Everyday redemption: Performances of hope

Abstract

“In every generation, each person must regard himself as if he had come out of Egypt.” This prescription of the Haggadah promises that there is a way of reading and speaking about Exodus that allows one to embellish old stories and to make them new in order to re-energize the ideal of biblical redemption, making it relevant to our everyday lives. Redemption in the Exodus narrative can be read not only as a historical record of ancient events, but can also be understood as creating a counter-culture of hope when all that has been experienced until now is one of pure necessity. Redemption, in this view, is an ongoing, everyday activity. It is creating islands of stability in a seemingly meaningless and unresponsive universe. In this article, I identify and explores several rabbinic conceptions of everyday redemption including 1-mirror play, 2-deep dialogue, and 3-and the institutionalization of Torah study. The article also briefly discusses the inherent and dangerous temptation of overreaching and demanding an otherworldly redemption (Redemption with a capital R) in the here and now. The article concludes with a description of some practical contemporary examples of everyday redemption in business.