Leaving Egypt Before Breakfast

I invoke heaven and earth today as witnesses for you. I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. You should choose life, so that you and your offspring will live. (Devarim 30:19) 

The train from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv is packed with commuters. Some are answering emails before work. Others scroll through social media. A few stare silently out the window as the Judean hills give way to glass office towers and crowded highways. 

Somewhere among them sits a religious Jew wearing a knitted kippah. Before opening his laptop, he reaches into his bag and pulls out a small Tehillim. He reads a chapter quietly, almost unnoticed among the sea of glowing screens. 

Nobody pays attention. 

No one will write a history book about those few minutes. No newspaper will report it. Yet according to the Torah, that small act may be far more significant than it appears. It may be another step in the Jewish people’s ongoing journey out of Egypt. 

That sounds strange at first. After all, we left Egypt thousands of years ago. Pharaoh is gone. The pyramids are ancient relics. The Exodus is history. 

Yet every day, Hashem commands us to remember it. 

In the Shema, immediately after the mitzvah of tzitzit, we are reminded that Hashem took us out of Egypt to be our God. The Torah repeats the command again and again, insisting that Yetziat Mitzrayim (exodus from Egypt) is not merely something that happened to our ancestors. It is something that remains relevant to every Jew living today. 

What are We Supposed to Remember? 

The simple answer is that Egypt was never merely a country. Egypt was a civilization, a worldview, and a way of seeing reality. Long after its monuments crumbled and its kings disappeared into history, many of its ideas continued their journey through other cultures and other ages. 

The Torah’s name for Egypt offers a clue. Mitzrayim shares a root with the word meitzarim, narrow places. Egypt represents a place where the soul becomes trapped, where clarity becomes clouded, and where human beings lose sight of their true purpose. 

The ancient Egyptians were among the most advanced people in the world. Their architecture inspired awe. Their wealth was legendary. Their learning attracted visitors from across the known world. Like every great empire, they possessed the power to define what was considered sophisticated, enlightened, and desirable. 

The challenge for the Jewish people was never simply surviving Egypt’s armies. The greater challenge was resisting Egypt’s influence. 

The Paradox of the Pharaohs 

The Pharaohs ruled Egypt. They represented the aristocracy. The rulers. The trendsetters. The people at the top. One of the men in Pharaoh’s inner circle was Potiphar, the man who enslaved Joseph HaTzaddik. The man was effeminate and gay¹.  How did a man like that elevate so high in Egyptian life?  

Egyptian society then must have been like ours today in that Potiphar’s lifestyle was accepted as normal for their society. Egyptian aristocratic men were often perfumed, groomed, and fashion-conscious. Elite culture valued softness, cosmetics, jewelry, and luxury in ways many modern societies associate with femininity. 

Cosmetics were normal. Men commonly wore eyeliner, oils, wigs, and elaborate clothing. It was considered civilized, and to the pagan idolatry it was considered “religious”. Today, you can see this in statues and tomb paintings. 

Egypt wasn’t the only culture to embrace men being effeminate. Other cultures followed. Notably, Persian, Byzantine, and French Versailles. Louis XVIII is pictured in a long-haired wig, white power on his face with lipstick, and tights. Similarly, Julius Caesar of Rome and Alexander the Great of Greece.  

They all date back to Egypt.  

The root culture of Western civilization today is Greece. However, during the Greek Empire, the cultural and intellectual center for centuries was Egypt. They had libraries of thousands of books. The “creators” of Greece as we know it all spent years studying in Egypt.  

The same way Rome “inherited” Greek culture when it conquered Greece, Greece inherited Egyptian culture when it conquered Egypt.  

Everything we are up against today originated from ancient Egypt – our sworn enemy.  

From Egypt to Eurovision 

That challenge has never disappeared. 

Every generation has its version of Egypt. Every generation encounters voices insisting that distinctions do not matter, that boundaries are obstacles, and that holiness is old-fashioned. The names change. The clothing changes. The technology changes. But the temptation remains remarkably familiar. 

Ancient Egypt often celebrated the blurring of distinctions. Throughout history, many powerful cultures followed a similar path. From imperial courts to aristocratic salons, from pagan temples to modern entertainment industries, civilizations have repeatedly embraced the idea that human fulfillment comes from dissolving boundaries rather than respecting them. 

The Jewish Mission 

The Torah teaches the opposite. 

In the opening chapter of Bereishit, creation itself begins with physical separation. Hashem separates light from darkness, land from sea, and the waters above from the waters below.  

God rests on Shabbat and sanctifies it. To this day, we are commanded to distinguish time itself between holy and mundane.  

The world emerges from chaos because distinctions are established. Boundaries are not limitations. They are the architecture of creation itself. 

That principle runs through all of Torah life. We distinguish between men and women, kosher and non-kosher, Israel and the nations, wool and linen, clean days and unclean days, proper speech and lashon hara.  

We are commanded to distinguish between good and bad. God orders us to choose light over darkness.  

Hashem commands we choose right over wrong.  

The Torah teaches us to recognize that not everything is the same and not every path leads to the same destination. 

Leaving Egypt is not something that happened once. 

Leaving Egypt is something a Jew does every day before breakfast. 

Editor’s Note

¹ See Rashi’s comment on Bereishit (Genesis) 39:1

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David Ben Horin lives in Afula with his family, 60,000 passionate Israelis, and Matilda, our local camel.