Pesach- Freedom

We start the Seder Pesach night with the saying of ‘Hu Lachmana Anu’- This- the matzah- is the poor man’s bread that our forefathers ate in Egypt. We relate to the matzah as bread of slavery. The bread we ate as slaves in Egypt it’s to remind us of the hardships we endured there. Later on in the Haggadah we have a different look at the matzah. We relate to the matzah as the food we ate as we hastily left Egypt and didn’t have time for dough to rise. The matzah is to remind us of the freedom we earned the night of Pesach.
What is matzah commemorating our bondage or our freedom?
Had we gone out of Mitzrayim on our own free will then we would have taken enough food to last us for the trip. Hashem wanted to make sure we realize that he is the one that’s giving us our freedom. Being freed by Hashem comes with a price tag - we became His servant. We were freed from the bondages of Paroh but we forever remain subjected to Hashem. R’ Shamshon R. Hirsch Zatza”l explains, that is the two aspects of matzah. Hashem when he took us out of Egypt made sure we knew that he is in charge by feeding us the same food that we ate as slaves in Mitzrayim- matzah. It is the bread of our affliction that we ate when we were freed that shows that we became and will always be servants to Hashem. As Chazal tell us ‘One is not free unless he toils in Torah’. Eating the matzah is to teach us that when we break our will, our wants and our desires for the will of Hashem’s - that shows that we truly are free men.

Wishing everyone a happy, healthy and free Pesach!

Pesach - True Freedom

It was the year 1942 and the ghetto of Krakow was completely judenrien. The Great city of Krakow - the epicenter of Judaism in Poland for over five hundred years, was now devoid of Jews, all systematically uprooted by the Nazi beasts. There were two brothers hiding, running from bunker to bunker, trying to stay alive amidst all the insanity. The Holiday of Passover was fast approaching and those two brothers had something far greater on their mind. They had to find a way to eat matzah on the first night of Passover. It took a lot of inventiveness and sacrifice - getting caught meant getting shot - but they build themselves a makeshift oven and found some flour. They were able to bake a small amount of Matzah for themselves. The night of Passover came and they sat down to their makeshift seder - celebrating the Jews exodus from Egypt. In years past they had sat at a beautifully laid table with the finest silver and surrounded by family. Tonight they sat down in a dark attic, all alone in the world, running from the Nazis, their very lives in danger, with a bit of Matzah that they sacrificed their lives for. The younger brother- a mere 21 year old - calls to his older brother; "There is no way I can have a seder tonight. The seder is to celebrate our freedom, our going out of exile- yet here we sit, our lives in danger, the tragedy unspeakable- our family is all gone, the entire city is up in flames and the Nazis won't be happy until every Jew is dead. Isn't this worse then the life the Jews had in Egypt? Back then their lives weren't in danger as it is in our time- what kind of freedom are we celebrating tonight?" The older brother answered; "Every night in the evening prayers we praise Hashem for taking us out of Egypt to an 'Everlasting freedom'. The everlasting freedom that we gained and are thankful for isn't a physical freedom - that is only a byproduct of what we got that night. Rather it's the spiritual freedom that was recognized. Passover celebrates the birth of a nation, when we went from being Egyptian slaves to becoming a newly born Jewish nation - a nation that G-d could call his own. When we sit down at the seder we celebrate something bigger then life, a going out of slavery into the embracing hands of our father in heaven- having the opportunity to be called 'A G-dley nation'. This is something that no one can ever take away from us - no matter how much they beat, torture and even kill us, we will always remain standing, free to serve G-d. G-d will always have his nation roaming the earth". With those words two brothers- my Grandfather and his older brother- sat down to a Seder that consisted of hard earned matzah and a little bit of borsht, yet was most probably the most magnificent seder ever experienced.