Rav Yitzchak Breitowitz: Escaping the Mitzraim Within

Yeah, welcome. Uh Hazal say Yeah, mishane makom mishane mazal, you change your location, you change your mazal. I don't know. New location, Baruch Hashem, I haven't seen such a large turnout uh maybe since before COVID. So, Baruch Hashem, it's uh nice to have people, uh see their live faces. Baruch Hashem, there's like big internet presence, but that's largely anonymous. Uh Rabbi Posen, as uh you probably know, uh is on his way to Chutz La'aretz. Uh His son and his daughter-in-law had a son, so he's going there. Uh for a bris, so he's not going to be here for a while, but uh Baruch Hashem, he set everything up. Uh tonight's sheer is uh dedicated uh for praying for the victory of our soldiers in Gaza, Lebanon, and Syria, the lasting unity of uh Am Yisrael, and for all those whose health has been affected by the war. Uh as all of you know, uh a hostage uh release deal is is imminent for those who are thankfully still alive. Uh Baruch Hashem, hopefully they will be uh released very, very soon. Um I'm not going to get into the fascinating political and halachic controversy about the idea of terrorist release in exchange. That is a hugely difficult, complicated matter, both as a matter of halacha and a matter of emotion. And uh Israel's been down that problem before. In fact, in some ways, what can I say? I mean, uh the whole genesis of October 7th, you know, Sinwar was released as part of a hostage deal with the Gilad Shalit. Was I don't know if it was Gilad Shalit or it was Gilad Shalit or Okay, yeah. So, in a sense Okay, I don't want to be too political. I mean, in a sense, we're kind of starting the whole thing over again. But, the hope would be Mashiach will will short circuit this this process as soon as as soon as possible. And either way, that shouldn't take away the simcha that we have that the Yidden that have been suffering so much together with their families that have been suffering should be as we say Hashem uh have a yeshua uh very very soon. Uh Aliyat Nishama uh Yitzchak Korb ben Eliezer uh Chana Leah bas Peretz and Shvona Sheindel Yehuda Tzvi ben Chaim Mush Printza and a dedication from Miriam Novak for the elevation of her brother's neshama Shalom ben Frecha. Again, the learning of our Torah should be a zechus uh for uh these nishamas. Okay, uh we are beginning uh Chumash number number two and uh it's very very interesting that uh Chazal have a nickname for every Chumash. Every Chumash has a nickname besides Bereishis, Shemos, Vayikra, Bamidbar, and Devarim. Bereishis is called Sefer Hayashar. The book of the upright because it is the stories of Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov who are called Yesharim, upright, in their relationship to God. Shemos, I'll get to in a minute. Vayikra is called Toras Kohanim, the laws of the Kohanim because much of Vayikra are about the laws of korbanos and the laws of the service in the Beis Hamikdash. In fact, that actually corresponds to the English or the Latin Greek term Leviticus, which really means the ritual of the Levi. Bamidbar, which has the countings of Bnei Yisrael, both those who left Mitzrayim and those who come to the land through different census, is called Chumash HaPikudim, the Chumash of countings, which actually corresponds to the English Numbers. And Sefer Devarim is called Mishneh Torah, a repetition of the Torah, because Moshe Rabbenu, although there are many new commandments in the book of Devarim, people don't always know that, but a lot of it is a repetition of the history of the Jewish people, as well as a repetition of laws, and that actually is called Deuteronomy, which means the second law. That's Mishneh Torah. You may also recall that the Rambam entitled his great work of codification on Jewish law, Mishneh Torah, the double Torah, because the Rambam took the position that was very controversial, that the Chumash, the five books of Moses, are the written Torah, and the Mishneh Torah gives you all the rulings of the Talmud, Bavli and Yerushalmi, and therefore it encapsulates the oral law. So, the second Torah is the oral law, and therefore all you need, the Rambam argued, was a Chumash and his book, Mishneh Torah, and you have the whole Torah. The obvious attack was, the Rambam seems to be saying we can kind of get rid of the Gemara, I took care of it for you, I gave you all the conclusions, and the Raavad already attacks the Rambam for disparaging Talmud study, and the Rambam actually had to wrote letters defending himself, I didn't mean that, etc., etc. Uh but the book but the the term Torah, although the Rambam appropriated it for the name of his book, is is Hazal's name for Sefer Devarim, Mishneh Torah, the repetition of the Torah. So, everything has a nickname. So, what is the nickname of the book of Shemot? So, the Ramban says that Shemot is called Sefer HaGeulah, the book of redemption, which, you know, means makes perfect sense, the redemption from Mitzrayim. Uh but the Ba'al Hilchos Gedolos, one of the Gaonim, gives Shemos a very unimpressive nickname. He says it's called Chumash HaShaini. It is called Book Two. So Bereishis is Sefer HaYashar, Shemos is Chumash HaShaini, Vayikra is Toras Kohanim, Bamidbar is Chumash HaPekudim, and Devarim is Mishneh Torah. So kind of what kind what kind of name is it? Sefer HaShaini? It's almost as if to be named, like it is to be named in the future. Like when they have dedications for for building, there's a to be dedicated in the future. So what type of name is Chumash HaShaini? So the Netziv in his Hakdama to the book of Shemos offers a very nice explanation that Chumash HaShaini is a very deeply meaningful name. Because Chumash HaShaini doesn't mean it's the second Chumash of the Torah. But it means it is Bereishis part two. It is the second part of Bereishis. As if to say, Bereishis, Sefer HaYashar was part one, and Shemos is part two. In other words, Shemos is essentially the second part of Bereishis. Because Bereishis talks about God creating the world. But what does Rashi bring? Rashi brings a Midrash at the very beginning of his commentary, Bereishis bara Elohim. In the beginning God created. So Rashi brings from the Midrash, because of two things that are called reishis, beginnings or choices, did God create the world? Bishvil HaTorah, which is called reishis, u'vishvil Yisrael, that there are that there will be a Jewish people. Like Bereishis, because of the two things that are called reishis, Hashem created the world. So then Netziv says, if Chumash Bereishis tells me that God created the world, Chumash Shemos now shows us why God created the world. Bishvil haTorah. This is the book of Matan Torah. Bishvil Yisrael. This is the book of the formation of the Jewish people as a nation through Yetziat Mitzrayim. And therefore it's called Chumash haSheini because essentially it is a long footnote on Chumash Bereishit. So say whether it's called Sefer haGeulah, the book of redemption, or whether it is called um Sefer haSheini, the book that gives the reason for Bereishit. This is the reason. But the book of Shmot obviously breaks down into three major sections with a few side digressions which are very important. Uh uh topic number one is of course the servitude and the exodus from Mitzrayim, Yetziat Mitzrayim. In fact, the English word exodus is a good