Miracles for the Jewish People

The Exodus and the Ten Plagues

The Torah tells that when the children of Israel groaned under slavery in Egypt, God heard their cries and remembered His promise to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Through Moses, God struck the mightiest empire on earth with ten wonders no one could deny: the Nile turned to blood, frogs filled the palaces, darkness so thick it could be touched, until at last the stubborn grip of Pharaoh was broken. On the night of the final plague, God passed over the homes of Israel, and a nation of slaves walked free — “with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm,” as the Torah says. Jewish tradition calls this the mother of all miracles, the moment a family became a people. To this day, every Passover seder retells it as if we ourselves had just walked out of Egypt.

Exodus, chapters 7–12 · retold each year in the Passover Haggadah · “The Ten Plagues of Egypt,” Chabad.org

The Splitting of the Sea

Seven days after leaving Egypt, the Torah tells, Israel stood trapped — Pharaoh’s chariots thundering behind them, the sea stretching endless before them. Moses lifted his staff, a great east wind blew all through the night, and the waters rose up like walls of crystal, leaving a path of dry land through the heart of the sea. An entire people — elders, mothers, children in arms — walked through on dry ground, and when the Egyptian army followed, the waters returned and swallowed the pursuers. On the far shore Moses led the people in song, and Miriam took up her tambourine as the women danced. The sages taught that at that moment even the humblest maidservant saw the glory of God more clearly than the greatest prophets of later generations.

Exodus, chapters 14–15 (the Song at the Sea) · “Splitting of the Sea,” Chabad.org

Manna from Heaven and Water from the Rock

How does a nation of millions eat in a wilderness of sand and stone? The Torah tells that every single morning for forty years, bread from heaven — the manna — lay waiting on the desert floor, wrapped in dew like a gift. Each family gathered exactly what it needed, a double portion fell on Friday so that none need gather on Shabbat, and the midrash teaches that the manna carried the taste of whatever a person longed for. When the people thirsted, God brought water gushing from solid rock, and a miraculous well accompanied them through the desert in the merit of Miriam. Even their clothing, the Torah says, did not wear out for forty years. Jewish tradition treasures the manna as the great lesson of trust: the One who fed us in a desert feeds us still.

Exodus 16–17; Numbers 20; Deuteronomy 8:3–4 · “What Was the Manna?” Chabad.org

Sinai: An Entire People Hears God Speak

Seven weeks after the Exodus, the Torah tells, an entire nation stood at the foot of a smoking mountain as heaven bent down to earth. Thunder rolled, lightning flashed, the sound of the shofar grew louder and louder — and then every man, woman, and child heard the voice of God Himself proclaim, “I am the Lord your God who brought you out of Egypt.” No lone prophet on a hilltop, no private vision: Jewish tradition stakes everything on this, that revelation came to millions of witnesses at once, something no other people on earth has ever claimed. The Torah itself asks in wonder, “Has any people heard the voice of God speaking out of the fire, as you have heard, and lived?” The sages add that the souls of every Jew yet to be born stood at Sinai too — which is why, each Shavuot, we rise to hear the Ten Commandments as if standing there again.

Exodus 19–20; Deuteronomy 4:32–35 · “Revelation at Sinai,” My Jewish Learning

The Walls of Jericho

When Joshua led Israel into the promised land, the first city before them was Jericho — the strongest fortress in Canaan, sealed tight behind massive walls. The Book of Joshua tells that God gave the strangest battle plan in history: no siege engines, no ladders, only faith. For six days the people circled the city in silence behind the Holy Ark, the priests sounding rams’ horns; on the seventh day they circled seven times, the shofars blasted, the whole nation shouted as one — and the walls of Jericho came crashing down where they stood. Jewish tradition tells it as the announcement that the same God who split the sea was bringing His people home. The battle was won not by force of arms but by the sound of the shofar and the voice of a united people.

