The Journey, In Gerangl

Haggadah Section: Introduction

[Yiddish for: In Struggle]    

by Margot Meitner    

Passover is my favorite chag (holiday). It’s the one in which I have always taken the opportunity to make a STATEMENT: Sometimes a political statement about my personal life; other times a personal statement about my political life. There was the time I plopped an orange on the Seder plate (representing the role of women in Judaism), or the time I nervously placed a crust of bread there (representing Queers in Judaism). There was the time I led the Seder in lieu of my father and my uncle (my budding feminism); the time I forced my family to be filmed on Passover (the budding documentary filmmaker); and the time I kept asking questions about my family’s experience in the Shoah (Nazi Holocaust).

Who can forget the interracial and interfaith seders, the union seder, and the sweatshop liberation seder? And then there was the time I contaminated my local Bay Area vegan seder with my contribution of gefilte fish (my sassy New Yorker intolerance for West Coast new ageism, which I have since succumbed to). The story of Exodus that we recount at Passover has evolved into a spiritual model that inspires my statement- making (aka, my progressive political work).

The Exodus story of liberation depicts the centrality of the Divine concern for the oppressed. Moving away from a source of oppression seems to be the immediate goal. But the beautiful thing about the Exodus story is that we wander through the desert never to quite reach Eretz Yisrael (the Land of Israel)—our destination. This forces us to focus more on the journey and the struggle. I have come to accept that the world will never be the one I hope for in my lifetime. But heartbreaking as it sometimes is to know that I will never reach my destination, it is the value that Exodus places on the journey and the struggle that sustains my political work. It is my own Eretz Yisrael—my vision of love, peace, and justice that guides me and enables me, each Passover, to continue to make a STATEMENT. 

Source:  
Love and Justice In Times of War Haggadah
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Table of contents
  • Passover Seder in Manila, Philippines, 1925
  • Iraqi Passover Haggadah, 1902
  • 1958 Seder
  • Jews Celebrating Passover. Lubok, 19th century
    • Introduction
  • Greetings
  • Yehuda Amichai Poem "Passover"
  • Making Halaik
  • The Journey, In Gerangl
  • Spain, Italy, Sicily, Morocco, Tunisia, Sardinia, and Hungary
  • Official Passover Haggadah for Pasifika Jews
    • Kadesh
  • La primera copa de vino
    • Urchatz
  • Ethiopian Jewish Customs
    • Karpas
  • Karpas History
    • -- Four Questions
  • Three Questions
  • Four Questions (sephardi)
  • Four Questions Yiddish
  • Las Cuatro Preguntas (Ladino)
  • Ma Nishtana in Luganda
  • Four Questions in Spanish
  • Multi Lingual Four Questions
  • Four Questions in Judeo-Persian/Farsi (Transliterated)
  • Di Fir Kashes (The Four Questions in Yiddish, corrected)
  • Ма ніштана – Чотири питання
    • Commentary / Readings
  • The Global History of Ma Nishtana
  • A Special Father-Son Duo and Their Unique Indian Charoset
  • The Spanish Roots of Classic Chicken Soup
  • A Modern Passover Miracle
  • A Prayer for Peace in the World
  • An immigrant from the Soviet Union Celebrates Her First Passover
  • The Global Experience of Passover
  • Passover: Engaging Across Differences
  • Entrée From Estonia
  • Passover Torah Teaching
  • Excerpts from “Passover Nights,” Hava Shapiro (1925)
    • -- Four Children
  • "Четверо дітей". Авторка Зоя Черкаська-Ннаді
  • 4 children
    • -- Exodus Story
  • American Soviet Jewry Movement Advertisement
    • -- Ten Plagues
  • Ten Plagues (sephardi)
    • -- Cup #2 & Dayenu
  • In Every Generation & Second Cup (Korean)
    • Rachtzah
  • Handwashing
    • Motzi-Matzah
  • Matsot sucrées à l'orange
    • Maror
  • Charoset in Other Countries
  • Марор – Гірке зілля
    • Shulchan Oreich
  • Passover Around The World Trivia
  • Let's Eat in 20 languages
  • World's Largest Seder
    • Tzafun
  • Цафун – Ми їмо знайдений афікоман
    • Bareich
  • Bareich -bordsbönen
  • Bendigamos a el altísimo (Ladino)
    • Hallel
  • Fun Fact
  • Cup of Elijah (Korean)
    • Songs
  • Had Gadya - Igbo Jewish (Nigerian) version
  • Who Knows One - Ladino
  • Chad Gadya in Ladino
  • Liberté/Liberty by French Poet Paul Eluard
  • Traditions Tunisiennes
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