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Eating the meal! | shulchan oreich | שֻׁלְחָן עוֹרֵךְ Enjoy! But don’t forget when you’re done we’ve got a little more seder to go, including the final two cups of wine!

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In Hopes of Freedom From Abuse For All Author unknown. Adapted by Hannah Litman and Rachel Novick. Sometimes, we cannot say Dayenu. Wehave the right to say, “No, this is not enough, I will not settle for this.” Sometimes, we wish we could say Dayenu. What would be enough? Together: When we can make choices about our own bodies, our own identities, and our own lives, Dayenu When courts, law enforcement and mental health professionals stop blaming the victim, Dayenu When...

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Finding and eating the Afikomen | tzafoon | צָפוּן The playfulness of finding the afikomen reminds us that we balance our solemn memories of slavery with a joyous celebration of freedom. As we eat the afikomen, our last taste of matzah for the evening, we are grateful for moments of silliness and happiness in our lives.

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Pour the second glass of wine for everyone. The Haggadah doesn’t tell the story of Passover in a linear fashion. We don’t hear of Moses being found by the daughter of Pharaoh – actually, we don’t hear much of Moses at all. Instead, we get an impressionistic collection of songs, images, and stories of both the Exodus from Egypt and from Passover celebrations through the centuries. Some say that minimizing the role of Moses keeps us focused on the miracles God...

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The charoset reminds us of the mortar and of the pain of slavery. However, as we eat it we taste it’s sweetness. This sweetness gives us hope that the future will bring redemption and justice to all people. We make sandwiches out of maror and charoset, to remind us of the mortar our ancestors used to construct huge monuments for Pharaoh in Egypt. As you we eat this sandwich, we consider the signs of hope for a more just future that...

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Dipping the bitter herb in sweet charoset | maror  |מָרוֹר      In creating a holiday about the joy of freedom, we turn the story of our bitter history into a sweet celebration. We recognize this by dipping our bitter herbs into the sweet charoset. We don’t totally eradicate the taste of the bitter with the taste of the sweet… but doesn’t the sweet mean more when it’s layered over the bitterness? בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יְיָ, אֱלֹהֵֽינוּ מֶֽלֶךְ הָעוֹלָם, אֲשֶׁר קִדְּשָֽׁנוּ בְּמִצְוֹתָיו וְצִוָּֽנוּ עַל...

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The Voice of a Sexual Assault Survivor What I do remember is waking up the next morning in a strange room, alone, cold, mostly naked and confused. In a panic I got my clothes together. My heart sank into my stomach as I looked down at the blood-stained sheets. I was so frightened I didn’t know what to do. I was hurriedly “pushed” out the door by the guy who lived in the room. Not much was said. The Voice of...

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Singing songs that praise God | hallel | הַלֵּל This is the time set aside for singing. Some of us might sing traditional prayers from the Book of Psalms. Others take this moment for favorites like Chad Gadya & Who Knows One, which you can find in the appendix. To celebrate the theme of freedom, we might sing songs from the civil rights movement. Or perhaps your crazy Uncle Frank has some parody lyrics about Passover to the tunes from a...

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Our story starts in ancient times, with Abraham, the first person to have the idea that maybe all those little statues his contemporaries worshiped as gods were just statues. The idea of one God, invisible and all-powerful, inspired him to leave his family and begin a new people in Canaan, the land that would one day bear his grandson Jacob’s adopted name, Israel. God had made a promise to Abraham that his family would become a great nation, but this promise...

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Passover, like many of our holidays, combines the celebration of an event from our Jewish memory with a recognition of the cycles of nature. As we remember the liberation from Egypt, we also recognize the stirrings of spring and rebirth happening in the world around us. The symbols on our table bring together elements of both kinds of celebration. We now take a vegetable, representing our joy at the dawning of spring after our long, cold winter. Most families use a...

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The formal telling of the story of Passover is framed as a discussion with lots of questions and answers. The tradition that the youngest person asks the questions reflects the centrality of involving everyone in the seder. The rabbis who created the set format for the seder gave us the Four Questions to help break the ice in case no one had their own questions. Asking questions is a core tradition in Jewish life. If everyone at your seder is around...

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The Cup of Elijah We now refill our wine glasses one last time and open the front door to invite the prophet Elijah to join our seder. In the Bible, Elijah was a fierce defender of God to a disbelieving people. At the end of his life, rather than dying, he was whisked away to heaven. Tradition holds that he will return in advance of messianic days to herald a new era of peace, so we set a place for Elijah...

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Ignorance |בורות Doubt |ספק Blame |אשמה Shame |בושה Fear |פחד Judgement |פסק דין Aversion |סלידה Prejudice |דעות קדומות Complacency |שאננות Imbalance of Power |חוסר איזון של כוח

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In past years people have added new items to the Seder plate as symbols of inclusion. For example, adding an orange for women in the rabbinate, an olive for reconciliation with the Palestinians, among other items. What item should be added at our Sexual Injustice Seder and why?

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We have now told the story of Passover…but wait! We’re not quite done. There are still some symbols on our seder plate we haven’t talked about yet. Rabban Gamliel would say that whoever didn’t explain the shank bone, matzah, and marror (or bitter herbs) hasn’t done Passover justice. The shank bone represents the Pesach, the special lamb sacrifice made in the days of the Temple for the Passover holiday. It is called the pesach, from the Hebrew word meaning “to pass...

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Why is this night different from all other nights? At other Passover Seders we focus on our Jewish narrative of slavery, but on this night we use our narrative to begin to understand modern instances of injustice. Why are we focused on sexual injustice? Sexual Injustice is a topic that is pervasive in our society today, but not at the forefront of discussion in our community. We want to bring attention and awareness to the issues related to sexual injustice in...

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As all good term papers do, we start with the main idea: ּעֲבָדִים הָיִינוּ הָיִינו. עַתָּה בְּנֵי חוֹרִין   Avadim hayinu hayinu. Ata b’nei chorin. We were slaves to Pharaoh in Egypt. Now we are free. We were slaves to Pharaoh in Egypt, and God took us from there with a strong hand and outstretched arm. Had God not brought our ancestors out of Egypt, then even today we and our children and our grandchildren would still be slaves. Even if we...

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Refill everyone’s wine glass. We now say grace after the meal, thanking God for the food we’ve eaten. On Passover, this becomes something like an extended toast to God, culminating with drinking our third glass of wine for the evening: We praise God, Ruler of Everything, whose goodness sustains the world. You are the origin of love and compassion, the source of bread for all. Thanks to You, we need never lack for food; You provide food enough for everyone. We...

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The charoset reminds us of the mortar and of the pain of slavery. However, as we eat it we taste it’s sweetness. This sweetness gives us hope that the future will bring redemption and justice to all people. We make sandwiches out of maror and charoset, to remind us of the mortar our ancestors used to construct huge monuments for Pharaoh in Egypt. As you we eat this sandwich, we consider the signs of hope for a more just future that...

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Why is this night different from all other nights? At other Passover Seders we focus on our Jewish narrative of slavery, but on this night we use our narrative to begin to understand modern instances of injustice. Why are we focused on sexual injustice? Sexual Injustice is a topic that is pervasive in our society today, but not at the forefront of discussion in our community. We want to bring attention and awareness to the issues related to sexual injustice in...

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The Voice of a Sexual Assault Survivor What I do remember is waking up the next morning in a strange room, alone, cold, mostly naked and confused. In a panic I got my clothes together. My heart sank into my stomach as I looked down at the blood-stained sheets. I was so frightened I didn’t know what to do. I was hurriedly “pushed” out the door by the guy who lived in the room. Not much was said. The Voice of...