“Don’t Swallow Maror Without Chewing It”

“Don’t swallow maror without chewing it” means that we need to work on our unity with greater perseverance despite our inability to reach it. If we in the group agree with the need to unite, then we have entered Egypt.

Previously, we did not agree or even speak about it. First, the brothers neglect Joseph and throw him out. But then there is a famine and they agree to unite, and then they enter Egypt.

At first, they live well in Egypt, but then they begin to realize that they are unable to connect. “And the children of Israel sighed from the labor” since they could not accomplish anything. It is then that “their cry ascended to God from the labor.”

This is the meaning of “Don’t swallow the Maror without chewing it.” We are obliged to “chew” this work and feel all its bitterness and heaviness, like the bitter and hard horseradish from which Maror is made. From hard work and our failure, we soften and, out of desperation, turn to the Creator.

Only after hard work do we begin to feel our captivity and the need to come out of it, and we begin to feel that there is a force that can help us.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/20/18, Writings of Rabash