Category: Pesach Through the Years
The Four Questions
The hagada is transmitting lights and instructions on many levels. There is information about history and many deep secrets about how the universe works and what freedom really means.
This Year…. Next Year….
Is there such a thing as a "free gift," and is it something to pray for and believe in?
Fifteen Stages of the Pesach Seder
Is there such a thing as a "free gift," and is it something to pray for and believe in?
The Seder as a Meditation on MATZAH
As we evolve and enlighten in the course of the evening we project a whole string of meanings and transformations onto that matzah.
Fifteen Stages of the Pesach Seder
The Fifteen Stages That Form the Backbone of Our Pesach Ritual and trace the soul’s journey from conception, birth, childhood, maturity and, finally, enlightenment.
Symbolic Resonance Permeates the Seder
Pesach 5778 / 2018 We start the seder by pronouncing the fifteen steps that comprise the ritual which marks the birthday of our peoplehood.
Blessed Be the Makom…Blessed Be the Giver of Torah…
Pesach 5777 / 2017 HaMakom refers to the womblike vacuum produced by the cosmic tsimtsum that hosts the unfolding of creation from Bereshit till the end of time.
A Short Discourse on Freedom
Pesach 2016 /5776 The reward phase of history called the world-to-come is characterized by unfettered freedom.
Elijah the Peacemaker
Pesach 2015 / 5775 Who is Elijah? What does he have to do with the seder? Why do we recite verses of vengeance when he arrives?
Plagues by Land…Plagues by Sea
Pesach 2014 / 5774 How deep did the lessons of the plagues absorb into the nerve net of the Egyptians and bring tikun there?
Tsafun—Afikoman
Pesach 5773 / 2013 The 12th step in our seder, Tsafun, marks the time for “dessert” which, at the seder, means our last portion of matzah, called the Afikoman.
Lavan the Aramean
Lavan becomes the prototype of the irrational component of anti-semitism, the Jew-hatred that pops up for no good reason.
Tikkun of Speech: Pesach 2011
On Pesach, our bodies were released from slavery and we literally exited the country, but a more fundamental deliverance unfolded beneath the surface.
Inviting Our Inner Stranger
Pesach Teaching 2010 / 5770. This is the bread of affliction that our fathers ate in the land of Egypt. All who are hungry, let them come and eat.
The Inevitable Fall From Grace: Pesach 2009
The sedar is a ritual meditation—a symbolic reenactment of our journey from exile to redemption. The whole point of a ritual is to bring light, fixing and healing into the deepest layers of the soul.
Matzah: Bread of Humility
The Ari declares that “on sedar night a conception occurred, and seven days later was the birth.” Yet what is this Kenesset Yisrael that was “conceived” on sedar night and born at the sea?
Slavery, Redemption and Matzah
Thoughts on Slavery, Redemption and Matzah;
Based on teachings by the Freidiker Rebbe of Chabad
The Removal of Chametz
Everyone knows that on Pesach, the removal of all chametz (leavened grains) from our household mirrors the removal of inflated ego states from our personalities.
“Pesach is the Conception”
On Pesach eve, the soul of Israel made contact with its body, i.e., the 600,000 families then under Moses’ charge. The Mystical Body of Israel was conceived on seder night.
The Secret of Eating at the Seder
Rabbi Tsadok HaKohen says that humanity's first sin was not Adam and Eve's eating of forbidden fruit, but rather the way they ate it.