As another Passover begins, the echoes of "Once we were slaves and now we are free"
and "Next year in Jerusalem" resound briefly and then fade into the background noise of everyday
life. We can board a plane tomorrow and fly off to Jerusalem. Some of us
are already there now. But will that make us free?
Since Egypt we have become slaves again, lived under the rule of
iron-fisted tyrants and forgotten what the very idea of freedom means.
And that will likely happen again and again until the age ends. What is
this freedom that we gained with the fall of a Pharaoh and the last
sight of his pyramids and armies?
Freedom like slavery, is as much a state of mind as a state of being. It is possible to be legally free, yet to have no freedom of action whatsoever. And it is possible to be legally a slave and yet to be free in defiance of those restrictions. External coercion alone does not make a man free or slave, it is the degradation of mind that makes a man a slave.
What is a slave? A slave is complicit in his own oppression. His slavery has become his natural state and he looks to his master, not to free him, but to command him. Had the Jews of Egypt merely been restrained by physical coercion, it would have been enough to directly and immediately smash the power of the Egyptian state. But their slavery was mental. They moaned not at the fact of slavery, but at the extremity of it. When their taskmasters complained to Pharaoh, it was not of slavery, but of not being given the straw with which to build the bricks.
The worst slavery is of the most insidious kind. It leaves the slave able to think and act, but not as a free man. It leaves him with cunning, but not courage. He is able to use force, but only to bring other slaves into line. And most hideously, this state of affairs seems moral and natural to him. This is his freedom.
The true slave has come to love big brother, to worship at the foot of the system that oppresses him. It is this twisted love that must be torn out of him. It is this idolatry of the whip before which he kneels, this panting to know who his superior and who his inferiors are, this love of a vast order that allows him to be lost in its wonders, to gaze in awe at the empire of tomorrow which builds its own tombs today, that must be broken. These are his gods and he must kill them within himself to be free.
The Exodus is not the story of the emergence of free men who were enslaved, but the slow painful process by which slaves became a nation of free men, a long troubled journey which has not yet ended. That is why we celebrate Passover, not as an event of the past, but as of a road that we still travel, a long journey from slavery to freedom.
Having escaped from Pharaoh, they built a glittering calf, and having left the desert behind, they sought out a king. Every idol and tyrant was another token of slavery, a desire to put one's ear up against the doorpost and become slaves for life. The idols have changed, but their meaning has not. There is still the pursuit of the master, the master of international law, of a global state, the gods of the superstate who rule over the present and the future and dispose of the lives of men.
There are far too many synagogues that worship the Democratic Party, rather than G-d, that bow to the ghost of FDR, the glittering echoes of Harry, Adlai and John, and the great golden statue of Hope and Change squatting obscenely over it all. And in Jerusalem far too many eyes look longingly to Washington and to Brussels, to the cities on the hill which offer order, truth and peace.
It is easy to slip into this kind of slavery. The pyramids are grand,
the slogans are clever and the future seems assured. It is only when the
dusty messenger comes along to whisper that "He has remembered". that
those who have not forgotten gather and some among those who have
forgotten, remember that they are slaves.
In Egypt the system of the state had to be smashed, but not simply smashed, but discredited. It could not be a mere contest of power, but of reason. The war between slavery and freedom could not end until the system of slavery had become ridiculous, until Pharaoh appeared a buffoon and his power no more than organized madness. And yet even so for a generation liberated from slavery, this majestic system, the only one they had ever known, remained their template, and in times of crisis, their immediate instinct was to retreat back to the only civilization they had known.
The slavery of the present is a more subtle thing. It grips the mind more tightly than the body. It still remembers that men enslave themselves best. It knows also that true power comes from making all complicit in its crimes so that they are also complicit in their own degradation. The system only asks that each man enslave himself and kill his own children. And once he has done that, he will only feel it right to demand that everyone else do likewise.
Do it for the environment, for social justice, for the Pharaoh of every age and his ideology. Enslave your mind. Kill your children.
