Exodus 2022/5782: A Reading for the Seder

Haggadah Section: Commentary / Readings

Exodus 2022/5782: A Reading for the Seder


By Rabbi Tamara Cohen


Why is this Passover different from all other Passovers?

Because this Passover, Shifra and Puah, the midwives who defied Pharoah and saved the Israelite baby boys, are mothers and grandmothers, aunts and neighbors, saving children all over Ukraine; because this year everyone who gives a home to a refugee escaping war or totalitarianism is expanding our understanding of the way liberation happens.

Behold in all my years of studying the Exodus I have never understood why God rewarded Shifra and Puah's acts of bravery with houses, as it says, “and God established for them batim, houses” (Exodus 1:21).

Why is a house the reward for this resistance that began the Exodus from Egypt? This Passover, I understand.
What else could a brave woman working to save her children and the children of others — so many others whose names she doesn't yet know, and babies who don't even have names, want?

Not the temporary haven of an overcrowded underground subway.

Not the cold and soon to be destroyed theatre devoid of actors but not of tragedy or everyday heroes.

What else could Shifra and Puah, or a thousand Nadyas and Iryanas huddled in Polish and Ukrainian shelters distributing food and blankets want?

Just this — for God, and for each of us — to see the work of their hands and hearts, and to establish, re-establish — for them, with them, safety, security, peace.

And houses for them and their families. Homes


After this reading, invite seder participants to pledge to give tzedakah or otherwise engage in supporting refugees fleeing from Ukraine or those on the ground in Ukraine.
Source:  
https://www.movingtraditions.org/never-again-this-passover-share-thoughts-on-the-war-in-ukraine/
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Table of contents
    Introduction
  • Passover greetings
  • Silent Meditation on Candelighting
  • Lighting the Holiday Candles
  • 9 Easy Seder Activities You Haven't Thought of Yet
  • Seder Plate and Ritual Items
  • A Seder plate for current events
  • Je Suis Juif, Parce Que... I am a Jew Because... by Edmond Fleg
  • LIBERACIÓN: Passover through a Latin-Jewish Lens of Liberation (English Version)
  • Prayer for Ukraine
    • Kadesh
  • Who Are You?
  • Kadesh Covid-19 Yahrzeit candle
  • Rabbi Abraham Pam on Slavery and Freedom
  • Woke Up This Morning
    • Urchatz
  • Algerian Passover
  • wade in the water
    • Karpas
  • What Do You Use For Karpas?
    • Passover Seder in Manila, Philippines, 1925
      • Yachatz
    • Uyghur Seder Insert
    • ENTERING THE BROKEN WORLD
      • Maggid - Beginning
    • Sunflower Seeds on My Seder Plate
    • Brombacher Haggadah Illustration
    • The Seder's Order
      • Commentary / Readings
    • Exodus 2022/5782: A Reading for the Seder
    • Lean Out / Lean In: A Meditation on Reclining, Connected to the Global Refugee Crisis
    • Winter is Over: Ukrainian Schoolchild's Poem, 1920, NLI
      • -- Four Questions
    • Four Questions in Fictional Languages
    • 4 Questions for Your Shabbat Table
    • New Questions for the Third Year of COVID-19
    • A Child Eating Matzah, Europe, NLI
      • -- Four Children
    • The Child Who Doesn’t Know How to Ask a Question
    • Golden Girls Wise Child
      • -- Cup #2 & Dayenu
    • The Exodus: Coming Out
    • Dayenu
    • Persian Passover
    • Dayenu—Finding Meaning in the Small Things
    • Dayenu, Disability Justice
    • An Orange on Plate for Women - And Spit out Seeds of Hate
    • Dayenu Cartoon, The Sentinel, March 24, 1977, NLI
      • -- Exodus Story
    • Lyric video: Wide as the Water (Mi Chamocha)
    • Dayenu "Moses in the Basket", The Sentinel, 1967, NLI
      • -- Ten Plagues
    • 10 Plagues, Amsterdam Haggadah, 1738, NLI
    • Red Sea
    • Makah/​Plague of the Binary
    • Ten Plagues of Fossil Fuels
      • Motzi-Matzah
    • Freedom Together
      • Koreich
    • Mixing The Sweet And The Bitter
    • Earth & Justice Freedom-Seder - The Blessings of Redemption
      • Shulchan Oreich
    • US Soldiers Celebrating Passover in Korea, 1953. Source: The National Archives.
    • Passover Seder at the Hannanshwili family, Tbilisi, Georgia (USSR), 1924
      • Rachtzah
    • Yemenite Passover
      • Bareich
    • Gratitude for the meal
    • Gratitude
      • Hallel
    • Fourth Cup
      • Nirtzah
    • Golden Girls Nirtzah
    • We Sing Your Song / Strong in Your Majesty
      • Songs
    • We Don't Talk About Pharaoh (Adapted From We Don't Talk About Bruno)
    • "The Uyghurs Must Be Free"
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