At the head of the table is a seder plate on which the following foods have been placed:

ZEROA

A roasted bone. This can be either a shank bone, the neck of a chicken, or a beet if we’re going for a vegetarian seder plate. The Zeroa reminds us of the special lamb that was offered on Pesach in the ancient temple in Jerusalem.

BETZAH

A roasted egg. In ancient days, on each of the three pilgrimage festivals (Pesach, Shavuot, and Sukkot) a sacrifice was offered in the temple in honor of the holiday. The roasted egg reminds us of that offering.

MAROR

Bitter herbs, usually horseradish. This is a reminder of the bitterness and hardship of slavery in Egypt.

CHAZERET

Bitter herbs, like romaine lettuce. This is also a reminder of the bitterness and hardship of slavery in Egypt.

CHAROSET

Traditionally a mixture of chopped apples, nuts, cinnamon, and red wine. This reminds us of the clay used with the mortar by the Jews when they made the bricks for the pyramids which they built for Pharaoh.

KARPAS

Some greens, usually parsley. The Karpas is a reminder of springtime, the season of Pesach, when nature blooms again and awakens our hope.

ORANGE

In the 1980s, Susannah Heschel, a Jewish feminist scholar, chose to include an orange at her seder to symbolize the inclusion of LGBTQ+ individuals alongside other marginalized groups.

The seder table also has:

Three whole matzos wrapped together. Matzo commemorates the bread which our forefathers were compelled to eat during their hasty departure from Egypt. We use three matzos to represent the three religious groupings of the Jewish people—Kohen, Levi, and Yisrael. They are placed together to indicate the unity of the Jewish people. In unity, we find our strength and the power to survive.

Wine. During the course of the seder we drink four cups of wine. Wine is the symbol of joy and thanksgiving. The four cups represent the four-fold promise which the Lord made to the Jews in Egypt. In the following words, the Lord assured them that they would be freed from slavery: “I will bring you forth;” “I will deliver you;” “I will redeem you;” “I will take you.”

Salt water. Use this for the dipping of the Karpas, representing the tears shed by the Jews in slavery.

Cup of Elijah. A large wine cup is in the center of the table in honor of the prophet Elijah.

Cup of Miriam. A larger cup of water is in the center of the table in honor of Miriam, Moses’s sister. Her well followed the Jewish people on their journey through the desert so they would have water.

As we light these candles in honor of Pesach, we hope that their brightness and warmth may bring joy and hope to us and to all our dear ones.

The Passover seder is conducted in an orderly fashion, with each ritual performed at a certain time, in a certain way, according to thousands of years of tradition. This is surprising, as the Jewish people—while we do have a history of being particularly good at community organizing—we do not have a history of being particularly well organized. Even God Themself often seems engaged in convolution, a phrase which here means “as if They have not quite followed Their own plan.” If you look around the Passover table now, you will most certainly see the muddle and the mess of the world. There is likely a stain someplace on the table cloth, or perhaps one of the glasses has a smudge. Soon things will be spilled. You might be sitting with people you do not know very well, so your own emotional state is somewhat disordered. Nobody likes everything served at the Passover dinner, so there will be chaos within people’s palates, and the room is likely to be either too cold or too hot for someone, creating a chaos of discomfort. Perhaps there is someone who has not yet sat down, even as the seder is beginning, because they are “checking on the food,” a phrase which here means “sneaking a few bites” when they’re supposed to be participating in this ceremony.

This is as it should be. Passover celebrates freedom, and while the evening will proceed in a certain order, it is the muddle and the mess around the order that represent the freedom that everyone deserves, and that far too many people have been denied. With that in mind, why not excuse yourself, in an orderly fashion at some point in the ceremony, so that you might check on the food?

Even though we have a roadmap, everyone should feel free to ask questions and offer their personal thoughts and stories as we reflect on how the Passover saga relates to today and our lives.

We have come together to celebrate the oldest holiday on the Jewish calendar. Tonight we celebrate the story of the Jewish people, who are linked throughout time with all peoples in the passion for justice and human liberty. As we retell the story of our ancestors going out from slavery to freedom, may we learn to appreciate more deeply the freedom we enjoy. May we also learn to care about all those who are not yet free. May we join in working for the day when all people everywhere shall be free from poverty, from oppression, and from war.

Here we are, prepared and ardent, allied and present, ready to perform the mitzvah of the first cup, the enactment of salvation’s promise. As the Holy One, Blessed is They, declared: “And I will lift you out from under the millstone that is Egypt.”

Blessed are You, Lord our God, Creator of the Universe, who sanctified us with Your mitzvot. And it is with love that You gave us holidays for our happiness, that You gave us festivals and seasons to rejoice, that You gave us the Sabbath, that You gave us the day of this Festival of Matzot in the season of our emancipation, and designated it as holy—a commemoration of the Exodus from Egypt.

