Easter Sunday

Passover | Easter Sunday

Mathew 26:26-29
26 And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, blessed [gave thanks for]
and broke it, and gave it to the disciples and said, "Take, eat; this
is My body."
27 Then He took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying,
"Drink from it, all of you."
28 "For this is My blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many
for the remission [forgiveness] of sins."
29 "But I say to you, I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from
now on until that day when I drink it new with you in My father's
kingdom."

1 Corinthians 11:23-26
23 For I [Apostle Paul] received from the Lord that which I also
delivered to you: that the Lord Jesus on the same night in which He was
betrayed took bread;
24 and when He had given thanks he broke it and said, "Take, eat; this
is My body which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of Me."
25 in the same manner he also took the cup after supper, saying, "This
cup is the new covenant in My blood. This do, as often as you drink it,
in remembrance of Me."
26 for as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim
the Lord's death till he comes.

1 Peter 2:21-24
21 For to this you were called, because Christ also suffered for us,
;eaving us an example, that you should follow his steps:
22 "Who committed no sin, Nor was deceit found in His mouth".
23 who, when He was reviled, did not revile in return; when he
suffered, He did not threaten, but commited Himself to Him who judges
righteously;
24 who Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we,
having died to sins, might live for righteousness --- by whose stripes
[wounds] you were healed.

Easter Sunday for Christians is a celebration of the resurrection after
Jesus the Christ celebrated the Jewish Passover in Jerusalem preparing
for his crusifiction.

Perhaps the day will come when Easter is celebrated not just once a
year on Sunday, but the Resurrection could be celebrated on a daily
basis, and that the eternal Passover will retire mankind from the
burdon of work, degredation, and poverty.

The Passover Seder [ see http://www.chabad.org ]

If there was ever a paradox it is this: that on Passover eve, the night
that freedom was born, we experience freedom by following a sequence of
fifteen defined and ordered steps. We call it the Seder or "Order."

The fifteen steps are:

1. Sanctify 2. Cleanse 3. Appetizer 4. Break 5. Tell 6. Wash 7. Bread
8. Matzah 9. Bitter 10. Wrap 11. Set the Table 12. Hidden 13. Bless 14.
Praise 15. Accepted

Before we can start, however, we'll need to set up the Seder Plate and
prepare the other Seder ingredients...

The Seder Plate (Ka'arah) includes most of the ingredients that go into
the making of the Seder. Its three matazahs and the six other items are
arranged in a formation dictated by their mystical significance and
relationship vis-a-vis each other.

Here's how you set it up:

On top of a large plate, tray or cloth place three whole matzahs, one
on top of the other. It's best to use round, hand-baked shmurah matzah.
(We'll be using middle matzah in steps 4, 5, 7, 8, and 12 of our
15-step Seder, the top matzah in steps 7 and 8, and the bottom matzah
in steps 7 and 10.)

Cover the matzahs with a cloth or tray. On top, position the following
six items as pictured above right:

1) "Zeroa" - a roasted chicken bone with most of the meat removed. This
will represent the Passover offering. It will not be eaten.

2) "Beitzah" - a hard-boiled egg, representing the festival offering.

3) "Maror" - grated horseradish (just the horseradish -- not the red
stuff that has vinager and beets added) and/or romaine lettuce, for use
as the "bitter herbs" (step #9).

4) "Charoset" - a paste made of apples, pears, nuts and wine. We'll be
dipping the bitter herbs in this (steps 9 and 10).

5) "Karpas" - a bit of vegetable, such an onion or potato (used in step
#3).

6) "Chazeret" -- more bitter herbs, for use in the matzah-maror
sandwich (step #10).

We'll also need a wine cup or goblet for each participant, and plenty
of wine (four cups each).

And a dish of salt water (in which to dip the Karpas).

Ok, we're ready to start our 15-step Seder. We'll talk more about the
function and significance of these items as we proceed.

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Matzah is unleavened bread. It's made from flour (from one of the "five
types of grain" -- wheat, barley, oats, rye or spelt) and water only --
absolutely nothing else -- that are swiftly combined, kneaded and baked
before the dough has a chance to ferment and begin to rise. It looks
something like a large, round flat cracker. It tastes simply delicious.


