As we get ready for our Passover seders next week, we will look at the number four and its significance in the ritual.
I will bring you out.
I will rescue you.
I will redeem you.
I will take you to Me…
Before the seder itself. Before the four Questions. Before the four Children. Even before the four cups of wine (though they are connected), we read God’s four promises to the people of Israel. Over the course of two verses in the Book of Exodus, we encounter Divine love and protection, promises not only for the moment of the Exodus, but for the eternal relationship between the Divine and the people of Israel.
Say, therefore, to the Israelite people: I am יהוה. I will free you from the labors of the Egyptians and deliver you from their bondage. I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and through extraordinary chastisements. And I will take you to be My people, and I will be your God. And you shall know that I, יהוה, am your God who freed you from the labors of the Egyptians.
(Exodus 6: 6-7)
Much later, the medieval philosopher Rashi connects these promises with the four cups of wine, encouraging us to focus on each of the four promises as we move through the seder. And, like the seder, we live the experience where the promises are both fulfilled and unfulfilled. Perhaps this year, more than ever, we are living Schrodinger’s Promise—we are brought out, rescued, redeemed, and brought closer to God. And meanwhile, our hostages are in captivity, waiting for rescue and redemption—never far from our hearts. We pray, certainly, that they feel God’s nearness, but we will never know.
The Mishnah teaches, based on these four promises, that we are to thank, praise, and bless the One who did these miracles for our ancestor and for us, bringing us from slavery to freedom, from anguish to joy, from mourning to festival, from darkness to great light, and from subjugation to redemption. Some 800 years or so later, we see the first version of the Acheinu prayer—said for those held captives. It is on this prayer that Rabbi Yoshi and Dr. Tali Tadmor based the beautiful piece we sing at services. Found as early as the 9th century, Acheinu reads:
Our family, the whole house of Israel, who are in distress, or in captivity — who stand either in the sea or on dry land — may the Omnipresent have mercy on them and take them out from narrowness to expanse, and from darkness to light, and from oppression to redemption, now, swiftly, and soon!
The links to the seder and the story of Passover are clear, and they are purposeful.
As Rabbi Elie Kaunfer teaches, then, as now, we pray: Just as our ancestors were redeemed from Egypt, may they journey from darkness to light—right now. Just as God kept Divine promises for the children of Israel in Torah, may we—our brothers and sisters—be brought out, rescued, redeemed, and taken into the Divine embrace.
— Rabbi Sari Laufer