ai2011_04_14_Passover

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THURSDAY, APRIL 14, 2011

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A few new Passover Haggadahs, and a facelift for an old favorite

By Sue Fishkoff Jewish Telegraphic Agency SAN FRANCISCO (JTA) — Nearing its 80th birthday, perhaps it was time the most printed Passover Haggadah in history had a major facelift.

The Maxwell House Passover Haggadah, which has had more than 50 million copies published, hits the shelves — and supermarkets — this spring featuring its first new English translation since 1934, the year it was originally printed.

Banished are the awkward “thee” and “thou,” replaced by the more conversational “you.” The Eternal One no longer “deliverith” but “delivers,” and seder participants are not invited to “eat thereof” but simply to eat.

While American Jews of the early 20th century might have accepted the original, archaic language, “it makes the haggadah more clumsy for contemporary readers,” said Elie Rosenfeld, CEO of Joseph Jacobs Advertising. The firm has represented Maxwell House from the beginning and spearheaded the new translation, which took nearly a year to complete.

“We wanted to make sure everyone who uses it feels comfortable with it,” Rosenfeld said.

That meant political as well as linguistic changes. The Higher Power in this haggadah isn’t a He, Lord or King, but is referred to by the gender-neutral monikers G-d, the Eternal and Monarch of the Universe.

The impetus for the new translation was not to address gender issues but to retell the old tale in contemporary language. Still, using gender-neutral language for G-d is indicated by modern theological understanding, Rosenfeld says.

“The fact of the matter is, G-d doesn’t have a gender,” he said.

The original Maxwell House Haggadah was created as a marketing tool to promote the company’s coffee, which was certified kosher in 1923. There had been controversy for years over whether coffee beans were legumes, and thus forbidden for Passover according to Ashkenazic norms, or whether they were in fact a berry — a fruit — and therefore permitted.

Marketing whiz Joseph Jacobs, founder of the ad agency, got Orthodox Rabbi Hersch Kohn to certify the coffee kosher for Passover. The publication 11 years later of the eponymous haggadah, still distributed free in supermarkets with the purchase of the coffee, cemented the dominance of

A refugee from Nazi Europe, Syzk embedded Eastern European Chasidic imagery in his intricate and highly emotional rendition of the Exodus narrative, creating the original version of his hagaddah in the mid-1930s.

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Maxwell House and its haggadah at American seder tables ever since.

Over the years, the cover design has changed, from the original bronze through various blueand-white versions to this newest iteration, which features a Yemenite-style silver kiddush cup.

The inside illustrations are more subtly rendered than in previous versions but have not changed significantly, with one exception: Instead of a young boy, a little girl is pictured asking the Four Questions. And not just any little girl: It’s Rosenfeld’s youngest daughter, 6-year-old Abigael.

The text is bigger to make it easier to read, and the layout is easier to navigate. But the story stays the same.

“The Jews don’t end up in Boca; they still get to the Promised Land,” Rosenfeld says.

Another old-new Passover Haggadah out this year is a new edition of the famous Szyk Haggadah featuring the magnificent illustrations of Polish-Jewish artist Arthur Szyk. Set for April publication, it has a newly commissioned English text written by Rabbi Byron Sherwin with Irvin Ungar.

A refugee from Nazi Europe, Syzk embedded Eastern European Chasidic imagery in his intricate and highly emotional rendition of the Exodus narrative, creating the original version of his hagaddah in the mid-1930s. Jewish survival, which Szyk viewed as the pressing need of his age, also is the theme of his haggadah: The illustration on page 26, for example, depicts empires that have tried to conquer the Jews, from the Assyrians to the Inquisition to Nazi Germany, with the two tablets of the Law astride them all, signifying the perseverance, and ultimate triumph, of the Jewish people.

“Szyk was an activist artist,” said Ungar, a former pulpit rabbi and San Francisco Bay Area resident who is curator of the Arthur Szyk Society. “He believed the Jews of Europe needed to be rescued immediately, and he was

going to do whatever he could to motivate the world community to take action.”

“A Passover Haggadah: Go Forth and Learn,” by Rabbi David Silber with Rachel Furst, is being put out by the Jewish Publication Society.

If the Szyk Haggadah is gorgeous, this new work by Silber and Furst is thought provoking, delivering new insights into the seder themes as well as first-rate commentaries on the liturgy.

Silber is an Orthodox Torah scholar and educator of wide renown, the founder and dean of the Drisha Institute for Jewish Education on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. He has been teaching these lessons for years, and here he puts them down on the page in a manner at once scholarly and accessible.

Furst teaches at Matan, a women’s institute for Torah studies in Israel, and is pursuing a doctorate in medieval Jewish history at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. This is a seder to study and discuss, but also to use —with the right crowd.

Speaking of the right crowd, kids are the target audience for “Passover Haggadah in Another Dimension” by Michael Medina, with artwork (sculptures and paintings) by Emi Sfard and photograph by Eli Neeman.

Published by Kippod3D, this haggadah boasts 3-D illustrations and comes with a pair of 3-D glasses that make the characters seemingly leap from the pages.

Whoa, are those soldiers really drowning in the Red Sea? There’s an English text, some Hebrew and transliterations of the main attractions — the plagues, the blessings, the favorite songs.

But this is really all about the images, which might make some adults too queasy to tackle the gefilte fish. It’s a gimmick, but a fun one.

Proceeds will be donated to the children of Hayim Association, which raises money for pediatric cancer research in Israel.

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Bringing change to symbols on the seder plate

By Suzanne Kurtz Jewish Telegraphic Agency WASHINGTON (JTA) — Of all the wedding presents Marilyn Fine received 36 years ago, the delicate English bone-china Passover seder plate is still her most cherished gift.

“I wish I could display it all year round,” says Fine, 59, a Jewish educator from Silver Spring, Md. It’s too big for her china cabinet, she says, so Fine looks forward to the yearly festival of the unleavened bread when she can take out the seder plate and show it off.

Laurie Blumberg-Romero of Denver shows off the silver-andwhite porcelain seder plate she received for her wedding, and also sets her Passover table with another plate that is of equal value in her eyes — the one her son made in the first grade that she says “connects him to the holiday.”

“It’s always, always on the table because it’s so cute,” says Blumberg-Romero, a 38-year-old hospital administrator.

Regardless of the design or designer — renowned artist or artistic child — one thing remains the same for each plate: a designated placeholder for each of the traditional food items necessary for telling the Passover story.

For a holiday that commands Jews to remember the ancient Israelites’ exodus from slavery to freedom, are we free to adapt these food items to tell our own stories?

A few years ago, during a visit to Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia, I heard of a Jewish soldier during the American Civil War who wanted to celebrate Passover but could not find suitable ingredients for making charoset. Instead of creating an

“While there are items that make it a seder plate, it’s important to ask, does this [symbol] fulfill the point?”

Rabbi Joel Levenson

edible concoction to represent the bricks made by the Israelite slaves, the soldier used an actual brick.

Despite its physical authenticity, I wondered if this resourceful symbol would have been considered kosher for Passover?

“There have always been variances in the community,” says Rabbi Joel Levenson of Congregation B’nai Jacob in Woodbridge, Conn. “While there are items that make it a seder plate, it’s important to ask, does this [symbol] fulfill the point?”

If the idea of pesticides on your karpas is as appealing as the Ten Plagues, Max Goldberg of the popular food blog livingmaxwell suggests using ingredients like grass-fed eggs and organic honey, almond butter and wine to create a seder plate devoid of chemical substances and synthetic growth hormones.

“For many [people], holidays do not mean a holiday from eating healthy food, and Passover can be a difficult time. So what do you do for them?” Goldberg asks. The food items on the seder plate have meaning, but “food is also medicine, regardless of the occasion,” he says.

After becoming a vegetarian 21 years ago, the idea of using an animal bone to represent the pascal sacrifice posed a serious problem for Heidi Krizer Daroff, a mother of two from Potomac, Md. She

decided to use a roasted potato in lieu of the roasted shank bone.

“I see the seder plate as representing freedom, and to me, a dead bone was offensive,” she says.

But freedom is not just the absence of shank bones or slavery.

“There is a very modern-day context to the story,” says Rabbi Levi Shemtov, head of the American Friends of Lubavitch office in Washington, D.C. He says seder participants also must remember those Jews still in bondage and unable to attend a seder. Shemtov leaves an empty seat at his packed Passover dinners as a symbol of solidarity with Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, who has been held captive in the Gaza Strip since June 2006.

Before Jews were permitted to leave the Soviet Union without difficulty in 1989, it became a custom to place an extra piece of matzah on the seder plate as a symbol of solidarity with refuseniks, those Soviet Jews whose applications had been refused, says Rabbi Isaac Jeret of Congregation Ner Tamid of South Bay in Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif.

“We tell our stories through our ritual items, and the seder plate tells our story as Jews,” Jeret says.

“The point is to remind us that we can be liberated. The day the seder plate becomes stagnant is the day Jews are no longer under any threat, but we’re not there yet.”

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THURSDAY, APRIL 14, 2011

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Passover and the Civil War

By Leon Cohen Wisconsin Jewish Chronicle MILWAUKEE (Wisconsin Jewish Chronicle) — Passover this year comes with a singularly interesting accompaniment. It occurs within the secular calendar month in which, 150 years ago, this country began “a great civil war.”

Moreover, that war’s causes and results fit with the Jewish holiday’s themes — the end of slavery and creation of “a new birth of freedom,” as President Abraham Lincoln put it in his great Gettysburg Address.

Sad to say, some people today strive to deny that slavery was the primary cause of the Civil War. They point to other issues of contention between the northern and southern states — tariffs, state’s rights, desires for territorial expansion.

They also point to the paradoxes within the combatants and the war’s story — that the majority of the southern population and Confederate soldiers did not own slaves; that the U.S. government at first denied that it wanted to abolish slavery; that some slavery-permitting border states took the Union side; that Lincoln’s much vaunted Emancipation Proclamation of 1862 actually didn’t free a single slave; and so on.

All these statements are true. But to make too much of them is like saying that because the majority of German people during World War II were neither Nazi Party members nor dedicated anti-Semites, therefore German anti-Semitism didn’t cause the Holocaust.

