The Passover Seder Ushpizin

To my friend, or rather sometimes friend, God^[1]: You really confuse me sometimes. I’m okay with you reminding us how great you were for freeing us; that’s why we are getting rid of all the chametz in our homes and eating matzot for seven days. But did you really want us to have 4 sets of dishes (2 meat/milk for everyday use and 2 meat/milk for company), not to speak of all the pots and pans and silverware and all the hysterical cleaning going on beforehand? What’s worse, I have to check with all my guests if they eat kitnitot (legumes, rice) or gebrochts (matzah that has come in contact with water), and if they do not, should I disinvite them from my seder? There’s no way we won’t have kneidlach (matzah balls) in the chicken soup.

Was your intent to create disharmony and fights at the dinner table? If so, perhaps we should have stayed in Egypt, where we knew who the enemy was. In the current state of world disharmony, should we really be arguing about what we eat at the seder? Please God, come down and clarify your intentions to this confused, occasional worshipper.

— Naomi Graetz

Abraham and Sarah

I can imagine having the following conversation with Abraham and Sarah:

Marc: “Abraham and Sarah—what do you think of the exodus story?”

A&S: “The what?”

So I read them Exodus 1–15.

A: “Oh—that’s a pretty good story. Wonder if it is just a story or if this all happened, in all of its contradictory details? In any case, now we understand what happened to us: A famine hit Canaan soon after we entered the land, and we went down to Egypt to get food. While we were there, we had some dealings with the Pharaoh, we tricked him and were enriched in the process, while the Pharaoh and his household were afflicted with great plagues. Then we were kicked out (see Gen 12:10-20). It would seem that that event was meant to prefigure the exodus from Egypt that our descendants were to experience centuries later. In a nutshell, we pre-enacted it. Pretty cool! I hear that several millennia later, a phrase developed: מעשׂה אבות סימן לבנים, ‘the ancestors preenact what their descendants would do.’^[2] So that’s why we did all of these things—since we were the founders of the nations, we got to hint ahead about the exodus without even realizing it. Cool.”

S: “You were the one who was enriched. I was the one forcefully taken by Pharaoh. That was not cool. And Pharaoh’s entire household was punished for what he did. That is not so cool either. And you asked me to lie on your behalf—all went well for you, but not for me. Not cool at all.”

A: “The ways of the LORD are mysterious.”

S: “That is not how I would summarize God’s behavior.”

— Marc Brettler

Jacob

As the first Jew to experience an imposed exile from the Land of Israel, the patriarch Jacob is the paradigmatic Jewish stranger – literally, the first wandering Israelite. Jacob inaugurates the fulfillment of the cycle foreshadowed by God to Abraham in the Covenant of the Pieces (Genesis 15); he flees Israel and lives the elements of avdut, inui and gerut—“hard labor and oppression as a stranger”—in the land of Haran. Jacob returns to Israel only to go back again with his family to the diaspora of Egypt.

The saga of Jacob, like the Haggadah of Passover, reminds us that every Jew is at heart a stranger. To be a stranger is to be vigilant and vulnerable and acutely aware that one’s life is ephemeral. The Torah warns,

^{שמות כג:ט} וְגֵר לֹא תִלְחָץ וְאַתֶּם יְדַעְתֶּם אֶת נֶפֶשׁ הַגֵּר כִּי גֵרִים הֱיִיתֶם בְּאֶרֶץ מִצְרָיִם.

^{Exodus 23:9} Do not oppress the stranger, for you know the soul of the stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.

To feel empathy for the stranger is a compelling lesson of the Exodus narrative and is a moral calling of the Jewish nation. Given the life trajectory of the biblical Jacob, I would welcome his presence at my Passover seder to deepen my understanding of the “soul of the stranger” and to explain how an appreciation of this existential state might heal and unify world Jewry.

— Rachel Friedman

Serach bat Asher

Serach daughter of Asher is a little-known biblical woman whose story is amplified in traditional midrashim.^[3] She is only mentioned in two lists of names in the Torah (Genesis 46:17 and Numbers 26:46). Since it is not possible for a normal human to be alive for the time between these lists, the rabbis infer that she lived an unnaturally long life and even eternal life, and that she entered heaven while alive (Derech Eretz Zutta 1:18).