Matzah may be flat, but it has many faces: it is the "bread of
affliction" and the "bread of poverty" which our forefather's ate as
slaves in Egypt. It's the "bread of proclamation" over which we tell
the story of the Exodus. It's the "bread of humility" that represents
our self-abnegating commitment to G-d, and the "bread of faith" that
embodies our simple faith, trust and devotion to Him. It's the "bread
of healing" with which we imbibe spiritual wholeness and wellness into
our beings.

Shemurah matzah ("guarded matzah") is made from grain that is guarded
from the time it was harvested lest it come in contact with even the
merest hint of water and moisture. It is also baked by hand, with the
specific intention and awareness that it will be used as a vehicle of
connection to G-d -- to fulfill the mitzvah of eating matzah on the
seder night. (No machine can do that, can it?)

It’s been a crazy week. The world with all its worries and bothers is
still clamoring for your attention. The first step is to forget all
that. Leave it behind. Enter into a timeless space, where you, your
great-grandparents and Moses all coincide.

Begin with a full cup of sweet red wine. A full cup of hundreds of
generations of rejoicing and tears and celebration and wisdom and… of
doing just what you are going to do tonight.

Fill cup with wine. That’s cup #1.

Have someone else fill your cup. Return them the favor. This way, we
are all like nobility, whose cups are filled by someone else. Make sure
your cup holds at least 86 mil. (a little more than three ounces).

Everyone stands and says the kiddush together.

The rest of the year, when the sanctity of Shabbat or a festival is
pronounced upon a cup of wine in the kiddish, one person says kiddush
for everyone else. Tonight, each man, woman and child recites every
word together.

Drink. And get ready for some serious relaxing: Recline on a cushion to
your left side.

Remember the ancient times, when we used to recline on couches while
stuffing down grapes? That’s what we are dramatizing by reclining
now. We are not just free, we are masters.

The beginning of all journeys is separation. You’ve got to leave
somewhere to go somewhere else. It is also the first step towards
freedom: You ignore the voice of Pharaoh inside that mocks you, saying,
"Who are you to begin such a journey?” You just get up and walk out.

This is the first meaning of the word, “Kadesh” -- to transcend the
mundane world. Then comes the second meaning: Once you’ve set
yourself free from your material worries, you can return and sanctify
them. That is when true spiritual freedom begins, when you introduce a
higher purpose into all those things you do.

Before we get to work, especially on such a sensitive and cosmic task
as the ritualistic handling of food to manipulate spiritual truths, our
hands should be clean. Wash them clean of the impurities of a life in a
materialistic world.

Fill a cup with water.

Many Jewish homes have a large two-handled cup especially designed for
this. You could leave the table to go to the kitchen.

What? We just sat down and now we have to get up and leave already?
Well, that’s a fairly normal migration pattern for Jews.

On the other hand, you could bring a basin and towel to the table.

Pour the water to cover your right hand. Repeat. Repeat again. Ditto
for your left hand.

That’s how the kohanim ("priests") did it when they entered the Holy
Temple in Jerusalem.

Dry hands.

Usually, we would recite a blessing at this point. When we wash the
second time before eating the matzah, we’ll say it then. But not now.


Our hands are the primary tools to interact with our environment. They
generally obey our emotions: Love, fear, compassion, the urge to win,
to be appreciated, to express ourselves, to dominate. Our emotions, in
turn, reflect our mental state.

But, too often, each faculty of our psyche sits in its cell, exiled
from one another. The mind sees one way, the heart feels another and
our interface with the world ends up one messy tzimmes.

Water represents the healing power of wisdom. Water flows downward,
carrying its essential simplicity to each thing. It brings them
together as a single living, growing whole. We pour water over our
hands as an expression of wisdom pouring downward passing through our
heart and from there to our interaction with the world around us.

Take a small piece of some edible vegetable (potato, onion, etc.)

We're doing everything we can to spark questions from the children. If
they say, “Hey mom and dad! The table is all set for a grand dinner.
Aren’t we supposed to eat real food now? Why just this little
itty-bitty piece of vegetable?” -- then you know you’re doing
things right.

