There is something about Jerusalem that feels different. Despite the modernity that surrounds the Old City and the City of David, when we stop and breathe in those places of our past that we have returned to, there is a feeling of freedom that is hard to replicate elsewhere.

Why? Where is this inner connection flowing from?

We are constantly searching in this world for our soul within. This is the true authentic part of us that yearns to be free of the confusion and darkness in this world. Ever since we were exiled as a sovereign nation from its land we have been searching for ourselves across the farthest reaches of the world. Yet, we never quite found what we were looking for until now – when we have returned home.

Chassidut teaches that the Lost Princess, the Shechina at a national level and our soul at an individual level is hidden, buried within the soil of the Land of Israel. It is this clear consciousness we seek and yearn for. Despite our return, we have yet to free her from her entrapment within the dark places of this world. If we are willing to free ourselves we can free her as well.

In Jerusalem, if we find the time to close our eyes and disconnect from the modernity that abounds we can feel our destiny awaken from within and the freedom and the soul that has been bound up inside us finally begin to be set free.

This is why Pesach is about renewal and elimination of those influences and forces that have caused us to forget our mission here and this is why Jerusalem is such a central catalyst during Pesach for this to take place.

It is incumbent on each one of us to return home, to reconnect to our mission here in this world and free our individual and national soul trapped and exiled so many years ago. That is real freedom.