While I would not call myself a true Civil War expert, I have been reading off-and-on about that fascinating topic ever since the centennial commemoration in the 1960s. I think the evidence in favor of the following overall description is overwhelming.

The Confederate States of America seceded from the United States and went to war primarily to defend slavery — and not just slavery, but slavery founded on racism, a factually baseless but emotionally held belief that black human beings were not truly human beings, and should be forcibly subordinated to serve white human beings.

I do not see how anybody can deny this who has read accounts of the events and statements leading to the war; who has read editorials in the southern newspapers and the statements of the Confederate political leaders from President Jefferson Davis on down; or who knows of the behavior of Confederate soldiers and officials toward black U.S. soldiers.

The federal government did eventually go to war against slavery. It did so slowly, reluctantly, ambivalently, in a strange hesitation dance of two or three steps forward

Moreover, that war’s causes and results fit with the Jewish holiday’s themes — the end of slavery and creation of “a new birth of freedom,” as President Abraham Lincoln put it in his great Gettysburg Address. and one or two steps back. Still, by the beginning of 1865, with the passage in Congress of the U.S. Constitution’s 13th Amendment, the Lincoln administration had made restoring the union and abolishing slavery its war aims.

The problem was that the federal government never went to war against racism. This, to me, is the great tragedy and the true missed opportunity of the Civil War. If this could have been done, we would live in a far different country today.

But it probably couldn’t have been done, principally because such a war would have involved fighting many people in the northern states as well as in the southern states. People don’t generally know that the majority of the northern states had laws discriminating against free blacks — not allowing them to vote or serve on juries, and so on. Indeed, three Union states — Indiana, Iowa and Illinois — actually had laws forbidding black people, free or slave, from living within their borders at all.

Racism was endemic to the whole country, north and south, before and after the war. I believe that is principally why, as superb Civil War historian Bruce Catton put it in his book “This Hallowed Ground,” “The blame for the chance that was missed after the war ended is like the blame for the war itself; a common national possession.”

As for the country’s tiny Jewish community, it too shared in the “common national possession.”

Despite the anti-slavery example of the Passover story — an example so inspiring to African Americans that they created one of their greatest spiritual songs about it, “Go Down, Moses” — American Jews were as divided about slavery as other American groups.

Indeed, American Jewry, mostly immigrants from the anti-Semitic German states, felt such a deep hunger for acceptance and belonging that they for the most part readily followed their neighbors’ lead.

Southern Jews largely became Rebels, northern ones Yankees.

Moreover, despite a few antiSemitic incidents — most notoriously General Grant’s Special Order No. 11 of 1862 — Jews

attained high positions on both sides, politically and militarily.

Yet, at a time when passionate disagreement ran high and literally became organized violence, some people could still see the humanity of their supposed enemies. Jews especially on the two sides seemed to see beyond the sectional divide.

Bertram W. Korn recounted several such incidents in his book “American Jewry and the Civil War” (1961). My favorite is this: One day during Passover, Union soldier Myer Levy of Philadelphia was walking through a captured Virginia town, when he saw a boy sitting on the steps of his house and eating matzah. When Levy asked for some, the boy leaped up and ran into the house shouting, “Mother, there’s a damn-Yankee Jew outside!” The boy’s mother came out and invited Levy to return that evening for a Passover meal.

Milwaukee recently had a forum about maintaining civility within our community. In that spirit, I propose that Chronicle readers recall this Civil War anecdote when you attend your seders this Passover.

Chag Pesach same’ach.

Reprinted with the permission of the Wisconsin Jewish Chronicle.

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By Katelyn Manfre The Jewish Daily Forward Each year at Passover we gather together, crack the door a bit, and break bread of the unleavened variety. It is a celebration of freedom, of tradition, and a reminder of those ties that bind.

While the Seder depicted in Matthew Lopez’s play “The Whipping Man,” which opened February 1 at New York City Center, serves its usual function, it does so in a haunting and powerful way that only America’s most tumultuous era could create.

The year is 1865 and we are in the nearly destroyed Richmond, Va. home of the wealthy DeLeon family, a setting that gives new overtones to the age-old celebration.

The war has ended, the South has fallen, and just a day ago Abraham Lincoln drew his last breath at Ford’s Theater.

André Braugher gives a commanding performance as Simon, the senior-most slave who has been left in charge of the homestead, while his comrade John (a smooth André Holland) disappears on benders for days on end. Stumbling in from the rain is Caleb (Jay Wilkison), their master’s son, laden with gangrene and a heavy heart.

Their meal is rag-tag at best, improvised the way the first Passover feast was: Hardtack

The year is 1865 and we are in the nearly destroyed Richmond, Va. home of the wealthy DeLeon family, a setting that gives new overtones to the age-old celebration. serves at matzo, raw collard greens as bitter herbs, and the wine has been pilfered from a vacant mansion down the road. As the night wears on, family secrets are revealed and questions are answered.

This stirring scene, dimly lit by a few scattered candles, creates a powerful comparison. “Let all who are in need come celebrate Pesach.

This year we are slaves, next year we may be free,” they read.

The solemnity and quiet of the little meal in a deserted city is striking. As Caleb reads from the Haggadah, Simon sings “Go Down, Moses,” a spiritual that soulfully tells the story of Passover. The resonance of Braugher’s voice, coupled with the nontraditional landscape of the dinner table inside a burnt, dilapidated mansion, is practically overwhelming.

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What director Douglas Hughes and the play’s fine trio of actors have created is a period piece that is not locked in its period. It is a story that examines cross-cultural identity (like the anomaly of AfricanAmerican Jews in the Confederacy), and ties them together through song and scripture. And the comparison does not focus only on the negative. Picking cotton or building the pyramids comes second to the experience of freedom itself, with all of its hardships, responsibilities, and promise.

The door that was cracked for Elijah has swung open in the night.

Now all three men, slaves of their station and its secrets, must begin anew. Bonded, though no longer in bondage.

(Reproduced with permission from The Forward.)

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THURSDAY, APRIL 14, 2011

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Relearning and rethinking the Passover saga

By Arthur Waskow and Phyllis Berman Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) — If a pharaoh fell in the Red Sea but nobody told the story, did it actually happen? No. If no pharaoh fell in the Red Sea, but we told the story for 3,000 years, did it actually happen? Yes. Is it still happening? Yes. To people brought up in the modern mode of focusing on cold, hard facts, these responses may seem ridiculous. Either something happened or it didn’t.

Suppose, however, that we can find no evidence beyond the Bible that our ancient stories of Exodus and wandering in the wilderness actually happened the way we have learned them? Should we throw them out? Or is there some profound value for our generation in retelling the story of Exodus, of Sinai, and of Wilderness?

We concluded that there is indeed deep wisdom in reframing and retelling the story, and that is why we wrote “Freedom Journeys,” paying especially close attention to the transformative roles of women and of ecological upheavals that have often been downplayed in previous tellings of the Exodus story.

Modern historians and archeologists have found little evidence outside the biblical text that the Exodus ever happened, yet the story lives, more powerful than its factuality, because it speaks to deep strands of arrogance, fear, despair and courage in the human process.

Far beyond the Jewish community, it has influenced not only the religious traditions of Christianity and Islam, but also the life of black America and many modern secular liberation movements rooted in class, nation, culture and gender. It has even influenced efforts to free and heal the Earth from destructive exploitation.

The pharaoh motif invoked in news coverage of the recent Egyptian upheaval that overthrew President Hosni Mubarak was due

certainly not only to geographic accident, but also to the nature of tyranny and popular resistance.

Courtesy Jewish Lights

“Freedom Journeys,” by Rabbis Arthur Waskow and Phyllis Berman, suggests the Exodus metaphor as a way to understand much of contemporary history.

And the issues are not only macro-political, but apply also to the spiritual and psychological struggles of individual human beings confronting their own “internal pharaohs,” when one aspect of the self takes over the whole person, twisting and perverting a person’s humanity by turning other facets of the self into slaves that yearn for freedom and full integration.

As T. S. Eliot wrote, “April is the cruelest month, mixing memory with desire, stirring dull roots with spring rain.”

Mixing memory with desire — weaving together our memory of the past with our hope for the future, a profound description of the intertwining of Exodus with Passover, Passover with Palm Sunday, Moses with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. “Mixing memory with desire” is what the biblical account of Exodus does by weaving together the description of the Exodus itself as a moment in the utter present — hope and desire turned

into action — with detailed instructions of how to celebrate that transformative moment, remembering it through festivals far into the future.

Looking at the world today, we see the whole human race, the whole planet in a crisis that reminds us of the archetypal tale of Pharaoh and the Ten Plagues, which were ecological disasters brought on by Pharaoh’s arrogance, stubbornness and brutality.

Today it is the arrogance of some powerful human institutions that an overwhelming majority of the world’s climatologists, oceanographers and epidemiologists say is leading to the Earth’s oceans and atmosphere heating up in a way that is already disrupting climate patterns and is likely to bring about radical changes in polar and high-mountain ice, ocean levels, droughts, crops and distribution of disease. These predictions warn of huge movements of new kinds of refugees, deepening the gulf between the extremely rich and the desperately poor, and could lead to the widespread collapse of many governments. In short, to what the Torah calls “plagues.”

But the echo of the Exodus story does not stop there. The ancient story sows the seeds of hope, too. A new community was born at Sinai and tested in many experiments during the trek in Wilderness. Today we are seeing the seeds sown for new forms of grass-roots community that curve across our globe.

So we believe that whether the story of Pharaoh, the Exodus and the Wilderness “actually happened” or not, our present situation calls us to relearn and rethink the story. It calls upon us to learn in order to act.

(Rabbis Arthur Waskow and Phyllis Berman are the authors of “Freedom Journeys.” Waskow founded and directs The Shalom Center in Philadelphia; Berman founded and directs the Riverside Language Program, which teaches English to new immigrants.)

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Through righteous women’s deeds, deepening the seder experience

By Dasee Berkowitz Jewish Telegraphic Agency

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NEW YORK (JTA) — What woman has changed your life? My toddler intuited his answer when he said to me, “Thank you ima for making me.”

That’s right folks, mothers, hands down, have probably had the single biggest impact on our lives. Giving birth to children is probably one of the most courageous things that women can do (do you know how much that hurts!) Beyond the physical drama, there’s the courage to bring life into our uncertain world.