What do you answer them? You say, “We're doing this so you will ask
questions.” And if they say, “So what’s the answer?” -- just
repeat, as above. That’s the best answer. Because you can’t learn
if you don’t ask questions. And the first thing to learn is that not
all questions have answers.

That’s a distinctive mark of Jewish education: More than we teach our
children how to answer, we teach them how to ask -- and how to be
patient in their search for answers.

Dip it into saltwater.

Like our earlier reclining with our cup of wine, we're engaging in a
display of expansiveness and sovereignty, mimicking the custom of
nobility and hoity-toity folk to precede their meals with an bite of
appetizer dipped in a dip.

Also: karpas (the Hebrew word for "greens" and "vegetable") read
backwards forms an acronym of a phrase meaning "600,000 [were enslaved
with] spirit-breaking labor," and the saltwater in which it is dipped
are the tears they shed.

This duality will repeat itself throughout to Seder. Telling the story
of the Exodus means reliving how things were before (slavery and
suffering) and what was achieved (freedom). We'll drink wine (joy,
liberty) and we'll eat the maror (bitterness, slavery). At times, the
same food or ritual will embody both aspects.

Say the blessing for vegetables ("Borei Pri Haadamah"), and have in
mind also the "bitter herbs" we'll be eating later. Munch it down.

Munch good. You’re not going to get much more for a while.

We need to re-taste the breaking labor of Egypt to liberate ourselves
from it once again. It was this labor that prepared us for freedom. It
was this labor that gave us a humble spirit to accept wisdom.

Today, as well, you can choose to achieve this humble spirit by
enduring the battle to survive the rat race. There will be plenty of
futile, hamster-wheel tasks to bring you to your knees.

Or you could choose another path: achieving true humility with the
realization of just how small we earthly creatures are. That will free
you from the need to experience materialistic futility.

Choose your battle. It’s up to you.

Take hold of the middle of the three matzahs on your Seder Plate.

We need the top matzah to remain whole. We’ll be making a blessing on
it later on. Blessings are said on whole things.

Break it in two. Leave the smaller half between the two complete
matzos.

The piece that remains on the Seder Plate is the “poor man’s
bread” over which the tale of our slavery is said. Poor people only
eat a small part of their bread -- they need to save the rest in case
tomorrow there is none.

Break the remaining (larger) piece into five pieces and wrap them in a
cloth.

According to Kabbalah, the world is created through five contractions
of light.

Hide the package until the end of the Seder when it will be eaten as
the Afikoman, or dessert (step #12).

In many houses, the children hide the afikoman and the adults have to
find it at the end of the meal. In others, the adults hide it and the
children find it. Either way, it keeps the kids up and in suspense
until the end of the meal.

Many Sephardic Jews have the tradition of tying the afikoman under the
arms of the children, who carry it like that all night, just like when
we left Egypt.

Why is there so much broken in this world? Why did the Cosmic Designer
make a world where hearts break, lives shatter, beauty crumbles?

A whole vessel can contain its measure, but a broken one can hold the
Infinite.

Matzah is called the poor man’s bread. He is low and broken. And it
is this brokenness that allows him to open his soul and escape his
Egypt.

As long as we feel whole, there is no room left for us to grow. It is
when we realize we are but a fragment, that we need the others around
us, that so much of us is missing -- that is when miracles begin.

This is it, folks. This is why it’s called a "Haggadah" ("telling").
Now we get to the meat and potatoes of the Seder your soul is longing
for. (As for the meat and the potatoes your stomach is longing for, you
can probably smell them simmering in the kitchen. Hold on, we’ll get
there.)

Fill the second cup of wine, following which the children ask the four
questions.

Of course, they can always ask more.

No children? Let an adult ask. There’s just you? You be the child,
and G-d will be the father. While you’re at it, ask Him a few other
difficult questions for us all.

Continue with the telling of the story, as written in your Haggadah.

Hey, you’re not limited to the Haggadah’s version! That was written
so that everybody would have something to say. But now is your chance
to get creative. Tell every story you know about the exodus. Examine
every word of the Haggadah and get into the deeper meaning. Keep it
real, make it profound.

