Passover is being celebrated by Jewish people around the world beginning tonight at sundown. Passover celebrates the Exodus of the Hebrew slaves from Egypt and one of the most important events in the history of the Jewish people.
Some customs and laws of Passover are:
To prepare for the holiday, houses are cleaned thoroughly and dishes and utensils are replaced with those used on Passover only.
Bread and other leavened food (chametz) is forbidden and removed from the home before Passover begins. Many Jews will eat only food specifically marked as “Kosher for Passover.”
Matzah, a flat bread made just of flour and water, is eaten.
Work is prohibited on the first two and last two days (in Israel, the first and last days only), when rules akin to those followed on the Jewish Sabbath are followed.
In Temple times, Passover was one of three annual pilgrimage festivals to Jerusalem.
The Seder Ritual: The seder is held on the first night or two (depending on custom) of Passover. Some characteristics of this ritual meal are:
The story of the Exodus is retold, using a book called a “Haggadah.”
Bitter herbs are eaten to recall the pain of slavery, and greens to celebrate the onset of spring. Other foods include haroseth–a fruit, nut, and wine mixture–and of course, matzah.
The youngest at the table recites the Four Questions.
Four cups of wine are consumed.
A festive meal is eaten.
Passover takes on new meaning in each generation with the incorporation of the present struggles for liberation with those of the original event. Beliefnet reports:
The custom of customizing even extends to Judaism’s most traditional branch. The Orthodox Jewish publishing house, Artscroll Mesora, offers some 50 different Haggadahs, one of which is written by Hasidic rabbi and addiction specialist Abraham Twerski to address the experience of substance abusers.
Adapting Passover’s message to fit a range of needs is practically as old as the holiday itself.
“Over and over again, the Bible itself uses the Exodus to justify all sorts of things,” from caring for the poor to “any number of laws and practices,” Sarna said. “So the idea of trimming the Exodus to justify whatever it is you want to justify really has very deep roots.”
Even before people fiddled with the text of the Haggadah, they incorporated illustrations that reflected their times, depicting the modern-day Egyptian as a Russian warrior or Nazi soldier, said Sarna, adding that even the traditional text requires reinterpretation.
“It says in every generation, they arise to destroy us and God saves us. Well, if that’s the message,” then “obviously we are supposed to interpret this story in light of contemporary events,” he said.
Without fail, Passover offers a fitting backdrop for any number of modern-day struggles.
That’s why the American Jewish World Service, an international relief organization, dispatched a mass mailing to U.S. synagogues with readings that offer a “fifth question” to Passover’s traditional four questions asked at the Seder table. The cards depict a refugee from Darfur and ask: “How can we make this year different from all other years?”
Click here for more coverage of the many aspects of Passover.
In other Passover news, according to Rachel Zoll of AP, Pope Benedict XVI became the first pope to visit an American synagogue Friday, bringing greetings for the Passover holiday and accepting gifts of matzo and a seder plate. Benedict, 81, stopped briefly at Park East Synagogue on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, near the Vatican residence.
Read it here.