Serach’s longevity brings with it the gained experience and wisdom. According to one midrash, she showed Moses where to find the buried bones of Joseph so that he could retrieve them to bring them to Israel (b. Sot. 13a). In another midrash, she appears in the Beit Midrash of Rabbi Yochanan, much like Eliyahu appears at our sedarim, presumably in a temporary descent from heaven, to solve a dispute concerning the appearance of the watery walls during the splitting of the sea (PdRK 11:12).

In yet another midrash, she is equated with the Wise Woman who advised Yoav, King David’s Commander of War (Midrash Mishle 31:5), and according to mystical texts, she has an important place in the women’s yeshiva in heaven studying torah:

^{ספר הזהר שלח לך כה:קצח} בְּהֵיכָלָא אַחֲרָא, אִית סֶרַח בַּת אָשֵׁר, וְכַמָה נָשִׁין רִבּוֹא וְאַלְפִין בַּהֲדָהּ. תְּלַת זִמְנִין בְּיוֹמָא מַכְרִיזִין קַמֵּה, הָא דִּיּוּקְנָא דְּיוֹסֵף צַדִּיקָא אָתָא, וְאִיהִי חַדָּאת, וְנַפְקַת לְגַבֵּי פַּרְגּוֹדָא חֲדָא דְּאִית לָהּ, וְחָמָאת נְהִירוּ דְּדִיּוּקְנָא דְּיוֹסֵף, וְחַדָּאת, וְסָגִידַת לְגַבֵּיהּ, וְאָמָרְת, זַכָּאָה הַאי יוֹמָא, דְּאִתְּעָרִית בְּשׂוֹרָה דִּילָךְ לְגַבֵּי סָבָאי. לְבָתַר אַהֲדְרַת לְגַבֵּי שְׁאַר נָשִׁין, וּמִשְׁתַּדְּלִין בְּתוּשְׁבְּחָן דְּמָארֵי עָלְמָא, וּלְאוֹדָאָה שְׁמֵיהּ. וְכַמָּה דּוּכְתִּין וְחֵידוּ, אִית לְכָל חֲדָא וַחֲדָא. וּלְבָתַר אֲהְדְרָן לְאִשְׁתַּדְּלָא בְּפִקּוּדֵי אוֹרַיְיתָא, וּבְטַעְמַיְיהוּ.

^{Zohar Shelach 25:198} In another chamber, Serach bat Asher comes, and so many thousands and thousands of women who merit to be with her. Three times a day, the announcement comes: The likeness of Yosef the tzadik is coming! With joy she goes out, to that curtained area which is dedicated to her, and observes light coming forth from the likeness of Joseph. With joy, she bows before him, saying, “Happy was that day, when I gave the tidings before my grandfather [that you were still alive]!” Then she returns to the rest of the women, and they delve into the praises of the Ruler of the world, and praise the Name. How many places and joys each one has! Then they return and delves into the precepts of Torah, along with their meanings.

Serach shares supernatural characteristics with our “regular” seder visitor, Eliyahu. She is a wise woman and a studier of Torah. She experienced the exodus and can come down from heaven. Serach deserves a seat at the seder.

— Anna Urowitz-Freudenstein

Pharaoh

At my seder table, my guest would be none other than Pharaoh (even if he is not Jewish). Once conjured, I’d ask him to identify himself—the Torah never says his name—and would let him kvetch about repeated bouts with stiff neck. He might, then, want to give us his side of the confrontations that led to such disastrous consequences for his people as well as to help us find written accounts of the events.

— Jack Sasson

Moses and His Cushite Wife

Since the sky is the limit why not shoot for the stars?

And who’s more stellar than Moses and his Cushite wife (see Numbers 12).^[4] Of course they might not let on who they are, partly out of modesty, but also, one can’t help but think of those medieval stories in which Elijah comes to saintly people without fully disclosing his identity.

Moses and his consort will set their stamp on the seder’s character. For example, in Egypt Moses prays repeatedly for plagues to end but he never prays for a plague to be visited upon the Egyptians. That will remind us not to give vent to hateful wishes such as שְׁפֹךְ חֲמָתְךָ “Pour out your wrath” (which appears in many printed Haggadot).

