Introduction: Forced Labor, Racism, and Immigration
This Haggadot.com version shares some of our favorite parts of this haggadah. To download the full text in PDF, or to order hardcopies, visit www.truah.org/haggadah.
Since 2009, T’ruah has been a leader in the Jewish community in the effort to end human trafficking — also known as forced labor and modern-day slavery. The first edition of this haggadah, published in 2015, helped to increase awareness and inspire reflection and action by the Jewish community on this crucial issue.
2020 and beyond calls for all that and more.
Human trafficking, at its core, is a crime of exploitation and control. Therefore, it can offer a lens — or perhaps a mirror — for viewing the other pressing issues of our day: immigration, racism, class struggle, and more. It is crucial for me to note that human trafficking does not require any movement across a border. American citizens — including white, middle-class men and women — can be and regularly are trafficked in their very hometowns. We cannot lose sight of that or fall into the assumption that trafficking only concerns immigrants and poor people of color. That being said, the people most vulnerable to trafficking are often immigrants and are often people of color. This haggadah focuses on their story and how it is part of our larger American story; thus, to the original title The Other Side of the Sea we have added The Other Side of the River. The expanded edition pays increased attention to immigration, particularly as it touches labor rights and worker exploitation.
This issue remains with us despite the inauguration of the Biden-Harris Administration. It will remain with us until we achieve a wholesale re-vision of our economy into one that treats human beings not as disposable cogs but as uniquely precious images of God.
--Rabbi Rachel Kahn-Troster, Deputy Director, T'ruah
The Other Side of the River, the Other Side of the Sea, by T'ruah
- Introduction
- Karpas
- Maggid - Beginning
- -- Exodus Story
- -- Cup #2 & Dayenu
- Tzafun
- Nirtzah
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