description of that. Uh topic number two is the receiving of the Torah. And topic number three is the building of a Mishkan to bring Hashem's Shechinah into the world. Yetziat Mitzrayim, Matan Torah, and Binyan haMishkan. And it's been suggested that although this is describing the macro processes of Am Yisrael, this is also a description of a person's own inner spiritual journey. I have to leave the inner slavery of my yetzer hara. I have to commit myself to God's will, which is Matan Torah. And then my heart and my soul can become a dwelling place for the divine presence. The three stages of Shmot are the three stages of making yourself a Mishkan, a dwelling place. You know the famous phrase, it's been set to music. Build as from safer Haredim Rabbi Elazar Azkari. Build va vi Mishkan efnech. In my heart I build a dwelling place for Hakadosh Baruch Hu. Every one of us are supposed to be a Mishkan for Hashem. But in order to build a Mishkan, you first have to have the Torah. You accept Hashem's will. And you have Excuse me, you have to leave the yetzer haras that pull you down, that inner Mitzrayim. Okay, so this is a very, very powerful progression of human development, of Jewish development, of spiritual development. And that is reflected in the three themes. And when the Ramban says that the book of Shemot is called the book of Geulah, it is connected to exactly One second. I'm sorry, I just have to be sure this is recording. One second. Pardon me. I'm sorry, I just wanted to post him the dafka. This week he specifically asked me, okay. Yeah. Okay, so so so the safer Hagolah is referring not just to Yitziat Mitzrayim, the safer Hagolah Hagolah is referring to all of that all of that progression. The centrality of Yitziat Mitzrayim to the Jewish consciousness is very, very great. Many, many mitzvahs in the Torah are connected to Yitziat Mitzrayim. Even things like Shabbos, tefillin, and tzitzis, and "Ani Hashem Elokeichem" we say in the parsha of tzitzis, "Asher hotzeisicha me'eretz Mitzrayim." There is, of course, an annual mitzvah to have a big seder in which we recount the whole narrative. But every single day, every single day, there's a mitzvah of the Torah to mention the Exodus. So, when we say, for example, Krias Shema, so we think the mitzvah of Krias Shema is to recite it in the morning and in the evening. That's very true. But the that only includes the two paragraphs of Shema and "Vehaya im shamoa". The third paragraph of tzitzis is actually not part of the mitzvah of Krias Shema, but one of the main reasons we recite it is because it does contain it does contain the verse, "I am Hashem, your God, who took you out of the land of Mitzrayim." And if you look at the you know, look at an ArtScroll siddur, it'll tell you at that pasuk one should have intention to fulfill the mitzvah of remembering the Exodus. It's a mitzvah d'oraisa, zechiras Yitzias Mitzrayim. Okay, so technically these are two different They go by two different names. The mitzvah of leil Pesach is called sippur Yitzias Mitzrayim, narrative. The mitzvah of kol y'mei hashana is called zechiras Yitzias Mitzrayim. And they are derived just from two different sources. The mitzvah of annual narration is from the verse "V'higadeta l'vincha you shall tell your child bayom hahu" on the day of the Exodus. "Ba'avur zeh" because of all that God did for me when I was taken out of Mitzrayim, we have to talk about this. That's the mitzvah of haggadah or sippur. Those are interchangeable. The mitzvah of daily recitation is from another verse. You shall remember the day that you left Mitzrayim. Kyle Yemei Chayacha. All the days of your life. All the days of your life. Now, if this pasuk is familiar to you, not just from Chumash, it's because the Haggadah of Pesach itself discusses this and there's a machlokes Ben Zoma and the Chachamim if the daily mitzvah is only in the daytime when we left or kol because of the word all the days of your life, it's even at night. And we pasken like Ben Zoma, it's day and night. I will leave for a thought question which you can think about till Pesach and that is why does the Haggadah bring the argument between Ben Zoma and the Chachamim which has nothing to do with Pesach at all. It is a machlokes of the whole year. Why is it even in the Haggadah? It has no shaychus. See, a lot of people make a mistake and say, "Well, we need to discuss the machlokes if there's a mitzvah to do this at night because we're doing it at night, so we have to establish you have to do it at night." That's totally wrong. Because even the opinion that says the mitzvah is only in the day is moda leil Pesach, you do it at night. So, the issue is not do you do a seder at night? That's not the issue. So, what is the relevance of the whole year? I'll leave that as a question that you can think about and if you have um uh your yeshiva sons or your seminary daughters uh who come for Pesach, ask them this question. I bet they probably did not discuss it and it'll be something to to think about. Uh I'll also throw out another question for thought, which I'm not going to address because, you know, this is really closer to Pesach, and that is what's the basis of this anomaly that everybody is moda, you make the seder at night, but according to one opinion, the daily mitzvah is only in the day. We pasquin day and night, but according to one opinion, only in the day. So, why would it be so that the daily mitzvah would be only in the day, and the annual mitzvah is only at day? There's an anomaly, there's a disconnect between the annual mitzvah of sepor and the daily mitzvah of zecher in terms of when you do it. And even like Ben Zoma that we pasquin like, so yeah, the daily mitzvah is day and night, but the annual mitzvah is only at night. You can't make the seder in the day, right? So, it's interesting side by side to analyze the distinction between the daily mitzvah of cursory zecher and the annual more elaborate mitzvah of the mitzvah of sepor. So, these are two questions you can think about, and maybe as we get closer to Pesach, maybe at the seder itself, we we might discuss them a little bit. But okay. But be this as it may, the Haggadah makes a statement that is really taken from the Mishna. So, the Haggadah did not make it up, it was taken from the Mishna. Chai ya vadam liros es atsmo ki ilu hu yotzei mi Mitzrayim. Every person must regard themselves as if they themselves were taken out of mitzrayim. Meaning when we think about Yitziat Mitzrayim Now this may be a unique mitzvah for Pesach but in these parshios we think about Pesach. The spiritual power of Pesach exists in these parshios to some degree. That when we think about Yitziat Mitzrayim we're not only thinking about commemorating a pivotal historical event in the formation of Am Yisrael but we have to feel we are personally experiencing the Exodus. And the question we have to ask ourselves is what does that even mean? And how is it true in any in any particular way? Now don't confuse this with another passage in the Haggadah which is roughly similar. The Haggadah does say if Hashem would not have taken our forefathers out of mitzrayim perhaps we and our children and our children's children might still be slaves or assimilated. Now that's a little different. What that's saying is I am grateful for what God did to my forefathers, my