Contributors

Julie Bolsom

Uncle Eli - Opening the Door

by Julie Bolsom

Opening the Door As the seder stretched on and I started to snore, my Mommy said: "Quick, now! Go open the door!" I didn't know who could be coming right now, but I stifled a yawn and I stood up somehow. I walked to the door and I opened it wide, and who do you think I saw standing outside? My friend Uncle Eli with his beard to the floor was waiting there quietly next to the door! His eyes were...

Uncle Eli Afikoman

by Julie Bolsom

Afikoman Do you know who I am? Have you heard of my name? Once you have met me, you won't be the same. I show up each year towards the end of the seder. My eye see like telescopes, ears work like radar. You can't ever fool me, you can't ever hide. Your matzah's not safe in the house or outside. I'm famous, fantastic! I'll tell you, in brief-- I'm Abie, the Afikoman-thief! Whenever you think that it's hidden away, locked...

Uncle Eli - matza maror korech

by Julie Bolsom

--------------------- Rabban Gamaliel Omer... Shh-h... Rabban Gamaliel has something to tell, so we'd better all listen to him very well. He says that each person must mention these three if he wants his whole seder to go perfectly. Tonight these three things might be found in your parlor-- They are: Pesah and Matzah and Maror. Pesah, the lamb that the Jews would prepare at the time that the Temple was still standing there, to remind us of how our ancestors were...

-- Four Children

Uncle Eli - 4 sons

by Julie Bolsom

The Four Sons To our seder last year came a strange-looking man with four sons: Smarty, Nasty, and Simple, and Sam. Now Smarty was smart-- yes, so clever and wise, he could do the whole seder while closing his eyes. From beginning to end, from the end to the start, he recited it over and over by heart. In Hebrew and Hindu, in Snufic and Roman, from the first Ha Lachma to the last Afikoman. But Nasty refused to take part...

-- Four Questions

Uncle Eli Avadim Hayinu

by Julie Bolsom

Avadim Hayinu We were slaves to King Pharaoh, that terrible king, and he made us do all kinds of difficult things. Like building a pyramid of chocolate ice cream when the sun was so hot that the Nile turned to steam, and digging a ditch with a spade of soft cotton. That Pharaoh was wicked and nasty and rotten! He made us prepare him a big birthday cake and buy fancy presents for Pharaoh to take, and he kept us awake...

-- Four Questions

Uncle Eli - 4 questions

by Julie Bolsom

--------------------- The Four Questions Why is it only on Passover night we never know how to do anything right? We don't eat our meals in the regular ways, the ways that we do on all other days. 'Cause on all other nights we may eat all kinds of wonderful good bready treats, like big purple pizza that tastes like a pickle, crumbly crackers and pink pumpernickel, sassafras sandwich and tiger on rye, fifty felafels in pita, fresh-fried, with peanut-butter and tangerine...

Maggid - Beginning

Uncle Eli Ha Lachma

by Julie Bolsom

Ha Lachma This is the poorest, the driest of bread. It crinkles and crumbles all over our beds. This is the matzah that Grand-Daddy ate when he zoomed out of Egypt, afraid he'd be late. You're welcome to join us-- Come one or come many! I'll give you my matzah. I sure don't want any.

Uncle Eli's Haggadah - 4 cups

by Julie Bolsom

The Four Cups Jacky the juggler is four inches small, but he'll juggle the four cups and not one will fall. Each cup is filled up with red wine to its top. They dance through the air but he won't spill a drop. Sari is trying to tickle his toes, and she's wiggling a feather right under his nose. But Jacky keeps juggling. His eyes are now closed. His feet in the air and one hand on the ground, the four...

Uncle Eli's Haggadah -Introduction

by Julie Bolsom

Uncle Eli's Special-for-Kids Most Fun Ever Under-the-Table Passover Haggadah Calgary 1995 / 5755 (c) 1986, 1990, 1995 by Eliezer Lorne Segal, 16-310 Brookmere Rd. SW, Calgary Alberta --------------------- A Present from Uncle Eli The house had gone crazy, all turned upside-down, with everyone busily running around. Mommy was screaming "Get out of the way! You can't keep on lying around here all day! Tomorrow is Passover. You don't look ready. We have to remove everything that is bready. Pack up the...

Commentary / Readings

Use of the Internet on Pesach

by Julie Bolsom

Pesach and Use of the Web From Der Internetter Rebbe Recently, it has come to my attention that the Jewish community may, chas veshalom, be making numerous violations of chometz and other prohibitions via their use of the internet both before and during Pesach. The following, therefore, is a compilation of some of the more important laws compiled from the Great Sefer Reshet Keshet, a sefer dealing specifically with the proper use of the internet in Jewish law, written by mor...