We wash our hands so that they will be clean and ready to do the special work required by our Passover seder—the handling of matzo, karpas, and the dipping of our fingers into our wine. We wash twice over the course of the night—this first time with no blessing. Typically, Urchatz is performed by pouring water over your hands from a pitcher held over a bowl but instead we can just use the sinks.

Even before the Exodus from Egypt, each spring our people celebrated creation and the mystery of life. As we did then, we now remind ourselves that both the tender greens of the earth and the salts of the sea are joined together to sustain life. We remind ourselves that in slavery the salt of our tears released our strength to survive.

The matzos represent the Jewish people and hope of freedom for all, particularly those still living in tyranny and oppression.

Since the Passover sacrifice of a lamb was no longer possible after the destruction of the second Temple in 70 C.E., a matzo, in addition to the bone (or beet), came to represent the lamb.

This is the poor man’s bread that our fathers ate in the land of Egypt. All who are bent with hunger, come and eat; all who are in dire straits, come share Passover with us. This year there are those in the world who are not yet free, next year may all be liberated.

It is altogether proper that matzo is called the bread of affliction, because it has been afflicted more than any other foodstuff on earth. It is born in a searing-hot oven and then completely ignored for fifty-one weeks of the year while people walk around shamelessly eating leavened bread and crackers. Then, Passover rolls around, and it is smeared with various substances, ground up into balls, and, in the morning, fried up into a counterfeit version of French toast. Everyone eats it and nobody likes it, and there’s always one last box that sits untouched in a cupboard for months afterward, lonely, broken, and utterly unloved.

This night is indeed different from all other nights of the year because on this night we remember one of the greatest dramas in Jewish history—the exodus from Egypt—second only to the Spanish Inquisition scene in Mel Brooks’s History of the World, Part One.

The first question asked concerns the use of matzo. We eat these unleavened cakes to remember that our ancestors, in their haste to leave Egypt, could not wait for breads to rise, and so removed them from the ovens while still flat.

We partake of the maror on this night so that we might taste bitterness, to remind ourselves how bitter it is to be caught in the grip of slavery as we were in Egypt.

We dip twice in the course of the seder, greens in salt water and maror in charoset, first to replace tears with gratefulness, and again to sweeten bitterness with suffering.

The fourth question asks why, on this night, we eat in a reclining position. To recline at mealtimes in ancient days was the sign of a free person. On this night of Pesach, we demonstrate our sense of complete freedom by reclining during out meal.

As we tell the story, we think about it from all angles. Our tradition speaks of four different types of children who might react differently to the Passover seder. It is our responsibility to to make our story accessible to all so we think about how we might best reach each type of child.

The wise child, what do they say? “What are the testimonies and laws which God commanded you follow?” It falls upon us to guide them through all the obligations of Pesach.

The evil child, what do they say? “What does this type of worship mean to you?” To you and not to him, her, them, or us. We should admonish this child as one who is not concerned about the laws personally, but only for others. Traditionally, we’re told this child would have been left behind in Egypt and not worthy of God saving them. Perhaps we should consider if this is a failing of the teacher instead. The exchange reminds us to continue to engage across generations, share our traditions and, in return, be open to new perspectives.

The uninformed child, what do they say? “What is this?” To this child, answer plainly, “With a strong hand God took us out of Egypt where we were slaves.”

And to the child who does not know how to ask, you should help them ask by telling the story, “It is because of what God did for me in taking me out of Egypt.”

All four instances remind us that everyone is on their own personal journey of learning and understanding. We cannot expect all around us—especially those who are uniformed or don’t even know how to ask—to be on the same page. We must be open and encouraging. We must also be aware that—while we are very old and wise about many, many things—there are times when we are in the position of each of these children. Not only in regards to our relationship with Judaism, but in the face of other challenging and complex topics. Maybe the evil child has a point in their questioning.

Some scholars believe there are four kinds of parents as well.

The wise parent is an utter bore. “Listen closely, because you are younger than I am,” says the wise parent, “and I will go on and on about Jewish history, based on some foggy memories of my own religious upbringing, as well as an article in a Jewish journal I have recently skimmed.” The wise parent must be faced with a small smile of dim interest.

The evil parent tries to cram the story of our liberation into a set of narrow opinions about the world. “The Lord led us out of Egypt,” the wicked parent says, “which is why I support a bloodthirsty foreign policy and am tired of certain types of people causing problems.” The wicked parent should be told in a firm voice, “With a strong hand God rescued the Jews from bondage, but it was my own clumsy hand that spilled hot soup in your lap.”

