To My Dear Students,

In a few days, we will, IY"H, celebrate the 3,321st commemoration of Passover.  In our Haggadahs we will read of Egypt, called in Hebrew "Mitzrayim."  The root of this name is "maytzar," meaning "narrow place."  Indeed, our people were narrowly confined when enslaved to Pharoah.

How can we make this ancient experience applicable to us today?  All of us live in Egypt, in a "Maytzar," a narrow place.  There are ways of thinking and ways of behaving that constrict our lives, that confine us, that even enslave us!  They may be behaviors, they may be habits, they may be fears, they may be relationships, and they even may be addictions.  Everyone has something from which they need to be free.  What is it in your life that closes you in, that has you in its grip?  From what do you need an Exodus, a liberation?

As you sit at your Seder table, make the Passover experience part of your life by examining what confines you and resolving to break out of it.  May the message of the Psalm be fulfilled for you:  "I called unto G-d out of the narrow places, and he answered me with great broadening."

With all best for a joyous and meaningful Pesach,

Your Rabbi