Korban Pesach: A Covenant

If somebody asks you after learning these p'sukim, "Why were the Yidden in Mitzrayim given a commandment to bring a korban Pesach?" All right, that's the p'shutei sh'mi'ah of the ikkar of what's happening in all these mitzvos. The korban Pesach. Why were they given a korban Pesach? So, I think you would answer, rightfully so, "This was the hekesh temsa for the Yidden to have a sh'mirah k'neged Makkas B'choros. They needed a sh'mirah for Makkas B'choros. And the way that they were going to have the sh'mirah was through the korban Pesach. What shayach is he going to bring a korban? Make sure you don't have a machshavas piggul. You're going to learn Z'vachim u'Menachos first, and then afterwards you're going to somehow get a sh'mirah. No, cuz you're going to take the dam and put it on the mezuzos and put it on the mashkof. And Kodesh Boruchu, the mashkof, is going to see it, and like this you're going to be protected." It's a good answer, but I That's not a satisfactory answer. The reason it's not a satisfactory answer is because if really this is just a hekesh temsa to have a little bit of sh'mirah, they could have taken a little bit of dam and put it on the mezuzos or the mashkof, or they could have taken anything for that matter, and put it on the mezuzos or the mashkof. Like this it would be a siman, "This is where a Yid lives." And as a result, everybody would The mashkof, Kodesh Boruchu, would know to jump over. So, of course in the p'shutei sh'mi'ah that's what's playing out over here. But it is also much from the p'shutei sh'mi'ah that there's more than meets the eye. Because if all this is is just a hekesh temsa for Kodesh Boruchu to know to jump over, for the mashkof to know to jump over, well, for that we wouldn't have to have a korban Pesach with all the dinim. So, it's much that there's more going on. Pashut. And the truth is that Rashi, in the beginning of perek bais, this is on pasuk vov, he quotes a Chazal that every single person knows. "A Yisrael Mitzri u'Chorashi." Rav Masya ben Charash used to say, "Aray vaymer, the navi Yechezkel said, 'Whatever aliyah the erech, v'hinei iteich is doiten.'" Kodesh Boruchu said, "I gave a sh'vu'ah in the spati l'Avraham she'egaleh es banav mi'Mitzrayim >> The time came for me to go ahead and fulfill the promise that I made Abraham Avinu and that is to redeem The promise that you didn't have no mitzvahs. And because they had no mitzvahs, so they had no so they had no in order to be redeemed. As the possuk says They were naked. They had nothing. Nothing to understand What Hashem did was he gave them two mitzvahs. did bris milah on that night. By the way, the reason they had to do bris milah on that night for nothing else is because the possuk is going to say that oral is not allowed to eat from the carbon pesach. So they were forced to do bris milah. So they had the dam of the milah and they had the dam of the carbon pesach. For the possuk also says God was because of the dam of the bris that I took out that I released these hostages. But the point is that you want to know why gave the mitzvah of carbon pesach because they needed a mitzvah. They couldn't be saved. They couldn't be redeemed without a mitzvah. And the time had come. The time had come. The time had He gave us fortune But on a mitzvah you can't get out. The ticket you need to show in order to gain admission is a mitzvah. They didn't have a mitzvah. And Hashem gave them a mitzvah. Not just one mitzvah he gave them two mitzvahs. He gave them dam pesach. He gave them dam milah. And when they had the dam now already they were able to get out. They made dam milah. ultimately led to the actual exodus. It's not just that we have have to have dam that we're going to have a little bit of a It's more than that. They also needed a mitzvah. So the Indian of the carbon pesach was the mitzvah. Now the mitzvah had a dam. Hashem saw the dam. The dam was saw the dam. This fluid of the dam is not Oh, I see dam and may I know what you live here. Yeah, that is for sure the pshuta of the mikra, but there's an oimek in it as well. And that is a Jew lives here and I see that that Jew was oisek in dam bishnei damim. If he brought a korban Pesach, that means dam Pesach, means dam milah, and now he has a zchus to be saved, a zchus to ultimately come out of Mitzrayim. And that's with a little bit more oimek of what's going on over here. But the truth is that if you look in the Rishonim, it's even deeper than that. Because another question you have to ask, and that is Okay, so with the korban Pesach, why was this the mitzvah? Why was this the mitzvah? Why was the mitzvah korban Pesach? And really, if