Even in places of dire political and social unrest, women continue to have children and, in that very act, they prophesize hope for better days.

It’s a story familiar to Jews as it is precisely the story about birth, and more specifically, the birth of a Jewish nation, that we celebrate each Passover.

The birth images and references of the Passover story are uncanny. Just look at the first chapter of the book of Exodus. We see a nation swelling in numbers under a Pharaoh who did not know of the deeds of Joseph. We meet midwives ordered to kill the Hebrew male babies and deny Pharaoh’s decree by letting the Hebrew children live. We meet Israelite women who are incredibly fertile. We see how Moses’ mother, Yocheved, protects her 3month-old child in a womb-like basket. And finally we witness the Twelve Tribes of Israel bursting forth to freedom surrounded by rushing water.

The Rabbis say that Israel was redeemed from Egypt because of righteous women. While women may have been front and center of the story way back when, by the time the seder rolls around these days, the only thing that righteous women have strength to redeem is the pot roast from the oven.

Who were these righteous women of the Exodus story and how can their deeds help deepen our experience of Passover this year?

Yocheved, under the decree to murder Israelite male babies, she conceives and has a son. After three months she is afraid that he will be discovered and harmed, so she places her son in a basket in a river and hopes he will arrive to a new reality in safety. Because of her daughter’s intervention

Israelite women seduced their husbands while the husbands toiled under the harsh conditions of slavery.

They had the foresight to know that the survival of their people depended on having a next generation. with Pharaoh’s daughter, Yocheved is able to feed and nourish her own son until he is grown.

Only then does she give him over to Pharaoh’s daughter. Her decision to continue to have children might be viewed as risky or even negligent to some, but it is that sense of risk that brings about the leader of our redemptive narrative, Moses.

Miriam, Moses’ sister, stands guard on the bank of the river as Moses’ basket floats downstream.

She has the confidence to ask Pharaoh’s daughter to let an Israelite (her mother) nurse the baby. We meet Miriam again after the crossing of the Red Sea, leading the women in victory. As the text in Exodus 15:20 states, “And Miriam the prophetess, the sister of Aaron, took a timbrel in her hand, and all the women went out after her with timbrels and with dances.”

Rushing out of Egypt, with little time to pack any non-essentials, Miriam brought her tambourine. She had faith that there would be reason to celebrate.

Shifra and Puah, Hebrew midwives, blatantly defy the demand of the Egyptian king. In reaction to the bursting population growth of the Israelites, Pharaoh orders them to kill every son born to an Israelite woman. When the king discovers their civil disobedience and they continue to let baby boys live, the midwives defend their actions by saying, “The Hebrew women are not as the (Egyptian) women; for they are like animals, and [give birth] before the midwives come to them” (Exodus 1:19). Their strong moral compass and clever protest save lives.

Israelite women seduced their husbands while the husbands toiled under the harsh conditions of slavery. They had the foresight to know that the survival of their people depended on having a next generation. Rashi, the famous French commentator, speaks of

God’s praise for the mirrored jewelry that the Israelite women later brought as their contribution to the Mishkan, the temporary tabernacle in the desert, saying that “these are dearer to Me than all the other contributions, because through them the women reared those huge hosts [many children] in Egypt!”

Rashi continues, “For when their husbands were tired through the crushing labor, they used to bring them food and drink and forced them to eat. They would then take the mirrors and each gazed at herself in the mirror together with her husband, saying endearingly to him, ‘See, I am more handsome than you.’ Thus they awakened their husbands’ affection and subsequently became the mothers of many children.”

These women, both named and unnamed, have the qualities that redeemed the Jewish people.

Their courage, foresight, willingness to fight for what they knew was right and self-possession give us cause to celebrate.

When we sit down to the Passover seder this year and raise four cups of wine, let’s dedicate each cup of wine to these qualities that our women of freedom possessed in abundance. Like Yocheved and Miriam, when we are faced with adversity, in what ways are we courageous? Like the midwives, how can we be sure to do what is right even when it is unpopular, or worse, politically dangerous? And like the Israelite women, how can we cultivate a sense of faith that moves us beyond the pain of the present moment toward a more promising future?

We read in the Passover Haggadah that “everyone who expands upon telling the story of the Exodus is praiseworthy.” This year, let’s expand our notion of the story we tell every year and let the righteous women of the Exodus story lead the way.

THURSDAY, APRIL 14, 2011

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In the spirit of the Mishnah, freeing up the seder

By David Arnow Guest Author SCARSDALE, N.Y. (JTA) — You can find the secret to creating lively Passover seders in a surprising place — an 1,800-year-old law code called the Mishnah.

For starters, the Mishnah did not envision reciting a Haggadah at the seder. Instead, it designed a careful balance between aspects of the evening that should be fixed and others that left room for spontaneity.

Fixed elements included drinking four cups of wine, eating matzah, explaining the meaning of the Passover sacrifice, eating matzah and bitter herbs, and reciting the six psalms of Hallel. These would bind us together as a people wherever and whenever we live.

But when it came to telling the Passover story, the Mishnah encouraged creativity. This would prevent seders from becoming lifeless clones of one another.

Brilliant!

Courtesy Jewish Lights

In a bid to liven up the festive meal, “Creating Lively Passover Seders” suggests having the participants talk about questions that are important to them.

For example, the Mishnah envisioned a night that should be so different from other nights that children would naturally ask, “Why?” Only if a child were unable or failed to ask spontaneous questions should a parent offer the prompt, “Why is this night different from all other nights?” Then a parent might point out things like “on all other nights we eat leavened bread or unleavened bread, on this night only unleavened bread.”

Just as the child’s questions were not prescribed, neither were the answers. As to a response, the Mishnah says, “According to the understanding of the son his father teaches him. He begins with disgrace and ends with glory; and he

A few weeks before Passover, ask each of your guests to respond to the following question: “What do you think would be a particularly important question to discuss at the seder this year?” expounds from My father was a wandering Aramean… (Deut.

26:5) until he finishes the whole section.”

Using a succinct version of the Passover story in Deuteronomy 26:5-8 as a frame, the story was to be told through the process of expounding, drasha — literally “drawing out meaning” — or making midrash.

There was no expectation to create the same midrash every year. The story was to be geared to the level of the child’s understanding, which would develop from one year to the next. The story becomes meaningful to those gathered around the table through an interactive, creative process. The Mishnah thus implies that the seder should change from year to year and that no two seders should be exactly the same.

In lieu of “slavishly” reading a prescribed text, the Mishnah encouraged us to take liberties, using its example as a core and a guide. Alas, over the centuries, the balance between the fixed and spontaneous elements of the seder disappeared. Rather than asking their own questions, children read or memorized a mandated set of questions. And in place of an answer aimed at the level of the child’s understanding, the Haggadah incorporated a written midrash on “My father was a wandering Aramean.”

The goal of an ideal seder became reading the Haggadah from beginning to end, skipping not a word. The result? Instead of seders feeling like a celebration of freedom, they began to feel more like a chore.

Generation after generation we recited these words from the Haggadah: “Whoever elaborates on the story of the Exodus from Egypt deserves praise.” But rather than prying open a little room for creativity, they remained just words on the page.

In the liberty with which we elaborate on the Exodus, we taste and celebrate freedom. We experience ourselves as free, independent creators, the very antithesis of

our ancestors mired in the mindnumbing pits of slavery. In so doing we renew the divine sparks within us that mark us each as images of God, the paradigmatic free creator.

In the spirit of the Mishnah, here are two simple suggestions that will help breathe life into your seder.

A few weeks before Passover, ask each of your guests to respond to the following question: “What do you think would be a particularly important question to discuss at the seder this year?”

If you do this by e-mail, paste the responses into a document without identifying who asked which question. Make a copy for each of your guests. Take turns reading the questions aloud. This is an easy, non-threatening way to let the group know what’s on everyone’s mind. Choose a few questions for discussion throughout the seder. You’ll probably find that questions cluster around particular issues, which can guide you in choosing which questions to discuss.

The second suggestion involves deciding where and when to hold this discussion.

Instead of doing it at the seder table, if possible gather in a different room beforehand. You’ll find that shifting the location to the living room, for example, sets the tone for an entirely different conversation. Countless readers of “Creating Lively Passover Seders” have confirmed that holding some of your Passover discussions before you sit down at the table is the simplest, most powerful way to create a more engaging evening.

If either of these suggestions helps you to experiment with your Seder this year, Dayyenu! It would suffice!

(David Arnow is the author of “Creating Lively Passover Seders: A Sourcebook of Engaging Tales, Texts & Activities” and co-editor of “My People’s Passover Haggadah: Traditional Texts, Modern Commentaries.”)

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Cokie and Steve Roberts’ new interfaith haggadah has its pros and cons

By David A.M. Wilensky Jewish Telegraphic Agency MADISON, N.J. (JTA) — There are two things you need to know about “Our Haggadah: Uniting Traditions for Interfaith Families,” one of the many new Passover haggadahs hitting the shelves this spring.

The first is it’s not quite a haggadah. The second is that it’s by Cokie and Steve Roberts. Yes, that Cokie Roberts, longtime senior news analyst for National Public Radio. She’s Catholic and Steve, her husband and a contributing editor at U.S. News and World Report, is Jewish.

What I mean when I say that it’s not a haggadah is that I cannot imagine any seder being conducted with nothing but copies of “Our Haggadah” for all the guests.

As a resource for interfaith families who want help holding a seder that is accessible to the whole family, it’s wonderful. The book bridges the gap between ritual and logistical for an audience that may not know the rituals well, including everything from recommendations about when to begin refilling wine glasses to some of the Roberts’ favorite recipes.

But despite the authors’ claims to the contrary, it’s not really a haggadah that should be used as the main text for a seder.

And when I say you need to know that the authors are Cokie and Steve Roberts, that’s the only way to make sense of the over-the-top name-dropping. How many hag-

...“Our Haggadah” is remarkable as a record of the traditions of a particular slice of world Jewry. It is replete with examples of little riffs that have become annual traditions in the Roberts household. gadahs can boast, as this one does, of its authors’ attending a high-profile seder at the Waldorf-Astoria residence of the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations? How many list their famous friends?

