The Inner Exodus: What Passover Is Really About - Rabbi Yitzchak Breitowitz

[music] >> Shalom everyone from Yerushalayim. As all of you know, [music] we are going through once again difficult times, and as we approach the Yom Tov of Pesach, >> [snorts] >> all of us pray that the Kodesh Baruch Hu should bring us shalom and the Geulah Sheleimah as Chazal say, uh "B'Nisan Nigalu", we were redeemed in the month of Nisan, "U'V'Nisan Asidin L'Higa'el", and the future redemption will be coming in Nisan as well, and may all of us be zocheh to see this Geulah b'meheirah v'yameinu. I wanted to share with you a thought about the four cups of wine. All all of us know that one of the great mitzvot of Seder night is we have to drink a four cups of wine because the Torah uses four terms of redemption. "V'hotzeiti", I will take you out, "V'hitzalti", I will save you, "V'ga'alti", I will redeem you, "U'l'kachti etzchem l'i l'am", I will take you for me for unto me for a nation, which is actually referring to Matan Torah, which is the ultimate and the climax of the redemption. And I indeed I have spoken about this before, but I'm going to say something that I have not said before, and that is I want to project backwards a little bit and look at the calendar before Pesach. In the month of Adar, we have four special parshiot, four special Torah readings in the month of Adar, uh Parshat Shekalim, about the half shekel, Parshat Zachor, about remembering Amalek, Parshat Parah, about the mystery of the red heifer, and last Shabbat, the Shabbat before Rosh Chodesh Nisan, we read about Parshat Hachodesh. Now, although we've already passed that, I actually want to connect it with the four cups of wine. Rav Tzadok of Lublin, the great Rav Tzadok writes that as we approach Pesach and we try to achieve freedom and connection with God because that's the ultimate meaning of freedom, we first have to eradicate the very bad and destructive middot that prevent us from developing that connection. Now, we know that the three positive things that create our connection to God are of course the three pillars that the world stands upon, and that is Torah, Avodah, Gemilut Chassadim, the learning of Torah, divine service of korbanot and prayer, and Gemilut Chassadim, acts of loving kindness. But the same way there are three positive features that build our relationship, there are three negative features that destroy them, that relationship, and these are encapsulated by Rabbi Elazar HaKappar, who says "HaKina", jealousy, "Ta'avah", excessive preoccupation with hedonistic pleasure, and "Kavod", the incessant seeking of ego gratification, "Motzi'in et ha'adam min ha'olam", they destroy a person's ability to connect to God. So Rav Tzadok suggests that before we come to the holiday of Pesach, we need to work on and eradicate, although we'll never be 100% successful, the negative attributes of jealousy, ta'avah, lust, and kavod, and he suggests therefore that this is the purpose of the four parshiot. Parshat Shekalim helps us deal with jealousy. Parshat Zachor helps us deal with ta'avah, I will explain this. Parshat Parah helps us deal with kavod, and as we have worked on kina, ta'avah, and kavod, we're then ready for the fourth level, which is chodesh, which means "hischadshut", renewal and connection to God. And as a result, this will exactly parallel the four cups of wine, that we are succeeding in getting liberated in stages. We try to liberate ourselves from jealousy, uh we try to liberate ourselves from ta'avah, we try to liberate ourselves from kavod, and then we're ready for the fourth cup, in which we can truly accept HaKodesh Baruch Hu's Torah, because as long as we have these bad and destructive middot inside of us, we are not ready to accept the Torah. Rav Chaim Vital says that good middot are a foundation to the edifice that you construct. They are kind of beyond the Torah, even prior to the Torah, because the Torah can only be given to people who are fundamentally good in their middot tovot. So now, let me just explain relatively quickly how each of the four parshiot corresponds to this destructive to the eradication of this destructive middah. Uh Parshat Shekalim, we know that the distinguishing feature of the Parshat Shekalim is that rich and poor give the same amount, that even if you are very, very wealthy, you cannot give more than a half shekel, and even if you're very, very poor, you cannot give less than a half shekel. Everyone is equal. The Sfas Emes writes that the lesson of Machatzit Hashekel is that when we talk about having a relationship to God, whether you're wealthy or poor makes no difference, and that doesn't only mean in money. Some people are wealthy in all sorts of talents, wisdom, charisma, leadership ability. Other people might be a little defective in some of those talents. But the point is, as long as you do the best with the kochot that Hashem has given you, you stand before HaKodesh Baruch Hu with equality. The rich, in what however that's defined, and the poor, however