When Moses first approached Pharaoh to request that the Israelites be set free, Pharaoh refused, saying that he did not recognize the God of the Jewish people. God responded by sending a series of ten plagues. After each of these, Moses again asked
Pharaoh to free the people, and each time Pharaoh refused—or agreed, only for God to harden his heart. Finally, after the tenth and worst plague – the killing of the first-born sons of Egypt– Pharaoh let the Israelites go.


Even as we are grateful for our freedom, we are pained by the knowledge that our freedom came from the suffering of the Egyptian people. The tradition reminds us that whenever people are oppressed, the oppressors suffer as well.

As we recite each plague, we dip a finger in our wineglass and spill out one drop
of wine, thereby acknowledging that our own joy is diminished by the memory of
Egyptian suffering.

Blood | dam |דָּם

Frogs | tzfardeiya |צְפַרְדֵּֽעַ

Lice | kinim |כִּנִּים

Beasts | arov |עָרוֹב

Cattle disease | dever |דֶּֽבֶר

Boils | sh’chin |שְׁחִין

Hail | barad |בָּרָד

Locusts | arbeh |אַרְבֶּה

Darkness | choshech |חֹֽשֶׁךְ

Death of the Firstborn | makat b’chorot |מַכַּת בְּכוֹרוֹת


haggadah Section: -- Ten Plagues