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6. I wasn't one of the six million who died in the Shoah, I wasn't even among the survivors. And I wasn't one of the six hundred thousand who went out of Egypt. I came to the Promised Land by sea.  No, I was not in that number, though I still have the fire and the smoke within me, pillars of fire and pillars of smoke that guide me by night and by day. I still have inside me the mad...

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By Ronnie M. Horn  Long before the struggle upward begins, there is tremor in the seed. Self-protection cracks, Roots reach down and grab hold. The seed swells, and tender shoots push up toward light. This is karpas: spring awakening growth. A force so tough it can break stone. And why do we dip karpas into salt water? To remember the sweat and tears of our ancestors in bondage. To taste the bitter tears of our earth, unable to fully renew itself...

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Source 1: Babylonian Talmud Context: The Babylonian Talmud is a collection of Jewish stories, laws and debates grounded in the Bible and other Jewish texts. It was compiled in the fifth century in modern-day Iraq, but many portions of it are much older. Here, the Talmud quotes and comments on a passage from a second-century text called the Mishnah. The Mishnah asks, “How long must a person live in a city to be counted among the people of that city?”, and...

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The Third Cup: Ending Militarism and Moving toward a Worldwide Fellowship There are three aspects to the growing militarization of America: (A) The military overseas, through great increases in military budgets and the longest war in American history; (B) The militarization of domestic U.S. police forces, especially those intended to deal with Black and Latino communities; and (C) the rising number of deaths by gunfire, including by weapons intended for war. Let us look at each: “A nation that continues year...

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The Paschal Lamb reminds us that the Holy One, praised be God, passed over the houses of our ancestors in Egypt. The Matzah is to remind us that before the dough our ancestors prepared for bread had time to rise, God revealed the might, power and presence of God unto them and redeemed them. The Bitter Herbs are to remind us that the Egyptians embittered the lives of our ancestors in Egypt. In gratitude for the miracles which God has performed...

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had you-i been given but seconds in this unreal reality, and the ten-thousand things not made themselves known to me-you, daiyenu, had the ten-thousand things made themselves known to me-you, and your-my blood not thudded circuitously, stubbornly, daiyenu, had your-my blood thudded circuitously, stubbornly, and these atoms not stayed gathered into matter as me-you, daiyenu, had these atoms stayed gathered into matter as me-you, and you-i not been born earthly entity, daiyenu, had you-i been born earthly entity, and these lungs...

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1) 64% felt unsafe at school due to sexual orientation 2) 44% felt unsafe at school due to gender identification 3) 42% of LGBT youth have experienced cyber bullying 4) 42% of LBGT youth say the community in which they live in is not accepting of LGBT people 5) Only 77% of LGBT youth say they know things will get better 6) 60% LGBT students report feeling unsafe at school because of their sexual orientation 7) LGBT youth are 4 times...

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By Rabbi Tamara Cohen We sit down for our seders this year at a powerful cultural moment when the voices of women and girls are rising – the collective activism of #metoo, Emma Gonzales’s six minutes of silence and 11-year-old African American Naomi Wadler’s speech at the March for Our Lives, and even the truth telling of Stephanie Clifford, also known as Stormy Daniels. All this makes the absence of women’s voices in the Passover Haggadah more glaring. Thirty years ago,...

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Break the middle matzah on the matzah plate. We break the matzah and hide one part (the Afikomen). We recognize that liberation is made by imperfect people, broken, fragmented — so don’t be waiting until you are totally pure, holy, spiritually centered, and psychologically healthy to get involved in tikkun (the healing and repair of the world). It will be imperfect people, wounded healers, who do the healing as we simultaneously work on ourselves. The Bread of Affliction Raise the middle...

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The Passover seder serves many purposes. First and foremost it is a ritualized celebration of the Israelites’ dramatic journey from slavery to freedom. But even early on, the seder was never just about our history. As the format of the seder was finalized in Mishnaic and Talmudic times, rituals were included to make each participant feel as if they personally were experiencing the journey from slavery to freedom. This theme of the seder goes beyond the Jewish people’s flight from Egypt...

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A Jewish community that has lived in Kochi, India for more than 2,000 years starts preparing for Passover right after Hanukkah. They believe that if a Jewish woman were to make even the slightest mistake in Passover preparation during the 100 days before the actual seder, then the lives of her husband and her children would be endangered. They keep special rooms that hold all of the Passover utensils. Houses would be scraped and immediately repainted after Purim. Wells would be...

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We are going to conclude our dinner tonight with a celebratory toast - a l’chaim. Rather than filling our own cup tonight, though, and focusing on us as individuals, let’s fill someone else’s cup and recognize that, as a family and group of friends, we have the resources to help each other and those in our community if we are willing to share our resources and collaborate – whether those resources are time, money, skills, or any of the other gifts...

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Hesed is often translated as loving-kindness. There are times when we are aware of God's loving-kindness towards us. Hesed is also a gift we receive from other beings, and which we can give to them. Recall some of the acts of hesed that you experienced, and in which you have engaged, since the death of your loved one.

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A GUIDED VISUALIZATION © Rabbi Susan Freeman, 2003 This is a journey from slavery to freedom. Close your eyes and take several slow deep breaths. Feel your body as being very heavy. Take a few minutes to go through each body part, feet to head, and feel the heaviness, the weight of every limb, every bone . . . You were a slave once in the land of Egypt. Remember when you were a slave among slaves. Go back. You were...

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Why Is This Night Different? Each one of us is obligated to consider ourselves as coming out of Egypt. Here are some questions for our individual journey of liberation.... - What in my life do I experience as "Egypt" this year? - In what ways have I been set free? - Mitzrayim, the Hebrew word for Egypt, means a "narrow place." How could my "narrow place" function as a place for growth? - In what ways could I confront and express...