That distraction aside, “Our Haggadah” is remarkable as a record of the traditions of a particular slice of world Jewry. It is replete with examples of little riffs that have become annual traditions in the Roberts household.

In her introductory essay, Cokie writes, “Every year Steve and I argue about where exactly in the service we first move to the book, causing hoots and hollers from our longtime Seder buddies who have come to see this dispute as a Passover tradition.”

That she finds this tradition worth mentioning is a testament to the extent to which she is invested in creating a seder for an interfaith audience, but not really an interfaith seder — the Roberts’ seder is a Jewish ritual through and through.

In a blog post on March 17, Ed Case, founder and CEO of interfaithfamily website, wrote that “It is clear from Cokie Roberts’ introduction that she completely respects the Seder as a Jewish ritual. She explicitly says she is not trying to ‘Christianize’ the Seder.”

Some might think that the Roberts’ focus on multiculturalism would break down the Jewish nature of the seder, but it’s more accurate to read this haggadah as an attempt to lend universal relevance to the seder’s themes of freedom. This tendency to universalize the Passover experience has been around for some time. “Our Haggadah” is a fine addition to the long list of texts attempting to do that.

However, this haggadah demonstrates limited respect for the liturgical integrity of the occasion. That’s not to say it is because the haggadah is aimed at interfaith families — Jewish families are just as capable of glossing over the minutiae of

meaning in their liturgy.

A striking example is the text’s exclusion of the seder’s most famous line. Cokie writes, “The Seder’s traditional ending is ‘Next year in Jerusalem,’ and if that phrase is meaningful to you, by all means, use it.”

What goes unsaid is that if you do want to conclude your seder with this sentence, you won’t be able to use their haggadah because it isn’t there.

There is a case to be made for a seder that eschews messianic aspirations for the future, which the Roberts seem to imply by leaving out the traditional “Next year” hope, but any pretense to a carefully considered approach to liturgy flies out the window when they describe how children at their seder open the door for Elijah. I guess no one told them Elijah is the herald of the messiah. There’s really no other reason for him to put in an appearance on Passover.

Despite being a beautiful volume, “Our Haggadah” has been poorly proofread. There are multiple instances of the same misspelling of the Hebrew word borei, or creates. (They end the word with a hey instead of the correct letter, alef.)

Case says that what is useful about “Our Haggadah” is the way it is contextualized.

“The context that they put around it is that they’re saying that it’s accessible to interfaith couples and they’re saying it’s good for interfaith couples to have a seder,” Case told JTA. However, Case adds, the book is “limited” because it does not present outside material. Indeed, my favorite haggadahs are those that provide such outside commentary.

Excerpts from “Our Haggadah” no doubt will be included in the homemade haggadahs that many people use, but it may not be the best choice for the sole text at the seder table.

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Spring greening: Reconnecting to Passover’s roots

By Leah Koenig MyJewishLearning.com NEW YORK — One of the dirty little secrets about the Jewish calendar is that many of the holidays have agricultural subtexts, which over time have been muted or lost completely under the historical and religious themes that were layered on top of them.

Two of these holidays, Sukkot and Shavuot, have maintained a relatively transparent relationship to their earthy roots. But finding the natural themes of Passover takes a bit more digging.

The first step is to forget about Moses — for now, anyway — and recall that Passover, also known as Hag Ha-Aviv (holiday of spring), is one of the Torah’s three mandated pilgrimage festivals. It is inextricably linked to the beginning of the barley harvest in Israel.

Leviticus 23:10-11 describes the omer (sheaf) offering of barley (the first grain to ripen in the spring) that took place in the Temple on the second day of Passover: “When you enter the land that I am giving to you and you reap its harvest, you shall bring the first sheaf of your harvest to the priest. He shall elevate the sheaf before the Lord for acceptance on your behalf.”

This priestly grain dance symbolized prosperity and was the official green light that the season’s harvest could be consumed.

Jews today count the Omer for 49 days, starting on the second night of Passover — to coincide with the date of the omer offering — and continuing through Shavuot, the beginning of the wheat harvest. In most cases, however, Omer practices have been nearly disembodied, stripped of their connections to grain and ground.

Contemporary Jews are, of course, forbidden to bring sheaves of just-picked barley, which is chametz, to our seder tables. Still, if one is willing to look, signs of spring and nature’s rejuvenation abound throughout Passover. This is especially true of the seder plate, which weaves together the historical and agricultural in one eating ritual.

The roasted lamb bone (z’roa),

which commemorates lamb sacrifices made at the Temple, is taken from one of spring’s most iconic babies. The green vegetable (karpas) sitting next to it that gets dipped in saltwater is a symbol of the first sprouts that peak bravely out of the just-thawed ground in early spring. The roasted egg (beitzah) recalls both the sacrifices made at the Temple and also spring’s fertility and rebirth.

Even before Passover begins, the act of removing chametz from our homes offers other opportunities to connect to the natural world. This period of “Jewish spring cleaning” requires us to shake out our sheets and round up any bread or crumbs hiding in our kitchen cupboards. But removing chametz from our homes also can remind us to get rid of the excess “stuff” clogging up our lives — to liberate ourselves from any emotional or spiritual baggage from the year, and send bad habits packing.

It is a perfect time to recycle the stack of junk mail piling up on the desk (and stop more from coming), plant seedlings in the garden, start composting, switch to compact fluorescent light bulbs or volunteer for a cleanup day at a nearby river, beach, forest or park.

It also offers a great opportunity to plan ahead in order to avoid the all-too-common overuse of disposable dishware during Passover.

As you clean out your kitchen cabinets, stock them with lightweight, recycled dishes and cutlery that store easily and can be reused year after year.

While these actions might seem like a distraction on an otherwise busy pre-Passover to-do list, integrating them into our holiday preparations can imbue our celebration with deeper significance that lasts beyond the holiday.

During Passover, Jews are challenged to remember the Israelites’ journey from slavery to freedom, and feel as if they went through it themselves. But for those willing to dig even further, the story of Passover is not simply historical. It is rooted to the land, the giddy joys of spring, and to the reminder that after every period of dormancy and every experience of suffering, new life awaits just under the soil.

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Uncle Harry’s Passover

By Ted Roberts Guest Author I remember my Uncle Harry.

He was in that most Jewish of Jewish professions, a money lender. Or to put it more plainly, he owned a pawn shop. Today’s euphemisms would call it a commodity lending agency. So, for 364 days he was a commodity lending specialist, but on that first Seder night, he was a Hebraic scholar.

Besides his expertise in appraisal of a watch, a ring, even a musical instrument, he was the only adult in our family who could read Hebrew, which uniquely qualified him as Seder Maestro. His generation — frenzied for integration — was interested in the Charleston, 23 Skidoo, big cigars and fast motorcars. But Uncle Harry — alone amongst his family peers — Uncle Harry, though he opened on the Shabbos and ignored kosherkeit, could read Hebrew, maybe because he was already 18 when he left the murderous Hell of Russia. (When World War II started and all the radio pundits predicted a quick blitzkrieg victory over Russia — Harry said, “Wait’ll they meet the Cossacks.”) So, Harry was our Pesach Generalissimo. He was the boss who like Moses, led us through the ceremony. Starring in their respective roles was Harry the money lender and his nephew, Teddy the Hebrew School student.

He read. I nodded — I mean in agreement, not sleep. And of course, who but the Hebraic scholar — ME (Hebrew School Monday, Wednesday and Friday) asked the four questions. His two daughters were gender disqualified. Nobody else said squat, as we

Southern Jews say. And we did not tell the Exodus story (“with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm”) as the Chumash commands.

Well, Uncle Harry sort of told it by reading the Hebrew side of the haggadah, which nobody — including Harry, the Hebrew scholar — understood. He did hide the Afikomen. But so unimaginative — under the second cushion from the right, living room couch. Same place every year.

I can’t help but think of Uncle Harry and his Seder audience when we gather for our Seder. His family is scattered all over G-d’s universe and the hovering Heaven that shelters it. He and his generation are now elevated in that realm where it’s always Pesach, we hope. My generation: his kids, nieces, and nephews, simply moved sideways to D.C., Miami, Huntsville, Alabama, and sites in-between.

He — Uncle Harry — would be amazed at the change in Seder traditions. The Patriarchal concept has vanished. Yes, there’s a leader, but at least in our Seders he’s a moderator, an M.C. Everybody talks. Everybody tells the Exodus tale; from my 3-year-old granddaughter — “we carried big rocks then we left town” — a rough, but accurate paraphrase — to my kids, who each demand 30 minutes without interruption for their recital. (“I’ll take questions when I’m through.”) My kids diligently prepare by reading Exodus every Pesach. To them, the Seder assembly is a fantastic meal preceded by an appetizing discussion. Wow — do we follow the biblical directive to tell the story! Sometimes all at once. And we show all the curiosity and even skepticism of the biblical commentators who began

with: “An apple in Eden? No way.

The Hebrew word is fruit, not apple,” and so on.

We thoroughly seek the truth.

(Just like Rashi or Ben Ezra.) Is it not strange that Moses, our first and foremost prophet — our CEO — would marry a Midianite? Not only a non-Jew, but the daughter of a priest. So, says one of the family cynics. But a better informed family member (I’m not going to name names here) says — “Izzatzo — well, the Midianites descended from Abraham and Keturah.

Zipporah could well have been as Jewish as Miriam.”

Another debater: “Well, how could Sinai support 600,000 hungry food-obsessed Jews (Oh, those flesh pots of Egypt!).

Answer: “Who knew the fertility of the Sinai peninsula three millennia ago. Do YOU?!”

Somebody questions the Reed Sea miracle (no longer the “Red Sea”) and somebody answers that it’s a natural phenomenon that even today occurs in the Gulf of Suez. “And notice G-d didn’t descend and push the sea apart with his divine hands. He simply sent a strong wind to do the job. Is that so hard to believe?” He hates to interfere with his own natural laws, you know.

Uncle Harry would be shocked at our departure from the Haggadah. And I think he’d also be impressed at devilish sites where we hide the Afikomen.

Even the 3-year-olds know to throw the cushions off the sofa — but who would suspect the den chandelier?

(Ted Roberts, “The Scribbler on the Roof,” is a syndicated columnist in the Jewish press.)

