“In every generation,” we say on Passover, “we must see ourselves as if we, personally, left Egypt.” The traditional Haggadah goes on to clarify that this is because “had the Holy One of Blessing not liberated our ancestors from bondage in Egypt, then we, and our children, and our children’s children, would still be slaves to Pharaoh.” But of course, the sages who wrote the Haggadah were living under Rome, in a world in which there was no Pharaoh ruling in Egypt, so they could not have expected their words to be taken literally. When they said “Pharaoh,” they meant “Caesar.” And when they spoke of having been freed from Egypt, they were speaking of their faith: that the same force that freed our ancestors in the days of Moses would free them from the oppression they were experiencing in their own generation. In so doing, they left us with the invitation to seek out that which limits our freedom in our own time.
It is only natural that even within a given generation there will be disagreements over what forces constitute the “Pharaoh” of the day. These are certainly disagreements for the sake of heaven. And on any given day, there will always be more than one generation at the table, and different generations will undoubtedly have different ideas about the nature of our oppression and our needs for liberation.
Generally, the older generations have the power to set the agenda for a community. They are the leaders, the politicians, the board members. But a wise older generation recognizes that the younger generation are our future, invites them into the conversation, listens to their perspective, and empowers them to act.
I would like to invite you, as you recline at your Seder tables this year, to discuss what you see as our “Egypt” today, and challenge you to listen closely to the voices of the next generation.
Wishing you a happy and liberating Passover,
~Reb Josh
by Yehuda Amichai
From the place where we are right
Flowers will never grow
In the spring.
The place where we are right
Is hard and trampled
Like a yard.
But doubts and loves
Dig up the world
Like a mole, a plow.
And a whisper will be heard in the place
Where the ruined
House once stood.
“The Place Where We Are Right” from The Selected Poetry of Yehuda Amichai, by Yehuda Amichai, translated by Chana Bloch and Stephen Mitchell, with a New Foreword by C.K. Williams, © 1986, 1996, 2013 by Chana Bloch and Stephen Mitchell. Published by the University of California Press.
