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A HAGGADAH for SPRING AWAKENINGS 2019 · 5779 2 1 (TOGETHER, in TURNS) We Gather Tonight to Celebrate the Journey of the Ancient Israelites from Slavery to Freedom

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A HAGGADAH for SPRING AWAKENINGS 2019 · 5779 2 1 (TOGETHER, in TURNS) We Gather Tonight to Celebrate the Journey of the Ancient Israelites from Slavery to Freedom A HAGGADAH FOR SPRING AWAKENINGS 2019 · 5779 2 1 (TOGETHER, IN TURNS) We gather tonight to celebrate the journey of the ancient Israelites from slavery to freedom. Jewish or not, religious or not, each one of us belongs to this community, here at our shared table. Our ceremony is the seder, from a Hebrew word that means “order.” We read from the haggadah, which means “the telling.” We tell the story of our deliverance from Egypt using symbols on our seder plate and at our seder table, whose meanings we explore. Though the Exodus occurred over three thousand years ago, because of Passover, no memory is more strongly embedded in the Jewish consciousness than the story told herein and lived and affirmed anew in every generation. The seder is a joyous ritual of freedom, celebrating through instruction, worship, song, and food, Israel’s liberation from bondage. This story lives on because there are still many forms of slavery in our world. We are still struggling to leave “Egypt,” mitzrayim —literally, “the narrow place.” There are still narrow places that confine us, and battles for freedom yet to be won. Our story of leaving Egypt is the shared narrative of a people, but it is also for each of us today to make it our own. In telling our story of free- dom, each of us around the table is invited to reflect on our personal journeys toward freedom this year. As we say, “In every generation each of us must act as if we had personally gone out of Egypt.” Let us remember that Passover is not just about who we are, but it is also about what we do. Tonight we celebrate. Tomorrow we act on all that we have learned. — ADAPTED FROM A TRILINGUAL HUMANIST HAGGADAH FOR PASSOVER, ED. CECILIA KREMER AND SANDRA MAYO; SHARING THE JOURNEY HAGGADAH BY ALAN YOFFE; THE LOVE AND JUSTICE IN TIMES OF WAR HAGGADAH, BY MICAH BAZANT AND DARA SILVERMAN 4 Welcome (SEDER LEADER) Here we are. Here we are, gathered to celebrate the oldest continually practiced ritual in the Western world, to retell what is arguably the best known of all stories, to take part in the most widely practiced Jewish holiday. Here we are as we were last year, and as we hope to be next year. Here we are, as night descends in succession over all of the Jews of the world, with a book in front of us. Jews have a special relationship to books, and the Hag- gadah has been translated more widely, and reprinted more often, than any other Jewish book. It is not a work of history or philosophy, not a prayer book, user's manu- al, timeline, poem, or palimpsest—and yet it is all of these things. The Torah is the foundational text for Jewish law, but the Haggadah is our book of living memory. We are not merely telling a story here. We are being called to a radical act of empathy. Here we are, embarking on an ancient, perennial attempt to give human life— our lives—dignity. Here we are: Individuals remembering a shared past and in pursuit of a shared destiny. The seder is a protest against despair. The universe might appear deaf to our fears and hopes, but we are not—so we gather, and share them, and pass them down. We have been waiting for this moment for thousands of years—more than one hundred generations of Jews have been here as we are— and we will continue to wait for it. And we will not wait idly. — THE NEW AMERICAN HAGGADAH, ED. JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER 3 WHAT’S HAPPENING HERE? The seder officially begins with a physical act: lighting the candles. In Jewish tradition, lighting can- dles and saying a blessing over them marks a time of transition, from the day that is ending to the one that is beginning, from ordi- nary time to sacred time. Candlelighting FOR CALLING THE SPIRIT BACK FROM WANDERING THE EARTH IN ITS HUMAN FEET Speak to it as you would to a beloved child. When you find your way to the circle, to the fire kept burning by the keepers of your soul, Welcome your spirit back from its you will be welcomed. wandering. It may return in pieces, in tatters. Gather them together. They will be happy to You must clean yourself with cedar, sage, or be found after being lost for so long. other healing plant. Your spirit will need to sleep awhile after it is Cut the ties you have to failure and shame. bathed and given clean clothes. Let go the pain you are holding in your mind, Now you can have a party. Invite everyone your shoulders, your heart, all the way to you know who loves and supports you. Keep your feet. Let go the pain of your ancestors to room for those who have no place else to go. make way for those who are heading in our direction. Make a giveaway, and remember, keep the speeches short. Ask for forgiveness. Then, you must do this: help the next person Call upon the help of those who love you. find their way These helpers take many forms: animal, through the dark. element, bird, angel, saint, stone, or ancestor. —JOY HARJO Call your spirit back. It may be caught in corners and creases of shame, judgment, and human abuse. LIGHT THE CANDLES. You must call in a way that your spirit will want to return. 