16 Mar VAYIKRA- HE PUT US THERE, AND HE PUT US HERE
There are two reasons why we eat matzah. Actually, there are two OPPOSITE REASONS why we eat matzah:
1) The pasuk, which we quote in the Haggadah, explains that Beneh Yisrael were rushed out of Egypt, and so the dough which they had prepared did not have time to rise. They ended up baking matzah, instead of ordinary bread, and this is why we eat matzah.
2) At the very beginning of the Maggid section of the Haggadah, we announce: ולכא†≠יד†אינע†≠אמחל†אה†םירצמד†אעראב†≠אנתהבא†– “This is the bread of affliction which our forefathers ate in the land of Egypt.”
The matzah, then, commemorates TWO OPPOSITE THINGS – the suffering of slavery, and our miraculous redemption.
Matzah is the food our ancestors ate when they were oppressed slaves, and the food they ate on the glorious day when they left Egypt. And so we eat matzah to commemorate both our slavery and our freedom!
How can this be? How can the same object represent two POLAR OPPOSITE experiences?
One answer is that this is PRECISELY the message of the matzah – that all experiences in life, from the best to the worst, have something very basic in common: THEY’RE ALL FROM HASHEM.
When our ancestors were slaves in Egypt, they were helpless. They were controlled by the most powerful empire in the world. There was nothing they could do to help themselves.
And after our ancestors left Egypt, they were still helpless. They were able to survive only through Hashem’s miracles – He split the sea, He provided water from a stone in the desert, and sent them manna from the heaven each morning.
This is the powerful message of the matzah. Wherever we are in life, in any circumstance, it is Hashem who put us here. He put us where we are now, and He put us where we were yesterday, last week, last month, and last year.
The Rabbis teach that the flat, unimpressive matzah represents humility. Regular bread is large, fluffy and impressive – symbolizing arrogance. Matzah is plain, simple and lowly, and so it is a symbol of humility.
True humility is recognizing that we are completely dependent on Hashem, that only He is in control, that He put us there, and He put us here. When life is the way we want it to be, and when life is not the way we want it to be, we are under His control.
I cannot think of any situation in my lifetime when this message is more relevant, or more urgent, than the situation we are going through right now. The whole world has been brought to its knees by the raging coronavirus, which has wreaked havoc in virtually every country and in virtually every imaginable way. Nobody saw this coming, and nobody knows where it is going. If we needed a reminder of the message of the matzah, that we are entirely under Hashem’s control, we got it. All of humanity has been humbled by a crisis that nobody anticipated and nobody knows how to solve.
And this humility is our greatest source of comfort and solace during this extraordinary period.
There is nothing more reassuring than knowing that we are in Hashem’s hands. This crisis has shown us beyond a shadow of doubt that everything is controlled by Hashem – and so we have every reason to feel confident that somehow, it will be solved. We know that Hashem is in control, we know that Hashem loves us, and we know that every situation He puts us in is precisely where we need to be. And so we turn our eyes and hearts to Him in sincere prayer, begging for His mercy and assistance during these times of unprecedented challenge, and we comfort ourselves with the knowledge that He is watching over us and the entire world, and has everything fully under control.