Maggid | Passover haggadah by Teresa Valeri

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Second Cup: Maggid, The Telling

All: “I have remembered My covenant.” Exodus 6:5

Host: As we read the history of our people from Ma'asei haShlihim, may the Everpresent Lord open our eyes to behold wondrous truths from His law.

Reader 1: Brothers and fathers, listen to me. Our glorious God appeared to our ancestor Abraham in Mesopotamia and said, ‘Leave your native land and your relatives, and come into the land which I will show you.’ God gave him no inheritance here, not even one square foot of land, but promised eventually the whole land would belong to Abraham and his descendants—though he had no children at that time. God also told him that his descendants would live in a foreign land, where they would be oppressed as slaves for 400 years. But He will punish that nation and in the end they will come out and worship Me here in this place.’

Reader 2: Abraham became the father of Isaac. Isaac became the father of Jacob. Then Jacob became the father of the twelve patriarchs of the Israelite nation.

These patriarchs were jealous of their brother Joseph and they sold him to be a slave in Egypt. But God was with him and rescued him from all his troubles. God gave him favor before Pharaoh, king of Egypt. God also gave Joseph unusual wisdom, so that Pharaoh appointed him governor over all of Egypt and put him in charge of the palace.

Reader 3: But a famine came upon Egypt and Canaan. There was great misery. Our ancestors ran out of food. Jacob heard there was still grain in Egypt. He sent his sons to buy some. When they returned a second time, Joseph revealed his identity to his brothers, and they were introduced to Pharaoh. Then Joseph sent for his father, Jacob, and all his relatives to come to Egypt, seventy-five persons in all. So Jacob moved to Egypt. He died there, as did our ancestors.

Reader 4: As the time drew near when God would fulfill His promise to Abraham, the number of our people in Egypt greatly increased. But then a new king came to the throne of Egypt who knew nothing about Joseph. This king exploited our people and oppressed them, forcing parents to abandon their newborn babies so they would die.

Reader 5: At that time Moses was born—a beautiful child in God’s eyes. His parents cared for him at home for three months. When they had to abandon him, Pharaoh’s daughter adopted him and raised him as her own son. Moses was taught all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and he was powerful in both speech and action.

Reader 6: One day when Moses was forty years old, he decided to visit his relatives, the people of Israel. He saw an Egyptian abusing an Israelite. So Moses came to the man’s defense and avenged him, killing the Egyptian. Moses assumed his fellow Israelites would realize God had sent him to rescue them, but they didn’t.

Reader 7: The next day he visited them again and saw two Hebrew men fighting. He tried to be a peacemaker. ‘Men,’ he said, ‘you are brothers. Why are you fighting each other?’

But the man in the wrong pushed Moses aside. ‘Who made you a ruler and judge over us?’ he asked. ‘Are you going to kill me as you killed that Egyptian yesterday?’ When Moses heard this, he fled the country and lived as a foreigner in the land of Midian.

Reader 8: Forty years later, in the desert near Mount Sinai, God appeared to Moses in the flame of a burning bush. When Moses saw it, he was amazed at the sight. As he went to take a closer look, the voice of Adonai called out to him, ‘I am the God of your ancestors—the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.’ Moses shook with terror and dared not look.

Reader 9: Then the ADONAI said to him, ‘Take off your sandals, for you are standing on holy ground. I have certainly seen the oppression of my people in Egypt. I have heard their groans and have come down to rescue them. Now go, for I am sending you back to Egypt.’

So God sent back the same man his people had rejected previously when they demanded, ‘Who made you a ruler and judge over us?’

Reader 10: By means of many wonders and miraculous signs, he led them out of Egypt, through the Red Sea, and through the wilderness for forty years. Moses himself told the people of Israel, ‘God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from among your people. You shall listen to Him.’ Moses was with our ancestors, the assembly of God’s people in the wilderness, when God spoke to him at Mount Sinai. And there Moses received life-giving words to pass on to us.

All: I am the God of your father…..The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. Exodus 3:6

haggadah Section: Maggid - Beginning