ancestors because had he not done it to my ancestors I might not be here today. But that's not saying I was a slave. That's just saying I'm grateful for what Hashem did to them. Okay, that I understand. Everything that we are is based on what happened to our ancestors in one way or the other. But what does it mean each person must regard themselves as if they were taken out of mitzrayim? How can that be? I was never a slave in mitzrayim. I was never in mitzrayim. So chiyav adam liros es atzmo ke'ilu yatzah mimitzrayim. So I'm briefly going to give uh three answers to that question. Uh answer number one is a Kabbalistic answer, which we can't automatically prove, but the Zohar Hakadosh says that in the 600,000 men who were enslaved in Egypt, actually that's only the 1/5 of the population that left, 4/5 died, are encapsulated all of the souls of Am Yisrael that will ever be born. There are said to be 600 root souls in Klal Yisrael. So, even if there's 15 million Jews, they are split off from those root souls. So, even though I may not remember being a slave in Mitzrayim, my neshama was actually enslaved in Mitzrayim. Yetziat Mitzrayim, every Jewish soul that is a breakaway from the 600,000 was in fact meshubad to Pharaoh in Mitzrayim, and therefore in a very literal sense, I was in Mitzrayim, and I was liberated in Mitzrayim. That's based on the Zohar. Interpretation number two uh is simply harnessing the power of imagination, meaning it's not making an empirical claim. I was a slave in Egypt, but rather in order for me to appreciate my gratitude to God, I have to envision myself as if I was a slave that was liberated. Because otherwise, it's too much of an abstraction. Meaning, it's hard for me to be grateful to Hakadosh Baruchu unless I envision what it's like to be a slave, to be beaten, to be harassed, to be humiliated, to be tortured. So, essentially what it's doing is we are supposed to harness the power of imagination in order to have a hargasha, in order to have a feeling that we were enslaved. Again, to use an irreverent expression, it's a form of method acting. Right? If you're familiar with method acting, Lee Strasberg, Marlon Brando, all of that. Uh sorry, I I I can't get away with this in our circle, so here I can mention uh some of the popular culture. So, the notion of totally immersing yourself in a role, becoming that character, becoming that person. So, one might say that the Haggadah is a form of method acting and so is much for the Rambam. I mean, the Rambam doesn't mention Marlon Brando, but the Rambam mentions the idea of putting yourself in the situation of slavery in order to be makir tov to Hashem. So, that's answer number two. But, answer number three is a fascinating powerful machshava from the Baal HaTanya, from the Alter Rebbe, who really it's such a powerful thought that he only says it in like three words. I mean, he you know, he's not marich in this at all. But, he says that the word Mitzrayim has a double meaning. Mitzrayim was a nation, it was an ancient empire, and we of course very much believe in the literal historicity of the Torah's narrative. We're not making things a metaphor. We were slaves, we were oppressed, we were liberated. Of course, that is what the Chumash says, and that is what we believe. As to the issue of how come there's relatively little archaeological evidence about the Exodus? Interesting questions. Uh you can do your research on that. Interestingly, you know, uh the people who have found the archaeological evidence for the Exodus tend to be Christian archaeologists. It's It's interesting. That's often it'll be the Christians for whatever that will try to establish the uh historical accuracy of of the Torah. Sometimes the Jewish archaeologists are interested in discrediting the historical accuracy of of the Torah. Okay, I'll leave that again for a question for for another time. Uh but again, certainly the story is literal. But the Baal Tanya writes, Mitzrayim has a double meaning. The word Mitzrayim also means constriction, limitation, boundary, blockage. When David Hamelech says in Hallel, Min Hametzar karasicha anani bamerchav ka in Hallel. Min Hametzar from the narrow confining places, I call out to God, and he will answer me with expansiveness. The word metzar connotes the idea of being trapped, having no place to go, being imprisoned, being desperate. As if David Hamelech is describing the predicaments of his life as his enemies, both external and internal, even his own children, try to kill him, and he feels desperate, and he has no escape. And he turns to Hashem in his moments of desperation, and he declares that Hashem has redeemed him with expansiveness, openness, and and and and the like. There's a remiss to this in the Beis Hamikdash itself, where Hazal say that one of the miracles in the Beis Hamikdash is there were so many people, so many crowds who were standing crowded together, and when it was time to bow down, everybody had plenty of room to bow down. And uh the Maforshim say, "This is Merumach. I call out to God from the Meitzar. I call out to God from being crowded." And he answers me with Merchav, expansiveness. So, Meitzar means a boundary. You're trapped. The period, by the way, between the 17th of Tammuz and the 9th of Av is called Bein Hamitzarim. You're trapped between a rock and a hard place. You're trapped. You're constricted. You're limited. So, Mitzrayim has a double meaning. It does mean Egypt, but it also means boundaries, constrictions, limitations. So, says the Baal HaTanya, "Seen in this way, every person has their inner Mitzrayim. Every person has their inner slavery. I could be a slave to my arrogance, to my Gaiva, to my conceit, to my anger, to my either haughtiness or my lack of self-esteem in which I think I'm a nobody and I can't accomplish anything, to one's laziness, whatever it would be, to the resentments uh that they feel at the hand of others. These are Mitzrayims. These are enslavers. They prevent me from moving forward. They prevent me from achieving my goals in life. They prevent me from becoming the person that I'm capable to become. This is an inner slavery that's much greater than an outer slavery. The saying goes, "It's easier to take the Jew out of Mitzrayim than to take Mitzrayim out of the Jew." And that is what Mitzrayim is about. It is about the nation of Egypt that enslaved us. It's also about the inner enslavement of the human spirit, of the Jewish soul to the yetzer hara, to the negativities of life that pull us down and sap our energy and deplete us and paralyze us and prevent us from moving forward. So says the Baal Shem Tov. When Hakadosh Baruch Hu took the Jews out of Egypt when he gave the yetzias Mitzrayim, he put into the briah he put into the creation a spiritual power in which each of us can latch onto that spiritual power and achieve a yetziah from our own Mitzrayim. And therefore, the statement each person must regard himself as if they were taken out of Mitzrayim does not mean each person must make believe they were a slave in Egypt but each person must recognize their Mitzrayim and recognize that yetzias Mitzrayim enables them to achieve a liberation from the Mitzrayim that is within. And therefore, it's a true statement. Chayav adam liros et atzmo ke'ilu hu yatza miMitzrayim. Because as long as I'm in Mitzrayim I'm stuck. As