Here's a basic summery of what we'll be talking about:

The Haggadah is two narratives bundled together, each of which (like
any good story) has a distressing beginning and a happy ending. The
central narrative is the story of the Exodus: how at first "We were
slaves to Pharaoh in Egypt" and then "G-d took us out with a Mighty
Hand." The larger story is how "In the beginning, our ancestors were
idol-worshippers" and then "G-d brought us to Him, to His service."

We'll trace the origins of the Jewish people starting with Abraham's
rejection of his family's idolatry. We'll recount how the enslavement
in Egypt -- but also the redemption and the "great wealth" that will be
taken from there -- was foretold to Abraham at the "Covenant Between
the Pieces." We'll confirm that G-d's promise to Abraham has stood us
by, not only in delivering us from Egypt but throughout Jewish history
as "in every generation, they pounce upon us to destroy us, but G-d
saves us from their hands." We'll describe the terrible suffering of
the Children of Israel in Egypt and the plagues brought upon the
Egyptians. We'll sing of the fifteen great gifts G-d bestowed upon us,
from the Exodus to the Splitting of the Sea to the Manna to the Giving
of Torah to granting us the Holy Land and the Holy Temple in Jerusalem.


We'll explain the significance of the Passover offering (in gratitude
to G-d for passing over our homes when He smote the Egyptian
firstborn), the matzah ("because our fathers' dough did not have time
to become leavened before G-d revealed Himself to them and redeemed
them") and the maror (the bitter herbs, which recall the bitterness of
our exile and enslavement). We'll conclude with the first part of the
Hallel (Psalms of praise) recited over the second cup of wine.

Basic Rules of telling the story:

· Get the children involved.

· Tell it in first person, in the now. Don’t say, “Long ago, the
ancient Hebrews…” Say, “When we were slaves in Egypt, the
perverse socio-bureaucratic system thoroughly crushed every
individual’s sense of self-worth!” Everything that happened there
parallels something in each of our lives. We are truly living it now.
We are simply examining our own lives in the dress of ancient Egypt.

· It’s all about miracles. Moses and his signs and wonders. The Ten
Plagues. The splitting of the sea. All those miracles happened so that
we would look at the events of our daily life and recognize that these
too are miracles. Tell it like it is: We are a people born of miracles.
We endured by miracles. The very fact that we are here now telling this
same story to our children in an unbroken chain of 3,316 years is an
abrogation of natural law.

We drink the second cup at the end of this step.

The exodus was not simply an event that happened to us. It is an event
that we became. It is who we are. It is the life of each one of us,
occurring again and again, in our wrestling match with the world, in
our struggle with our own selves. We embody freedom in a constant mode
of escape. Perhaps that is why Jews have always been the rebels of
society, the ones who think out of the box. The experience of leaving
Egypt left such an indelible mark on our souls, we never stopped doing
it. A Jew who has stopped exiting Egypt has ceased to allow his soul to
breathe.

To tell the story is to bring that essential self into the open, to
come face to face with who we really are and resuscitate it back to
life.

Fill a cup with water

Again? Yes, again. It’s been a long time since the last washing. And
the last time you didn’t have the matzah in mind. Anyways, it's good
to get up and stretch a little, right?

Pour the water to cover your right hand. Repeat. Repeat again. Ditto
for your left hand.

Say the blessing. "Blessed be You, L-rd our G-d, King of the World, Who
has sanctified us with His commandments, and commanded us concerning
the washing of the hands."

Dry your hands.

As long as we live in this world, freedom remains elusive: While moving
forward, we are free. Stop, and we are bound and fettered again.

That is why freedom is something you cannot buy nor steal. Never can
you put freedom in your purse and say, “Freedom is mine forever!”

For freedom is a marriage: Freedom is the bond our finite selves with
the Infinite, the power to transcend the world while working inside it.
It is a marriage of heaven and earth, spirit and matter, soul and body.
And like any marriage, it is kept alive only by constant renewal. Like
the miracle of the splitting of the Red Sea, suspended in its state of
paradox by a continuous, other-worldy force.

Yet, in our exodus, we were granted eternal freedom. Not because we
were released from slavery. But because we were given the power to
perpetually transcend.

That’s the order of the Seder tonight: Kadesh/Urchatz, Transcend and
Purify. Over and over. Rise higher, then draw that into deeds. Rise
higher again, then draw that down even more. Never stop rising higher.
Never stop applying.

