Every year, we gather at the seder table with four sons: “one wise, one wicked, one simple, and one who does not know how to ask.” This quartet is indeed diverse, but we must still ask: Which sons (and daughters) are still not included? Despite their differences, the four sons mentioned in the Haggadah still participate in seder night, even if passively (he who does not know how to ask), or in an adversarial way (the wicked). But what about those who are not present at the seder, or who are not connected to the festival of Passover in the first place? We are called upon to embark on a quest to find these lost sons, invite them, and make room for them at the seder table.
THE LOST SON
The Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneersohn, was the first to draw our attention to a son who’s not mentioned in the Haggadah.
There is a “fifth son,” he explained—he who is for the time being lost to Judaism. So alienated is this son, that he has no interest in attending the seder, and may not even be aware of its existence. He lives somewhere in the vast world, absorbed in his affairs, completely disconnected from his heritage and holidays. Anyone who celebrates the seder night should seek these “fifth sons” and with much love and compassion invite them to join the seder, thereby reconnecting them to their Jewish roots.
One modern interpretation of the four sons sees them as representing four generations of the people of Israel, expressing what is known as “generational decline” (yeridat ha-dorot)—an increasing distancing from Judaism:
- The wise son is symbolic of the Judaism of old, when everyone was still associated with Judaism to one degree or another, and in this sense, all were somewhat “wise scholars”
- The wicked son symbolizes the generation that purposefully rebelled against Judaism and brashly distanced themselves from it, ceasing to observe its commandments
- The simple son symbolizes the children of the rebellious generation. They do not oppose Judaism with the same intensity as their parents, but on the other they also don’t know much about it
- Finally, the son “who does not know how to ask” is the next generation after that, those who are so disconnected from it, that they don’t know how to begin asking questions about it, or even that questions are welcomed in Judaism
Following this interpretation, we can explain the Rebbe’s fifth son as the next generation in this process—the children of those who don’t know how to ask. While those who don’t know how to ask still have a flimsy connection to Judaism through their rebellious grandparents, the fifth sons have absolutely nothing to tie them to it. They are even more distant than their parents and therefore do not even bother coming to the seder.
While the fifth son is the most distant, it is explained in Chassidic teachings that the “fifth” (חמישי, chamishi) embodies a quality that is “Messianic” (משיחי, meshichi, same letters). He is a potential ba’al teshuvah, a returnee or repentant, who can rise above the greatest of tzaddikim. When he finally arrives at the holiday table, he brings with him all the energy of his journey’s trials and tribulations, thus elevating the seder night to a whole new order of holiness.
THE RESEARCHER SON
We would think that the fifth son embodies all those absent from the seder night, and there is no need to search further. However, on closer inspection we can identify another type of character, who does not exactly participate in the seder like the first four sons but is also not completely absent from it like the fifth one. We call this sixth son the researcher.
The researcher son is an academic type who conducts scientific anthropological research on the seder night of the Jews and its participants. This son is a persona unto himself: on one hand, he is present at the seder, sits at the table, and even participates in reading the Haggadah and eating the special foods; but on the other hand, due to his commitment to the objectivity of his research, he is there, as it were, “on duty”; he remains an outside observer who constantly stops himself from identifying too much, lest he get over-immersed in his research subject. The sixth son is thus simultaneously present and absent, a midway category between the first four sons and the fifth son.
Borrowing a term from his own playbook, the sixth son can be termed a meta-son. The word meta is used in academic terminology to describe a perspective from above, particularly regarding a system’s self-referentiality (like a “meta-theory,” which is a theory about theories). The meta-son is the son who critically observes all the sons participating in the seder, including himself.
Even though the sixth son is physically present at the seder night, he could be said to be psychologically even more distant from it than the absent fifth son. While the lost son knows for certain that he is not participating in the seder, and can therefore be simply invited there, the researcher son thinks he is participating, and it is very difficult for him to grasp just how much he is outside of it. Regarding such situations, the Ba’al Shem Tov said that the verse “And I will surely hide My face on that day” means that the greatest hiddenness is oblivious hiddenness—when we imagine to ourselves to be close to God while we are really distant.
However, like the fifth son, the sixth son also has a remedy, and in his rectified state can surpass all his predecessors. Once he comes to his senses and extricates himself from his elusive exile, the researcher son sits down to write a commentary on the Haggadah. Here he once again adopts an external perspective on the festival and its participants, trying to explain their characteristics and roles. However, this time he doesn’t observe them from the outside as objects, explaining away their spiritual experiences. Rather, he sees them as subjects, fellow believers in whose spiritual journeys he is genuinely interested. Instead of isolating the various parts of the festival and reducing them to external circumstances, he seeks to understand their inner meaning, and to place them in a holy, overarching pattern in which each has its proper place.
SIX SONS, SIX ATTRIBUTES
Inspired by the sixth son, let us now order the six sons that we have identified according to a Kabbalistic structure.