long as I'm in Mitzrayim, I don't move. As long as I'm as I'm in Mitzrayim, I am mired in negativity and lack of growth. But they have to be margish. I have to feel that yetzias Mitzrayim is poel on me b'chol es u'v'chol sha'ah. every single time there's a Yitzias Mitzrayim. Now, it may very well be some say that this is a here specifically well seder to have these thoughts. Um but I have to say the Schlock brings down that as we read the partials of Schmos for A with the partials of Yitzias Mitzrayim the spiritual energy of the Exodus does come to pass during this particular tekufa. So in a sense we are experiencing Pesach in microcosm without the need to clean the house and without the need to get rid of chametz. So in a sense we can absorb the spiritual messages even if right now we don't have to get involved in the physical hachonot, the physical preparations uh for the cham. Right? So the notion therefore is that as we learn Yitzias you know people often raise the question in more progressive circles is the Torah a metaphor or is the Torah a history? Meaning the narrative portions of the Torah. You know there are those who like to say everything's a metaphor or the midrasha is a mashal for things. Uh some say God forbid the avos God forbid the avos didn't really exist and uh the Jews were never in Mitzrayim but these are what are called myths and myths by the way are also important because they they convey spiritual ideas. So someone a met- metaphorized the whole Torah and others look at the Torah as history which we do. We believe these things happened. There were from Yitzchak and Yaakov, there were Yitzias Mitzrayim etc. But the truth of the matter is in reality it is not a binary either or question. It's not is it fact or is it mashal? Is it metaphor? The answer is it is a fact that is also a metaphor meaning to say we believe the historical events of the Torah. Historical for sure. Machivas Yosef, all of that happens. But they are also symbolic of spiritual forces. That's the entire approach of Kabbalah. The entire approach of Kabbalah is to view the whole physical world, whole physical universe, as essentially a parable or a symbol of deeper spiritual forces that are involved. And therefore Yetzias Mitzrayim is the same thing. Uh the Baal HaTanya is for sure not saying the Exodus is a metaphor. The Exodus happened. But at the same time, it is a metaphor for a spiritual power that comes into the world to enable us to be liberated. So, if I could quote uh one interesting uh source that is hardly an authoritative source. It's again from uh an actor. Uh some of you might have heard of a fellow, Mr. T. I have not been following him a lot uh for many, many years already. I was never a great fan. Anyway, uh I don't know I don't know I don't even know if he's alive. But he's a black entertainer. Uh big, strong guy. I think he was a bouncer. And he wears uh gold chains. Or he wore gold chains. So, he once said something. I I somehow came across something that he said that it surprised me because it really was a profound remark. Uh albeit maybe he didn't intend it in a profound way. I don't know. Uh he was asked why he always wears gold jewelry. So, he said he wants to emulate ancestors. They came from Africa as slaves to the United States in chains. So, he wants to wear chains to connect to his ancestors. But the difference is, their chains were on their legs and were iron. And his chain is around his neck and it's gold. So, Chochma Bagoyim Ta'amen, wisdom among the Gentiles, one has to believe. Look at what Mr. T is Machadis here. He's saying, you know, a gold chain around the neck is the same thing as an iron chain around the leg. It's just a different type of slavery. There's the slavery to an oppressor and there's the slavery to the tyvis to the to the hedonism of the world, etc. That's a slavery, too. And just like we needed the Yitzias Mitzrayim from the first one, we need the Yitzias Mitzrayim from the second one as well. You can be a slave to all sorts of things. You can be a slave to your money, to your guyva. All of that is slavery. It mamesh is slavery. And indeed lahepech sometimes a person might be enslaved externally, but in their heart they are in fact free. There's might be an inner freedom of the spirit that can exist. Think of No, so many Jews uh been in Russia and Poland over over over the centuries who remained so faithful to Hakadosh Borchu, avdei Hashem, under the worst conditions of oppression. They were free. They were free. Right? So, this is the koach of Yitzias Mitzrayim. Now, to go back a little bit uh to the mitzvah, the annual mitzvah of re- talking about the Exodus. I want to mention interesting another interesting halacha that the Mishna says. The Mishna says, when you have to discuss the Exodus at the Seder, you cannot just talk about redemption. You have to talk about the bad part as well. This is This is actually a halacha. If I were to simply sit down See, again, let me just explain something. D'oraisa, the Torah does not give you a Haggadah text. It does not say you got to say these words. The Haggadah as a document is a rabbinic document. Who compiled it is a bit of a mystery. Uh and when it was compiled is not entirely known. Generally, we assume it's attributed to the Anshei Knesseth Gedolah, the men of the Great Assembly towards the beginning of the Second Temple period with later additions. The songs for sure, Had Gadya is for sure later. But we don't we don't have a lot of precise information regarding the composition of the book that is called the Haggadah. It's an interesting bibliographical mystery in some ways. But the point is for sure that uh reciting the Haggadah is not required by the Torah. The Torah does not give you a book. The Torah basically says you must narrate to your child or to yourself the story of the Exodus. And the original plan was in your own words. Remember, tefillah itself is very much the same way. The Rambam understands that there's a mitzvah d'oraita to daven. You are got to daven to God every day. But not the Amidah. You daven in your own words. Later, it was thought we needed to give people a nusach. Haggadah is exactly the same thing. In fact, everything is that way. Birkat Hamazon is the same way. The Torah says you got to thank God after you eat, but the Torah does not give you a nusach. The nusach comes later. So in a sense, right, the mitzvah of talking about the Exodus was based on your own words. But there are certain halakhic requirements in what you say even when you say it in your own words. And one of those requirements is what the Mishnah calls maschil bignus umesayem bishvach. You must begin with the bad and end in the good. Can't just say "Thank you, God, for taking us out of Egypt." You got to talk about the slavery. Actually, there's actually a machlokes in the Gemara. What is the bad that you're talking about? According to one opinion, it's the evils of slavery, avadim hayinu. According to the other opinion, it's the fact that we were originally pagans, ovdei avodah zarah. And that's why the Haggadah incorporates two journeys, the journey from slavery to freedom, the journey from paganism to belief in Hashem, because both of them are yetzias Mitzrayim. But you got to begin with the bad. So once again, let's focus on why begin with the bad. Uh and why can't I just talk about the good? Why do I got to begin with the bad? So the standard answer that's given, which is a perfectly legitimate answer, so I mean, sometimes the standard answer is not at all wrong necessarily, is that in order to appreciate the good, you have to remember how bad things were. Meaning, just as this is human nature. Uh a person appreciates health when they go through illness, they go through difficulties. When a person is healthy their whole life, they don't necessarily appreciate it. Uh even freedom is that way. Those of you that uh have parents or grandparents or relatives who came from oppressive environments, whether Holocaust survivors, aren't that many left, or people who came from the former Soviet Union, who lived lives of persecution, when they come to a free country, whether it be Israel or the United States, they tend to be patriotic. Right? 