SO THE PEOPLE TOOK THEIR DOUGH BEFORE
IT HAD FERMENTED, THEIR KNEADING BOWLS WRAPPED IN THEIR CLOAKS UPON THEIR
SHOULDERS…. NOW THEY BAKED THE DOUGH WHICH THEY HAD BROUGHT OUT OF EGYPT INTO
MATZOTH CAKES, FOR IT HAD NOT FERMENTED, FOR THEY HAD BEEN DRIVEN OUT
OF EGYPT AND COULD NOT LINGER; NEITHER HAD THEY MADE PROVISIONS FOR
THEMSELVES.

 (Shemot 12:34, 39)

"Before it had
fermented" – The Egyptians did not let them wait for
fermentation.

(Rashi, Shemot 12:34)

"For they had
been driven out of Egypt… neither had they made provisions for
themselves." – The fact that they were driven out of Egypt and
that they could not even prepare the necessary bread for the journey, so that
at the actual moment of the exodus, it was on their part an unwilling one, this
fact impresses for ever on this exodus the stamp of its being exclusively the
act of God, and makes the prohibition of matzah and chametz into
a symbol of still greater significance. Without this memorial, Israel's
descendants could have looked on the exodus as being a human achievement
similar to so many others in history. We have heard in the preceding verses
that they were 600,000 sturdy men, so their liberation would be no wonder, the
wonder would only be that they submitted for so long to such inhuman
oppression. But then the matzah tells us that they were driven out of
Egypt, so driven that they could not even prepare their bread properly; they
would willingly have tarried… but they could not, it was not in
their power, the Egyptians would not permit them.

                                                                 (Rabbi Shimshon Rafael Hirsch 12:39 –
translated from the original by Isaac Levi)

LIBERTY AND ITS PRICE

Ariel Rauthaus

At
the beginning of his commentary to the Book of Bereishit, Rashi queried: Should
not the Torah have begun with "This New Moon shall be for you the
beginning of the New Moons, it is for you the first month of the year"
(Shemot
12:2 – Parashat Bo), for
this is the first commandment "with which all Israel was charged"
[the commandments regarding circumcision and the gid hanasheh were given
to individuals, as explained by the "Siftei Chachamim"]

This
is an extreme and paradoxical position (ignoring, for a moment, Rashi's famous
answer, regarding our claim to Eretz Yisrael): even if we accept the position
that the Torah is only a book of laws and divine commandments, the story of
Creation by God, "King of the Universe" lays the ideological
foundation for the keeping of the mitzvot, and, as such, it is proper
that it precede the first mitzvah.

But
the logic of Rashi's opening words becomes clearer when we recall the special
nature and content of the mitzva of "Hachodesh hazeh
lachem" – This New Moon is for you." Traditional commentary sees
this as a basic and founding mitzvah, its ideological significance being
no less deep than the story of Creation itself: If Parashat
"Bereishit" presents God, Creator of the Universe, Whose majesty
commits the Jewish people to observe His mitzvot, Parashat "This
New Moon is for you" reminds us of the new reality created for the
Israelite nation in that month of Nissan – which we are commanded to designate
the first of New Moons – a reality of redemption and freedom. Redemption and
freedom are not only the return of the image of man to those who lost it in
bondage; it is also the true sine qua non for observance of mitzvot. This
feeling of rebirth given by freedom was beautifully expressed by Rabbi Ovadia
Seforno, in his commentary on "This New Moon is for you first of the
New Moons":

"From
now on these will be your New Moons, to do with them as you see fit, but
in the days of subjugation your days were not yours, they were for the service
of others and the carrying out of their wills. Therefore – "It is for
you the first of the year's New Moons", for in it began your volitional reality [your reality as people able
to chose]."

The Ramban elaborates upon this subject at length,
from a perspective similar to – yet different from – Rabbi Ovadia. It is clear
to him that the Torah's designation of Rosh Hodesh Tishrei as the first month
of the year, and the mitzvah to count the months from Nissan are related to the
need for emphasizing the great and founding event of the exodus from Egypt. For
when we say "the first month" or "the seventh month", we
mean "the first month of the geula, and the seventh month of geula".
According
to his position, however, the goal of the mitzvah is not
completely reached by counting the months from Nissan. Ramban was of the
opinion that the mitzvah of marking of the geula,
the
subject of the verse "This New Moon is for you" is a fluid mitzvah, "an
incomplete one", whose parameters changed through Jewish history,
paralleling the misfortunes and the liberation of the nation. Just as at the
exodus from Egypt Israel was commanded to count the months from "The
first New Moon" of their delivery, so at the return to Zion from
Babylon they decided to call the months by their Babylonian and Persian names,
in order to highlight the new deliverance of Israel by
God:

