The Exodus is justly celebrated as the earliest triumph for freedom in human history. But as everyone from the American founders, to Frederick Douglass, to Cecil B. DeMille understood, the story of Israel’s freedom—and the American freedom modeled on it—would be incomplete without the Ten Commandments. Because what the Revelation at Sinai introduced to civilization was the idea that there is no lasting freedom without obligation. So this week, Rabbi Lamm spoke with Nellie Bowles of the New York Times about unchosen obligations, converting to Judaism, and why what America needs right now is…tradition!