וגם אני שמעתי את נאקת בנ"י אשר מצרים מעבדים אתם ... (ו-ה)
MASHAL: The Rebbe of Rizhin, R’ Yisroel Friedman zt”l, once told his Chassidim the following story: An ignorant villager traveled to a city for Rosh Hashana. Arriving in the beis medrash, the villager stood silently and watched everyone pray. During Shemoneh Esrei, he noticed many people began crying bitterly. “Why are they crying?” the villager wondered. “It must be because the prayers are taking so long, and they’re hungry already.” He began to cry as well.
After Shemoneh Esrei, the people stopped crying and the villager wondered why. Then he thought he’d figured it out: Before he had left his accommodations that morning, he had seen that there was a tough piece of meat in the tzimmes. The longer the meat cooked, the tastier the tzimmes would be, so there was really no reason to be upset that davening was taking so long. He, too, stopped crying.
During tekias shofar, the congregation began weeping again. The villager was confounded, until he thought of an explanation: It’s true that the longer we wait, the tastier the food will be - but we don’t have the strength to wait that long! And now he burst into tears. The Rizhiner finished speaking and the Chassidim realized that the Rebbe’s parable alluded to our lengthy, unbearable galus.
NIMSHAL: After enduring 210 years of backbreaking labor and endless atrocities, Bnei Yisroel could not wait any longer. They finally cried out to Hashem desperately, beseeching the almighty to put an end to their seemingly endless predicament. We, too, await Moshiach and the final redemption. We know there is a purpose for this all; our sins are being forgiven, but we need to cry out to Hashem - we simply don’t have strength to wait much longer. Please bring the geulah soon!