The Four sons are a crucial element of the Seder Table, without which the table is incomplete.
The most important family gathering of the year at the Passover Seder Table, needs to be all encompassing and embracing. We are not all the same in the way we think, act, or feel, yet we are taught that we are not complete and cannot fully experience the Seder message of freedom, purpose and meaning, unless we are cognizant of the underlying deep bonds that connect us all together and find a way to enable them to be expressed.
The Lubavitcher Rebbe would always talk about the fifth child who is not represented at the Seder Table, the one that didn't show up. Indeed, besides those who agree to sit down together, we need to seek out and invite to our home even those who may not even feel a connection or feel included in the differences.
Indeed we are not even complete, when everyone who is willing to sit at the table despite their differences, is seated. We need to go beyond ourselves and convince those who don't even feel a connection with you, to feel welcome and embraced.
The seventh day of Passover is not much different as we celebrate the miracle of the Splitting of the Sea and how the Jews were saved. The Midrash tells us that there were four major groups of opinions in how to to react and respond as this huge crisis unfolded. Fight, Surrender, Pray or Suicide.
The arguments were strong and opinionated and one can only image the screaming and arguing that ensued as they faced this existential threat that was about to destroy them.
Yet G-d tells Moses, Speak to the Children of Israel and they shall travel forward!
Then united in their faith and goal and despite their differences on how they should approach this issue, they found a way to march forward and be a part of a one time dramatic miracle that helped them move on in to the desert and eventually to the Land of Israel.
Differences of opinions, personalities, perspectives on right and wrong, and of course levels of interest in study, action, tradition and more, have never been foreign to the Jewish experience. In fact, they are an essential dynamic of the Jewish journey throughout history.
Yet knowing about the differences is never enough. Instead, embracing the differences and welcoming them to our shared table, is the message of the Passover Seder.
Indeed, it is how we take this great story and share it with our children, and enable them to carry the faith and message forward in a diverse and complex world.
Best of luck with final pre Passover days of Preparation.
Shabbat Shalom & Good Shabbos
Yisroel