More on Passover and Unity

(See here for a completely new Harry Potter related thought about Passover.)


I wrote previously about the importance of unity, both in Harry Potter and in Torah thought, particularly around Passover:
http://harrypottertorah.blogspot.com/2007/03/passover-thought-related-to-harry.html

A friend of mine wrote another note about Passover and unity, noting that we start the Passover Seder with an invitation to others to join us at our Seder, underscoring the importance of Jewish unity specifically on Passover.

I'd like to add two additional thoughts about Passover and unity.

First, in the discussion in the Hagadah of the four sons, we see that the wicked son, the "rasha," would apparently still have been saved from Egypt despite being wicked, until he excludes himself from the people of Israel. Only excluding oneself from the Jewish collective results in the Hagadah saying that were he to have been in Egypt he would not have been saved. Being wicked in the first place was not as bad as excluding oneself from unity with the rest of the Jewish people.

Second, we say at the beginning of the Hagadah "not just once have our enemies rose up against us." If you look carefully at the Hebrew, the literal translation is "that not only one, our enemies rose up against us." I saw commentaries that interpret this to say that our enemies will always rise up against us when we're not one, when we're not unified together.

I hope that all of our Passover Seders can lead to the strong Jewish unity that we need.

Happy Passover everyone!