Kli Yakar (16th-17th C, Prague)
You must know and understand, that these three types of tzara’at afflict three different things because these are the three “coverings” a person has. The first covering is the skin of his flesh. On top of that, are his clothes, which cover his skin. And then on top of them, is his house, which covers him completely, and protects him from the wind and rain. And one who has all these coverings removed from him is considered wild and exposed… Therefore, the plague of the skin is mentioned first, and then, the plague of the clothes, and finally the plague of the house, in order to remove all of his coverings, one by one, until he is completely wild and exposed.
"These plagues are indeed devastating. But according to the Kli Yakar, they are not meant as a punishment, exactly. They are God’s way of slowly, methodically breaking down all of the barriers we have that keep us at a distance from the world."
— ParshaNut: 54 Journeys into the World of Torah Commentary by David Kasher
You must know and understand, that these three types of tzara’at afflict three different things because these are the three “coverings” a person has. The first covering is the skin of his flesh. On top of that, are his clothes, which cover his skin. And then on top of them, is his house, which covers him completely, and protects him from the wind and rain. And one who has all these coverings removed from him is considered wild and exposed… Therefore, the plague of the skin is mentioned first, and then, the plague of the clothes, and finally the plague of the house, in order to remove all of his coverings, one by one, until he is completely wild and exposed.
"These plagues are indeed devastating. But according to the Kli Yakar, they are not meant as a punishment, exactly. They are God’s way of slowly, methodically breaking down all of the barriers we have that keep us at a distance from the world."
— ParshaNut: 54 Journeys into the World of Torah Commentary by David Kasher
Rebbe Pinchas of Koritz (18th C, Lithuania)
The exerted efforts undertaken around the house before Passover allow a person to forget his troubles. It is as if he is shedding an old suit, an older version of himself, and donning a new one. Only through the pressure of cleaning for Passover can he receive new vitality and new light. Therefore, a person should throw away things for which he has no need; this is the essence of Passover cleaning.
“In other words, cleaning and reorganizing give us energy and a new spark, and the reason for cleaning is to simply throw away what we don’t need. The things we collect and do not use simply drain us of energy. They take up space in the home, but also within our souls. Every unnecessary object represents a false desire, a distraction. We need to clean out extraneous things in order to live a more focused life, to live with what we truly need. We should also leave space for new things, especially new blessings to enter our lives, if only we will let them.”
— Days are Coming: A Journey through the Jewish year by Sivan Rahav-Meir
The exerted efforts undertaken around the house before Passover allow a person to forget his troubles. It is as if he is shedding an old suit, an older version of himself, and donning a new one. Only through the pressure of cleaning for Passover can he receive new vitality and new light. Therefore, a person should throw away things for which he has no need; this is the essence of Passover cleaning.
“In other words, cleaning and reorganizing give us energy and a new spark, and the reason for cleaning is to simply throw away what we don’t need. The things we collect and do not use simply drain us of energy. They take up space in the home, but also within our souls. Every unnecessary object represents a false desire, a distraction. We need to clean out extraneous things in order to live a more focused life, to live with what we truly need. We should also leave space for new things, especially new blessings to enter our lives, if only we will let them.”
— Days are Coming: A Journey through the Jewish year by Sivan Rahav-Meir
Sefat Emet (19thC, Poland)
“According to the Sefat Emet, the great Hasidic commentator, we connect the time of our liberation to the time of our revelation because the revelation we experience on Shavuot is precisely proportional to the liberation—the leave-taking—we experience on Passover. We have to let go of yesterday’s Torah—the Torah we know by habit and rote—in order to make room for the Torah peculiar to this moment, the particular truth we can only know when we have left habit and convention behind and are flush with our experience. This, according to the Sefat Emet, is why we empty our house of chametz—of leavened grains and by extension all grain products—in the days preceding Passover. This emptying—this letting go of the flour that has become stale—is a tangible representation of the spiritual liberation we hope to achieve. We must leave, we must let go of that which is stale, in order to make room for that which is fresh and new and arising out of this moment.”
— Be Still and Get Going: A Jewish Meditation Practice for Real Life by Alan Lew
“According to the Sefat Emet, the great Hasidic commentator, we connect the time of our liberation to the time of our revelation because the revelation we experience on Shavuot is precisely proportional to the liberation—the leave-taking—we experience on Passover. We have to let go of yesterday’s Torah—the Torah we know by habit and rote—in order to make room for the Torah peculiar to this moment, the particular truth we can only know when we have left habit and convention behind and are flush with our experience. This, according to the Sefat Emet, is why we empty our house of chametz—of leavened grains and by extension all grain products—in the days preceding Passover. This emptying—this letting go of the flour that has become stale—is a tangible representation of the spiritual liberation we hope to achieve. We must leave, we must let go of that which is stale, in order to make room for that which is fresh and new and arising out of this moment.”
— Be Still and Get Going: A Jewish Meditation Practice for Real Life by Alan Lew
Rabbi Benjamin Shalva (21st C, USA)
The essence of freedom is choice. If we want to free ourselves of a cluttered life, we must also make choices. Some of our meetings, activities, events, e-mails, calls, texts, parties and playdates need to stay and some of them need to go.
How do we choose? Marie Kondo’s life-changing message to the rescue! Her motto for sorting overstuffed shelves can also guide us as we sort busy schedules. Keep only those things that speak to your heart, she writes. We have to work. We have to shlep to Trader Joe’s. These items are nonnegotiable. Other events in our day, however, we can probably live without. Are there items in our calendar, routine ways we keep ourselves busy, that speak not to our hearts but to our more anxious, ambivalent, enslaved selves? Would we survive, might we thrive, even, without that extra extracurricular, without that one last e-mail, without another brick added to the pyramid?
Supplanting chaos and routine with simplicity and purpose is a lifelong journey. Passover comes every year because we need it every year. We need this periodic entreaty to clean, to declutter, to dump that everything drawer and schedule, and start anew. When we keep only those things that speak to our heart, when we choose to live a life not of momentum but of purpose and delight, we join our ancestors on the road to freedom.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2015/04/03/what-passover-can-teach-you-about-getting-rid-of-clutter-and-finding-joy/
The essence of freedom is choice. If we want to free ourselves of a cluttered life, we must also make choices. Some of our meetings, activities, events, e-mails, calls, texts, parties and playdates need to stay and some of them need to go.
How do we choose? Marie Kondo’s life-changing message to the rescue! Her motto for sorting overstuffed shelves can also guide us as we sort busy schedules. Keep only those things that speak to your heart, she writes. We have to work. We have to shlep to Trader Joe’s. These items are nonnegotiable. Other events in our day, however, we can probably live without. Are there items in our calendar, routine ways we keep ourselves busy, that speak not to our hearts but to our more anxious, ambivalent, enslaved selves? Would we survive, might we thrive, even, without that extra extracurricular, without that one last e-mail, without another brick added to the pyramid?
Supplanting chaos and routine with simplicity and purpose is a lifelong journey. Passover comes every year because we need it every year. We need this periodic entreaty to clean, to declutter, to dump that everything drawer and schedule, and start anew. When we keep only those things that speak to our heart, when we choose to live a life not of momentum but of purpose and delight, we join our ancestors on the road to freedom.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2015/04/03/what-passover-can-teach-you-about-getting-rid-of-clutter-and-finding-joy/