4th of July, Yom Ha'atzmaut, a big, big deal, because they appreciate being free. Whether they're religious or not, they appreciate being free, because they know what it's like to be oppressed, to be crushed, as opposed to a person that's a native-born Israeli or native-born American. You take things for granted. You were born into freedom. The Ksav Sofer indeed points out the anomaly in this. He says, "Imagine a person who spent the first years of his life in abject poverty, lack of food, lack of shelter. They were living in a hole surrounded with mud and snakes. Disgusting type of life, such a life without hope. And one day a benefactor comes and pulls them out of the hole and gives them clothes and shelter and food and comfort and medical care. How grateful would such a person be? Now, if you were born into that and you never suffered the deprivation, the chesed is even greater. It's even greater. And yet you appreciate it less because you never saw the bad side. So, the simple meaning that I got to talk about the bad before I talk about the good is you only appreciate the good because of the bad. All right, and that's a that's a straightforward answer, which is perfectly perfectly legitimate. But, there is a kasha on that answer. And that is the following. Hashem is the one who decreed that these bad things are going to happen to me in the first place. Hashem told Avram at the covenant of the parts, the Bris Bain HaBetarim, that your children will be strangers in a land that is not theirs. And they will be afflicted and they will be enslaved for 400 years. And the nation that oppresses them, I will eventually judge. And they will leave with great wealth. Now, granted, God in His loving kindness, we were not in Mitzrayim 400 years, we're only in Mitrayim 210 years. And let me point out of that 210 years, less than 100 years we were slaves. And remember that. We were not slaves in Mitrayim for 210 years. The slavery did not begin till number one, Yakov died. Not only Yakov though. All the Yosef and all of the brothers. So in reality, from the time Yakov came to Mitrayim till the time we left Mitrayim is 210 years. And of that time, less than 100 we were slaves. But still, the slavery was very, very bitter, very, very, very difficult. So here's the question. I mean, if I take you and I throw you in jail and I say you're going to languish here for 400 years. And I come back after 210 years again, just assuming everyone's alive, and I release you and I say, "Be grateful to me. I'm taking you out 190 years early." Well, just to get out of there, I may be diplomatic, but I'm going to be thinking, "Yeah, but why did you put me in?" I mean, as I talk, it it eerily reminds me that that's exactly how Hamas behaves. You know, you know, when Hamas I mean, you we've already had a few hostage releases over the past past you know, year and a half. And every time like Hamas like looks at the hostages and say, "Well, you know, uh isn't it great that we're releasing you? You know, be grateful." I mean, it's kind of you know, uh So, some of the hostages were drugged. They were given amphetamine. They were given something. They were given speed and whatever it is and you know, they're smiling and laughing and even shaking hands, but uh some of them just I remember one one woman who was released, you know, Hamas said, "You know, you know, etc." And the woman just gave this ice cold ice cold stare was not going to give any type of gesture like, oh, somehow you're a great sadist because you released us. Hey, very nice of you. Uh why did you take us? Why did you do what you do? Rape, torture, murder, maim. Uh we're supposed to be grateful for that? So, khas v'shalom, khas v'shalom, but one could raise, again khas v'shalom, a similar question on God himself. That is, hey, I think about the slavery and I'm so grateful for the liberation. But it was God that put us into the slavery. So, is that supposed to make me feel grateful? Hakadosh Baruch Hu put me into that slavery. He decreed it to Avraham. So, how do you understand the idea of gratitude to the Almighty? And and and not only that, but we're mechuyav in the narrative to talk about the slavery in order to increase our gratitude, even though it was Hashem that put us into the slavery. So, the answer has to be a much deeper answer. And the deeper answer is that the reason we talk about the slavery is not simply so we'll be grateful to the redemption. It's not just a before and an after, but the slavery itself is part of being redeemed. Meaning like this. Before the avdus, we were free. We then get enslaved. We then get free. If the freedom after the slavery would be nothing more than the freedom we had before the slavery, then the question on God is going to be a very powerful question. What have you done for us, God? We were free. You enslaved us. We then got free. All you did was put us back in the situation we were. Why did we have to go through this? But if you understand that the freedom we achieved after the slavery was qualitatively and spiritually a different type of freedom. We were not the same as we were before. Then the slavery is not just the precursor for the redemption. The slavery is part of the redemption itself. So, the question is what what does that mean exactly? What do we mean if we say the slavery is part of the redemption. So, here once again, I'll give you two ways of understanding this and both of which are true. This These are not either or. I mentioned last week the idea that in the 210 years the Jews were in Mitzrayim at least certainly after the tribes died there was a very very rapid spiritual degeneration. Although we had a an enormously uh big birth rate, but spiritually we declined. We became over the Abodah Zarah. Uh we except for Shevut Levi we did not practice Brit Milah. Except for Shevut Levi. Ad Ke Dei Kach, that the splitting of the Red Sea, the sea didn't want to split because the sea said "Why are the Jews any better than the Egyptians? They don't deserve to be redeemed." And not only that but 4/5 of the Jewish people died in the plague of darkness. So, yeah. Most 80% of Klal Yisrael was not redeemed. It's the 1/5 that were treated as idol worshipers. In other words, the taina of the angels that they don't deserve to be redeemed is on the 1/5 who survived. And yet, you'll remember that there were certain residual merits that the Jewish people had. They didn't change their names. They didn't change their language. They