The Book of Exodus describes Israel's rebellion for freedom against a stubborn Pharaoh who thought of that people as his chattel and refused again and again to grant them freedom or even surcease of labor for a limited time. For the people of the world the story of the Exodus has been the paradigm through which all nations and all groups strive. For how many thousand years has this slow process of gaining freedom been not only the desire but also the process of history?
The world has changed much since the Exodus. At that time our ancestors only wanted a simple freedom. Generations and centuries and millennia had to pass before women asked for their freedom, before parents sought freedom for their children, before the poor sought any sort of economic freedom.
In the modern age many still strive for basic freedom while more developed societies strive to bring freedom to peoples and areas of society that never before have recognized freedom. In the United States these lessons are clear. We all celebrate July 4th to commemorate the freedom we won from England. A generation ago we began to celebrate Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday for freedoms our forefathers never envisioned.
Sadly those struggles that are so evident in the Torah continue and hundreds of thousands die every year in pursuit of a basic freedom. For that reason the Torah is an eternal document. As long as people are enslaved or perceived that they are enslaved Exodus is relevant. As long as the danger of tyranny hangs above us Exodus is relevant. Until the concept of the End of Days, the Time of the Messiah is recognized by all peopl4es and all nations there is reason to study, consider and imitate that rebellion which is so clearly presented in Torah.
The Torah describes plagues and the Torah describes miracles. They might have happened. They might be the stuff that legend is built from. However, the greatest miracle in Torah is the successful desire and struggle of a little enslaved people to gain freedom. That they did gives hope to everyone who thinks that slavery is a permanent institution; to everyone who believes that despots will always rule; to those who hold that injustice is the way of the world.
Torah teaches the freedom is a condition attainable by all people in every generation.