The Midwives started it. The Book of Genesis recounts that the midwives refused Pharaoh’s edict to kill the Hebrew baby boys. A birthing mother followed them. She saw her baby son and used the word, good, tov, recalling God’s word in creation. God saw creation and “it was good.” The word good gave the mother strength to disobey the Pharaoh; she put her baby on the Nile where high ranking women bathed. What did a mother/all mothers hope when the life of their children is threatened? That people would see a child/all children created in God’s image. It was the daughter of Pharaoh, the third in the story to act in civil disobedience. She adopted the Hebrew-forbidden-baby and named him Moses. The women’s disobedience was how Moses came to lead a slave revolt – Let My People Go.
Category Archives: Essays on Passover
Up From Slavery by Peter Eisenstadt
When Israel was in Egypt land. It has never been easy when two peoples live in the same country. It’s very difficult to share a county. Especially when one of the peoples thinks they are the superior one, and the thinks the other inferior. Or thinks that they are the masters, and the other people are their slaves, without rights, and that their lives can be trifled with, or ended, with impunity, without repercussions. The Egyptians wanted to end the situation by ending the existence of the Israelites. The Israelites only wanted to get out of Egypt. No one thought it possible to live together as equals.
The Plague of Plastic by Deborah Kornfeld
We are standing at a strange time in history. We are witnessing plagues of Biblical dimensions; floods, fires, diseases, infestations and climate changes- real life consequences of human impact on the environment. In the Exodus story in Sh’mot, it took taking the life of Pharaoh’s first-born child for the Israelites to be liberated from Egypt. Can we confront these modern plagues in a positive way and impact on the toll they are taking on humans and the environment?
We invite a young family to our house for Shabbat lunch. The cholent is bubbling and the table set with our Shabbat china. There is a little girl in the family and when she sees the table she innocently asks “What are those?” pointing to the china. I tell her that those dishes are my special Shabbat china. She asks a second question “do you mean that other people have eaten off of them?” Suddenly my china has developed a “yuck” factor. Kashrut blended with a new hygienic sense has made my grandmother’s china a little disgusting.
How Liberation Begins By Ayala Emmett
She holds the baby inhaling his sweet smell and kisses his forehead for the last time. She carefully puts him in a wicker basket that she tested over and over, to make sure that it has no leaks and is lightweight enough to float carrying her precious child. She gets as close as she dares to the river, her lips moving in prayer and the tears she tries to hold back are defiant.
As we are witnessing it, we are horrified. “Is she mad?” “Should I call 911?” Ready to pull out our cell-phones. Not yet. Right now we are only figuratively witnessing this mother and child. We are together in the text of the Exodus, and the narrator goes on to tell us that the woman we are watching has her daughter at her side. The girl does not cry, “Mother stop.” She does not retrieve the wicker basket; instead, gathering her long dress in one hand she runs following the floating basket down the river, when she hears the laughter of women.
Religious Celebrations in the Time of Covid19 by Ayala Emmett
In the midst of this painful coronavirus we are about to celebrate Passover. As we prepare for the Seder, we, as do other religious communities, experience two different emotions: anxiety and sadness at the devastation of the pandemic as well as anticipation of celebration. Should we stay with our sadness? Would it be right to rejoice? Rather then make a choice we can honor these conflicting emotions and thus follow a Jewish tradition of the two eternal pockets that are sewn into the fabric of life. What are these two pockets about? The Hassidic Rabbi Simcha Bunam tells us that the two pockets are there so that each one of us can reach into them and retrieve in one pocket, “For my sake was the world was created,” and in the other, “I am but dust and ashes.” While firmly stitched in Jewish tradition, the pockets are a universal human experience like this virus moment in our life. Right now I have in one pocket a note with the fragrance of rich spices saying, “Celebrate this Seder with joy,” and in the other, smudged with tears the note says, “We remember those touched by the coronavirus, those who are ill, and those who lost loved ones.” The coronavirus has forced spatial separation in places of worship and in families that cannot be together at the Seder table. Yet Zoom has opened up a getting together in celebration, to bless and be blessed, giving us a communal opportunity to tell and retell the meaning of freedom then, and now in our days.
Celebrating Passover With Refugees by Ayala Emmett
The Passover Seder is the retelling of our passage from slavery to freedom, a defining Jewish journey. Tonight at Temple B’rith Kodesh we will celebrate the Seder with families from Iraq and Afghanistan, brought to Rochester by No One Left Behind.
Temple B’rith Kodesh forged a partnership with NOLB, an organization dedicated to fulfill a promise to those who helped the US military and saved lives. The pledge has been to give them and their families visas at such a time when their own lives would become endangered. Tonight we will tell the story of the Exodus and celebrate our/their freedom.
“ It was God who made Pharaoh Obstinate.” What is our excuse? By Deborah Kornfeld
I always look forward to the plagues. That part of the Haggadah recited in a singsong ritualistic manner accompanied by the small thrill of putting my finger into the wine cup and marking my plate. It carries with it a memory that despite the power and might and Technicolor special effects accompanying our redemption, we need to be mindful that the Egyptians also suffered. In the exquisite theatre of the Seder, every participant has an active role in this custom. To make out seders lively and fun for the children, we often decorate our table with frogs and beasts and lice- a real table top menagerie.
So We Open Our Doors and Hearts by Ayala Emmett
The Passover Seder is the retelling of our passage from slavery to freedom, our defining central journey. We begin the Seder by opening the door and say, “All who are hungry, come and eat. All who are needy come and celebrate Passover with us.” This is the night that we are seated around the table, friends and families, to narrate our history as a people. We raise the Matzah plate and recite, “This is the bread of poverty that our ancestors ate in the land of Egypt.”
The exodus powerful narrative of freedom has produced enduring timeless Jewish values of care, compassion and justice as foundational and compelling. In some communities it is customary to put an empty plate on the table to remember those less fortunate, those who are suffering, those in need of shelter, refugees, asylum seekers, the homeless and the hungry. We who follow the custom, place verbal pledges on the plate and commit to do a mitzvah of our choice to alleviate suffering in the coming year.