"When we came up from Bavel and there was
fulfillment of that which was written: "It shall no more be
said, "As the Lord lives, who brought the Israelites out of the land of
Egypt," but rather, "As the Lord lives, who brought out and led the
offspring of the House of Israel from the northland" (Jeremiah
16:14-16 and 23:7-8), we once again called the months by the names used
in the land of Babylon, to remind us that there we stood and from there the
Holy One raised us up. For these names Nissan, Iyar, and the others, are
Persian names, to be found only in the books of the prophets of Bavel and in
Megillat Esther, and therefore Scripture states "In
the first month – that is the month of Nissan" (Esther
3:7).
Even today, the nation in the lands of Persia and Medea call them Nissan and
Tishrei, etc., as do we. Thus the months remind us of the second geula, as was
heretofore with the first geula." (Ramban,
Shemot 12:2)

It is conceivable, therefore, that according to the
Ramban, the mitzvah of "Hachodesh
hazeh lachem" recorded in Parashat "Bo", has yet to
reach completion; now that a significant part of the Jewish people has departed
the third exile, achieved its independence and has been 'redeemed' (at least on
the most basic physical sense), perhaps the proper thing to do would be to
change the names of the Hebrew calendar (actually Babylonian-Persian-Medean) to
'January', 'February', and 'March', to remind us that the first of the
returnees to Zion of the modern age lived in Europe and went up from there. In
this way we would fulfill the eternal commandment to mark the geula, as in the
words "This New Moon is for you". In any case,
it is clear that the Ramban's words (like the deep observation of Rabbi Ovadia
Seforno), explain very lucidly that the mitzvah of "Hachodesh
hazeh" is not simply another one of the 613 mitzvoth; it is basic foundation
of the Israel's religious and national experience.

Thus we see that it could have been proper to have
begun the Torah with this verse, as per Rashi, so that we know that freedom,
physical and spiritual, is the beginning of every spiritual experience, and
that there exists no holiness other than in the hearts of people who are able
to utilize their free right of choice.

* 
*  *

Until now, we have
discussed freedom. From here on, a few words about the cost of freedom. Freedom can sometimes be very costly, such as
when the freedom under discussion is spiritual freedom, which is achieved
through a painful process of self-education and internal maturation; but the
price can be costly sevenfold when seeking freedom from a physical yoke.

The opening chapters
of the Book of Shemot describe events that indicate how heavy this cost can be.
In Parashat "Shemot", the Children of Israel pay the price, as their desire for liberation
leads to increasing of their burden. But in Parashot "Vaera" and "Bo" it is the
Egyptians who pay the price, as their refusal to grant freedom to the Israelite
nation leads to the destruction of their land by terrible plagues, peaking with
the most agonizing of all, the death of the firstborn – "there remained no household without someone
dead."

True, the Angel of
Death spared the Israelite homes, but the killing of the firstborn left its
mark upon Jewish historical consciousness. The mitzvah to pass the firstborn of the cattle and to redeem the firstborn son
which was decreed for all generations in Parashat "Bo" with direct
reference to the death of the firstborn, causes the Jew to stand symbolically
in the situation of one whose son and property are taken from him, until the
son is returned through the act of pidyon haben. Until this very day, it is customary for the firstborn to fast on the
eve of Pesach, even though this tenth plague saved Israel and granted it its
freedom and one might expect that the event be marked in less ascetic fashion.
This fast was not instituted as a sign of mourning over Egypt's misfortune, but
such mourning does receive expression in Rabbinical sources, e.g., the reply
given by The Holy One, Blessed Be He, to the request of the angels to sing at
crossing of the Sea of Reeds: "My creations are drowning in the sea, and
you recite song?!" (Bavli, Megilla 10b)

The passages
regarding the firstborn of man and cattle at the end of Parashat "Bo" (as other
verses in that same parasha) are connected to one of the central and best known
sections of the Pesach Hagadda, the berayta of "The Four Sons".
Perhaps the words just spoken about the striking of the firstborn are able to
shed light on one of the many perplexities posed by this selection.

In the parasha of the
firstborn, the Torah writes:

 "You must redeem every first-born male among your
children. And when, in time to come, your son asks you, saying 'What is this?'
you shall say to him, ' It was with a mighty hand that the Lord brought us out
from Egypt, the house of bondage. When Pharaoh stubbornly refused to let us go,
the Lord slew every first-born in the land of Egypt, the first-born of both man
and beast etc." (Shemot
13:13-15)

The Pesach Hagadda
attributes this question to the "Tam" – the 'simple' son. We ask: Why
particularly the 'tam'? And furthermore: What is the meaning of the question
"What is this?" – a question more direct and more basic than those attributed by the
Hagaddah to the 'Wise' and the 'Wicked' sons? And what exactly is the meaning
of the answer given the 'Tam'?

