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!