The uninformed parent does not grasp the concept of freedom. “There will be no macaroons until you eat all of your brisket,” says the ignorant parent, at a dinner honoring the liberation of oppressed peoples. “Also, stop slouching at the table.” In answer to such statements, the wise child will roll their eyes in the direction of the ceiling and declare, “Let my people go!”

The parent who is unable to inquire has had too much wine, and should be excused from the table.

Long ago God promised Abraham that he would be the father of a great people who would be a blessing to the world. God also promised to watch over the Jewish people. In every generation there are those who rise against us to annihilate us.

We now lift our cups of wine and thank God for Their faithfulness in keeping Their promise.

The story of the Jewish people in Egypt begins with Joseph. When Joseph succeeded in interpreting Pharaoh’s dreams, Pharaoh rewarded him by appointing him prince over the land. In that position, Joseph helped Egypt to survive during the year of hunger which he predicted would come. In fact, Joseph served Egypt so well that all the neighboring countries had to buy food from Egypt when the famine came.

The hunger in Eretz Yisrael also brought Jacob and his family to Egypt. They were seventy people in all. As time went by, they grew in number until it seemed that they were everywhere.

After Joseph died, a new Pharaoh arose. He disregarded the great contribution which Joseph had made to Egypt. He issued harsh decrees against the Jews, made slaves out of them, and even ordered every baby boy born to the Jews be put to death.

One such baby boy was saved from Pharaoh’s evil decree by his mother Jochebed’s courage and love. His name was Moses. By a strange twist of events, he was raised in the Pharaoh’s palace. There he could have lived peacefully and happily, enjoying the wealth, the protection and the excitement of the palace.

But Moses saw the suffering of the Jewish slaves and he felt the pain in his heart for them. One day when we saw an Egyptian taskmaster beating an Jewish slave, Moses could not control his anger. He killed the Egyptian. Moses now had to run away from Egypt. He fled to Midian where he became a shepherd.

God forgets. A shocking idea: God chose us, and then forgot us. Only by wailing at the whips of our taskmasters and the death of our children did we remind Them of our existence. But God’s problem is our problem as well. We’re masters of forgetting: about prejudice and unfairness, wars and genocides, hunger and misery. We’re busy; we’re overwhelmed; we’re callous. So what reminds us of injustice in the world? Wailing. Protest. Complaining. Suffering in silence is not a Jewish virtue. Complaining is a Jewish virtue, because dissatisfaction is a particularly Jewish characteristic. Sometimes we are dissatisfied by trivial matters, by issues of money and status and luxury. But one of the joys of being Jewish is membership in a group that is eternally dissatisfied with the way things are. We are, at our core, a messianic people. We dream of a better time, when the entire world will make the journey from slavery to freedom. And how will that journey begin? By opening our mouths.

Wherever people gather to express dissatisfaction with the way things are—on healthcare, on the environment, on taxes, on immigration, on civil rights and social policy and foreign policy—you will find Jews leading both sides of the same dispute. Throughout history, Jews have been agitators for change.

But the question arises: Do Jews who agitate so ardently for change do so as Jews, or because they are Jews? Is there something embedded in the Jewish cultural DNA—the memory of Moses’s calling, perhaps—that sparks a desire to change the world? Or is it just coincidence?

Overwhelmingly, they are driven by tikkun olam, a central tenet of the Jewish faith. Tikkun olam: repair the world. Whether that is through policy, social and environmental justice, or the arts, it is about interconnectedness. Rabbi Brian Besser of Congregation Beth Shalom in Bloomington, Indiana once said that Torah isn’t just the written word—it is the air we breathe; it is forests, mountains, and seas; it is life.

“And the Lord heard our voices.” As it is written: “And God heard their wailing, and God remembered Their covenant, Their Abraham, Their Isaac, Their Jacob.”

One day, while Moses was looking after his sheep, he heard the voice of God calling to him from a bush. Moses answered, “Here I am.” Then, according to the Torah, God spoke to him in these words:

“I am the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob… I have surely seen the suffering of My people in Egypt and I have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. So I have come to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and large land, a land flowing with milk and honey… Therefore come now and I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring forth My people…out of Egypt.”

And so Moses went to Pharaoh and delivered God’s message, “Let my people go and if not I’ll smite your people dead. Let my people go.”

Despite Moses’s plea and the threat of God’s punishment, Pharaoh stubbornly refused to free the Jewish slaves. One plague after another was brought upon the Egyptians. After each one, Pharaoh would promise to obey God’s command. But as soon as the plague had passed and relief came, Pharaoh changed his mind. Only after the tenth and most horrible plague, the death of the first-born, did Pharaoh finally agree to let the Jews go.

