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Reclining on our left side demonstrates our freedom from slavery. We hold our fourth cup of wine and we recite: בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יי אֱלֹהֵינוּ מֶלֶךְ הָעוֹלָם בּוֹרֵא פְּרִי הַגָפֶן Baruch Atah Adonai, Eloheynu Melech Ha’Olam Borey P’ree Hagafen. Blessed are You, Lord our God, Ruler of the universe, Who creates the fruit of the vine. Drink the fourth glass of wine!

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Reclining on our left side demonstrates our freedom from slavery. We hold our third cup of wine and we recite: בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יי אֱלֹהֵינוּ מֶלֶךְ הָעוֹלָם בּוֹרֵא פְּרִי הַגָפֶן Baruch Atah Adonai, Eloheynu Melech Ha’Olam Borey P’ree Hagafen. Blessed are You, Lord our God, Ruler of the universe, Who creates the fruit of the vine. Drink the third glass of wine!

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The story begins in Egypt with the persecution of newborn Hebrew males, and Ptira's, the Pharaoh's daughter, discovery of the infant Moses on the Nile. Moses' youth at the Pharaoh's court ends abruptly when he is forced to flee, after he kills an Egyptian overseer to save his brother Aaron. During his years of exile, Moses meets his future wife Zipporah and her father Jethro. After Moses and Zipporah's wedding, the vision of God in the Burning Bush occurs, commanding Moses...

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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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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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Water is refreshing, cleansing, and clear, so it’s easy to understand why so many cultures and religions use water for symbolic purification. We will wash our hands twice during our seder: now, with no blessing, to get us ready for the rituals to come; and then again later, we’ll wash again with a blessing, preparing us for the meal, which Judaism thinks of as a ritual in itself. (The Jewish obsession with food is older than you thought!) To wash your...

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"For me, the recent meaning of Passover in my life has been a reclaiming of the seder ceremony away from the patriarchal tradition. I remember the seders of their early childhood, conducted by their grandfather entirely in Hebrew, incomprehensible to most in attendance, unvarying from year to year, except for how long it took until the children were sent away from the table for giggling. Our goal now is to create seders that reflect our awareness of the past and present,...

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As we now transition from the formal telling of the Passover story to the celebratory meal.                                                              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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BOILED EGG (TO EAT)  or ROASTED EGG May we reflect on our lives this year and soften our hearts to those around us. Another year has passed since we gathered at the Seder table and we are once again reminded that life is fleeting. We are reminded to use each precious moment wisely so that no day will pass without bringing us closer to some worthy achievement as we all take a moment to be aware of how truly blessed we...

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Dayenu Lyrics in English and Hebrew If He had brought us out from Egypt, and had not carried out judgments against them Dayenu, it would have sufficed us! אִלּוּ הוֹצִיאָנוּ מִמִּצְרַיִם וְלֹא עָשָׂה בָהֶם שְׁפָטִים דַּיֵּנוּIf He had carried out judgments against them, and not against their idols Dayenu, it would have sufficed us! אִלּוּ עָשָׂה בָהֶם שְׁפָטִים וְלֹא עָשָׂה בֵאלֹהֵיהֶם דַּיֵּנוּIf He had destroyed their idols, and had not smitten their first-born Dayenu, it would have sufficed us! אִלּוּ עָשָׂה...

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Go Down Moses Louis Armstrong Go down Moses Way down in Egypt land Tell all pharaoes to Let my people go! When Israel was in Egypt land Let my people go! Oppressed so hard they could not stand Let my people go! So the God said: go down, Moses Way down in Egypt land Tell all pharaoes to Let my people go! So moses went to Egypt land Let my people go! He made all pharaoes understand Let my people go!...

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There are three pieces of matzah stacked on the table. We now break the middle matzah into two pieces. The host should wrap up the larger of the pieces and, at some point between now and the end of dinner, hide it. This piece is called the afikomen, literally “dessert” in Greek. After dinner, the guests will have to hunt for the afikomen in order to wrap up the meal… and win a prize. We eat matzah in memory of the...

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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. We now dip it...

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Judaism is a spiritual path, a set of practices intended to facilitate living an awakened life. Passover is the Jewish holiday celebrating the Exodus from Egypt, the holiday of freedom. During the Passover Seder, Jewish parents tell a story to their children about their ancestors journey from slavery and bondage to freedom, a tale that has been passed down from Jewish parent to child for over 2,500 years. In the Haggadah, the book used to guide the telling of the story,...