didn't intermarry. Uh they didn't speak lashon hara against each other to get advantages with the government. In Yanam like this, and as we explained last week without repeating everything, that these were not from things. This was not being religious. I mean, if you're an idol worshiper, you can't be a servant of God. But these were ideas of achdus and unity and togetherness. So, apparently what Chazal are telling us is that even if the Jews abandoned avodah zara, I'm sorry, even if the Jews were in avodah zara, but the 1/5 that were redeemed was because of their connection to each other. They cared about each other. They wanted to be a separate nation. They wanted to be identified as Jews. It's like the guy who wears the Magen David. It's still significant. So, we would conclude they didn't dissimilate in terms of remaining a separate nation. But there appears to be a contradiction to that teaching. The Medrash tells us that when Yosef died, the Jewish people, the descendants of the tribes, said to themselves, "If we were so beloved and appreciated by the Egyptians when Yosef was alive, that was the case. When we were living a different life, we were in Goshen, we were distinct, we were culturally different, then how much more will we be beloved and accepted by the umata olam if we assimilate and abandon our Jewish distinctiveness. And they said which is said in every generation by many many Jews nihiya kamitsriyam Let us be like the Egyptians. Let's adopt their ways. Let us adopt their culture. Let's stop being different. Because they made a kal v'chomer, a very erroneous kal v'chomer. And that is if they love us when we're different they'll certainly love us if we're like them. And the medrish says that is why God put hatred in the hearts of the Egyptians so that the Jews would realize that they can never be like the umata olam. Actually I I wrote a little article and it was a transcript of a talk I gave that was in the Jewish Action a few years ago. It was called the hidden blessings of anti-Semitism. Now of course we don't we don't wish uh any Jew to suffer in any in any way at all. So I'm not saying it all. Baruch Hashem for the halacha. I mean you know God forbid we don't want any suffering. But the truth is historically it's been very very true that the hatred of the nations of the world has been a very powerful catalyst to make Jews realize that although we're productive and we work with societies and we do our best in the world we don't create disorder or chaos but a Jew has to fundamentally know that they are different. Like Avraham Avinu said all the way back when he was negotiating to buy a burial place for Sarah. Ger vetoshav anochi machan. I am a stranger and I am a resident amongst you. And Rav Soloveitchik used to describe, these are the two sides of being a Jew, at least in chutz la'aretz. Maybe Eretz Yisrael is a little different. Of course, Avraham was even saying it in Eretz Yisrael. I am a toshav. I am a resident. I'm a citizen. I contribute. I'm involved in society. But I'm also a ger, meaning I have to have a sense that I'm a stranger here. It's not completely you know, me. And as I say, Eretz Yisrael of course is very, very different. But but even even here in terms of societal norms, whatever it is, a person has to feel a certain distance from certain aspects. So, anti-Semitism has been one of the ways in which Jewish consciousness has been raised. Even today it's working that way. Um Reb Meir Shapiro once said, the great Lubliner Rav, he says, if the Jewish people don't make kiddush, the will make havdalah. Which is a very witty remark. Kiddush is sanctification. Havdalah is separation. If we don't sanctify ourselves, we want to be like the nations of the world, they're going to make havdalah. They're going to push us away. You see? So, it turns out the following. The Beit Halevi explains this. I raise the contradiction. On one hand, we're told the Jews left Mitzrayim because they were unified and they were not assimilated and they kept their own clothes and their own language and their own names. But what do you mean? The Midrash says, after Paroh died after Yosef died, they wanted to assimilate to be Egyptians. So, which was it? Was it assimilation or was it separation? The answer is it was assimilation until the slavery came. The slavery itself was the experience that taught us we're not going to get accepted by abandoning who we are. It's only going to result in more and more and deeper rejection. So, in that sense, the slavery taught us a very important lesson. That's why I'm going back to the question of why am I grateful? Because it was the slavery that taught us that the path to inner salvation and happiness is not by abandoning the distinctiveness of being a Jew. Fact, I mean, getting far afield a little bit. I mean, this was essentially uh the mistake of of political Zionism. If we go back to uh Theodor Herzl. And you know, I am not going to knock Herzl. I mean, Herzl had no Jewish education at all and um I believe his motives were very, very sincere and he very, very deeply cared about the Jewish people. Uh so, I'm not here to be negative at all, but the basic concept of of political Zionism. I don't mean cultural Zionism. I don't mean Ahad Ha'am, which is a a variation of Herzl's Zionism, was normalization. Right? Herzl saw uh in European Jewry tremendous anti-Semitism. Uh the Dreyfus affair, he saw hatred of Jews. And he was convinced that the source of that hatred is that Jews are always so different than everybody else. They don't have their own country. They don't have their own army. Uh they have their own culture, whether they're religious or not, but they're different and they're hated because they're different. So, Herzl thought if only the Jewish people could be like every other nation, having their own country, having their own army. I think there's a quip they attribute to Ben-Gurion, although I'm not sure, that says, "We will be a nation when we have our own bank robbers and thieves. We want to be like everybody else." So, Herzl saw normalization as the solution to anti-Semitism. And in that premise, I think we have to say that he has been proven wrong time and time again. In fact, the Holocaust is actually the best example of that. Uh within Germany, at least, Jews were very, very assimilated. Uh Jews were very much part of the culture. And yet, the Holocaust came out of Germany. Although, it affected, of course, the much more religious populations of Poland. And I understand that. But, the origin of the Holocaust came out of a very highly assimilated society. Because the lesson is, you try to escape who you are, the nations are going to remind you that you can't escape. And that's why there's such an irony that even Jews who converted to Christianity died in Auschwitz. In fact, the one woman is even a saint, Edith Stein, a Jewish woman who became a Carmelite nun. She was a very de-very very devoted Catholic. Again, Rachmanus on the son. Uh she died uh in Auschwitz, and uh she was canonized by the Roman Catholic Church as a martyr to her faith, which is very peculiar. Uh she did not die because she was a Catholic. She was not a martyr to her faith. She died because she was a Jew. Unless you want to give it a Kabbalistic interpretation that in the penimiyut of her neshama, her faith was still Jew- Judaism, and