Overview
of the Torah Reading
To be read on Shabbat Last Day of Pesach, 21 Nissan 5785
/April 19
Torah: Ex. 13:17-15:26; Haftorah: Shmuel II, 22:1- 51
An
essay from Rabbi
Shaul Yosef Leiter, director of Ascent
(for a
free weekly email subscription, click
here)
Towards
the beginning of the Hagadah, soon after we voice an invitation
for guests to join us in the meal, we are told, "All those that
increase (hamarbeh) in their telling about the exodus from Mitzrayim
(Egypt) are praiseworthy!" Generally, this is understood to mean
that one should add to his or her telling of the miracles G-d did for
us more than 3,000 years ago. This is because the paragraph that follows
in the Hagadah is about the 4 scholars who remained awake all
of the seder night telling the stories of the exodus. There is
a Chassidic commentary that says that the word "increase"
can also mean to have a lot of people over, that we should add (i.e.
increase) in our guests at the seder table to publicize G-d's
miracle with a crowd! There is a hint to this in the Psalms (109/30):
"I will praise G-d very much with my mouth, and together with many
I will extol Him!" Rabbi Dov Greenberg explains the invitation
to guests in the Hagadah's first paragraph in a different way.
The whole event of the Hagadah is to remind us that the Almighty
freed us from slavery. A prisoner's mentality is to hoard rather than
to share. He is fearful of the lack of control in his life and must
guard against any unforeseen turn. Even though the final redemption
has not yet arrived, still G-d has freed us, His people, from the total
slavery of Mitzrayim. By inviting guest and sharing what we have,
we show we are no longer slaves.
* * *
The purpose of the 10 plagues was not only to humble and punish the
Egyptians for their treatment of the Jews but also to show the Jewish
people G-d's greatness. G-d's greatness was not just in His show of
power but also in His hinting to the Jews a rule for how they had to
grow spiritually. We see this in the first two plagues, Blood and Frogs.
The Rambam writes (Yesodei HaTorah 4/2), "the nature of fire is
to be hot and dry … and water to be cold and wet." Water is
cold and wet. The nature of blood on the other hand is to be warm. The
Torah teaches us (Dvarim, 12/23) that a person's blood is the body's
vessel for the soul. The soul is a person's life force. And life brings
warmth.
It follows that
the strength of the blood was to transform the cold water to blood,
from coldness to warmth! We see almost the opposite phenomenon with
the plague of frogs. A frog lives in the water which shows its coldness.
Yet what does the Torah tell us about the frogs? That they entered into
the ovens of the Egyptians (Shmot 7/28)! While the plague of blood turned
cold to hot, the plague of frogs turned the heat to coolness. How can
we understand this?
The Nile River
was worshipped by the Egyptians as one of their gods. On a subtle spiritual
level the Torah is telling us that the Egyptians wanted to make the
Jewish people cold to all aspects of holiness and divine worship. That
even if we serve G-d completely and fulfill His will in all its details,
still our evil inclination tries to sidetrack the person, telling him
it is enough to serve G-d in a cold way. Do not feel obligated to serve
G-d with liveliness and enthusiasm.
And when a person
is cool to holiness and divine service he does not get excited about
holiness, the natural result is that his enthusiasm and warmth gets
directed to worldly and impure things far from holiness. It is a person's
nature that when we are cold to holiness, we automatically get warm
and excited about those empty things that are lacking in holiness. And
this was the impure mission of Mitzrayim: to cool off the Jew
from holiness and to get him warm and excited about anything but.
This then is the
inner dimension of the plagues of blood and frogs. First G-d transformed
the Nile to blood. In place of coldness to holiness, G-d transformed
it to excitement about serving G-d. And only afterwards came the frogs
that jumped straight into the ovens. Rather than a warmth to inappropriate
things - worldliness far from holiness - there should be coldness, and
all his or her warmth and excitement should be for holiness alone. Not
just then, now too!
How can we say
at the end of the Hagadah, Next year in Jerusalem! Aren't we
supposed to be waiting every day for Mashiach's arrival? Why
wait till next year? There is no contradiction here at all. Bez"H,
(with G-d's help) next year's seder will be after the Mashiach
has arrived, when all the Jewish people will be gathered together again
in the holy land, as part of the annual Passover pilgrimage to the 3rd
Temple, newly rebuilt by the Almighty Himself. Amen
Shabbat
Shalom and a Joyful Pesach
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a free weekly email subscription, click
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For last year's essay by Rabbi Leiter on this week's Reading, see the
archive.
FROM
THE SAGES OF KABBALAH ON KabbalaOnline.org
Specifically,
for an overview of the recommended articles in the columns:
Holy Zohar, Holy Ari, Mystic Classics, Chasidic Masters, Contemporary
Kabbalists, and more,
click to Pesach
Mystical Classics
Maharal’s
Magic Matzah
By Jonathan Udren
The
matzah at the Seder table consists only of flour and water. It is called
lechem oni, literally a “poor” bread, likened to the impoverished
The poor person’s lack of possessions allows him a type of freedom
from the burden of the physical world. So too the nation of Israel were
released from the chains of bondage, entering an existence beyond the
demands of Egypt.
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