Ki Tetze - Yeshua in the Torah
“If, as you are walking along, you happen to see a bird’s nest in a tree or on the ground with chicks or eggs, and the mother bird is sitting on the chicks or the eggs, you are not to take the mother with the chicks. You must let the mother go, but you may take the chicks for yourself; so that things will go well with you, and you will prolong your life.” (Deuteronomy 22:6-7)
In Ki Tetze, this week’s Torah portion, we learn about sending the mother bird away. The sages think that this commandment is the least of the commandments. This commandment might be the same commandment that Yeshua had in mind when he said, in Matthew 5,19, “So whoever disobeys the least of these mitzvot and teaches others to do so will be called the least in the Kingdom of Heaven. But whoever obeys them and so teaches will be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven.” This is like the Talmudic saying, “Be careful with a light mitzvah as to a grave one, as you do not know the assigned reward of the mitzvot.” Pirkei Avot 2:1
Midrash Tanchuma, Ki Teitze, states, “There is no easier mitzvah [to perform] than sending away the mother bird from the nest. And what is its reward?” The sages looked deep into this and said, “So that you will benefit and you will live long.” During the Messianic Age when Messiah will reign as King in Israel, the prophet in Isaiah 65:20 foretells of a time when “"Never again will there be in it an infant who lives but a few days, or an old man who does not live out his years; the one who dies at a hundred will be thought a mere child; the one who fails to reach a hundred will be considered accursed.”
The sages also connected this commandment with the coming of the Messiah. As it says in Deuteronomy Rabbah:
“YOU SHALL LET THE BIRD GO. The Rabbis said: If you have fulfilled the precept of letting the bird go you will merit also to fulfill the precept of letting go free the Hebrew slave. Whence this? For it is said, “And when you let him go free from you (Deut. 15:13). Another explanation…If you will fulfill this precept you will hasten thereby the coming of King Messiah, of whom Scripture uses the expression shiluach (sending free), as it is said, “That send forth freely the feet of the ox and the donkey” (Isa. 32:20). Another comment: R. Tanhuma said: If you fulfill this precept you will hasten the coming of Elijah the prophet, of blessed memory, of whom Scripture uses the expression, ‘shiluach,’ as it is said, “Behold, I will send (sholeach) you Elijah the prophet” (Mal. 3:23); and he will come and comfort you. From where is this derived? For it is said, ‘And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children (ib. 24).’ Deuteronomy Rabbah 6:7
The Zohar says that this commandment can also be likened to Messiah. It compares the bird’s nest to Jerusalem, and the mother bird to Messiah:
“The Messiah enters [the bird’s nest], lifts up his eyes, and sees the Fathers [Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob] coming to the ruins of the House of God and then he sees Rachel with tears on her face, and the Holy One, blessed be He, comforting her... Then the Messiah lifts up his voice and weeps, and the whole Garden of Eden trembles, and all the pious who are there cry and weep with him. When he cries and weeps the second time, the firmament which is above the Garden shakes.” (Zohar 2.8a-9a)
This representation of Messiah corresponds to two things Yeshua did. In Luke 19:41 Yeshua stands at the Mount of Olives and weeps over the coming destruction of the city of Jerusalem and the Temple. In Luke 13:34-35, Yeshua compares himself to a mother bird:
“Yerushalayim! Yerushalayim! You kill the prophets! You stone those who are sent to you! How often I wanted to gather your children, just as a hen gathers her chickens under her wings, but you refused! Look! God is abandoning your house to you! I tell you, you will not see me again until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of Adonai!’”
Yeshua left the nest of Jerusalem, he, the mother bird, was sent away. When he did so, he left his chicks, the people of Israel, vulnerable. Shortly after Yeshua left, the Romans destroyed the city of Jerusalem, and sent the people of Israel into exile. Now Yeshua waits for us in the heavenly Jerusalem, ready to gather his people from the four corners of the earth. As it says in Zohar 2.8a-9a:
“He will enter again the place which is called ‘the Bird’s Nest,’ there to behold the picture of the destruction of the Temple, and of all the saints who were done to death there... On that day the Messiah will begin to gather the captives from one end of the world to the other”
Rabbi Chaim Vital (1543-1620) was the foremost student of Rabbi Isaac Luria, the Arizal, and transcribed of his master’s famous teachings. His autobiography explains that Messiah son of Joseph and Messiah son of David are only terms reflecting two aspects of a single man (Sefer HaChizyonot, 106). In the ceremony for cleansing the metzora (leper) the priest must release a living bird that was dipped in a mixture of living water and blood of another bird that was sacrificed. These two birds in the ceremony foreshadow the death and resurrection of Messiah, its flight into the open field depicts his ascension into heaven.
Rabbi Vital writes in Arba Mei’ot Shekel Kesef, 68, “Messiah [who will be largely unknown] will thereupon rise to heaven just as Moses ascended to the firmament, and will subsequently return and be revealed completely for all to see. The entire Jewish people will then perceive him and flock towards him.”
“Then the Messiah will arise from the Garden of Eden, from that place which is called ‘The Bird’s Nest’. He will arise in the land of Galilee, and on that day the whole world shall be shaken and all the children of men shall seek refuge in caves and rocky places. Concerning that time it is written: ‘And they shall go into the holes of the rocks and into the caves of the earth, for fear of the Lord and for the glory of his majesty, when he arises to shake terribly the earth’ (Isa. 2:19). ‘The glory of his majesty’ refers to the Messiah when he shall reveal himself in the land of Galilee; for in this part of the Holy Land the desolation first began, and therefore he will manifest himself there first, and from there begin to war against the world. After the forty days, during which the pillar shall have stood between heaven and earth before the eyes of the whole world, and the Messiah shall have manifested himself, a star shall come forth from the East variegated in hue and shining brilliantly, and seven other stars shall surround it, and make war on it from all sides, three times a day for seventy days, before the eyes of the whole world. . . the Messiah shall be hidden for twelve months in the pillar of fire, which shall return again, although it shall not be visible. After the twelve months the Messiah will be carried up to heaven in that pillar of fire and receive there power and dominion and the royal crown. When he descends, the pillar of fire will again be visible to the eyes of the world, and the Messiah will reveal himself, and mighty nations will gather round him, and he shall declare war against all the world. At that time the Holy One shall show forth his power before all the nations of the earth, and the Messiah shall be manifested throughout the whole universe, and all the kings will unite to fight against him, and even in Israel there will be found some wicked ones who shall join them in the fight against the Messiah.” Zohar 2:8a-b
Let us cleanse our hearts of sin, remember who this Messiah is. He is not an anti-Torah, anti-Semitic Greek Jesus. He is like a mother hen to her cherished flock. Though he was “driven away” after his sacrifice as Messiah son of Joseph at his first coming, it is our faith that Messiah Yeshua will return to his people as King Messiah son of David to fight for his flock.
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