02 Apr PESAH: EARNING REDEMPTION, THEN AND NOW

Twice during the Seder
on Pesah we take a piece
of food and dip it into a
liquid before eating it.
First, after Kiddush, we
take the Karpas – a vegetable – and dip it in salt
water. Later, after eating the Masa, we dip the
Marror in Haroset. What do these two dippings
represent?
The Karpas, it has been suggested, hearkens back
to the early history of the Egyptian exile – to the
story of Yosef and his brothers. Yosef’s brothers
despised him, resenting his favored status, which
was symbolized by the “Ketonet Pasim” – the
special cloak which Yaakob had made for him.
Rashi, in explaining the word “Pasim,” writes
that this word stems from the same root as the
word “Karpas,” which means a “fabric that
covers.” The word “Karpas,” then, is associated
with Yosef’s special cloak. As we know, at the
time Yosef’s brothers assaulted him and threw
him into a pit – before eventually selling him as
a slave to merchants who brought him to Egypt
– they tore off his “Ketonet Pasim” and dipped
it in goat’s blood, in order to make it appear as
though he was attacked by a beast. Therefore, as
we begin the Seder, we dip “Karpas” in liquid
– to commemorate the tragic event of Mechirat
Yosef (the sale of Yosef), which resulted in our
ancestors’ relocation in Egypt, thus facilitating
the bitter exile.
The second dipping, which we perform later,
after we study the story of the Egyptian bondage
and the Exodus, commemorates the dipping
which occurred on the night our ancestors
achieved their freedom. They were commanded
to slaughter the Pesah sacrifice, and to then
dip a bundle of hyssop in the blood, and place
some blood on their doorposts. The bundle of
hyssop (“Agudat Ezob”) represents the nation’s
unity, the peace and harmony that prevailed at
that time, their coming together into a single
“bundle,” a single unit. As such, it reflects the
drastic transformation that they had undergone
– from the time of Mechirat Yosef, when they
turned against their brother, to the point where
they merged into a single “bundle,” bound
together by mutual love and devotion.
This is the transformation that we, too, are to
undergo at the Seder. We are to reflect upon the
cause of the Egyptian exile – internal strife and
conflict – and on the need to come together in
peace and harmony in order to be worthy of
redemption.
Rav Eliyahu Dessler (1892-1953), in his
Michtab Me’Eliyahu, observes that the current
exile which we endure is characterized by Sin’a
– senseless hatred toward the Jewish People.
Over the course of the nearly two millennia of
this exile, we have been despised for so many
different reasons. Jews have been despised
for being rich, and despised for being poor.
It seems entirely irrational, and it is. But Rav
Dessler teaches us the harsh reality about this
experience – that the hatred toward us is a mirror
image of the hatred that exists among ourselves.
The Gemara famously teaches that the Second
Temple was destroyed because of Sin’at Hinam
(baseless hatred), and this scourge continues to
be the reason why our final redemption has yet
to arrive. Our nation has suffered baseless hatred
from other nations because of our baseless hatred
toward one another.
I once took a trip to the town of Radin in Belarus,
and visited the yeshiva of the Hafetz Haim (Rav
Yisrael Meir Kagan, 1839-1933). It was there
where the Hafetz Haim wrote his legendary work
on the laws of Lashon Ha’ra (negative speech
about other people). We then crossed the street
to the Hafetz Haim’s grave, and prayed. Not far
from the grave, we noticed a memorial plaque.
The plaque commemorated the liquidation of
Radin by the Nazis in June, 1941. The Nazis
killed 1500 Jews, and they were buried in a mass
grave. I was struck by the proximity of these two
sites – the yeshiva and grave of the Hafetz Haim,
who devoted much of his life to teaching the
importance of avoiding negative speech about
our fellow Jews, and the senseless hatred which
the Nazis harbored toward the Jews. It is almost
as though the Hafetz Haim prophetically saw
the irrational hostility and crimes that would be
perpetrated at that site, and set out to teach us
to combat this hatred by eliminating the hatred
among our own nation, our own families and our
own communities.
The Arizal (Rav Yishak Luria of Safed, 1534-
1572) observed that the letters of the name
“Pharaoh” spell the words “Peh Ra” – “evil
mouth.” The root cause of the oppression we
suffered at the hands of Pharaoh was the “evil
mouth,” the harsh words spoken to and about
one’s fellow. We rectify this ill, the Arizal taught,
through “Pesah,” which can be read as “Peh Sah”
– “the mouth that speaks,” referring to proper
speech, to speaking words of Torah, prayer,
praise of G-d, and expressions of friendship, love
and kindness to our fellow Jew.
The Egyptian exile, and the Exodus, serve as the
prototype of all future exiles and redemption.
We sit at the Seder to not simply recall the
past, but to apply the lessons of the past to the
present. Let us, then, spend some time reflecting
on the transformation from the first dipping to
the second – from the tragic hatred of Mechirat
Yosef to the “bundle” that was formed through
the people’s friendship and harmony at the time
of the Exodus. And let us commit to making this
transformation in our own lives, as well, so we
will be worthy of our final redemption, speedily
and in our times, Amen.