Rabbi Mark
“(T)he right of the people PEACEABLY to assemble”.
(First Amendment to the US Constitution)
This month we celebrate Passover, The time of Freedom. Many people have very different views of what freedom represents. These past few months with the Israel-Hamas war destroying lives in horrifying numbers, people have shown how they view freedom. In America, the First Amendment to the constitution and our interpretation of it has led to much conflict and little resolution,” My Way or the Highway” has become my Yelling voice is the only Voice.” My Rights are the only Rights!
When in doubt, I look to our Scriptures for guidance! In the Haggadah, the book we read at the Passover Seder is the story of the four children (sons).
The wise child, the “evil” child, the simple child, and the child who does not know to ask. While we normally focus on the “Evil’ child who separates himself from the family, we should look at how all deal with freedom.
The Wise child asks about all the laws of Passover, not really concerned with his own freedom but with the Freedom of people. How do we co-ordinate freedom with the restraint of laws? That is his query!
The Simple child, who basically asks what is Freedom? and the response of the leader of the Seder is to describe what G-d has given us to make us free! A parallel in the Talmud is the comment that a man should be happy in his portion in life. If you can be free to appreciate what you have, you don’t need to violently protest your lot or others’ freedom.
The Child Who Does Not Know to Ask is unaware of the freedoms we have. We are to show that child what freedoms there are for us to partake in, the spiritual food that nourishes our souls.
Now to that problem child! His remarks are harsh. It reminds me of these recent days when people, instead of trying to come together for a solution to the war instead are calling for more bloodshed. The answer to this evilness comes in the answer of the Haggadah leader,
“Accordingly, you will set his teeth on edge (hak’heh et shinav), and say to him, “For the sake of this (community), God wrought for me in my going out of Egypt” (Shemot 13:8). ‘For me’ and not ‘for him.’ If he (the Evil one) had been there, he would not have been redeemed.”
The answer to using the First Amendment violently is that when this War is over and the Peace Process has begun, the “Evil Ones” will not be able to ‘redeem’ themselves, for they can’t release themselves from their anger. And the opposite of Freedom will be the prisons they have put themselves into.
When celebrating Passover this year, let us all pray for freedom for those who are imprisoned in the jails of anger and violence and who can join the community of lovers of the First amendment and of Passover.
B’ahava v’Herutainu (Freedom),
Rabbi Mark