This is the slavery of the system. It requires few whips and many words. It nudges men to be their own taskmasters and to reach out their hands to the new Pharaoh in the hope that he will save them. It is this slavery which is so pervasive, which Passover wakes us from, if it has not already been perverted into the Passover of the system, into civil rights seders and eco-matzas with donations to Planned Parenthood which will do what the midwives did not, if has not become yet another tribute to the Pharaoh of Hope and Change.
"Once we were slaves," the ancient words call on us to remember that we have been freed. That it is no longer Pharaoh who enslaves us, but we who enslave ourselves. "Now we are free men." But what is freedom really? Is it the freedom of the system or the freedom of the self? The system proclaims that they are one and the same. And that is the great lie which ends in death.
Like the slaves of ancient Egypt, we are shaken, dragged out of our everyday routine and commanded to be free. But how do you command men and women to be free? You can lead them through the habits of free men and women who think of themselves as kings and queens, who drink wine while reclining, who sing loudly in defiance of all oppressors, who boldly proclaim "Next year in Jerusalem" while the Pharaoh of Hope and Change bares his teeth at Jews living in Jerusalem.
You can unroll the scroll of history and show them how they were taken out, but all this routine is useless unless they understand and are sensible that they are free. Free not in their habits, but in their minds. Ritual is the gateway to a state of mind. A ritual of freedom only succeeds when it invokes a state of mental freedom. Otherwise it is a rite, a practice, a habit whose codes may help some future generation unlock its meaning, but which means little today.
Passover is the beginning and the end. It is the start of the journey
and the end of it and we are always in the middle, on the long road out
of Egypt, discovering that there are more chains in our minds than we
realized a year earlier or a hundred or a thousand years ago. Each step
we take toward freedom also reminds us of how far we still have to go.
It is the ritual that reminds us that we are still on the journey, that though we have been lulled by the routine of the system, the trap of the present that like the soothing warmth of an ice storm or the peaceful feeling of a drowning swimmer, embraces us in the forgetfulness of the dying moment, concealing from us the truth that the journey is not over. The desert still lies before us.
This journey is the human journey. It is the recreation of what mankind lost when it defied G-d, when it turned with weapons on each other, when it built towers, created systems and tried to climb to heaven on the backs of slaves and pyramids. It is a transformative road that requires us to not only endure, but to learn.
Surrounded by willing slaves who preach the creed of slavery, we must speak for freedom. Though few seem to remember the journey or the chains, it is our duty to remind ourselves. The message of Passover fully begins only when the holiday ends and its habits carry over into our daily lives. Once we were slaves, now we are free.
Freedom like slavery, is as much a state of mind as a state of being. It is possible to be legally free, yet to have no freedom of action whatsoever. And it is possible to be legally a slave and yet to be free in defiance of those restrictions. External coercion alone does not make a man free or slave, it is the degradation of mind that makes a man a slave.
What is a slave? A slave is complicit in his own oppression. His slavery has become his natural state and he looks to his master, not to free him, but to command him. Had the Jews of Egypt merely been restrained by physical coercion, it would have been enough to directly and immediately smash the power of the Egyptian state. But their slavery was mental. They moaned not at the fact of slavery, but at the extremity of it. When their taskmasters complained to Pharaoh, it was not of slavery, but of not being given the straw with which to build the bricks.
The worst slavery is of the most insidious kind. It leaves the slave able to think and act, but not as a free man. It leaves him with cunning, but not courage. He is able to use force, but only to bring other slaves into line. And most hideously, this state of affairs seems moral and natural to him. This is his freedom.
The true slave has come to love big brother, to worship at the foot of the system that oppresses him. It is this twisted love that must be torn out of him. It is this idolatry of the whip before which he kneels, this panting to know who his superior and who his inferiors are, this love of a vast order that allows him to be lost in its wonders, to gaze in awe at the empire of tomorrow which builds its own tombs today, that must be broken. These are his gods and he must kill them within himself to be free.
The Exodus is not the story of the emergence of free men who were enslaved, but the slow painful process by which slaves became a nation of free men, a long troubled journey which has not yet ended. That is why we celebrate Passover, not as an event of the past, but as of a road that we still travel, a long journey from slavery to freedom.
