Tonight, beginning at sundown, is the first day of Passover for Jews around the world. It’s the holiday that commemorates our escape from slavery in Egypt thousands of years ago.
As I struggle to clean my apartment of chametz (anything that contains yeast) today while watching the Red Sox and catching up on homework, I wanted to leave my reader with the following:
- Here is a post I wrote that discusses the Exodus and how it relates to the current debate in the United States over immigration. Jews were once strangers in a strange land, and now we need to remember that immigrants in America — and Arabs in Israel, for that matter – are the same.
- The venerable Adin Steinsaltz: Passover’s theme of redemption reminds us of the World to Come. What can each of us — Jew, Christian, Muslim, atheist, Buddhist, Hindu or whatever – do to make this world a better place?
- What would Moses do? Great leaders are humble and put their people before themselves. Israel’s current leaders should remember this.
Some things to think about.
Elsewhere: Jonahan Tobin writes that Passover should inspire Diaspora Jews to defend Israel in the face of new anti-Semitism from the Left. Ha’aretz editorializes that some things haven’t changed on this night: the government’s ineptness. Slate’s Shmuel Rosner examines why there isn’t a Passover-Easter delimma like the Chanuka-Christmas one. Contributors to the Jerusalem Post state that an anti-Semitic lie involving matzah still exists today. James Carroll explores the tension between Judaism and Christianity at this time of year.