she died al Kiddush Hashem in that way, but I don't think that's what the church meant when they when they canonized her. So, the kids are this is a a long way of expressing it. There is a gift of slavery because it makes us realize that we have to be together. And we have to be different, and we have to be distinct. Because if we try to simply abandon our distinctiveness, we are opening up the gates of hatred and rejection. And therefore, slavery taught us that very, very important lesson of understanding that assimilation, normalization is not going to bring you happiness even in olam hazeh, forget about olam haba. But even in olam hazeh. So, that's one idea. Now, that you might say Jewish particularism emerges from the negativity of the slavery experience because their original attitude was after Yosef died, niah kamitzriyam, let us be like the Egyptians. And God put hatred, the midrash says, in the hearts of Paro so that could never happen. He will not allow it to happen. Hashem will not allow this to happen. And again, uh if you look in the book of Yechezkel, you see this actually actually before this, the idea is brought up before this, that when you say nia kagoyim, Hashem says, hayo lo sihyah, it shall not come to pass. But there's another message in the slavery that almost moves in an opposite direction, but but it's also a true perspective. Now, the Torah says more than 30 times how if somebody converts to Judaism, somebody becomes a ger, you must love them. You must treat them with compassion and respect. And in several places the Torah gives the reason. The Torah says, "You shall love the stranger for you were gayrim in the land of Egypt." Now, let's just translate this. When we see the word ger, we think about a convert to Judaism. But you can't plug in that translation. You shall love the convert to Judaism because you were converts to Judaism in Egypt. That's That's not what the verse means. Obviously, the verse is using ger not as a halachic concept. It's using ger in terms of its literal meaning. The meaning of the word ger is a stranger. Now, a convert to Judaism is called the stranger because they join obvious realm without family connections, without yichus. So, they are the other that we have to embrace and accept. But the original meaning of ger means, of course, a stranger. So, what is the Torah saying? Love the stranger because you were once that person. You know, we live in a culture, in general culture, in which, particularly in the United States, maybe more more than Israel, but uh of kind of a narcissistic self-preoccupation with people's personal traumas. Now, again, this is a very delicate thing and I I I don't want to be criticized as being insensitive. I mean, there are people who indeed have suffered various forms of abuse, sexual abuse, physical abuse, emotional abuse. It's real. You know, it is real and people who suffer from any type of abuse, adults or children, men or women, certainly deserve compassion. Although I have to admit, my heart does not go out to college students who are traumatized because Trump won the election and have to have chocolate milk and and puppies to play with when all classes are cancelled. I mean, those are just as Trump talks about fake news, those are fake traumas. But, that doesn't obscure the fact that there are real traumas in the world. So, I want to be on the record of saying that you know, I identify, I commiserate. I want to offer any help and support that I can. And we have to have rachamim. But, there's a certain danger in being the victim. And that is your life becomes kind of a narcissistic preoccupation with self-protection. I'm not going to allow myself to be hurt anymore. That's all what you all that you think about. Now, and therefore my my life becomes distancing myself from the psychic pain that I experienced. The Torah has actually a different approach to trauma. The Torah says, do not forget about your trauma. Connect to it. Remember it. Re-experience it. Relive it. And let it be the source of your empathy and compassion to other people who are suffering. Look at the remarkable idea here. A stranger comes to you. And again, I'm going to use the word stranger for ger, a non-Jew. Doesn't own land, doesn't have property. Remember, in ancient Israel, obviously, property ownership was a very significant thing. Maybe less so today because we don't have the tribal divisions. But, in the time of the Beit Hamikdash, in the time of the judges, land was a big big big deal. The gear had no land. The gear had no family. The gear was an outsider. He was the bottom person on the totem pole. And you're sitting pretty in your land and you have your land and your king and your judges. And you look down at that person who's a nobody. What does the Torah say? Remember, you were once a nobody. You were once a slave. You were once the person that people would spit upon, humiliate, shame, embarrass, harass. You counted for nobody. So, when you see other people are in a vulnerable position, remember that you were once there. And use your rahamim to lift them up. This is very remarkable. Don't forget your traumas. Remember your pain. And use it as a way of helping others. Hazal tell us there are three characteristics of the Jewish people. Rahmanim, they are people of compassion. Baishanim, humility. Gomlei Hasadim, people who want to do kindness. What is the source of Jewish rahamim and hasadim? There are actually two different sources, like two rivers, two streams that join into a river that feed our nishamas. One, of course, is the yerusha of the avot and the imahot. From Avraham, Yitzchak, Yaakov, Sarah, Rivka, Rachel, Leah, Bilhah, and Zilpah. Compassion, care, rahamim. And the other? You might You might almost call that the genetic component. Although it's not truly genetic, but but you know, we get it from our ancestry. And the other source is Yitziat Mitzrayim. But not Yitziat Mitzrayim, the slavery of Mitzrayim makes us remember what it's like to be the downtrodden outsider. That is the source of rachamim. That is why, to give secular examples, even when Jews move far away from the Torah. This is why Jews were involved in civil rights struggles, whether in the United States or anti-apartheid in South Africa. And sometimes, I'm going to get in very big trouble for this, like many, many things, legitimate good feelings can get perverted when they're not put in a proper perspective. But I would submit that even the compassion towards Palestinians often misplaces, to be sure, in destructive ways. But in a sense, I give a certain credit to a Jewish heart, in which a Jewish heart cries when any human being suffers. Again, I obviously you have to weigh it against all sorts of things, of course, so I'm not endorsing any of the excesses that are indeed very, very bad and in some ways evil, so I'm not getting into into that. But at the same time, it comes from someplace. And that is we have a collective memory of slavery, of persecution, of abandonment, and that is the source of our compassion. So in a sense, I started off with the question, "Why should I be grateful that God made me a slave?" If all that happened was I'm I'm I'm getting back the freedom that I had, what has Hashem done for me? The answer is the freedom that I get after the slavery is not the same as the freedom I had