What Will Matter

About Passover

Passover is one of the biggest and grandest festivals celebrated by the Jewish community across the world. Marked with immense zeal and gusto, Passover commemorates the freedom of the Jews from the brutal slavery of the Egyptians. Celebrations begin on the 14th day of the Nissan month in the Jewish Calendar, where family and friends gather together to mark the festivities with traditional customs and rituals. After sundown the night before the first official day of Passover, Jews conduct the Seder, a special ceremony during which they re-tell the story of their ancestor’s liberation. During the Seder, family members read from the Haggadah which is often customized for length and content by families.  The Haggadah always includes Passover’s own story book with a special focus on the children who are often asked to read portions and participate in songs and prayers. The theme is the beginning of Exodus, the escape from slavery of the Egyptian. It includes a telling of the ten plagues God imposed on the Pharaoh to induce him to let the Hebrew people go, the Pharaoh’s change of mind and pursuit of the fleeing Hebrew people and the parting of the Red Sea to assure freedom. Central to the tradition is the requirement that Jews eat no bread but only a dry cracker called Matzoh to symbolize the fact that the fleeing Jews had no time to let their bread leaven.  Every ceremony includes the four questions to focus all children and remind the adults on the meaning of Passover and its various rituals.

 

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