Seeking What is Hidden
A revelation is not a creation of new information, but it is the ability to access something that was previously unknown. When something is concealed, it’s not less there, it is just more hidden. On the night of Passover we expand our ability to see that which is typically cloaked in darkness. The Seder is different from all other nights in that it behaves like daytime, allowing us to see more clearly.
The Divine Revelation at Mount Sinai began with the word “I – אָנֹכִ֗י” in the statement “I am Hashem Your God who took you out of Egypt.” When we are not worthy of that level of clarity of the Divine presence, because of our mistreatment of God, then that “I – אָנֹכִ֗י” is concealed, as it says: “וְאָנֹכִ֗י הַסְתֵּ֨ר אַסְתִּ֤יר פָּנַי֙ בַּיּ֣וֹם הַה֔וּא – Yet I will keep My countenance hidden on that day.”1 The Sfas Emes sees the repetition of the word “hidden,” in Hebrew, as the location of God when God isn’t in a revealed state. It is not just that God is hidden, but the hiding place for God – and where God can be found – is in the hidden.
Tradition associates the day and night with designated tasks of Divine service: “לְהַגִּ֣יד בַּבֹּ֣קֶר חַסְדֶּ֑ךָ וֶ֝אֱמ֥וּנָתְךָ֗ בַּלֵּילֽוֹת – to relate Your kindness in the morning and Your faithfulness in the nights.”2 However, when Jacob awakes after he dreams about the angels and the ladder, he acknowledges that God is in that place “וְאָנֹכִ֖י לֹ֥א יָדָֽעְתִּי – and I didn’t know it.”3 Perhaps it is in this moment, of Jacob’s journey into an exile, that he comes to experience the “I – אָנֹכִ֗י” usually reserved for the day, in the darkness of night as well.4
The name “Haggadah”speaks to our obligation to tell of God’s kindness in taking us out of Egypt, as in the verse “לְהַגִּ֣יד בַּבֹּ֣קֶר חַסְדֶּ֑ךָ – to relate (haggid) Your kindness in the morning.” Similarly, we find the biblical obligation to share the story of the exodus, on the night of Passover, being described as daytime: “you shall explain to your child on that day – וְהִגַּדְתָּ֣ לְבִנְךָ֔ בַּיּ֥וֹם הַה֖וּא.”
Day and night are less determined by natural light and more by our capacity to be guided by the light of the Divine. Korech (כּוֹרֵךְ), the wrapping of the bitter herb (מָרוֹר – maror) with the Matzah, is a commemoration of the Temple and better times. On the surface, the symbolism of both of these ingredients seems unclear. The Matzah, while emphasizing the liberation that didn’t provide enough time for the dough to rise, is still also the bread of affliction. Similarly, the Maror, which literally means “bitter – מר – mar” and encapsulates both the suffering of slavery and the pain of the destruction of the Temple’s destruction, also has a positive aspect. We are told that mar, read backwards is “רם – ram” and refers to the future elevation of the 9th of Av as a celebratory holiday referred to as “moed,” and observed as the same day of the week at the seder. The mixing of the mixtures, while not losing their individual focuses of redemption and exile, helps us better identify them both, below the surface, wherever we might find ourselves along that journey.
The Haggadah elevates this universal struggle, to be both present in the moment while also being focused on the future, by bringing our attention to the specific context of Hillel’s sandwich: זֵכֶר לַמִּקְדָּשׁ כְּהִלֵּל. כֵּן עָשָׂה הִלֵּל בִּזְמַן שֶׁבֵּית הַמִּקְדָּשׁ הָיָה קַיָּם” – as a remembrance of the Temple like Hillel. This is what Hillel did while the Temple was still standing.”
Hillel possessed the sensitive discernment necessary to see beyond the privilege of a particular instant, and recognize the presence of potential for a later time. It was his practice, before the Temple was destroyed, to remember it and its destruction.
Maror is understood, in the mystical tradition, as occupying the extreme poles of human experience. Numerically, מרור has a value of 446, the same at מות – death. It is also shares the numerical value of “חסד שבחסד – the kindness within kindness,” which begins the first night of the counting of the Omer in terms of the seven attributes blending within themselves.
Perhaps Korech is an exercise in being able to both hold, and taste, the absence of perfection in the good times and the presence of goodness in the bad. The Talmud teaches that one does not fulfill the obligation to eat Maror if it is swallowed whole. We are instead obligated to chew on it. By chewing – however unpleasant and bitter it is – we can identify the source of the bitterness and process it for a future of sweetness.
In the difficult times of exile, the Israelites often felt abandoned and forgotten by God. However, when they were redeemed, it was clear retroactively that God was focusing on them the whole time. Despite its taste and name, the Maror isn’t the bitterness itself, but the awareness of the goodness which is being masked before the total taste of freedom. What is hidden, in the hidden, is the revealed.
1. [Deuteronomy 31:18.]↩
2. [Psalm 92:3.]↩
3. [Genesis 28:16.]↩
4. [See Ohr Yitzchak and Bier Moshe.]↩
Rabbi Mike Moskowitz is a founding builder at Bayit, author of several books, and scholar-in-residence for queer and trans Jewish studies at Congregation Beit Simchat Torah.
