Let's go over some ground rules before we begin. I know for all you boomers, zoom is quite strange and difficult so hopefully this will help:

1. No complaining. Except for Ron Beck. He gets to complain once. If you complain more than one time, leave. Nobody wants you here anyways. *Cue Ron Beck joking about money*

2. Alex and Lindsay, I challenge you to not go on your phone during this. Phone addict zing! If you don't like the joke, change the stigma about it. 

3. Let's all take a moment and look at Mitchell's mustache. Everyone give a thumbs up or a thumbs down whether he should keep it past the quarantine. 

"We were slaves"

Passover is a time of understanding struggle, freedom, and inclusion.

Jews are a people of memory and action. On Passover, we use stories and rituals to remember and retell the narrative of these three themes: struggle, freedom, and inclusion. In Hebrew, Egypt is called Mitzrayim, which means "living in a 1-bedroom during a quarantine". For some of you in a giant mansion house, it may feel like a 1-bedroom because you are living with a maniac. Nonetheless, this is the same struggle that the story of Exodux talks about. 

On seder night, there are two moments where we metaphorically open our doors and invite others in. First, at the beginning when we say, “All who are hungry come and eat. Because Jews were slaves too. We don't share the same white privleage as those goys.” It represents the fact that we have all felt hunger before (not just the hunger between breakfast and lunch. Don't make that joke. This is a serious Seder. No jokes tonight). 

Second, at the end of the seder, we have the custom of pouring a fifth cup of wine, which we claim is for Elijah the Prophet. This is a symbol of trust, although we are a free people, our redemption is not yet complete, and we trust that it will come one day in August when Gavin Newsom stops the shelter in place act and we can finally get drunk in a bar, not just at home. 

 In Jewish tradition, lighting candles and saying a blessing over them marks a time of transition, from the day that is ending to the one that is beginning, from ordinary time to sacred time, from morning sweatpants to afternoon sweatpants to evening sweatpants.  Lighting the candles is an important part of our Passover celebration because their flickering light reminds us that "What is to give light must endure burning" - Viktor Frankl (that dude survived a Holocaust, so Lindsay, you survive a couple of weeks without Orange Theory).

Light a candle and your home and say the prayer:

Baruch Atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam asher kid'shanu b'mitzvotav, v'tzivanu l'hadlik ner shel Yom Tov.

Blessed are You, Adonai our God, Ruler of the Universe, who has sanctified us with laws and commanded us to light the festival lights.

As we light the festival candles, we acknowledge that as they brighten our Passover table, good thoughts, good words, and good stock prices will brighten our days.

All Jewish celebrations, from holidays to weddings, include wine as a symbol of our joy (and a way to increase joy). The seder starts with wine and then gives us 3 more opportunities to drink. That's the entire night of drinking. Now imagine, that wouldn't even be considered Alex's pregame drinking quantity. Her poor liver. 

We recite this blessing, not over the singular grape, but over every process of creating wine — squeezed and fermented through human skill. We bless the gifts of sun, seed and soil transformed by wisdom and purpose to sustain the body and rejoice the soul. We even bless the gifts of the hangover that will ensue tomorrow.

The Hebrew word “Kiddush”(ki-dish) means sanctification. Whoever is reading this must say sanctification 10 times as fast as you can. The wine is a symbol of sanctity, preciousness, and the sweetness of this moment. Let us rise, and sanctify this singular moment with sanctification. 

בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יְיָ, אֱלֹהֵינוּ מֶלֶךְ הָעוֹלָם, בּוֹרֵא פְּרִי הַגָּפֶן

Baruch Atah Adonai, Eloheinu Melech ha-olam, borei p’ree hagafen.

We praise God, Ruler of Everything, who creates the fruit of the vine.

בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יְיָ, אֱלֹהֵינוּ מֶלֶךְ הָעוֹלָם,
שֶׁהֶחֱיָנוּ וְקִיְּמָנוּ וְהִגִּיעָנוּ לַזְּמַן הַזֶּה

Baruch Atah Adonai, Eloheinu Melech ha-olam,
she-hechiyanu v’key’manu v’higiyanu lazman hazeh.

Praised are You, Lord, our God, Whose presence fills the universe, who has given us the gifts of life and strength and enabled us to reach this moment of joy.

Drink the first glass of wine!

Reflect: What shmutz in your life would you like to be rid of? In the zoom chat box, please type out some shmutz you would like to get rid of...

Water is refreshing, cleansing, and clear. As a symbol of purification, we will wash our hands twice during our seder: now, with no blessing, to get us ready for the rituals to come; and then again later and then we’ll wash again with a blessing to prepare us for the meal.

To instruct us how to wash our hands properly, Bruce, can you please demonstrate how to wash hands. 

