March brings spring along with the festival of Passover. Passover, with its Seder rituals and story of freedom is one of my favorite Jewish holidays. The story of our exodus from Egypt is a story I find very compelling, a story with an important message to teach, the importance of freedom for everyone throughout the world.
Mitzrayim, the Hebrew word for Egypt, is often translated as a narrow space, a place of limited opportunities and constricted choices. During the Seder we consider what it means to be personally liberated from Mitzrayim, and many Jews use this as an opportunity to reflect on what holds us back from fully living our lives. This year our limits are more tangible and less metaphorical. While we are not slaves, our lives have been severely restricted and constricted by the Covid pandemic. Some of us have gone through difficult illnesses and may even be enduring lasting physical effects. Some have experienced losses without being able to attend a funeral or spend last days with loved ones. Some folks are bored, greatly missing grandchildren and others they are close to. Yet other people I speak with are thriving in the calmer, slower paced lives that the pandemic has required.
While we haven’t been liberated from the Covid pandemic yet, we do see hopeful signs as case numbers decrease in our community, throughout the country and around the world, and the numbers of those vaccinated increases every day. We remember that when we were liberated from Egypt, we wandered in the desert for 40 years, as we learned how to transcend our limitations and live in freedom. As we start to find a way out of the narrow space of this pandemic, it will take us time to learn how we can live in this new reality.
With the arrival of warmer weather, I look forward to holding outdoor services and other events. The board of directors has started to discuss how we may be able to transition as the situation improves. We continue to place high priority on everyone’s health and safety while we understand the community’s need for more connection. Many thanks to Rabbi Farbman for continuing to provide stimulating services and events virtually, and to all of you who have been participating. Thanks as well to those who delivered Mishloach Manot/Purim bags to our members, making the personal connection so many of us crave.
I look forward to passing through this narrow space together, moving into a place of less restriction and more openness. I am hopeful that as spring brings us more sun and more warmth it will also bring us more freedom. Meanwhile, I will continue to enjoy seeing many of you on Zoom, at services, breakout rooms, meetings or TE programs.