Outline
Biblical Anthropology - Passover (2008)
In Exodus, the Bible (in the original JPS translation) Exodus 12:6-8, says, "6. Seven days thou shalt eat unleavened bread, and in the seventh day shall be a feast to the Lord. 7 Unleavened bread shall be eaten throughout the seven days; and there shall no leavened bread be seen with thee, neither shall there be leaven seen with thee, in all thy borders. 8 And thou shalt tell thy son in that day, saying: It is because of that – "ba’avur zeh" – which the Lord did for me when I came forth out of Egypt"Because of that which the Lord did for me when I came forth out of Egypt." What is the antecedent of the word "that?" The verse lacks clarity and is therefore open to various interpretations. In the 1985 JPS translation of Tanakh, the ambiguity is resolved: "And you shall explain to your son on that day, ‘It is because of what the Lord did for me when I went free from Egypt.” Hence, clearly, the Passover ritual is occasioned by the need to acknowledge and praise the Lord for liberating us from the shackles of Egypt. That is, indeed, the common understanding of this key sentence. Rashbam, and apparently Onkelos, agree with this reading of our text, as do Ramban and others. However, Rashi and more explicitly Ibn Ezra and implied in the Targum Jonathan, reverse the cause and effect: It is in order that I perform these rituals that the Lord took us out of Egypt. Ramban, as I mentioned, is critical of this translation, one which is adopted as well (without mentioning the above authorities) by a famous contemporary scholar, R. Yitzchak Zev Halevi Soloveitchik. At first, this seems to be an outrageous halakho-centric exegesis: it is not the divine gift of freedom that is celebrated at the Passover Seder. Rather, He blessed us with freedom so that we might perform the mitzvot of Passover: the matzah, the bitter herbs, the Haggadah narrative.However, upon further reflection, what they are saying is that, in general, the Torah is not here to teach us history unrelated to practica…
