No Time for Bread: What the Exodus Teaches About the Coming of the Mashiach

This matzah we eat — why?

Every child knows the answer: our ancestors left Egypt in a hurry, on the night of the Plague of the Firstborn that finally broke Pharaoh's stubbornness, and their dough didn't have time to rise. So they baked matzah at lightning speed, tied it up in their packs, and left Egypt.

But here's another question we don't always think to ask: why did our ancestors have to leave Egypt in such haste that they couldn't even pull together normal sandwiches for the road? The Ten Plagues unfolded over a full year, during which the hard labor of the Israelites ceased. They witnessed the miracles and wonders of Hashem, who had promised: \"I have surely remembered you.\" They knew that Moses had been sent to take them out of Egypt, and that the Egyptians' morale was being ground down somewhere between lice and wild beasts. So why weren't their bags already packed? During those many months when it was clear Pharaoh couldn't hold out much longer, there was plenty of time to buy suitcases and load them with everything you'd need for the road. And even if bread, specifically, wouldn't keep long in a world without freezers—surely they could have baked bread on the eve of Pesach, once they'd already been commanded about the Korban Pesach and the scent of redemption was in the air?

Chazal teach that the Exodus from Egypt was meant to teach us about the future redemption. That's what the verse in Micah hints at: \"As in the days of your going out from Egypt, I will show you wonders\". Do we believe we're living in the era of the birth pangs of the Mashiach, the generation before redemption? Of course. Most of us are convinced we're at the tail end of exile, very close to the coming of the Mashiach. We love to quote Rashi on the Gemara in Sanhedrin: \"When Eretz Yisrael yields its fruit generously, then the end is near, and there is no clearer sign of the end than this.\" We read what Chazal say about the signs of the generation of the footsteps of the Mashiach, and we nod along: chutzpah will surge? Obviously. Prices will skyrocket? What kind of question. Truth will go missing? The face of the generation like the face of a dog? No doubt about it—the description fits our times. And so we convince ourselves yet again that the Mashiach is just about here and, with a sigh, we close with the line that seals that Mishnah in Sotah: And what do we have to rely on? On our Father in Heaven.

All well and good. But which of us has a special holiday outfit hanging in the closet, ready for the arrival of the Mashiach? Who has already packed a suitcase with everything needed for an immediate trip to Jerusalem to celebrate the building of the Third Temple? Who among us is raising a lamb for a Korban Todah? Who's saving up for a place in the Jewish Quarter so they can visit the Beit HaMikdash morning, noon, and night?

Let's be honest—those ideas feel far from us. It's told of the Chafetz Chaim that he kept a special garment set aside in honor of the Mashiach. Other greats also lived with a constant awareness of 'With all this, I await him every day that he may come.' For them, the Mashiach was truly just around the corner. We, living in a generation where sign after sign described by Chazal for the days of the Mashiach is playing out before our eyes, are very aware that we're in the middle of a process of redemption—and still, we'll be surprised on the day the Mashiach knocks on the door.

That's what happened to our ancestors in Egypt. The Nile turned to blood and their cruel neighbors had to buy water from them at full price. Frogs and lice filled Egypt's borders—and only they were unharmed. Wild beasts and pestilence devastated the livestock, yet did not touch Israel's property. Boils turned Egypt into one big hospital—where only the Israelites weren't admitted. Hail killed people and animals, but passed over the heads of the Jews. Locusts wiped out Egypt's produce and condemned it to famine—yet did not harm what the Jews had planted and sown. In the plague of darkness the Egyptians froze in place, while their Jewish neighbors, who saw great light, roamed through their homes unhindered and discovered what treasures were in the Egyptians' possession. Remembering all this—and understanding that the plagues didn't hit Egypt in a dizzying blitz that blurred even the Israelites' understanding (the sages say the plagues were spread over twelve months)—you could reasonably wonder: why weren't they better prepared for the redemption that arrived on the night of Pesach?

But then we have to wonder about ourselves, too... We're in the midst of a process of redemption that has been going on far longer than a dozen months. Are we ready for the moment when a great shofar will sound, the news will excitedly report that the Third Beit HaMikdash has descended from the heavens, and we'll all head to Jerusalem to greet our righteous Mashiach? Are we any more prepared than our ancestors were for their departure from Egypt?

Chances are, we are not.

Chazal compared the full arc of redemption to the first light of dawn: \"So it is with the redemption of Israel: at first little by little, and the more it goes, the more it increases.\" But the final moment of the redemption, the crescendo when we are redeemed in an instant and behold the face of the Mashiach? \"Suddenly the Lord will come to His Temple, whom you seek,\" says the verse in Malachi. No matter how much we revel in the signs of the generation of redemption and agree that there is no clearer sign than the one we've merited, in the end we too, like our ancestors in Egypt, will be redeemed in haste—so surprised that our provisions for the road will not be ready.

The halachot of chadash, which are also tied to the holiday of Pesach, teach us how true this is—that the complete redemption will arrive all at once, just like the Exodus from Egypt. By Torah law, when there is no Beit HaMikdash you may eat from the new grain starting on the morning of the 16th of Nisan—and when the Temple stands, only after the offering of the new grain on the 16th of Nisan. But in Sukkah it's stated that Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai decreed that when there is no Beit HaMikdash, the Jewish people may eat new grain only from the evening of the 16th of Nisan. And why? Rashi explains that Rabbi Yochanan feared that the Beit HaMikdash might descend from the heavens the night before, and it would take time to organize the offering of the new grain, so it would be brought only toward evening. To prevent us, in that case, from eating the new grain before the offering, Rabbi Yochanan decreed that in any case we should not eat from the new grain during the daytime of the 16th of Nisan.

Indeed, as in the days when we left Egypt, we will witness wonders: just as our ancestors in Egypt had only brief moments to get ready to leave, with no time to wait for their dough to rise—so too we, when we merit the complete redemption, will find ourselves surprised, unprepared, rushing into the new life of the days of the Mashiach.

May we merit it soon!