Tag: Hosting a seder

Which Haggadah, Rabbi?

One of my students asked this evening about suggestions for Passover Haggadot (plural of Haggadah) and books about Passover. What a great idea!

Keep in mind that the Haggadah is merely a script for the evening. What you choose to do with it is up to you: do everything, do only some parts, add favorite bits from other haggadot, do parts of it as skits, interpretive dance, whatever. OK, I was mostly kidding about the interpretive dance. But if that idea excites you, please send video! My point is, it’s your seder, do it in a way that will be meaningful for you and the people at your table!

A complete set of haggadot can be a considerable investment, unless you inherit some or use the free ones that some grocery stores in big cities give away. The absolute best way to buy one is to go to a real bookstore and browse them: hold them in your hands, see how the pages turn, feel the weight, imagine them on your table. Look at the pictures or lack thereof, look at the text. If you must buy via the Internet, then buy one or two and try them out before you take the plunge.

The other possibility is that maybe you want to collect haggadot and mix and match the contents for your own seder. More about that in another post.

Haggadot (hah-gah-DOTE)

ChildrensHA Children’s Haggadah, Text by Rabbi Howard Bogot and Rabbi Robert Orkand, Illustrated and designed by Devis Grebu. I especially like this one when there are going to be children and/or folks who are new to the seder. It’s very well done but also quite simple.

goldbergPassover Haggadah, by Nathan Goldberg. A traditional haggadah text, with both English and Hebrew. Pages and lines are numbered which will help after two glasses of wine. (“Where are we now?”)

HaggadahCCARA Passover Haggadah,  Rabbi Herbert Bronstein, ed. Illustrated by Leonard Baskin. This classic has been around many seder tables for years.

 

diffnighthA Different Night, the Family Participation Haggadah, by David Dishon and Noam Zion. This book changed my whole approach to the seder. I used to feel bound by the seder and terribly anxious if we skipped anything. This book made me feel free to tailor the seder to the group at the table, and seders have been much better ever since. There is also a “compact edition” of this that you can buy to have at each place at the table (less expensive, and easier to handle.) The “leader’s edition” really qualifies not only as a Haggadah but also as a book about Passover.

santacruzhThe Santa Cruz Haggadah, by Karen G.R. Rockard. Affectionately known at my house as “that hippie haggadah,” this is another personal favorite. Besides the bizarro name (it was written in 1991 in Santa Cruz, CA – there are no “holy crosses” in it, I promise!) it has cartoony illustrations and lots of alternative readings about tikkun olam, our responsibility to heal the world. You’ll either love it or hate it. It, too, comes in a “leaders edition” and a “participant’s version.”

Beautiful Haggadot

Some haggadot are gorgeous art books and not really intended for the table. OR they are commentaries on the haggadah, intended more for the study table in the weeks leading up to the seder. Either way, they can be wonderful to own in addition to the regular haggadot you will stain with wine and brisket gravy. Trust me: you do not want to juggle an art book or a ten pound commentary at the seder table!

I have mentioned a few of my personal favorite haggadot. I’d like your help in expanding this list: what’s your favorite haggadah to actually use at the seder table? Please tell us about it in the comments with enough information for readers to find a copy!

Happy preparations, everyone!

 

Seven Things to Do to Make Your First Passover Seder a Success

Image

So:  This year you are going to host your own Passover seder!  You’ve decided that this year it’s going to be at Your House.  Alternatively, someone else has decided that this year it’s going to be at Your House. Either way, you are now feeling a mixture of excitement and dread, because this is the first time you’ve hosted.  Here are seven tips for making your first seder one that you will remember with a smile, or maybe a laugh.

1.  PARTNER, DIVIDE, and CONQUER!  Your partner may be your spouse, your beloved, your roommate, your best friend, or the other Jew in your book group.  The point is, you don’t want to do this alone.  One of you is going to be in charge of food  and the other in charge of setting the table and leading the seder.  Don’t be fooled by the word “leader:” these two roles are co-equal and equally critical to success.  During the first part of the seder, both of you will be busy.  One of you will serve as Maestro/a of Ceremonies, making sure that things move along, that everyone participates, that everyone has a good time, etc.  The Food Czar will be monitoring final developments in the kitchen, or monitoring the warming of potluck dishes, or making sure the cat stays out of the kugel, while supervising the movement of greens, salt water, wine, grape juice, and other necessities.