It is traditional to spill a drop of wine from our cups as we recite each plague. Our cup of rejoicing cannot be full if others are suffering, even if they are people we disagree with. The Talmud recounts that when the heavenly angels sang songs of praise to God as the Egyptians were drowning in the Sea of Reeds, God reprimanded them for celebrating the suffering of Their children: the Egyptians. Let us dip from the cup of wine for all that the Egyptians endured.

Blood

Frogs

Lice

A maelstrom of beasts

Pestilence

Boils

Hail full of fire

Locusts

Darkness

The killing of the firstborn

All the symbols of the seder are important, but Rabbi Gamliel, who was a great religious leader more than 1,800 years ago, used to say that there are three major Pesach symbols and if you do not explain these symbols at the seder then you have not fulfilled your duty.

They are:

1. The Pesach (or Paschal) Lamb
2. Matzo
3. Maror (or bitter herbs)

What is the significance of the Paschal lamb which our ancestors ate in the days when the Temple was in existence? It serves as a reminder that the Lord “pasach”—or “passed over”—the homes of our mothers and fathers when They smote the first-born sons of the Egyptians because the lamb’s blood was smeared over our ancestors doorways.

What is the significance of matzo? It is the flat, unleavened bread which our mothers and fathers ate during their departure from Egypt, for in their haste they could not wait for the dough to rise.

The story of Passover may seem very remote to us, as it happened thousands of years ago, when the oldest people at our seder table were very, very young. So many of the details of the story seem somewhat old-fashioned, such as the smearing of lamb’s blood over the doorway of one’s home, which has largely been replaced by signs warning away solicitors.

But, as we spoke of earlier, the story of liberation is one that is still going on. People all over the world continue to be literally and figuratively in bondage, and we wait and wait, as the Jews in Egypt waited and waited, for the day when freedom will be spread all over the world like frosting on a well-made cake, rather than dabbed on here and there as if the baker were selfishly eating most of the frosting directly from the bowl. The Passover story tells us about a journey towards universal freedom for all, and like most journeys, it is taking much longer than it ought to take, no matter how many times we stop and ask for directions.

Let us now raise the second cup of wine as we thank God for this beautiful festival of Pesach. It reminds us of Their great gift of freedom to our ancestors and to us.

Before eating matzo for the first time tonight, we wash our hands.

When the Temple stood in Jerusalem, the most important Passover ritual was eating the lamb offered as the Pesach sacrifice. Rabbi Hillel would put the meat in a sandwich made of matzo, along with some bitter herbs. While we no longer make sacrifices, we honor this custom by eating a sandwich of matzo, maror, and charoset. We balance the bitterness of maror with the sweetness of charoset, reminding ourselves that in times of freedom, there is knowledge of servitude, and in times of bondage, there is hope of redemption.

We are about to partake in the third cup of wine, in gratitude for the freedom which the Lord granted our ancestors, and in thankfulness for the earth’s bounties, of which we have eaten.

Three thousand years ago, a farmer arose in the Middle East who challenged the ruling elite. In his passionate advocacy for common people, Elijah created a legend that would inspire generations to come. Elijah declared that he would return once each generation in the guise of someone poor or oppressed, coming to people’s doors to see how he would be treated. He is said to visit every seder, and sip from his cup of wine.

Tonight we welcome two prophets: not only Elijah, but also Miriam, sister of Moses. Elijah is a symbol of messianic redemption at the end of time; Miriam, of redemption in our present lives. Miriam’s cup is filled with water, evoking her Well which followed the Jews in the wilderness. After the crossing of the Red Sea, Miriam sang to the Jews a song. The words in the Torah are only the beginning:

“Sing to God, for God has triumphed gloriously; Horse and driver, God has hurled into the sea.”

So the Rabbis asked: Why is the Song of Miriam only partially stated in the Torah? And in midrash is found the answer: the song is incomplete so that future generations will finish it. That is our task.

The Cup Of Miriam

Marge Piercy

The cup of Elijah holds wine;
the cup of Miriam holds water.
Wine is more precious
until you have no water.

Water that flows in our veins
water that is the stuff of life
for we are made of breath
and water, vision

and fact. Elijah is
the extraordinary; Miriam
brings the daily wonders:
the joy of a fresh morning

like a newly prepared table,
a white linen cloth on which
nothing has yet spilled.
The descent into the heavy

waters of sleep healing us.
The scent of bread baking,
roasting chicken, fresh herbs,
the faces of friends across

the table: what sustains us
every morning, every evening,
the common daily miracles
like the taste of cool water.

As we drink the “fourth” cup of wine, we recall our covenant with God, and accept the responsibility and privilege of being a Jew.