It was the last Zoom before Passover 5785. I asked those present to write about the holiday:
Someone in the chat asked very basic questions, because this is the first year she's not eating chametz and wants to observe as much as she can. Someone else wrote that her husband is in reserve duty (miluim). A father, freshly divorced, wrote about his first holiday without his children. And someone from New York shared that she has invited relatives who are reconnecting with Judaism, and she is excited to host them.
And it goes on: we got messages from someone from the northern border, and a young excited couple who got married this year, and a great-grandmother hosting the entire clan, down to her youngest great-grandchild.
What do they have in common? What do you have in common? The shared Jewish story. The Torah and the commandments. And it all began tonight, with the Exodus from Egypt.
Tonight we will sit at the holiday table. Very different, very diverse — but united in our Jewish identity.
Matzah, bitter herbs, four cups of wine, all the mitzvot and all the words of the Passover Haggadah — it's all waiting for us.
98% of Jews celebrate the Seder night, more than 3,000 years after God took us out of Egypt on that first Seder night.
That is quite a victory picture.
So wherever you are — in Israel or around the world, through every challenge and struggle — have a Chag Kasher vSameach.
May we merit to continue the story, until the complete redemption.
