We are thankful for the freedom from captivity on Thursday of Gadi Mozes, Arbel Yehoud, and Agam Berger, along with Pongsak Thenna, Sathian Suwannakham, Watchara Sriaoun, Bannawat Seathao and Surasak Lamnau.

And for the release today of Keith Siegel, Ofer Calderon, and Yarden Bibas. May they find healing of body and spirit in the days and weeks ahead. And may those who remain hostage be returned to their families speedily and without delay.

We are reminded, during these tense and perilous times, of the Jewish values of making sure everyone is included. This is a value that finds expression in this morning’s Torah portion, Parashat Bo. The first seven plagues have struck Egypt.

At this point, Pharaoh is under pressure from the Egyptian court to let the Israelites go. So he summons Moses and Aaron back to the palace and orders: “Go serve the Lord your God!” He seems to have given in. But then he asks: Mi va’mi ha’holkhim – “Who and who are the ones who will go?” (10:8)

 That’s a silly question. Has Moses not told him exactly who must be allowed to leave? Time after time, he has said something to the effect of “Thus said the Lord: Let My people go that they may worship Me.”

Nevertheless, Moses answers Pharaoh’s seemingly redundant question. 

With our young ones, with our elders we will go, 
with our sons and with our daughters, 
with our sheep and with our oxen we will go— 
for it is the Lord’s pilgrimage-festival for us.

Here, Moses adds a new element to his request. Never before has he specified who, exactly, is included by the term “My people.” Now he says it outright: our children, and elders, our sons and daughters, even our sheep and oxen. That is who is included in “My people.”

To this, Pharaoh claws back the permission he has just granted. No way will I let your children go with you. Just the men can go to worship the Lord.

What is the point of these word games? Why does Pharaoh insist on this verbal jousting. And why does Moses need to articulate what “My people” means.

According to Rabbi Shmuel Goldin, there is a deeper conversation taking place. Remember, Moses has not yet requested that the Israelites be freed from slavery and allowed to leave Egypt outright, even though we know that is God’s ultimate plan.

So now Pharaoh has agreed, in principle, to allow the three day holiday to take place outside of the land. How does Pharaoh, and the rest of Egyptian society, for that matter, think this is going to happen?

In Egyptian religion, and indeed, in every ancient religion, worshipping the deity was the domain of an elite priestly class. You may recall, at the end of the Book of Genesis, with Joseph as the vizier to an earlier Pharaoh, the Egyptian monarchy consolidates all land in the empire under the crown, except for the land holdings of the Egyptian priesthood. They are a powerful force to be reckoned with.

Access to the gods, religious worship, was the domain of a limited elite. The common people could not, and were not expected to, participate in the central observance. It is the king, the priests, the sorcerors who manage the relationship between people and the gods.

So when Pharaoh asks Moses “who, exactly, is going to go?” this is what he has in mind. The idea that the entire nation, including children even the animals, need to participate in the festival to God, is completely foreign to him. So when Moses answers the question in such an expansive way, Pharaoh takes personal offense.

But this too is part of God’s plan to introduce something new to the world. In just two chapters, when the Israelites assemble at the base of Mount Sinai, God will declare them to be a “kingdom of priests, a holy nation.”

The Exodus from Egypt begins a process of democratization of religion. Every Israelite will be able to participate in the worship of God. We see elements of this in this morning’s Torah portion, Parashat Bo. The Torah interrupts the Exodus story before the enactment of the tenth plague to tell us about the laws of Passover.

We learn that this is a holiday that is observed by the entire family. Nobody is left out. It does not require a priest or a Temple. It is observed in the home. Moses instructs the Israelites, us, to observe it as an institution for all time.

Three separate times, he emphasizes the obligation upon parents to teach their children about the symbolism of the rituals and what they represent. Maybe this sounds familiar.

And when your children ask you, ‘What do you mean by this rite?’ you shall say, ‘It is the passover sacrifice to the Lord, who passed over the houses of the Israelites in Egypt when smiting the Egyptians, but saved our houses.’

This is one of the sources of the parable of the Four Children in the Pesach Seder.

What is the grand moral of the story of the Exodus? We are used to it being a story of freedom, conveying the lesson that humans ought not enslave one another, that the condition to which we must strive is for all people to be free. Or perhaps it is the lesson to Pharaoh, Egypt, and the nations of the world – that no human is a God.

Here we learn another message: that every human being can stand in the presence of the divine. God is accessible to every human being. God’s revelation to the Jewish people includes every one of us, regardless of class, gender, or station. All must be included for our celebrations to be complete.

This is what we strive for in our synagogue. It is embedded in Jewish history and practice. And it is part of the culture that has driven our commitment to bringing home our brothers and sisters taken hostage in Gaza. 

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