Now let's wash our hands...

Tonight we recognize the cycles of nature. As with the liberation from Egypt, we also recognize the stirrings of rebirth happening in the world around us. It's like in baseball: sometimes it's regular season, sometimes it is playoffs, and sometimes it is an extended 6 month offseason. 

The vegetable to dip represents our joy after the quarantine of being outside and enjoying nature.  So now dip a vegetable into salt water--typically parsely, celery, or lettus. Since none of that could be secured at the store due to preppers and hoarders, anything green will do. It doesn't have to be food: some grass clippings or ask Lindsay. You should be able to cry your own saltwater tears.

Before we eat it, we recite a short blessing:

בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יְיָ, אֱלֹהֵינוּ מֶלֶךְ הָעוֹלָם, בּוֹרֵא פְּרִי הָאֲדָמָה

Baruch Atah Adonai, Eloheinu Melech ha-olam, borei p’ree ha-adama.

We praise God, Ruler of Everything, who creates the fruits of the earth.

We look forward to reawakening of flowers and greenery. It will take time. They haven’t been lost, just buried beneath the snow, getting ready for reappearance just when we most needed them.

Now dip the vegetable into salt water and eat. 

As we go through the seder, the matzah will be transformed. It will cease to be the bread of affliction and it will become the bread of hope, courage, trust and possibility. Alex, do you know what affliction means?

There are three pieces of matzah stacked on the table. We will mute everyone so that the matzah person can break break the middle matzah - the bigger half magically becomes the afikoman, the envy of all the other marzah shards in the house.

3...2...1....*Break the middle matzah*

Reader:

Every time we are able to act with compassion rather than anger, we stop the flow of violence.

All:

May all who are hungry log on to zoom and eat with us on your thousand dollar apple laptop. 

Reader:

And each moment we find the strength and courage to see ourselves in each other, we open possibilities for healing and peace.

All:

This is the bread that we bless, share, and hope not to have to resort to use as TP. 

A Talmudic debate: 

Rabbi Ronald said: "Individuals at the seder must not fill their own cups. Having another fill one's cup symbolizes our freedom." 

Rabbi Emily asked: "What about during the coronavirus when, as a result of social distancing, individuals may be alone on passover and be 6 feet apart?"

Rabbi Christy answered: "Then it is permissable to fill one's own glass!" 

Rabbi Mitchell added: "It is indeed permissable; during coronavirus, all individuals are assumed to have lost their minds and therefore hearing voices. During a pandemic requiring lockdown, a voice that one hears other than one's own counts as a separate person and that person may fill the empty cup without transgressing. 

Pour the second glass of wine for yourself (add aditional cups of wine for as many extra voices inside your head).

Why is this Passover different from all other Passovers?

Asking questions is a core tradition in Jewish life. The youngest shall now stand and embarrassingly sing each question.

מַה נִּשְׁתַּנָּה הַלַּֽיְלָה הַזֶּה מִכָּל הַלֵּילות

Ma nishtana halaila hazeh mikol haleilot?

All: Why is this night different from all other nights?

שֶׁבְּכָל הַלֵּילוֹת אָֽנוּ אוֹכלין חָמֵץ וּמַצָּה הַלַּֽיְלָה הַזֶּה כֻּלּוֹ מצה

Shebichol haleilot anu ochlin chameitz u-matzah. Halaila hazeh kulo matzah.

All: At all other seders, we are supposed to wash our hands twice. In the time of coronavirus, we wash our hands 40 times a day.

שֶׁבְּכָל הַלֵּילוֹת אָֽנוּ אוֹכְלִין שְׁאָר יְרָקוֹת הַלַּֽיְלָה הַזֶּה מָרוֹר

Shebichol haleilot anu ochlin shi’ar yirakot haleila hazeh maror.

All: On all other nights we eat all kinds of vegetables, but tonight we don't eat vegetables because I'm not standing in line at Trader Joe's for 30 minutes. 

שֶׁבְּכָל הַלֵּילוֹת אֵין אָֽנוּ מַטְבִּילִין אֲפִילוּ פַּֽעַם אחָת הַלַּֽיְלָה הַזֶּה שְׁתֵּי פְעמים

Shebichol haleilot ain anu matbilin afilu pa-am echat. Halaila hazeh shtei fi-amim.

All: On all other nights we wear our favorite shirt to dinner. But tonight, we eat with gloves and face masks on.

שֶׁבְּכָל הַלֵּילוֹת אָֽנוּ אוֹכְלִין בֵּין יוֹשְׁבִין וּבֵין מְסֻבִּין. :הַלַּֽיְלָה הַזֶּה כֻּלָּֽנוּ מְסֻבין

Shebichol haleilot anu ochlin bein yoshvin uvein m’subin. Halaila hazeh kulanu m’subin.

