In the Torah reading for this week, our Israelite ancestors heard this declaration of God’s promises, totaling five, by Moses:
“I am the Eternal. I will free you from the labors of the Egyptians and deliver you from their bondage. I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and through extraordinary chastisements. And I will take you to be My people, and I will be your God. And you shall know that I, the Eternal, am your God who freed you from the labors of the Egyptians. I will bring you into the land which I swore to give to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and I will give it to you for a possession, I the Eternal.”
This passage establishes the number of cups of wine that we drink at a Passover Seder, and one from which we don’t drink - the Cup of Elijah. Four plus one equals, in Exodus and Seder math, five.
The Torah says that the people could not hear Moses’ message because of “KOTZER RUACH,” which has been translated many ways. The phrase has been rendered as “broken spirit,” “anguish of spirit,” “despondency,” “crushed spirit,” “shortage of spirit,” and “shortness of breath.”
All of those translations add a dimension to the feelings of the Israelites. Contemporary Bible translator and commentator Robert Alter was the one who suggested “shortness of breath.” Perhaps I should have listed that first.
I went to my doctor last Friday for my annual physical exam. When the nurse put that device on my finger, which I now know is called a pulse oximeter, I knew that I wanted to hear him say that my arterial oxygen saturation level was in the mid to high 90s. And so it was. And when it’s not, for any of us, only extra oxygen offers us a lifeline.
When we say in a stressful moment, “I can’t breathe,” we are expressing a sense of being overwhelmed by a current situation in such a way that we feel we have a loss of control. We need a lifeline at those times, as well.
A people who had been enslaved for their entire lives saw their shortness of breath or spirit as a constant reality. No container of oxygen would help them. What they needed was something intangible.
What did Moses offer them? Mose revealed to them God’s pledge of the possibility to choose the labors in which they would engage for livelihood, subsistence, and even personal fulfillment.
Moses announced the available gift of an escape from their bondage. Living in slavery was not just characterized by their hard work. Their shortness of spirit and breath came from the fact that they believed that they would never be anything but slaves. They could never aspire to anything else.
Moses declared that the people would be redeemed. Redemption can mean an exchange. Their trade was likely not only about leaving bondage and entering a state of freedom. The exchange was that the cruel Pharaoh, who considered himself a god, would be replaced in their lives by the God of the Israelites, who would not act with cruelty or oppression. This God would encourage them to live in freedom and to use that freedom wisely and well based on the God’s teachings, which would be upon their lips and in their hearts for generations to come.
Moses told the Israelites that they would be God’s people. Their redemption, their newly-found freedom, and rules from God directing them to act with respect, goodness and righteousness would bind the people to God, and link God to the people through their prayer, their study, and in their newly refreshed spirits.
And where would all of this happen? Not in Egypt. Moses assured the people that they would return to the land of their ancestors. That would be the place where they would apply these new values to their lives in a context of freedom.
All of these promises, together, were like oxygen to the people to heal their shortness of breath and shortage of spirit.
Today, we know, as we live in this land of liberty, that we will best preserve freedom for everyone when our nation offers spiritual oxygen in the form of equal opportunity, choice, the possibility of advancement and upward mobility, a shared sense of purpose that transcends any differences that could set us apart, respect for the law, and a love of neighbors not only in our country but throughout the world.
Moses offered the Israelites oxygen to cure their shortness of breath in the form of hope. May we do the same for one another to assure that freedom, deliverance, redemption, and a deep sense of connection and oneness will envelop the entire human family, all who dwell on our precious planet.
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