BS”D
THE
CONCEALED CANDLE: PESACH II
Shira
Smiles shiur – March 30, 2014/Adar II 28, 5774
Summary
by Channie Koplowitz Stein
The
Gemarrah instructs us that on the night of the fourteenth of Nissan we
are to
search for chametz throughout the house by the light of a
candle. We are
also told that in each generation every one of us is obligated to
consider
himself as if he himself left Mitzrayim. How are we to accomplish this,
and how
does using a candle help us in our tasks?
The
first thing we must realize is that the Mishnah uses only Mitzrayim,
Egypt, and not Eretz Mitzrayim, the Land of Egypt,
to
signify what enslaved us. That word, mitzraim, signifies narrow
straits,
challenges and troubles that may afflict us wherever and whenever we
are. So
when we consider ourselves free, we must consider ourselves as having
been
redeemed from situations that confine and enslave us, and this is
indeed what
Pesach is all about. However, there is much that keeps us enslaved that
has
nothing to do with building bricks for a tyrant, and this is where a
candle can
indeed be instrumental and instructional.
If
we realize that our enslavement in Egypt was twofold, both physical and
spiritual, as rabbi Reiss points out in the essay Korvoh el Nafshi
Gealah,
we will more readily relate to our personal enslavement that is
intertwined
with our communal enslavement. Although in Egypt we were already
immersed in
the forty-ninth level of impurity, we still managed to cry out to
Hashem, a cry
emanating from our enslaved souls, even if we didn’t realize it.
It was this
cry, a wordless prayer, that sparked the redemptive process, and it is
prayer
that can help us escape from any spiritual enslavement we find
ourselves in
today, for Rabbi Gamliel Rabinowitz writes in Tiv Hahagaddah
that we
daily face enslavement to the yetzer horo who continuously
tries new
tricks to enslave us and whom we can only escape with Hashem’s
help, just as we
could escape Mitzrayim only with Hashem’s help.
Rabbi
Rabinowitz continues and teaches us that in retrospect we understand
that our
horrific enslavement served a purpose, for it made us a compassionate
people, a
nation whose treatment of the weak and downtrodden would serve as a
light unto
the nations. Similarly we must come to realize that our personal
challenges and
troubles also serve a purpose, and Hashem is providing us an
opportunity for
growth through these situations, as difficult as they are in the
present. The
Seder should serve as a vehicle for reaching out to Hakodosh Boruch Hu
and ask
Him to help us understand what we are meant to learn from the
challenges He is
putting us through.
The
Torah writes that Hashem saw and He knew. Rabbi Reiss in Pa’amei
Moed
raises the question: What did Hashem see and what did He know?
The Targum
Yonatan notes, that Hashem saw our suffering, and knew that within the
deep
recesses of our hearts we were doing teshuvah albeit we were unaware of
it.
That’s why it took us a full forty-nine days from our exodus
until we reached
Mount Sinai to be ready to accept the Torah, one day for each level of
impurity
to which we had sunk. We can therefore see that there are parallels
between the
Seder of Pesach and Yom Kippur when we are also immersed in the
teshuvah
process and when the men don their white kittel. When we are using the
candle
to search for chametz before Pesach, we should also symbolically be
searching
within ourselves to remove the impurities within ourselves.
With
this thought in mind, let us try to understand the true nature of
servitude and
freedom. Using Rabbi Bachya ibn Paquda’s Chovot Halevavot
as his starting
point, Rabbi Moshe Schwab discusses the concept of freedom and the
essence of
man. If we were redeemed from the servitude of Egypt into freedom, how
are we
to explain our submission and acceptance of the yoke of heaven and
servitude to
Hashem at Sinai? What exactly is freedom?
One
must first understand that man is a composite of two elements, the
physical
body and the spiritual soul. The spiritual soul was forced to come down
from
its abode under the Heavenly throne and enter the body of man. However,
it
always yearns to return and free itself from its physical trappings.
The body,
on the other hand, is always enslaved. If it does not accept the
control of the
soul, it will remain enslaved to the power of the physical, to the lure
of the
ego, to physical pleasure, all of which is transitory, and he will
never be
able to remove those chains. The soul too, will then be enslaved to the
physical. Our soul, however, always sees God and wants to serve Him.
The moment
the body recognizes its true purpose and also desires to serve Hashem,
it sets
the soul free. The moment man becomes a servant of God and can elevate
the
physical to a spiritual level, the soul understands its purpose in
being sent
to earth, in exile from its Heavenly abode. The soul then can lead man
to a
higher spiritual standard, just as the Jews are meant to lead mankind
to a
higher moral standard.
Along
these lines, Rabbi Avraham Schorr presents a unique interpretation to Chad
Gadya – One Kid, the song with which we conclude our Seder.