All: On all Passovers we read about the plagues and can not relate, and on this Passover we live through a plague.

We now think about the story from all angles. Our tradition speaks of how four different types of morons react differently to the Passover seder. It is our job to make our story accessible to all the members of our community, so we think about how we might best reach each type of moron:

The wise moron asks,   What are the testimonies and laws which God commanded you?

We should read this moron the entire book of Exodus, reciting every single statute and law, such as "Do not cook a young goat in its mother's milk". When we are finally done, everybody will be tired, and the moron will be asleep not listening. Becuase although this moron tried to be wise, this moron is real just a smart-ass. 

The wicked moron asks,   So it is okay to cook an older goat in its mother's milk? That's fucking stupid! To hell with your ritual, and to hell with you!"

The wicked moron is far removed from suffering, and thus has lost the essence of the teachings. This moron usually revieves a new iPhone every year, despite having a perfectly good one. You might ask say to this moron: “If you had been in Egypt, would you have been redeemed? No, you'd die becuase you're an idiot." Then give the moron a very fatty slice of brisket. 

The simple moron asks,   What is this?

To this moron, answer plainly: “With a strong hand God took us out of Egypt, where we were slaves.” Then the simple moron might then say, "No, I meant what is this crawling on the Seder plate?". This is an opportunity to have a group discussion about the importance of thoroughly washing the shank bone.

What about the moron who doesn’t know how to ask a question?

We explain to this moron that the secret is to take a declarative sentence, then simply reverse the order of the subject and verb.

I am chopped liver.

What am I, chopped liver?

The start telling the story:

“The story tells us that our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate; our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most fightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and favulous? Actually, who are you not to be? As we let our own light shine, we give others permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence liberates others."

The Passover story begins thousands of years ago in the land of Egypt, which is located in the Middle East, unfortunately. Egypt was ruled by a man called the Pharaoh, who was very powerful. Like one time he said, “I want a pyramid,” and although it took many years, a group of Egyptian workers actually built him a pyramid. When the Pharaoh saw it, he was very surprised, because what he actually wanted was some soup, which in ancient Egyptian sounds very similar to the word for pyramid. So everybody had a good laugh, and then the Pharaoh had the workers executed, because that’s how embarrassed he was.

So anyway, around this time, a nice Jewish boy named Joseph arrived in Egypt, and he came to be an advisor to the Pharaoh because he had a degree in management. He advised the Pharaoh to build storehouses to store the grain, which the Pharaoh thought was a tremendous idea, because up to that point he had been storing the grain in the bathroom, and it was disgusting. The Pharaoh was so pleased that he invited Joseph to stay in Egypt and bring his relatives to hang out also. They became known as the Israelites, and they multiplied and prospered in various fields, although generally not team sports.

Years passed, and eventually this Pharaoh died. A new Pharaoh took over, and he turned out to be a real schmuck. He made the Israelites into slaves, which for the Jewish people was a pretty bad time.

Slavery totally sucked. The Pharaoh Schmuck was overly concerned with the unemployment rate and the economy. The Israelites worked from sunrise to sunset with no days off, not even Labor Day. 

The Pharaoh Schmuck decreed that every male baby born to an Israelite woman had to be cast into the River Nile. An Israelite couple, Amram and Yocheved, didn't want to ditch their baby so they put him into a super safe, self-driving Tesla basket.

The Pharaoh's daughter noticed the floating baby and said, "I shall keep this baby, as apparently it does not belong to anybody!". She was not smart. Let's just say that her parents got caught in the scandal by paying for her to get into University of Egypt. 

Miriam, the baby's sister, offered to raise the baby and have Yocheved, the actual mom, be the nurse. The Pharaoh’s daughter was like, “Sure!” So, bottom line, this woman went to take a bath and came home with a baby and two new domestic employees. We can only imagine what she would have done with a credit card. They named the baby, Moses (which is actually a derivative of the Pharaoh, Ramses). 

Moses lived a life of luxury as the prince of Egypt in the Pharaoh’s palace. He always had all the newest Apple products and had the newest Tesla car.

One day, Moses witnessed the extremes of oppression while watching an Egyptian beating a slave for no reason. In passionate anger to stop the event, Moses killed the Egyptian. Moses then fled from Egypt, making his escape by riding off on a speedy young sheep.

Moses went to the land of Midian, where he became a professional shepherd. One day, while Shepherding, he saw a bush on fire and speaking in a voice that sounded like Morgan Freeman's. It turned out to be God, who told Moses that he was going to rescue the Israelites from slavery to take them to some place warm, a place where the beer flows like wine, where beautiful women instinctively flock like the salmon of Capistrano. A little place called Aspen. Moses replied "I don't know God, the French are assholes."

