Q&A: Why We Thank the Holy One, Blessed be He, for the Exodus from Egypt — and in General
Why We Thank the Holy One, Blessed be He, for the Exodus from Egypt — and in General
Question
Why must we thank the Holy One, Blessed be He, for taking us out of Egypt, when He is the one who brought us down there in the first place?
[Seemingly, one could ask this about any expression of thanks for being saved from distress. “Four are obligated to give thanks,” and so on. After all, the Holy One, Blessed be He, also brought about the distress.
Must one always say that a person, through his sins, caused the calamity, whereas the rescue is never due to his merits but is always a “gift” from the Holy One, Blessed be He?]
Answer
Indeed, an excellent question.
Rabbi Akiva already said: “Fortunate are you, O Israel! Before whom are you purified, and who purifies you?” If the view is that both the distress and the rescue come to purify us, then there is room to thank the Holy One, Blessed be He, for the fact that He acts toward us—bringing us into troubles and taking us out of them. If He did neither one nor the other, then we would be disconnected from Him. Something like this appears in the biblical comparison between the Land of Israel and Egypt (“where you watered it with your foot, like a vegetable garden”): although in Israel there is water scarcity, dependence on the Holy One, Blessed be He, means that He acts toward us and does not leave us to ourselves as in Egypt. That is why that same Rabbi Akiva also laughed when he saw a fox coming out of the Holy of Holies while the others cried.
But all this is within the conventional view. In my view, there is nothing to thank Him for regarding any particular thing, because the Holy One, Blessed be He, does not do things in the world (at least nowadays). “Rescue” is only a psychological opportunity to thank Him for creation itself and its laws, within whose framework we operate.
——————————————————————————————
Questioner:
“The Holy One, Blessed be He, does not do things in the world (at least nowadays)”
What do you mean? Does this fit with Nachmanides’ statement, “until we believe that all our affairs and all our occurrences are all miracles”? And with “I believe, etc., that the Creator, blessed be His name, did, does, and will do all deeds”?
——————————————————————————————
Rabbi:
It really does not fit. Apparently I have no share in the Torah of Moses (as he writes about a view like mine).
I will elaborate in my book, God willing.