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Kadesh
A Toast to Freedom
Freedom is the natural state of man. Free him of all outside forces that limit and inhibit him, and you have a free human being. Passover embodies a far more ambitious freedom...  2 Comments | |
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Urchatz
Washing Hands
Passover is so much the festival of the child. For it is the child who opens our eyes to the ultimate significance of Passover... | |
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Karpas
The Appetizer
Man is in essence a spiritual being, so his very birth and enmeshment in a material body and life is an exile... | |
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Yachatz
Break the Matzah
Man posseses both a land and sea personality. The ultimate challenge for man is not only to be a fish, but to be a fish in the midst of the land... 2 Comments | |
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Maggid
Retelling the Story
But there are also children who are of a far-off tomorrow. Children who inhabit a distant world, who speak a distant language and relate to distant values... | |
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Rachtzah
Washing Hands
By defining the extent and the nature of our material involvements, Torah extricates our capacity for infinite and non-definitive commitment from its material exile... | |
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Motzie Matzah
Thank G-d for Bread, Bless the Matzah
Faith may hover in some neutral space above one’s everyday self. It may move him to a frenzy of action, but nothing in him has changed. Soon his euphoria wanes... | |
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Maror
Bitter Herbs
The mind can come to understand that suffering refines man. But, ultimately, why must it be this way? You, G-d, could have ordered reality so that there is gain without pain... | |
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Korech
Sandwich
Then there are those elements that are as qualified a building material as raw clay: our selfish and animalistic instincts, and a material world that obscures the truth of its Creator... | |
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Shulchan Orech
Festive Meal
In essence, matter is no less a creation of G-d, and no less capable of serving and expressing His truth, than spirit... 2 Comments | |
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Tzafun
Out of Hiding
Any moment, the pagan mores and slave mentality which still pervaded our minds and hearts may re-assert themselves. We were escaping Pharaoh, and we were escaping ourselves... 2 Comments | |
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Beirach
Grace after the Meal
The culminating level of redemption—its "I will bring you into the land" element, which shall be fully realized only in the era of Moshiach—transcends human efforts... | |
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Hallel
Songs of Praise
When the sea split, trees grew from the sea bed; the children fed the fruits of these trees to the birds, who joined the Jewish people in their singing of praise... | |
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Nirtzah
Acceptance
The Seder never concludes. Its message endures throughout the year. A Jew leaves Egypt every day by transcending his limitations... 1 Comment | |
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