Passover: Ritual and Relevance
Passover: a holiday of past events that influences our present as the rituals of seder give meaning to Jewish living.
Pesach, Passover, sits at the center of Judaic thought. It is not just a holiday but forms the base for many of our prayers, for our ethics, for our involvement in civil rights and social justice. In order to understand this holiday, we need to recognize that it is not a single narrative. There is not one Haggadah that everyone reads the way there is one Torah that everyone reads. However, like Torah, the original base, the original story that begins with the Exodus of the Israelites from Egyptian slavery, is read and is reinterpreted according to societal changes. The word Haggadah means telling. We tell our stories from generation to generation so that the memory will not be lost. This is our family story. It is precious to us and when we retell it, we become part of the story and it becomes part of us. You see, this story isn’t just told one or two nights a year. This story, the leaving of slavery and crossing of the Sea of Reeds is part of our daily prayer service. As such, it becomes embedded in our hearts and our consciousness and therefore it is foundational to our actions.
To understand how this can be, we need to understand some of the basic words of the season. According to the Etz Chayim chumash, the chumash is the book form of the Torah, also known as the Five Books of Moses, the “The Hebrew noun ‘pesach’ has given rise to the English adjective ‘paschal,’ used to designate the Passover lamb, the Passover holiday and Easter. …(And) three traditions about the meaning of the stem peh-samach-chet have survived: ‘to have compassion,’ ‘to protect,’ and ‘to skip over’.” The easiest of these to understand is skipping over. This references the marking of the doorposts of the Israelite doors with blood from the lamb so that the death that was the final plague, passed over those homes. With that understanding, it readily follows that the marking protected the homes and that God, (often depicted as the ‘messenger of death’, although the Torah clearly says, “when I see”, “I will pass”, “I will strike”), it was God who had compassion on these families and allowed the first born males to live.
Although Pesach technically references only the first day, it has come to refer to the entire week or eight days of celebration. The balance of the week otherwise is known as the festival of matzah. What is matzah? Matzah is unleavened bread which means it has not had a chance to rise. To be matzah for Pesach, it is watched from the time of planting to the time it is removed from the ovens. Particularly important is that from the time the flour mixes with the water, no more than 18 minutes pass until it is placed in the oven. This watchfulness has become a central piece of the agrarian concept of Pesach. Being watchful of what we eat, how it is grown, what it is doing to the land, to the laborers, to the eco-system and of course to our bodies. This has become a conscious raising message of Pesach. Are you eating slave labor chocolate? Are those working the farms earning a fair wage? Are our trade agreements taking people’s livelihoods?
Another way to think of unleavened bread, matzah, is to equate it to keeping one’s ego in check. Matzah is both the bread of freedom and the bread of affliction. We need to keep these two ideas in balance just as we need to keep our lives in balance. Torah instructs us, “This day will be to you to remember…” Remember what? Remember that you were slaves and now you are free. We are each to feel as if we personally were redeemed from slavery so that we do not oppress others. For when we do, we place the other person in Mitzrayim.
Mitzrayim is the Hebrew word for Egypt. It is also translated as a ‘narrow place’. We can be bound by narrow places in many ways. Obviously, being physically confined is one way of being in mitzrayim. Human trafficking, rape, carrying unwanted pregnancies, avoiding health care due to costs, literal slavery as is the case in many countries, being a second class citizen and I could go on, are physical aspects of mitzrayim. But let’s expand the concept.
We can be in a narrow place when we cling to old ways despite their being objectionable, i.e., there are still people who believe women should not vote or be in certain jobs; that blacks or other races are inferior; that the LGBTQ community should be shunned or being gay is a choice. For our children, narrow places are often the clicks they have to navigate at school, the bullying they endure at school and on social media. Narrow places are the things that restrict us from reaching our fullest potential for fear of failure, or fear of success.
Finally, let’s talk about the seder. The word seder means order. There are 15 steps to the evening service and meal. We even have a song to remind us where we are in those steps.
Kaddesh – Urechatz – Karpas – Yachatz – Maggid – Rachtzah – Motzi – Matzah – Maror – Korech – Shulchan Orech – Tzafun – Barech – Hallel – Nirtzah.
Order implies power. By controlling the order of the meal, we show that we are truly free people with power over our bodies, our desires, our appetites, our minds and our spirits. We can depart from the written words on the page and discuss the questions that come to mind. In fact, ‘The Four Questions’, should just be the beginning of the night of questions and discussions. Over the generations, haggadot have been written to include the issues of the day be it civil rights, Soviet Jewry, support for Israel, or a Queer seder. Supplements have also been included for such things as disabilities, alcocholism and drug addiction and domestic abuse. Why? Because these are mitzrayims, narrow places for which people need support to gain control for themselves. The symbols on the seder plate, too, have expanded to include things that represent these societal changes.
