![]() Ashkenazi Jews take this proscription to extreme measures, just to be “safe,” and prohibit corn, rice, and cannellini beans. The phrase is “keeping Passover,” which means eight days (seven in Israel) of giving up leavened foods, and (just to be sure) foods that could, theoretically, ferment on its own. It was a powerful reminder that the freedom we take for granted is denied to our neighbors, and it challenged us to pay attention and take action. It was jarring – almost brutal – but it brought home the plague of mass incarceration that has gutted the lives and dreams of Black and Brown Americans by the millions. A few years ago, my daughter put a padlock on the Seder plate. It is, however, a sign that Jewish traditions change over time. The orange is no longer controversial or even a curiosity. Since the late 1970s, an orange has been added on many Seder plates in recognition of the Jews who used to be ignored or excluded by the community - including women and LGBTQ Jews – but are now welcome and treasured. The Seder plate is part of the lesson plan, with items symbolizing spring, rebirth, and suffering. The Seder is an ancient pedagogic strategy, which commands us to teach our children about the Exodus from Egypt in a manner so vivid that everyone at the table – but especially children – remembers (not just imagines but actually remembers) what it feels like to be a slave. It was wonderful, even without the cherry Jell-o mold. When that beloved family moved to the other side of the country, we were adopted by another clan who shared their customs and memories, which included a lot of singing, and course after creative course of unheard-of and delicious dishes. My daughter sat at the far end of the table with older kids who didn’t stop her from sampling the wine – one of her fondest Passover memories. Roast chicken, kugels, soup, and a red Jell-O-salad full of canned cherries that I looked forward to every year. 5įor many years, my husband, daughter and I were invited to celebrate at a big Seder that became our family Seder, and provided us with sustaining, joyful memories. I have very few childhood memories of Passover: it was the only time I can recall eating in the dining room – on fancy china and wine glasses stored in a sideboard that was never opened there was chicken soup and matzah balls my mother never sat down and her impatience to serve the meal permeated the room it was not fun. I envy families who look forward to tables groaning with Grandma’s recipes, who don’t invent the menu or the service from whole cloth every year. I am jealous of people whose memories of Passovers past are sweet as Manischewitz, who cheerfully execute two Seders without a word of complaint about the cleaning, planning, cooking and clean-up. And many of our tables will be missing loved ones who died of COVID-19, whose memory will become part of all our Seders to come. Except that this year, like last, we will celebrate at a distance, on screens. It’s been so long since our enslavement, we can bask in our freedom. The Seder turns a story full of pain and terror (murders, snakes, the death of innocent children – both Hebrew babies and first-born Egyptians) into a dinner party, with pillows to recline on and more wine than necessary. But we do know the names of the midwives who refused to murder Hebrew babies, and Shifra and Puah, may have been Egyptian allies rather than members of the tribe.Īnd by the way, Moses himself, God’s right-hand man, grew up as an Egyptian and had a speech impediment. Like most of the women mentioned in the Torah, she is not named. Pharoah’s daughter – the villain’s own flesh and blood – is the one who rescues Moses from the river. The story includes a cast of unlikely – and diverse – heroes. I am not suggesting an equivalency, not from the comfort of our bountiful tables, but the liturgy won’t let us forget that we were strangers – chattel, in fact – and that freedom is always at risk. Our people wandered for 40 miserable years in the desert and spent much of the ensuing centuries with a packed suitcase by the door. The redemption of George Floyd’s ancestors was never complete much less assured. Passover celebrates the arrival of spring, but slavery, redemption, and freedom are front and center at the Passover Seder, and never more than this year, as Congress considers the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act. It is one of the greatest stories ever told, repeated and repurposed in every form of narrative, from opera to superhero saga: both Superman and Moses were sent away in a baby-sized capsule to escape the threat of death, raised by a very different family, and as adults used their special powers to help others.
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