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Telling the Story Part 1
Contributed by Lily Kaplan

  • TOP HAGGADAHS FOR 2023

The symbols and the story of Passover reflect the struggles against injustice, both old and new.

This is the story of Pesach. Let us turn to our ancient tradition.
During a famine, Jews came to Mitzrayim. Their children multiplied and prospered.
They held important positions and played an important role in the political, cultural, and economic life of the country. The old Pharaoh died, and there arose a new Pharaoh, who said: “Look! The Jewish people are too mighty for us.” So Pharaoh put the Jews into labor gangs and set taskmasters over them with heavy loads. He made them slaves and treated them harshly.

In spite of the many cruel decrees of Pharaoh, the Jewish people continued to live and grow strong. Hard work could not destroy them. Pharaoh now hit on a new and more terrible plan. He commanded the Jewish midwives to kill every boy born to a Jewish family. The heroic midwives defied this decree. They continued to help the women give birth and their babies grew healthy and strong.

Shortly thereafter, two defiant midwives, Shifra and Pu-ah helped a son to be born into the house of Levi, to Yocheved and her husband Amram. Yocheved, frightened by Pharaoh's law, hid her son in a basket and placed it on the River Nile.

Pharaoh's daughter rescued the baby; the baby’s sister Miriam, who was hiding in the bulrush plants, offered to find a woman to nurse him. She ran to get Yocheved, the baby’s mother. So Moses, Moishe, which means, “drawn from the water,” was raised by his own mother, his sister, and the Pharaoh’s daughter.

He grew up as a prince, but aware that he was a Jew. One day he tried to stop a taskmaster from beating a slave. Moses hit the taskmaster and accidentally killed him. He was forced to flee the palace. The story goes that one day he saw a bush that was on fire and yet alive and green. Moses saw this as a sign that he must rescue the Jewish people from slavery. Moses saw his people's suffering in Mitzrayim and wanted to set them free. Some say that Moses was the first community organizer, helping Jews see their treatment as unjust and leading them in a fight against oppression and an escape to freedom, building a sense of unity and peoplehood.

The story says that ten plagues ravished Mitzrayim, and then Pharaoh finally agreed to let the Israelites leave. Soon after, however, Pharaoh had a change of heart and mobilized his soldiers to recapture the Jewish slaves, who were now on the shores of the Red Sea. The Jews looked back and saw Pharaoh’s army approaching. The only way out was to jump into the sea before them. According to the book of Exodus, the sea parted, creating a path.

Legend has it that the waters did not divide until one man, Nachshon, walked into the sea. As he walked in, the water rose above his ankles, above his knees, above his waist, above his shoulders, above his mouth and nose - and he kept walking. In doing so he acted as a free person ready to take the ultimate risk for his freedom, and only then did the waters of the Red Sea part for the Jews to walk through. When they reached the other side, the waters flowed back together, catching the army of Mitzrayim and drowning them.

When the Jewish people had crossed the Red Sea, they looked back at Pharaoh’s army and realized that they who were drowning had suffered as well. The Israelites’ joy at escaping slavery was not complete because of the suffering of the others.
haggadah Section: -- Exodus Story

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