(4) Moses said, “Thus says YHVH: Toward midnight I will go forth among the Egyptians, (5) and every first-born in the land of Egypt shall die, from the first-born of Pharaoh who sits on his throne to the first-born of the slave girl who is behind the millstones; and all the first-born of the cattle. (6) And there shall be a loud cry in all the land of Egypt, such as has never been or will ever be again; (7) but not a dog shall snarl at any of the Israelites, at man or beast—in order that you may know that YHVH makes a distinction between Egypt and Israel.
Ellen Frankel, The Five Books of Miriam, pg. 107
"With the final plague, all of Egypt feels what it's like to be a slave girl, who has no control over her own fate. And with the death of every firstborn, every Egyptian family knows what it's like to be crushed like dry grain between millstones. Poor Egypt! That so many should suffer because of one man's hardened heart."
How do we cope with feelings of being out of control right now (having no control over our fate)?
How do we deal with feelings of fragility, vulnerability (crushed like grain)?
Can we face the ways we've hardened our hearts to the environment - ways that contribute to increased contact between wild and domesticated animals?
(22) Take a bunch of hyssop, dip it in the blood that is in the basin, and apply some of the blood that is in the basin to the lintel and to the two doorposts. None of you shall go outside the door of his house until morning.
(Bava Kama 60a) Once permission has been given to the Destroyer to do damage, he does not discriminate between righteous and wicked.
The drama of that night is an engulfing destruction: it is for this reason, the Talmud asserts, that the Israelites are under house arrest that whole night. (Aviva Zornberg, The Particulars of Rapture, p.170)
The Israelites are trapped in their homes with an invisible destroyer causing death all around them.
“To live with terror is to wake up each morning and to feel that nothing belongs to you – your mate, your children, your life, the streets you walk through, the coffee shop you sit in with friends, the building which houses your office, your computer, your new stockings. Everything can be taken from you in the blink of an eye – destroyed, ravaged, turned into a rubble of torn metal, flesh, fabric. And that it will happen without a trial, lawyers, jury, the right to appeal: you, yours, all you ever thought was yours by birth, by right, by law, by simple human decency will be stolen from you by someone you never met, who doesn’t even know your name, who will become your self-appointed judge, jury, executioner.” Naomi Ragen (From "Consider This: Living in Terror’s Long Shadow")
(29) In the middle of the night YHVH struck down all the first-born in the land of Egypt, from the first-born of Pharaoh who sat on the throne to the first-born of the captive who was in the dungeon, and all the first-born of the cattle. (30) And Pharaoh arose in the night, with all his courtiers and all the Egyptians—because there was a loud cry in Egypt; for there was no house where there was not someone dead.
"God brought you out of Egypt by night" (Deut. 16:1). The night is indeed the time of redemption, as the people hold fast to the words of their new master and stage a tableau of release. The tension inherent in such a scene is palpable, particularly if one bears in mind the shrieks that rend Egypt and that are heard from the interiors of Israelite houses, set in among the houses of death. To leave by day, “with hands high”: this is the stuff of epic. But the night is another country. (Avivah Gottlieb Zornberg, The Particulars of Rapture: Reflections on Exodus p.165)
(11) This is how you shall eat it: your loins girded, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and you shall eat it hurriedly: it is a passover offering to YHVH.
"The manner in which they are to eat of the so-far unnamed sacrifice is be-chipazon - in haste; but the word, as translated by the Targum, and by Rashi, has connotations of panic (behala), of disorientation. There is a lack of control in this meal...." (Avivah Zorberg, The Particulars of Rapture p.172)
Parashat Bo challenges us to imagine God as a midwife, to embrace our night vision. The poet Theodore Roethke writes: “In a dark time, the eye begins to see.” In their Egyptian midnight, our terrified ancestors caught their first glimpse of freedom. In our own midnights, we, too, begin to see—but only if we find the faith to hold our ground despite our fear, to wait patiently in the shadows rather than running prematurely for the light. (Daniel Fink; The Narrative of the Night)
(יט) ר' יהודה אומר, כל אותו הלילה היו ישראל אוכלין ושותין ושמחין ומהללין לאלהיהם בקול גדול, והמצריים צועקים במר נפש על המגפה שבאת עליהם פתאום, שנ' כי אין בית אשר אין שם מת.
(19) Rabbi José said: All that night the Israelites were eating and drinking, rejoicing and taking wine and praising their God with a loud voice, whilst the Egyptians were crying with a bitter soul, because of the plague which came upon them suddenly, as it is said, "And there was a great cry in Egypt; for there was not a house where there was not one dead" (ibid. 80).
What do we do with the frustration of seeing others not following guidelines?
With leaders (some governors, etc.) refuse to comply with the guidelines?
Afikomen this year...
On seder night, we hide and then seek the afikoman, reuniting the two parts separated at the beginning of the seder. May we learn to discover the lost parts of ourselves, to become reconciled with relatives who have become distant and to find wholeness in a Jewish tradition from which we have become alienated. (A Different Night, Haggadah by Shalom Hartman Institute)
How will we differently appreciate people we've been separated from during this time?
Cup of Elijah this year.....
Now the seder focuses on the hope for the future redemption symbolized by Elijah the Prophet, bearer of good news.
In Egypt, the doors of the house were shut tight on the night of the tenth plague. Blood marked the lintels of the doorposts where we now place the mezuzah. However, in the contemporary seder the doors are opened wide in expectation. This is no longer a night of terror but the dawn of hope. It is, as the Torah calls it, a Night of Watching in expectation of great changes for the better. (A Different Night)
Counting the Omer this year...
On the second night of Pesach we begin counting the 50 days from the Exodus to Sinai, from Pesach, the harvest of barley, to Shavuot, the harvest of wheat. Traditionally, the rabbis interpret the counting as reflecting Israel’s eager anticipation of the giving of the Torah at Sinai on Shavuot. The physical liberation is not an end in itself, but must be wedded to a life of values and responsibility. (A Different Night)
What will have changed for us that we will take into life after quarantine?
Parashat Bo reminds us that darkness is also the incubator of hope, the place where redemption is born. In Egypt, the Jewish people become a nation. We are conceived in the darkness of bondage and delivered in the middle of God’s eternal night of vigil. This ancient poem from the Passover Haggadah recounts our story of miracles fashioned amidst the darkness: Unto God let praise be brought / For the wonders God has wrought / At the solemn hour of midnight (A Passover Haggadah, ed. Herbert Bronstein [New York: CCAR, 1994], p. 90).
I know that even as matzah is the bread of affliction, it is also the bread of redemption, for it holds out the promise that, like our ancestors, we can anticipate the exhilaration of spiritual freedom even in the midst of physical bondage. As we sit together each year at the seder table and recite these words which link us to every generation, we can draw strength from one another to relive the past, to be here in the present, and to make our way into the future. Somehow, this helps to turn the night of waiting into a time of gathering strength for whatever lies ahead. In one way or another, I know that I will be standing there at Sinai. -- Dr. Tamara Green