Passover as a Rebirth: A Hasidic Perspective on the Festival of Matzot

Passover goes by many names: it is called Chag HaMatzot (the Festival of Unleavened Bread), Chag HaAviv (the Spring Festival), and Zman Cheiruteinu (the Season of Our Freedom).

These names all have something in common—an oxymoron: the force of emergence on one hand, and the vulnerability of transitions on the other.

What if Passover were another birth?

What if freedom were also a personal matter?

What is different this year from all other years?Hasidic insights on some dimensions of the Festival of Matzot.

Strength and Vulnerability

In the Land of Israel, Passover occurs in the spring—it must occur in springtime. So much so that once every few years, an additional month, Adar II, is added to ensure that the meaning of the Exodus is mirrored by a nature that is being reborn, as fragile flowers break through the bark of their buds.

Indeed, it takes immense strength for the flowers of a new season to burst through their buds, and at the same time, young shoots are so delicate.

Just like the Children of Israel, who are suddenly thrust forth, rushed out—in chipazon—on the night of “Pesach,” the Divine’s passing over their homes, into the desert of their freedom.

Yes, freedom is an eruption—so sudden that there was no time to let the dough rise.

And yes, when one emerges from slavery, one is vulnerable—like those at the back of the column who will be attacked by Amalek.

Hasidic thought, through gematria, gives this an inner reading: “Amalek” shares the numerical value with safek, doubt.

It is easy to doubt ourselves when we have been alienated for too long.

So, in memory of these paradoxical emotions, and to fully taste the ambivalence of liberation, we eat for a week, instead of leavened bread, matzot—those flat, unleavened cakes that some of us have remembered since childhood, with their bittersweet taste evoking both festive family memories and the austere simplicity of suddenly reclaimed freedom.

Rosh Hashanah, Purim, Passover: End, Beginning, New Beginning

When we situate Passover within the rhythm of the Jewish calendar, another perspective arises.Passover occurs in the middle of the month of Nisan, which, according to the biblical narrative, is “the first month of the year”—Hachodesh hazeh (“this month”), says God to the Children of Israel before they leave Egypt.

This means Passover is our first festival—and Purim, the last.Yet Passover and Purim are opposites in many ways:Purim’s story is perhaps the closest to our daily lives—it takes place in exile, in the galut, where God is not only hidden (nistar) but appears absent from human destiny.

The Jews rely solely on their inner faith and courage to reverse the pur, the “lot,” from which the holiday takes its name.Passover is the inverse: it is the festival of the great geulah (redemption) through the liberation of the Hebrew slaves—the very same letters as galut, reversed.

This happens through the hitgalut (revelation) of the Divine, who redeems His people with a “mighty hand and an outstretched arm.”

The Exodus seems guided not by chance, but by strong Divine intent, voiced through Moses and Aaron to a stubborn Pharaoh: “Let My people go.”

While Purim features disguise, excess, luxurious feasts, and drinking to the point of blurring good and evil, Passover’s ethos is the opposite: embodied rituals, symbolic foods at the seder, the taste of the “bread of affliction,” and bitter herbs evoke both the tears of slavery and the difficult path to freedom.

As Levinas called it, this “difficult freedom” is clearly felt in the biblical narrative: through Israel’s complaints and ambivalence, it becomes clear that leaving Egypt means losing a familiar world—a comfort zone—and facing life’s wilderness with vulnerability.

So to rebuild ourselves after Purim’s chaos—akin to the tohu va’vohu, the formless void at creation’s start—we begin Passover with a seder (literally: “order”): like good therapy, we recount our story, stage by stage, reliving the Exodus through our senses, memory, tastes, and songs.

From primordial chaos to foundational order, from inward connection to the Divine in a godless world to the birthing of a people carried by God’s arms—from Purim to Passover, from Rosh Hashanah to Passover, from end to beginning, and from beginning to beginning again—it’s no coincidence that the Shabbat Kiddush we recite all year reminds us of both ma’aseh bereshit (the act of creation) and yetzias Mitzrayim (the Exodus from Egypt): the birth of the world, and the birth of our people.

