Tonight's seder for the second night of Passover also coincides with the end of Shabbat. Traditionally, an extra paragraph is added to the blessing over the first cup of wine to make the havdalah blessing for the end of Shabbat. We do not use the usual twisted candle for havdalah; the blessing for "eish" (fire) is made over the festival candles.

The blessing ends on what sounds like an odd note. Usually, at the end of the havdalah ritual, we bless God, hamavdil bein kodesh l'chol,  "who makes distinction between sacred and ordinary." That is, we acknowledge that God makes a distinction between Shabbat, a holy day, and the ordinary days of the week. Tonight, however, when Shabbat is immediately followed by a second day of the festival, the blessing changes to hamavdil bein kodesh l'kodesh, "the One who makes distinction between sacred and sacred."

We make a blessing to acknowledge that there is a difference between the sanctity of Shabbat and the sanctity of Passover. There is something interesting and, perhaps, even profound about the idea that sanctity comes in different flavors. The blessing seems to be an secret invitation for us to discover and name all the different families, genera and species of holiness.

Is there a holiness of human beings that is different from the holiness of plants and other animals? In Jewish tradition, we make blessings for getting out of bed in the morning, for drinking a glass of water, and for using the bathroom. Do each of these everyday activities have a different type of holiness? Is the holiness of a sunrise different from the holiness of a sunset? 

Whenever I meet with people in my synagogue office, I try to recognize each person as a holy representation of the image of God. It is helpful, somehow, to recognize that each person may posses a different kind of holiness. We each are different and each bring a different aspect of divinity into the world. Blessed is the One who makes distinction between my sacredness and your sacredness.

To carry the thought a bit further, there is also this. The day I married my wife is sacred to me. The day each of my children was born is sacred to me, and each in different ways. The day each of my grandparents died, the day I first walked in the land of Israel, the day I became a rabbi, the day that I began to serve the congregation that is my spiritual home…all of these moments are sacred to me, each in its own way. 

Part of the challenge of religious living is to seek out the holiness in each moment. Each experience and each moment of our lives can be sacred in a different way. Whether it is a moment when I am laughing with my children, a moment when I am frustrated with a student, a moment when I am washing the dishes, or a moment when I am holding the hand of a person who is sick, each moment can be a holy moment in the rainbow of holy moments. 

Baruch Atah Adonai, Eloheinu Melech Ha-Olam, Hamavdil bein Kodesh l'Kodesh.


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My younger daughter and I made matzah yesterday evening. (It’s surprisingly easy). I do this most years in preparation for Passover and we use the homemade matzah to fulfill the mitzvah of eating matzah at the seder. My daughter begged to help me; making matzah is a lot of fun for kids.

I had this moment of realization while making the matzah that seems to strike me every year, as if for the first time. While squishing the dough between my fingers, I remembered why all matzah must be baked before the holiday begins. Once Passover starts, no more matzah can be made.

The reason is surprising, simple and paradoxical: It is impossible to make matzah without also making chameitz.

So, I need to give a bit of background here. Matzah is the flat, unleavened bread that is eaten during Passover as a sacred obligation. It is made by combining flour and water, mixing them quickly, and placing the flattened dough into a very hot oven within eighteen minutes, before it has time to rise.

We usually think of chameitz as the opposite of matzah. It is any food made from grain that is not matzah. Bread, cookies, cake, beer, pasta, cereal and grain-based liquors are all examples of chameitz. All are forbidden during Passover. Chameitz, during Passover, represents our “puffy” egos and inflated sense of self. Not only is it not permitted to eat these foods, according to traditional Jewish law, one is not even permitted to own chameitz during Passover. 

And this is the reason why you cannot make matzah during Passover. In the simple act of combining flour and water, chameitz is a necessary by-product. Any water-flour combination that does not enter the oven within eighteen minutes becomes chameitz. 

As I was making the matzah with my daughter, we were constantly cleaning off the white, sticky dough that covered the rolling pins, the counter, our hands and our aprons like glue. All of it becomes chameitz; all of it would be forbidden to be in our house after Passover begins on Friday evening.

This is the paradox of matzah and chameitz. They are not really opposites. Rather, the distinction is only in the arbitrary conceit that flour and water turn into chameitz in eighteen minutes. Matzah and chameitz are separated only by the fire of the oven and the fire of our imaginations. 

There is a teaching about this narrow distinction between matzah and chameitz based on the similar spellings of the two words in Hebrew. Matzah is spelled mem, tzadi, hey. chameitz is tzadi, mem, chet. The two words are as close to each other as the two letters hey (ה) and chet (ח)—distinguished only by a small gap in the hey. The only difference between matzah and chameitz is in that gap, a narrow space in which we allow God to enter.

The fact that we cannot make matzah without making chameitz reminds us during Passover that we cannot create any holiness in our lives without also introducing the possibility of its shadow. We cannot make ourselves more holy without also introducing arrogance and self-aggrandizement into our egos. We cannot purify ourselves spiritually without also risking the possibility that we will thereby separate ourselves from others. Like matzah and chameitz, sacred holiness and gross arrogance are not really opposites. They are separated only by the small gap of how we invite God into our consciousness.