before the slavery. And in two different ways, which almost move in opposite directions. The first gift was it taught me I have to be different. I can't assimilate. The second gift is I got to care. One is particularistic and one is universalistic at the same time. Both of those ideas go in. And again, we have to say it's an enormous source of pride. There are many things that living in Israel we should be very proud of about Israeli society, you know, religious, non-religious, whatever it is, but one of the things that Israel is very, very outstanding for is the help that it provides all over the world to any catastrophe, any emergency, any human suffering. We try to help. We try to alleviate. When Syria was going through issues years ago year years ago before and now with collapse, who knows what's going to happen now with that. Very exciting and very interesting. But you know, who knows. It's really uh very volatile at this point. But uh when Israel was providing the medical assistance to people who would be very happy to kill kill us at any moment. Again, was that the right thing to do? Okay. Uh there are issues one can debate about this, but once again, I will go back to the Jewish heart. I'll be a cardiac Jew for a little bit here and say, whether it was the right decision or the wrong decision, it came from a Jewish sensitivity towards the suffering of others. And that is a noble impulse. And that is one of the gifts that we got from yetziat Mitzrayim. I'm sorry, not yet. That was one of the gifts we got from the slavery in this right. Now, there's the point the whole point I'm making is it's not just the Exodus that gave us gifts. It's the slavery that gave us gifts. So, in effect, this is a lesson that applies to us in our private lives as well. And that is to see the redemptive potentials in adversity, in disappointments, in failure, to understand that there are hidden gifts. Maybe in ways we certainly don't want to get our gifts that way. But there are gifts in everything. We might call them the the awesome, awful gifts of God. I'm not using awful in the modern English, but in the old, traditional sense, something that was overwhelming. Something that could break me. But in some sense, there's some light I can grab onto. So, let me just end with a little story. Some of you might have read the book or come across the book All for the Boss. Uh this is a book about Rabbi Yaakov Yosef Herman, the author of All for the Boss. He was a great, great tzaddik. He was the father-in-law of Rabbi Scheinberg. Uh and uh and Rabbi Scheinberg's sister was Ruchama Shain, another Rebbetzin, and Ruchama Shain wrote a biography of her father, who was a big, big, big unusual tzaddik. And in the book, she tells a story about her father. Her father came with his parents to the United States. Again, my dates may not be fully accurate, but around World War I, maybe after World War I, or right before World War I, I don't remember. And um he was 11 or 12. And the parents couldn't stay. They couldn't make a living here. So, they went back to Europe and they left him here. They left him as a 12-year-old in the United States. And they set him up with a room in which he had to pay something like, whatever it is, $5 a month. Those were, you know, rents in those days. And as soon as the parents left, the landlord raised the rent to $10. This little boy who was working, cuz in in those days there were no child labor laws, so 10-year-olds were working. Uh this kid couldn't afford it. So, he was evicted Friday afternoon. He was kicked out of the apartment. And he spent the Friday night and Shabbat in Central Park. All by himself, and he had a little bag of two rolls. That's all he had. And can you imagine? Maybe we can't even imagine it. Although Central Park was probably relatively safe in those days. But he's in Central Park. He's cold. He's alone. He has no place to go. And in those days, even jobs, you know, uh if you didn't go to work on Saturday, you'd have to find a new job on Monday. Sunday was a day off, but uh but so can you imagine how despondent he was, how sad he was, how overwhelmed he was? And he had no parents. He had no family. And his prayer to Hashem was, he says he prayed to Hashem that night. And he said, "I know you're going to give me a yeshua. I know that I will have a parnassah. I know that I will get married. I know that I will have children. I know you will do this for me. My prayer to you, Hashem, is I should never forget what it's like to be cold and lonely and afraid and abandoned. I want to remember it when I'll be successful. I want to remember what this feeling was like so that when I see others who are going through it I'll know what they're going through. And if you read the book, you discover that, you know, eventually uh he became successful. He became uh relatively wealthy. Although he lost it in the depression, so there's ups and downs, but but there were years that he was in the fur business. I think he was he was very successful. He married a righteous Rebbetzin. Had children. And his house was an open house. He had hundreds and hundreds of people go through his house. And now now he had his share of Rosh Yeshivas. In fact, it was one of the few places that every Rosh Yeshiva from Europe who would normally not trust the kashrus of anybody in America. He was the the one person he and his wife was the one family that was totally trusted. So he had his share of gedolim. But he also had a huge number of people that we would not enjoy as our Shabbos guests. People who were mentally ill. People who were abusive. People who would kind of not just come for lunch, but they would kind of stay there for 6 months without, you know, without leaving. And uh there were times that Rebbetzin Ruchama Rebbetzin Ruchama recounts that somebody didn't like the cholent, so they took the whole uh tureen of cholent and they dumped it on him. You know, they didn't like it, whatever it was. And people would ask her of him, and he says, "How can you take this? How can you take these crazy abusive people? Just get rid of them." And he said, "I know what they're feeling. I know what they're going through because I was there. And I can't blame people for the way they behave because they've gone through so much suffering. So, he remembered that evening, that night. And that night gave him rachmanus his whole life to become the the man that he became. Eventually, you know, he had ups and downs as they say. He lost his uh wealth in the depression. Then he got a little bit of it back. He came through Eretz Yisrael. He died in Eretz Yisrael. Uh but a great great great great uh tzaddik all for the boss. That was his saying that he would he would refer to Hakadosh Baruch Hu as the boss. And he would say, "Everything's for the boss." You know, and and the like. So, what I'm suggesting is that you see Yitzias Mitzrayim as kind of a paradigm for the notion of using the traumas in our own lives as a basis of rachamim and compassion for others. And in that way part of our gratitude to the Almighty is not just for the redemption but for the slavery itself. So, be as Hashem, uh we should look at everything that happens in our lives as something that can uplift us, can educate us, can train us as difficult as as those things are. So, a good shavua, a good shabbos, and a good good week.