It will also be tempting to ask for the meaning of the contested phrase בעבור זה עשה השם לי בצאתי ממצרים “on account of this” (Exodus 13:8).^[5] Ibn Ezra, for instance, quotes R. Marinus (=Jonah ibn Janach) who opined that “on account of this” means “because of what God did for me.” But he disagrees:

^{אבן עזרא שמות יג:ח [פירוש השני]} כי אין אנו אוכלים המצות בעבור האותות שעשה השם במצרים. רק פירוש בעבור זה – בעבור זאת העבודה, שהיא אכילת מצה ולא יאכל חמץ (שמות י״ג:ג׳), שהוא תחלת המצות שצוה השם, עשה לנו אותות ומופתים עד שהוציאנו. והטעם: כי לא הוציאנו ממצרים רק לעבדו,

^{Ibn Ezra Exod 13:8 [2nd com.]} For we don’t eat matzah because of the wonders God performed in Egypt. Rather for the sake of this worship, namely, eating matzah and refraining from leaven, which were the first commandments God gave, did God perform for us the wonders and signs until we were freed. In other words, He did not take us out of Egypt except in order that we worship Him.

Perhaps Ibn Ezra, like Rashi and probably the Haggadah before them, were all influenced by the verse in Psalms:

^{תהלים קה:מה} בַּעֲבוּר  יִשְׁמְרוּ חֻקָּיו וְתוֹרֹתָיו יִנְצֹרוּ הַלְלוּ־יָהּ.

^{Ps 105:45} that they might keep His laws and observe His teachings. Hallelujah.

After they leave I shall probably kick myself for failing to ask the really important questions…

— Isaac S. D. Sassoon

The Righteous Women of the Exodus

The “righteous women of the Exodus” (b. Sot. 11b) donated their mirrors to the making of the copper laver (basin) during the construction of the Mishkan (Tabernacle). These mirrors were among those of the ministering women בְּמַרְאֹת הַצֹּבְאֹת אֲשֶׁר צָבְאוּ [marʾot ha-tzovʾot ’asher tzav’u], who gathered at the entrance to the tent of meeting (Exod 38:8). According to midrash Tanchuma (Pequdei 9), they had used these mirrors to seduce their husbands in the field, raising up “the host [tzavʾot] of Israel” (Exod 12:41, 51). I would ask one of these women: How did you hold onto hope during the crushing period of slavery in Egypt? When you gave up your mirror to the making of the Mishkan, how was the symbol of your desire transformed?^[6]

— Rachel Adelman

An Israelite family

We are told that in every generation each one of us should see ourselves as if we came out of Egypt. But I cannot imagine what that experience felt like. So I would invite to my seder an Israelite family, just common Israelites, who participated in the exodus from Egypt. Among the questions I would ask them are:

Did they understand what was happening or why? How did it feel to pack up everything so quickly and leave the place where they had lived all their lives (even if they were not treated so well by the Egyptians)? Did they trust Moses and Aaron, even when they arrived at the Reed Sea, with a body of water in front of them and Pharaoh’s army behind them? Did they believe in God and expect that He would save them? Were they among the doubters and complainers during the years in the wilderness or did they have confidence that everything would be ok? Could they envision life in the land of Israel?

And how would they react when they learned that they had participated in the most momentous event in Jewish history, celebrated still after more than two millennia?

— Adele Berlin

Joshua

Joshua would be my guest of choice at my seder, for a few reasons. First, I wrote my dissertation, first book, and several articles on him, so I think I owe him one. Second, he is one of the few biblical characters described as celebrating Pesach, and his was especially dicey, since it takes place right after he circumcises all the males (Josh 5:10–12), and on the very day the manna stops falling. I figure that must have been a pretty rough festival, so maybe he wants to commiserate. In addition, the book of Nehemiah (8:17) notes that Joshua celebrated Sukkot properly:

^{יהושע ח:יז} וַיַּעֲשׂוּ כׇל הַקָּהָל הַשָּׁבִים מִן הַשְּׁבִי  סֻכּוֹת וַיֵּשְׁבוּ בַסֻּכּוֹת כִּי לֹא עָשׂוּ מִימֵי יֵשׁוּעַ בִּן נוּן כֵּן בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל עַד הַיּוֹם הַהוּא וַתְּהִי שִׂמְחָה גְּדוֹלָה מְאֹד.