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Passover — a holiday for freedom lovers

By Ted Roberts Guest Author My Christian friends, alerted by the media, are full of Passover questions. I happily explain that it’s a celebration of freedom commemorating the flight from Egypt of 600,000 barefoot, fractious Israelite slaves led by a law giver, warrior, priest, politician, named Moses. It’s a great holiday crowned with a feast. Very simple to observe, ecumenical in its simplicity you might say.

Here are the rules I cite to my pals at the office: 1. You must be a freedom fan; i.e., you must dislike oppression worse than a midnight toothache.

Anybody who enjoys laying bricks for pyramids is automatically disqualified as a Passover celebrant.

2. You must be an eater with a wide-ranging interest from muscular matzoh balls, whose secret essence is chicken fat, to Rib Roast. Cadaverous fashion models must eat alone at the kitchen table.

Nobody wants to be reminded of starvation on the festive night.

3. Now here’s the bad news. No bread is allowed during this 8-day holiday. That’s because our ancestors bailed out of Egypt in such a hurry that they didn’t have time to cancel their magazine subscriptions, or wait for their yeast to swell up in the oven. Instead of yeasty bread, we eat flat slabs of unleavened cakes — Matzohs; appropriately called “the bread of affliction” in the Passover narrative.

The mass exit from Egypt started around 1300 B.C. The children of Israel, ex-nomadic shepherds who loved the wide open spaces, suffered the first major problem of their young history. They were slaves in Egypt! We’re not talking non-union, or minimum wage, or an OSHAless workplace. We’re talking slavery — ownership of one human being by another — a profitable 13th Century B.C. industry. It was a violent era and swords beat shepherds’ staffs every time.

Their escape from bondage is joyfully celebrated at our family feast the first two nights of the 8day holiday. Besides the entrees that would warm the heart of King Solomon’s chef, many ceremonial dishes are presented. An apple is chopped up and sprinkled with cinnamon and wine to represent the mud mortar of pyramid bricks.

Spread on a tasteless matzoh, it improves it like orange marmalade improves dry toast.

Much tastier are two hardboiled eggs served whole in a soup bowl of salty water. This is a dish full of symbolism. The eggs, round, with no beginning or end like creation itself. The salt water, like our enslaved ancestor’s tears and the briny Red Sea crossed by the fleeing Israelites. (One of the great mysteries of Judaism — untouched by the Talmud — is why boiled eggs in salt water only charm your palate on Passover. Any other day of the year it’s a dish to run from.)

And there’s horseradish to remind us of the bitterness of slavery.

At table center there’s the lamb

shank symbolizing the sacrificial lamb eaten at the first Passover meal — the creature whose blood on the doorpost warned off the Angel of Death who attacked our oppressors — a symbol still embedded in the Christian image of Christ as the Pascal or Passover Lamb.

And, of course, before the feast, as instructed by our Torah, we tell our children the story of our deliverance: “With a mighty hand and an outstretched arm,” says Exodus, HE who made both Egyptians and Israelites plucked these weary slaves out of their bondage. He was their navigator guiding them with a cloud by day and fire by night. And He was their quartermaster feeding them with manna and quail when they lusted for the flesh pots of Egypt.

Even the most skeptical guests, who wonder how the Sinai peninsula sustained a mob of 600,000 vagabonds, nod in belief; overpowered by the miraculous narrative and the sedative effects of the hot chicken soup.

There’s a closing ceremony honored by tradition, where we shout, “Next year in Jerusalem!” A reasonable prayer for the Jews of yesteryear in hostile lands awaiting the ominous hammering on the door. But not here in America.

Didn’t the Pilgrim fathers, who braved a watery waste instead of the sandy Sinai, call their wilderness home the “New Jerusalem”?

(Ted Roberts, “The Scribbler on the Roof,” is a syndiated columnist in the Jewish press.)

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By Pat Launer San Diego Jewish Journal

This Passover, when we sit down to our Seders, the mention of Egypt will very likely have a new and different resonance. It certainly will for us.

My husband John and I returned from the ancient land in November, just two months before the revolution. (Things heated up considerably after we left Zimbabwe, too, and the Tienanmen Square massacre occurred shortly after our departure from China.

Was it something we said?)

Our Egypt journey was enlightening in so many ways. Thrilling, too. We love antiquity, and in Egypt, we wallowed in it. Mindbogglingly enormous temples and pyramids, constructed as far back as 5,000 years ago. Still standing, undiminished. I used to think Greece and Rome were the cradle of our Western civilization. But those two cultures invaded Egypt late in its development and coopted many ideas from the Egyptians. As in earlier times, there were large Jewish populations in all parts of Egypt during the Greco-Roman period (300-30 B.C.E.). Jews and Egypt have a long and enduring history.

What undoubtedly intrigued and attracted cultures like the Greeks and Romans was the Egyptians’ intricate cosmology, written language, architectural prowess and their ability to make use of the Nile that sustained and flooded them every year.

In modern times, too, it’s hard not to fall for the Egyptians. In

addition to their boundless generosity, they’re open, friendly and playful. This characteristic was notable in everyone from the kids to the cab-drivers, the archaeologists to the street-vendors. I loved the omnipresent lightness and jocularity, though it didn’t fully mask the subtle undertone, a straining at the bit, a whispered hope for freedom and democracy. But who knew it would come so soon, with such intensity?

When you’re in the midst of antiquity of that enormity, you need time to absorb the expanse of it all, time to feel the energy of these powerful places. After a monthslong quest, we found the perfect trip, from a company called All One World Egypt Tours, run by a terrific Rhode Islander, Ruth Shilling. The impressive two-anda-half-week itinerary, called “Time and Space in the Temples and Pyramids,” included special arrangements such as two hours within the Sphinx enclosure and two hours inside the Great Pyramid — just our group of 14. Ruth, a spiritual leader, college professor and concert violinist who has made 54 trips to Egypt, scheduled the trip so we arrived at every site when all the other tourists were leaving; we had almost every locale to ourselves. We got up close and personal with the Sphinx, and the Great Pyramid was all ours for a time.

The Great Pyramid of Giza, also called the Pyramid of Khufu (to Egyptians) and Cheops (in Greek), is the oldest of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, and the only one that remains intact. Built around 2650 B.C.E., 480 feet high when it was constructed (the erosion of the outer casing has decreased its height), it remained the tallest man-made structure in the world for more than 3,800 years (surpassed in 1,300 by Lincoln Cathedral in Canterbury, England).

The structure is neck-snapping in size, created from 2.3 million blocks, some weighing up to 80 tons each. When first built, it was covered by white casing stones that formed a gleaming outer surface.

What we see today is the underlying core structure, which only looks smooth from afar; it’s actually jagged up close. The present height is 455 feet, and each side is 755 feet wide (it takes a long time to walk around the perimeter).

We made the arduous climb into the king’s chamber and, appreciating the incredible acoustics (also true in the queen’s chamber), we

hummed, intoned and marveled at how our voices crescendoed into something as heavenly as a choir of angels.

Then, each of us had a chance to lie in the king’s chamber sarcophagus. Ruth had arranged for the internal Pyramid lights to be turned off for 15 minutes. It was pitch black. Incredibly silent. Vibrating with the ancient energy.

I was lucky enough to be the one in the sarcophagus when the lights went out. It was an encounter with the past I won’t soon forget. (If you’re even a tad claustrophobic, this might not be your cup of travelers’ tea; the narrow passageways into the tombs and pyramids are dark, close and low-ceilinged; not for the faint of heart, short of breath or weak of knees). But for me, being deep inside that 4,500year-old edifice was a head-spinning, time-traveling experience.

There were so many breath-taking moments on this trip, so many temples, so many still colorfully fresh-looking 4,000-year-old drawings and hieroglyphs to decipher.

And so many surprises, like the temple of Hatshepsut, the only female pharaoh in history. The ancient Egyptians did everything to erase her memory, including rubbing out her image on many temple walls. But the gorgeous mortuary temple she commissioned in the 15th century B.C.E., nestled into the cliffs on the West Bank of the Nile across from Luxor, is so beautiful, so strikingly modern in design, it looks like it could have been built yesterday.

But amid all this grandeur and glory, I began to have nagging doubts and questions.

First, did my ancestors actually build the pyramids at Giza, as I’d been taught in Hebrew school?

Various finds in the workers’ villages and tombs show that the pyramid-builders were not Jews.

They weren’t even slaves. They were, apparently, hired hands, and their own village hieroglyphs showed pride in their work and praise for their pharaoh (some called their teams ‘Friends of Khufu’ or ‘Drunkards of Menkaure,’ the third pyramid’s namesake). The walls show records of payment, of medical services.

It took an estimated 20,00030,000 workers more than 80 years to build the pyramids at Giza. It’s highly unlikely they were Jews.

As Amihai Mazar, professor at the Institute of Archaeology at Hebrew University has noted, “No

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THURSDAY, APRIL 14, 2011

I was sad to learn there are currently fewer than 200 Jews left in all of Egypt: 42 families in Cairo and about 110 in Alexandria. The last Jewish wedding reportedly took place in 1984.

Jews built the pyramids, because Jews didn’t exist in Egypt at the period when the pyramids were built.”

Okay, check off one concern.

Then, there was the problem of Ramesses II. He was the most prolific of the pharaonic builders; he reigned for an astonishing 66 years (1279-1213 B.C.E.), and his likeness and temples are everywhere along the Nile. His gargantuan Ramesseum, on the West Bank of Luxor, is most likely what inspired the English poet Percy Bysshe Shelley to write the 1818 poem, “Ozymandias,” that I learned in school and never forgot, about how power and glory and hubris never endure. Of course, as memorable as the verse is, the fact is that the pharaohs’ creations have endured, astonishingly well.

But I had a hard time with Ramesses II (there were 12 in the line of Ramesses). I’d been told — not least of all by Cecil B. DeMille in “The Ten Commandments!” — that he was the pharaoh who motivated the Passover holiday, the one who enslaved the Jews, would not “let my people go,” and forced the God of Israel to bring down the Ten Plagues, igniting the Exodus from Egypt. Could that monster be the same monument-builder who inspired a timeless poem? It was cognitive dissonance for me.