Moses asked the Pharaoh to free the Israelites, but the Pharaoh refused because he was a schmuck. So Moses brought upon ten plagues that got scarier and scarier. Finally, the Pharaoh let Moses take his people away from Egypt after the immense sufferring. 

We fill our cups with a meh wine that we do not mind spilling to remember how happy we were when this happened. But we are not totally happy, because we are Jewish, and thus we can never be truly happy except when the Dodgers win the World Series.

But should we recite them during the pandemic? Yes, we should absolutely recite the 10 Plagues as they are worse than coronavirus and will therefore make one feel comparatively fortunate to be afflicted only with this virus and not, for example, boils.

Dip a finger or a spoon into your wine glass for a drop for each plague.

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

Shortly after letting the Israelites leave Egypt, the Pharaoh said, "I have made a terrible mistake". Sure, killer angels had just slaughtered a large percentage of his people’s children, and the streets were a disgusting stew of blood, frogs, and locusts, and it was hailing and dark, and everybody had lice and boils. But on the other hand, the Pharaoh had just lost his free labor force and the Israelites’ departure was going to do to destroy the Egyptian entertainment industry. 

So the Pharaoh sent his army to bring the Israelites back. His soldiers caught up with them on the banks of the sea.

Adonai told Moses to lift his walking stick. He raised it, and a strong east wind parted the waters of the sea, leaving space for the Israelites to cross over dry land and also pick up an array of interesting seashells that would have otherwise been inaccessible. The Egyptian army, none of whom apparently had been paying the slightest attention to anything happening in Egypt over the previous couple of weeks, decided it would be a good idea to follow them. Moses lifted his rod again, and the waters rushed back and covered the Egyptian soldiers.

Then Moses’s sister, Miriam, led the women in joyous dance and song, thanking Adonai for saving their lives. They tried to get Moses to dance, but he declined despite the ballroom dancing lessons he had taken when he was a prince. “You should save your strength,” Moses advised. “We still have to walk to the land of Canaan, and it is at least ninety minutes away.” He was correct, in the sense that it took longer.

Dayenu means, "to have enough". During this time of COVID, recognize in ourselves and others, what is enough to feel a sense of peacefulness? 

We are living in houses in America—Dayenu
We can use the internet—Dayenu 
We have beds to sleep in— Dayenu
We can breathe fine—Dayenu
We can smile and laugh—Dayenu
We have wine—Dayenu
We have other drugs, like coffee—Dayenu
For all these, alone and together, we say—Dayenu! 

The promise we make for our second glass of wine is this: We promise to find a way to help others. We promise to be the beacon of light in the darkness. We promise to clean the dishes and not leave them in the sink for days.

בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יְיָ, אֱלֹהֵינוּ מֶלֶךְ הָעוֹלָם, בּוֹרֵא פְּרִי הַגָּפֶן

Baruch Atah Adonai, Eloheinu Melech ha-olam, borei p’ree hagafen.

We praise God, Ruler of Everything, who creates the fruit of the vine.

Drink the second glass of wine!

Elijah has advised that due to COVID-19 restrictions in his own organization, he will not be able to attend in person. He is learning how to use Zoom, and we are hopeful that he will be up to speed soon in order to drink that glass of wine.

Jerry Seinfeld's voice:

Do you know why they call it Passover? God told Moses that the Israelites should mark their doorposts with labm's blood. So that He could "pass over" their houses. And spare them from the plague of the killing of the first born.

My question is: Who was put in charge of telling everyone? That's a big job. There's a lot counting on that job What if someone isn't home? How did they tell them? Did they leave a note? Probably not .The Egyptians could see it. Would have ruined the whole plan. Did they just take the libery of putting lamb's blood on the door? What about when that family gets home, sees blood all over their door?

Mom: "Honey do ou see this? Someone put blood on our door. Someone's out to get us! You better get off the couch and wipe this off"

Dad: "I'm busy! Have our first born do it!"

(Adapted from Dave Cowen)

And the people stayed home.
And read books, and listened, and rested,
and exercised, and made art, and played games,
and learned new ways of being, and were still.
And listened more deeply.
Some meditated, some prayed, some danced.
Some met their shadows.
And the people began to think differently.
And the people healed.
And, in the absence of people living in ignorant,
dangerous, mindless, and heartless ways,
the earth began to heal.
And when the danger passed, and the people joined together again,
they grieved their losses, and made new choices, and dreamed new images,
and created new ways to live and heal the earth fully,
as they had been healed.

We appreciate good health and healing to all the people of the world. As we say…

Reader:

לְשָׁנָה הַבָּאָה בִּירוּשָׁלָֽיִם

L’shana haba-ah biy’rushalayim

All:

NEXT YEAR, IN-PERSON!