^{Josh 8:17} The whole community that returned from the captivity made booths and dwelt in the booths—the Israelites had not done so from the days of Joshua son of Nun to that day—and there was very great rejoicing.

This makes Joshua a good candidate for my Sukkot ushpizin as well, if he wants to come back for a second round.

— Zev Farber

Philistine Women

Without doubt, I would have been delighted, and mighty curious, to have at my seder the women who shaped Samson’s life in Philistine land. How did they fare after Samson’s death?

In order to ask Samson's unnamed Philistine wife (Judg 14), I would first have to resurrect her from the ashes to which she and her father were consigned by their irate co-patriots after Samson had torched their fields (Judg 15:1–6).

I would then query the equally anonymous sex worker of Gaza (Judg 16:1–3) about her relationship with the Israelite strong man. Did she tell him about the plan to capture him after a night full of passion? I always suspected that she did. What happened to her after her lover walked away with the city gate on his shoulders?

Above all, I would be burning with curiosity to hear Delilah's side of the story, assuming that she survived the deadly banquet honoring Dagon (Judg 16:4–31). How did she manage to cut Samson's hair that had grown unimpeded for decades? Whatever had been said about her, I had always envisioned Delilah as a skilled hairdresser, applying her art to unruly male heads. Did she continue to ply her profession, sharing with customers stories of her nights with the eyeless Israelite man?

Given time, I would also ask Samson how he found time, amidst his amorous adventures, to judge Israel for no less than two decades (Judg 16:31).

— Hagith S. Sivan

Elijah

Elijah’s fifth cup is subject to complex halakhic argument.^[7] Elijah himself is also considered the one who will resolve moot halakhic debates when he heralds the messiah. The cup’s indeterminateness inserts an intoxicating ambiguity into “order.” When Elijah approached death, his disciple Elisha refused to let go of his spiritual father. Elijah offered him the potential of surpassing his own prophetic power, on condition that Elisha witness his death. (2 Kgs 2:10). To be trapped by the past is to preclude advancing beyond it.

The biblical source for Elijah’s messianic role does not anticipate grandiose achievements like global peace but simply,

^{מלאכי ג:כד} הֵשִׁיב לֵב אָבוֹת עַל בָּנִים וְלֵב בָּנִים עַל אֲבוֹתָם...

^{Mal 3:24} He shall reconcile hearts of fathers with their children, and hearts of children with their fathers…^[8]

A major source of conflict results from parents viewing their children as clones of themselves. Elijah reconciles successive generations by warning them that their reciprocal love does not entail acting as mirrors of each other. Elijah’s death scene itself captures the resolution Malachi contemplated.

Elijah hovers over that fifth cup to prevent being mired in the past the seder commemorates. His biblical life, traditional messianic role, and rabbinically enigmatic cup provoke the questions that preserve the past and enable transcending it. Elijah doesn’t require a personal invitation to the seder since the door is always open to him.

— James A. Diamond

J (the Yahwist)

I’d ask J when s/he wrote, and what part of the Torah he/she wrote, and why.^[9]

— Liz Fried

Ezra

On the pivot from the ancient to the modern, many scholars believe that Ezra and the leaders of the exiled Judean community in Babylonia were responsible for finalizing our Five Books of Moses. As the first person to bring the Torah into Judea and have it read to the people (Nehemiah 8),^[10] Ezra would have so much to tell us. How did they go about it? Where did the sources come from? Why did they decide to do it then? So much we conjecture would be known.

— Philip Kahn

Second Temple and Rabbinic Period

Hananiah

Hananiah is the author of the so-called “Passover letter” from Elephantine.^[11] The fragmentary papyrus letter, dated 419 B.C.E., is usually reconstructed and interpreted entirely in line with biblical (and even rabbinic!) language and notions surrounding the Passover laws. These reconstructions, however, are based on the problematic, a priori assumption that the Torah was already widely known and commonly regarded as authoritative at this early date.

