Dvar Torah By Rabbinit Dr. Jennie Rosenfeld
Hasidic thinkers write about the exile of Egypt as an exile of speech, an exile of the word. This exile was personified in Moshe who calls himself both “kevad peh u’kevad lashon” as well as “aral sefatayim.” Hasidic writers view Moshe’s speech impediment as reflecting a wider phenomenon – the exile of speech. Redemption, correspondingly, is a redemption of speech.
The Rambam codifies the obligation of each and every one of us today to feel as if we personally have been redeemed from Egypt. We are, therefore, forced to ask ourselves what this redemption of speech means on a practical level and what it could look like for us today.
Rav Shimon Gershon Rosenberg, z”l (1949-2007), better known as Rav Shagar, writes about this in his book “Zman Shel Cherut: Drashot l’Chag haPesach” (“A Time of Freedom: Sermons for Pesach”). Redemption for Rav Shagar is found in human interaction and connection – in conversation between people rather than between man and G-d.
Rav Shagar writes movingly that the essence of the redemption we experience on Pesach is communal, rather than personal. We experience a widening of our own boundaries that enables us to make space for guests in a way that doesn’t hinder us. Both the welcoming of guests (“Kol dichfin yetei veyeichol”—”Let all who are hungry come and eat”) and conversation with others are hallmarks of the Seder night. Conversation is so essential that the Rambam even obligates the person who is alone at their own Seder to recite the Haggadah in question-and-answer form, so that he is in dialogue with himself!
The challenge inherent in Rav Shagar’s teaching is indeed trying, particularly over Pesach – will we open our homes to those in need of hospitality? And will we also open our hearts? How will the conversation at the Seder look – will we simply act out the same conversations and clashes as last year? Or will we enter with an open mind and heart, striving to find redemption this year, even if we have not succeeded in past years? Are we open to letting in the new and the unexpected?
Rav Shagar presents a model of what true conversation can look like – a speaking between subjects, where each person truly listens to the other, thus allowing the conversation to develop in an organic way. In true conversation, no matter how well one knows the other person, neither side knows in advance what the other or even the self will say. Redemption, for Rav Shagar, is the ability to open ourselves up to the possibilities that can emerge when we truly speak to the other, without fear.
May each and every one of us merit a Pesach of redemption, a Pesach in which we experience the verse in Psalms (118:5) (“Min hameitzar, karati y-ah, annani bamerchav y-ah”), a Pesach in which those areas that are currently narrow, and in which we experience only tunnel vision, should be widened into the broader perspective of redemption – both in our personal lives in prayer and Torah study, as well as in our wider relationships with family and friends.
Rabbanit Dr. Jennie Rosenfeld serves as Manhiga Ruchanit in Efrat, Israel. She received a heter hora’ah from the Susi Bradfield Women’s Institute for Halakhic Leadership at Midreshet Lindenbaum and a Ph.D. in English from the CUNY Graduate Center. She co-authored “Et Le’ehov: The Newlywed’s Guide to Physical Intimacy.”
