Passover resources
David Seidenberg
Almost Shabbat Hagadol, the shabbat before Passover! I'd like to share four things for Passover with you all:
1) Get the Omer Counter app: neohasid.org's resources on Passover are found at: http://www.neohasid.org/zman/pesach/ -- including the Haggadah of the Inner Seder, and the Omer Counter app
2) neohasid.org's prayer for Passover starting on Earth Day, which means we burn our Chametz on Earth Day: "May we remember on this day that just as we do not own this chametz, we do not own this Earth. May we recall that Adam, the human, is made of afar min ha’adamah, soil, dirt, and that we belong to the soil. May we cherish the soil that comes from centuries of rocks breaking and life growing and decomposing. We too are 'hewn from the rock and dug from the mine' of Abraham and Sarah (Isa 51:1-2). And so, may it be Your will, Adonai Eloheinu, that we live in truth Your promise to Abraham, that his progeny would become 'like the dirt of the earth, ka`afar ha’aretz' (Gen 13:16) -- k`afra d’ar’a -- and that, like the soil, we may live to nourish all Life." Learn more at: http://neohasid.org/resources/bedikat/
3) Add hyssop to your seder plate to honor the two cultures, Palestinian and Jewish, that have roots in the land of the promise. The short version is: "Eizov zo al shum mah? This is because of the blood on the doorpost that saved the Israelites in Egypt from the terror of the plague of the firstborn, and because we share this symbol with the Palestinian people, for whom it represents being steadfast. We imagine a time when none of our children will die because of terror or war, when the land will be filled with peace and justice." Learn more at: https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/hyssop-on-your-seder-plate/
4) On Passover we end the prayers for rain that began on October 7, and begin the prayers for dew. The prayers end, but the war that began with the October 7 attack does not. Here is a reflection on that:
Morid Hatal – מוריד הטל – to the One who settles the dew, post-October 7*
The rains are come and gone, the winter passed,
the blood stains washed into the soil — if they are ever really washed away.
Now dew will collect, gently, on burned down beams, on untended orchards
And so we ask for Tal, for dew of blessing, of peace…
Our prayer for rain came with terrorandrapeandmurderandtorture this year.
There was only one cardinal sin, and Zionism was to be an iron wall against it: to
never
again be victims.
While the enemies who breath violence still breath upon us, yes, indeed you will
Then to stop that breathing, at any cost of life or soul, is that the mission?
But what year-to-come, what world-to-come, can bring strong enough rain,
enough to wash away tears for the tens of thousands burned or buried
under sundered concrete, where the dew cannot reach?
And now the rains are come and gone.
But aggrievement wrought still works new grief,
so in Aza love becomes death-like, azah khamavet ahavah.
And so we ask for Tal, for dew of blessing, of peace…
Let it not be said, heavens, earth, will not give, for still do they give their dew, their fruits,
but their gifts of peace, of living lavetach in the land, those are stayed,
their stillness held imprisoned, or us imprisoned from their lack.
Still the kalaniyot, the poppies, burst forth just when they are supposed to,
not mourning,
feeling no pain
And so we ask for Tal, for dew of blessing, of peace…
Are there anyway sufficient drops in the ocean, to wear away the runnels
of desperation, of anger, of grief?
To wash away the hatred, impregnating the land like salt, like Eden’s mist?
Were all the heavens parchment and all the seas ink,
blah blah blah — why bother with one more scrap of liturgy,
why drop another poem for that matter?
as if this were normal,
and we can pretend to get back to normal times,
while the worst wend any path to freeze time still, or jump it forward
to end times, so there can be no reckoning
for themselves,
while these brothers and sisters, fathers mothers children, await, still, in darkness.
May waiting cease, for them to be brought out, from darkness to light, mei-afeilah l’orah.
And so we ask for Tal, for dew of blessing, of peace…
They will live, your dead, this corpse of Mine, they will rise up, awakening,
so the writ speaks.
They will sing, the ones dwelling
in sod and rot and dirt, or under collapsed buildings, or burned to ashes,
for it was said: a dew of lights comes a-dawning: that will be your dew, and the land —
the land will let fall its ghosts,
or drop them from its dewey womb, returned from death to some kind of life
And so we ask for Tal, for dew of blessing, of peace…
And those who sow war, let them let it lie fallow, or be felled, or failing.
And protect the innocent,
return them to their land that is also this land. Must we wait
til vengeance be consumed, deplete?
That dew of resurrection, secreted in the seventh heaven, called Aravot, waiting
to drop like mercy, gentler than the gentle rain, tizal katal...
Didn’t this god of ours promise: I will become like the dew to Israel.
Like a lily that land will flower, they will strike their roots,
as deep as the mountains of Lebanon,
as eternal as the hills, so that blessing be commanded forever, like dew upon
the mountains of Zion…
And so we ask for Tal, for dew of blessing, of life,
of peace…
©2024/5784, David Mevorach Seidenberg
* On October 7 (which was Shemini Atseret), we began reciting prayers for rain. On Passover, we end those prayers and begin reciting prayers for dew.
Verses/texts used:
Song of Songs 2:11, Psalm 27:12, Song of Songs 8:6, Haggai 1:10, Song of Songs 2:12, Isaiah 26:19, Job 38:28, Chagigah 12b, Deuteronomy 32:2, Hosea 14:6, Psalm 133:3