After Hananiah has experienced our seder—having listened to the story of the Exodus and having eaten the matzah and marror—I would love to ask him if he recognizes any of the Exodus narrative or associated rituals from his own experience as a Jew living in late 5th century B.C.E. Egypt. I would love to learn if he had ever heard any of the stories about the enslavement of our ancestors in Egypt, about Moses, the ten plagues, or the splitting of the Reed Sea. And I would love to learn if any of the springtime rituals his own Jewish community may have observed might have resembled in any way the Passover rites that appear in the Bible or those practiced today.

— Yonatan Adler

Ezekiel the Tragedian

Large parts of the Haggadah as we know it today were shaped in response to positions held by ancient Christianity. Before the text reached its final static form, the seder probably consisted of some kind of theatrical performance with scenes similar to those we can still observe in certain Sephardic seders. Hellenistic Egyptians resented their Jewish neighbors for repeatedly reenacting their victory over their ancestors and Pharaoh. This, among other factors, incented the development of anti-Jewish literature.

In reaction, Hellenistic Jewish authors sought to ease tensions between the communities by providing new versions of the Exodus narrative in which both Jews and Egyptians were portrayed positively. The Hellenistic Jewish playwright, Ezekiel the Tragedian (3rd cent. B.C.E. Alexandria) composed a revised drama, “The Exodus” (Exagoge), that may have replaced the traditional ceremonial shows, but most of his text is lost to us.^[12] It would be captivating to have him expose the parts we are missing and to hear from him about the circumstances that led him to this new version as well as whether his work and adapted narrative had any direct impact in his neighborhood.

— Stéphanie É. Binder

Alexander Jannaeus

The controversial Hasmonean high priest and ruler of Judea (103–76 B.C.E.), Alexandar Jannaeus was the son of John Hyrcanus, grandson of Simon (Judah Maccabee’s brother), and husband to Queen Salome Alexander (Shelamzion HaMalka).^[13] The last powerful monarch before the Roman conquest,^[14] I would ask if he has any advice on how to keep the Jewish state from tearing itself apart despite being militarily dominant. I realize that probably his first recommendation would be to crucify the troublemakers, but maybe he knew a couple of more subtle and less violent tricks?

— Serge Frolov

Jesus

I would hope that Jesus could clarify some things about the Last Supper. If we go along with the accounts in the Gospels of Matthew (26:17–30), Mark (14:12–25), and Luke (22:7–20), the Last Supper was a Passover meal (though whether there were sedarim yet is a matter of debate). Since we know so little about how Passover was celebrated in the early first century C.E., I would ask him to describe what the meal was like. All we know is that they had bread/loaves (ἄρτον) and wine. What else did they eat as part of the commemorative meal? What else did they do at that supper to remember the events of the Exodus?

I would also ask what he meant when he told the disciples that the bread is his body and the wine is his blood (Matt 26:26-28; Mark 14:22-24; and Luke 22:19-20). How did he understand the symbolism of the bread and the wine in the context of the Passover meal, and how did he understand his own role in relation to this? Not only could Jesus shed light on what Passover meals were like at that time, but he could also provide insight into how he understood the nature, meaning and significance of one of the most important institutions in Christianity.

— Hilary Lipka

Queen Helena

The first-century Heleni ha-Malka, also known as Queen Helena of Adiabene, is remembered in the Tosefta for building an enormous Sukkah.^[15] The Tosefta describes that she sat in the Sukkah with her seven sons and welcomed rabbinic sages during the holiday. Rabbinic sources also mention Heleni's decision to become a Nazarite and to donate golden objects to the Jerusalem temple, and they refer to her family’s mezuzah practices and approaches to Sabbath observance.

Josephus, whose account of the queen is our earliest source about her, describes her pilgrimage to Jerusalem and that she fed the people of the city during a time of famine, importing grain from Egypt and figs for Cyprus. But no ancient texts about Heleni describe if and how she celebrated Passover.

I would be curious to meet the queen (I am currently writing a book about her!) and to hear about whether she and her family observed the holiday, and if they did, what that might have entailed.

She ended up settling in Jerusalem in the final years of her life. Did she witness the city becoming crowded as pilgrims arrived for the holiday? Did she partake in any of the temple-related Passover rituals or celebrations? What would she think about the way we celebrate Passover today?

