Maggid - Why is there an Orange on the Sedar Plate?
Lastly, we see an orange that sits on the sedar plate. This orange and the meaning behind it dates back to the 1980s when we first saw a crust of bread, preceisely what we cannot eat over these 8 days, grace the sedar plate of Susannah Heschel, a Jewish feminist scholar. It followed a comment made by a male leader in Judaism that "a lesbian in Judaism is like a crust of bread on a sedar plate." The following year, Heschel realized it probably didn't make the most sense to have bread on a sedar plate, so instead replaced it with an orange, following yet another comment by a man who said "a woman on the bimah is like an orange on the sedar plate." Why these men see the Sedar plate as the ultimate qualifier for what is normal is unknown, but an orange on the sedar plate now represents the fruitfulness of a Judaism that welcomes all.
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