From Geula to Geula to Geula As soon as Adar arrived, the Mishenichnas signs and songs were dusted off and displayed as we began to feel the joy of the coming month. Actually, some of our sources explain the concept of "When Adar enters, our joy increases" as applying to the months of Adar and Nissan, not Adar alone. In 13-month years, Purim is "moved" or "located" in the second Adar, in order to juxtapose Geula (of Purim) to Geula (of Pesach). And as we approach Pesach, we see signs of the further link between the Geula of the past (Pesach, Purim, and various other occasions) with the Geula of the future, the Complete Redemption. In the haftara of Shabbat HaGadol, the Navi proclaims that G-d will send Eliyahu HaNavi as the harbinger of the Great Day to come. We extend this idea at the Seder by filling a fifth cup of wine - the Kos shel Eliyahu - which sits on our table, while we speak of G-d's bringing the nations of the world to Judgment and while we joyously sing - Next year in Rebuilt Jerusalem. If one thinks things through, it is hard to be too happy about Purim per se, because we remained in exile under the thumb of foreign rulers. It is hard to be completely joyous about Pesach in and of itself... UNLESS we are able to focus on the complete redemption yet to come. That allows us to develop a healthy optimism that allows us to see things in perspective. Haman wanted to kill off the entire nation of Mordechai. And we were saved from that terrible threat. Joy? To be sure. But how many more Hamans have we faced since then? Potentially depressing. Come the promises and prophecies of the Geula yet to come. Belief and complete confidence and trust in the coming of Mashi'ach and in T'chiyat HaMeitim is one of the 13 principles of faith. We don't just believe these things; we make our beliefs part of identity - as a nation and as individuals. Then we can sit at the Seder table, relive the experiences of slavery and of the Exodus... but with the impending Geula Sh'leima as part of the experience. DAYEINU teaches us two different lessons: One, that if all G-d did for us was to take us out of Egypt, we would have sufficient cause to thank Him and praise Him for it. And two, that G-d has done many more things for us, and we are to be thankful for them all. Right after the DAYEINU statements, we find AL ACHAT KAMA V'CHAMA... How much more so do we thank and appreciate G-d's gifts and His protection, etc. The words with which we tell the story of the Exodus are borrowed from the recitation of the Bikurim bringer. That Bikurim bringer is each of us. He is not the recently freed slave who had sunk to the 49th level of impurity; he is the Jew standing in the courtyard of the Mikdash and joyously acknowledges G-d for all the good He has done for us. [The Parshat Tzav Homepage]
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