you think of the mitzvah, it's a very, very, very nuanced mitzvah. A seh, a common, a zachar, ben shanah. There's a whole bunch of different halachos related to the korban Pesach. Now, we're going to talk more about this in the next year, right? But just to bring out one point before we even roll our sleeves up here, and that is one of the themes of the korban Pesach is that it had to be eaten b'chipazon. The Rashbam in pshuta of the mikra, and the Rambam in the Moreh Nevuchim says this as well, that really all the halachos come out related to the korban Pesach is related to that inyan, right? Why they eating matzah and that nacham it's that everybody knows because there's no time when you're going to wait three hours now until the challah is ready, right? We have to move. We have to do this quickly. Why was it tzli esh? Because to put a piece of meat on the grill, it cooks a lot faster than if you go ahead and you cook it bashal b'vosev u'v'marav. Why did it have to be rosho al kroav al kirbo? Because there's no time to start chopping it up. So, you're supposed to keep it whole, says the Rashbam, says the Rambam in the Moreh Nevuchim. We know that there was a lot in the Torah we didn't see this yet. We'll see this in the next year. Od ha'etzem lo yishaver bo. There's no time to start chopping up bones. The whole inyan had to be done b'chipazon. So, there's a whole bunch of halachos over here associated with this. But the bottom line is, if all this is is dam, and if all this is is even a mitzvah, so why this mitzvah? It's still something that's in a yom el d'rabbanan. So, all the rishonim say kish achad b'lev achad in some nusach or another that the inyan of bringing the carbon Pesach dafka as the mitzvah that was the hachana for yetzias Mitzrayim was related to the fact that the Yidden in Mitzrayim were shutfim avodah zarah. And they needed to detach themselves from the avodah zarah of the Egyptians and this was the heches tinsha for them to be able to do that. And really, in order to appreciate this, in order to understand this, we have to take a step back and we have to understand a little bit better the avodah zarah culture of the ancient Egypts. Now, this is an inyan that is above my pay grade, but at the same time, it's somewhat accessible and just a a toy am el in terms of trying to understand this a little bit. So, at the time that the Yidden were Mitzrayim, the entire world practically were over the avodah zarah. They were pagans. Now, baruch Hashem, we're very, very removed from the world of avodah zarah. We're certainly very removed from the world of primitive than prehistoric avodah zarah. The yetzer d'avodah zarah was already bottle. It's not something that us Yidden understand even superficially, let alone in a nuanced way where we could fully appreciate what's going on. But, just to set the scene a drop, the ancient over the avodah zarah, they didn't just worship a getchka, they worshipped multiple getchkas, right? They were polytheists. They had this complex, intricate web of different gods and deities that they worshipped. As a matter of fact, everything had a god, right? All the celestial beings had gods. All the inanimate objects had gods. Every emotion had a god. Everything was governed by some sort of god. And if you read, which of course you're not supposed to, Greek mythology and Egyptian mythology, there's fighting going on between the gods and this kind of this kind of this kind of this kind of That's what's going on over there. But this was what they believed. And they believed in all these to the rate of of the Zohar. That's how it was. So, you know, for an Egyptian, if you had a farm or he had a a you know, a backyard where he grew corn and he wanted to make sure that he has a good crop. So, to him, what did he do? He would worship a certain constellation or he would worship a certain animal or whatever it might be. And in his mind, that was the school. That was the school that he needed in order for everything to to play itself out. It's interesting that the Rambam in the Moreh Nevukhim, this is in Helek Shelishi, he talks a lot about the Avodah Zarah of the Egyptians. As a matter of fact, he even traces them to a cult of the prehistoric times known as the Tzabin. In English, known as the Sabeans. I just want to read one excerpt from the Rambam. He says, "Yadoa, it's Yadoa, she'avram Avinu are they the Avram Avinu god of Avodah Zarah Tzabin. He grew up, he was raised in a family that followed this form of Avodah Zarah known as the Tzabin. The Avodah Zarah of Egypt at the time of the Exodus, at the time of Yetzi'at Mitzrayim, says the Rambam in the Moreh, was the identical Avodah