This is the story issued that can be read with the Orange that is added to the Seder plate.

Date:   4/17/2006 7:02:34 PM ( 18 y ago)

2. Passover Reflections
and new Rituals

Background

Why is There an Orange
on the Seder Plate?

{Add an orange to the traditional items on the Seder plate.
Ten invite someone to ask, "one more question, "as above, and tell
the following story in response:]

In the days long ago when women were just beginning to be rabbis,
Susannah Heschel was traveling in Florida, the Land of Oranges.
One night she spoke at a synagogue about the emerging equality
of women in Jewish Life--as rabbis, teachers and students of Torah,
synagogue presidents, and in all other ways.

After she spoke, a man arose in wrath, redwith fury.
"A woman belongs on the bimah [pulpit], he said,
"as much as an orange belongs on the Seder plate!"

So ever since that day, we place an orange on the Seder plate,
for it belongs there as a symbol that women belong wherever Jews
carry on a sacred life.

[Another Voice] And thereare those who add:
The orange carries within itself the seeds of its own rebirth.
When we went forth from the Narrow Place,
Mitzaiim, the Jewish people passed with a narrow birth canal
and broke the waters of the Red Sea, and so was born into the world.
The wisdom of women who were midwives made that birth psssible.

In our generation,the Jewish people is again giving birth to itself.
For the first time, women are sharing equally with men in bringing
this new birth to its fruition. So we must for the first time bring
to the Seder plate a fruit that carries, within, the seeds of its own
rebirth.

[Another Voice] Still others add; Every symbol on the Seder plate speaks
to us of the Divine Unfoldmens, the S'phirot. The tenth of the Unfoldings,
the S'phirah of Malkhut of Majesty, is the gathering-together of all the Divine
Energies, and that S'phirah is symbolized in the human body by the Womb,
in whicheach human life is gathered into wholeness on the verge of entering
the world.

Until now, none of the objects on the Seder plate has symbolized Malkhut:
the plate itself has been Malkhut. Malkhut has been the Unseen Ground
of Being, unpon wich alll visible history has happened. But tonight we make
visible the Gathering-place, Malkhut; tonight we place upon the field of being
the orange that is a visible echo of the Seder plate.

[Voice Together] Tonight women, rebirth, and Malkhut take their place
before the eyes of our reborn people. Tonight we palce the Orange on the Seder
plate.

This text originatedwith ALEPH:
Alliance for Jewish Renewal, 7318 Germantown Ave.,
Philadelphia, PA 19119 Phone 215/247-9700
Email: alephajr@aol.com

 

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