The matzah we made with our own hands is, like us, both spiritual and earthy. It is bound up in the sweat and labor of ploughing fields, growing grain, grinding, kneading and baking. At the same time, it is elevated to the sacred by careful attention to our intentions. By noticing the subtle differences between pious humility and arrogant self-righteousness, between hey and chet, between matzah and chameitz, we discover how we can be both material and divine.


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There is no Jewish ritual that requires more planning than the Passover seder. It is not just the cleaning and removal of chameitz from the house. It is not just the meal planning, the shopping, the baking and cooking. It is not just setting the table, reviewing the Haggadah, and planning the seder. On top of all of that, the really hard part is doing it all in ways that inspire us, spiritually move us, and fill us with joy. 

Here are some ways to plan joy into your seder:

1) Answering children's questions is the main purpose of the seder and it is the experience that gives the seder a heart and soul. Get started early on helping the children attending your seder to have questions that they are genuinely curious about. Read Passover stories with them and start writing down the questions they ask. Even better, get them to tell you the story and find the questions together with them. The haggadah reminds us that we have an obligation to teach each child in a way that is appropriate to his or her abilities and interests. Make sure that you get older and more curious children to ask deeper questions in a way that will keep them interested—How do we experience slavery in our lives today? Where is Pharaoh in the world today and where is Pharaoh in our own hearts?

2) Keep a balance between traditions and new innovations. Many of the joys of the seder come from doing things exactly as they have been done in the past—with cherished ritual objects, favorite recipes, and the little details that make the seder your own. Be aware, though, of the places where traditions have outlived their purpose or have grown stale. My family use to conduct our seder under a tent in the living room as a way to give us more room and make the seder more exciting for the kids. After a few years, though, the innovation turned into a just another "thing we're supposed to do," so we dropped it. Try at least one new thing every year.

3) Don't turn the Haggadah into an idol. I love the poetry of the Haggadah, but I know that there are plenty of seders in which reading the words becomes more important than finding meaning in them. It is helpful to remember that the Haggadah developed over centuries. In its original form, the Haggadah was little more than an outline of topics and a series of suggestions for conducting the seder. Give the Haggadah its due, but make sure its message doesn't get swallowed up in its words.

4) Sing. Sing. Sing. The seder has some of the funniest and oddest music in the entire repertoire of Jewish liturgy. Enjoy it and sing it out. When else during the Jewish year do we sing a sacred song about how "it would have been enough" for God to deliver us from Egypt even if we never got the Torah? How odd is it that we ask our children to sing a song of questions that we never completely answer? Who can explain a song that is the Jewish equivalent of "There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly"? Have fun with them all.

5) Share your seder. There is a moment in the seder in which we open the door and invite all who are hungry to join us. It should not be just a symbolic gesture. There are plenty of people who hunger for food and there are plenty of people who hunger for spiritual and community connection. Invite them to your seder and discover how much more joyful your seder can be when you welcome others to join you, especially those who may not otherwise have any seder to attend.

What are your suggestions for a more joyful seder? Let us know in the comments.

I think this is why people like weddings so much. Each wedding has a bit of an other-worldly quality. Watching two people come together, we believe in the possibility of new beginnings. We believe that the mistakes of the past can be erased and that people can restore all of their original hopes unblemished. We see in each wedding the possibility of a world remade as it was intended to be made from the first.

The imagery of the Jewish wedding ceremony is built around this theme. The blessings that conclude a Jewish wedding turn the flesh-and-blood bride and groom into metaphors for the world's creation and its fulfillment. The sixth of the traditional Seven Blessing declares, "Gladden these loving companions, as was Your joy in Your creations in the Garden of Eden of old. Blessed are You, Adonai, who brings joy to groom and bride." With a bit of poetry, we transform the couple into the first lovers who embraced each other without a clue about the harsh and frustrating realities of building a marriage for the long-term. We see the couple, instead, as perfect, immersed in a love that can wash away all difficulties.

And then, as suddenly as we turned the couple into Adam and Eve, we then take them to the other end of reality. The seventh wedding blessing sees the couple as harbingers of the world's final fulfillment: "Blessed are You, Adonai our God, ruler of eternity, who created rejoicing and joy, groom and bride, celebration, song, dance and merriment, love and friendship, peace and companionship. Quickly, Adonai our God, may the sound of rejoicing and joy, the sound of groom and bride, be heard in the cities of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem, the sound of happiness of bridegrooms from their bridal canopy and of the youths from their joyous feasts. Blessed are You, Adonai, who makes groom rejoice with the bride."

Even though we know that life is difficult and building a happy marriage is hard work—despite all that—we are ready to hear a voice at each wedding that announces the redemption of the world. We are ready to have our pessimism proved wrong. We are ready to see in that couple—the ones with the eyes brightly shining at each other—a reminder that there are moments in life when all the pain, difficulty and frustration is wiped away. We find redemption in the couple's joy as we remember that life is sweet when we live it deeply caring for one another. 

The couple I married today is too wise and too experienced to think that every groom is a prince and every bride is a princess on their wedding day. But they also are wise enough and experienced enough to realize that there is an even deeper joy than the Disney cliche.

Better than any fairytale is this truth about life: We are made for each other. We discover ourselves only when we experience life as part of a larger whole. As brides and grooms, we become timeless. Our individual stories are merged into the one great story that spans from creation to redemption. We become, in that moment, the radiant beings we were always meant to be.

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