— Sarit Kattan-Gribetz

Rabbi Akiva

My seder would not be complete without Rabbi Akiva or one of his contemporaries. I would want to hear from them how the seder was transformed in the decades following the destruction of the Second Temple from a meal focused on a sacrificial offering into a dramatically different model that has survived, evolved, and become one of the most important rituals on the Jewish calendar. I’d also want to hear about the events behind the seder in Bnei Berak that continued until the morning.

— Zvi Grumet

Aḥer

Elisha Ben Abuyah is known to the tradition as Aḥer, “the other.” He is the only rabbinic sage who left Judaism to become part of Roman culture. First, I would wish to hear what he could teach us about his great contemporaries, such as R. Akiba and R. Meir. Second, I would delight in his realizing that the Roman world he left is gone and the Jewish people he spurned are here. And third, he would be an extraordinary ambassador (for surely he wouldn't attend only one seder?) for the eternity of the Jewish people and the foolishness of those who abandon their people for “greater” cultures.

When Saul Bellow met with Shai Agnon, both of them Nobel novelists, Agnon asked if his works were translated into Hebrew. When Bellow said yes, Agnon replied, “Thank God – then you are safe!” Aḥer, at the seder, would understand.

— David Wolpe

Rabbi Yannai the Paytan

Rabbi Yannai the the 6th century synagogue poet (paytan) from the Galilee, whose poem, “It happened at Midnight,” ויהי בחצי הלילה, appears at the back of the Ashkenazi haggadah.^[16] Until the twentieth century, this was the only well-known Yannai poem, of which we now have full volumes, assembled from Cairo Geniza fragments.

I would love to ask Yannai to perform the poem as he did, perhaps differently for multiple synagogue audiences. How did he pronounce the Hebrew? What tunes did he perform, what does he think of tunes developed by Jews in subsequent generations? What would he change in the poem, and what are his favorite parts of this amazing piyyut (liturgical poem)? Yannai joining our seder would be a pure joy!

— Steven Fine

Medieval and Early Modern Age

Maimonides

Maimonides (Moses ben Maimon) was born on Passover (as was my Grandmother). He was smart, knew his biblical text better than anyone, actually touched the Aleppo Codex, and none of that was even his day job!

Maimonides faced many issues we face today. He understood living in a world that changed quickly. For example, he was exiled from Cordoba refusing to convert to Islam. Shortly after arriving in Egypt, Maimonides was involved in coordinating efforts to redeem captives (read hostages) taken from Bilbays, Egypt, who were taken by the Franks to Palestine!^[17]

In a world where friends became enemies (he had to leave Spain because the Jews’ dhimmi status, the legal protection for non-Muslims living in a Muslim state, was revoked) and, possibly the opposite (he was the doctor for Saladin), he seemingly strove to be a mensch in a time when others, especially leaders, were not.

— Tammi J. Schneider

Rabbi Eliezer of Beaugency

For those who know me well, it would come as no surprise that among all the luminaries of history, I would love to invite Rabbi Eliezer of Beaugency (France) to my seder. I have been fascinated by his commentaries for much of my adult life, and so little remains of his oeuvre that just to have a lengthy evening to “talk Torah” with him (on any subject, and any evening!) would be a dream come true.

What might I hope for from such a long conversation at the seder? I would assume R. Eliezer, like his master Rashbam,^[18] would have much insight to share with respect to the gap between our practice of Judaism and what is recorded about Israelite and Judean religious practices in the Tanakh. For example, R. Eliezer begins his examination of the legal section of Ezekiel (one of the few biblical books for which his commentary is extant):

רבותינו דרשו בערכין מה שדרשו, ואינו לפי פשוטו.

Our rabbis have expounded whatever they expounded in Arakhin (b. Arakhin 12a), but their teaching doesn’t follow the peshat (simple/contextual meaning).

Further, he points out at least twice in his commentary on Ezekiel that the prophet’s description of the Passover holiday is different in significant ways from the observance that the Torah requires (e.g., at Ezekiel 45:24–25), he twice notes that:

הרי שינוי מפורש מנסכי משה.