Generally, when we have a system with six components, the Kabbalistic model that lends itself most naturally to ordering them is that of the six attributes of the heart (part of the wider system of the ten Kabbalistic sefirot). When we had only four sons, there was no real basis for this comparison, and other models were more appropriate. However, now that we have added the fifth and sixth sons, the correspondence to the six attributes practically begs to be made. In fact, the six emotional attributes are also known as “sons”—metaphorical offspring of the intellectual sefirot that precede them, particularly, the sefirah of knowledge (da’at).
The names of the six sefirot in question are loving-kindness (chesed), might (gevurah), beauty (tiferet), victory (netzach), acknowledgment (hod), and foundation (yesod). As we shall now see, the six sons align to these sefirot in exactly the order in which they are mentioned in the Haggadah and which we have developed here:
- loving-kindness-chessed Wise son
- might-gevurah Wicked son
- beauty-tiferet Simple (Earnest) son
- victory-netzach Son that Does Not Know How to Ask
- acknowledgement-hod Lost son
- foundation-yesod Researcher son
LOVING-KINDNESS: THE WISE SON
Loving-kindness embodies the power of love and the kindness of giving. The wise son corresponds to loving-kindness because a true scholar is also a person of kindness who wishes to share his wisdom with others. In fact, in the sefirot system, loving-kindness stems from the sefirah directly above it, wisdom (chochmah), suggesting that true wisdom always generates acts of kindness.
MIGHT: THE WICKED SON
Might embodies the power of awe and limitation, also referred to as judgment (din). When this attribute is not properly cultivated, it can lead to negative and even aggressive actions. The wicked son represents the negative aspect of this attribute (and if he repents, its positive side too).
BEAUTY: THE SIMPLE SON
Beauty balances and mediates between loving-kindness and might. Positioning the simple son in with beauty reveals an interesting new facet about him: he is revealed to be standing in the middle between the wise son and the wicked son, listening earnestly to both and trying to make up his mind about them.
VICTORY/ETERNITY: THE SON WHO DOES NOT KNOW HOW TO ASK
Internally, in the psyche, victory is experienced as confidence; confidence and trust in the powers God has given us, and which enable us to overcome and succeed when faced with challenges. However, in its negative state, victory can produce an egocentric confidence in oneself—a sense of “my power and the might of my hand,” which doesn’t acknowledge that all our prowess is a gift from the Almighty. This provides a new and surprising take on the son who doesn’t know how to ask: instead of the silent child we usually imagine, he is revealed to be a self-assured, argumentative type, who cannot ask because he believes he already knows everything.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT: THE LOST SON
Acknowledgment (hod) embodies the ability to gratefully acknowledge that which is above us. However, when dysfunctional, our power of acknowledgment can lead us to acknowledge foreign “masters” and lead our lives based on some other set of beliefs, be they a different religion, or a rationalistic philosophy that does not leave room for Judaism. When acknowledgment becomes a negative force that distances a person from faith, it is described in the Bible as, “my acknowledgment turned against me to my destruction.” Since the root of “Judaism” (yahadut) is the same as that of “acknowledgment” (hod), when acknowledgment is dysfunctional it can make the lost son feel that Judaism itself is a destructive force. Of course, once the lost son returns to Judaism, he once again rectifies his power of acknowledgment allowing him to recognize God and His Torah.
FOUNDATION: THE RESEARCHER SON
The sefirah of foundation gathers and concentrates all the forces above it, channeling their influence downward and outward. It does this by summoning the power of knowledge (da’at), the sefirah that is considered the key to these six emotional attributes, as if knowing them from above. Similarly, the researcher son is simultaneously beneath all the others—a role he assumes to “interview” others—and above them, feeling that he knows them better than they know themselves. Once he returns to his rectified state, however, he truly rises to knowledge and through its power binds all the sons together.
THE INSIDERS AND THE OUTSIDERS
Now notice something interesting: the addition of our two new sons, and the integration of all six into the structure before us, have created a new and surprising division of the sons into two groups of three: the first three sons form one trio, and the following three sons form a sort of lower version of this same trio. This structure reveals several new things about our sons, both old and new:
Firstly, Kabbalah explains that the three higher sefirot are relatively more inner-oriented, while the three lower sefirot are relatively more outward-oriented. This division precisely reflects the relationship between the first three sons and the last three. The first three sons—the wise, the wicked, and the simple—are the most present and active within the seder. It could be said, according to their arrangement in the diagram, that the wise son studies and teaches the Haggadah, the wicked stands opposite him and challenges him, while the simple son stands in between, listening to both and trying to mediate between them.
In contrast, the second trio of sons—the one who does not know how to ask, the lost son, and the researcher—are in one way or another outside the seder. The son who does not know how to ask, although included in the original quartet, is practically with “one foot out the door” since he does not contribute to the conversation; the lost son is completely outside the seder; and the researcher son, as we explained, is simultaneously both present and absent—he sits inside at the table, but his mind and his stance are those of an objective observer standing on the outside. Thus, while the first trio is turning towards the seder table, the second is revolving around it.
Secondly, there is an interesting affinity between each of the first three sons to the son directly below him. The lower three sons, one might say, represent fallen versions of the higher three sons, and the beginning of their rectification lies in their ability to return and resemble the sons above them:
- The son who doesn’t know how to ask, who argues without listening, is a fallen version of the wise son, whose main virtue is that he knows how to ask (“Who is wise? One who learns from every person”). Thus, the rectification of the son who does not know how to ask is to become a true scholar, ready to ask and learn.
