By Rabbi Arthur Waskow

There follow five ways of making real the passage of the Passover Haggadah that says, "In every generation all human beings must look upon ourselves as if we ourselves go forth from slavery, not our forebears only."

A. The Freedom Plate

Three or four years ago, Martha Hausman, now a student at the Jewish Theological Seminary, proposed that a special plate be set aside next to the traditional Seder plate, on which could be placed physical objects brought by every participant in the Seder as a symbol of her/ his liberation THIS YEAR.

My wife Phyllis and I have done this each year now, and find it very powerful. Mature, learned Jews, children, and people who have never before attended a Seder can all relate to this, and the stories about the objects on the Freedom Plate become a very powerful part of the Seder.

Our custom is that soon after we begin, we ask those present to begin lifting and explaining their freedom-object. One year it was a just-completed 500-page book manuscript for one person, a single gold coin that another's father had brought out of Germany as a last-ditch economic prop in case destitution were descending; for another, a watch, representing liberation from rigid time-rules; for another, nothing -- representing freedom from the rule that something should be brought.

Alternatively , one might use either the passage "In every generation one rises up against us to destroy us" or "In very generation every human being must look upon her/himself as if we ourselves, not our ancestors only, come forth from slavery" as a time to raise up the Freedom Plate and hear its stories.

B. For many of us, one of the worst oppressions in our lives is being driven into overwork, and the spiritual and emotional exhaustion that follows.

(Today the New York Times reported that schools are increasingly abolishing recess time in order to get the children to do more work. This is a form of slavery. As the article noted, the possibility of "wonder" is being squashed, and this is the opposite of Heschel's teaching that the root of all spirituality is "radical amazement."

So we could add the following to the Seder, perhaps after the passage, "In every generation, there is one who rises up against us, to destroy us." (Some of the imagery is a paraphrase of Heschel.)

Today we face a new kind of Egypt, the tight and narrow place. Freedom without jobs is a bitter joke--yet many of us find our jobs dissolved, downsized, disemployed. Jobs without freedom are a form of slavery--yet many of us are forced to overwork. Our jobs exhaust us. When Moses faced the Burning Bush, he learned that like an eternal burning bush, time itself is not consumed, though each instant vanishes to open the way to the next. Things of space seem permanent-- but as we seek to make them into our servants, they may enslave us. When the Israelites went forth from slavery, they sought time for rest and self-reflection: They found Shabbat. Rather than live under the tyranny of space and overwork, we will in our lives set apart a time for freedom.

C. Benjy Ben-Baruch of Ann Arbor has suggested a new practice for Ashkenazic households that are not yet ready for a total break with the prohibition on rice and beans that has operated in Askenazic but not Sephardic homes, a prohibition that has been denounced by leading Conservative authorities in Israel as propping up the differences between the two communities and even an atmosphere of Askenazic superiority.

The proposal is that along with Elijah's Cup there be set aside a small plate of rice or beans, not for eating but for observing. (Its presence does not contaminate with prohibited food the table or the house AT ALL, since all agree this is not forbidden for Passover.)

This dish of rice is to symbolize our hope for respectful pluralism among all Jews, and our intention to cross over all meaningless boundaries between us, while honoring our distinctive customs."

D. The Orange on the Seder plate.

I saw this morning that this has achieved mainstream status: it was mentioned among other, older traditions in an article in the Philadelphia Inquirer (general, not Jewish, newspaper).

Origins of this custom are shrouded in the mythic mists of the 1980s: according to the tale, a women who spoke on women in the rabbinate and the equalization of other forums was rebuked by a man who said, "Women belong on the bimah like an orange belongs on the Seder plate." Thus the new custom.

The story may have originated in a practice of some Jewish lesbians of setting *bread* on the Seder plate as a symbol of affirming lesbianism, though understanding it as transgressive of Jewish tradition . (See Rebecca Alpert's excellent book, Like Bread on the Seder Plate.)

