You'd have thought Parshat Shemot would begin with the birth of Moshe. But the Torah introduces the saga of the Exodus by first telling us of Pharaoh's plot to exterminate the Jewish males and the heroic efforts to foil his evil plans.


Singled out for mention are two midwives who feared G-d rather than Pharaoh and saved the boys. Chazal tell us these special women were Yocheved - nicknamed Shifra,

What a lesson there is here.

because she lovingly caressed the babies' limbs - and Puah, because she made soothing, "cooing" noises to calm the children.


Notice that the source of the nicknames for these heroines, amazingly, is not the fact that they saved the babies, but rather the "small" acts of love and care they gave to the children.


What a lesson there is here. The Torah is trying to teach us that no act of kindness is trivial, no display of love for a fellow Jew insignificant. If B'nei Yisrael is punished for acting harshly or rudely to each other, then we are saved by our moments of chesed and empathy with our neighbors.


Notice: Yosef cares enough to turn to the baker and butler in prison and hear their dreams, and so starts the road to Geulah. Moshe turns towards, and not away, from the palace window so as to see the plight of his brother Israelites and to join their struggle. Doing a "good turn" is the beginning of Redemption and the midwives exemplify this trait.


A diamond dealer in New York once told me the following story. He was a non-observant Jew, living in Communist Russia, who had recently taken over his late father's jewelry business. He was rushing one day to a very important meeting in his office, carrying a valise filled with his most valuable diamonds. Suddenly, a man approached him and asked, "Are you a Jew?"


Nervously, he said, "Yes," and the man then said he needed him to make a minyan so

Doing a "good turn" is the beginning of Redemption.

that he could say Kaddish. The young jeweler tried to put him off, saying he was in a hurry and that he had a very big meeting waiting, but the man insisted: "Someday you may need a minyan for your father, so help me."


So, he went with him to a little shul and stayed through the davening, nervously looking at his watch every few seconds. When it was over, as he rushed towards his office, a colleague met him on the way: "Whatever you do, don't go back to your office!" he warned him. "The KGB is waiting there to arrest you!"


He immediately turned around, bribed his way out of the country, came to America, and opened his firm. All in the merit of making a minyan.


Life is no small thing; yet, it's the small things in life that sometimes can mean the most.