This sermon was delivered on the seventh day of Passover at Temple Beth El in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Hineini, here I am. Hineinu, here we are on the final day of Pesach according to Torah. (There are those in the diaspora who follow later teachings and celebrate this holiday eight days.) On the first day of Pesach, we celebrated the moment when we were freed from slavery. On this, the seventh, we celebrate the day we cross through the sea to freedom.

Crossing through the sea is fearful. Crossing though the sea is muddy. Crossing through the sea is overwhelming.

On this day, according to Jewish traditional reckoning, 3337 years ago, the Israelites stood at a treacherous place. The Egyptian armies were pursuing them from behind and a sea was before them. The Israelites were terrified and paralyzed with fear.
Then God called out to Moses saying, “Why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to move on. Raise your staff, stretch out your hand over the sea to divide the water so the Israelites can go through on dry ground.”

Moses’ call to action is reflection of the Talmudic teaching (in Tractacte Pesahim 64b), “ain somchim al ha nes – do not rely on miracles.”

What always strikes me on Passover eve is the full moon – the same fullness of the moon that gave the Israelites the light to leave in their darkest hour of slavery still shines for us each and every year. We are given the light and the clarity that we need to move forward.

When we find ourselves in precarious situations, “ain somchim al ha nes – do not rely on miracles,” the Talmud teaches.

We, too, stand at an uncertain time – economically, politically, democratically. We now face a fearful and uncertain moment — when due proces and academic freedom seem to be threatened.

The Israelites cried out to God and God responded, “Why are you crying out to me? Lift up your arm,” God said, “And let the sea part.”

In spite of the paralysis that anxiety can create, God is saying to us that we have what we need to move forward.

I am a professor at a University, Queens University, that is facing a fearful time. Our University does not have the economic roots to withstand the storms of threats of reduced federal support for our students so they ability to attend Queens. This is why I was so thankful this week when the presidents of Princeton and Harvard stood up to the fight.

Princeton’s president, Christopher Eisgruber, was the first to speak out and say “No” to the administration’s demands. We are going to support academic freedom in the face of threats to withdraw government funding.

Harvard’s president, Alan Garber, was the second to stand up, speak out and say no. “No government—regardless of which party is in power—should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue.”

Garber, Harvard’s President, is a Jew who wraps tefillin every day and prays with Harvard’s Chabad any opportunity he has. Eisgruber, Princeton’s President, didn’t discover he was Jewish until 17 years ago, when his son had an assignment to research his family’s immigration through Ellis Island. It was then that Eisgruber learned that his mother, an immigrant from Germany who came to our shores as a child, was Jewish. While raised Catholic, Princeton’s president now identifies as a nontheist Jews.

Both these University presidents are Jewish. Both are speaking out against the weaponization of antisemitism to take away freedoms and make universities what one commentator deemed “vassal entities.”

Apparently, I was not alone in being struck by the fact that it was Jewish college presidents who were fighting back. Nora Berman, deputy opinion editor of The Forward noted, “There’s one thing that unites the university presidents that have so far prominently stood up against President Donald Trump’s ongoing assault on higher education: They’re Jewish.”

In addition to Garber and Eisgruber, Jonathan Levin, president of Stanford University; Michael S. Roth, president of Wesleyan University; and Sally Kornbluth, president of MIT, have all raised their voices of opposition or joined lawsuits challenged the administration’s cuts. As they each celebrated Passover, the seder narrative no doubt resonated powerfully. Judaism commands us to address threats to ourselves and to those of our community and confront them. “Ain somchim al ha nes – you do not rely on miracles.”

Today marks the anniversary of crossing the sea. Howard Seidler is about to chant Shirat Hayam, the Song of the Sea. This reading is so monumental that some members of the Chabad Chasidic movement stay up all night leading until this moment. Others come to their shuls at midnight and recite this Song of the Sea — verse by verse as they sing and dance to its words. Some wake up at dawn to gather and chant it. Some even pour water on the floor as they dance as a physical reminder of the originally sea crossing.

One Midrash in the Talmud (Sotah 73a) teaches that an entire tribe of Israelites, the tribe of Benjamin, stepped into those waters at the same time, all not yet knowing whether the waters would part. This Song of the Sea is part of our psyche. We sing the Mi Chamocha, our song of freedom daily, morning and evening, having faith like those before us that freedom will come. Crossing the sea is part of our Jewish memory. It is part of our Jewish DNA.

The leading college presidents fighting the governmental stranglehold on academic freedom are Jewish because yetziat mitrayim, the Exodus from Egypt, and Shirat Hayam, the Song of the Sea, are their inheritance.

I don’t know how many of you grew up coming to seventh day Pesach services and hearing the Song of the Sea chanted. I did. I asked my sister and twin brother to confirm if my memories were accurate. My parents would keep all five of us, their kids, out of school for every Jewish holy day and drag us to synagogue. It was a bit dreary but we were promised ice cream afterwards. Attendance was always super sparse – under two dozen congregants would show up. Services were painful. I don’t remember the song being chanted from the Torah.

Perhaps had they danced and splashed water on the floor I would have remembered it. Maybe we should run sprinklers on this day and have our religious school kids pass through them. Then they will remember that this day marks the anniversary of the parting of the sea.

Yet still I return today for Yizkor to recite prayers remembering my father and my grandparents and my cousin who died at the Nova music festival on October 7, 2023.

This day mattered to my dad and mattered to his dad, so it matters to me.

How do we cross the hard seas? With the memory of the ancestors who’ve crossed seas before us. They did not necessarily cross on dry land but on water — they crossed oceans leaving pogroms, the Holocaust, and antisemitism, in search of a better life. Their trauma and resilience are part of our DNA and part of our Jewish souls. If they crossed seas, then so can we.

The Talmud teaches, “Ain somchim al ha nes – do not rely on miracles.”

We do not rely on miracles. But we do rely on memories of those who taught us, who inspired us, who paved the way for us.
And we do rely on song… the Song of the Sea that Howard will now chant.

Photo by Rehan Syed on Unspash.com.