#522: Two Different Kinds of Fear

וַיֹּ֥אמֶר אֵלָ֖יו לֹ֣א אֵלֵ֑ךְ כִּ֧י אִם־אֶל־אַרְצִ֛י וְאֶל־מוֹלַדְתִּ֖י אֵלֵֽךְ׃

“I will not go,” he replied to him, “but will return to my native land.”

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Moses invites his variously named father-in-law (Yitro, Ḥovav, Reuel, Keini, etc.) to enter the Promised Land and tells him that Israel will be generous with him if he agrees. Yitro, in response, demurs and says that he will instead return to his native land of Midian.

This is surprising to anyone familiar with Yitro in Exodus. For instance, in Ex. 18:9, Yitro expresses profound joy for God’s salvation of Israel and joins his destiny to that of our ancestors. It was not lost on the Sages that the Torah portion named for Yitro contains the Ten Commandments.

So why in Numbers has Yitro/Ḥovav decided to quit and go home-home to a kingdom he once served as a priest but then abandoned? I cannot imagine that Yitro thought Midian would give him a parade. The answer, according to Ḥizkuni ( bio), is fear:

כִּי אִם־אֶל־אַרְצִי וְאֶל־מוֹלַדְתִּי אֵלֵךְ , “but I prefer to go to my country and my birthplace” [to die there. Ed.] According to our author, Yitro preferred the evil he knew to the evil he did not know, i.e. he knew what awaited him in Midian, but he did not know what awaited him in the land of Canaan.