Passover ended Thursday. Already Friday night, Shabbat is ‘in remembrance of the Exodus.’ The point?
It seems like a tautology, but it’s not. The primary lesson of Passover is . . . Passover.
Search out the word. See its context. G-d “passed over” the Jewish Israelite homes when G-d smote the Egyptian firstborn.
This nomenclature and narrative are so routinized that the critical point is missed: Why is Passover — the entire history of the redemption, and the entire holiday, even its very name — tied to the 10th plague alone?
There were nine previous plagues! There were 210 years of slavery.
The length of the slavery and the process of the redemption were long, leading to nine devastating demonstrations of the truth of Moses as over against the emptiness of Pharaoh. Yet, all this is reduced to one word, “Passover.”
What does this mean?
Pharaoh himself never conceded Moses’ truth — that it was G-d and not sorcery Who was behind Moses’ demands for freedom and the nine devastating plagues. Asfor the Jewish understanding of G-d’s liberation of the Israelite slaves, it would seem that a broad term capturing the entire process would have been most appropriate.
Yet, the Torah settles on a single word, a single moment, “Passover.” Jewish collective memory and common usage settle on the same single word, “Passover.”
“Passover” is the remembrance of the last step in the long redemptive process, the 10th plague. The final plague is anticipated five days before it happens, which was on the 15th of Nisan. On the 10th of Nisan, the Israelites were commanded to set aside the lamb or the goat they would use for the Pascal sacrifice, to be offered on the 14th of Nisan and consumed on the 15th — the evening of the death of the firstborn. What set this event apart for all time, designated as “Passover?”
Perhaps this:
G-d “passed over” the Israelite homes because they daubed the blood of the Pascal sacrifice on their doorposts —and Jewish tradition understands the sacrificed lambs and goatss among the Egyptian gods. Their slaughter by the Israelites was a blunt statement of Israelite contempt and fearlessness: Your gods are not G-d. Your fundamental driving idea is false . You are ideologically bankrupt.
“Passover” was the time when the Israelites triumphed not only over Egyptian power, but over the Egyptian idea. If a totalitarian government suffers tremendous reverses, but its idea remains intact, the totalitarian will come back from its reverses.
Note: In the “Dayyenu” segment of the Passover Haggadah, one of the stanzas reads: “If G-d had executed judgment against their gods, and had not slaughtered their first born, it would have been sufficient. ” Of what relevance to the Israelites were the Egyptian gods? Who cares? These “gods” were inherently absurd. They had no power. Belief in them had no foundation. Israelites accorded no credibility to these “gods.” Why was it important that G-d “execute judgment” against Egypt’s gods? It seems pointless. It seems qualitatively different from the Divine judgment against actual Egyptian oppression and the miraculous Divine salvation (“dividing the Sea, guiding the Israelites across dry land,” etc.).
In fact, Divine judgment against the Egyptian gods was key. These gods were Egypt’s ideology, the Egyptians’ raison d’etre. The coincidence of the Israelite sacrifice of an Egyptian god — a lamb or a goat — and the killing of the firstborn united the ideological and the material downfall of the Egyptian empire: the trashing of the driving Egyptian idea together with the worst plague. This was “Passover.”
“Passover,” then, is not just the name of the holiday. It is the critical moment in the Israelite-Jewish redemption. “Passover” connotes: Until the enemy suffers its worst defeats, it will come back. Its worst defeats are the defeat of its idea and the downfall of its power. Reject its gods. Kill its firstborn.
Iran will come back if its radical Islamist Shiite (“Velayat-e Faqih”) idea remains in place. Iran will come back if its military assets are not destroyed. “Passover” is recalled more than any other Jewish holy day because it captures the essence of redemption: the ideological defeat, and material defeat, of the oppressor.
Note: Part of the “Hallel” section at the end of the Haggadah — the praise of G-d lifted from Psalm 136 — is twofold. This psalm affirms universal Divine concern because it ends, “[G-d] supplies food for all flesh,” and this psalm details G-d’s redemption of the Israelites from Egyptian oppression.Of the psalm’s 26 verses, 15 of them detail the Exodus and the subsequent Divine assistance extended to the liberated Israelites.
But look where the Psalmist’s record of the Exodus starts! Not with the birth of Moses. Not with the 10 plagues — the first nine plagues are skipped! The Psalmist’s record of the Exodus begins with the 10th plague alone: “Give thanks to G-d . . . Who smote the Egyptian firstborn.” The entire process of the Exodus is encapsuled with Passover!
The pivot.
The confluence.
The final blow: the death of the Egyptian idea and the death of Egypt’s most precious asset, the first born of each family.
The Exodus is carried forth in the kiddush of every Shabbat and every Jewish holiday and in their prayers: on Shavuot, Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, Sukkot and Shemini Atzeret.
In 5786, the formal holiday of Passover is now over. However, “Passover” has not passed. Its critical confluence — redemption from the fallacies of the oppressors and from their powers — speaks to us always. It speaks to us poignantly and painfully now, as we wage war against the Pharaoh of our age, and suffer bitter losses, even as we must pursue its most powerful assets and its evil, foundational idea to yield the essential Exodus of today.
© IJN 2026
