Parashat Bo

The people of Israel go out to freedom. To the bondage of Egypt were born generations upon generations of children who never knew the taste of freedom. Why is freedom so important to those who never knew it? After all, they did not know what they were “missing.” And how is freedom understood by those born in captivity? One of the explanations is written in Midrash Rabbah (Leviticus, Emor): “that they did not change their names or their language, and did not speak slander, and none of them was licentious.” There is an actual freedom, and there is a freedom of consciousness. By not changing their names and their language, they remained connected to their source and to a consciousness of freedom. By not speaking slander, they remained faithful and connected to their fellows and to social freedom, and by not being licentious, they remained connected to their morality and to moral freedom. All these enabled the spirit of freedom to blow even hundreds of years after they had been enslaved. When we are in inner freedom, external freedom will come to us!

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