passover 2010

Passover 2010 Story: The four themes & Seder meal

Its Passover time for 2010, or Pesach, as it’s known in Hebrew, and it’s the Jewish practice that’s most widespread across the world. A lot of people are not sure what Passover is really all about so we’ll try to give you some idea. It really all revolves around the concept of liberation and how we all need to free ourselves from our personal Egypt, or “tight spot”.

Passover is a celebration of making that move for freedom or ridding ourselves from oppression and is marked in many ways. Brad Hirschfield, via the Huffington Post, feels that there are 4 main themes to Passover. Principle One involves expanding our scope of empathy, listening to people in need and helping out where we can.

Principle Two involves questioning everything, and as much as possible, as questioning signifies freedom, even if we don’t always like the answers. Principle Three is all about liberation and remembering that while this means being free, it cannot be gained by not having obligations to others, or not being accountable for our actions.

Finally Principle Four is a reminder of the importance of people in our lives, from inviting people to sit for dinner together, and recognizing the significance of kinship and friendship. One of the special Passover traditions is the ritual Seder dinner, which represents togetherness of people. So here in a nutshell is what Passover is all about, and we hope you can celebrate your own personal path to liberation, whatever that may be.