The Exodus: A Collective Memory, A Personal Journey

At first glance, everything about the ritual seems collective: the narrative presumes connection—it requires someone to speak and someone to listen.

The memory is that of a people shaping its identity by retelling its foundational myth.

Of course, transmission is central: Passover is one of the festivals where children are key players—through songs, questions, and the playful search for the afikoman, a cultural tradition that’s become almost ritual.

Yet the Haggadah invites us to read the story as our own: “as if you yourself had come out of Egypt.”For Hasidic masters, the Exodus is also an inner, deeply personal journey.Hasidut, as we know, tends to read biblical stories and characters symbolically and inwardly.Thus for Rabbi Menachem Nachum of Chernobyl, one of the Baal Shem Tov’s earliest disciples, the word “Mitzrayim” (Egypt) is read as meitzar yam—a narrow sea channel.

In this Hasidic light, Egypt is not just a place, but a parable. Mitzrayim becomes a symbolic threshold: the birth canal of maternal waters, split at our own birth.

Pharaoh, the king with a “hardened heart” who refuses to release the slaves, is no more than the ego—our inner part that tries to control everything and only surrenders when life brings us to our knees. Sound familiar?

And there’s more.

For the Meor Einayim, Egypt is finally a state of consciousness: galut ha’daat—“the exile of awareness.”

This means the Exodus is not just personal—it is ongoing. We are never entirely free from returning to Egypt. No one is perpetually conscious .Each time we fall into old patterns, unconscious reactions, missed intentions—we are back in Egypt. But the good news: we need only open our eyes, bring awareness to our thoughts and emotions, and we can be free once again. The Exodus is thus a continual personal practice, more than a one-time liberation—it is an oscillation, a call to cultivate consciousness, every day.

A Seder that Makes Sense

If we view the Seder as a ritual to rush through before dinner—done on autopilot or without understanding—let’s be honest: it can be boring.But if we see it for what it is—a consciousness-altering embodied ritual, like a shamanic ceremony, with symbolic foods and wine that connects us, an intimate and shared rite of liberating speech, of storytelling that builds us and shared meaning that binds us—then this night can become one of the most beautiful of the year.

Some simple tips: sleep well the night and day before—reclaim the nap!

Have a good snack so you don’t arrive famished, allowing you to fully taste each stage of the ritual.

Ideally, read the Haggadah and learn about the Seder beforehand (why not value this prep as much as the cleaning and cooking?). On the night itself, read in a language you understand, ask every question that comes to mind, and invite everyone around the table to ask theirs too.Becoming active participants in our rituals gives them the best chance to transform us—body, mind, and soul.

A New Ma Nishtanah

The Seder begins with a song whose melody you might hear in your mind as you read this: Ma Nishtanah HaLayla HaZeh—“Why is this night different?”This year, the Seder may feel even more different than usual.

This year, more than ever, it’s hard to be Jewish in France.

Hard, especially for children and students, in schools where they increasingly face ambiant insults or direct hostility about their identity.

This year, with broken hearts, we’ve heard children say "they don’t want to be Jewish anymore'".

Perhaps this is what will be different this year: This is not just the time to tell our collective story, but to hear theirs—the stories of our children facing antisemitism today.

The pain and burden of being Jewish in societies hostile to us is not new in our collective memory.For some generations, today’s young people’s pain may resonate with their own memories as children in the late 1930s.

And then there’s the present tragedy of literal captivity—at the border of today’s Egypt.

This year, for the second Passover since October 7th, Israeli families will hold the Seder without their loved ones—still hostages in Gaza.

Yes, history seems to repeat itself, and human madness runs on a relentless cycle.

Yet perhaps in that very repetition lies hope: the Seder plate is round, and the egg upon it, recalling the korban chagigah, symbolizes the cycle’s vitality, the strength of renewal. Like Passover itself, it holds the promise of rebirth and life’s re-emergence. A reminder that the Exodus is a promise eternally renewed.

This is also the message of Hasidut: There is no exile too dark that we can't emerge from. it

There is no eternal Egypt we cannot collectively leave, again and again.

It is up to us to keep believing, and to act to bring it about.

And maybe, just maybe, it starts with something as simple as eating symbols, and telling our story.