Reply To: Dvar Torah for Pesach (Seder)

Meaningful Hesber on an alternative reason for the 4 Cups

The Cup of Redemption:
וכוס פרעה בידי… ואשחט אותם אל כוס פרעה ואתן את הכוס על כף פרעה… ונתת כוס פרעה בידו
The cup of Pharaoh is in my hand… I squeezed them into the cup of Pharaoh, and I gave the cup on the hand of Pharaoh… and you shall give the cup in Pharaoh’s hand (Bereishis 40:11-13).
When the cupbearer of Pharaoh told his dream to Yosef and when Yosef interpreted it, the word cup appears in the verses four times. We are told (Shemos Rabbah 6:4, Yerushalmi Pesachim 10:1) that the four cups at our Pesach Seder correspond to the arba leshonos shel geulah, the four terms of redemption, which are mentioned in the Torah (Shemos 6:6-7). They are: “Ve’hotzeisi – I will take you out” of Egypt; “ve’hitzalti – I will rescue you” from servitude; “ve’ga’alti – I will redeem you;” and “ve’lakachti – I will take you” as My people.
The Yerushalmi (ibid.) says that another reason for the four cups is the four times that the cup of Pharaoh is mentioned in the above verses. What message were Chazal trying to convey in this association? What lesson can we learn from the cup-bearer’s dream and those four cups of Pharaoh, when we drink our four cups of wine at the Pesach Seder?
Rav Eliyahu Klatzkin, in Chibas HaKodesh (Cheilek HaDerush #1), offers a beautiful explanation of this Yerushalmi, which takes into account the actual context of the four cups of Pharaoh – namely, the dreams and ambitions of an imprisoned man, the sar hamashkim.
What was it that led Yosef to give a favorable interpretation to the cup-bearer, and a moment later to give a dismal interpretation to the baker? This question takes on great significance in light of the Gemara (Berachos 55b), which states that a dream follows its interpretation, and is often a reflection of what the dreamer thought about during the day. Although the Gemara says that the interpretation must be similar to the dream, why was Yosef unable to find something within the dream of the sar ha’ofim that could be interpreted favorably, as he did for the cup-bearer?
As we read the cup-bearer’s rendition of his dream, we note the repeated emphasis of the cup of Pharaoh, which indicates a person longing and even obsessed to return to his former post. The cup-bearer had obviously taken pride in serving Pharaoh before, and hoped to be given the chance to return to his job. Thus, when Yosef listened to the dream, he gave a positive interpretation. Since the cup-bearer was a person who only wanted to serve his master, any offense he may have committed (in which a fly was found in the cup of Pharaoh) was no doubt inadvertent, and he deserved another chance.
In the dream of the baker, however, there is no indication that he longed to return to serve Pharaoh. He never mentioned or described himself as baking for or serving his master, only that there was a basket of Pharaoh’s bread above his head. In fact, he should have carried the bread in his hand, where it would have been safer from birds. Signs of loyalty or devotion to his master were starkly absent from the dream. It seems he never cared about the royal personage he served; he only wanted the job so that he could fill his stomach with royal fare. The offense, in which a stone was found in the bread of Pharaoh, was a true offense to Pharaoh. According to the letter of the law, he deserved to be punished for his wrongdoing. Yosef could not find any redeeming factor in the dream to enable him to interpret it favorably. Therefore, Yosef delivered the interpretation that the baker would be killed and would never return to his position.
This, writes Rav Klatzkin, is why Chazal mandated four cups at the Seder, corresponding to the four cups of Pharaoh. When we drink our wine and reflect on our liberation from Egypt, we should have in mind something akin to the longings and ambitions of the cup-bearer. He only wanted to be freed in order to return to serve his master and to continue to show his devotion to the king. In the same vein, when thanking Hashem for deliverance from Egypt, we should also recall the true purpose of freedom.
Whatever pit we find ourselves in, our longing and prayer for redemption should be only to serve Hashem. Our ambition must be to keep His Torah and mitzvos and bask in His radiance, not the personal pleasure or physical perks that come with geulah and freedom.
And just as the longing to serve was the catalyst for the cup-bearer’s freedom, so, too, our desire and longing to serve Hashem will be the merit that frees us from our pits, and allows us to go from darkness into light.