In this week’s Torah portion of Shemos we find Moshe fleeing for his life from Egypt and, according to the basic interpretation of the pesukim, he went straight to Midian. The Torah states: “Pharaoh heard about this matter and sought to kill Moshe; so Moshe fled from before Pharaoh and settled in the land of Midian. He sat by the well. The minister of Midian had seven daughters; they came and drew water and filled the troughs to water their father’s sheep. The shepherds came and drove them away. Moshe got up and saved them and watered their sheep. They came to Reuel their father. He said ‘How could you come so quickly today?’ They replied, ‘An Egyptian man saved us from the shepherds and he even drew water for us and watered the sheep.’ He said to his daughters ‘Then where is he? Why did you leave (עזבתן) the man? Summon him and let him eat bread’ (Shemos 2:15-20)!”
Rabbeinu Ephraim ben Shimshon (a Rishon that lived in the times of the Rokeach) was bothered by Reuel’s (aka Yisro) response to the words “למה עזבתם את האיש;” “Why did you abandon the man.” Rabbeinu Ephraim asks: “Is it the way of maidens to bring young men home? It appears to me that when Moshe ran away, he left without any provisions for the journey, just like a person running away for his life. That is why he said to them ‘Why didn’t you give him bread.’ A person without bread is called a “נעזב” forsaken as it says in Tehillim (37:25) ‘I have not seen a righteous man forsaken etc.'”
This pasuk in Tehillim is what we say at the end of bentching [The Grace After the Meal], “נער הייתי גם זקנתי ולא ראיתי צדיק נעזב וזרעו מבקש לחם.” “I was a youth and also have aged, and I have not seen a righteous man forsaken, with his children begging for bread.”
The question of Rabbeinu Ephraim seems to be based on the fact that Yisro’s (Reuel) daughters were acting modestly, and the issue was that what then was wrong with the way they conducted themselves by not bringing Moshe back home with them? Modesty is an inborn trait for every single woman, Jewish or not Jewish. The Maalos Hamiddos in the chapter of modesty brings a medrish (Breishis Rabba 18:3) which says that Hashem specifically created Chava out of Adam’s rib, which is hidden, to instill in her and her gender the genetic make-up of modesty. If that is the case, then what did the daughters of Yisro do wrong? They returned home without Moshe just as any modest woman would do. Even if he was forsaken and destitute, why should it have been expected that the girls would bring him home to feed this stranger of a man? Imagine if your daughter brought home any random man, especially a homeless, smelly, haggard man off the street! Moshe was a runaway from Egypt; he probably looked disheveled, smelly and unkempt. Granted, he proved himself not to be dangerous (which is why, for the most part, nowadays one should never bring a stranger home), because he saved them from harassment of the other shepherds. But the Rabbeinu Ephraim didn’t say that Yisro expected them to help Moshe out of gratitude; rather, because he clearly looked destitute and forsaken. So why did Yisro expect them to have brought Moshe home?
It must be that as important and ingrained as modesty is in a woman, kindness still has to be balanced and ultimately weighed as a higher priority. There might be a hint to this from the opening statements of the Maalos Hamiddos in the chapter of Modesty: “My children, come and I will teach you the quality of modesty. You should know my children, that the quality of modesty is one of the most important and distinguished character traits because it is one of three traits Hashem expects of the Jews, as it says ‘And what does Hashem ask of you but only to do justice, love kindness, and walk in modesty with your G-D’ (Micha 6:8).” From the fact that loving kindness comes before walking in modesty, it can be implied that although both are very important attributes, which should be adhered to at all times as best as possible, but kindness should be prioritized before modesty, when balanced and weighed together, while adhering to both of them simultaneously.