Loud-Mouth Jews and The Silent Seder

An Untold Passover Story From the Child Who Does Not Know How to Ask.

I never do this.

I never write the thing about the feelings.

I mean I do, you know, abstractly.

I’m a writer actually. I create new characters, new worlds, new rules.

Live in them. Feel from them. Move with them.

But me?

It’s hard to get me down on paper.

I don’t like to have a record of my thoughts and feelings.

Wouldn’t want to look back and be disappointed.

This week feels different though

I’m trying something new because it’s Passover. A holiday I associate with my cute little Nana reading from a children’s Haggadah, telling the story of the Israelites as if to a table of kindergarteners, though we are actually adults.

Smells are something like matzo ball soup, dusty fake flowers, old lady lipstick.

Sights are gelatinous gefilte fish, my papa snoring, my dad picking dill out of his teeth.

Feelings of boredom, discomfort, second-hand embarrassment, and when will it be over.

My family doesn’t really talk about Israel.

Of course they do in the casual abstract.

The “where we come from”, “where we’re going”, “next year in Jerusalem”; you know the drill.

But not really.

Don’t get me wrong, we have political opinions.

My Nana was a feminist, a supporter of gay rights, lover of democracy. She was also kind, open, and curious, ready to learn new things, excited to challenge herself. Pesach was her favorite holiday, with it’s themes of liberation, strength, and transformation.

My Nana also lost most of her family to the Holocaust, and critical discussion of Israel was not on the table.

So I waited.

Waited to better understand this holiday, or at least learn to care.

Hoping there was more to it than a coloring book of ten connect-the-dot plagues.

This week, many years later, I am at seders of my own. And they are great.

They are full of love and friendship and exploration. There’s lots of songs, and lots of jokes, and beautiful wonder. If my Seders are anything like yours then you too spend endless hours with loud-mouth jews, known for their stubborn opinions and empowered revelations, and you love them. You become family with these folks who will cook for you, and warm the room, and will fill your glass when it’s empty. And yet here I am, barely a glass of wine in, and finding it hard to keep it together.

Sometimes it is easier to numb yourself. Write off the complex. Avoid making statements. Shy away from taking sides or responsibility. We watch television and sign petitions, we do yoga and focus inward. But is it enough?

As the hours pass and we sing Dayenu I can’t help feeling like — No, it’s not.

I begin to think of Israel.

The Israel I never got to talk about. The Israel we’re still not talking about.

Because somehow at these seders when it comes to discussing freedom for the Palestinian people, a people our people are persecuting, we are suddenly very quiet.

The yelling across the table and sureness in our voices drops off.

Silence sets in.

This is familiar. This is learned.

We become the overwhelmed fourth child, who does not know how to ask questions. Unable to dive into the messiness that has been put on our plates. Afraid to empathize. Uncomfortable to engage. Unwilling to challenge ourselves. The mirror might crack, and then what?

I chat with people I’ve just met of a reality that is hard to comprehend.

What do we agree on? Where is our power? Are we wasting our breath? Why can’t we all get along?

There is so much to learn, more questions than answers, this shit is so hard.

We speak, as if in code, because the truth is ugly and we’re focusing on Moses.

And so I’m back at the plagues. Connecting-the-dots.

The old plagues, the new ones, the ones that haunt us, the ones we use to haunt others.

I watch the Pesach news reports roll in: The price of marching is death. 18 Palestinians murdered. A thousand more wounded. Teenage Israeli soldiers firing on unarmed Teenage Palestinians. The Israeli Prime Minister tweeting to his army with encouragement and congratulations (I mean talk about a Pharaoh).

But the children and grandparents are marching still, waving their flag, surviving in the absence of human dignity. Someone might throw a pebble, a rock, a tire; it could be all they have left to express the devastation. Their words will not be heard.

They persevere together for six more weeks (plus of course, a lifetime). A protest against a system of violence and oppression that denies their basic human rights. Speaking up under the most dire of circumstances, when their mere existence is already resistance.

We watch the Palestinians rise up like the Israelites did, yet we are trying to rewrite their story.

This is the contemporary plague currently befalling the Israelites, currently upon us;

The Occupation.

My Nana couldn’t say it, but I am proud to say it for her. To free myself from the grip of fear. To honor a legacy of righteousness. To lead my Jewish community into a new era.

It doesn’t make it less hard.

But for me, it is harder to do nothing.

I will not sit at a seder and pray for a peace that cannot happen without action. Dayenu

I will not prioritize my people’s pain at the cost of another’s. Dayenu

I will not expect this broken world to repair itself. Dayenu

We want to look back and know we we’re on the right side of history, but will we be?

I suppose it’s up to us.

Urging you to consider our mutual liberation this Passover season. “The season of our freedom.”

We are not free of this yet.

Chag Sameach. Tikkun Olam.

There are so many young people all across the country who believe in Jewish community, and it’s power to do better. An organization I am beyond passionate about called IfNotNow engages with the Occupation in an accessible way for american jews from all walks of life and jewish identity (or lack-there-of). The work we do comes from a place of love for our people and our history, with eyes wide open to this current moment. IfNotNow provides a warm space for critical thinking, skepticism, optimism, and confusion. I feel so grateful to be apart of a group that (in jewish tradition) does not shy away from questioning and uncertainty.

IfNotNow holds regular Orientation trainings in cities all over the country, and will be a community of over 10,000 Young American Jews by the end of this year. Attending one of these trainings, even if only to learn more about us, is an opportunity to bravely wrestle with this complex issue and DO something.