The traditional seder plate brings to life the reminders of the past and with a little practice, promises of the future. In Torah, the Pesach event occurred in the month of Aviv which means spring. In years following biblical times, the Jewish calendar would be adjusted with the leap year if the barley was not ready for reaping for Pesach. On the seder plate spring is represented by green leaf or celery or parsley. Today this might remind us to honor the land and live not off of it but in harmony with it.
The shank bone is the reminder of the lamb sacrifice. The word for sacrifice in Hebrew is korban which means to draw near. Offering a sacrifice to God was for the purpose of drawing nearer to the Divine. We all make sacrifices in our daily lives as we make choices to do or not do activities. Perhaps we could make a conscious effort to take on a spiritual practice. It need not be prayer, if that’s not your thing. It could be tzadakah (charity), or being involved in social justice actions. Perhaps you might decide simply to offer three smiles a day to people you don’t know. You have no idea what ripple effects these simple daily donations make in the world.
Maror or bitter herbs: This represents the cruelty inflicted on the slaves, our lives were bitter. Offer healing somewhere, to someone and make their life less bitter.
Salt water. Are these the tears of slavery? The tears of freedom? The water of the sea? We can’t all be Nachshon, the brave soul to first enter the water but we can all support someone else as they make their journey through whatever sea in which they find themselves. Not all tears of sorrow can be turned into tears of laughter, but don’t let someone flounder or tread water when you can help them walk or swim.
Charoseth is the mixture of apples, nuts, wine and spices, sometimes with other ingredients mixed in. It is sometimes chunky and sometimes a patè. It is generally thought to represent the mortar for the bricks that built the pyramids or sometimes to represent the bricks, themselves.
There is nothing in the Talmud that places this food on the seder plate. The recipe, it turns out, comes from the Song of Songs which we read during Passover. It reads like this:
“Feed me with apples and with raisin-cakes;
“Your kisses are sweeter than wine;
“The scent of your breath is like apricots;
“Your cheeks are a bed of spices;
“The fig tree has ripened;
“Then I went down to the walnut grove.”
In the 1980s, an orange was added by many to the seder as inclusion of the LGBTQ community. However, the charoseth already was a symbol of love: the acceptance of love as Divine and wonderful, after all the first commandment is be fruitful and multiply. Its formula was perhaps a reminder that love of God can’t exist in a vacuum. We can only see our beliefs and our feelings in the activities we carry out and the words we exchange in the here and now. The Divine must be found in these interactions with all life. The Song of Songs is a song of love.
Finally, the egg is the circle of life, a life of meaning that makes a difference in the world. I don’t believe that needs reinterpretation.
Pesach is one of four new years in the Jewish calendar. On this new year, may your lives be full, fresh and free.
Passover: a holiday of past events that influences our present as the rituals of seder give meaning to Jewish living.
Pesach, Passover, sits at the center of Judaic thought. It is not just a holiday but forms the base for many of our prayers, for our ethics, for our involvement in civil rights and social justice. In order to understand this holiday, we need to recognize that it is not a single narrative. There is not one Haggadah that everyone reads the way there is one Torah that everyone reads. However, like Torah, the original base, the original story that begins with the Exodus of the Israelites from Egyptian slavery, is read and is reinterpreted according to societal changes. The word Haggadah means telling. We tell our stories from generation to generation so that the memory will not be lost. This is our family story. It is precious to us and when we retell it, we become part of the story and it becomes part of us. You see, this story isn’t just told one or two nights a year. This story, the leaving of slavery and crossing of the Sea of Reeds is part of our daily prayer service. As such, it becomes embedded in our hearts and our consciousness and therefore it is foundational to our actions.
To understand how this can be, we need to understand some of the basic words of the season. According to the Etz Chayim chumash, the chumash is the book form of the Torah, also known as the Five Books of Moses, the “The Hebrew noun ‘pesach’ has given rise to the English adjective ‘paschal,’ used to designate the Passover lamb, the Passover holiday and Easter. …(And) three traditions about the meaning of the stem peh-samach-chet have survived: ‘to have compassion,’ ‘to protect,’ and ‘to skip over’.” The easiest of these to understand is skipping over. This references the marking of the doorposts of the Israelite doors with blood from the lamb so that the death that was the final plague, passed over those homes. With that understanding, it readily follows that the marking protected the homes and that God, (often depicted as the ‘messenger of death’, although the Torah clearly says, “when I see”, “I will pass”, “I will strike”), it was God who had compassion on these families and allowed the first born males to live.
Although Pesach technically references only the first day, it has come to refer to the entire week or eight days of celebration. The balance of the week otherwise is known as the festival of matzah. What is matzah? Matzah is unleavened bread which means it has not had a chance to rise. To be matzah for Pesach, it is watched from the time of planting to the time it is removed from the ovens. Particularly important is that from the time the flour mixes with the water, no more than 18 minutes pass until it is placed in the oven. This watchfulness has become a central piece of the agrarian concept of Pesach. Being watchful of what we eat, how it is grown, what it is doing to the land, to the laborers, to the eco-system and of course to our bodies. This has become a conscious raising message of Pesach. Are you eating slave labor chocolate? Are those working the farms earning a fair wage? Are our trade agreements taking people’s livelihoods?
