Jewish Mysticism and Passover

Passover is one of the most important holidays of the year. The holiday is a celebration of the Hebrew people's freedom from slavery and their exodus from Egypt. Directly following the escape from Egypt, the Jews were given the Ten Commandments, the Torah, and were eventually led into the land of Israel. Without these sacred texts and lands the Jewish people and religion could not and would not have survived. Yet the story and present day observance of the Exodus are equally important when looked at through Jewish Mysticism. The holiday of Passover begins with the Seder at sundown on the 14th day of Nissan. The purpose of the Seder is to not only teach of the story of the Jew's exodus from Egypt, but to relive the experience so that one may feel as if he personally was redeemed. When one retells the story of Passover and eats the matzah and the bitter herbs it is a form of repentance for ones sins. Like the Jews in Egypt, many of us today are in a lower state of holiness or communication with G-d. The idea of repentance on Passover is symbolic of saying like the Jewish people in Egypt, "I am also freed and thus worthy of the Torah and Ten Commandments". One has to repent to show that he would have been worthy enough to have received these sacred objects. The word repentance in Hebrew means to return or response. Repentance for sins is one of the most important ideas in Judaism. The idea is that one can make bad decisions and choose the wrong path in life, but through repentance, however, one recognizes that he has made mistakes and asks G-d for forgiveness and for him to show the right path. Without this any action could be seen as the right action. By repenting one needs to look back into his past and review the choices he has made. He is showing God that he wants to continue on his divine path and not the one he himself has created by making bad decisions. Thus when one eats the bitter herbs on Passover he is signifying that he feels the pain and suffering