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A Passover Message from Jerusalem

Dear Steven,

I received an email from a friend in Jerusalem talking about the coming of Passover, and I wanted to share some of the preparations that are being made in the Holy City with you:

Shabbat Shalom dear friends - the countdown is on!!!

Jerusalem is so clean! I swear that the white stones are glistening, the streets gleaming, and the parks have not one sweet wrapper on the ground as we prepare for the last run-up to Passover!!! Despite the wonderful orange blossoms on the trees the predominant scent is of cleaning fluids!

The shouk, Mahane Yehuda, is buzzing and the multi-coloured mountains of newly picked fruit and vegetables are grabbed as if going out of style. In the markets, the fish are jumpin' in the springtime, too. Carp, traditionally used to make gefilte fish, is so fresh that it is bought alive, and I won't describe the other part! Remember the supermarket I went to last week that had nothing on the shelves because they were cleaning them all? Well this week, even the wide passageways were filled to overflowing, and the streets around Givat Shaul were lined with huge delivery trucks trying hard to keep up with demand!

I have not seen my neighbours for a week or two, but I can hear them. The constant hum of vacuum cleaners and furniture being dragged to clean behind, the thud of carpet beating on verandas and the sound of scrubbing as apartments and houses are prepared for Passover. The sense of spiritual cleansing is deep in our souls, and the excitement of the new and fresh days to come make it all worthwhile. However - it is important to remember that Passover is the festival that celebrates our delivery from slavery so please - don't overdo it!

Seder, the order of reading the story of the Exodus from Egypt, is brilliantly put together. We eat herbs, we bless the wine, the children ask four essential questions: "Why is this night different from all other nights?" pertaining to our behaviour on this night; the host then reads the story to explain to the children so that they will also make their nights different to all other nights and respect our incredible achievements for a nation that has been in slavery not once but many times.

We eat unleavened bread - to appreciate the simple essentials of life of a free man.

We eat a hard boiled egg in salt water - to celebrate new life embodied in an egg, combined with the tears we shed in slavery.

We eat bitter herbs, herbs and a delicious combination - to remember the bitterness, to celebrate the green of new growth and to remember the cement between the stones of the incredible structures we built in slavery.

We eat........... and eat............ and eat........... and eat!!! Oh yes, predominantly we eat after reading the story, and then we thank G-d for what we have eaten, we put out wine for the Prophet Elijah who visits each home (not down the chimney, though), and then we sing special songs.

One friend from California asked me what Jerusalemites say on Seder Night since the whole Jewish world invokes the prayer "Next Year in Jerusalem" at the end of the Passover Seder (literally means order but has become a term for the meals at which we recite the story of Exodus), but we are already here. I told him the prayer is not just a personal prayer; it is a prayer for the whole Jewish people. Here we it sing with extra gusto so that you will come here, too - "NEXT YEAR IN JERUSALEM" ......... next year and the year after that and the year after that and after that and after that............ ad infinitum. AMEN.

I wish you a happy and kasher Pesach - with love from Jerusalem where it all started!



http://jerusalemprayerteam.org/