Passover: Tension of the Good Sort
There is a healthy tension in being distinct while also being part of something larger. Judaism is unique in its desire to balance the particular and the universal.
While Judaism advocates there is one God for all of humankind, it does not believe that we all have to be of one religion.
Jews take the lessons of Judaism and apply them universally to the issues of our day.
Passover serves as a sterling example. As Jews, we commemorate and celebrate the Exodus from Egypt. We acknowledge that God did this for our People with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. And yet, from this lesson of what God did for us—the particular—we conclude the universal, that God wants all humanity to be free.
What makes the Jewish People distinct is our rootedness in our faith, tempered with our universal concern. It is important not to minimize the former. Should we do so, we risk losing our vehicle for the latter.
— Rabbi David Woznica