It’s quite a moment to sit down for a long, ritualized meal all about a people departing treacherous conditions in order to escape to an uncertain future, huh?
We say that each year we are obligated to see ourselves as if we ourselves had left Egypt. Every year, that matters. But this year? This year it’s everything.
We are living under a would-be Pharaoh.
We are having to make decisions like Shifra and Puah, the Hebrew midwives who refused to heed Pharaoh’s commands and instead did what they could to save the children Pharaoh ordered them to kill.
We are having to choose whether to behave as your typical ancient Egyptian, benefiting from immigrant labor without acting with concern for their needs or wellbeing; to behave as Moses and Aaron, going directly to the seat of power to demand something better; or to behave as the ancient Hebrews did in caring for one another as best they could under far from optimal circumstances. (We could, of course, choose to behave as Pharaoh in directly exploiting and dehumanizing immigrants, but I’d hope none of us would opt for that.)
A few weeks ago, I joined dozens of rabbis learning from a Minneapolis-based Freedom Trainer at the Reconstructionist Rabbinical Association biannual conference. As we spent the afternoon discussing authoritarian backsliding and nonviolent resistance, I found myself hopeful not because I thought a modern Moses was going to come rescue us, but because of what the Twin Cities did earlier this year, together. Hyperlocal organizing saved lives, kept families together, and ultimately led to ICE diminishing its presence in Minnesota. This organizing was not sufficient to help everyone who needed it, but it was powerful all the same, and it’s organizing that we can emulate across the country, if we have the courage and tenacity to see it through.
At last weekend’s No Kings March, reports are that over 8 million people participated across the United States, in gatherings big and small, in red communities and blue. That number is significant— marking potentially the largest day of protest in American history— but it’s not enough. Protesting and then going home and back to normal doesn’t make change. What makes change is consistent engagement over time, particularly with the people on our block.
This isn’t to knock No Kings. It’s to say that for people who went to No Kings for the first time, this is an invitation to a larger movement. For people who go to No Kings and do nothing else, that invitation must be extended again and again. Protest does matter. Collectives of hope and rage and community matter. The followup matters more.
Of course, beyond the midwives, we have no idea what kinds of “civil disobedience” the Hebrews may have engaged in. The only direct acts we see come from Moses before he flees Mitzrayim for Midyan (and it’s far from non-violent), and from Moses’s mother Yoheved when she tries to save his life by placing him in a basket in the Nile. Was this civil disobedience or desperation? Was Rosa Parks an old woman who needed a seat, as so many of us were taught in elementary school, or a middle-aged woman who had been well trained and took a calculated risk to escalate the encounter with power and move forward the cause of civil rights?
We Jews are blessed with our sacred myth, including of course our Haggadah. Each year, when we place ourselves in the story, the world around us informs our vantage point. This year, many of us are afraid of what things will look like by next year. Many of us are furious with would-be despots, from Trump to Netanyahu to Putin, and the millions of people who even today would gladly reelect them. Many of us are jaded, teetering on hopelessness. And many of us just want to have a pleasant seder experience, without thinking about anything beyond whether each of the 10 plague finger puppets made it back into the Passover box last year, and how long the matzo balls have to cook (half an hour longer than you think, and for heaven’s sake do not cook them in the soup or they’ll absorb it all. I digress.).
So what are our questions for this year, beyond the famous four? Here are a few to add to the list:
1) How do you think Moses and Aaron felt when they were about to approach Pharaoh? How have you felt when you were about to do something daunting but important?
2) In the 4 children, the Wicked Child is the one who feels most removed from our people, and the Haggadah tells us to reinforce that separation by telling him that he would not have been saved from Egypt. How could we respond in a way that might invite him to see himself as part of our people instead?
3) The Passover story is full of people at risk who take risks. With so many people at risk right now just because of who they are, what risks are you able to take? What risks are you willing to take? (These are not necessarily the same thing.)
4) We end every seder with the words “בשנה הבאה בירושלים– Next year in Jerusalem!” What’s the sort of Jerusalem that you hope will exist by next Pesach?
I hope that one year, soon and in our days, my four additional questions will reflect a world of greater peace and collective care. For now, I offer these to help us live fully in two civilizations and to invite us to organize as our ancestors were invited to organize.
This year, may your seders warm your hearts and your bellies. May you enjoy connecting with dear ones and those who could become dear to you. And may you let the story of our people then soften your heart so that, together, we can change our story now.
Chag Pesach Sameach, y’all. (And seriously, cook the matzo balls half an hour longer than you think you need to.)