It seems that the
solution to these difficulties lies in the definition of 'tam' in this
selection. The word can be translated as being synonymous with 'tipesh' – a fool.
Actually, the version in the Jerusalem Talmud read "tipesh" rather than 'tam' (Pesahim 10:14) Rashi, in his
commentary to Chumash accepts this version and explains the verse "And when… your son asks you" as follows: " 'What is this?" – This is the foolish child who is incapable of asking deeper questions,
and asks simply". In other words, it is the foolishness of the questioner,
who is unable to formulate more complex questions, which causes the question to
be asked so simply.

But the fact remains
that the author of the Hagaddah chose the word 'tam' (as in the
version of the berayta in the Mekhilta, end of the Parashat "Bo"),
and it is quite possible that he had in mind a different 'tam-ishness', a
different 'temimut', that 'temimut' attributed to Yaakov, "a 'tam' person,
dweller in tents" (Bereishit
25:27), and which is also hinted at in the first verse of
the Psalm 119: "Happy are those
whose way is blameless ['temimei
derech']. Say then: Perhaps the author of the Hagaddah
understood that this is the question asked by the innocent child who fully
believes that God's way are straight, as he stands confused and puzzled by this
terrible punishment, the smiting of the firstborn. In the Torah, as we have
just pointed out, the question "What is
this?" is directly related to the mitzvah of redeeming
the firstborn, a remembrance of the smiting of the firstborn; the answer which
the son receives is intended to explain the moral justice of that tragic – yet
inevitable – event. The Jewish people had the right to be free, says the
answer, but Pharaoh "stubbornly
refused to let us go" and therefore the
Egyptians were punished. Their intransigence and their choice of evil brought
calamity upon themselves, and this is the price of freedom – for them and for
us.

According to this
interpretation, the simplicity of the question derives from the candor of the 'tam', not from his
foolishness. The Wise Son, in his wisdom, asks: "What mean the decrees, laws, and rules?", and the Wicked Son, in his wickedness asks "What do you mean by this rite?"; but the Tam asks, in his innocence, "What
is this" – a simple 'gut question'
, blunt and demanding in its lack of sophistication, a question which
expresses moral shock at the fact that the Angel of Death reached even
"the firstborn of the captive in the dungeon", so that the Israelite
nation could win its freedom and leave the House of Bondage. This question does
not go unanswered, but, like all the other question of Seder night, its power
lies in its timelessness and its indispensability, for even a wise man, who
knows all the answers, is commanded that night to ask himself anew, and to
answer himself, should there be no one else to ask.

Among all the questions regarding the
labors, the mitzvot and customs which remind us the acquisition of freedom,
suddenly, on Seder night, there echoes the simple question about the price of
freedom – and it is good that these questions of the 'tam' are asked in Israel,
in those days and at this time.

Dr. Ariel Rauthaus is a literary
researcher and translator.

"And it shall be for a sign on
your hand" – The Tephillin should be laid on the weak hand.

And so it is with the two hands of a person, for
the left hand, weak and feeble, is next to the heart in which dwells
wisdom, for the place of intelligence which is in the heart causes this
hand to be weak, for the hand is occupied with physical activity, but the right
hand is near the liver, for there resides the power of desire which does not
contravene the hand for there is the main strength, but in the place of the
sanctuary of the intelligence, there the hand is weak. And when it says here
"and it shall be for a sign upon your
hand" [Trans. note: In this verse, "your hand"
is spelled in an unusual fashion, making possible the reading "weak
hand"], as though to say it shall be a sign upon your heart, for
the heart is the reason for the weakness of the hand, for the purpose of the
Tephillin is to serve man as a remembrance in the place of the residence of the
intelligence which is in the brain and in the heart. And it says the tephillin
of the head shall be "between your
eyes", because the eyes and the heart are the agents of sin (Yerushalmi, Berachot, 1:35), therefore these two places require something to remind them of the
existence of The Holy One, Blessed Be He, and His powers, and thereby he will
refrain from sin.

                                                                                                 (Kli
Yakar, Shemot 13:15).

Editorial Board: Pinchas Leiser
(Editor), Miriam Fine (Coordinator), Itzhak Frankenthal and Dr. Menachem Klein

Translation: Kadish Goldberg

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