Having escaped from Pharaoh, they built a glittering calf, and having left the desert behind, they sought out a king. Every idol and tyrant was another token of slavery, a desire to put one's ear up against the doorpost and become slaves for life. The idols have changed, but their meaning has not. There is still the pursuit of the master, the master of international law, of a global state, the gods of the superstate who rule over the present and the future and dispose of the lives of men.
There are far too many synagogues that worship the Democratic Party, rather than G-d, that bow to the ghost of FDR, the glittering echoes of Harry, Adlai and John, and the great golden statue of Hope and Change squatting obscenely over it all. And in Jerusalem far too many eyes look longingly to Washington and to Brussels, to the cities on the hill which offer order, truth and peace.
In Egypt the system of the state had to be smashed, but not simply smashed, but discredited. It could not be a mere contest of power, but of reason. The war between slavery and freedom could not end until the system of slavery had become ridiculous, until Pharaoh appeared a buffoon and his power no more than organized madness. And yet even so for a generation liberated from slavery, this majestic system, the only one they had ever known, remained their template, and in times of crisis, their immediate instinct was to retreat back to the only civilization they had known.
The slavery of the present is a more subtle thing. It grips the mind more tightly than the body. It still remembers that men enslave themselves best. It knows also that true power comes from making all complicit in its crimes so that they are also complicit in their own degradation. The system only asks that each man enslave himself and kill his own children. And once he has done that, he will only feel it right to demand that everyone else do likewise.
Do it for the environment, for social justice, for the Pharaoh of every age and his ideology. Enslave your mind. Kill your children.
This is the slavery of the system. It requires few whips and many words. It nudges men to be their own taskmasters and to reach out their hands to the new Pharaoh in the hope that he will save them. It is this slavery which is so pervasive, which Passover wakes us from, if it has not already been perverted into the Passover of the system, into civil rights seders and eco-matzas with donations to Planned Parenthood which will do what the midwives did not, if has not become yet another tribute to the Pharaoh of Hope and Change.
"Once we were slaves," the ancient words call on us to remember that we have been freed. That it is no longer Pharaoh who enslaves us, but we who enslave ourselves. "Now we are free men." But what is freedom really? Is it the freedom of the system or the freedom of the self? The system proclaims that they are one and the same. And that is the great lie which ends in death.
Like the slaves of ancient Egypt, we are shaken, dragged out of our everyday routine and commanded to be free. But how do you command men and women to be free? You can lead them through the habits of free men and women who think of themselves as kings and queens, who drink wine while reclining, who sing loudly in defiance of all oppressors, who boldly proclaim "Next year in Jerusalem" while the Pharaoh of Hope and Change bares his teeth at Jews living in Jerusalem.
You can unroll the scroll of history and show them how they were taken out, but all this routine is useless unless they understand and are sensible that they are free. Free not in their habits, but in their minds. Ritual is the gateway to a state of mind. A ritual of freedom only succeeds when it invokes a state of mental freedom. Otherwise it is a rite, a practice, a habit whose codes may help some future generation unlock its meaning, but which means little today.
It is the ritual that reminds us that we are still on the journey, that though we have been lulled by the routine of the system, the trap of the present that like the soothing warmth of an ice storm or the peaceful feeling of a drowning swimmer, embraces us in the forgetfulness of the dying moment, concealing from us the truth that the journey is not over. The desert still lies before us.
This journey is the human journey. It is the recreation of what mankind lost when it defied G-d, when it turned with weapons on each other, when it built towers, created systems and tried to climb to heaven on the backs of slaves and pyramids. It is a transformative road that requires us to not only endure, but to learn.
Surrounded by willing slaves who preach the creed of slavery, we must speak for freedom. Though few seem to remember the journey or the chains, it is our duty to remind ourselves. The message of Passover fully begins only when the holiday ends and its habits carry over into our daily lives. Once we were slaves, now we are free.
Comments
G-d Bless You, Sir. Passover is now personal, and new for me.
ReplyDeleteGood stuff (again...I expect nothing less). I know I have thoughts of slavery in me, just like those that came out of Egypt. For them, the generations that grew up in slavery had to die in the wilderness. They cried out for the 'security' that slavery gave them, much like those trapped in social programs cry out for their masters. With all but a couple of men of the older generations dead, that gave the younger generations a chance at freedom. But, as you said, they demanded a king. 'The state will be our god, and we will be it's people'...