This is an explicit difference from the libations of Moses.

So, welcome, Rabbi Eliezer, let me pour you a cup (or rather, four cups) of wine and ילמדינו רבינו, “let our Rabbi teach us!”^[19]

— Robert A. Harris

Dona Gracia Nasi

Dona Gracia Nasi is my Jewish hero of all time. During the period of the Portuguese Inquisition, she used her inestimable wealth to save Jews, relocate them to the Ottoman Empire, finance the printing of Tanakh in a translation that Portuguese- and Spanish-speaking Jews could understand, found yeshivot and a poetical academy (!), and promote a trade boycott of Ancona when its prince failed to protect the Jews under his sovereignty.

For all that is known about Dona Gracia’s actions, little is written about her inner life. How did she think about issues of theology such as God's role in history; spirituality; purposefulness? We are so used to focusing on what people do, that we sometimes forget that, behind the great achievements, stand some kinds of belief. I am curious about hers, and I hope that, at the seder, she would be willing to talk about them.

And I would allow her to bring the wine! She must have had a great cellar!

— Deborah Miller

Dona Gracia or La Señora (The Lady), my wife and I would be greatly honored if you would consent to join us and our family and guests for this year’s seder. We feel your gracious presence would bring home to all present the human dimension of the journey from slavery to freedom. In your own person you experienced subjection to the rigors of the Inquisition in Spain and subsequently in Portugal where you had sought refuge. Yet even as you submitted outwardly to the demands of the oppressor you sustained your inner integrity and through God’s infinite mercy found a path to freedom and the recovery of your true self in His service.

Not content with your own exodus, you used your wealth and influence to create an escape route for countless others to the relative freedom of Constantinople, where you continued without interruption your tireless undertaking of rescuing Iberian Jewry and looking after the poor and destitute as well as supporting scholars and the new technology of printing. We who take our freedom for granted seek to learn from you how precious a gift that freedom is, how best to use it, and how we might extend the blessing to those less fortunate than ourselves.

— Norman Solomon

Baruch Spinoza

Baruch Spinoza would be my seder guest, for a few reasons.

1. He must have spent a long time without attending a seder, since Spinoza was excommunicated and I suppose that no one in the Jewish community invited him for Pesach. I imagine he felt very lonely.^[20]
2. Spinoza was one of the most important philosophers ever been. His philosophy is valid today. Hegel said that he changed the way we think forever. For example: Because he had such a bad experience switching from Judaism to Catholicism and then back again to Judaism, he came up with the idea that religion is private matter and not something the state should get involved with. This is the separation of church and state that we see today in the USA and Europe. Even an Orthodox Jewish philosopher like Prof. Yeshayahu Leibowitz said that if we want to keep the religion alive, we must separate it from the state, because if the state goes down, the religion goes down. Spinoza said so 350 years ago, and still in Israel, this elementary insight has not dawned on Israeli leaders.
3. Even though I do not speak Dutch or Portuguese, I will be able to converse with Spinoza since he wrote a book on Hebrew grammar.
4. Spinoza is the torch bearer of secularism. During his time, most people believed in one religion or another. Today a growing number of people define themselves as secularists, in some part, thanks to Spinoza.
5. The way he was treated is not a merit for the Jewish community at the time. He was right, and the rabbis responsible for this were wrong. It is time to ask Spinoza for forgiveness for his excommunication.

— Rami Arav

20th Century and Modern Day

Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook

Dearest Rebbe, we've hung your picture up in our sukkah ever since we named our first-born son “Meir Lev Kook” (MLK), but we truly hope this year you'll not only walk into our sukkah but also into our Pesach seder. If every generation has a Moshiach (messiah) if we are ready to receive them, I believe you were likely the early 20th century potential Moshiach we needed, given the depth of your intertwined universalistic and particularistic vision.

But we have a vegan seder and we replace our shank bone with a beet and our egg with a mushroom. Would you be okay with this seder plate and with this dinner served? We teach that it is because of your vision that we won't need to eat a kezayit of the Korban Pesach but rather that the messianic times will only require vegetable offerings (Kevatsim ii 15). True, we’re not in messianic times, but should we not strive to live those ideas now if we see illuminated sparks of holiness within animals?

