Our Mission

In every generation, we are required to view ourselves as having personally left Egypt.
It was not only our ancestors that the Holy One, blessed be He, redeemed from Egypt. He redeemed us as well along with them.

— Haggadah

A METAPHOR

A seer tells his friend to flee the country because of an impending war. The man follows this advice, emigrates, and raises many generations of offspring. One would not refer to the seer as having saved all of his friend’s future offspring. Rather, the seer saved the patriarch, and this salvation resulted in the possibility for future offspring.

Why then do we say that G-d redeemed all generations?

When G-d redeemed us, He implanted a sense of freedom in the souls of our people for all generations. Thus, even when we are persecuted, we remain internally free. This is why it was G-d Himself who carried out the salvation—not an angel—since only G-d could have effected this eternal transformation of the Jewish soul.

So our freedom today is not only the result of our ancestors’ freedom but because of the freedom we were granted during the Exodus.Maharal

INNER FREEDOM

In Egypt, we were immersed in the materialism and paganism of Egypt. Even the essence of the Jewish soul had become enslaved. With the Exodus, God implanted an inner freedom within us, one that the later exiles could not undo.

Yes, we may feel as if subjugated to the superficial consciousness of exile, but at our core we are free—the essence of the soul can never again be enslaved. 

The Rebbe

—The Haggadah:

with Classic Commentators,

Midrash, Kabbalah, the Chasidic Masters

and the Lubavitcher Rebbe