Ben Buckman.net

During the second seder tonight, I was reading the Hebrew as we were going around reading the English, and noticed something fascinating that I never saw before. The haggada quotes a Biblical verse about the Pharaoh assigning "task masters" over the Hebrew slaves, burdening them with hard work, and building (with their labor) "store cities" of Pithom and Ramses.

At least, "task masters" is the way this book, and every seder I remember, understood the verse. But literally in Hebrew, the phrase is sarei misim - tax officers. Tax officers! "And Pharaoh assigned tax officers over the people, and they worked very hard, and Pharaoh built the store cities of Pithom and Ramses..." Wait a second! This whole story is about "taxation without representation?" They worked hard and were taxed too much? The cities were built with the tax revenues from their labor? That's quite a different tale from 400 years (actually 210, but who's counting) of "slavery"!

Maybe misim translated as "taxes" is a quirk of modern Hebrew that deviates totally from the ancient meaning; maybe the modern meaning is a linguistic joke, a way of saying that taxes are slavery. The libertarian part of the human soul permeates every language.

Maybe. Or maybe the text (and its associated story) needs to be reevaluated. Thoughts anyone?