that is defined, stand with equality of dignity and importance and belovedness in the eyes of God as long as you do your best. If you think about this, this is obviously a very great antidote to jealousy, because I look around and I see somebody who's smarter than me, who's richer than me, who has seemingly more success in life, and I look at myself and I feel cheated and I feel deprived and I feel I wasn't given the chances that I need. But the lesson of Machatzit Hashekel is you serve God with what you have. You are as beloved to God as the person who serves God with what they have. And "l'heitech", if you give God 100% of what you have, that is actually greater than the person who might do much, much more than you, but is only giving God 20% or 30%. So the machshavah of Machatzit Hashekel uh helps us uproot the very destructive middah of jealousy. Now, we then come to Parshat Zachor, and here the association is a little less clear, uh but Rav Tzadok writes, and other sefarim write it as well, that when we talk about eradicating Amalek, Amalek represents this evil in the world, but it's not only the external Amalek, but there's an internal Amalek that's within us, and part of the obligation of eradicating Amalek is to eradicate the Amalek that is within us, because in essence, it is the Amalek within us that gives power to the external Amalek to persecute us and to destroy us. So what is the Amalek within? Rav Tzadok suggests it is coldness in the service of God. Now, the Torah talks about Amalek as "Ashercha ba'derech", they encountered you in the way, but Rashi brings a midrash that "korcha" means they made you cold. Now, the way Rashi explains it, again, the way the midrash explains it, is when the Jewish people left Mitzrayim, the whole world was afraid of them. They were like a boiling, scalding bath that nobody would dare put in their toe or put in their finger. They were scared of the Jews. The splitting of the Red Sea, the 10 plagues. Amalek jumped into that boiling bath, and they got burnt, but they cooled off the bath for the next guy. That's how Rashi, based on the midrash, understands "made you cold". Rav Tzadok takes the same etymology, but he he moves it in a different direction. He says the "shoresh", the root of Amalek, is coldness and complacency in our service of God. You know, even if a person keeps the mitzvot, and even if a person learns Torah, that's a wonderful thing, but if you do it without feeling, you do it without passion, you do it out of a sense of boredom or complacency or disinterest, there is something defective in that avodah, and that's kind of the Amalek of indifference and coldness. And therefore, when we talk about eradicating Amalek, we are talking about eradicating the coldness of the soul that does not respond to spirituality with joy and vibrancy. Rav Tzadok then goes on and says, "Why would it be that mitzvot sometimes don't excite us? Why don't we get an excited passion about every Shabbat, every davening, every benching, every bracha? Why is it that we turn off and tune out, even if we're going through the motions?" So Rav Tzadok suggests that this is when you're over-involved in the hedonistic pleasures of the world. Now, Judaism is not ascetic, we do believe that a person should legitimately enjoy the world and thank God for it. But it's also true that the more we are connected to the physical and the material, the more that becomes the central part of our lives, the less attuned and sensitive we will be to spiritual pleasure. And that is because physical pleasures tend to be immediate and spiritual pleasures take effort and work. And once we get habituated to the immediate rush, we're not willing or happy to put in the effort. So, based on these train of associations, let me reiterate, Parshat Zachor is eradicating Amalek. But eradicating Amalek on the outside also means eradicating Amalek on the inside. And Amalek on the inside is coldness in Avodas Hashem. And the coldness comes from the taiva, the over-involvement in materialistic and hedonistic pleasure. So, Parshat Zachor makes us reflect on the fact that we need to disengage a little bit from the rat race of accumulation and taiva and possessions. It's okay to own possessions, but you got to be careful that your possessions don't own you, because there you're in trouble. So, Shekalim helps us with jealousy. Zachor in an indirect way helps us reflect on taiva. And then we come to Para Aduma, uh the mystery of the red heifer, uh in which if a person was tamei by being in contact with a dead body, so the purification ritual is to be sprinkled with the ashes of the red heifer. >> [snorts] >> And this is called a chok. This is a law for which we really don't understand all the reasons. Uh even Hamelech, the wisest of all people, who understood or thought he understood all of the mitzvos of the Torah, when he got to this one, he realized that this was an enigma. Nevertheless, the Sifrei Chassidim give us a little bit of an explanation, and they basically