Let’s Take a Journey
Together
Pesach is
one of the most important occasions of the year to most Jews. As well it should be. Because no annual observance reflects what we
have come to view as the spirit of Judaism more than the journey that our
ancestors took at Pesach. I’m sure that
you’ve heard the cliché that Life is Journey – you’ve heard it from my mouth, but you’re also aware that it
isn’t original to me. Speaking of life
metaphorically as a journey from point to point is a popular illustration – a
popular way to understand the emotional and intellectual processes that our
lives force us through. But with our
distant ancestors, the generation of Israelites that went out of Egypt – there
was nothing metaphorical about the journey.
Because the Pesach ritual is rich and complex, it forces us to
take – as it were – a complex journey to realise its important lessons. But the truth is, most of us will not take
that journey. The minutiae of the ritual
can get in the way of our seeing
exactly what those lessons are. It’s
like another common cliché – we have a tendency not to see the forest for the
trees. In other words, the complexity
and overwhelming fullness of the minutiae of observance, can hamper our overall
view of the lessons that Pesach would have us learn. And that’s why we have Shabbat Hagadol, the Great Shabbat, this Sabbath preceding Pesach. It serves as an opportunity for me to share
with you something of the meaning of the festival, to bring it meaning beyond
just the need to comply with all its complex procedures.
You’ve heard me speak before about the ‘danger’ of getting so caught in
the minutiae of observances that their deeper meanings escape us. Some of us like the escape of minutiae.
If you’ve ever been in counselling, you probably went through at least a
phase where you resisted taking to heart the counsellor’s, er, counsel. It is sometimes, really always, uncomfortable to be told that you need to change. So we focus on that which is not so uncomfortable. Life in Judaism sometimes requires
self-examination, and that self-examination can be uncomfortable. When made uncomfortable in this way, sometimes
we busy ourselves in the details of observance as a way of avoiding it. So with Pesach, we focus on the details of
the Seder. The shape of the table. The place settings. How we’re going to prepare the gefilte fish. Who’s bringing the various items that are all
‘required’ parts of the meal or the Seder plate. Which Haggadah will be used. How long the service will take. Et cetera…et cetera.
The truth is that all these things don’t make much difference in how we
internalise the lessons of Pesach. They
serve as a way of avoiding the pain that the self-examination, if we’re doing
it right, may very well bring. It is far
less difficult to produce a picture-perfect Seder, than to really be moved by
the lessons of the festival.
But there is one ritual
associated with Pesach that, if we do it assiduously, will likely not serve to hide from us the truth of
what Pesach’s journey of self-discovery is supposed to bring. And it is, sadly, a ritual that I daresay
most in this room today will not have performed by Monday afternoon. The ritual is the search for, and burning of,
chametz, leaven, in our homes.
Most of you won’t perform bedikat
chametz and biyur chametz, for a
variety of reasons. The traditional
believer does it, because he takes quite seriously the Torah’s dicta. And the Torah tells us to remove all chametz
from our homes (Exodus 12:15); not to possess any chametz within our private domains
(Exodus 12:19, Deuteronomy 16:4); and not to eat of any chametz (Exodus 12:20 and
13:3; Deuteronomy16:3). If the Torah instructs
thusly, and if it is stated in so many places, and you accept the premise, then
God does care. But most progressives do not accept the
notion a deity who cares about such things.
There’s another reason, beyond not seeing a Divine imperative, that it
isn’t widely done in our congregation. It
is after all a private ritual; you don’t do it in front of your Seder
guests. You do it 24 hours before
Seder night. This, after a thorough
cleaning of the house in the days leading up to that moment. In our circles, Jews tend to avoid
individual, private rituals. Somehow
they make us uncomfortable. Why this
is so, is perhaps another topic for another day.