The Night of Pesach

by Julie Bolsom

The night of Pesach By Michael Druck © 1992 It was the night of Pesach And all through the house You couldn't find bread In anyone's mouth The table was set with karpas and fish And maror and wine And potato knish With Daddy and Mommy And poor Uncle Lou Grandma and Grandpa And Sammy and Sue A place was set where nobody sat For Elijah the Prophet and a cup that was fat With wine and cheer For all that...

The Enchanted Matza

by Julie Bolsom

The Enchanted Matzoh By Arthur R. Pell The matzos, all freshly baked, were packed neatly in their box, waiting for the seder. Most of them were quietly awaiting their fate. They didn't mind being eaten because they were baked especially for that purpose and it never entered their minds to expect anything else. But one little matzoh was different, perhaps the baker had made a mistake when he mixed the dough or perhaps this matzoh was enchanted. He didn't want to...

-- Four Children

The 4 sons

by Julie Bolsom

The Four Sons of the Passover Hagaddah By Nachum Mohl By now the four sons that are mentioned in the Haggada have achieved some measure of fame. But the commentators on the Haggada ask a question on the manner in which they are listed: 'The Torah speaks in regard to four sons: A wise son, A wicked son, a simple son and a son who does not know even to ask." In reality, if we were to analyze this listing we...

Matzah

by Julie Bolsom

Matzah By Avi Lazerson Matzah has a special taste, but this is not due to any special ingredients. Just the opposite, the matza that we eat at the Seder has no ingredients in it other than flour and water. There is no oil, no sugar, chemicals, food additives or colors. It is simply flour and water mixed together and baked in a manner that precludes it from rising. Perhaps the reason we enjoy it so at the Seder is because we...

Commentary / Readings

Women at the Seder

by Julie Bolsom

Women at the Passover Seder Taking an active part in the Passover Seder is an important mitzvah for women, since the Exodus from Egypt took place “in the merit of the righteous women…” ( Babylonian Talmud, Sota 11b ). Perhaps an additional reason why we read most of the Hagadah before the meal, is to keep the women at the table, free from their kitchen chores for a few more hours. Women are obligated to drink the Four Cups of wine...

Commentary / Readings

How many cups

by Julie Bolsom

How Many Cups Of Wine Do You Drink At The Seder? 3,4, or 5? By Meir Loewenberg Ask anyone, even a first-grader, how many cups of wine we drink at the seder and the answer will always be: FOUR. This is what we do, what our parents did and what their parents did. And this is the halacha ( Shulchan Aruch, OC 472.8). The usual explanation for drinking these four cups of wine at the Seder cites the four expressions of...

Commentary / Readings

An immigrant from the Soviet Union Celebrates Her First Passover

by Julie Bolsom

Our First Passover By Natalia Nikova It was April 1980. My mother, my teenage daughter, and I were flying from Rome to New York City. Our journey started two months earlier in Leningrad, where after a long waiting period we were allowed to emigrate. We stayed a week in Vienna and a month and a half in Rome. Our documents were thoroughly checked, fingerprints were taken, and finally we got permission to settle in the United States. Looking out the window...

Commentary / Readings

Now that we left Egypt, may a Jew now live in Egypt?

by Julie Bolsom

May a Jew live in Egypt? By Meir Loewenberg When we sit at the Seder, we celebrate our redemption from Egyptian slavery. The Haggadah tells us that everyone must look at himself as if he himself had departed from Egypt. And if the Almighty had not liberated us from Egypt we and our children and our grandchildren would still be slaves to Pharaoh. But the Jewish people were redeemed from Egypt! In the Torah the exodus-story ends with the Lord telling...

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No Recent Haggadah

If the New York Times reported on the 10 Plagues

by Julie Bolsom

-- Four Children

Ballad of the 4 sons

by Julie Bolsom

-- Four Children

Ballad of the 4 sons

by Julie Bolsom

-- Four Children

Ballad of the 4 sons

by Julie Bolsom

The Ballad of the Four Sons For the Passover Seder (to the tune of Clementine) © Ben Aronin, first published in his community haggadah, 1954, used with permission Said the father to the children "At the Seder you will dine, You will eat your fill of matzoh, You will drink four cups of wine." Now this father had no daughters, But his sons they numbered four, One was wise, and one was wicked, One was simple and a bore. And the...

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