ReplyDeleteYep, this could be me. This time LAST year I thought that my liberal US Jewish community was so full of noble folk it would always want to improve education of the young and strengthen their desire to identify as Jews. LAST year, I thought J Street was probably a cool organization, that a 2-state solution was a good idea, that Obama would never take any action to undermine Israel. All I can say is that THIS year I have come to comprehend that all these things I believed in are false! I have far fewer friends than I did last year, but paradoxically, I feel psychologically much better and with this freedom comes the ability to think more clearly.
ReplyDeleteWith much wisdom comes much grief.
ReplyDeleteI'm an Irishman who well understands the protracted paralysis of slavery. Brilliant as always, maestro Daniel. I arrived on the planet 30 years after our 'official' liberation, but despite an excellent education, a sense of subservience lingered for many years and bubbles up from time to time.
ReplyDeleteWatching the capitulation and multi-cult invasion of the UK gives me no solace (I have many English cousins), but does make me wonder why they suppressed and brutalized us for so long. From a very young age I identified with the plight of the Jews and have always admired their tenacity for freedom and their refusal, like us, to play the victim card. Chairde (friend). Max
Slavery or freedom was offered in Genesis with a choice to obey G-d and be free or defy Him and be enslaved.
ReplyDeleteThe wrong choice decries, “Vanity, vanity all is vanity.”
As humans make more invisible discoveries and invent products which function through unseen technology – microwaves, cell phones, TV and alarm remotes, x-rays, sonar, radar, holograms, et al – it seems wryly inversely proportional that man’s belief in an invisible Creator diminishes, cementing the illusion that he can challenge G-d solidifying his slavery.
And manna falls from the underbelly of the golden calf of vanity, the straddling glittering idolatrous god of man-made government feeding men a mirage of false freedom.
Having taken their eyes off the one true G-d, they stumble bitching and wailing for forty years – now forty generations, ungrateful self-deluded wretches who can’t navigate an ideological distance righteous men travel in a brief quantum leap.
Another year, another Passover, another chance to cross the desert to real freedom…
While for far too many the map of Moses’ timely chiseled 2nd Commandment lies crumpled in the sand.
Very inspirational Daniel. Thank you.
Best Pesach shiur I ever read. Thank you!
ReplyDeleteDaniel,
ReplyDeleteThank you for this piece. I always find something new in your work.
Joel Birkeland
An image that is what you just created ... And that image will stay with me ... Thank you .. Ad
ReplyDeleteAmerica, even while in good intent like Europe did with it's many social justice benefits, is doing a bad job re-enslaving millions, who already barely, if at all, managed to truly shed the chains of slavery, with it's entitlements programs making the beneficiaries utterly dependent of their new masters and obliged to bark in their tune. A further proof of re-enslavement is the PC oversensitivity to the racial specter haunting and permeating every aspect of especially most left-wing media discussion.
ReplyDeleteI'm about as Kosher as a pork chop, but I GET IT!!!
ReplyDeleteThank you.
This year, Passover coincides with the Christian festival of Easter. Yesterday was Maundy Thursday (The Last Supper) and as I sat through the service I was reminded of this article and particularly how Jewish suffering and redemption, combined, as it is, in slavery and Exodus, is a chronicle of all human existence. Will we live as slaves to tyranny or as free men secure in God’s love? How I pity the Godless – the burden must be intolerable.
ReplyDeleteI’ve just re-read the piece and its message is timeless. My compliments.
Pamela Geller wrote a piece in American Thinker today and it intrigued me. It seems she has a beef with NRO which is what really caught my attention. I haven’t read national Review Online for years – its opinions can be odd at times, serving up thin gruel and milquetoast spinelessness. Also given a major role in the squabble was Ayaan Hirsi Ali but, try as I might to track down the argument, it eluded me. Can someone enlighten me? If you regard this as an intrusion, Daniel, forgive me. I don’t mean to offend.
God’s speed
churchill
Post a Comment