From Slavery to...Freedom?

Tonight, April 6th, the 15th of Nissan, Jews worldwide will be celebrating Pesach (Passover). 3 Matzahs, 4 cups of wine, bitter herbs and sweet charoset, we will recall the events that led to the leaving of Egypt by our people years ago. But for what purpose did G-d take us out all those years ago? And He (G-d) said (to Moshe),
"For I will be with you, and this is the sign for you that it was I Who sent you. When you take the people out of Egypt, you will worship G-d on this mountain." (Exodus 3:12)

The ultimate purpose of leaving the shackles of Egyptian slavery, was to receive the Torah from G-d at Mount Sinai, accepting upon ourselves the various laws and instructions - the Mitzvot - contained inside. An obvious question arises: How come we make such a big deal over our freedom from Egypt and our servitude there, if we were only freed in order to become slaves to another master!? With all of these rules & regulations, where's our freedom!? And if so, what are we even celebrating? The answer to this is a profound one - touching on the essence of who we are and what it means to truly feel free.

Who are we? Judaism teaches that we are lofty souls, that have descended & been clothed into coarse bodies that are constantly distracted by any and every lust & desire that passes before our eyes. Especially today in 2012, with the dominant role electronic devices play in our lives - with its constant barrage of messages and visuals, as well as the rise in our standard of living, much time has been devoted to our bodies, while less and less time & opportunity has been afforded our souls.

In the books of Jewish Mysticism, it is often described how painful for the soul it is to have to descend from its lofty home in the spiritual worlds to an earth full of lies and falsehood. Where the outer shell is emphasized as truth and the inner dimension invisible. And that's where Torah & Mitzvot come in. Far from limiting us, when one learns Torah or performs a Mitzvah, one's soul is able to finally express itself - to free itself from the shackles of shallowness, shining through the coarseness of physicality.

By way of example, let's take a look at the mitzvah of observing Shabbat. We know that a major theme of Shabbat is that it's a day of rest. But so much we do that day seems to be the opposite of rest! From walking to synagogue to avoiding computers & television to exerting ourselves in prayer and learning, Shabbat seems to be more strenuous than restful! But that's if one is looking at the resting of the body. Avoiding the numerous every day distractions of life, for one day, opens up a door for one's soul to express itself. Prayer, learning, a time for contemplation and reflection, gives a person a chance to express his true essence. And that is the true "rest" the soul desires all week long.

May this Passover, and its continuation to the holiday of Shavuot, inspire us to get more in touch with our souls, through connecting with our Torah & Mitzvot.

Shabbat Shalom!

-Daniel

The Middle Path

Living in California in 2012, I hear a lot about living healthy. From my lovely sister-in-law's health foods to my Physician father's vitamins, I have my fair share of exposure to a life of health. Unfortunately, I do not heed the calling of living healthy as much as I should. But in today's western world, it's hard to ignore the emphasis placed on being shape, working out, eating right, and doing what's in one's power to live a long and healthy life. But as we well know now, and the medical profession has confirmed, living healthy isn't only regulated to one's stomach, but also to one's mind - our inner well being.


Our greatest of Sages, with Maimonides (1135-1204) at the forefront, taught that the path to a truly healthy life - not surprisingly - is to live a balanced life. This truism pervades all of reality. Physically, balance is essential: Too much sugar, and a person can G-d forbid develop diabetes. Low blood sugar can lead to hypoglycemia. Too many bacteria-fighting white blood cells is Neutrophilia, too few - Neutropenia. We breathe in, we breathe out. Our muscles contract & relax. Just like for our bodies to work healthily, there must be balance, so too in our personal lives. It's important to work and accomplish, but also to hang out with friends and enjoy free time - to set a balanced schedule. When raising children, it is important to have a certain balance, with discipline together with kindness and free flowing love. Unfortunately, the culture around us often creates a difficult environment for us to live balanced lives. What was once an intimate family dinner, is now an I-phone/laptop/TV dinner. What was once a private home and life filled with good values, is now heavily influenced by the shallow pop culture of the trendy and famous that we see everywhere that we turn. How to dress, look, act and think. Whats "cool." How can we cure this ailment, this affront to a balanced - and therefore healthy - life? By creating borders. Deciding what enters our bodies, minds, homes, and families - of course in a balanced way.