Matzah is the most important item in the Seder, and eating it fulfills
the central mitzvah of Passover. But matzah is also bread -- albeit of
the decidedly unleavened sort. Tonight it fulfills the role of the two
whole loaves that are the mainstay of every Shabbat and festival meal.
That's why we have three matzahs on our Seder plate -- so that in
addition to the "piece" of matzah over which we tell the story of the
Exodus, we'll have two whole matzahs over which to pronounce the
"Hamotzi" blessing, praising and thanking G-d "Who brings bread from
the earth."

Grab all three matzahs—the top one, the broken middle one and the
bottom one—and pick them up a little.

Say the blessing: "Blessed be You, L-rd our G-d, King of the World, Who
brings bread out of the earth"

Hold on… more techie instructions to follow in the next step.

We feel an affinity with the food we eat: We too are a miracle out of
the earth.

We and the bread share a common journey. The bread begins as a seed
buried beneath the ground. And then, a miracle occurs: As it decomposes
and loses its original form, it comes alive, begins to grow sprout and
grow. As spring arrives, it pushes its way above the earth to find the
sun, and then bears its fruits for the world.

We too began buried in Egypt, all but losing our identity. But that
furnace of oppression became for us a firing kiln, a baker’s oven,
the womb from whence we were born in the month of spring. In our
liberation from there, we brought our fruits of freedom to the world.

Techie instructions continued: Carefully release the bottom matzah.
Recite the blessing on the remaining whole matzah and the broken
matzah: "Blessed be You, L-rd our G-d, King of the World, Who has
sanctified us with His commandments, and commanded us concerning eating
matzah."

Break off a piece from each of the two matzos for yourself and for each
of those sitting at your table. Pass them around.

What we're doing is covering both our bases, ensuring that we
experience both the poverty and humility that matzah represents (the
broken matzah) and the freedom and healing it brings (the whole
matzah).

Supplement the two pieces of matzah from the Seder Plate with more
matzah, so that everybody gets at least 2 oz. of matzah altogether
(about two thirds of a large shemura matzah.)

Hey, it’s a mitzvah after all!

Don’t forget to recline to the left while you munch—just like with
the wine.

Since the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, matzah is the only
opportunity we have to actually eat a mitzvah. That’s right, the
matzah you are eating is pure G-dliness. In fact, it has enough G-dly
energy to blast your soul out of the deepest ditch into the highest
heights.

The Zohar calls matzah “Bread of Faith” and “Bread of Healing”.
Did I say “faith?” Well, actually, that’s a rather feeble
translation. “Emunah” is the word in Hebrew, and it means a lot
more than “I believe, brother!” Faith can often be something people
rely upon when they don’t care to think too much. Emunah is when you
go beyond thinking and you get somewhere your mind could have never
brought you to.

Emunah is when you touch that place where your soul and the essence of
the Infinite Light are one. It’s a point that nothing can describe.
Where there are no words, no doubts, no uncertainty, no
confusion—nothing else but a magnificent oneness before which all the
challenges of life vanish like a puff of vapor.

Eating matzah is a means of plugging your entire self into that
reservoir. Your physical body digests the Emunah of your soul,
everything is integrated back into one, your body and spirit are whole
and harmonious.

How on earth, you may ask, can a mixture of water and wheat from the
ground baked in an oven contain a spiritual cure? Well, welcome to the
Jewish People, where there is no dichotomy of spirit and matter, soul
and body. Where the spiritual transforms into physicality and material
objects rise to become spiritual in a perpetual chemistry of exchange.
Where bodies are healed by empowering the soul and souls are nourished
by the rituals of the body.

After all, we live in the world of a single G-d.

Grab some of that bitter herb, enough to make the size of a small egg
if you would crunch it into a ball. Some have the custom of using both
horseradish and romaine lettuce (though either/or is also ok).

Dip the bitter herb in the charoset. Shake off any excess.

It’s a careful balance: You want bitter herbs, but you want to
sweeten the bitterness a little. But it’s still got to be bitter
herbs—not a sumptuous charoset hors d'oeuvre. Look, you can try that
later at the meal. We’ll get there—don’t worry.