Zarah that Avram Avinu grew up in. How much color does that add to what we say in the Haggadah, mitkhila hayu avoteinu ovdei avodah zarah, Terah avi Avram, right? It was the same exact Avodah Zarah. The Avodah Zarah that the Yidden were so intertwined with at the time of Yetzi'at Mitzrayim was mamash of Zarah that Avram Avinu grew up in. That's what it was. As a matter of fact, the Rambam says that he got his hand on many, many books that talk about the Sabeans and that talk about the Tsabim. He said, "Anything that was written in Arabic he read." Now, there's a lot of Torah how was the Rambam allowed to read this? The Rambam himself writes in the Yad Hazaka, you know, allowed to read these types of Chitzonim. The Kama Komos in the Stav, but this is Meforash in the handwriting of the Rambam in the Moreh where the Rambam writes that he read a lot of these different books. There's one book that he gives a a very particular shout-out to. He refers to it as Avodah Zara Hanabatit. It's actually a book that, believe it or not, if you try hard enough, you can find today. It's called Nabataean Agriculture and the Rambam even gives a shout-out to the Mechaber. He says Shetirgam was written by Ibn Wahshiyya. Some right, I'm even you often. It was written by Ibn Wahshiyya and the Rambam says he read the book and he said when he read this book he had so much of a better understanding of what was going on in Mitzrayim at the time that the Yidden were there and he understood the Avodah Zara. And then he famously said that it also helped him understand a lot of the Ta'amei Hamitzvos. Again, but this is way beyond the scope of what we have to do right now. But the bottom line is so the Rambam describes the specific form of the Egyptians, even gives a name to the cult. They were known as the Sabeans. They were known as the Tsabim. Now again, this is a little bit overwhelming, but just two things that I think are worth mentioning and that is that within the world of the complexity of the mythology and of the Avodah Zara of the Egyptians, there were two gods, so to speak, that stood out. Now, by the way, I just want to give a shout-out to a book that was written by a Yid whose name is Yisrael Kahan. It's called Mitzrayim Midrash and Myth, Egyptian Mythology, Rabbinic Tradition and the Story of the Exodus. Nachi Weinstein interviewed him a little while back. He actually learns with Chavrusa with a a very close Yid of the Machberah, Dr. Naor Bar-Zev, somebody that we all know and we all love and appreciate very much. But anyway, they learned together with this Yeshiva man that he wrote a book where he basically works through the midrashim in light of an academic understanding of Egyptian mythology. So it's a fascinating mission statement. By the way, he's not the machaber or the mechadesh of this idea. There was a safer that was written by an Italian godol in the 19th century, Rebel Leo Ben Amozegh. He wrote a safer called Em La Mikra. It's a well-known safer and throughout safer Shemot this is an inyan. Dov Beis HaLevi works with this a little bit in his farm. The bottom line is he's not the first person to do this. So there's already a precedent to do this. But the bottom line is working through some of these inyanim. But just two things that I think is shavua nefesh that I will find interesting. And that is the Rambam in Perek Tes in the Moreh. So the Rambam he starts talking a little bit about the more specific avodah zarahs of the Egyptians, of the tzavim. And then he says that they used to worship the kochavim and the mazalot. That's why in the Torah we always refer to ovdei avodah zarah petisei nachash shamayim and you're going to see all the celestial beings. And then the Rambam says one line, "V'she Hashem as they believed that the sun he hu el ha ha godol." That's like the spitz god. So the god that created the world and that's in control of everything they believed they believed is the shemesh. The truth is that as Yisrael Cohn brings in his book Ba'arichos the Egyptians considered the sun god to be the god and it was known as Ra. R A or Reish Ayin. It was known as Ra. Now the sun god had a a temple. The temple is what's known in the secular world as Heliopolis. That was a a city in Egypt. The Torah refers to Heliopolis as On. Remember Potiphar? Is he Potiphar is he not Potiphar? Rashi says he's Potiphar. Rashi says he's not Potiphar, right? Ends up Potiphar. But either way, so Potiphar was a coin of iron. You know what it meant? He was the coin of iron. It means he was the priest. He was like managed the coin got to he goes the knife of the snip, right? He literally literally is the one that's in iron. That's the sun