- The lost son, who is not present at the seder at all, is a fallen version of the wicked son, who, despite all his wickedness, is at least present and takes part, challenging the wise son. The return journey of the lost son begins by sitting around the table of scholars and confronting the wise, even if at first all he does is repeat the old claims of the wicked.
- Finally, the researcher son who interviews everyone for his work is a fallen version of the simple son. The simple son listens equally to everyone, but with the aim of learning from them, not studying them. The rectification of the researcher lies in infusing himself with a healthy dose of simplicity and earnestness that balances his cleverness and allows him to genuinely listen to others.
After these initial steps, all six must continue to climb to their ultimate corrected state: to be “we are all wise, we are all understanding, we all know the Torah” (yet still commanded to recount the story of the Exodus from Egypt, meaning to constantly advance in our teshuvah). This continual ascent is represented by the upper three intellectual sefirot: wisdom (chochmah), understanding (binah), and knowledge (da’at), which lie above the six emotional attributes.
ENTER THE MISCHIEVOUS DAUGHTER
We noted above that the six emotive attributes are described in Kabbalah as six “sons.” What we haven’t mentioned is that these sons have a sister—a seventh sefirah extending further downward called kingdom (malchut). The six emotive attributes relate to kingdom much as the six weekdays relate to Shabbat: though they are the majority and she is the minority, she is the principal, and they are secondary to her. The six weekdays revolve around the Sabbath like servants around a queen, both serving her and deriving sustenance from her.
The correspondence of the six sons with the six emotive attributes would not be complete without adding to them the seventh daughter corresponding to kingdom. It is she who completes them and grounds them.
But who is the mysterious seventh daughter? Now that we have outlined the two circles of insiders and outsider, who still remains outside on this magical, Spring seder night?
A wonderful verse dealing with the end of days comes to our aid: “How long will you shy away, O mischievous daughter,” says the verse, “for the Lord has created a new thing on the earth: a woman shall court a man.” This verse describes a future reality in which the Jewish people, having for years fled from God and resisted His courtship, turn around and seek Him on their own, without coercion or necessity. From a “mischievous daughter” who shies away from God, she becomes a mature woman who actively courts God as a woman would court her husband.
This maturation process is a metaphor for a teshuvah—a return to God—that is voluntary and free, a “repentance from love” without a hint of external and negative fear.
This mischievous daughter is the seventh, lost daughter of the Haggadah. She does not sit at the seder table, nor does she revolve around it. Rather, she plays under it. On the seder night she is embodied first and foremost by the children, who come to the seder to play with nuts, steal the afikoman, roam between the legs of the adults, and generally drive everyone crazy. All the questions and answers of the older sons, all their intricate and complicated journeys of return, none of these matter to the mischievous daughter. If the adults call her to sit with them and participate in reading the Haggadah, she will wriggle out of their grasp and run back under the table. She is at the seder for the fun of it.
If we continue the interpretation of “generational decline,” the mischievous daughter appears to be the furthest of them all, the last stage in the process of detachment from participation and involvement in the seder. For if the essence of the Passover seder is, as its name suggests, order, then the mischievous daughter embodies its absolute opposite—an anarchic disorder. She is literally “out of order!”
At first glance, this characteristic seems completely contrary to the nature of a sefirah called kingdom, whose concern is the imposition of order and the avoidance of anarchy (as the sages say, “were it not for the fear of the kingdom [authority], a man would swallow his fellow alive”). But according to Chassidic teaching, alongside the control and authority that kingdom radiates outwardly, inwardly it must be imbued with childlike lowliness and playfulness. It is precisely the king, more than anyone else, who must be the most careful not to get caught up in his exterior image, lest he start to believe that he is truly more important than others. To be a true king, he must act from an inner sense of freedom—there must be a drop of anarchy in his soul.
The root of the mischievous daughter’s inner freedom lies in the highest sefirah—the exalted crown (keter), which expresses all that lies beyond our rational comprehension. In fact, the crown contains the secret of the Exodus from Egypt, around which the entire Passover seder revolves. It is said of the sefirot that “their end is embedded in their beginning, and their beginning in their end.” Thus, crown—the highest and first of the sefirot—is intertwined with kingdom—the lowest and last of the sefirot. It is precisely the mischievous daughter who captures the secret of the Exodus from Egypt better than all her six older brothers.
Through her free-for-all playfulness, she will merit, in her maturity, to make true teshuvah out of love and by choice. While the sons study, argue, and interpret the story of the Exodus, the seventh daughter simply lives it.
Our updated partzuf is thus:
- loving-kindness-chessed Wise son
- might-gevurah Wicked son
- beauty-tiferet Simple (Earnest) son
- victory-netzach Son that Does Not Know How to Ask
- acknowledgement-hod Lost son
- foundation-yesod Researcher son
- kingdom-malchut Mischievous daughter
May we merit to embrace within us all the children of the Haggadah and come out with them to true freedom. Have a happy and kosher Pesach!