Then, Ehab Mahmoud, our magnificent Egyptian guide, a trained Egyptologist, pulled me aside when we were in the Valley of the Kings, also on Luxor’s West Bank, and said he had something important to tell me. He said it wasn’t Ramesses II at all during the Exodus. It was another pharaoh named Merenptah.

Ehab pointed out Merenptah’s tomb, which was, alas, closed to the public (there are only certain tombs accessible at any given time). I surreptitiously snapped a photo (no pictures allowed, inside or out, at the Valley of the Kings), and under a brutal, cloudless sky, I sat down and meditated at the mouth of the tomb, made a little connection with Pharaoh Merenptah and had a few choice

words to say to him. It was a healing moment for me and put me at peace with my past for a while.

When I returned home, I did some research on the Exodus. Not only do many serious students of history — Jewish, Egyptian and otherwise — doubt that the Exodus ever happened (there is little, if any, physical, literary or archaeological evidence), but those who do believe are in considerable conflict about what year the Exodus occurred and which Pharaoh was in power at the time.

Merenptah (who ruled from 1213-1203 B.C.E., and was the 13th son of Ramesses II — that guy is still involved!) is definitely a contender. But he has a lot of competition: Ramesses I, Akhenaten, Horemheb, Ahmoses, etc. Choose your source or investigator; each makes a compelling argument. I dealt with Merenptah kind of personally, so I’m sticking with him.

You can do your own research and reach your own conclusions.

One Exodus from Egypt that’s not debatable is the one that occurred in the 1950s, under the directive of Gamal Abdel Nasser.

Between November 1956 and September 1957, thousands of Jews had their possessions confiscated, thousands were arrested and thousands more were expelled from Egypt. (All those expelled had to sign a pledge never to return.) Of the 80,000-100,000 Jews in Egypt in the 1950s, only 8,500 remained by 1960. By the end of the Six-Day War in 1967, only 800 Jews were left.

When we hired a driver to take us to Old Cairo, we visited Ben Ezra Synagogue, one of the world’s oldest temples. Outside, in the narrow alleyway, standing at a table selling a few Jewish trinkets and displaying an article about himself from the New York Times, I met a man who’d been working with the shul for 40 years.

Ahmed Sherif is a Muslim; I guess you’d call him the “Shabbos goy.” He told me Ben Ezra was built in 882 C.E. on the ruins of a Coptic church. Services, he said, were held there for 1,000 years. The

great physician/scholar/philosopher Moses Maimonides (1125-1204) was said to have prayed there. Ben Ezra was also the site of the big find of the 18th century: the Cairo Geniza, hundreds of thousands of Jewish manuscript fragments, dating back to 880 B.C.E., discovered in the temple genizah, or storeroom. They included Jewish religious writings (and sections from the Qur’an) as well as court documents and community correspondence.

There are still three standing synagogues in Cairo, but only Ben Ezra is open to the public. The 98year-old Shaar Hashamayim is heavily guarded (we weren’t allowed to take photos, even outside); it’s only open on Sundays.

Ahmed said Shabbat is observed at Shaar Hashamayim and Chanukah at Ben Ezra. That’s how he attracted my attention; he called out “Happy Chanukah!” as I walked past. That stopped me in my tracks. (I must’ve had that latke kind of look.)

I was sad to learn there are currently fewer than 200 Jews left in all of Egypt: 42 families in Cairo and about 110 in Alexandria. The last Jewish wedding reportedly took place in 1984.

That, after thousands of years and millions of Jews, whose history has been intertwined with Egypt’s, and not always in a bad way.

For instance, there’s a striking similarity between Pharaoh Akhenaten’s Hymn to the god Aten, written in the 14th century B.C.E., and the Old Testament Psalm 104; the wording is almost identical (“How manifold are thy works?”).

Millennia later, in 1979, Egypt became the first Arab country to sign a peace treaty with Israel.

So this Pesach, I’m going to think very differently about Egypt and the Egyptians. They’re not just some ancient anonymous enemy any more. Faces of the wonderful folks I met are etched in my mind (we’ve sent them money in these tough times), coupled with images of the other courageous people who took to the streets this year to fight for their own freedom, bravely overthrowing a modern-day Pharaoh.

I have newfound respect for what their ancestors built and hope for what they have the potential to create for the future. I’m going to pray they achieve their democratic aims — and continue their peaceable relationship with Israel. That, as the Seder song goes, would be enough. Dayyenu.

Reprinted with the permission of the San Diego Jewish Journal.

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The buried Seder plate

By Rabbi Benjamin Blech Guest Author

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“Remember that you wer e once slaves in Egypt…”

The exodus and the miracles of the Passover story happened a long time ago, but they are still part of our contemporary consciousness because of the power of memory.

Thomas Cahill, the Catholic writer who authored the best-selling book, “The Gifts of the Jews,” concluded that it was the Torah with its commandments to remember that gave the world the concept of time and a reverence for the past. Passover speaks to all generations, reminding us to not only recall our past but to also shape our future.

But not everyone remembers, and tragically, some choose to forget, as demonstrated by the incredible incident I had with Shmuel’s Seder plate.

A few years ago I was browsing in an antique store on the East Side in New York when I spotted an all-too-familiar object. I recognized it immediately, even before I spotted the family name clearly etched on its border. How could I not know what it was when I had been so involved in its story?

After all, my eulogy of Shmuel, a miraculous survivor of the infamous Auschwitz concentration camp, focused on it.

What a tale it had been. The Germans had rounded up all the Jews in his little town for deportation. Some believed that they were merely being transported to another site to be used for labor. But Shmuel knew that they were meant to be murdered. He understood that the Nazis wanted to eliminate every Jew as well as every reminder of their religious heritage.

So Shmuel took a chance. Had he been caught, he would have paid with his life. But he did what he had to do so that something might remain — so that even if not a single Jew in the world stayed alive, someone might find it, reflect, and remember. He paced off 26 steps, corresponding to the numerical value of God’s name, from the apple tree alongside his house and carefully buried his treasure – a silver Passover plate.

He wished he could have hidden much more. How he wanted to preserve a Torah scroll. But he had so little time, so little space for concealing an object of value. His choice, in retrospect, seemed almost divinely inspired for its symbolism – the key vessel used to commemorate the festival of freedom. Shmuel thought, with what he later conceded was far too much optimism, miracles could perhaps once more occur even in modern times. And from that day forward not a day went by in the hells of the

He wished he could have hidden much more. How he wanted to preserve a Torah scroll. But he had so little time, so little space for concealing an object of value. His choice, in retrospect, seemed almost divinely inspired for its symbolism – the key vessel used to commemorate the festival of freedom. concentration camps that his mind did not return to his Seder plate in its special hiding place.

Shmuel could never explain how he, out of all his family and friends, survived. In his heart of hearts, he once confided to me, it may have been because he viewed his continued existence on earth as a holy mission — to go back to his roots and uncover his own symbol of survival. Incredibly enough, in ways that defy all logic and that Shmuel only hinted to me, this escapee of 20th-century genocide was reunited with his reminder of deliverance from age-old Egyptian oppression. Shmuel journeyed back to his home, found his tree, counted off his steps, dug where he remembered he had buried it and successfully retrieved his Seder plate. It became a symbol of his own liberation as well. With it he celebrated dozens of Passovers, until his death.

That Seder plate, in almost total disbelief, is what I saw in the shop for sale. Where was it from, I inquired. What was it doing for sale when it carried with it so many precious memories? “Yes, I want to buy it,” I assured the dealer, “but I need to know how you happen to have it.”

“It was part of the sale of the contents of an estate by the children,” the dealer replied. You see, the deceased was religious but his descendants aren’t. So they said they don’t really have any need for ‘items like these.’”

The very symbol that sanctifies memory was discarded by those who forgot their past.

If you have a loved one who suffers from Alzheimer’s you know how horrible it can be to live without an awareness of events that came before. We don’t have a name for a similar condition that describes ignorance of our collective past. Yet the voluntary abandonment of historic memory is equally destructive.

How I wish that the unsentimental harshness of Shmuel’s

descendants was just an aberration, a remarkably unusual demonstration of insensitivity not likely to be duplicated by others. But the sad truth is that we are part of a “throwaway” culture that gives equal weight to used cars, worn furniture, and old family treasures. What has served the past is of no interest if its sole claim to respectability is its gift of associations.

Memorabilia have lost their allure because we no longer revere the meaning of memories. So what, I am often asked, if my grandparents used this every holiday? We have no space, we have no need for it. As if utilitarian function is the only rationale for holding on to something that enables us to preserve our past!

The ring with which I married my wife may not be the most expensive but I pray it remains in my family as a legacy of the love we shared, perhaps to be used again by my grandchildren. The cup with which I usher in the sanctity of every Sabbath may reflect the poverty of my youth, but I hope it is passed on to the future as a testament to the importance of religious values in our household. If what we treasured is held sacred by my children, then perhaps what we lived for will also be reverentially recalled.

“Unless we remember,” English novelist Edward Morgan Foster put it so beautifully, “we cannot understand.”

That’s why I weep for my friend Shmuel, whose family has become an orphan in history, severed from its past.

And that’s why I keep retelling Shmuel’s story on Passover, because I believe it captures the essential message of this holiday.

God commanded us to remember because it is only by treasuring the messages of the past that we can understand the present and hope for a more blessed future.

(Reprinted with permission from Aish.com)

THURSDAY, APRIL 14, 2011

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Escaping the box: 18 minutes to Passover freedom

By Edmon J. Rodman Jewish Telegraphic Agency LOS ANGELES (JTA) — In every generation, the Haggadah tells us, the wise, the simple, the non-askers and even the baddies are obligated to see themselves as though they themselves actually had come out from Egypt.

Unfortunately, the closest many of us come to this ideal is a stroll through the Passover aisle of our neighborhood supermarket.

Why does Passover have to come in a neatly packaged box with easy bake instructions?

This Passover, to heat up and personalize my leaving from Egypt, I decided to forego the usual rectangular shrink wrapped packages of the holiday’s mainstay, matzah. If our ancestors could prepare for their journey in one night by baking an unleavened quick bread, so could I. In my best Mah Nishtanah singsong I chanted, “How hard could it be to bake homemade matzah?”

