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We are all refugees
Contributed by Steve Abrams

  • TOP HAGGADAHS FOR 2023

For a Refugee Seder

3½ years ago, a tiny Syrian boy, Alan Kurdi, washed up on a Turkish beach, along with drowned refugees trying to reach Europe. Photos of this young child, face down in the sand with his tiny red T-shirt, captured world attention. It was one of many reminders of people fleeing their homes to escape civil unrest and warfare. United Nation statistics show 65.3 million people displaced by war and persecution around the world. While the refugee crisis is not new, it has become more critical with the election of a new president in the United States who is determined to "secure our borders." American borders have been closed and immigration severely limited, and Moslems are often demonized because of extremist elements.

It wasn't so long ago Jewish refugees found themselves literally in the same boat as those people who are now fleeing unrest. On the eve of World War II, Americans closed the border to Jews fleeing Nazi persecution. The SS St. Louis came from Germany and docked in Havana and off the Florida coast. For 10 days, the captain tried to negotiate release of its 937 refugees. Those refugees were not given sanctuary in their hour of need. After refusals by Cuba, Canada, and America, they returned to Europe, where many were murdered in concentration camps. Their trip is still called the "Voyage of the Damned."

All of us live in a ship called Exodus
Overcrowded and stuffed with lost memories
On the verge of sinking into hidden depths.
We hold on and to each other
And hope for the Promised Land ahead.
All of us have passed through the straits,
Have fought the terror that holds us down.
We feel the press of prison walls,
Of mind and metal, of dark emotions
And some can say, I've passed this way before.
All of us have felt the coldness of the Nile,
The bitterness of mortar Made without appreciation.
The harshness of human demands
We've built a world for someone else,
All of us have been there and some remain.

As we celebrate Passover this year, we focus on the plight of refugees around the world and the policies of our nation toward those seeking asylum. A simple reading of the Haggadah's verse Arami Oved Avi could be "My father was a fugitive Aramean." This could be Abraham, who left Aram in search of his destiny, or Jacob, who was a refugee 20 years far from his birthplace. This is homelessness.

Homelessness lies at the very heart of Jewish experience. It's no coincidence that Judaism was born in two travels away from the ancient world's greatest civilizations: Abraham left Mesopotamia, Moses and the Israelites left Pharaoh's Egypt. The Torah is the world's great protest against empires and imperialism. In the eyes of the prophets and the Bible, the most serious offense was using power against the powerless: the widow, the orphan and, above all, the stranger." [Based on Rabbi Jonathan Sacks]
haggadah Section: -- Exodus Story
Source: https://sedersforyou.tripod.com/19.refugee.seder-with.grace.variants.pdf

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