But regardless of the origins of the orange, it has come to stand for the freedom and equality of women in Jewish life, and implicitly of how the achievement of that freedom is already changing Jewish practice. The orange also (as the only whole fruit on the plate) symbolizes its own advent, because it carries within itself the seeds of its own future as Torah carries within itself the seeds of change. Further, the orange can symbolize the (feminine) divine aspect of Majestic Inclusion. Till now, the other objects on the Seder Plate have symbolized the other six aspects and Majestic Inclusion has been symbolized by the Plate itself--very important but present only as background.

The traditional practice of the orange on the seder plate is, either in response to someone's independently raising the question, "Why is there an orange on the Seder plate?" or by raising the question deliberately (as a fifth question, or in pointing to the items on the plate just before the meal) to answer with any or all the answers above.

E. For a couple of years after Rosh Hashanah 1993, I had hoped we would no longer need to ask these additional questions at the Seder table. Sadly, we see that we still must.

May the confluence in one week this year of the Muslim festival of Eid al Idha (commemorating the Binding of Ishmail), the Christian festival of Easter, and our own Passover remind us how our different stories overlap, how what divides us could also be the many-eyed vision that gives us deeper perspective on God and truth and freedom. In honor of our cousins, the Children of Ishmael, let us ask Four More Questions:

FOUR MORE QUESTIONS

A Passage to be Read in the Passover Haggadah (Perhaps After the Tale of the Five Rabbis in B'nei B'raq)

Let us therefore tonight expand upon the story of our deliverance from slavery by asking:

Why is this Passover night different from every other Passover night?

Because on every Passover night--tonight as well--We call out to another people, "Let our people go!" But tonight we also hear another people Calling out to us: "Let our people go!"

Tonight the children of Hagar through Ishmael and the children of Sarah through Isaac call out to each other: We too are children of Abraham! We are cousins, you and we! As Isaac and Ishmael once met at Be'er LaChai Ro-i, the Well of the Living One Who Sees, So it is time for us to meet -- Time for us to see each other, face to face. Time for us to make peace with each other.

They met for the sake of their dead father, Abraham; we must meet for the sake of our dead children--Dead at each other's hands.

For the sake of our children's children, so that they not learn to kill.

And so tonight we must ask ourselves four new questions:

(1) Why does the Torah teach: "When a stranger lives-as-a-stranger with you in your land, you shall not oppress him. The stranger who lives-as-a-stranger with you shall be as one of your citizens; you shall love her as yourself."

Because Hagar Mamitzria [Hagar the Egyptian] was a stranger in your midst, and "because you were strangers in the Land of Egypt."

(2) Why do we break the matzoh in two?

Because the bread of affliction becomes the bread of freedom --when we share it. Because the Land that gives bread to two peoples must be divided in two, so that both peoples may eat of it. So long as one people grasps the whole land, it is a land of affliction. When each people can eat from part of the Land, it will become a land of freedom.

(3) Why do we dip herbs twice, once in salt water and once in sweet charoset?

First for the tears of two peoples, Israeli and Palestinian; then for the sweetness of two peoples, Palestinian and Israeli; for the future of both peoples, who must learn not to repeat the sorrows of the past but to create the joys of the future.

(4) Why is there an egg upon the Passover plate?

It is the egg of birthing. When we went forth from Egypt, the Narrow Place, it was the birthtime of our people, the People of Israel; and today we are witnessing the birth of freedom for another people, the People of Palestine.

When the midwives Shifrah and Puah saved the children that Pharaoh ordered them to kill, that was the beginning of the birth-time;

When Pharaoh's daughter joined with Miriam to give a second birth to Moses from the waters, she birthed herself anew into God's daughter, Bat-yah, and our people turned to draw ourselves toward life. When God became our Midwife and named us Her firstborn, though we were the smallest and youngest of the peoples, the birthing began; when the waters of the Red Sea broke, we were delivered.

So tonight it is our task to help the Midwife, who tonight is giving birth to a new people--and so to give a new birth to ourselves.

Blessings for a sweet and liberating Passover and a life-giving birth thru the waters of the Sea.