When did the redemption from Egypt begin in the Torah? According to the Rabbis, it began when the Israelites themselves became angry and impatient with their slavery. The worst consequence of slavery, taught the Belzer Rebbe, was that they got used to it. Once the Israelites began to feel their own pain and appreciate their own worth, they cried out for redemption.
That is one reason why on Passover we read the Song of Songs, which is a love story. Passover itself is a kind of love story, both between Israel and God and among the Israelites themselves. Recognition of one’s own worth is not enough. In knowing we are worthy, we must extend this to others, to a larger circle.
In the words of writer and philosopher Iris Murdoch, love is the difficult recognition that another person is real. You must see them and care for them. In other words, the Exodus began in frustration – Shimon Peres once said that the great Jewish gift to the world was “dissatisfaction” – and ends in love. Thus, we read that the seder begins in degradation and ends in glory.
As we pray each day for the hostages, we are beset by both emotions. We are dissatisfied – more, we are angry and grieved — at the cruelty and suffering that characterizes so much of our world. But our motivation is not primarily a negative one – it is borne of love. We gather around the seder table with those close to us and hold up the Matzah which represents affliction and speak the final words pointing to Jerusalem, which represents redemption. We are caught forever between the two – the anguish of the world as it is and the enchantment of our vision of what God’s world can be.
Each of us is charged to bring those two closer together. We imagine it at the Seder: “This year we are slaves, may next year we be free.” We pledge ourselves, in this year of confusion and conflict, to help save those in captivity, bind up our society’s wounds, and repair God’s broken world.