tell us that death Adam and Chava should have lived forever. Death came into the world because of arrogance and gaiva, because the nachash told them, "The day that you eat this fruit, you will be like God at understanding good and evil." In other words, the fruit was marketed as a God pill. Imagine the ultimate ego trip of being God. Now, in many ways a human being is God-like. We are made in the image of God. We have free will. We have autonomy. We have intelligence. We have creativity. We can destroy worlds. We can create many, many things. And yet, when a human being is carried away and to think he can replace God or be as good as God, that will ultimately be his destruction. Death came into the world because of arrogance and gaiva. And the reason why we are purified with ashes is because ashes is a sign of humility. Death comes into the world because of arrogance. We become liberated from death by gestures of humility and submission. Now, what's interesting is humility is both good and bad. There is good humility and bad humility. The good humility is the humility in which I understand that everything I am is from Hashem and I must use my talents to serve Hashem. There is bad humility in which I think I'm worthless and what I do what I do doesn't count. And that might even be part of the mystery why with Para Aduma we have the paradox that the ashes can purify the impure, but those who handle the ashes become impure. Because how could the same thing make you pure and impure? Humility is exactly that situation. The humility of turning my life over to God is wonderful and pure, but the humility of self-loathing, a lack of self-esteem, a sense of worthlessness turns out to be destructive and impure, because you'll never become the person that God intended you to be. As Rebbe Nachman of Breslov said, "A person who is not aware of his faults is a foolish person if I think I'm perfect, but a person who is not aware of their inner greatness >> [snorts] >> is a tragic person, because he will never know the tools that God gave him to accomplish his mission." So, so far we have the very beautiful progression. Shekalim helps us with jealousy. Zachor helps us with taiva. The paradox of Para Aduma helps us balance the need for humility and the need of healthy self-esteem. Hopefully, we go through a transition where we try to improve ourselves in the areas of kina, taiva, and kavod. Afterwards, you are ready for renewal. Now, halachically it's very interesting that in the Jewish calendar, there can sometimes be a break between Shekalim and Zachor and Zachor and Para, but there is never a break between Para and Chodesh. Shabbat Parshat Zachor Chodesh is always the Shabbat right after Parshat Para. And the reason Rav Tzadok says is the following idea. After you eradicate the evil and you've achieved a certain level of inspiration, you must concretize it in virtuous action. You know, all of us have moments of inspiration. It might be after Yom Kippur. It might be at a wedding of our child or grandchild. It might be at the Kotel. It might be just walking in Yerushalayim. There are moments in which we are inspired, but if you don't concretize it by I'm going to even by even in a small way, I'm going to pray to Hashem, give thanks to Hashem in my own words for 15 minutes. I'm going to learn an extra half an hour, the inspiration dissipates, disappears, and it's not going to be recaptured. So, after you've achieved a successful battle against kina, taiva, and kavod, you then have to have renewal. So, now let's swing over to the four cups of wine. If the four cups of wine are an expression of freedom, perhaps homiletically, now this is a drash, I'm not claiming this is pshat, the first three cups, we're achieving symbolically freedom from kina, taiva, and kavod, just like Shekalim, Zachor, and Para. And the last cup is Matan Torah, V'lakachti es Chaim l'am, because that's exactly the message. Only when you have purified your middos are you truly ready to accept Hakadosh Baruchu's Torah and live the life of a Jew. As Rav Chaim Volozhin as Rav Chaim Vital says, without middos tovos, we are not yet human beings. The Torah was given to human beings, not to animals. And when we live on the level of animals, we are not ready to be sanctified and elevated by Hashem's Torah. So, as we think of the four parshiyos and we try to connect them to the four cups of wine, let us recognize that Pesach is not only about the historical redemption of the Jewish people from their slavery in Egypt. It is about the redemption of each and every one of us from the inner enslavements that we have. The chains that hold us back. The middos ra'os that block us. As the Baal HaTanya says, the very word Mitzrayim means metzarim, boundaries, constrictions, and blockages. May all of us be zocheh to become liberated from all that enslaves us in our personal life. A chag kasher v'sameach. Hi. This is Rabbi Mordechai Klugman, a proud alumnus of Ohr Somayach. 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