PASSOVER/PESACH

13th – 20th April 2025

Jewish

This major Jewish festival lasts eight days and commemorates the liberation of the Children of Israel and their Exodus from slavery in Egypt. The highlight is the Seder meal, held in each family’s home at the beginning of the festival, when the story of their deliverance is recounted, as narrated in the Haggadah (the Telling, or the Story). Matzah, (unleavened bread) is eaten throughout the festival, as are other foods that contain no leaven (yeast). There is a major spring cleaning in the home shortly before the festival to ensure that no trace of leaven is left in the house during Pesach. Coconut pyramids and matza balls (which are put in soups) are foods that might be eaten at this time.

Marking the key events in Jewish history is part of the Jewish calendar’s annual programme. Right at the heart of Jewish history is the Exodus with its theme of God’s unconditional relationship with his chosen people. A relationship that does not preclude suffering but eventually demonstrates both God’s power and His continuing commitment to his people. As a result of the regular telling of the story of slavery and freedom, Jews are called upon (more than 30 times in the Torah) to remember the stranger ‘because you were strangers in Egypt’. This sense of having been a slave people and a migrant people is central to Jewish consciousness and is recalled daily in Jewish liturgy and weekly in the practice of Shabbat.

Exodus 7-12.

NB The first two days and the last two days are full festival days when, for Orthodox Jews, work is not permitted.