The "Passover Revolution"
So I spent part of the last afternoon of Pesach surfing YouTube with my boys, listening to the rather impressive number of Passover-related song parodies that have been posted to that particular media hub. "Uptown Funk" parodies (think "Pesach Funk" and "Uptown Passover") seem particularly popular this year, as did riffs on Disney's "Let It Go". There was a Bieber-Adele mashup video (culminating in the feel-good moment of Moses shouting "Hello from the other side" across the Red Sea to Pharoah), and a hilarious "Bohemian Rhapsody" spoof that delighted my older boys (who at some point mysteriously became Queen fans).
But the stage was stolen, as always, by the incredibly talented a capella group The Maccabeats, who led off our search for Pesach tunes with the traditional Jewish song "Dayeinu" ("it would be enough") re-sung in almost every musical genre of the 20th century, and ended our musical spree with the amazing revelation that the music of Les Miserables needs only a minor word change here and there to be all about the story and message of Passover. Coming as I do from a generation for whom Les Mis was very nearly sacred music, that last song medley left me speechless.
And that my friends, is a revolution.
But the stage was stolen, as always, by the incredibly talented a capella group The Maccabeats, who led off our search for Pesach tunes with the traditional Jewish song "Dayeinu" ("it would be enough") re-sung in almost every musical genre of the 20th century, and ended our musical spree with the amazing revelation that the music of Les Miserables needs only a minor word change here and there to be all about the story and message of Passover. Coming as I do from a generation for whom Les Mis was very nearly sacred music, that last song medley left me speechless.
Anyhow…somewhere in one of those songs (I think it was the Bohemian Rhapsody take-off), I heard the phrase "Passover revolution," and this got me thinking: what is so revolutionary about this story most of us have heard a hundred times?
There is something revolutionary about the Passover story, to be sure. A group of slaves, led by a man who gave up a life of royalty to become an outcast and then returned to take his people with him, aided by ten miraculous plagues of increasing severity, break the bonds of their captivity and end the story looking back from the far shore of a vast sea at the wreckage of one of the ancient world's most powerful armies. It's no wonder this story has inspired some of history's most downtrodden masses ("Go Down Moses," now a staple of Jewish Seder singing, was originally written by African slaves on American soil), not to mention being picked up by Hollywood on numerous occasions!
There is something revolutionary about the Passover story, to be sure. A group of slaves, led by a man who gave up a life of royalty to become an outcast and then returned to take his people with him, aided by ten miraculous plagues of increasing severity, break the bonds of their captivity and end the story looking back from the far shore of a vast sea at the wreckage of one of the ancient world's most powerful armies. It's no wonder this story has inspired some of history's most downtrodden masses ("Go Down Moses," now a staple of Jewish Seder singing, was originally written by African slaves on American soil), not to mention being picked up by Hollywood on numerous occasions!
But to truly understand the revolutionary-ness of Passover, you have to look beyond the story of how a people escaped slavery to the story – okay, the rather massive volume of stories – of what came after the exodus. The Jews did not become just another free people, free of anyone telling them what to do, free to go forth and become like their Egyptian former masters, free to do what most peoples of the ancient world did at some point: oppress and exploit anyone and everyone they could assert power over.
Instead, the children of Israel somehow came to the understanding that they had been freed for a higher purpose. They became an independent nation, yes, but one dedicated to following an ethical code unmatched in the world at their time. Again, a Les Mis reference comes to mind: Jean Valjean's conflicted solo "Who am I" comes to its point of decision with the line: "my soul belongs to God, I know / I made that bargain long ago…"
Indeed, the Jews took that bargain. They became free from slavery to a harsh master in order to serve a benevolent one. Our Hebrew blessings remind us daily that we now serve a divine monarch: "...eloheinu melek ha-'olam..." (our god, sovereign of all creation). Our ancestors received and accepted the Torah, and in doing so they promised to live up to a higher standard than that of their oppressors in Egypt: a standard that expressly forbade the oppression of the powerless.
Have we always lived up to that higher standard? Of course not. Jews are as human as anyone else. The present State of Israel, heir to the highest ambitions and also the highest standards of Judaism, has not yet been able to deal with all of its people equally and equitably (but to its credit it keeps trying), and we do know of Jewish landowners in the antebellum South who held slaves just like their Christian neighbors did, happily celebrating Passover the whole time.
But if history presents us with Jews who did not live up to the standards of their religious heritage, it also presents us with the story of a people who strove, generation after generation, to welcome the stranger, take care of the alien and the widow and orphan, provide for the dispossessed and the destitute, deal humanely with those in their care or their employ, and treat everyone they met like they had worth. Lest we forget why we do these things, the Torah ceaselessly reminds us "for you were once slaves in Egypt", and the Passover haggadah insists that we are not truly free until all of our brothers and sisters are free.
Because we still remember, thousands of years later, that our ancestors were enslaved, we are forbidden to be harsh masters to those who are beholden to us, bidden to help any who are enslaved by their circumstances to achieve their freedom. We are set free to set about the solemn duty of making a better world than the ones that enslaved, exiled, and oppressed our ancestors.
Indeed, the Jews took that bargain. They became free from slavery to a harsh master in order to serve a benevolent one. Our Hebrew blessings remind us daily that we now serve a divine monarch: "...eloheinu melek ha-'olam..." (our god, sovereign of all creation). Our ancestors received and accepted the Torah, and in doing so they promised to live up to a higher standard than that of their oppressors in Egypt: a standard that expressly forbade the oppression of the powerless.
Have we always lived up to that higher standard? Of course not. Jews are as human as anyone else. The present State of Israel, heir to the highest ambitions and also the highest standards of Judaism, has not yet been able to deal with all of its people equally and equitably (but to its credit it keeps trying), and we do know of Jewish landowners in the antebellum South who held slaves just like their Christian neighbors did, happily celebrating Passover the whole time.
But if history presents us with Jews who did not live up to the standards of their religious heritage, it also presents us with the story of a people who strove, generation after generation, to welcome the stranger, take care of the alien and the widow and orphan, provide for the dispossessed and the destitute, deal humanely with those in their care or their employ, and treat everyone they met like they had worth. Lest we forget why we do these things, the Torah ceaselessly reminds us "for you were once slaves in Egypt", and the Passover haggadah insists that we are not truly free until all of our brothers and sisters are free.
Because we still remember, thousands of years later, that our ancestors were enslaved, we are forbidden to be harsh masters to those who are beholden to us, bidden to help any who are enslaved by their circumstances to achieve their freedom. We are set free to set about the solemn duty of making a better world than the ones that enslaved, exiled, and oppressed our ancestors.
And that my friends, is a revolution.
Comments
Post a Comment