Musings #115
April 25, 2005
16th of Nissan
More Playing With Words and Letters
My mind never ceases to host dancing Hebrew letters, busy changing partners. In addition, people write to me asking questions, stimulating my mind even more.
Suddenly I realized that I had left out an important, possibly the most important variation of the word, “chametz.” Remember that the word “chametz” is made up of the letters, “chet,” “mem” and “tzaddi” in that order, and one must banish it from one’s possession during the Passover holiday. But if you reverse the order of the letters, you have the word “tzemach,” plant. The verb, “l’tzmo’ach,” means to grow, expand.
There are no coincidences in Hebrew; there must be a reason for this. Judaism is the one religion that recognizes all of man’s physical and spiritual needs and contains a series of Laws to control these needs to utilize them for good. Chametz is powerful; it can both destroy and create, like G-d. When we rid ourselves of the chametz, desist from playing G-d, we can enjoy the benefits of the tzemach, the growing, expansion, progress.
The next word I’ll be playing with was inspired by a shiur (Torah class) this past Shabbat HaGadol by Rabbi Reuven Grodner of Kfar Adumim. He and his wife Chaya were here in Shiloh and he gave a very stimulating class. What I’m writing is not a transcript of what he said, though there are many things I learned from him that day. He had my mind spinning with ideas. If it hadn’t been Shabbat, I’d have been taking notes non stop, and then I would have run home to the computer to write it all down before the glorious messages and ideas were forgotten. But, as we all know, not only was it Shabbat, but it was also the Eve of Passover.
Saturday night, once the sky filled with stars, I couldn’t run to the computer. I had to set the table for the Passover Seder. And then until well after midnight we were busy with the tradional reading of the Hagadah and eating the ritual foods and the festive meal. The next night, once the holiday restrictions were eased there was so much else to do, and now so little of what I learned and thought is remembered in accessible places of my mind.
One word keeps playing in my brain, as it played while Reuven spoke. It’s “Pharoh,” “Parroh,” as we say in Hebrew. “Peh,” “resh,” “eyin,” “heh.” “Pri,” “ra,” bad or evil fruit. “Ra” means “ratzon atzmi,” or ego, selfishness. “Avodim hayinu l’parroh b’Mitzrayim,…” “We were slaves to Pharoh in Egypt,…”
Maybe I’m the only one, but every once in a while I’ve wondered why Yaakov and clan stayed in Egypt. Why didn’t they leave as soon as the famine was over? Why did they make that deal with Parroh for the land, the riches? Look again at that very well-known line in the Haggadah, and read “Parroh” as its meaning. “We were slaves to the evil fruits, the addicting riches and materialism in Egypt.”
When we read it like that, everything becomes clear. Their sometimes irrational behavior even after seeing those great miracles include worshipping the Egyptian cow and dreaming of the “Egyptian delicacies.” The Children of Israel weren’t happy to have left. Many blamed Moshe for making a difficult situation worse.
I’m reminded of the Holocaust survivors who, despite all they suffered at the hands of the Germans still considered the German culture superior to all others. Even when their daily lives became more and more difficult, the majority made no serious attempt to leave. And they didn’t rebel in sufficient numbers to be successful.
Human nature hasn’t changed, or has it?
Chag Sameach and Shabbat Shalom,
Batya Medad, Shiloh
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