2.  CHOOSE a HAGGADAH.  Your first seder is not the time to roll your own Haggadah (that’s next year.)   You need at least one Haggadah for every two participants, and really, each guest having their own is best.  This is one reason the Maxwell House Haggadah and other free ones are so popular.  The Maestro/a of Ceremonies should read the Haggadah well ahead of the actual seder, cover to cover.  Consider possibilities:  if you find, mid-evening, that you need to skip, where do you intend to shorten things?  Are there other readings or stories or games you have experienced at other seders you’d like to include?  If you are adding things to your seder, make sure to have as many copies as you need.

3.  PLAN YOUR GUEST LIST.  Yes, I know that your Great Aunt Sadie always had at least 50 people at her seders.  Trust me, she started small too.  In my experience, a minyan [10 people] is a nice maximum for a first seder. Think about dishes.  Think about where everyone will sit.  Think about whether you can cook for this number, or if you will be potluck.  Think about the ratio of seder “veterans” to newbies.  A minyan of people who have never been to a seder trying to have a seder is adventurous but might result in 40 years lost looking for the afikomen, or even trying to figure out what the afikomen is.

Note:  if you have inherited the family seder, and like it or not you will have 50 people in your home for your first time seder, grab the relative with whom you feel the most comfortable and level with him or her about exactly how freaked-out you are.  Ask for help. Humbly accept help. Keep reading this list, there is still stuff here that will be useful to you.

4.  PLAN THE MENU.  Rabbi Noam Zion, in his wonderful book, A Night To Remember, pointed out than in the ancient seder, no one sat starving for hours while we told the story. The scrap of soggy parsley you had at seder years ago could also be a bountiful plate of crudités with dip for everyone to nosh [snack] on while you tell the story and talk about what it means. Keep the parsley on the seder plate, and have a nice plate of celery, endive, and other crunchy goodies for everyone — then you won’t need a salad for the meal.  As for the meal itself, let the Food Czar decide what he or she wants to wrangle and how.  Whatever you choose, avoid foods that require last minute fussing.

Note:  Not all of your guests may be of the same mind about what constitutes kosher-for-Passover food.  Check in with any guest you expect will have a strong opinion on the subject, so that you can plan for everyone’s comfort.  If the meal is potluck, make sure that guests who may not know anything about Passover food are assigned something specific, lest they show up with home baked bread or some other labor-intensive inappropriate food.  Hospitality is a Jewish value, and embarrassing a guest is a Jewish sin.

5.  CONSIDER THE TABLE.  Maestro/a of Ceremonies: if your group has several young children, plan entertainment for them:  crayons, finger food, costumes, age-appropriate activities.  Join in the children’s activities, lest the children suspect they are being snookered.  If you have a table full of adults, the Maestro/a of Ceremonies should be ready with some leading questions or statements or a clipped article to get a lively discussion rolling.  Most adults have at least one part of their lives in which they feel they are in servitude, or one wild plan for a jailbreak from that servitude:  the trick is to free them to talk about it.  The wine will help. Speaking of which:

6.  PREPARE THE WINE.  The seder is planned around four cups of wine.  Even if you are absolutely certain that everyone at the table will be over 18 and is not a recovering alcoholic, have a bottle of grape juice handy.  No one should have to drink a glass of alcohol after they feel they’ve had enough.  By the same token, make sure your table setting includes water glasses and water.  Sweet kosher wine is a love/hate thing: some love it, some hate it.  I put both Manischewitz and a “nicer” kosher for Passover wine on my table, to accomodate both.

The Maestro/a of Ceremonies might want to have a joke about the Red Sea ready for the almost-inevitable spilled glass of something.

7. REMEMBER, THERE IS ALWAYS NEXT YEAR.  The purpose of the seder is to tell the story of freedom in a way that will make it a part of everyone around the table.  It is a shared experience that will build memories for the group at the table.  Have fun with it.  Some of the best seders I’ve been to involved spilled wine, crumbs everywhere, a burnt side dish, and a lot of laughter.   If you skip something in the haggadah, or you forget a dish, or the dessert melts, it isn’t the end of the world.  After all, every year at the close of the evening, we remind ourselves that Passover will come again next year.

What advice do you have for someone hosting a first seder?