Now is the time for a special game of hide-and-seek. We must hide the Afikomen --a piece of matzah that will be the very last thing we eat at the end of our Seder meal.

On our table we have three pieces of matzah. We will take the middle piece and break it in half. One half will stay with the other two pieces. The other half will become our Afikomen which we will hide during the Seder.

This matzah is the bread of affliction--the bread of poverty and sorrow--that our ancestors ate when they were slaves in the land of Egypt.

What is matzah? Special bread made without leaven or yeast so it cannot rise. Why do we eat matzah on Passover? Because matzah reminds us that we had to escape from Egypt so quickly that there was no time for bread to rise. It also reminds us of the poor food we ate when we were salves. Breaking the matzah into pieces reminds us that when we were hungry, we had very little to eat. When we were slaves, we never had enough food to save for later.

Leader:

Someone please open our door as we say these words together:

Let anyone who is hungry come and eat. Let anyone who is a stranger, anyone homeless or poor, share with us the hope of Passover. For we know how it feels to be a stranger in a strange land.


haggadah Section: Yachatz
Source: The Family Haggadah