GOOD MORNING! This upcoming Wednesday evening (April 5^th), Jews all over the world will begin to celebrate the holiday of Passover. This holiday doesn’t just memorialize the miracles that God performed in Egypt for the Jewish people, it also commemorates the birth of the Jewish nation – when we transitioned from a clan of familial relationships to a society with a national identity.

Interestingly enough, the first person in the Torah to note this transition from familial interconnectivity to nationhood was Pharaoh (who saw this new entity as a threat to the Egyptians), “And he said to his people: Behold, the nation of the children of Israel are more and mightier than we” (Exodus 1:9). Given the fact that Passover celebrates the birth of the Jewish nation, it should not be surprising to learn that the Passover Seder is a key Jewish “life cycle” observance.

What is a Passover Seder? The Hebrew word “seder” (pronounced “say-dehr”) translates to “order” in English. This refers to the fifteen rituals that are performed in a very specific order during the Passover holiday meal. The order of the Seder is presented in the Haggadah, which is the special Passover booklet containing the liturgy and instructions for the night’s many rituals.

According to the Pew Research Center, almost 80% of those who identify as Jews participate in a Seder. Of this same group, only about half fast (at least partially) on Yom Kippur and only about 20% light Shabbat candles regularly. Surprisingly, more than 40% of those who don’t have any religious affiliation whatsoever (defined as those who acknowledge some Jewish parentage but identify as atheists or agnostics) also participated in a Seder.

Why? What makes this night different than all other Jewish rituals?

One of the overriding themes of Passover – found repeatedly in the Haggadah – is that we are enjoined to see ourselves as if we had personally been freed from the bondage in Egypt. This is more than a little strange; after all we weren’t slaves – we were born some 3,300 years after the enslavement in Egypt. Why are we supposed to “pretend” as if we ourselves were actually freed? What does this really accomplish?

I have always been fascinated by how important it is to the human psyche to identify oneself with a larger subset of people. This innate need is easily demonstrated when it comes to sporting events. A person walking into a room of people watching a football game will inevitably ask, “Are we winning?” As if he and the people in attendance actually own part of the team. This is true in every aspect of our lives (we won the Revolutionary War, etc.).

The holiday of Passover, being that it is the celebration of the birth of the Jewish nation, is all about self-identifying as a Jew. This explains why it was so important for the Jews of Egypt to identify themselves by placing the blood of the paschal lamb on their doorposts so that they wouldn’t be affected by the tenth plague – death of firstborn sons. It wasn’t because God needed it to identify which was a Jewish home verses an Egyptian home. It was an act of self-identification; we had to identify that, even though we had lived in Egypt for a couple hundred years, we still identified as Jews and not as Egyptians. (It is, of course, no coincidence that to this very day we place mezuzot in that very same place – the doorposts of our homes – to identify it as a Jewish home.)

On Passover we must see ourselves as if we ourselves left Egypt – because it isn’t merely history, it’s our history and we have to make that affirmation. As my brilliant brother Rabbi Akiva Zweig likes to say, “Judaism isn’t a spectator sport; it’s a contact sport.” We need to immerse ourselves within it and own our Judaism. Freedom from Egyptian bondage isn’t what happened to the Jews in Egypt – it is what happened to us.

This is how Judaism doesn’t stay rooted in the past – it is always looking forward. As Jews, we take our past experiences and learn from them in order to work towards a brighter future. As a nation, our goal has always been the same: the unification of our people, settling in “our” land (Israel), and living in a true moral and just Torah society. Thus, Passover is the time when we remind ourselves where we came from and where we hope to arrive. This is the true meaning of “Next Year in Jerusalem!”

In order to achieve this perspective, the overarching theme of the Seder is the retelling of all that the Almighty has done for us as a people. There is a very specific mitzvah in the Torah regarding this:

That you may tell your son and grandson how I toyed with the Egyptians and the miracles that I performed in their midst so that you may know that I am God (Exodus 10:2).

This verse is the source of the mitzvah of telling over the story of the Exodus. Yet the construct of the verse seems a little odd; the verse ends “[...] so that you may know that I am God.” Since the purpose of retelling the story of the Exodus is to relate the greatness of the Almighty and all that He has done, the verse should have ended with “so that they will know that I am Hashem.” Why do we say so that you will know that I am God?

Naturally, one would think that a person would have to internalize the greatness of the Almighty before telling it over to one’s children and grandchildren. So why does the Torah point out that only after telling the story to your sons and grandsons will you know “that I am God”?

The Torah is conveying a very deep message here. We live in a society that celebrates people for no other reason than that they are the children of famous people. For the most part, people are preoccupied by their lineage – as if they were racehorses. They tend to focus on themselves as if their parentage makes them somehow special.

However, what most people fail to grasp is that, in the end, it’s their children who will define them. Wherever their kids end up, they will end up as well. Time and time again, I have seen that if the children become more religious then the parents will slowly follow suit. Unfortunately, the converse is also true; if one’s children lessen their Torah observance then the parents usually make accommodations and compromises.

When it comes to choosing between family and religion most choose family. After all, it’s only natural to want to be with one’s children and grandchildren.

This is what the Torah is conveying: When you properly educate your children in everything that the Almighty has done for the Jewish people and their descendants, then your children and grandchildren will follow the same path. Ultimately, where they go you will follow. That’s why the verse ends “so that you may know that I am God.”