god. That's like the god god god. That's where it is that he's operating. One of the things that he strolls home says, he says, "Me or they are if that's not shot in a Rashi that we gloss over on purpose in the first year and Irishman's boy. When Moshe Rabbeinu is having it out with Paroi and at one point he's Paroi says, "All right, you want to go go. I will meet with me I will go home. Tell me who's on the list, right? I don't want to I want to review it." Somebody says, "You want to know who's on the list? I'm going to tell you." Ben Rabbeinu Ben Moseinu Ben Tzeinu Ben Koreinu. Right? Did I miss anything? Everybody is going. So Paroi told him However Ra negative negative I don't even know what the Targum means. There's a there's a constellation of star whose name is Ra. Paroi told him Ra is going to come after you. You know what he told him? He says, "What? I understand. Ha values very impressive. And what you're doing right now I got to give it to you. But at the same time if you're going to go out into the midbar Ra is going to be waiting for you. He is the god in Egypt and he's going to be there and he's going to take you out. That's Ra. It's this Ra. It's Like what's even the shot? It's it's even more than that. The Rambam says it's in the mirror that the Egyptian kings, the Pharaohs, the Pharaohs, they claimed to have been the sons of Ra. They claimed that they were the sons of Ra. Right? This idea of the son of God is an idea that, you know, became more popular with Masha Zaman and Mayfin Yofen. But, the pharaohs believed to be the sons of God. As a matter of fact, the word Ramses, right? A lot of the Egyptian kings were known as Ramesses. Ramesses the first, the second, the third, right? There's 11 of them. But, there was a lot of these Ramesses, right? Based on the city of Ramses. But, what's the etymology of the word Ramesses or the word Ramses? So, Ra the Ra part of Ramses, that's the sun god. That's what Ra Mesu in Egyptian means born to, and Mes means son. That's what Ramses means. It means the son of Ra. It means the son of God. That's what's going on over here. I'll tell you something even more fascinating. And that is that Rav Saadia Gaon in a place, he talks a little bit also about the way they served the Egyptians. And he says, "I Kasa Shlishis Imeres Sha Hashem Shua Avoy Kara Agamor Vusivas Kol Avoda Nefsa." He said there's a certain cut of Avoda Zara, the Sabeans, the Tsabim that the Rambam's talking about in the Rambam came after Rav Saadia Gaon. But, he's referring to this group of people and he says they believe that the sun is the god of all gods. "Vusivas Kol Avoda Nefsa. Viktzas Mechaqmei Mitzrayim Nimshachu Achal Machsheves Avoda Zara and the some of the Chachmei Mitzrayim that very much followed it. U Lo you ready for this punchline? What was the second to last Makas Rav Saadia Gaon? "Hoyu Shlishis Yemei Choshech Mitzrayim." For us "Hekir Parash Inam Emtzo Meatzmo." That's the Eima K'Makas Choshech. Take out Ra. Fascinating. Right before the Mitzrayim message for them, this is like the second to last, right? Cuz again, it's going in progression. D'Tzach Adash B'Achav is spoken about right now. So, Makkas right before, almost over, bam, three days of darkness. What's the significance? And by the way, the Rambam says if we would know this culture more, you would have everything. You would have why frogs, you would understand everything. But we're limited in terms of our understanding. The Rambam says he tried getting his hands on everything written in Arabic on this topic. Yes. It's much better according to Rambam and say to God it's fascinating. But the bottom line is that's the only of the solution may have failed. That's what was going on over here. But either way again, so within the world of all this Egyptian mythology, we have to at least be a little bit a little bit acquainted with Ra because he's someone that that plays a very very big role. But there was another I believe this is a very huge deal in Egypt. And this already we have a lot of them and that is the Egyptians used to worship the constellation that's known as Aries. And Aries is in the form of a ram. It's in the form of a clay. They used to worship They used to worship the muzzle of clay. This was that way they said they would worship. As a matter of fact, as he said in his book that if you study Egyptian mythology, the Ra the sun god at night would always take on the form of a ram. That was always in their mind the way he looked. But the the ram the clay was a very very big deal. The Rambam talks about this in his book in chapter 11. Over there the Rambam says that it wasn't only the ram the clay that they used to