Say the blessing: "Blessed be You… and commanded us concerning eating
bitter herbs."

Eat it. All of it. No funny faces now.

What's so great about the bitterness? Why do we want to remermber that?


Actually, our bitterness in Egypt was/is the key to our redemption. We
never got used to Egypt. We never felt we belonged there. We never
said, “They are the masters and we are the slaves and that’s the
way it is.” It always remained something we felt bitter about,
something that was unjust and needed to change.

If it hadn’t been that way, we probably would never have left. In
fact, tradition tells us that 80% of the Jews said, “This is our
land. How can we leave it?” And they stayed and died there.

But as for the rest of us, when Moses came and told us we were going to
leave, we believed him. It was our bitterness that had preserved our
faith. Everyone has his Egypt. You’ve got to know who you are and
what are your limitations. But heaven forbid to make peace with them.
The soul within you knows no limits.

This is the sweetness we apply to the bitter herb: Bitterness alone,
without any direction, is self-destructive. Inject some life and
optimism into it, and it becomes the springboard to freedom.

Break off two pieces from the bottom matzah. (You'll need one oz. of
matzah altogether. Supplement with matzah from the box if needed.)

Now you know what the third matzah is for! If you’ve followed
instructions until now, it should still be whole.

Take an olive-size volume of the bitter herb and place it in between
those two pieces. Again, some mix together the horseradish and lettuce.
Ask your bubbe (grandma) for your family custom.

Now you know what that second pile of bitter herb at the bottom of the
seder plate is for.

Dip the bitter herb in the charoset. Shake off any excess.

Say the words: “This is what Hillel did, at the time that the Temple
stood. He wrapped up some Pesach lamb, some matzah and some bitter
herbs and ate them together.”

And you thought it was because they packed sandwiches to leave Egypt.
Well, it is fast food.

Hillel read the words of the Torah about the Pesach lamb, “on matzah
and bitter herbs you shall eat it,” and he took it literally. And so
the sandwich was invented. Or maybe we should be calling it a hillel?

Lean to the left while you eat.

In the view from within Egypt, this world is a mess of fragments.
It’s called “The Passoverly Challenged Perspective.” Plain
materialism. Where mitzvahs are a mishmash of dos and don’ts, Jews
are a collection of irreconcilable riffraff, daily life is a cacophony
of hassles and, well, just stuff.

Once we blast off far enough to escape materialism’s gravitational
pull, we look back down and see a whole new perspective: It’s all a
single landscape.

From up there looking down, mitzvahs are multiple expressions of a
single spiritual path, Jews are multiple faces to a single soul, all
the artifacts of today’s journey harmonize together as a symphony
with a single conductor playing a single melody.

When we make ourselves into a temple for the Divine, the bitter, the
sweet and the tasteless responsibilities of life wrap together in a
single sandwich.

The festive holiday meal is now eaten (You know how to do this, right?)


It's been a long haul; on a regular Shabbat and Yom Tov, we'd have
eaten hours ago. But well worth the wait. So far everything we've eaten
had a ritual significance; now we eat to fulfill the mitzvah of
enjoying the festival.

It's customary to begin the meal with the hard-boiled egg that was on
your Seder Plate (commemorating the festival offering), dipped in salt
water.

A boiled egg is a sign of mourning. On every festive occasion, we
remember to mourn for the destruction of the Temple and Jerusalem.

This step, along with Korech before it, marks the re-entry we mentioned
at the beginning. We’ve escaped Egypt and reached a higher vision.
And then we start the process again -- on a higher level.

Because freedom consists of more than escape. Complete freedom is when
you can turn around and liberate all the elements of your world from
their pure material state, and make them transcendent as well.

That’s what we do when we eat every day—we take foods which grow
from the earth, say a blessing over them and bring them into our
journey as human beings. And when it’s Shabbos or another Jewish
holiday, we elevate them further, into the realm of pure spirituality.
As for tonight, this meal is going to be truly Divine.

So don’t imagine we’re just fressing now. We’re reaching a higher
state. And what a great way to do it!

Are you sure you’ve eaten enough? Filled up on that exotic fruit
salad? Had enough to drink? Better be sure, because this is your last
chance. The only thing to pass your lips tonight after this afikoman is
another two cups of wine.