Many of us do accomplish the
house-cleaning part, if not the search for, and burning of, chametz. We either clean house ourselves, or hire
someone to do it for us. We point to the
ritual of getting the house spic-and-span as an important part, as the essence
of Pesach. I’ve even heard Jews assert
that it was this cleaning of the house, combined with certain other Jewish
rituals, that caused Jews to not be affected as much as their Christian
neighbours during the Black Death that swept Europe in the 14th century. Now it may very well be that certain Jewish purity
rituals did lessen the scourge of the
Black Death for Jews compared to their neighbours. But to assert that this was the purpose of these rituals is to miss the
point. In the case of the search for and
burning of chametz, its deeper purpose is to teach us…humility. And let’s be honest about it; of all the things
we Jews are known for…well, humility isn’t one of them. But the search for, and destroying of chametz
in our homes, is calculated precisely to make us humble. Let me explain.
To the Rabbis the whole point of ‘giving up’ chametz for the seven – or
eight – days of Pesach is to get our egos in check. What is chametz, after all? It is something made of grain that has been
allowed to get ‘puffed up’ in the process of turning it into food. Instead of our eating, and possessing, all
manner of thus ‘puffed up’ foods, our consumption of grains is limited to matzo
– the poor bread of affliction. If you
eat enough of it, you’ll know exactly what is meant by ‘bread of affliction’…because
it is dry and tasteless and unappetizing.
Really, there’s no way around it!
It’s a terrible substitute for all the breads, and pastries, and
pastas that we normally eat. Unless, of
course, we’re on the Atkins Diet.
Similarly, over time, our egos become ‘puffed up.’ We exaggerate, in our own minds, our own
importance. We take ourselves far too
seriously. We construct elaborate worlds,
of which we are in the centre. Where
everything is me, myself, and I…where everything revolves around me. Look,
people…this is a natural part of the human condition. It is not a crime. But it does keep us from benefitting
from Pesach in the sense of preparing us for Shavuot – for receiving the Torah.
If we do not learn to be humble, at
least sometimes, we cannot accept the Torah. And if the Torah is going to be a living
tradition, if it’s going to live in each one of our hearts, then we must
sometimes learn to put our egos in check.
The search for, and purging of chametz teaches us that.
Because it’s not just a matter of changing our diet for a week. Any of us can do that. I have a personal ritual of eating pizza with
friends right after sunset on the day Pesach ends. I mean, how much more chametz-y can you get,
than pizza? But when I do eat it
on that night, it’s seldom with a sense of desperation. It’s nice to have, but I never feel terribly
deprived for not eating it for a week.
But bedikat chametz, and biyur chametz, if you do it,
will bring your ego down to size. Because
it’s plain hard to get rid of all the chametz in the house. Just when you think you’ve got it all, you’ll
find some crumbs in a corner, or underneath a couch cushion. Those little crumbs just don’t seem to want
to get out of your life.
It’s like the excess emotional baggage that we all carry around. All the quarrels and all the offence we’ve
taken, all the sense of grievance and aggrieve-ment. It’s not easy to purge from our lives. But we must, if we are going to achieve
happiness. If we’re going to be
whole. If we’re going to clear the decks
for Torah. We simply must get rid of it
all at some point. But just like the
little crumbs of chametz that stubbornly remain in our houses and make us work
so hard to get rid of them, the excess baggage resulting from our unchecked
egos weighs us down.
This is not a complaint against you if you’re not a bedikat chametz-kind
of person. I do like cleanliness,
although you wouldn’t know it from looking at my office. (I like to say, I’m clean enough to be
healthy, and dirty enough to be happy.) But
as a rabbi in the Progressive tradition, my real concern is not that you
fastidiously follow all ritual. To put
it differently, I can’t say I’m worried about your well-being, should you
inadvertently spend Pesach with some hidden chametz in your houses. Rather, my concern is this. I want the lessons that our tradition has
drawn from the ritual to affect you. I
want you to be able to benefit from the ego-settling that the Rabbis identified
as a by-product of this ritual. I want
you to recognise the danger of being ‘puffed up’ and respond to the need to ‘un-leaven’
your ego. If only for a time. So that, when Passover is past and Shavuot is
approaching, we will benefit from the exercise of making room inside ourselves
for Torah. For God.
Not an easy proposition, is it? But
let’s be honest…much of what is worthwhile, is not easy. But easy or not, may this come to pass…Amen.
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