With only a teaspoon full of baking experience, I consulted Claudia Roden’s authoritative “The Book of Jewish Food,” which assured me that Jewish people once “made unleavened bread at home.” According to Rodin, all I needed was some “special hard wheat bread flour,” spring water, an oven and a fork to poke holes in the rolled-out dough.

Problems rose immediately: The flour is harder to find than any afikomen. Many observant Jews will have nothing less than shmurah flour for their matzah, which is made from wheat that has been guarded from the time it was taken to the mill to ensure that it has not come in contact with fermentation-causing moisture.

Searching for shmurah flour, I called a kosher market where I shop.

“Don’t have it,” said David, one of the owners, adding, “And I don’t think it’s available anywhere commercially.”

Next I tried a local ChabadLubavitch rabbi, Mendy Cunin.

“I can help arrange a trip to Crown Heights, where there is a matzah bakery,” he suggested.

That meant traveling across the country to Brooklyn, N.Y. I was in a rush, I explained.

Unfazed, Rabbi Cunin suggested that as I proceeded, I should see the “humility of the matzah.”

“It’s unlike the egotism of the challah, which is mostly air,” he said. “With matzah, what you see is what you get.”

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With just flour, water and a homemade “forkler,” freedom from commercial prepared matzah is attainable.

A Conservative rabbi with whom I consulted had another opinion, believing that I could simply use kosher flour. She suggested that I was covered for Passover use under the principle of “batel b’shishim,” a loophole which says that if a forbidden ingredient like chametz is less than one-sixtieth of the hole, then the product is still OK. Still, if you choose to try this at home and the origin of your flour is important, please consult a religious authority; rabbis do differ.

I prepared my exodus from the box with a bag of kosher whole wheat flour and a bottle of spring water. I cranked up the oven as high as it would go, to 550 degrees.

While waiting for the oven to reach the desired temperature, I removed my watch and laid it on the kitchen table; I would need it.

Someone long ago determined that the matzah-baking process from the time you add water to flour until you take the unleavened bread from the oven could not take more than 18 minutes. Longer than that and the mixture could rise and thus be leavened.

As I measured out the ingredients, three parts flour to one part water, it dawned on me that in addition to becoming a baker, I was now a game-show contestant, too.

As I readied the mixing bowls and measuring cups, I imagined a show called “Unleaven Heaven” or “18 Minutes to Win It.” Round 1: I added water to flour, mixed it together with my hands, kneaded the sticky ball for a minute and slapped it down. With a rolling pin I flattened and spread the dough. I carefully poked wholes with a fork. But when it came time to lift the taco-sized

round, the whole thing wouldn’t budge. My exodus was stuck.

Round 2: I checked the instructions; I needed to knead longer. As I did, I could feel the dough becoming less sticky in my hands.

For the bread made in haste the night before the departure from Egypt, patience was an unlisted ingredient.

I flipped the easily freed round into the oven and returned to rolling out another. But why did the kitchen smell like burning toast? I opened the oven door to matzah flambe. Two of the wonders of the Haggadah were happening right in my kitchen: fire and pillars of smoke.

Round 3: The fork wasn’t working; to bake more crisply, the dough needed more holes.

Veterans of matzah baking use a kitchen tool called a docker, a hand roller with spikes. I thought about buying one. What would Moses do? Didn’t liberation call for taking freedom into your own hands? So with three forks, some duct tape and a piece of cardboard, I devised a “forkler.”

I mixed, kneaded and rolled. I forkled.

Flipping the round into the oven with plenty of time to spare, this time I watched, guarding my freedom carefully. Still warm out of the oven, I admired my work as I ate it. It was one part haste, one part invention and one part humility, but all parts with meaning baked in.

And if it tasted like a chewier cardboard, well, it was my cardboard.

(Edmon J. Rodman is a JTA columnist who writes on Jewish life from Los Angeles. )

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By Linda Morel Jewish Telegraphic Agency NEW YORK (JTA) — With all the restrictions, are decent desserts even possible during Passover?

“My particular talent is working around restriction,” says Paula Shoyer, author of “The Kosher Baker: Over 160 Dairy-free Recipes from Traditional to Trendy” (Brandeis University Press, 2010).

Her cookbook contains a chapter on Passover baking, as well as many sensational recipes sans flour or yeast — Passover taboos.

Flourless Chocolate Cake, Marble Chocolate Matzoh and Mocha Matzoh Napolean are some of the book’s gems.

Shoyer, whose magical touch is without peer in the Passover dessert genre, calls them “my gift to the Jewish people.”

More than anything, Shoyer wants the eye rolls to stop upon hearing the words pareve desserts — pastries made without dairy products. She laments that kosher bakeries year after year for Passover offer the same dry brownies, sponge cakes, coconut macaroons and vanilla rolls with jam inside.

“Have you ever noticed that packaged Passover cookies and cakes start appearing in supermarkets in February?” asks Shoyer, of Chevy Chase, Md. “With so many preservatives in them, they could survive a nuclear attack.”

During Passover, Shoyer bakes as much as possible, mostly for the sake of her children.

“Home-baked desserts are kind of a holiday bonus,” she says.

Using 28 dozen eggs during the holiday, mostly in pastries, Shoyer prepares plenty of Chocolate Chip Hazelnut Biscotti and Chocolate Brownie Cookies for the kids’ snacks. She also keeps a supply of her popular Amaretto Cookies on hand for visiting friends.

Her most stunning Passover dessert? Without doubt it’s the Key Lime Pie — even though Shoyer’s favorite is the Chocolate Chiffon Cake.

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texture of her Strawberry Mousse, Shoyer confides that when she was growing up, her mother stuck to traditional dessert fare at Passover.

She relied on Manischewitz mixes to make brownies, coffee cakes and sponge cakes.

Her grandmother baked the perfect lemon sponge cake using a recipe straight from the Streit’s box, then changed it so frequently over time that one couldn’t recognize the airy but distinctly citrus result.

With such natural talent, Shoyer’s grandmother once asked her, “Why go to school to learn how to bake?”

Shoyer had started baking for fun during college. She brought back chocolate from a trip to Belgium in 1984 and began experimenting with it in recipes.

During her 20s she moved to Geneva and landed a job at the United Nations. In Switzerland, she tasted some sensational desserts and decided to reinvent them as dairy free without sacrificing their buttery flavor.

Then in her 30s, while living in Paris, Shoyer received her pastry diploma from the Ritz Escoffier Ecole de Gastronomie Francaise.

She returned to Chevy Chase, Md., and started Paula’s Parisian Pastries Cooking School.

With such a varied career, she found time to get married and raise four children — and revolutionize kosher baking.

“I wouldn’t eat a dessert that isn’t worth the calories,” Shoyer says.

In “The Kosher Baker,” Shoyer worried that the Passover chapter was too heavily weighted with chocolate pastries.

“Can you have too much chocolate?” asked one of her friends.

The following recipes are from “The Kosher Baker.” All are pareve and kosher for Passover.

STRAWBERRY MOUSSE (Two-Step Prep, But Very Doable) Shoyer likes to serve this dessert in individual ramekins. You can also

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Ingredients: 16 ounces fresh strawberries 1 teaspoon rum or cognac 2 teaspoons kosher for Passover confectioner’s sugar (or confectioner’s sugar after Passover ends) Juice of 1 lemon 6 tablespoons sugar 2 tablespoons unflavored kosher gelatin powder 1 cup pareve whipping cream Preparation: Remove the stems from the strawberries. Select six strawberries, slice thinly, and place in a small bowl with the rum and confectioner’s sugar. Mix to combine and then place in the refrigerator.

Cut the remaining strawberries in half and place in a blender or food processor fitted with a metal blade. Puree the strawberries completely, scraping down the sides of the processor bowl or blender so that all the strawberry pieces are pureed.

Place the strawberry puree in a small saucepan. Add the lemon juice and sugar and stir. Cook on medium-low heat for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the sugar melts. Add the gelatin, whisk, and then remove from the heat. Strain into a medium bowl, pressing hard to get as much strawberry puree through as possible, and place in the refrigerator for 20 minutes, stirring twice during that time.

In a large bowl with an electric mixer on high speed, whip the whipping cream until stiff.

Remove the strawberry puree from the refrigerator and fold in the whipped cream in four parts.

Scoop the mousse evenly into the ramekins and smooth the tops with the back of a spoon. Cover with plastic and place in the refrigerator for at least three hours or overnight. You can store covered in the refrigerator for up to three days.

To serve, remove from the refrigerator and place a few of the rum-soaked strawberry slices on top. Yield: serves 8

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Chocolate Mousse Meringue Layer Cake is one of the Passover goodies featured in “The Kosher Baker.�

CHOCOLATE CHIFFON CAKE (Two-Step Prep, But Very Doable) This cake is a classic Passover dessert in terms of the technique, which entails separating eggs. But the flavor is without peer.

Ingredients: 1 cup matzah cake meal 1/2 cup potato starch 1 tablespoon baking powder 1 teaspoon salt 1 1/2 cups sugar, divided in half 1/2 cup vegetable oil 8 large eggs, separated 3/4 cup water 1 tablespoon rum extract 1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice 4 ounces pareve bittersweet chocolate, chopped into 1/4-inch chunks Preparation: Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a large bowl, sift together the cake meal, potato starch, baking powder, salt, and 3/4 cup of the sugar. Add the oil, egg yolks, water and rum extract; beat until smooth.

In a separate bowl, use an electric mixer on high speed to beat the egg whites with the lemon juice until stiff. Turn the speed to low and gradually add the remaining 3/4 cup of sugar.

Turn up the speed to high and then beat until the whites are very stiff and shiny, about 1 minute more.

Use a silicone spatula to fold the egg-yolk mixture into the whites and then fold in the chopped chocolate.

Pour the batter into an ungreased 10-inch Bundt or tube pan. Bake for 1 hour. Let cool in the pan. When cool, use a knife to loosen the edges of the cake and

turn onto a serving plate.

Store covered in plastic at room temperature for up to five days or freeze wrapped in plastic for up to three months. Yield: 16 servings KEY LIME PIE (Three-Step Prep, Doable But Requires Planning) Although this classic American dessert is usually made with condensed milk, Shoyer went through several stages of experimentation to achieve creamy results using only pareve ingredients. Her recipe calls for regular limes.

