Page 33 - HaMizrachi #28 Pesach USA 2021

Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik zt”l:
The Inner Transformation on
Pesach Night, adapted from
a manuscript of a Shabbat
HaGadol drasha delivered
in Yiddish, 5717 (1957)
n 1957, Rav Soloveitchik’s Shabbat
HaGadol drasha focused on slavery
Iand freedom, through the lens of
halacha. He begins by detailing the ways
that a slave can become a free person.

There are two ways that a slave can Thus, the sanctity of human identity – with the proclamation of G-d’s unity
be taken away from his master. The expressed in the exclusive sovereignty and acceptance of his commandments
first is through conquest by war, as of the Creator – contradicts the insti- as expressed in the four passages
the Mishnah says, “A slave who was tution of slavery. If one accepts G-d’s contained in the tefillin. Similarly, if
captured and ransomed, if he was commandments and attains inner a master calls upon his slave to read
ransomed to be a slave, then he will be sanctity, one cannot be enslaved to from the Torah in public, the slave
enslaved, but if he was ransomed so another person. “‘For the children of earns his freedom. With the bless-
as to go free, he shall not be enslaved” Israel are slaves to me’ (Vayikra 25:55) ing over the Torah “He who chose
(Gittin 37b). If the master went to war and not slaves to slaves” (Kiddushin us from among all the other nations
and was defeated, his slave belongs to 22b). Therefore, in the circumstance and gave us His Torah,” the slavery is
the victor, who can either keep him described above, the slave becomes annulled and the slave is now bound
as a slave for himself or set him free. free once he immerses himself with only to the Creator…
Conquest establishes possession. the intention to convert, for his inner
identity has become sacred and whole When the freedom of a slave stems
Second, a master can lose his slave if, by means of his acceptance of G-d’s from a transformation of identity as
upon the master’s acquiring him, the commandments. in immersion with intent to convert,
slave immerses himself in a mikvah from the raising of the soul from pro-
with the intention of converting to Rav Soloveitchik explained how the fanity to sanctity, from the acceptance
Judaism. The Gemara says: “... since halachot of slavery teach us the intrinsic of the yoke of commandments, from
the slave preceded the prospective meaning of what it is to be free: leaving the lands of the nations and
new master and immersed himself for Sanctity and slavery are contradic- moving to the Land of Israel, his new-
the purpose of conversion, his slavery tory. Slavery is rooted in the pro- found status can never be annulled.
is annulled.” fane, in impurity, in the unworthy; Personal sanctity cannot be annulled
it cannot be paired with the holiness of itself. It can never be uprooted, and
Why? The answer is simple. A fully
developed person whose tzelem and the spiritual fitness of the per- the sanctity is for this time and for-
Elokim is active, whose soul is pure sonality. That is why the slave’s tes- ever more.
and holy, cannot become a slave. timony is unacceptable. He cannot The transformation which the Jews
contract a marriage because the
What is the meaning of tzelem ability to betroth stems from having underwent during yetziat Mitzrayim,
Elokim, of kedushat Yisrael, of kavod a hallowed personality. The moment from slaves to free men, is an eternal
haBriyot? All these ideas express one a slave achieves personal sanctity, his transformation, never to be undone.
notion: that a person has only one slavery is annulled. From hereon, the Jews are free people.
master and not two. “The Master G-d Rav Soloveitchik finished:
of Israel” (Shemot 34:21). Man is sub- The halacha expresses this idea very
ject only to G-d; a human being is nicely: a slave whose master places No power in the world can crush the
free and not subjugated to any other tefillin upon him goes free. Why? Divine revelation of the still, small
person. Because slavery cannot harmonize voice in the depths of the human soul.

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