Passover is a holiday of memory. More than that, it’s a case study in how memory can be used to cultivate identity and promote justice. We are commanded to “remember the Exodus all the days of your life,” to maintain constant awareness of God’s relationship with the Jewish people and to inspire us to care for the vulnerable — the strangers among us — because we know what it’s like to be strangers in a strange land. (Exodus 23:9)

However, while the story of our experience in Egypt is a driving force behind our caring for the vulnerable, I believe a more powerful expression of this message is found in its precursor. Exodus is a story about God remembering the plight of an oppressed immigrant population in a foreign land, but Joseph’s is a story of being forgotten in a strange land, and it was that forgetting that led to the enslavement of the Israelites.

Joseph is one of the most unfortunate characters in Tanach. The favorite of his father but hated by his brothers, Joseph is stripped of his familiar surroundings and taken to Egypt, abandoned by his family. There, he suffers from oppression and exploitation by people who had the power to help him but didn’t. In Potiphar’s house, Joseph painstakingly cares for his master’s property, only to be imprisoned for a false accusation without a second thought. In prison, Joseph eases the pain of a cupbearer by interpreting his disturbing dream, informing him he would soon be freed. His only request is to be remembered and advocated for after the cupbearer’s release:

I was kidnapped from the land of the Hebrews; nor have I done anything. (Genesis 40:15)

And yet, as soon as he’s freed from prison, “the cupbearer didn’t remember Joseph; he forgot him.” (Genesis 40:23) Or Ha-Hayyim explained that the verse’s emphasis on the cupbearer’s forgetfulness was highlighting that the forgetting was deliberate. To forget, Or Ha-Hayyim claimed, is to actively “blot something out” of one’s mind. Alternatively, Rabbi Yaakov Mecklenburg claimed, “Most usages of forgetting mean not putting one’s attention to something, since it isn’t important in his eyes to put his mind to it.” Joseph, a kidnapped slave imprisoned for a crime he didn’t commit, didn’t matter enough to the cupbearer to be remembered — despite Joseph’s kindness. That remained the case until the cupbearer stood to benefit from Joseph when Pharaoh needed a dream interpreter. (Genesis 41:12)

Ultimately, Joseph’s time in Egypt becomes a blessing; he is given a new name, family and position, and saves the kingdom from famine (Genesis 41:45). But his good fortune is short-lived. In the opening verses of Exodus, we are informed that “a new king arose over Egypt who didn’t know Joseph.” (Exodus 1:8) The immigrant, kidnapped from his home and forced to live among strangers who used and abused him — only to become viceroy and save the kingdom — is forgotten by the kingdom he saved.

Joseph’s experience in Egypt is so often the experience of the immigrant and the downtrodden, mistreated and abandoned by strangers unless he (or his memory) serves their needs. It’s an experience we must remember almost as much as we need to remember our redemption. The Talmud Yerushalmi suggests that the four cups of the seder are sourced in the four times the word kos/cup is used in the cupbearer’s dream. (Talmud Yerushalmi, Pesahim 10:1) The very last thing the Israelites did in Egypt wasn’t make Matzah. It was fulfill their promise to Joseph to remember him and bring up his bones from Egypt. (Exodus 13:19)

Maggid, the section of the Passover seder where we retell our foundational story of the Exodus, doesn’t start with an in-depth analysis of the story. It begins with Ha Lachma Anya, an invitation to the less fortunate — the strangers, immigrants, and poverty-stricken, those without seders or homes of their own — to join ours. It’s a public declaration that we haven’t forgotten them, and a promise to remember them when the seder ends and they leave our homes. It’s an opportunity for tikkun, a reparation, for the forgetfulness that plagued Joseph and led to Egyptian enslavement. It’s only when we remember the less fortunate among us that we can truly sing Le-Shanah ha-ba’ah bi-Yerushalayim, next year in Jerusalem, remembering that we too are immigrants, longing to return home.

This essay appeared in a collection of essays related to Passover and Immigration, ““In Every Generation:” Immigration as a Jewish Value—A Passover Haggadah Supplement” from the Academy for Jewish Religion.

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)