The Small Test That Defines Real Freedom: From Moshe’s Lost Kid to the Chasam Sofer’s Gate

"My treasure," the mother gushed as she said goodbye to her son at the preschool doorway on the first day of school. For four years she had stayed home with him, showering him with every term of endearment; now she struggled to part from him even for a short while. "My sweet angel, I’m going to miss you so much, my sweet boy".

At pickup after that first day, she was already waiting outside the gate, full of anticipation: "Mommy’s perfect one! What did you learn at preschool today?"

"Today I learned," her beloved son answered proudly, "that my name is Dani"...

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The redemption of the Jewish people from Egypt unfolded through the shepherd of Israel for all generations: Moses, Moshe Rabbeinu. When Moses fled from Pharaoh, he tended the flock of his father-in-law Yitro; in the wilderness, with the sheep, Hashem informed him that He wanted to send him to redeem the Jewish people from Egypt.  

That revelation was preceded by a test that Hashem gave Moses—a story every child can excitedly recite. As our sages relate in the Midrash (Shemot Rabbah 2:2): "Our rabbis said: When Moshe Rabbeinu, of blessed memory, was shepherding the flock of Yitro his father-in-law in the wilderness, a kid ran off and he ran after it... A pool of water appeared, and the kid stopped to drink. When Moses reached it he said, 'I didn’t know you were running because you were thirsty. You’re tired.' He placed it on his shoulder and walked on. Hashem said: 'You have such compassion in tending the flock of flesh and blood—by your life, you will shepherd My flock, Israel.'"

Only after this did Hashem reveal Himself to Moses and command him to become the first redeemer of Israel.

But this raises a question: Of course Moses was worthy to redeem Israel; surely compassion for a kid goat—great as it is—doesn’t by itself qualify someone to lead the Jewish people. So what are we meant to learn from this episode in our own lives?

Years later in Pressburg, at the famed yeshiva of the great Rabbi Moshe Sofer, the Chasam Sofer, a young man arrived after Sukkot to take the entrance exam. He longed to be accepted to the yeshiva of the generation’s leading sage and drink deeply from his Torah. He had studied, toiled, and reviewed his learning, and now he came to be tested by the Chasam Sofer, a test that would determine whether he could join the ranks of the yeshiva’s students.

After the exam, the Chasam Sofer asked one of his sons to inform the applicant that he had not been accepted. The son, himself a great Torah scholar, was puzzled and asked his father: I was in the room during the examination; I saw that he knew his learning well and that there was no flaw in his answers. Why won’t Father allow him to be counted among the students?

The Chasam Sofer replied to his son: "Indeed, I also saw that he knows his learning well. But that is not why I don’t want him in the yeshiva. The reason is that I lifted my eyes as he entered the courtyard on his way into the house. In the yard, the branches of the s’chach that had covered the sukkah were still lying about. This young man stepped on them with a heavy, confident stride instead of walking around.

"A student who has no feeling for something sacred—as with the s’chach that had been on the sukkah—shows that his inner self does not match his outer self and that he lacks yirat Shamayim. If he lacks yirat Shamayim—in our yeshiva he cannot study"...

Only a few years passed before the Chasam Sofer’s words, to our sorrow, proved sadly true: that young man threw off the yoke of Torah and joined the maskilim, who wreaked havoc in the vineyard of the House of Israel.

This story helps us grasp why our sages attached such importance to the tale of Moshe Rabbeinu running after the weary kid and carrying it back on his shoulders. There’s no doubt Moses was worthy to redeem Israel because of his character and qualities, but there was still a small test needed to prove his fitness for so lofty an appointment.

And that test came specifically by way of a small, seemingly insignificant kid. As the Midrash puts it (ibid. 3): "Hashem does not grant greatness to a person until He tests him in a small matter, and only then does He raise him to greatness."

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On Passover we mark our exodus from Egypt—where we were slaves—to become free people.

Freedom isn’t what many imagine, that a "free person" is someone who does whatever he wants with no one to limit him. True freedom is internal: letting the mind rule the heart and bending the heart to His will, may He be blessed.

Just like that little boy’s name—a single word that captured his whole essence—so too the freedom of the soul is measured precisely in the small things. In the marginal moments. In the sensitivity that shows up in details we tend to dismiss—that’s where a person’s exodus to freedom from the chains of impulse is truly measured.