worship based on the constellation of Aries, but they also used to worship the goat. And so this So like this people will not bring they won't bring the clay to the ram. They're not going to worship the goat. Now why did worship the goat? So, the Rambam says cuz they believed that the shadim, the demons, would take on the physical uh embodiment of the goat, then it was somehow representative of shadim, which was, you know, devil worship. This is part of their avodah. But, the bottom line is, says the Rambam in the Moreh, they used to worship the tleh, the mazel of tleh, that constellation. Additionally, they used to worship the goat. Just to hear Zeram dos This type of avodah, of worshipping goats, was very popular in the times of Moshe. But, the bottom line is, what did they used to worship? They used to worship the sheep, the ram, and they used to worship the goat. It's for that reason, it's for that reason amongst all, there was so many hundreds, maybe thousands, but amongst all of them that they had, it was Ra. And in addition to Ra, there was also the the tleh, and the goat, and the sun. These were things that were considered very sacred. These were things that were considered very, very holy. Now, as we mentioned, the Yidden were very, very much akur in the avodah zarah of Mitzrayim. Right? It wasn't just the Egyptians, it wasn't just the secular people. It was laida laida in the chaimisha chraishin also. This was something that every single person on some level, right? Just to hear the leshone azav of the Ramban. Everybody knows. And he quotes the pasuk in Yechezkel perek chof where the navi says tells them in Mitzrayim pesel Mitzrayim They were steeped in the avodah zarah. Everyone knows when the Yidden came to the am so the am so didn't want to support for the Jews, he said Everyone knows said that Mitzrayim, told me they would have stayed in Mitzrayim one extra second, they would have never had an opportunity to get out. But here's the bottom line. The Yidden was steep. They were so core in the avodah zarah of the Egyptians, of the Mitzrayim. And in order for them to leave Mitzrayim, it wasn't enough that they have a siman. And it wasn't even enough that they did a mitzvah. They needed to on some level do a pe'ulah to eradicate their connection to the avodah zarah of the Egyptians. They had to be manatik themselves somewhat from the avodah zarah of the Egyptians. And how did they do that? They took the tleh, a male because it's a ram. They took the ram and they went ahead and they slaughtered it and they You're shocheting the ram? Remember what Paroh Moshe told Paroh earlier in Parshas Va'eira, when you know, Paroh is bending a little bit. He says, "You know what? You want to bring korbanos? Just do it here in Egypt." So Moshe tells him, "Do you understand what we're going to do? We're going to shochet a sheep. We're going to shochet cattle. They're going to kill us if we do this." And they went ahead and they did it anyways. And the inyan was to go ahead and show that this avodah zarah that you worship, this avodah zarah that we worship, we understand now that there's a Yud Kay Vav Kay, there's a Havayah, there's a Hoyeh Hoyeh v'Hayah. That's Mashgiach al kol protaynu. And he's a takif ba'al yecholos ba'al koach kol v'chol. They also saw the makos. And they also came to that kor of yedat em. Right, they understand what's going on over here. And we realize that we need to serve him. And you know we're going to serve him? We're going to take what we've been serving, what we considered sacred, and we're going to shochet it, and we're going to offer it up 100% to the real God of all gods, to the real Melech Malchei Hamlachim. And that's what they needed to do in order to be manatik themselves, in order to discharge themselves from the clutches of the avodah zarah in order for them to be able to leave Mitzrayim. That's the oimek. That's the oimek of the korban Pesach. Yeah, you read the story of the korban Pesach, you read the psukim, it It like they needed blood as an ois. It's just like a cool way to do it. What do you mean for that you don't need a carbon Pesach with all the halachas? Okay, Ramasim and choras addressed it already. Ramasim and choras have a problem with mitzvah. Even that is still Torah beer. Why is this the mitzvah? It's a mitzvah. It's not a mitzvah sikhli. It's like what exactly is this? The teretz is this oimek. And really like the Rambam says in the more of the more you understand Egyptian mythology, the more you would appreciate the higher level of what's going on. The more you would be able to appreciate every single nuance and every single prat and everything that's happening.