6 Candlelighting (TOGETHER, IN TURNS) FOR CALLING THE SPIRIT BACK FROM WANDERING THE EARTH IN ITS HUMAN FEET Let the earth stabilize your postcolonial Put down that bag of potato chips, that white insecure jitters. bread, that bottle of pop. Be respectful of the small insects, birds and Turn off that cellphone, computer, and remote animal people who accompany you. control. Ask their forgiveness for the harm we hu- mans have brought down upon them. Open the door, then close it behind you. Don’t worry. Take a breath offered by friendly winds. They The heart knows the way though there may travel the earth gathering essences of plants be high-rises, interstates, checkpoints, armed to clean. soldiers, massacres, wars, and those who will despise you because they despise themselves. Give it back with gratitude. The journey might take you a few hours, a If you sing it will give your spirit lift to fly to the day, a year, a few years, a hundred, a stars’ ears and back. thousand or even more. Acknowledge this earth who has cared for you Watch your mind. Without training it might since you were a dream planting itself run away and leave your heart for the precisely within your parents’ desire. immense human feast set by thethieves of time. Let your moccasin feet take you to the encampment of the guardians who have Do not hold regrets. known you before time, who will be there af- ter time. They sit before the fire that has been there without time. 5 Kadesh — THE MAXWELL HOUSE HAGGADAH, DELUXE EDITION (1964) (TOGETHER, IN UNISON) —RABBI GAVRIEL GOLDFEDER, With this blessing, we lift our wine, our symbol of joy; let us welcome the festival of Passover! JEWISH CHAPLAIN, MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY DRINK THE FIRST CUP OF WINE! 8 WHAT’S HAPPENING HERE? During the seder, we join together to bless and drink four cups of wine, which tradi- tionally represent each of the promises of freedom God made to the Israelites: I will bring you out, I will deliver you, I will re- deem you, I will take you to be my people. (TOGETHER, IN TURNS) All Jewish celebrations, from holidays to wed- Kadeshdings, include wine as a symbol of our joy—not to mention a practical way to increase that joy. The seder starts with wine, then gives us three more opportunities to refill our cups and drink, each with its own intention. At an ordinary meal, our blessing over the wine would be called the kiddush, which means sanctification. But on Passover, this section of the seder is called kadesh, which means “Sanctify!” Instead of an everyday acknowledgement, it is a joyous imperative: “Make this night holy!” In other words: beginning with this first cup of wine, make tonight special for you. What- ever brings you to the table, allow yourself to believe that tonight will change you. Though it is up to us to do the work of transformation, believe that when we commit to seeking free- dom, we can be sure our efforts will bear fruit. —RABBI GAVRIEL GOLDFEDER, JEWISH CHAPLAIN, MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY 7 WHAT’S HAPPENING HERE? At this point in the seder, it is tra- ditional to eat a green vegetable dipped in salt water. The green veg- etable represents rebirth, renewal and growth; the salt water rep- resents the tears of enslavement. Karpas(TOGETHER, IN TURNS) Our tradition teaches us that the Israelites’ story Like many of our holidays, Passover began with an awakening: Moses saw the burning combines a celebration of an event bush and recognized that he was called to liberate from our Jewish memory with a his people from Egypt. Let our journey tonight begin recognition of the cycles of nature. with an awakening, too—of the need for inner free- The karpas is the first of the symbol- dom that exists in each of us. As you pass and dip the ic foods we will eat tonight, and it karpas, turn to your neighbor, and share: typically represents two things: our ancestors’ liberation from Egypt, What does mitzrayim mean to you, right now? and the first stirrings of spring.
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