Passover starts Monday at sundown, this year falling much later than Easter, though these two major holidays for Jews and Christians are often very close together on the calendar. As many may know, Jesus was traveling to visit his family to celebrate Passover, and the seder has been historically depicted as the Last Supper.
The Passover seder is a communal experience, combining friends, food, alcohol, and songs with a great, tragic, and joyous story detailed in the haggadah. Once again, our thanks to our good friend Bob Wolfe, for another original haggadah. Somehow, Bob, a retired staff attorney for the Court of Appeals in Santa Ana, manages to find time and inspiration to write a new haggadah each year that he generously shares with friends. We, in turn are happy to share his work with Buzz readers.
“Feel free to share it with anyone (including Larchmont Buzz readers) who might be looking for something to deal with all the complex emotions that are swirling around all of us,” he wrote.
By most accounts, this has been a tough year for peace in the world. So appropriately, this year’s theme is hope and resiliency, explained Wolfe.
“This is a year of existential crises: fraying civil society, global authoritarianism, planetary
survival, staggering violence and human suffering, resurgent antisemitism, the deadliest day in Jewish history since the Holocaust. Where do we find hope in the brokenness of the world?” wrote Wolfe in the introduction. “Passover tells us that we have been through this before, and much, much worse. How have we survived? Can we reach into our tradition and values to access tools to make our way through this year and into the next? How we move beyond passivity and distress to transcendence, community, and resilience is our focus. It’s okay tonight to be troubled or numb.”
“Passover” is a translation of the Hebrew word Pesach ח ַסֶּפ, which means to “skip” or “jump.” In this spirit, feel free to skip parts of this haggadah to move it along–or add what you think is missing,” wrote Wolfe. “Feedback, of course, is welcome.”
Here’s the link.
Chag Sameach! (Happy Holidays)
