minute, she couldn't keep herself away. "Of all the prayers and Jewish ceremonies," she said, "the Kol Nidre tune has haunted me all these years." She had just wanted to hear it sung once again.
That evening, Pam also asked my wife Miriam if she would teach her how to read Hebrew. They set up a weekly lesson.
Not long after, Pam's husband, who was not Jewish, was transferred and the whole family moved away. We kept in contact with her off and on.
Three years passed. The third time Pam came into our lives was via a telephone call. She was living in New York and wondered if we could hook her up with the local Chabad rabbi. It seemed that her daughter was showing an interest in learning Hebrew.
Looking for a happy ending? Well, since then we have not heard from Pam again. But meeting her those times made a famous Chasidic expression come alive for me. The Lubavitcher Rebbe often emphasized, "One must never underestimate a Jewish soul."
Each and every Jew possesses a Divine soul, which is "part" of G-d above. The soul is constantly searching and striving to get closer to G-d, and to its Jewish roots.
This is actually what Passover is all about. Passover is the festival of liberation. Our Sages teach us "In every generation, and every day, a Jew must see himself as if he had that day been liberated from Egypt."
Freedom was not a one-time thing. It needs constant guarding because every environment carries its own equivalent of "Egypt" - a power that undermines the freedom of a Jew.
Perhaps the most potent threat comes from the individual himself. Every day he must personally "go out from Egypt," he must escape the limits, contraints and obstructions that his physical existence places in the way of his spiritual fulfillment.
I hope that this year, Pam will leave her "personal Egypt" and once and for all rejoin the Jewish nation as we celebrate Passover, the Festival of Liberation.
Rabbi Zushe Greenberg is the spiritual leader of Chabad Center of Solon, Ohio
Reprinted from the archives of L’Chaim (March 22, 2002/9 Nisan 5762), a publication of the Lubavitch Youth Organization in Brooklyn, NY.