Crust: 4 tablespoons pareve margarine 2 cups ground walnuts (walnuts can be purchased ground or can be prepared from 4 cups of walnut halves ground in a food processor but not as fine as flour) 3 tablespoons light brown sugar 8- or 9-inch pie pan Filling: 5 large eggs, plus 3 yolks 1 1/2 cups sugar 7 limes, or 14 Key limes (which are smaller than regular limes) 1/2 cup (1 stick) pareve margarine 1 drop green food coloring, optional Meringue Topping: 2/3 cup sugar 1/4 cup water Candy thermometer 2 large egg whites Preparation: Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

To make the crust: Place the margarine in a medium

microwave-safe bowl and heat for 45 seconds or until melted. Add the walnuts and brown sugar; mix until combined. Place this mixture into the pie pan and press to cover the bottom and about 1 inch up the sides. Place in the oven for 15 minutes. Remove from oven and set aside. Leave the oven on.

To make the lime cream filling: Place the eggs, yolks and sugar in a heatproof bowl and set over a medium saucepan with simmering water (or use a double boiler). Zest 3 of the regular limes (6 of the Key limes) and add to the bowl.

Stir to combine. Juice the 3 zested limes, plus the remaining 4 limes (or 8 Key limes) to obtain about 1/2 cup of juice. Then stir juice into the egg and sugar mixture.

Cook uncovered over simmering water for about 25 minutes, stirring occasionally, until a thick mixture forms. Be patient and do not stir too much. If the water in the saucepan or double boiler boils too fast, turn down the heat.

Remove the bowl from the heat and whisk in the margarine in small pieces until the lime cream is smooth. Add the green food coloring, if using, and stir.

Pour the lime cream into the prepared crust and smooth. Place the pie on a cookie sheet and bake for 20 minutes, or until the outside edges of the lime cream are set (the inside can remain wobbly).

Let cool and then place in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours.

PASTRIES on page 21

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Passover dishes from around the JDC world

By JTA Staff Jewish Telegraphic Agency This Passover you can heat up that matzo ball soup and whip up grandpa’s famous firehouse horseradish, but make room for new Seder tastes from India, Estonia and Israel. The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC), the world’s largest Jewish humanitarian assistance organization, sponsors hundreds of Passover Seders around the world as part of its community building and welfare programs. The recipes below were chosen to represent some of the more than 70 countries where JDC works today.

Bowl over your guests with our spicy Moroccan fish appetizer, fill your roast turkey with our delicious matzo stuffing, and satisfy your sweet tooth with sweet potato balls rolled in mixed nuts.

Get adventurous for this year’s festive meal. Dayenu!

Appetizer From Israel:

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Moroccan Fish (serves 4) Recipe courtesy of Rachel Tachvilian from Beit Shemesh, Israel.

Ingredients: 4 slices tuna or Nile perch (if available); 2-3 ripe tomatoes; salt (for marinating fish and for sauce); lemon juice; 1/2 teaspoon turmeric; 1/2 teaspoon chickenflavored (meatless/ “pareve”) soup mix; 2-3 cups boiled water, plus more boiled water if using tuna; handful of fresh coriander, chopped; 1 red pepper, cut into wide strips; 1 long chili pepper, preferably dry, cut into wide strips; 1 clove fresh garlic, peeled and chopped; about 1/2 cup vegetable oil; and 1 tablespoon sweet red paprika.

Preparation: Sprinkle salt and lemon juice over fish and let marinate for 30 minutes. In the meantime, prepare sauce by peeling the tomatoes and placing them in a wide pot. Add salt, turmeric, and soup mix and bring to a boil. Mash cooked tomatoes (can use a potato masher). Add 2-3 cups boiled water to pot. Bring sauce to a simmer.

Rinse fish: if using tuna, rinse it first with boiling water and then with tap water; if using Nile perch, rinse with tap water. Place fish in sauce in a single layer in the wide pot. Place chopped coriander, pepper strips and

chopped garlic on top of fish.

Bring fish to a boil. In the meantime, thoroughly combine the oil and sweet paprika in a separate dish and add this mixture to fish.

After fish has boiled for 10 minutes, reduce flame and simmer about another 30 minutes. Serve fish with sauce, hot or at room temperature.

Entrée From Estonia: Turkey with Matzo Stuffing Recipe courtesy of Larisa Simonova from Tallinn, Estonia.

Ingredients: 1 large turkey For the stuffing: 10 pieces of matzo; 1 1/2 cups white wine; vegetable oil; 2 medium-sized onions, cubed; 2 tablespoons soup mix; 1 stalk celery, diced; 10 rosemary twigs; 1/2 to 1 cup walnuts, chopped; For the basting oil: 1/2 cup olive oil; 1 1/2 teaspoons mustard; 1/2 teaspoon black pepper; 1/2 teaspoon paprika.

Preparation: Clean turkey thoroughly. Soak matzo in a dish with the white wine, until soft.

Fry onion until golden. Mix onion together with the matzo, then add the celery, rosemary, and walnuts.

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Mix olive oil, mustard, black pepper and paprika in a separate dish and smear on turkey using your hands. Stuff turkey with the matzo stuffing, placing any additional stuffing under the bird.

Cover with foil and roast for at least 3 hours, turning it from time to time, until it is tender and golden.

Dessert From India: Rolled Ratalu (Sweet Potato) with Nuts A specialty of the Bene Israel community; recipe courtesy of Rosy Solomon Moses of Mumbai, India.

Ingredients: 1 lb. sweet potatoes; 2 tablespoons mashed dates; 1/4 cup almonds, pistachios, and cashews.

Preparation: Boil sweet potatoes with a little salt. When tender, peel and mash potatoes and add the mashed dates. Mix and create small balls.

Roll in crushed nuts and serve.

PASSOVER

THURSDAY, APRIL 14, 2011

PASTRIES from page 19 To make the meringue topping: In a small heavy saucepan, bring the sugar and water to a boil, stirring to dissolve the sugar.

Continue to cook the sugar until it reaches 230 degrees on the candy thermometer. You can dip a pastry brush in water and wipe down the sides of the pot, if any sugar crystals appear on the sides. While the sugar is cooking, in a medium bowl, beat the egg whites with an electric mixer on high speed until stiff. When the sugar is ready, turn the mixer speed to low and then slowly pour the cooked sugar into the bowl, down the side of the bowl, not directly onto the wire whisk. When all of the sugar has been poured in, turn the mixer up to medium-high and beat for 1 minute, until the meringue is thick and shiny.

Use a silicone spatula to spread the meringue all over the top of the pie. You can use a blowtorch to lightly brown the top or place the pie in a 450-degree oven for a few minutes, watching the entire time until the top browns. Chill in the refrigerator.

Pie can be stored in the refrigerator for up to four days. Yield: 8 servings

B21

Why is this holiday more stressful than all other holidays?

By Jamie Geller Jewish Telegraphic Agency NEW YORK (JTA) — I love Passover, but sometimes I wish I could pass over the arduous cleaning and re-cleaning, pass over the crumbs that my kids have snuck (and stuck) between couch cushions, and clone myself for culinary purposes.

Cooking can prove cathartic when it is of the no-stress, no-mess variety, but when you’re catering to aunts, uncles, grandparents, cousins, cousins of cousins, in-laws and guests, varying taste buds and dietary restrictions need to be considered. You may find yourself making two types of charoset — one with chopped walnuts and one without — and using more prunes than you can stomach.

You would think that as a cookbook author I would have this all figured out, but I am still trying to get it down to a science.

This year I decided that I had to stick with my recurrent “Quick & Kosher” theme. I always make

suggestions to others about keeping it simple for the greatest enjoyment as a cook or baker. This year is going to be the year, G-d willing, to really follow my own advice, chill out and still get it all done.

As I sit with cucumbers over my eyes (for just a nanosecond before my kids come trailing down the stairs and my BlackBerry starts buzzing), I’m struck with sudden inspiration: I will set my timer and make sure to keep prep and cook time to a minimum for each dish. I will modernize some of my traditional faves and make this a fun experience with recipes that are easily replicable. I may be dreaming, but at least I’m dreaming big.

I take out a piece of paper and divide it into sections: Adults, Kids, Adults with Dietary Restrictions/Preferences, Kids with Dietary Restrictions/Preferences. It is time to hammer out a menu, but the process is going to be enjoyable, please G-d. After all, Passover is the celebration that once we were slaves and now we’re free — I will not be a slave to my kitchen!

“Quick & Kosher” Passover recipe from Jamie Geller (reprinted with the permission of Joy of Kosher with Jamie Geller Magazine): Pomegranate Braised Brisket Prep: 5 minutes Cook: about 4 hours Total: 4 hours 30 minutes Ingredients: 1 four-pound first cut beef brisket 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper 4 tablespoons olive oil, divided 3 medium onions, peeled and cut into eighths 6 cloves garlic, smashed 2 cups pomegranate juice 2 cups chicken broth 3 tablespoons honey 3 bay leaves 1 small bunch fresh thyme Preparation: Preheat oven to 375. Season

brisket with salt and pepper. Heat 2 tablespoons olive oil in a large roasting pan or Dutch oven over medium high heat. Sear brisket about 4 minutes per side or until browned. Remove and set aside.

Add remaining 2 tablespoons olive oil and saute onions and garlic for 5 minutes over medium low heat until softened. Return brisket to pan and add pomegranate juice, broth, honey, bay leaves and thyme. Bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer and cover. Transfer to preheated oven and roast for 2 hours.

Flip brisket over and continue roasting for 1 to 1 1/2 more hours or until tender. Let brisket rest for 10 minutes before thinly slicing against the grain. Strain liquid and serve on the side au jus.

Yield: 8 servings This slow cooked hearty brisket makes the perfect pairing for a robust Cabernet Sauvignon.

Jamie Geller is the bestselling author of the “Quick & Kosher” cookbook series.

HAPPY

PASSOVER from

THE AMERICAN ISRAELITE NEWSPAPER & WEBSITE and families of:

Marianna Bettman Netanel (Ted) Deutsch Alexia Kadish Lev Lokshin Millard H. Mack Michael Mazer Stephanie Davis-Novak Iris Pastor Zell Schulman Nicole Simon Phyllis Singer Joseph D. Stange Janet Steinberg Rita Tongpituk Erin Wyenandt and all contributors