Further, while we love Eretz Yisrael and Am Yisrael, our seder attendees have a much stronger desire to influence the diaspora than to make Aliyah especially given some of the religious extremism emerging from the ideological group that you founded. Would you choose to attend a diaspora-rooted, liberal Zionist, universalistic, vegan seder or would you be more comfortable at a seder in the settlements where the teachings of your son promote a militaristic hawkish ideology?

— Shmuly Yanklowitz

Chaim Grade

Chaim Grade was a great Yiddish novelist and survivor of the Shoah/Holocaust. In his novellae and lengthy novels, Grade wove a tapestry of nuanced and complex people, struggling to make sense of a beautiful Jewish heritage in disruptive and violent times. He lost everything in the Shoah and lived a double exile in New York (far from his destroyed home, and in an alien culture) but he refused to paint a pollyannaish caricature of the world and people murdered. He also insisted on showing their greatness and the allure of traditional Jewish culture. We need his vision and his courage now, so I’d love him to join my seder.

— Bradley Shavit Artson

Rabbi Dr. Yaakov Herzog

A Pesach seder that I remember fondly, was, while I was a student in Israel at the home of Rabbi Doctor Yaakov Herzog (1921-1972) the son of the first Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of the State of Israel (Rabbi Isaac HaLevi Herzog).

A brilliant, wonderful man in every respect, he was the head of Prime Minister of Israel’s Office from 1965 to 1972 when he died prematurely. He had a distinguished career in the Diplomatic Service particularly as Israel’s Ambassador to Canada. There he famously engaged in a public debate with the British historian Arnold Toynbee, who had called the Jewish people a “fossil” and compared Israel’s actions in the 1948 War to the Nazis.

Herzog was appointed as Chief Rabbi of Britain in 1965 but on consideration, wisely withdrew. The atmosphere in his home was inspiring and eclectic: from Talmud to history, from literature to philosophy, in the company of other great Jewish minds.

One of his opinions has stayed with me ever since. Talking about the divide in Israel between the secular and the religious, he said that were it not for the external threat from Israel’s enemies, Israel would tear itself apart in a civil war, so deep were the religious and cultural differences.

I wish he were still around today as a voice of reason between the extremes. Sir Isaiah Berlin described him as “one of the best and wisest, most attractive and morally most impressive human beings I have ever known.” I will be thinking of him and missing him this seder night.

— Jeremy Rosen

Nechama and Yeshayahu Leibowitz

Nechama, our Morah (teacher), who pioneered contemporary Tanakh education, and Yeshayahu the prophet—together embodying aspects of Moshe Rabbeinu and Miriam the prophetess. In these bewildering times, I would welcome their guidance to sensitively and insightfully expound the text and its traditions, as well as its philosophical, historical, moral, and religious relevance.

Today, when some of Yeshayahu Leibowitz’s most dire predictions and warnings have become reality, his moral compass and perspicacity and Nechama’s humble, capable, authentic, and empowering leadership would serve as a sorely needed corrective to the hardened hearts and stiff necks of those whose leadership is driven by optics and power.^[21]

— Shani Tzoref

Agam Berger

Each year, I try to welcome Miriam Ha-nevi’ah (the prophetess) to the seder. I pour water into “Miriam’s cup” but am never sure when is the right time to drink from it. Singing Debbie Friedman’s ode to Miriam’s singing and dancing is meaningful but not completely satisfying. How did Miriam experience the journey from slavery to freedom?

This year, the Jewish heroes who inspire me on Pesach are the women and men who returned from captivity in recent weeks. I would like to invite Agam Berger to my seder.

Agam Berger, twenty years old, an IDF lookout soldier, survived 482 days in captivity. In Gaza, she kept kosher, fasted on Yom Kippur and Tisha b’Av, avoided chametz on Pesach, and refused to travel on Shabbat, even to be returned home. In her words:

בדרך אמונה בחרתי ובדרך אמונה שבתי.

I chose the way of faith, and I returned by way of faith.

May the faith and bravery of the biblical Miriam, Agam, and the others, inspire us in our Pesach observance and in our prayers for the liberation of all of our Israeli brothers and sisters.

— Abigail Gillman