The incompatibility of Manichean moralizing and the modern Middle East
By Yair Rosenberg|April 11, 2014 9:02 AM
NOTE: Obviously we'll be posting a lot of Passover Themed articles. This one is wonderful!
There are many distinctive colors which Jews encounter at the Passover seder. There is red for wine and blood, green for the plague of frogs, and black for that of darkness. But there are no shades of grey. Nuance is a scarce commodity in the Passover account. In fact, the story of the Exodus is the prototypical black-and-white moral narrative. There are the innocent and enslaved Israelites, and then there are the cruel and literally baby-killing Egyptians.
There are not two sides to this story. There is no “Egyptian narrative.” Though Jews do briefly note the tragedy of the loss of human life during the seder, pouring out drops of wine for each plague inflicted on their tormenters, this commemoration in no way excuses or sympathizes with the biblical Egyptians themselves. We are presented with an oppressed and an oppressor—a right and a wrong.
The inadequacy of this foundational Jewish narrative to address certain fundamental Jewish questions today was brought home to me as a college student several years ago. Mere hours before the onset of Passover, an email was sent to my school’s Progressive Jewish Alliance listserv with a link to the news that the Israeli government would be closing off the West Bank border for the duration of the holiday. The author of the email appended one question: “What does it mean if on Passover, the celebration of freedom, we lock in the people living under our control?” CLICK HERE TO KEEP READING
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