Dear Friends:
Pesach is “z’man cheiruseinu… the time of our freedom.”
America is called “the land of the free…”
What does “freedom” mean?
Is it freedom from the Yetzer ha TOV, the GOOD inclination, or is it freedom from the Yetzer ha RA, the EVIL inclination?
In the Desert our ancestors wept over the memory of the food they had enjoyed in Egypt “free of charge,” (Numbers 11:5). But Rashi explains that they meant “free from the obligation to perform mitzvos.” When Am Yisroel left Mitzraim, we were released from a culture in which there was absolute freedom, meaning there was no restraint. There were no mitzvos, no obligations to Hashem, which translates into no morality, no laws… ultimately no life. When we arrived at Har Sinai we left the land of involuntary servitude and entered a new and unprecedented existence: voluntary servitude to the Ribono shel Olam. When we said “na’ase v’nishma” (Shemos 24:7), we obligated ourselves to serve the King of all kings.
This is true freedom, and in this freedom Am Yisroel has existed since then, against all odds and all apparent logic. Through this freely-exercised choice to serve the Ribono shel Olam, we have survived all our tests and this freedom is the basis of our exalted position as the Children of the Eternal G-d.
Until the age of thirty one, I grew up in complete freedom. I could have lived any lifestyle. I could have eaten any food I wanted. I could have done anything I wanted on “Saturday.” And so on…..
That life was pure torture! I never had one moment’s peace! I was a slave to my own desires and was tormented because I was constantly aware that there was no point to my existence and no way out. I was also terribly depressed because I sensed the utter futility of my puny efforts to escape from the spider’s web of serving my own desires. No matter which way I twisted, I could not free myself from the sticky threads that trapped me in this prison. I knew that it was only a matter of time until the spider arrived and put an end to it all! I was not only trapped, but hopeless of ever escaping!
Hashem came to my rescue on the night of January 10, 1966, when I was a student at the University of Michigan. I sincerely believe he sent an angel to rescue me on that night in Ann Arbor so many years ago! (See my book, FROM CENTRAL PARK TO SINAI: How I Found My Jewish Soul, beginning of Chapter Two.)
What happened to Am Yisroel at midnight on the Fifteenth of Nisan in the days of Mitzraim? How did we merit to be rescued by the Ribono shel Olam? Was it because of our greatness and worthiness? I do not believe so. “Lo al tzidkosainu…. Not in the merit of our righteousness do we cast our supplications before you, but in the merit of Your abundant mercy. What are we? What is our life? What is our kindness? What is our righteousness? What is our salvation? What is our strength?” (Shacharis service) Hashem picked us up from “mem tes shaare tumah,” the forty ninth level of degradation, from within a hair’s breadth of total assimilation into the Egyptian culture of utter rebellion against G-d.
Today, my friends, we also stand within a hair’s breadth of assimilation into the alien culture which dominates the world. Yes, there are holy Jews who are anchoring us to Torah, but we are in general hanging on to our Life Preserver just by our fingertips!
And the cynical world around us is trying to convince us that we are dreamers! I know why they do it: they themselves are hopeless and depressed, enmeshed as they are in their materialism, just as I was hopeless and depressed until I met Hashem.
“Do you really believe in morality,” they ask. “Do you really think there can be a world at peace? Do you really believe the world can ever be clean and pure again? Do you really believe that the other nations will ever permit you to live at peace in the Holy Land? You are facing hopeless odds! Do you really think you can stop the crazy man in Iran?”
We are not only near the forty ninth level of impurity, we are near the forty ninth level of hopelessness!
“Do you really think you will ever get out of Exile? Come now, be REALISTIC!”
OK, my friends, here’s REALISM!
“I poured My anger upon [the House of Israel] … and … I scattered them among the nations… and they desecrated My Holy Name…. but I pitied My Holy Name…. Therefore, say to the House of Israel: ‘… Not for your sake do I act … but for My Holy Name that you desecrated among the nations to which you came.’ And I will sanctify My great Name that was desecrated among the nations. Then the nations shall know that I am Hashem. … and I shall take you from the nations and gather you in from all the countries, and I shall bring you to your Land and I shall sprinkle pure water upon you, that you be cleansed. From all your contamination and from all your filth I will cleanse you, and I shall give you a new heart and a new spirit shall I put within you. I shall remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh; and My spirit shall I put within you and I shall cause you to go by My decrees and guard My laws and perform them and you shall dwell in the land that I gave your father and you shall be to Me a people and I shall be your G-d…” (Yechezkel 36:18-28; Haftaras Parah).
The Novi is telling us that just as it was in Egypt so it shall be in the coming days.
No, we may not be worthy! We may not merit redemption!
Yes, we are in terrible danger! Yes, we are near “mem tes shaare tumah”!
But our Redemption is not coming from our own efforts!
As we say every day, Hashem will send a Redeemer “l’ma’an shmo b’ahava… for His Name’s sake, with love”! But we must believe in Redemption, because it seems clear from the fact that eighty percent of Am Yisroel never made it out of Mitzraim (see Rashi on Shemos 10:22; 13:18) that those who gave up and ceased to believe in Redemption are the ones who did not make it out!
“Ani maamim… I believe with complete faith in the coming of the Moshiach and even though he may delay nevertheless I anticipate every day that he will come.” (Thirteen Principles of Faith)
It is classic knowledge that the Haggadah shel Pesach and the halachos of the Seder combine elements of both slavery and malchus, degradation and redemption. That, my friends, seems to be a remez, a hint of what is to come, for “this year (we are) here but next year in the Land of Israel; this year (we are) slaves but next year free men ….”
As it was then, so it is now. It was literally IMPOSSIBLE to imagine redemption for those ground down in the idolatrous slave pits of Mitzraim. How could one imagine the lofty heights of Torah and the glory of closeness with the Ribono shel Olam? Yet we were in fact redeemed.
In the cynical, pleasure-obsessed contemporary world it is almost impossible to imagine that we will one day live in a world of purity and moral greatness. But it is absolutely going to happen! If we believe it, then we can hope to participate in it. And someday soon, B”H, we will look back upon the present days and wonder how we could ever have despaired that this Great Day would come!
Do you believe in the threats of our enemies? Are you afraid of the madman in Iran? I would like to remind you of the scene at the Yam Suf directly after we left Mitzraim. As we stood between our enemies and the sea, Hashem surrounded us with “a pillar of fire and cloud” (Shemos 14:24) “to separate between the camp of Egypt and the camp of Israel and to intercept the arrows and catapult stones of Egypt.” (Rashi on Shemos 14:19)
DO YOU THINK THAT THOSE CLOUDS OF GLORY AND FIRE ARE NOT IN PLACE TODAY?
Just as Hashem rescued us “in the blink of an eye” from Biblical Egypt, so it can and will happen again. It happened to me, I am convinced, in Ann Arbor, Michigan in the middle of the night of January 10, 1966 and there is every reason to believe that we will soon, as a nation, “hear … for a second time in the presence of all the living … “’I am Hashem your G-d’” (Shabbos Mussaf)
Yes, this is the season of our Redemption!
How long can it be, my friends, until we hear the Shofar Gadol?
“L’Shana haba’a b’Yerushalayim!”
