Haggadot Contributors

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Leader: Let us say grace. Company: Let us bless Him of whose bounty we have partaken and through whose goodness we live. Leader: Praised art Thou, O Lord our God, King of the universe, who sustainest the world with goodness, with grace, and with infinite mercy. Thou givest food unto every creature, for Thy mercy endureth for ever. Company: Through Thy great goodness, food has not failed us. May it never fail us at any time, for the sake of Thy...

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By: Rabbi Ari Weiss At the close of the Haggadah, after moving from past humiliations to future hopes, a surprise! A piyut, or liturgical poem, first quoted in Sefer Rokeach (1160-1238), that returns to the Haggadic theme of retribution but on a deeper, more fundamental register. Nature is a "war of all against all."[1]  The cat that attacks is attacked just as the Egyptians who oppressed are oppressed. "Nature red in tooth and claw."[2]  And so it goes. Violence always escalating,...

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If He had brought us out from Egypt אִלּוּ הוֹצִיאָנוּ מִמִּצְרָיִםand had not carried out judgments against them וְלֹא עָשָׂה בָּהֶם שְׁפָטִים— Dayenu, it would have been enough דַּיֵּנוּIf He had carried out judgments against them אִלּוּ עָשָׂה בָּהֶם שְׁפָטִיםand not against their idols וְלֹא עָשָׂה בֵּאלֹהֵיהֶם— Dayenu, it would have been enough דַּיֵּנוּIf He had destroyed their idols אִלּוּ עָשָׂה בֵּאלֹהֵיהֶםand had not smitten their first-born וְלֹא הָרַג אֶת בְּכוֹרֵיהֶם— Dayenu, it would have been enough דַּיֵּנוּIf He had smitten...

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Where do we find the answers? The answers are in the story itself.Avadim Hayinu. We were slaves in Mitzrayim. Our ancestors in their flight from bondage in Mitzrayim did not have time to let their dough rise. With not a moment to spare they snatched up the dough they had prepared and fled. But the hot sun beat as they carried the dough along with them and baked it into the flat unleavened bread we call matzah. In memory of this,...

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 היינו‎ עבדים (We were slaves). Shmuel and Rav disagreed about the perspective of the central story to be shared at the Seder table. Why was it that that the rabbis disagreed on how the story of Pesach should be shared at the seder? I believe that this was because Shmuel proposed that the story was to explain of how the Jews came from physical slavery to liberation and Rav showed that the main lesson of the seder was of our turning...