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SELECTIONS FROM THE BOOK YETZIAT MITZRAYIM, the singular event commemorated by Passover, is nothing less than a defining element of Jewish thought and behavior. It set in motion the pattern for Jewish history, provided the foundation for the Jewish approach to the world, and established the agenda for Jewish national life. Its theme of exile and redemption is the leitmotif of our existence, its message of the absolute right and necessity to be free our core value. So central are the Exodus and its lessons to Judaism that references to it recur throughout our Bible's accounts of history, and its laws, prophecies and prayers. The life of a traditional Jew is suffesed with it not just once a year during an extended festival, but every single day. It is because God brought us out of Egypt that we are commanded to obey Him regarding our two-way relationship, ritual observances and ethical behavior. Among Torah passsages enclosed inside the tefillin put on by Jewish men each weekday morning are those pertaining to the Exodus. Daily services include recitation of the song sung by the Israelites after crossing the Reed Sea and a prayer covering the past, and hoped-for future, redemption. And the fact that the Sabbath, the once-a-week respite from the servitude of the workweek, memorializes the Exodus elucidates the meaning of Creation, which the Sabbath also commemorates: Both the world and the liberated Israelite nation were brought forth with specific Divine purpose. . . . WE WHO LIVE in an open democratic society tend to think of ourselves as free. But are we really, just because we are not physically bound to an overlord? What do being enslaved and unencumbered by oppression really mean? And are they mutually exclusive? In Hebrew, Egypt is called Mitzrayim. According to the text on Jewish mysticism, the Zohar, the name is derived from m'tzarim, narrow straits. When God took us out of Mitzrayim, He extricated us from the place of constricted opportunities, tight control, narrow-mindedness, where movement was severely limited. Each of us lives in his or her own mitzrayim, the external or physical narrow straits of financial or health constraints or personal tragedy, perhaps; universally the psychological burdens to which we subject ourselves. Like the duality in virtually all of Pesakh's symbols, they work in two ways: They turn us into both slaves and oppressors, of ourselves and of others. Passover leads us to question the values and attitudes we hold--and which hold us to those roles. (Do we pursue, even worship, things like money and status for their own sake, rather than for how they can make our lives and the lives of those around us, better? Do our own insecurites or overconfidence inhibit us from fully participating in life rather than getting the most out of relationships? Do our sterotyping, prejudice or exploitation oppress other people by robbing them of their dignity rather than affording them the same opportunities we want for ourselves?) As we get rid of leaven and replace it with matzah, we are supposed to confront whatever it is that we normally allow to persist in our lives, but which should perhaps, like the leaven, be eliminated, and that which we suppress that should, like the back-to-basics unleavened bread, be admitted. . . . |
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HISTORIC 