Retrieve that hidden matzah. Eat, reclining on your left side.

With the first matzah, we fulfilled our obligation to eat matzah. This
one is in place of the Pesach lamb (which can only be brought in the
Holy Temple in Jerusalem) that is meant to be eaten on a full stomach.

In the Kabbalah, it is explained that there is something deeper than
the soul. There is the body, the spirit, and then there is the essence.
If the soul is light, then that essence is the source of light. If it
is energy, then the essence is the dynamo. It is called "tzafun,"
meaning hidden, buried, locked away and out of reach.

Whatever we do, we dance around that essence-core, like a spacecraft in
orbit, unable to land. We can meditate, we can be inspired, but to
touch the inner core, the place where all this comes from, that takes a
power from beyond.

On Passover night, we have that power. But only after all the steps
before: Destroying our personal chametz, preparing our homes for
liberation, the eleven steps of the Seder until now. Then, when we are
satiated with all we can handle, connecting every facet of ourselves to
the Divine, that’s when that power comes to us. Whether we sense it
or not, tasteless as it may seem, the matzah we eat now reaches deep
into our core and transforms our very being.

In general, it is this way: Those things you find inspiring and nice
may take you a step forward. But if you want to effect real change, you
need to do something totally beyond your personal bounds.

It’s late now. Adults are falling asleep. Kids are having a great
time taking advantage of that. But it’s not over. There’s songs and
wine and Elijah the Prophet is on his way…

Pour the third cup of wine. All the way to the tip, just like the other
ones.

Say the Grace After Meals as printed in your Haggadah.

Say a blessing on the wine and drink it down, reclining on your left
side.

The theme of grace after meals is confidence. Confidence in a Higher
Force that is with us in our daily lives. With that confidence you
don’t just see food before you. You see a river of life travelling
from Above onto your plate.

When we say this out loud, with joy and sincerity, we initiate a
reciprocal current. The energy we receive is bounced back with even
greater force, replenishing all the higher worlds and ethereal beings
through which it passed on its way here. The channels of life are
widened and their currents grow strong.

Miracles happen when Divine energy from beyond the cosmos enters
within. Why did miracles happen in Egypt? Because we believed they
would. Those who didn’t believe in miracles saw only plagues. To see
a miracle, you need an open heart and mind, open enough to receive the
Infinite. That is the opening we make when we thank G-d for the miracle
of our food.

Pour another cup of wine (#4). Yes, you can handle it.

Now pour another cup and set it in the middle of the table. You won’t
drink this wine—it’s for Elijah the Prophet.

Send some kids to open the door. Recite the lines, “Pour out your
wrath…” from the Haggadah. Watch Elijah the Prophet enter. Can’t
see him? That’s precisely why you need another cup of wine.

Elijah the prophet comes to announce the imminent arrival of the final
Exodus.

Tonight is a night of protection—"Leyl Shimurim" we call it. Tonight,
we are not afraid of anything, for we are carried securely in His holy,
gentle hand. We open the door in the middle of the night and we show
that confidence, that deep trust that no harm will befall us.

On that very first night of Passover in Egypt, we were redeemed on the
merit of our trust that He would redeem us. Tonight, we will be
liberated from this Egypt of the soul. Again, we must show our trust.

Now we finish the Hallel, the "Psalms of Praise" (the first half was
said at the end of step #5). It’s all there, in your Haggadah. Sing
whatever you have a song to.

At the end, say a blessing and drink the wine. You guessed it:
reclining. But try not to fall over.

The ancient rabbis clued us in on a key principle in cosmic functions:
Whatever He tells us to do, He does Himself. Of course, there’s a
difference: We do it in our little human world. He does it on a cosmic
plane.

He told us to open our door on the night of Passover. So, tonight, He
opens every door and every gateway of the spiritual cosmos to every
member of the Jewish People. To each one of us, regardless of what we
have been doing all the rest of the year. Tonight is the chance to
reach to the highest of spiritual levels. Prophecy, divine spirit,
wisdom and insight—take your choice and jump a quantum leap.
There’s nothing stopping us.

Do nothing. This is His job now.

