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Four Children or One?
Contributed by Sophia + Jacob

  • TOP HAGGADAHS FOR 2023

I now invite the reader to imagine that the Haggadah’s text is not about four different children at all, but a single child.

The first and second questions—objectively viewed—are more or less equivalent to each other. They both begin with “mah”, which in biblical Hebrew can mean “what?”, but can also mean “why is it?” or “what is the meaning of?”

Seeing the various rites, the child first wants to know why the parent is living this way and why it is deemed important to pass it on. But the parent prefers to understand “mah” in its easier meaning of “what”, and so responds: “Here’s a catalogue of all you need to know about living a Jewish life”. (And, by implication: “Am I not a good parent/teacher, and aren’t you a wise child?”).

But the child hadn’t asked a “what” question, but rather the crucial “why” question—perhaps the most important question anyone, of any age, can ask. The essential message of Passover is that the service of God is unlike the service of Pharaoh. Pharaoh does not brook “why” questions. No tyrant does. No slave may ask such questions. But the essence of being free is that one is entitled to ask such questions. And one is entitled to answers, or at least good faith attempts at answers.

So, let us go back to the child. Having gotten the catalogue of rules, the child feels the need to clarify: “No, what I meant was: ‘Tell me the meaning of this service of yours’.” And now that the parent cannot avoid the import of the question, profound embarrassment ensues. Like so many of us, the parent hasn’t thought very deeply about why we should be doing what we do, and why we want our children to continue those practices. We are, like the parent, much more comfortable with “what” questions than with “why” questions.

The natural reaction when a question exposes the fact that we lack a reasonable answer is all too often to declare the question illegitimate, offensive, and out of bounds, and thus to lash out at the questioner. The “second child”—who is just the same child paraphrasing the original question—is now called “wicked” for asking such an impertinent question.

The child is now perplexed. The question about the Passover rites is put aside for another question: simply “what is this?”—why this kind of abusive treatment is forthcoming. The parent only has one answer: “God took us out of Egypt with a strong arm”. In other words, service of God becomes just like service to Pharaoh—we must simply respect the “strong arm,” the power, and not make trouble with “why” questions.

The outcome of all of this is sadly predictable. The child has now been taught, perversely, not to ask questions. And in this radio silence, the Haggadah offers the only possible advice: “you had better reopen the conversation with this child all over again.” And this time, open a serious dialogue about the essential “why” questions. It is for this very reason that our ancestors were freed, and why people everywhere yearn to be free: to end our constriction to the “what”, and to be able to ask what is, after all, the signature human question: “Why?”
haggadah Section: -- Four Children
Source: Rabbi Gordon Tucker, Masorti Foundation

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