Grading on the curve...

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Parashah Bo (Exodus 10:1 – 13:16)

“In the middle of the night God struck down all the first-born in the land of Egypt, from the first-born of Pharaoh who sat on the throne to the first-born of the captive who was in the dungeon, and all the first-born of the cattle.” Exodus 12:29

Rabbi Judah Loew, The Maharal of Prague (1525-1609) explains that the Jewish People, who had remained distinct in Egypt, were spared from the fury of the first nine plagues on a relative scale. The Jew who had retained even a part of his heritage stood out amongst the decrepit culture around him. Therefore the Jewish People dodged the waves of misfortune that fell upon Egypt.

The 10th plague, however, was different. This one was to be delivered by God and no other delegate. To survive it wasn't enough to be a little better than the low society about them. It became necessary not just to abandon everything Egyptian but to also adopt everything of God. The crucial test was to determine a willingness to approach the light of The Infinite and to bear forever the standard of The Absolute.

Rabbi Label Lam, in his d’var Torah of this week’s Torah portion, shared a story of when he arrived at his college campus so many decades ago, how, for some non-mystical reason; about 80% of the entering freshman class had their sights on medical school. He was not part of that pack but it seemed everyone around him was. Obviously not all were going to make it so they had these impossibly hard and competitive pre-med bio-chem classes to weed out the weak willed and under-qualified. People stayed up nights at a time and one by one, dreams were dashed as grades were posted.

Everyone, Rabbi Lam shared, was graded "on a curve". If everyone did poorly then even a low grade could still earn an "A". Nobody despaired when tests were handed back because as long as others had failed as miserably, they might still salvage a high mark. After a particularly tough test everyone looked madly to see where on the curve they fell. The great upset was when some genius of a fellow actually scored "99". Now everyone else's "40" automatically spelled failure and many a tense and teary phone call was made to disappointed parents.

You see, for Rabbi Lam, the curve on the science tests lowered the standard of performance just like the first 9 plagues.  Yes, some students passed, but was it because they were qualified, or was it because the others around them were simply worse off?  The 10th plague, however, had no curve.  The 10th plague was a test that had an identical passing grade for everyone.  You either believed and passed, or disbelieved and failed.

This weekend talk to your children about how they rate themselves.  Do they do it based on the people around them?  Are they right, successful, and/or good, when others are wrong, failures, and/or bad?  Or does your child understand that as long as they pursue righteousness, justice, and truth, it does not matter what others do, for they will always end up on top.