In anticipation of the upcoming holiday of Pesach, ADDeRabbi writes about the role of shared memory in the shaping our religious awareness. Judaism, he argues, tells a story. The primary function of our theological commitments, as important as they are in and of themselves, is to
form the ‘plot’ of this story, this ‘meta-narrative’, which is the infrastructure of how I see and understand myself and my world.
Meta-narratives form the very fiber of our perception and identity… All of my relationships – with my kids, my car, my house, my job – are predicated upon the shared memory of certain events. Inside this paramount reality, at present, the truth of the event plays a secondary role to the shared memory of it. The ‘plot’ of each of these stories is very simple. With my car it’s ‘this car rolled off the assembly line in 1998, was purchased by x, who sold it to y, who sold it to me. The story explains my possession and is the basis of my ownership.
In this light, the meaning of the specific mitzvah of recounting the Exodus (sippur yetzi’at mitzrayim) becomes clear. At the Seder tonight, Jews around the world will take special notice of our shared history and retell the theological story that is the foundation of Judaism.
Chag Samaech.