Look up from your wine. The table’s a delicious mess. Uncle Irving
looks so serene, snoring into his Haggadah, serenaded by the first
chirping of dawn. As you carry the little ones to their beds, the sound
of matzah crunching beneath your feet, you wonder, “And who will
carry me to bed? Who will wake me in the morning to go to shul?”

Was it the best Seder that could have been? Look, it had its
highlights. A few times, the kids got a little over-excited. And the
horseradish and chicken soup didn’t mix too well in little Miriam’s
stomach. But Grandpa told some great stories. We all had fun with the
songs. We told the tale again, with new enhancements and flourishes,
just like we have for 3300 plus years. We did what we are supposed to,
in our own human way.

And now, let Him do what He has promised to do: A re-run. A modern
exodus of liberation. Starring us. With lots of miracles. But this
time, forever.

Some people think we are meant to make a perfect world. But if that is
what our Creator wanted, why did He make us such imperfect beings?

Rather, what He wants of us is our very humanness. Sometimes we do
good. Sometimes we fall. But we keep on struggling, and eventually we
make some real change.

And then, once we have done all we can, like a kind parent helping with
the homework, He makes sure to touch up the job and make it shine.

For 3300 years we have been leaving Egypt. For 3300 years we have been
doing our human job of transforming the darkness of His world into
light. And now it is His turn to lift us up, to banish the darkness
forever, to make our work shine.
____________________________________________________________

Word for "Easter" in various languages

Names related to Eostremonat (Eostre Month)
English Easter
German Ostern
Samoan Eseta (derived from English)

Names derived from the Hebrew Pesach (Passover)
Latin Pascha or Festa Paschalia
Greek Πάσχα (Paskha)
Afrikaans Paasfees
Arabic عيد الفصح (ʿĪdu l-Fiṣḥ)
Bulgarian Пасха (Paskha)
Catalan Pasqua
Danish Påske
Dutch Pasen
Esperanto Pasko
Finnish Pääsiäinen
French Pâques
Icelandic Páskar
Indonesian Paskah
Irish Cáisc
Italian Pasqua
Lower Rhine German Paisken
Norwegian Påske
Tagalog (Philippines) Pasko ng Muling Pagkabuhay (literally "the Pasch
of the Resurrection")
Polish Pascha
Portuguese Páscoa
Romanian Paşti
Russian Пасха (Paskha)
Scottish Gaelic Casca
Spanish Pascua
Swedish Påsk
Turkish Paskalya
Welsh Pasg
Albanian Pashkë

Names used in other languages
Armenian Զատիկ (Zatik, literally "resurrection")
Belarusian Вялікдзень or Vialikdzen’ (literally "the Great
Day")
Bulgarian Великден (Velikden, literally "the Great Day")
Simplified Chinese: 复活节; Traditional Chinese: 復活節; Pinyin:
Fùhuó Jié (literally "Resurrection Festival")
Croatian Uskrs (literally "resurrection")
Czech Velikonoce (literally "Great Nights" [plural, no singular
exists])
Estonian Lihavõtted (literally "meat taking")
Georgian აღდგომა (Aĝdgoma, literally "rising")
Hungarian Húsvét (literally "taking, or buying meat")
Japanese 復活祭 (Fukkatsu-sai, literally "resurrection festival") or
Īsutā, from English
Korean 부활절 (Puhwalchol, literally "Resurrection season")
Latvian Lieldienas (literally "the Great Days", no singular exists)
Lithuanian Velykos (derived from Slavic languages, no singular exists)
Polish Wielkanoc (literally "the Great Night")
Romanian Inviere (literally "resurrection")
Serbian Ускрс (Uskrs) or Васкрс (Vaskrs, literally
"resurrection")
Slovak Veľká Noc (literally "the Great Night")
Slovenian Velika noč (literally "the Great Night")
Tongan (South-pacific) Pekia (literally "death (of a lord)")
Ukrainian Великдень (Velykden’, literally "the Great Day")
or Паска (Paska)

Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!!!

Passover | Easter Sunday Links:
http://www.chabad.org
http://www.crosswalk.com
http://www.iclnet.org
http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/index.jsp
http://www.jewfaq.org
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org
http://www.thewrittenword.org

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