Half Slave - Half Free: Yetziat Mitzrayim, Taking out Egypt

^{Pesach 5781 | March 2021}

Rabbanit Michal Kohane

Class of 2021

The name Pesach, aside from being a reminder of God’s “passing-over”, can also be read as pesach, literally, “a talking mouth”. No wonder that such a holiday is accompanied by a book called Haggadah - “Telling”, which instructs us that:

But… what does the term Yetziat Mitzrayim actually mean?

If it means “the Exodus from Egypt”, as the Haggadah suggests, the phrase should read “yetzi’a mimitzrayim”; and if it means the exit of the Children of Israel then it should be “yetziat bnai yisrael”….

Yetziat Mitzrayim literally means “the going out of Egypt.” This phrase suggests that there is something about Egypt that needs to be “going out”. It suggests that this story has a greater scope than our own slavery and freedom, that it possibly also has to do with our relationship with the world around us, and that our redemption is not isolated, but that Egypt also needs to be redeemed.

Is there any evidence in the Torah or Talmud to support this reading? Or does it result solely from a very nuanced understanding of the Hebrew phrase?

The opening Mishna in the 8th chapter of Masechet Pesachim discusses how to determine which group a person should join for eating the korban Pesach when the person has loyalties to multiple groups. Three such situations are discussed – a married woman, an orphan who has multiple guardians, and a slave who has two masters. The Mishna then discusses a person who is half slave and half free (because one of his two masters has freed him), and states that such a person may not eat from his master’s korban.

In his commentary on this Mishna, Rav Steinsaltz explains that “it is assumed that the master did not intend to allow this person’s free half to partake of the lamb (korban), and therefore the master did not slaughter the lamb with him in mind. Consequently, the half slave is not included among those registered for his master’s offering unless he was explicitly included”. (English from William Davidson digital edition of the Koren Noé Talmud, on Sefaria)

The Gemara (Pesachim 88a-b) further delves into the absurdity of the situation. What should someone do who is half a slave and half a free person? Beit Hillel says that such a person serves his master one day and himself one day. Beit Shamai disagrees, because while that works out fine for the master, it leaves the person in a limbo status in which he is unable to marry anyone – the free part of him cannot marry a slave, and the slave part of him cannot marry a free woman. Instead, Beit Shammai says we force his master (who still half owns him) to make him a free man, and the slave then writes a bill accepting his responsibility to pay half his value to his master. Beit Hillel ultimately agrees with this position.

Who is this half slave, half free person who’s mentioned here?

There’s a hint in the opening verse of parshat Beshalach (Shemot 13:17) which tells us:

“When Pharaoh let the people go”… but wait! Who let the people go?

Placing this seemingly halachic discussion of the person who is half slave and half free here in Pesachim hints at the status of Bnai Yisrael: We too were like a slave to two masters: God, who let us go, and Pharaoh, who would have rather kept us in but was forced to set us free, against his will. As we saw in the Gemara, the slave has to “write a bill accepting his responsibility to pay half his value to his master” (the one who did not want to let him go). Similarly, we too, are left with a debt to the world, represented by Egypt. That is Yetziat Mitzrayim: it’s not just about ourselves, but about the world. On this Pesach, we might wonder, are we done “taking out Egypt”?

Chag Sameach!