Book of Joshua, chapter 6 · “Jericho,” Chabad.org

The Sun Stands Still for Joshua

In the valley of Gibeon, the Book of Joshua tells, Israel fought five kings at once after an all-night march — and as the sun sank toward evening with the battle not yet won, Joshua dared to pray for the impossible. “Sun, stand still upon Gibeon,” he called out before all Israel, “and moon, in the valley of Ayalon.” And the sun stopped in the middle of the sky and did not hasten to set, the Scripture says, until the people had prevailed. The sages taught that the heavens themselves paused their eternal song so that God’s people could be saved. The verse marvels: “There was no day like it, before or after, when the Lord heeded the voice of a man.” Jewish tradition tells it to remind us that for the sake of His people, God will rearrange the sky.

Book of Joshua 10:12–14 · “The Day the Sun Stopped for Joshua,” Chabad.org

“There was no day like it, before or after, when the Lord heeded the voice of a man.”Joshua 10:14

Chanukah: One Flask of Oil, Eight Days of Light

More than two thousand years ago, a mighty Greek empire ruled the land of Israel and decreed that Torah, Shabbat, and the faith of the Jews be erased. Jewish tradition celebrates how a small band of Maccabees — priests, farmers, brothers — rose up against the greatest army of the age, and as the prayers say, God delivered “the mighty into the hands of the weak, the many into the hands of the few.” When they reclaimed the Holy Temple and came to light the golden menorah, they found only a single flask of pure olive oil still sealed by the High Priest — enough for one day. The Talmud tells that the little flame burned on for eight full days, until new oil could be pressed. Every winter since, Jewish families set menorahs glowing in their windows, adding a light each night — proclaiming to the world that a small, stubborn flame can outlast any empire.

Talmud, Shabbat 21b · the Al HaNissim prayer · “The Hanukkah Story,” Chabad.org

Purim: The Hidden Miracle

The Scroll of Esther tells of the darkest decree in the ancient world: Haman’s plan to destroy every Jew in the Persian empire’s 127 provinces in a single day. And then, thread by thread, everything turned — a Jewish girl named Esther just happened to become queen, Mordechai just happened to overhear a plot and save the king’s life, the sleepless king just happened to be read the record of it on the very night Haman came to demand Mordechai’s death. Here is the wonder Jewish tradition treasures most: God’s name never appears in the entire scroll, not even once, yet His hand is on every page. The sages taught that a miracle dressed in coincidence is in some ways the deepest miracle of all — the quiet proof that God guides history even when He hides His face. That is why Purim comes wrapped in masks and costumes: the whole holiday is about finding what is hidden.

The Book of Esther (Megillat Esther) · “Why Isn’t G-d’s Name Mentioned in the Megillah?” Chabad.org

The Miracle Nobody Planned: A People That Would Not Disappear

Every Passover, Jewish families around the world raise their cups and sing V’hi She’amda: “In every generation they rise against us to destroy us — and the Holy One, blessed be He, saves us from their hand.” Consider what those words describe: ancient Egypt is gone, Babylon is gone, the empires of Greece and Rome are dust in museums — and the small people they each tried to erase is still here. Scattered across every continent, through every exile and every persecution, the Jewish people kept their Torah, their language, their Shabbat table, and their hope. Thinkers through the centuries have called Jewish survival the greatest miracle of all, because no law of history can explain it. Still here, still teaching children the same words, still lighting the same candles our great-great-grandmothers lit — Jewish tradition sees in this the quietest and mightiest of God’s wonders.

Passover Haggadah, V’hi She’amda · The Haggadah text, Chabad.org

“In every generation they rise against us to destroy us — and the Holy One, blessed be He, saves us from their hand.”From the Passover Haggadah

Miracles Have Not Ended

Jewish tradition insists that the age of miracles never closed. Three times a day, in the Modim prayer of the Amidah, Jews thank God “for Your miracles that are with us every day, and for Your wonders and favors at all times — evening, morning, and noon.” The sages taught that the person a miracle happens to often does not even recognize it — the illness that turned around, the danger that passed us by, the stranger’s kindness that arrived at exactly the right moment. A baby’s first cry, bread rising from seed and rain, a family reunited, a broken heart that heals: tradition calls these daily wonders, no less God’s hand than the splitting of the sea. The only difference, the rabbis say, is that we have grown used to them. To live Jewishly is to keep noticing — and to answer every hidden miracle the way our ancestors answered the open ones: with gratitude.

Modim prayer, from the daily Amidah; Talmud, Niddah 31a · “Full Text of Modim,” My Jewish Learning