A Closer Look At The Pesach Haggadah Reveals How Our Understanding Of Nature Informs Human Behavioral Development

Ancient Water Cistern

“If only the universe would send me a clear sign, I would know what to do”. I find myself thinking about this on occasion and maybe you do as well.

While on tour at the Neot Kedumim Biblical Nature Reserve I visited the ancient stone water cistern shown in this picture. Similar to a pulley system, a vessel attached to a rope was lowered into the cistern to collect drinking water and then pulled back up. Over time, the repetition of the wet rope sliding against the stone created the grooves that my fingers are pointing to.

As cool a “Snapple” fact as this is, my goal in telling you about it is to connect it to the Pesach (Passover) Haggadah which we read at the Pesach Seder (Passover Feast).

Rabbi Akiva, who was the leading rabbi of his generation in Israel (a Tanna) in the first and second centuries of the common era, makes an appearance in our Pesach Seder when the rabbis, so immersed in their study of Torah, had to be reminded by their students that dawn arrived and with it the time to daven (pray). 

But we met Rabbi Akiva earlier, when he was an anonymous 40-year-old shepherd. I can imagine him sitting under the shade of the tree near the stream where his flock was grazing and drinking. He is watching over his animals and enjoying the tranquility that nature around him has to offer when his eyes fixate on grooves in the stones of the stream created by water flowing over them repeatedly. Uneducated at the time this may have been an interesting science lesson for him but fortunately for us he takes this lesson to another, deeper level and realizes that “If water can make such an impression on stone, maybe the Torah can make such an impression on my heart” (Avot D’Rabbi Natan Nusach 2 12:3). Such a seemingly simple encounter turned into food for thought gave us one of the most influential and followed Rabbis of his day. All because he looked at nature/reality and sought to understand how it should inform his choices.

But when looking at the impressions in this ancient cistern in Israel made by the wet rope from the vessel used to draw water, we gain a visual understanding of the parallel that Rabbi Akiva drew (pun intended)!

In the Pesach Haggadah we meet the Pharaoh of Egypt also in the context of water several times. His daughter draws Moshe (Moses) out of the Nile River and Pharaoh allows her to raise him in the palace with the royal family even if his decision was passive. G-D showed Pharaoh who HE is when HE transformed the Nile River, much revered by the Egyptians as the source of their existence and economy, into blood rendering it useless.

After coming face to face with the reality of G-D’s existence and power, Pharaoh has a choice to make. Does he acknowledge this reality and this G-D of the Israelites? Or does he opt for a more convenient interpretation which maintains him as the “One ring that rules them all”? It’s not a spoiler to say that he chose the latter. Instead of allowing the reality of what he saw with the waters of the Nile to wash over him and leave an impression, his heart is hardened (like stone) in defiance. Would things have looked different if he knew what we know about water’s impression on stone?

Our reaction to the figurative waters (reality) that we encounter can either bring us clarity to be followed by action as it did for Akiva who became a great leader we remember even today, or we can choose to remain in a fog and be crushed by the waters as Pharaoh was in the Red Sea.

We each have our own realities to face and actions to decide upon, especially in these damn challenging days. I ask G-D for clarity to recognize, and the strength to pursue and achieve what it is that I and we are meant to do with our realities.

Praying For Their Immediate and Safe Return

With the holiday of redemption approaching, I hope that these 18 months, our 10 plagues, are over and that HE rescues all our captives and heals all our physical and mental injuries now and the world will know today as they did then that it was HIM and not man in charge.

Enhance Your Seder Discussions:

1.    Give an example of a reality/situation that you had to contend with where you chose to deal with it vs. ignoring it and were a better person for it.

2.    When has observing a process or behavior in the natural world informed you on how you should or should not behave. Examples:

a.    Water creating grooves in stone.

b.    Animals fight for survival vs. petty disagreements.

c.    Trees and flowers may seem dead or of low value in the winter, but they are preparing for their big entrance in the spring!

3.    Can you use a story from the Pesach Haggadah as inspiration to write your own story to add to your own Haggadah?