As we get ready for our Passover seders next week, we will look at the number 4 and its significance in the ritual. In a fairly radical rereading of the original Torah text, the rabbis of the Mishnah imagine four children gathered around the seder table--the wise, the wicked, the simple, and the one who does not know how to ask. Over centuries, artists and philosophers and satirists and more have imagined these characters; often, the Wise Child is the Torah scholar, the wicked son the “cool kid,” cigarette in hand. In a 1941 Haggadah illustrated by Viennese artist Siegmund Forst, the wise son is given the verse “a righteous man lives by his faith” (Habakuk 2:4). The wicked son is depicted as a revolutionary, ready to set the world on fire. The simple son is assimilated, sipping champagne and playing the guitar. The son who does not know how to ask simply watches the [...]

As we get ready for our Passover seders next week, we will look at the number four and its significance in the ritual. A man asks his rabbi, “Why do Jews always answer a question with a question?” And the rabbi replies, “How should we answer?" Often when I work with conversion students raised in another faith, they share that one of the aspects of Judaism that feels most appealing is the freedom to question. Rather than be told what to believe, these students appreciate the encouragement to wonder and ask and explore. I should note that there are students—young and old alike—who express their frustration about this very concept, wanting to just know “what Judaism says.” But, I digress, since questions are the topic of the moment. Because, of course, questions are central to the seder. The Maggid, the telling of the story, cannot begin until those Four Questions are asked. In [...]

As we get ready for our Passover seders next week, we will look at the number four and its significance in the ritual. Long before we used words like pedagogy, or experiential education, the rabbis of the Talmud understood the seder to be all of those things. From pillows to horseradish, kiddush to Hallel, the seder is meant—as I wrote yesterday—to help us feel that we are moving from darkness to light, degradation to praise, and slavery to freedom. So, here’s another four to consider. We know that the four cups of wine are connected to the four promises God makes in Exodus 6. But, the rabbis get even more granular than that. Redemption, they say, does not happen in a single moment. Not because God is not powerful enough, but perhaps we are not. Rather, redemption occurs over time, in starts and stops, in stages. And we celebrate that in our seder as well, marking four moments in the [...]

As we get ready for our Passover seders next week, we will look at the number four and its significance in the ritual.I will bring you out.I will rescue you.I will redeem you.I will take you to Me…Before the seder itself. Before the four Questions. Before the four Children. Even before the four cups of wine (though they are connected), we read God’s four promises to the people of Israel. Over the course of two verses in the Book of Exodus, we encounter Divine love and protection, promises not only for the moment of the Exodus, but for the eternal relationship between the Divine and the people of Israel.Say, therefore, to the Israelite people: I am יהוה. I will free you from the labors of the Egyptians and deliver you from their bondage. I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and through extraordinary chastisements. And I will take you to be My people, and I will be your God. And [...]