A Quarantined Jew's Perspective on "The Prince of Egypt" during Passover

• Eli Azizollahoff

Listening to The Prince of Egypt Original West End Cast Album, as a Jew, on Passover, During Quarantine.

Or: Some thoughts on Passover from this new kind of bondage

Throughout Passover, we stress again and again how we must feel that we were saved in Egypt ourselves, and this year the ties of bondage have felt real in a way they never have for me before.

Important things to know about me: I am an Orthodox Jew, I love theater, I am currently celebrating the holiday of Passover (“Pesach,” in Hebrew) in which we remember the Exodus from Egypt, I am in quarantine from COVID19 with the rest of the world, and I just listened to the Original West End Cast Album for The Prince of Egypt for the first time.

Now, I could do a whole deep dive into my reaction to the cast album from the perspective of a young Modern Orthodox Jew, and maybe I still will, but for now, I have a few dominant thoughts about these songs.

I have known and loved The Prince of Egypt film for many years, as one of the few mediums that almost accurately portrayed Jews, Jewish life, and Jewish history (maybe that too should be its own article: why Fiddler on the Roof and Falsettos are an inaccurate representation of Judaism. I’m sure that’ll go over well,) so I was really excited to get a chance to listen to this mesmerizing music reworked for the stage.

Unfortunately, I was utterly disappointed.  While the musical arrangements, lyricism, and performances were stunning, the beauty of the original Prince of Egypt was lost in this retelling. This is because, in adapting it they changed it from a nearly accurate retelling of a story that is actually primarily about the relationship between God and the ancient Jews, the Hebrews, into a fictitious and out of character narrative about a man that hardly resembles the Moses (aka “Moshe”) from the Hebrew Bible, the Torah.

A large part of me would like to go on to list how bastardizing this ancient and fundamental tale is an insult not just to Jews, but all Abrahamic religions, and, honestly, religion in general. This is to say that it clearly views the scripture that millions hold as the foundation of their faith and vital to their way of life, as a matter of loose source material for a story they think will sell better if they add two love songs and make Moses and Pharaoh buddies at the end.

I don’t think I need to go into detail about the nature of the story for you to understand how messed up that is. I do think, I should add though, the opening title to the film which states:

On Pesach each year we hold what is called a “seder,” this is a meal that generally spans many hours into the night, in which we discuss at length – and in detail – the Exodus from Egypt. I did this with my parents last Wednesday and Thursday night (oh ya, and those of us that don’t live in Israel do it twice.) So, I feel it is fair to say that I am brushed up on the details of this story at present, and what this tale really is, at its essence, is a love story between God and the Jews.

The original Prince of Egypt film honestly stayed mostly true to that concept. The Jews calling out to God, singing “deliver us,” makes my eyes pinch with tears and was the real inspiration for my desire to listen to the new cast album and write a piece on it during this holiday. God coming down and casting miracle after miracle to save his chosen people. The awe and reverence the music swells with, as you watch the plagues get carried out, harsh but fair after the centuries of torture the Egyptians inflicted on their Jewish slaves. The story of the Exodus is the story of God following through on his promise to choose the Hebrews and the Hebrews calling out to God and screaming that they haven’t lost faith. It is beautiful and fills me with awe and I wonder at being able to watch The Prince of Egypt and have it actualized so it feels less like a story and more like the real history I know it to be.

So, you can imagine how upsetting it was to listen to this new interpretation of such a beloved movie and hear that that had warped it so drastically. Whereas the film opens with a disclaimer, explaining that the Exodus story is paramount to many religions and they staid as accurate as they could, the show molded it into something the story just isn’t. At the seder, Jews read from a book called the “Haggada” which lays out the rituals of the evening, as well as tells the story of the Exodus. It is noted, that in the Haggada Moshe’s name is never mentioned, only eluded to once. This is because the story is not about Moshe, he was just an emissary, the story is about God and the Jews.

Yes, I understand the show is called “The Prince of Egypt” and is therefore told through Moses’s perspective, and I find no inherent fault in that approach – as we know from the movie, it can be carried out well. What was so wrong about the stage retelling was that they took this story and made it only about Moses, barely about the rest of the Jews, set up Moses as the one carrying out the deliverance in response to “deliver us” rather than God, and then fictitiously characterized him, Ramses, Tzipporah, and their relationships (as well as adding an entire number [“For the Rest of My Life”] in which he questions God saving the Jews and views all the deeds he has carried out – the ones that are actually viewed as wonders both in reality and in the movie – as crimes).

The movie tried so hard to stay true to the text and to be respectful, and in many ways, it succeeded. While it is extrapolated the life of Moses as a prince in Egypt prior to being the chosen leader of the Jews, most of these additions are at the very least not contradictory to the Torah text. The stage production, on the other hand, seemed to throw the source material out the window and did whatever they wanted (if I haven’t proven it to you enough by now, there is a number [“Never in a Million Years – Reprise”] in which Tzipporah mourns leaving her father, Jethro (“Yitro”), when it is in the text that he comes along to accompany the Jews, so much so that there is actually a section called “Jethro” in the Book of Exodus. That doesn’t take much research to find out, just look at an index.)

While the show seems angry at God for carrying out the means to the Exodus and passing judgment on the cruelty of the Egyptian slave owners, the movie reinforces – as does scripture – that it was Pharaoh’s stubbornness and hardened heart that led to the extent of the plagues his people had to endure. It was him being a selfish leader, motivated by pride rather than concern for the well being of his land and people, that resulted in the degree to which they were punished. It was him too, who set up the Jews as slaves, to be abused and belittled, whipped and overworked, with their babies thrown into rivers, that made Egypt into the monstrous place it was for the Jews. As a leader, it was his responsibility – and capability – to shape the narrative and approach of his people and he chose to make them cruel and then chose again to let them be hurt rather than stepping down and “letting God’s people go.”

To be fair, I may be wrong about some of my criticism of the stage production, as I haven’t seen it and am making my judgment from the cast album alone. For all, I know Pharaoh and Moses don’t end up on good terms, but that is dealt with in dialogue, no song. I will give it that room for error, but I will also stress that the messages and tone they have shown in the cast album does not match the “essence values and integrity [of the story] that is the cornerstone of faith for millions of people worldwide.”

Because I had such an intense reaction to the cast album, I also rewatched the movie to see if I still felt the same way about it as I had before. Upon watching it, the sensation, the longing for freedom hit home so much more acutely than it ever had before. I felt that at the seder as well. For the first time, I feel truly bound. Bound by this quarantine. Bound to my house. Bound by the fear of getting or spreading this virus. For the first time, I am in bondage as I sit and say that I too was freed from Egypt, as I watch and sing from my soul praying for God to deliver us, to free us from this situation.

Pesach is usually a holiday celebrated with lots of families, with meals of 23 people and laughter and debate and starting the soup course at 11:30 pm. This year I knew it would be different because it would be just me and my parents, our plans to visit my sister and her kids falling away with the Stay at Home warnings weeks ago. I never expected this acute empathy with my ancestors. I never expected to feel enslaved – so far from my own freedom. But this is the reality, and as flawed as I found the West End cast album to be, I am also grateful to have songs like “Deliver Us,” “Heaven’s Eyes,” and “Miracles” to turn to and renew hope for the day the whole world will have another exodus, all joining together to celebrate our freedom and the hope of a better world rising up from the ashes of COVID19.

Photo: Matt Crockett