A bit of housekeeping…

On Passover there is the prohibition against consuming foods that are “chometz” – the literal translation being “fermented.” This refers to any food that contains grain (made from wheat, barely, oat, etc.) whereby the leavening process (“fermentation”) begins when water is added to it. This includes virtually any food that has a grain ingredient, they are all prohibited on Passover unless they have a reliable Kosher for Passover certification.

Beverages that are made from grain are also prohibited (e.g. beer and most alcoholic spirits - sorry) and, because the majority of processed products have some trace elements of grain derivatives, no food or drinks should be brought into the home without proper Kosher for Passover certification.

Passover has an added stringency: Jews aren’t even allowed to own these products during Passover.

Herein lies the source for perhaps one of the greatest “workarounds” in Judaism: Any product containing chometz is sold to a non-Jew for the duration of the holiday. After the holiday, the chometz is purchased back. This is a legally binding sale, both in Jewish law and in civil law.

In general, the practice has been to go to the home of one’s rabbi before Passover and authorize him to sell whatever products and chometz you own. In the twenty-first century, many of these transactions have shifted to e-commerce – meaning you can now conveniently sell your chometz online. If you would like to sell your chometz, please visit: tinyurl.com/SS-chometz.

There is no charge whatsoever for this service (though you can make a small donation if you desire).

For two millennia synagogues in every Jewish community around the world have the custom of reading Shir Hashirim – Song of Songs – on the Shabbat of Passover.

What is Song of Songs and why is it read on Passover?

Song of Songs is one of the five Megillot, or Sacred Scrolls, that are part of the Hebrew Bible. According to Jewish tradition, it was penned by King Solomon and is a timeless allegory of the relationship between God and the Jewish people, as described in terms of the love between a man and a woman.

This love is deeply expressed in the most beautiful and poetic terms. Song of Songs is written in an unabashedly sensuous manner, and is quite a paean to the intensity of longing for a beloved. It is an intensely beautiful tribute to love.

Given the sensuous and sometime explicit nature of Song of Songs, its inclusion in the biblical canon was a matter of some controversy. In fact, it seems that it would have been excluded from the Bible altogether, if not for a powerful champion. As the Sages debated which books were to be included in the Scriptures, the famous sage of the first century, Rabbi Akiva – perhaps the most respected sage of his era – argued that “while all of the sacred writings are holy, Song of Songs is the holy of holies!” (Mishnah Yadayim 3:5).

The commentaries suggest that Rabbi Akiva’s affinity for Song of Songs stems from his metaphorical understanding of its contents as an extended allegory about the loving relationship between God and Israel. Indeed, the tradition of understanding Song of Songs as a metaphor for the Divine love, rather than the human, is found in both Jewish law and Jewish mysticism.

Maimonides, the great medieval sage and philosopher and perhaps the greatest codifier of Jewish Law, writes; “What is the proper form of the love of God? It is that he should love the Almighty with a great, overpowering, fierce love as if he were love-sick for a woman and dwells on this constantly [...] And it is to this that Solomon refers allegorically when he says: ‘For I am love-sick’ (Song of Songs 2:5) for the whole of Song is a parable on this theme” (Hilchos Teshuvah 10:3).

Still, what does all of this have to do with Passover? Why did the rabbis establish that Song of Songs should be read on Passover?

Did you ever wonder why so many Jewish rituals mention the Exodus of the Jewish people from Egypt? Jewish tradition is rife with constant reminders of this. As an example, the sanctification of Shabbat over wine on Friday night includes the following line: “(Shabbat) is first of the holy days and a remembrance to the Exodus from Egypt.” What does that even mean?

When the Jewish people were standing at Mount Sinai and the Almighty introduced Himself at the beginning of the Ten Commandments, He said; “I am the Lord your God that took you out of Egypt” (Exodus 20:2). This seems very odd. A much better description of the Almighty would seem to be that He is the Creator of the world and everything in it. In fact, this would be a much stronger reason as to why we owe Him fealty. Why did the Almighty limit Himself to the One who took us out of Egypt?

The answer is that God is informing us that the basis of the relationship is love. God took us out of Egypt because He cares about us and desires a relationship with us. This is why we constantly remind ourselves of the Exodus: it’s the basis of our relationship with the Almighty – a relationship of love.

Now we understand why reading Song of Songs is so appropriate for Passover. God’s love for His people, as expressed by freeing us from slavery in Egypt and making us His own, is truly a love relationship. This is so eloquently described in King Solomon’s sublime paean to love and most appropriate for the holiday of Passover.

True love is about the connectivity of two entities merging into a greater whole. The Hebrew language is ancient and is the language by which the world was created (“And God said [...]”). The Hebrew alphabet has a number system assigned to it. In its most basic form, the first letter is the number one the second letter is the number 2, etc.

The numerical value of “love” (“ahava”) is 13 and the numerical value for “one” (“echad”) is 13, further expressing the relationship between the two concepts. In addition, in Hebrew the word for song is “shir.” This is the root of the word “sharsheres,” which is an interlocking chain, because a song connects one to another, just like love is about connectivity.

It is for this reason that we constantly remind ourselves of the Exodus. It’s like hearing the words “I love you” from someone who you care for deeply. As we know, hearing someone tell you that they love you never gets old. Now apply that lesson to your own life and let those in your life know how deeply you care for them as well. Happy Passover!