In Halekach
Vehalebuv, Rabbi Schorr cites the idea that the entire song
represents each
soul’s struggle to extricate itself from the body that confines
it and tries to
lead it astray. A kid is by nature submissive to its
“father” as the soul is
automatically submissive to its Father, especially the soul of the Jew
Whose
Father bought it with two symbolic coins, the two covenants of
circumcision and
Shabbat. But the independent cat, like a baby, is completely
egocentric, and
does not recognize a master. The dog symbolizing the yetzer horo, joins
the cat
in trying to pull the soul away from its Master. Nevertheless, whatever
happens, the kid always yearns to return to be submissive to its
Master, as
reflected in the repeating refrain of “One kid, one kid.”
As the child matures,
the stick enters the picture, and he gets a sense of morality,
consequences,
and Mussar, but this is followed by the fire of the passionate
adolescent. While the life giving water of Torah can subdue the fire,
the
haughtiness accompanying adulthood will vie for recognition. As we grow
and
understand our limitations, we slaughter that haughtiness of the yetzer
horo
and submit again to Hakodosh Boruch Hu. But even the Angel of Death
cannot
destroy the yetzer horo completely. Only the Almighty in all His glory
can
effect a total repair of this world and the annihilation of the Yetzer
horo.
This
struggle of the soul is symbolized best through the image of a candle,
writes
Rabbi Mindel in My Prayer, for a candle flutters and strives to
move
continually upward, to detach itself from the wick which keeps it
anchored
below. Indeed, the verse states that the soul is a candle of God.
An
interesting custom seems to embody this concept. Along with practical
reasons,
some families have an especially long candle on their Seder
table,called the
Mah Nishtna Licht, to symbolize this yearning of the soul. A
more
universally accepted custom, although also nowhere cited in the
Gemarrah, is
the custom of having a special cup designated as the Cup of Eliyahu as
an integral
part of the Seder. Here too we may start with practical reasons, that
we
prepare an extra cup for any unforeseen guest who may arrive as a
result of our
invitation at the beginning of the Seder (Ho lachmo anyo), or
perhaps as
a depository for wine not consumed as part of the wine of each of the
four
cups, so that the wines of consecutive mitzvoth are not intermingled,
or
perhaps as a welcome for Eliyahu as we anticipate his arrival to herald
the
coming of Moshiach, writes Rabbi Gedaliah Oberlander in Minhag
Avoteinu
Beyodeinu.
Let
us now go back to discussing the dual nature of Man and the model of
the
Prophet Eliyahu, as the Malbim explains it. When Adam was first
created, before
the sin, body and soul were not fused, and Adam could shed his body and
rise
heavenward at will. This ability was lost after the sin. However, when
Eliyahu
rose to heaven, he regained this ability, and only his soul rose to
heaven,
while his body was cast off in Eden. Eliyahu, however, does return to
earth
from time to time. When we see him, he has donned his physical body,
but
usually we do not see him, especially at the two events his presence is
always
welcomed: at every circumcision and at every Seder. As Eliyahu bears
witness to
the covenant of the blood of circumcision, so does he also bear witness
to the
second blood, the blood of the Pascal Sacrifice. So we open the door to
greet
him, and some call out, “Boruch Habo” as they do at
the bris. But
Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Kotzk teaches us that Eliyahu does not really
enter
through the door, but rather through our open hearts and souls.
Halekach
Vehalebuv writes that Eliyahu can bring out the inherent holiness
in each
of us. As we celebrate our Seders, take that symbolic flame and reach
upward,
open the door of your heart that will open the gates of heaven and use
the wine
as the medium for the growth of our inner core, our neshama.
Just as the
inner core of the grape, the wine, is greater than its outer covering
and
receives a greater blessing than the grapes from which it is extracted,
so too
are our neshamos greater than the physical bodies that contain
them.
This is the greater lesson of Eliyahu who could shed his physicality
and rise
to heaven, and this is one reason some have the custom of distributing
the wine
from his cup to all the Seder participants. By all participating in
drinking
from a single cup, we share in the unity of our nation in spite of the
differences in our individual lives, and we will thus hasten the
arrival of
Eliyahu heralding the arrival of Moshiach, writes Rabbi Twerski.
The
candle, then, is necessary not only in searching for chometz, but
also
for searching the recesses of our hearts for that which keeps us from
aspiring
upwards, for seeing the flame of God within us and for understanding
our dual
nature, as Eliyahu Hanavi understood it. As we open the door for
Eliyahu, the
candle reaches higher with the additional ruach, the spirit
and
the breeze. The Heavenly gates are open. Let our prayers and the
yearning of
our souls enter.