Pasach

By Rabbi Ammos Chorny

With the impending arrival of the Festival of Passover, having just completed the portions of the Torah that describe in detail the events leading up to the Exodus from Egypt, I ponder on the description of the last plague: The Demise of the First Born!

What preparation did our forefathers have to undertake in order to survive what was going to be an indiscriminate attack on the population? As most of us are aware, the narrative suggests Moshe instructed the Hebrews to place lamb’s blood on the doorposts to their homes and thus ensure God would “pasach” [pass over their dwellings]. The medieval commentator, Rashi, interprets “pasach” to denote God’s “pity,” and willingness to “pass-over” the Jewish homes (Exodus 12:23) while smiting only the Egyptian homes. While skipping over Jewish homes makes sense, why would Rashi translate God’s actions as an expression of God’s pity?

Some more contemporary commentators propose that many Hebrews at the time considered themselves to have been “Jewish Egyptians,” having been enslaved for centuries and enduring all the previous plagues. For those Jews who self-identified as “Egyptian Jews” – God readily “skipped them over” and spared them. Even those who identified themselves merely as Egyptians, but still put the blood on their doorposts were saved, but out of pity rather than merit.

While the notion of identifying with one’s past is of critical importance, and admirable, it is fundamental to our ethos, as Jews, encompassing the essence of that which enables us to actively identify as Jews in any age, but above all, in the present day. As grateful as we must be for the freedoms and liberties our country affords those of us blessed to live within its shores, as “American Jews,” we have to be forever cognizant of the degree to which we are indebted to our ancestors for “getting us to this place” and planting the seeds that have germinated in the advent of a thriving Jewish presence.

As we complete merely a year of living under the dark cloud of a pandemic, having mustered all our strength and resourcefulness to adapt to the demands and the realities of our day, we are obligated to remember those who have been taken away from us, the contributions and sacrifices they made to ensure we — like our ancestors — continue to merit God’s “pity,” blessings and support.

May the day soon dawn when we can be together again, enjoying each other’s company, and growing together as a blessed people.

Rabbi Ammos Chorny serves at Beth Tikvah of Naples.