Another way to think of unleavened bread, matzah, is to equate it to keeping one’s ego in check. Matzah is both the bread of freedom and the bread of affliction. We need to keep these two ideas in balance just as we need to keep our lives in balance. Torah instructs us, “This day will be to you to remember…” Remember what? Remember that you were slaves and now you are free. We are each to feel as if we personally were redeemed from slavery so that we do not oppress others. For when we do, we place the other person in Mitzrayim.
Mitzrayim is the Hebrew word for Egypt. It is also translated as a ‘narrow place’. We can be bound by narrow places in many ways. Obviously, being physically confined is one way of being in mitzrayim. Human trafficking, rape, carrying unwanted pregnancies, avoiding health care due to costs, literal slavery as is the case in many countries, being a second class citizen and I could go on, are physical aspects of mitzrayim. But let’s expand the concept.
We can be in a narrow place when we cling to old ways despite their being objectionable, i.e., there are still people who believe women should not vote or be in certain jobs; that blacks or other races are inferior; that the LGBTQ community should be shunned or being gay is a choice. For our children, narrow places are often the clicks they have to navigate at school, the bullying they endure at school and on social media. Narrow places are the things that restrict us from reaching our fullest potential for fear of failure, or fear of success.
Finally, let’s talk about the seder. The word seder means order. There are 15 steps to the evening service and meal. We even have a song to remind us where we are in those steps.
Kaddesh – Urechatz – Karpas – Yachatz – Maggid – Rachtzah – Motzi – Matzah – Maror – Korech – Shulchan Orech – Tzafun – Barech – Hallel – Nirtzah.
Order implies power. By controlling the order of the meal, we show that we are truly free people with power over our bodies, our desires, our appetites, our minds and our spirits. We can depart from the written words on the page and discuss the questions that come to mind. In fact, ‘The Four Questions’, should just be the beginning of the night of questions and discussions. Over the generations, haggadot have been written to include the issues of the day be it civil rights, Soviet Jewry, support for Israel, or a Queer seder. Supplements have also been included for such things as disabilities, alcocholism and drug addiction and domestic abuse. Why? Because these are mitzrayims, narrow places for which people need support to gain control for themselves. The symbols on the seder plate, too, have expanded to include things that represent these societal changes.
The traditional seder plate brings to life the reminders of the past and with a little practice, promises of the future. In Torah, the Pesach event occurred in the month of Aviv which means spring. In years following biblical times, the Jewish calendar would be adjusted with the leap year if the barley was not ready for reaping for Pesach. On the seder plate spring is represented by green leaf or celery or parsley. Today this might remind us to honor the land and live not off of it but in harmony with it.
The shank bone is the reminder of the lamb sacrifice. The word for sacrifice in Hebrew is korban which means to draw near. Offering a sacrifice to God was for the purpose of drawing nearer to the Divine. We all make sacrifices in our daily lives as we make choices to do or not do activities. Perhaps we could make a conscious effort to take on a spiritual practice. It need not be prayer, if that’s not your thing. It could be tzadakah (charity), or being involved in social justice actions. Perhaps you might decide simply to offer three smiles a day to people you don’t know. You have no idea what ripple effects these simple daily donations make in the world.
Maror or bitter herbs: This represents the cruelty inflicted on the slaves, our lives were bitter. Offer healing somewhere, to someone and make their life less bitter.
Salt water. Are these the tears of slavery? The tears of freedom? The water of the sea? We can’t all be Nachshon, the brave soul to first enter the water but we can all support someone else as they make their journey through whatever sea in which they find themselves. Not all tears of sorrow can be turned into tears of laughter, but don’t let someone flounder or tread water when you can help them walk or swim.
Charoseth is the mixture of apples, nuts, wine and spices, sometimes with other ingredients mixed in. It is sometimes chunky and sometimes a patè. It is generally thought to represent the mortar for the bricks that built the pyramids or sometimes to represent the bricks, themselves.
There is nothing in the Talmud that places this food on the seder plate. The recipe, it turns out, comes from the Song of Songs which we read during Passover. It reads like this:
“Feed me with apples and with raisin-cakes;
“Your kisses are sweeter than wine;
“The scent of your breath is like apricots;
“Your cheeks are a bed of spices;
“The fig tree has ripened;
“Then I went down to the walnut grove.”
In the 1980s, an orange was added by many to the seder as inclusion of the LGBTQ community. However, the charoseth already was a symbol of love: the acceptance of love as Divine and wonderful, after all the first commandment is be fruitful and multiply. Its formula was perhaps a reminder that love of God can’t exist in a vacuum. We can only see our beliefs and our feelings in the activities we carry out and the words we exchange in the here and now. The Divine must be found in these interactions with all life. The Song of Songs is a song of love.
Finally, the egg is the circle of life, a life of meaning that makes a difference in the world. I don’t believe that needs reinterpretation.
Pesach is one of four new years in the Jewish calendar. On this new year, may your lives be full, fresh and free.