What’s Behind the Mask of Moshe? | Rabbi Stewart Weiss | Beit Midrash

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The last 7 p’sukim of our Sedra are quite mysterious. Moshe descends from Har Sinai with the Luchot, unaware that his skin has become radiant, or glowing. This radiance, says Rashi, occurred when earlier (33:22) Hashem covered Moshe "with His hand;" the Medrash says it resulted when Moshe took the ink he saved when writing a small, rather than full-size Aleph in the word "Vayikra" & then wiped it on his face. The people are scared of this phenomenon, & so Moshe dons a Masveh, either a mask or a hood. But Moshe stays unmasked when teaching the nation or communing with Hashem. Otherwise, he wears the mask (so we needn’t feel like we’re the only ones wearing masks!). In an infamous perversion of Hebrew, Michelangelo follows the mistranslation of the words "karan ohr, beams of light" as "horns of skin," & sculpts his famous Moses (in Rome’s St. Peter in Chains church) with horns, leading millions of people to believe (some until this day!) that Jews have horns.

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