Dye, dye…einu, are words of a song etched in the collective consciousness of the Jewish mind and heart for thousands of years. The word “Dayeinu” means “it would have been enough for us.” This traditional up-beat Passover song is over one thousand years old and is found in the Siddur (prayer book) of the ninth-century sage Rav Amram Gaon. The song is about being grateful to the Almighty for all of the gifts He gave the Jewish people, such as taking us out of slavery, giving us the Torah and Shabbat; had G-d only given us one of these gifts (fifteen are mentioned), it would have still been enough. This is to show how great our appreciation is for all of them. This year when you are sitting at your Seder, pay attention to the first words of Dayeinu. It begins: “Had He taken us out of Egypt…” That phrase – and it alone – is never qualified with a “Dayenu.” It never says, “Had You not taken us out of Egypt it would have been enough for us,” as it says for the other fourteen things mentioned in the song. Why is this first verse not followed by Dayeinu? The answer is simple: if G-d hadn’t taken us out of Egypt, there would be no “us,” and therefore it wouldn’t make sense to say “had You not taken us out of Egypt it would have been enough for us” because there would be no us. The Exodus is non-negotiable. It was the singular, crucial, transformative point in Jewish history; it’s when we Jews became a people, with all the special interrelationship that peoplehood brings. Had Jewish history ended with starvation in the desert or even at battle at an undisturbed Red Sea, it would have been, without doubt, a terrible tragedy, the cutting down of a people just born – but still, the cutting down of a people, born. The Jewish nation, the very purpose of creation, would still have existed, albeit briefly. Our nationhood is precisely what we celebrate on Passover. Most of us are familiar with the Four Sons mentioned in the Haggadah and the questions each asks, but long before the Haggadah was written, the Torah recounted the wicked son’s question (Exodus 12:26) and it records that the Jews responded by bowing down in thanksgiving. This seems odd, why were they thankful for the news that some of their descendants would be wicked? The Chassidic sage Rabbi Shmuel Bornstein (1856-1926), known as the Shem MiShmuel, explains that the very fact that the Torah considers the wicked son to be part of the Jewish People, someone who needs and merits a response, was the reason for the Jews’ joy. When we were merely a family of individuals, each member stood or fell on his own merits. Ishmael was Avraham’s son and Esav (Esau) was Isaac’s, but neither they nor their descendants merited to become part of the Jewish People, who were ultimately forged from Yaakov’s (Jacob’s) family, at the Exodus from Egypt. Now, after the Exodus, even a “wicked son” is considered a full member of the Jewish People and that indicated to our ancestors that something had radically changed since pre-Egyptian days. The people had become a nation, and that merited an expression of thanksgiving. Once the nation-entity was forged, things changed radically. With blood on their doorposts and sacks filled with matzah, they readily followed Moses into the desert on G-d’s orders, knowing not what awaited them. At that point the Jews began the process of becoming a living nation—an entity whose members and descendants throughout history are part of an organic whole, no matter what lifestyle any of them may choose to live. And thus, the subtle message of Dayeinu is the sheer indispensability of the Exodus—its importance beyond even the magnitude of all the miracles that came to follow. For centuries upon centuries, that sublime thought—that the Exodus is crucial to our existence as Jews—has quietly shaped the hearts of each generation.This year, that message feels especially real. As we sit around our Seder tables, singing Dayeinu with family and friends, we are deeply aware that there are many of our brothers and sisters—soldiers defending the Jewish people—who will not be at their own tables. Some are far from home, standing guard and placing themselves in harm’s way, proudly protecting Am Yisrael in a time of danger and uncertainty. When we say, In every generation, they rise up against us to destroy us… (בְּכָל דּוֹר וָדוֹר עוֹמְדִים עָלֵינוּ לְכַלּוֹתֵנוּ) it is no longer just a line from the Haggadah, it’s a living reality—and so too is its conclusion: וְהַקָּדוֹשׁ בָּרוּךְ הוּא מַצִּילֵנוּ מִיָּדָם—that Hashem saves us.Perhaps this year, when we sing Dayeinu, we can hold them in our hearts and feel our peoplehood not only in theory, but in practice—in gratitude, prayer and a renewed sense of responsibility to one another because the very idea of Dayeinu is rooted in being an us—a people bound together across time, distance, and circumstance. May those who are defending our people be protected, strengthened, and returned safely to their families. And may we all merit to sit together in peace, in unity, and in freedom. Chag Samayach/Good Yom Tov |
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