APRIL 6 • 2023 | 49
not be concerned about that
great city?” Jonah 4:10-11
God teaches Jonah to care
by giving him something
and then taking it away.
Loss teaches us to value
things, though usually too
late. What we have, and
then lose, we do not take for
granted. The religious vision
is not about seeing things
that are not there. It is about
seeing the things that are
there and always were, but
which we never noticed or
paid attention to. Faith is
a form of attention. It is a
sustained meditation on the
miraculousness of what is
because it might not have
been.
What we lose and are
given back we learn to cher-
ish in a way we would not
have done had we never lost
it in the first place. Faith is
about not taking things for
granted.
This is the key to under-
standing a whole series of
narratives in the book of
Genesis. Sarah, Rebecca and
Rachel long to have chil-
dren but discover that they
are infertile. Only through
God’s intervention are they
able to conceive. Abraham
goes through the trial of
the binding of Isaac, only to
discover that God, who has
asked him to sacrifice his
child, says “Stop” at the last
moment.
This is how the covenantal
family learns that having
children is not something
that merely happens. It is
how the people of Israel
learned, at the dawn of their
history, never to take chil-
dren for granted. Jewish con-
tinuity, the raising of new
generations of Jews, is not
natural, inevitable, a process
that takes care of itself. It
needs constant effort and
attention. The same is true
of freedom.
Freedom in the biblical
sense — responsible self-re-
straint — is not natural. To
the contrary, the natural
order in human societies,
as it is in the animal king-
dom, is that the strong prey
on and dominate the weak.
Nothing is rarer or harder
to achieve than a society of
equal dignity for all. Merely
to conceive it requires a
massive disengagement
from nature. The Torah tells
us how this was achieved,
through the historical
experience of a people who
would ever afterward be the
carriers of God’s message to
humankind.
Israel had to lose its free-
dom before it could cherish
it. Only what we lose do we
fully pay attention to. Israel
had to suffer the experience
of slavery and degradation
before it could learn, know
and feel intuitively that there
is something morally wrong
about oppression. Nor could
it, or any other people, carry
this message in perpetuity
without reliving it every
year, tasting the harsh tang
of the bread of affliction
and the bitterness of slavery.
Thus was created, at the
birth of the nation, a long-
ing for freedom that was at
the very core of its memory
and identity.
Had Israel achieved
immediate nationhood in
the patriarchal age without
the experience of exile and
persecution, it would — like
so many other nations in
history — have taken free-
dom for granted; and when
freedom is taken for grant-
ed, it has already begun to
be lost.
Israel became the people
conceived in slavery so that
it would never cease to long
for liberty — and know
that liberty is anything but
natural. It requires constant
vigilance, unceasing moral
struggle. Israel discovered
freedom by losing it. May it
never lose it again.
The late Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks
served as the chief rabbi of the
United Hebrew Congregations of the
Commonwealth, 1991-2013. His teach-
ings have been made available to all
at rabbisacks.org. This is an extract
from The Jonathan Sacks Haggadah.
W
ow! This year, I
entered Passover on
a high.
Just days before the start of the
holiday, I had the pleasure of par-
ticipating in a parade of “Mitzvah
Tanks,
” armed with shmurah
matzah, tefillin, Shabbat and hol-
iday candles and Passover
information, aka Mobile
Mitzvah Centers.
What a pleasure to meet
Jewish people all over the
Detroit Metro area, from
Campus Martius Park to
the suburbs. It was special
to see people’s eyes light up
as they accepted our gift of
shmurah matzah and tell us
with pride that they would
be bringing them to their
family Pesach seders.
I have no doubt that these
handmade matzahs — made
according to time-hallowed
traditions — added to the spirit-
ed conversation at seders all over
the city. And it’s not over yet.
The final two days of Passover —
Tuesday evening until Thursday
night — are also laden with sig-
nificance, ritual and redemption.
In addition to lighting can-
dles, enjoying festive meals and
attending Yizkor, there is another
special element to the closing
portion of Passover. On the sev-
enth day, we celebrate the miracle
of the Splitting of the Sea, after
which the people “trusted in
God and His servant Moses.
”
And on the eighth day, we read
the Haftorah about the future
redemption, the era of Moshiach,
which will eclipse the miracles of
the Exodus in its sheer miracu-
lousness. The spirit of Moshiach
and redemption permeates the
entire day and gives it a special
energy just waiting for us to tap
and experience.
How do we do it? Chassidic
custom, dating back to the Baal
Shem Tov, on the final after-
noon of Passover, dictates that
we gather for a special feast
known as Moshiach’s
Meal. It’s celebrated by
eating matzah, drinking
four cups of wine or
grape juice and lively
discussions of the future
redemption and how
we can begin to taste its
spiritual bliss in our lives
today.
Now, here is what
makes this Moshiach’s
meal so relevant to us:
We are presently in a
Hakhel year, when Jews
are enjoined to gather to
connect with each other
and our tradition through Torah
study and sharing inspiration. As
I see it, this meal is the ultimate
Hakhel gathering. With Jews get-
ting together, Torah being shared
and hearts united with Jewish
inspiration. What could possibly
be better than that?
So, if you have never hosted
or attended a Moshiach’s Meal
before, this is the year to begin,
either by joining one at your
local Chabad House or by host-
ing your own. And if you live
near our beautiful Shul commu-
nity, we’
d be delighted to host
you at our Moshiach’s Meal on
Thursday, the final day of Pesach.
Find out more at theshul.net/
events.
Rabbi Kasriel Shemtov is spiritual
director of The Shul in West Bloomfield.
The Spirit of
Redemption
TORAH PORTION
Rabbi Kasriel
Shemtov
Parshat
Pesach Hol
Hamoed:
Exodus
33:12-34:26;
Numbers
28:19-25;
Ezekiel
37:1-14.