok and Yaakov, remains the standard-bearer for
belief in a single G-d – monotheism – but polytheistic religions, such as
Hinduism, Paganism, Buddhism, Shinto and others, persist to this day. Thus, the
Maharal teaches, it is critical for us to understand the full implications of
the Shma declaration as an affirmation of Hashem’s unity. Yes, we have
the apparent opposite creations of light and darkness, but we make a point of
mentioning, in the first daytime Shma brocha, darkness during the
light part of the day and, at night, light during the dark part of the day, to
attest that they are really one, and the output of a single Creator.
What is Darkness?
Let us now examine an
assumption inherent in the Maharal’s answer discussed above, and that is that
darkness is a “creation” in its own right. As the language of the blessing
itself testifies, Hashem “creates darkness”. Indeed, as we will discuss
shortly, that language originates in a pasuk. If, however, darkness is
the absence of something, it cannot be created at all!
This raises the question,
what is darkness? Is darkness a “thing”, like light, which has an independent
existence? Or is it merely the absence of light? If the latter, then darkness
cannot be created and the Maharal’s demonstration would not be valid. So the
Maharal apparently takes the position that darkness has a reality of its own
and exists in parallel to light. It is not merely the absence of light.
The Plague of Darkness
The Vilna Gaon, in Kol
Eliyahu at the beginning of parshas Bo, in the context of makas
choshech, the plague of darkness, also says that darkness has its own
reality is not merely the absence of light. He explains that normally light is
a stronger force than darkness so when a light source is brought into a dark
place the darkness retreats in the face of the light. During the plague of
darkness that afflicted Egypt prior to the exodus, nature underwent a change
and darkness became a stronger force, instead causing light to retreat.
The annotator on the Kol
Eliyahu references the commentary of the Ksav v’Hakaballah on parshas
Beraishis, who quotes the Vilna Gaon and adds that this
understanding of darkness is inherent in the verse, “Who forms light and
creates darkness” (Yeshayahu 45:7). If darkness can be created then it
has its own reality, as we stated earlier. (The wording of this part of the
verse constitutes the opening of the first Shachris Shma blessing and
accomplishes the objective described by the Maharal of mentioning the
attributes of night by day, as we explained.)
In support of the position
of the Vilna Gaon the annotator also mentions a Gemara in Pesachim
which cites the verse, “And Hashem called the light day, and the darkness He
called night” (Beraishis 1:5) and explains that “call” in this context
does not mean to give a name, as is commonly understood, but rather, it means
“to summon”. If darkness can be summoned then it is a thing in itself, not the
absence of something else.
However the annotator also
mentions the view of the Bach on Tur Orach Chaim 6, who
apparently takes issue with the view of the Maharal and the Vilna Gaon,
and holds that darkness is in fact merely the absence of light.
The View of Science
The holy words of the
Maharal, the Vilna Gaon, the Bach and the other Gedolim we
have cited have deep meaning in the world of ruchnius – the world of the
eternal truths of the Torah. It is not necessary to reconcile them with
science, which is a continually changing “work in progress”. Nonetheless, it is
interesting and instructive to examine the two views regarding the nature of
darkness in the context of current scientific theory.
It would seem that science
would side with the view of the Bach that darkness is the absence of
light. Light is energy; when that energy is present it reflects off the objects
that surround us and we see them, since our eyes are sensitive to energy of
that frequency. When light is absent there is no energy to reflect off our
surroundings and stimulate the sensors in our retina that respond to light. We
perceive what we call “darkness”.
Interestingly, though,
modern science can be reconciled with the view of the Maharal and the Vilna
Gaon and perhaps even to favor it.
All matter emits energy in
the form of photons; this energy surrounds us at all times, but our eyes are
only sensitive to energy in a relatively small segment of the frequency
spectrum. We call that energy “light”. When it is reflected off objects in our
vicinity we can see those objects. Energy outside the segment that our eyes are
sensitive to is also reflected off objects in our vicinity but they are not
visible to us because the sensors in our eyes are not sensitive to non-light
energy frequencies. That is “darkness”. Both light and darkness, then, are
similar in that they are both forms of energy – that is, they both exist as
independent entities. The difference between them is a function of our
“receptors” – our eyes. If the energy outside the range of our reception is
made to overwhelm and effectively blot out the energy within the range of our
reception we remain in total darkness. Possibly that is what the Vilna Gaon
meant when he wrote that during the plague of darkness nature underwent a
change and darkness became a stronger force, causing light to retreat in its
face.
Conclusion
The Shem MiShmuel
(Parshas Bo, 5672) cites an opinion in a Medrash that holds that the
darkness of the Egyptian plague of darkness originated in the “darkness of
above”. He explains, based on an Arizal, that “darkness of above” is an
energy so intense that the human eye is incapable of absorbing it. When it
supersedes visible light energy the result is zero vision since, as we said,
vision is our eyes reacting to visible light energy being reflected off
surrounding objects. It seems clear that the Shem MiShmuel (and the Arizal)
also hold that darkness has a positive existence and is not merely the absence
of light. Their view appears similar to that of the Maharal and the Vilna
Gaon.
In any event, it is clear
from the description of the Shem MiShmuel of makas choshech as
“darkness from above” that the discussion about the nature of darkness centers
around deep ruchnius’dike concepts, not the laws of physics. May we be
zoche to understand them on that level, and to merit absorbing the light of
Torah and to “seeing” the ohr haganuz l’tzadikim l’osid lavoh, quickly,
in our day!
