"LET MY PEOPLE GROW"

April 19, 2003








Rabbi Edward Paul Cohn
Temple Sinai
New Orleans, Louisiana



First, by a royal decree, which called for the death of every Hebrew male infant, a mother placed her newborn child in a basket floating amidst the bulrushes of the Nile. A desperate act for a desperate time, it was hoped that Pharaoh's own daughter would discover the child, rescue it, and take it for her own.

Thus was Moses reared, surrounded by palatial splendor and accustomed to kingly privilege. He was undoubtedly tutored and schooled by the very best scholars of the known world, so that should destiny ever call, he would be prepared to assume the position in the Pharaoh's court.

And yet, Moses was aware of his Hebrew origins. Enjoying his status in the royal palace of Egypt, he nevertheless could not avoid knowledge of his real people and of their tragic plight. But what to do? Any effort to assist the Hebrew slaves or to mitigate their sufferings would surely run the risk of losing his own favored position.

We read in Torah that it was the outrageously cruel beating of a Hebrew slave by an Egyptian taskmaster which ultimately proved too much for Moses. He killed the Egyptian and he saved the Hebrew. But word got out, as word always does, and that was the end of his promising career in the Egyptian royalty. Sometime later, at the naming of his infant son, Moses, on reflecting on this former life of his in the royal confines of Egypt, acknowledged his utter realization:

Ger hayeete b'aretz Nawch-reeyah

I have been a stranger in a strange land.

Once a stranger in a strange land, as Moses saw himself, he had now grown to find and claim his real self; grown to an awareness of his possibilities and his unique role in life, Moses grew into the servant of both God and God's people.

A couple of nights ago, the Jewish people worldwide sat down to the Seder, re-enacting the events of some 3,300 years ago. From oldest to youngest, we gathered at table-side to recall those resounding words of Moses to Pharaoh: "Let my people go that they may serve their God." The Passover message would remind us that freedom is never won by the easy road of mere escape. But, rather, freedom implies an active and combative struggle both for personal growth and for the realization of spiritual ideals. Perhaps, then, it is only after we have found ourselves that, like Moses, we can cease to be strangers in a strange land. Freedom from enslavement must, of necessity, begin deep down within each human breast.

If, dear friends, as we look within ourselves this Passover season, we sense that we are not the people we ought to be, it seems to me we had best remedy that situation. The realization is, in and of itself, the invitation for personal growth.

Let me quickly observe that sometimes in life we let circumstances enslave us. Sometimes we let routine enslave us, and perhaps there are times when we let things enslave us. Perhaps, still, there are times when, with weak will, we even enslave ourselves.


I.

Some people are enslaved by circumstances.

Fate can, and frequently does, present most of us with a measure of disability. Some of us make it through our lives more or less unscathed by personal hardship or crisis. Others, surely less fortunate by far, are shaken and plagued by tragic sickness, misfortune, and just plain bad luck. The majority of us, however, experience at one time or another some traumatic reversal, some stone wall which refuses to budge, some severe trial which tests our very mettle. Someone has put it this way:

As a rule, the game of life is worth playing,
but the struggle is the prize.


Some people, though, are enslaved by circumstance:

A poem I read several years ago sticks with me because, though its words are simple, its meaning is both potent and illuminating, "The Philosopher" by Sara Teasdale.