Teaching the Value of Freedom at the Seder

Thoughts for the Pesach Hagaddah

By Rabbi Reuven Spolter, Director of Recruiting and Special Projects

Imagine the following Seder "teaching" technique. (Full

disclosure: my wife has forbidden me from actually doing this at
our Seder this year. Or any year.)
‫לכן אמר מתחילה עובדי עבודה זרה היו אבותנו; אף על פי שהיו‬
‫ ומה שגזר עלינו הקדוש‬,‫אבותינו בני חורין היו עובדי עבודה זרה‬
‫ שעל אותה שיעבוד חס עלינו‬,‫ברוך הוא שעבוד לטובתנו היה‬
‫ ונתן לנו את‬,‫ והכנסנו תחת כנפיו‬,‫הקדוש ברוך הוא והוציאנו‬
After Kiddush, sometime after eating the Karpas and .‫ ובנה לנו בית הבחירה לכפר על כל עוונותינו‬,‫השבת ואת התורה‬
breaking the middle matzah, you turn to one of your For this reason it says, " Originally our forefathers were
children arbitrarily, point to her angrily and say, "Go to your idolaters"; even though our forefathers we free, they were
room. Now!" nonetheless idol worshippers, and that which God decreed
"Why? What did I do?" upon us was for our own benefit. For, through this
"Get in your room I said! And the longer you take to get subjugation the Holy One had compassion upon us and
there, the longer you'll be there." redeemed us, and brought us under the canopy of His
After either a small or large argument, your child will storm wings, and gave us the Shabbat and the Torah, and built for
off, likely in anger, perhaps in tears. us the Temple to atone for all our sins.
Wait five minutes. Then call the child, giving her permission
to return to the Seder, and ask her the In essence, God punished us in order to redeem us. He took away
our freedom in order to give it back to us in a

following: "How do you feel? Wouldn't you
like to celebrate the fact that you're now new, fundamentally different way. He couldn't
free to return to the Seder? Hasn't your time just give the Torah to Ya'akov's sons in Cana'an.
in your room given you a new appreciation Retelling the story of the Their children (us) would never have accepted it
for your newfound freedom?" fully. Only through the crucible of suffering and
Redemption to our children
the joy and relief of redemption could we come
isn't about reading the text of to appreciate God's greatness and the
If your child has calmed down enough to speak,
her answer will probably be "no." Before the Hagaddah and sharing redemptive nature of the Torah.
celebrating her freedom, she'd want to know commentary on the text. It's All this makes me wonder: how much do we as
why she was sent to her room in the first place. about personalizing the story parents impose suffering upon our children in
It's hard to celebrate redemption from a order to make them grow?
so that our children can come What cruel parent imposes suffering upon her
perceived injustice.
But isn't that exactly what we do at the Seder.
to appreciate both the children? you wonder. We all do, as well we
We're supposed to relive the Redemption from meaning of suffering that should. What child wants to sit and do her math
Egypt. We're supposed to act like kings on the they taste in the Matzah, and homework? Which self-respecting teenager
night of the Seder, luxuriating in our newfound wants to wash the dishes, or sweep the floors on
the value of redemption they
freedom. But in order to appreciate the good, erev Shabbat? What child wants to spend time
must feel as they lean back in her room (or without internet or cell phone
the Mishnah (Pesachim 116a) tells us that we
must first begin with the bad: ‫מתחיל בגנות‬ and drink their wine. access, God forbid!) as a punishment for some


‫" – ומסיים בשבח‬we begin with the criticism and
conclude with the praise." With which
"criticism" do we begin the Seder? The Gemara
presents two answers:
‫רב אמר מתחלה עובדי עבודת גלולים היו אבותינו [ושמואל] אמר‬
‫עבדים היינו‬
Rav said, "Originally our forefathers were idolaters" and
Shmuel said, "Our forefathers were slaves."
minor or major infraction?
We "subjugate" our children by "forcing" them
to do countless things that they would prefer to
avoid in order to help them grow. In fact, if we failed to "subjugate"
and "oppress" our children; if we gave them complete freedom to
act as they pleased and do whatever they wished, we would be
abdicating our parental responsibility. We would be bad parents.
All of this brings me back to our original scenario. The gemara I
mentioned above concludes with a story:

Examining Shmuel's explanation, I wonder: Sure, we were slaves.
And yes, God redeemed us from slavery. But why were we in
slavery? How did we get there? Was it not the same God that
redeemed us Who also sent us into slavery in the first place? Rav's
explanation seems to answer this question. We entered into
slavery because we were idolaters. In essence, God initiated the
process of ‫ שעבוד מצרים‬in order to redeem us. Commenting on the
section of ‫ מתחילה עובדי עבודה זרה‬in the Hagaddah, Rabbi Yishaya
of Tarani (‫ )רי"ד‬explains:
‫ מה שבח הוא זה שהכניס אותנו המקום למצרים‬,‫לפי שיש לשאול‬
‫ ולמה‬,‫ לא יכנוס ולא יוציא והרי אנו בני חורין‬.‫ואחר כך הוציאנו‬
?‫נשבח על אותה הוצאה‬
For one might ask, what praise is there that He brought us
into Egypt and only then redeemed us. Let Him not bring us
in nor redeem us, and we would have remained free. Why
should we offer praise for this redemption?"
Good question. Rabbi Yishaya answers:
‫אמר ליה רב נחמן לדרו עבדיה עבדא דמפיק ליה מריה לחירות‬
‫ויהיב ליה כספא ודהבא מאי בעי למימר ליה? אמר ליה בעי‬
‫לאודויי ולשבוחי אמר ליה פטרתן מלומר מה נשתנה‬
Said Rav Nachman to Daru, his slave: A slave whose owner
freed him, and gave him money and gold – what should he
say to [the owner]? He answered: he must thank him and
praise him! [Rav Nachman] said back, you have exempted
us from reciting the Mah Nishtanah.
The story in the Gemara sounds to me much like my "educational"
scenario. Retelling the story of the Redemption to our children isn't
about reading the text of the Hagaddah and sharing commentary
on the text. It's about personalizing the story so that our children
can come to appreciate both the meaning of suffering that they
taste in the Matzah, and the value of redemption they must feel as
they lean back and drink their wine.
Which makes me wonder: while I won't send my child to her room
on the night of the Seder (remember, I've been forbidden to do so),
wouldn't I be a better parent and "teller" of the story of the
Redemption if I did?