You don’t have to be religious to love Passover—because who doesn’t love celebrating freedom? But what about Shavuot1, which, among other things, celebrates the giving of the Torah at Mount Sinai? The Torah includes all those rules and boundaries (613 according to tradition). There’s lots of “you shall” and “you shall not.” But wait a minute—what happened to freedom? Shavuot has just collided with Passover—or has it?

It may seem like these two festivals are sending mixed messages, but they are closely related. And together, they reveal something crucial for anyone who values freedom.

Freedom and Boundaries

People often talk about freedom from something: freedom from oppression; freedom from debt; freedom from addiction—freedom from other people’s expectations. Only by getting rid of the constraints that interfere with our choices, many would say, can we be truly authentic. Only then can “you do you.” Seen in that way, freedom is the absence of boundaries and limits.

But that idea of freedom is not the way we have understood it throughout our history.

The ironic thing about Passover is that when we became free from Pharaoh, we became “enslaved” to someone else—God. God had freed us to be his people; he formed us into a nation and asked us to follow his commandments.

Was this Slavery Version 2.0, only using words instead of whips? Or was there something profoundly different about this new relationship in which Israel was now free to obey God and live within his boundaries?

A Deeper Perspective

The key to understanding Passover and Shavuot (and the rest of the Bible) is to see that true freedom requires boundaries. Every great painter has to have a canvas. Every great nation is based on a rule of law. Every great inventor must heed the laws of physics as well as ethics. Greatness in any field of human endeavor requires a set of appropriate limitations.

Trying to live without limits is like trying to play checkers without a board. Boundaries are necessary if we want to live in community. That’s why you’re free to park “anywhere” you like at the mall. But anywhere does not include the middle of the food court or even in space already occupied by someone else’s car.

Some seem to think that limits rob us of our full humanity, disallow personal expression, and stifle our creativity. But limitations prevent us from descending into chaos.

For a great example of what that chaos could look like, read Lord of the Flies, by William Golding. A group of pre-teen boys are stranded on an island with no adults and no rules. Their freedom ends up spiraling downward into tribal rivalries, violence, and eventually murder.

Too much freedom leaves us with either stagnation or disorder.

Most of us aren’t about to descend into violence and animal brutality any time soon. But the novel presents a believable and terrifying scenario of what happens in the absence of boundaries and structure. And we know history presents many equally ugly scenarios.

Life without any boundaries would become chaotic, not to mention dangerous. Too much freedom leaves us with either stagnation or disorder.

That said, not all boundaries are healthy: totalitarian countries impose strict limits on the press, the internet, and the opinions of everyday people. Some legal, religious, or cultural boundaries are arbitrary and oppressive.

But God’s boundaries in Torah were different; they were meant to promote human—and Jewish—flourishing.2 There’s a reason why ancient Israel celebrated them! If you had just come out of a life of subjection to vicious taskmasters and suddenly found yourself free, you would need—you would want—guidelines to know how to live. When you think about it that way, who wouldn’t want to know the best way to navigate life as free people?

Same Torah, New Context

Shavuot commemorates the boundaries and guidelines that God gave to our ancestors to help them live a full life. In Moses’ day, those ranged from ethical commandments to rules of civic life to symbolic rituals designed to help them know God. It was structure, not for structure’s sake, but for Israel’s sake, in fact for humanity’s sake—because we were also meant to be a light to the nations.

The Book of Ruth, traditionally read at Shavuot, reminds us that the Torah instructed farmers to leave parts of their crops unharvested for poverty-stricken people to collect. That and other commandments made generosity part of the culture and gave not only food but dignity to those of little means.

Today, not many of us have farms so we need to live out the guidelines to provide for the hungry in other ways. But though we have to adapt God’s guidelines for a new context, they still reflect the same core principles.

If Shavuot suggests that we can still be free to follow God’s guidelines, does Passover point to what we can still be free from? We see mentions of modern-day oppression in the news, and it’s important to care. But what about us personally?

In 1973 I became a follower of Jesus. As a Jew, I have continued to observe Passover. And I have reflected that one thing we need freedom from is … ourselves. For we inflict harm on ourselves, on others, and on the environment in ways large and small. For me, Jesus’ death not only atoned for my sins but has enabled me to grow into the kind of person that can bring God’s shalom—rather than harm—to others. I have experienced freedom from my sin, and “freedom from” has become personal, as well as Jewishly communal.

Our ancestors became free from Pharaoh in order to be free to follow God.

So have Passover and Shavuot collided? Not at all! They are the two poles of human freedom. Our ancestors became free from Pharaoh in order to be free to follow God. And if we want to be truly free today, we need to recognize the goodness of God’s boundaries. He gave them to us so that we can we flourish freely in our humanity, be fully authentic, and embrace our destiny as creative human beings living in community with God and with one another.

Endnotes

1 Literally “weeks” the holiday is so named because it comes 7 weeks after Passover

2 Read Psalm 119 some time; it’s an extended joyfest about the Torah and its commandments.