Immigrant Roots, Immigrant Rights: The Ten Plagues | Make Your Own Passover Haggadah

Ancient Plague: Blood
Modern Plague:Upheaval and Oppression in Home Countries

Ancient Plague: Frogs
Modern Plague: Poor Access to Education

Ancient Plague: Lice
Modern Plague:Language Access Barriers

Ancient Plague: Wild Beasts
Modern Plague:Wage Theft

Ancient Plague: Pestilence
Modern Plague:Unemployment

Ancient Plague: Boils
Modern Plague:Fear of Law Enforcement

Ancient Plague: Hail
Modern Plague:Housing Obstacles

Ancient Plague: Locusts
Modern Plague:Racism and Racial Profiling

Ancient Plague: Darkness
Modern Plague:Inability to Secure Documentation

Ancient Plague: Slaying of the Firstborn
Modern Plague:Separation of Families

haggadah Section: -- Ten Plagues

Featured clips

Introduction

Looking Towards Pesakh

by Ritualwell

We’ve been bound by a hardened heart And our inability to see ourselves in each other. We have been puffed up by ego and pride. Enslaved by how things have always been. And now it is time to go. But fear threatens to paralyze. How can we possibly exist any other way? Our imagination falters The attachment to what we know is so great It doesn’t matter that it causes us so much pain. We dig in. We will not be...

-- Exodus Story

Order of the Seder

by Toby Lausin

Maggid - Beginning

quote

by Robyn London

-- Exodus Story

Min Hametzar - Calling Out from the Narrow Place

by Annie Matan

1. God, have You forgotten me? I have forgotten how to breathe. The air here is tight around me Each day presses in and tomorrow feels impossibly far away I long to feel Your wide, wide love To feel hard earth beneath my cracked feet, shade on my bent back, cool mist on my sun-scorched skin I long to hear sweet words For respite from the sting that forces me into this pit and keeps me here Day after day God,...

Maggid - Beginning

The Heroic and Visionary Women of Passover

by Raechel Banks

By Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Rabbi Lauren Holzblatt On Passover, Jews are commanded to tell the story of the Exodus and to see ourselves as having lived through that story, so that we may better learn how to live our lives today. The stories we tell our children shape what they believe to be possible—which is why at Passover, we must tell the stories of the women who played a crucial role in the Exodus narrative. The Book of Exodus,...

-- Cup #2 & Dayenu

Dayeinu: an immersive Experience

by Leor and Deborah

By Rabbi & Dina Brewer Dayeinu is a highly counter-intuitive hymn. Among its fourteen stanzas it proclaims that: Had God taken our ancestors out of Egypt, but not rescued them at the Red Sea, it would have been sufficient. And had God rescued them at the Red Sea, but not nourished them in the dessert, it would have been sufficient. And had God brought them to Sinai, but not given them the Torah, it would have been sufficient. These statements make...

Introduction

Pesach Thoughts

by Haggadot

by Lisa/Leah Russ I dreaded passover growing up. It seemed boring and oppressive and... dreadful with the emphasis on DREAD. I never really named it, but felt somewhere in my hungry gut that this wasn't a great place to be...my grandparents’ overheated undersized apartment in Queens, with these flat books in our hands, these hollow songs, this jelly on my fish. A couple of years ago I was at a workshop called L'dor V'dor (generation to generation) and I thought about...

Urchatz

Hand Washing

by Haggadot

Introduction

On this night, we partake

by theatre dybbuk

Commentary / Readings

The Banana on the Seder Plate: A Ritual to Reflect the Refugee Crisis

by Religious Action Center

The world was awakened and shattered by the images of a little boy whose body lay lifeless amidst the gentle surf of a Turkish beach this past summer. Another nameless victim amongst thousands in the Syrian Refugee Crisis, the greatest refugee crisis since WWII. But this little boy, like every little boy ,had a name. His name was Aylan Kurdi (age 3), he drowned along with his older brother, Galip (age 5), and their mother, Rihan, on their own exodus to...

Motzi-Matzah

DIY Matzoh Baking

by Ken Goldman

-- Exodus Story

Moses See the Hebrews

by Nina Paley

Introduction

March on Washington, 1963

by Haggadot

Maror

Bitter Herbs: Where Does Our Food Come From?

by Religious Action Center

The bitter herbs serve to remind us of how the Egyptians embittered the lives of the Israelites in servitude. When we eat the bitter herbs, we share in that bitterness of oppression. We must remember that slavery still exists all across the globe. When you go to the grocery store, where does your food come from? Who picked the sugar cane for your cookie, or the coffee bean for your morning coffee? We are reminded that people still face the bitterness...

Yachatz

Is His Life Worth Less Than Mine?

by Haggadot

More clips from Smith College Jewish Community

Kadesh

Kiddush

by Smith College Jewish Community

The Hebrew word “Kiddush” means sanctification. But it is not the wine we sanctify. Instead, the wine is a symbol of the sanctity, the preciousness, and the sweetness of this moment. Held together by sacred bonds of family, friendship, peoplehood, we share this table tonight with one another and with all the generations who have come before us. Let us rise, and sanctify this singular moment. HOW? We will drink four cups of wine at the Seder in celebration of our...

Koreich

Koreich – Hillel Sandwich

by Smith College Jewish Community

We now take some maror and charoset and put them between two pieces of matzah and give the sandwich to the person on our left. In doing this, we recall our sage Hillel (head of the Sanhedrin, the supreme council of Yisrael, 1st century B.C.E.) who, in remembrance of the loss of the Temple, created the Korech sandwich. He said that by eating the Korech, we would taste the bitterness of slavery mixed with the sweetness of freedom. This practice suggests...

-- Cup #2 & Dayenu

Dayenu

by Smith College Jewish Community