On a spiritual level, internally, balance is also key. We are told that the angels in heaven "run" toward the light of G-d in a state of extreme love, only to pull back in awe. So too, we work to feel closer to G-d and a spiritual reality, only to bring an inspiration to our daily lives in this world in order to do good in a practical manner here. Indeed, next Friday night is the 1st "Pesach (Passover) Seder." Literally translated, Pesach means "leaping" (as G-d did when he "passed over" the homes of the Jewish people during the plague of the male first-born), while seder means "order." The seder is a 15-step, orderly method, given to help us leap to greater spiritual heights than we have ever before. Every line, every nuance of the seder, is replete with layers upon layers of amazing meaning and depth, that we unfortunately do not have room to discuss now. This theme of "ordered leaping," is one of the fundamental themes of the Torah & Judaism. Torah & its Mitzvot are in essence orderly methods of connecting to the infinite, of leaping to places that we can't dream of leaping to on our own, no matter how hard we try, for we are finite, while G-d is infinite.

And isn't that seen throughout the holiday of Passover? What makes Matzah so great in the eyes of Judaism? Is it really so different to Chametz (leaven)? What separates the two, technically, is only a few extra minutes, even seconds, of flour spent in an oven baking! But that's the point. Matzah is simply disciplined chametz. We have to know when to draw the line. In life, we mess up constantly. And we aren't expected to eliminate our animalistic and materialistic drives, but rather to work on channeling them, to tame them. And this balance is amazingly sweet, for the "upright path is the middle path" (Maimonides). We shouldn't be extreme, but we shouldn't give in on our principles and moral values either. There are only 2 areas of the human psyche that Maimonides says must be avoided to the extreme, no middle path necessary: One's anger and ego. Humility is symbolized by the matzah which is flat, while chametz is bloated and puffed up, symbolizing one who is full of himself. On Passover, one doesn't just lessen his chametz intake - he eradicates it completely!

May we all have a meaningful and joyous Passover holiday! And may we each take upon ourselves one area in our lives, where we will work to balance out in a healthy way.

Shabbat Shalom!

-Daniel

True Freedom

Regardless of one's level of Jewish observance, Passover (Pesach) holds a special significance in the life of every Jew. It's actually amazing to see how long Jews, from various backgrounds worldwide, have observed this holiday. I remember once as a teenager in high school, attending a party, that happened to be during Passover. While everyone was consuming beer, I saw out of the corner of my eye a group of Jewish teens drinking bottled wine, kosher for Passover. While it warmed my heart (not that I advocate underage drinking ;), it drives home this amazing power of Passover for every Jew, even those that don't observe very many Jewish practices during the rest of the year. What is this spiritual energy of Passover? And how come we are so obsessed with it, enough that we mention the leaving of Egypt throughout our daily prayers?

The spirtual theme of Passover is freedom. Of course we commemorate the freedom of leaving Egypt and its slavery over us. But what does that mean for us today, free to do as we please? What does it mean to truly be free?

The mistake comes in our way of thinking. We think that freedom is when all constraints on a person are taken away. Meaning, we assume that freedom is the natural state of a person - that if one is liberated from external forces that limit him, we have a "free" human being. The message of Passover is that a much greater and truer freedom can be attained. When G-d took us out of Egypt, this was but the 1st step toward Mount Sinai and the giving of the Torah. When we left Egypt, we were free in the conventional sense - no one ruled over us. But then, as we proceeded through the desert, we began to rid ourselves of the depraved culture and Pagan habits we had developed during hundreds of years in Egypt. So too, today, we can free ourselves in so many ways. TV, phones, social media and the materialistic culture that surrounds us - all trap us into thinking a certain way. Is that freedom? On a deeper level, there is ego, anger, impatience, depression - each of us has our own personal trigger reactions to our surroundings, buttons that when pressed, don't exactly elicit the finer elements of our inner selves. We have to work to free ourselves and not be subservient to our habits. Through hard work (represented by the 49 days between Passover & Shavuot when the Torah was given), we can help free ourselves from the shackles of our evil inclination, revealing the massive amount of good within.

But then we received the Torah. Then we were empowered to achieve a yet greater freedom: The ability to transcend even our good inclination. Meaning, to always improve and reach greater heights. The Torah and its divine wisdom are sometimes looked at as the opposite of freedom - limiting us with rules and regulations. But if we take a deeper look, we can see that at the end of the day, no matter how hard we work, we can't really be free. Because no matter how "great" we improve, it will always be "me." Defined by the boundaries of self. Torah & Judaism came to raise us beyond self, to a G-dly plane, an infinite one. It draws out the divine within each of us, the infinite potential we have to constantly "Pass-over" the level we were on yesterday.

May this year's Passover (Night of April 6th - 14) unleash the divine, infinite potential within each of us, infusing us with spiritual power to break all of our boundaries; to leave our personal Egypts.

Shabbat Shalom!

-Daniel