Peeling a Pomegranate

I think a great afikomen prize is critical for seder success. I have no kids at my seder, so I like to make sure that I have a prize worth tearing my house to pieces for. If you aren’t willing to dig through the dirty laundry for it — it’s not worth giving.

A few years ago I found the ultimate — the Moses Action Figure! You would not believe how hard people fought for this prize. Jew and gentile alike, tearing through my 1000 sq ft house. Willing to brave dust bunnies and bunnies to get there hands on this fabulous piece of pop culture goodness.

So — how the heck do you top that.

This year, I think I’ve finally done it. It’s time to unleash — The Brick Testament. The story of Exodus in told in Legos, I mean modeling blocks. The guy who created this is a genius. It’s about the only telling of the Ten Commandments that challenges Charlton Heston’s. I expect to have my personals rifled through like never before.

And, I’m going to create a little buzz for next year’s anticipated afikomen prize. During dinner, I plan on play SoCalled’s Hip Hop Haggadah. Which if you haven’t heard it, is brilliant. It’s good JewHop — not just Pesach-kitsch. If you think that Jewish hiphop means the Beastie Boys, then you really need to check out this album. And for the Matisyahu fans, he’s on a couple of tracks.

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Interview with Carly Lesser on the Peeling a Pomegranate Passover Haggadah
Originally printed in the Tel Shemesh newsletter, a publication of www.telshemesh.org.

Carly (Chava Chai) Lesser is a shamanic earth-based Jew and the
spiritual leader of Becoming, a multifaith pantheistic circle in
Washington, DC. She is the creator of the 2006 Jewitch Calendar, and
also of the Peeling a Pomegranate Haggadah. She will be
a participant in the Kohenet program (www.kohenet.org) beginning in
August. Rabbi Jill Hammer of Tel Shemesh interviewed Carly about her
haggadah (storytelling ritual for the Passover meal) and her views on
Passover (which is coming up in just over two weeks!).

JH: You begin your seder with a ritual evoking the beginning of creation.

CL: I have to credit Rabbi Arthur Waskow for the inspiration. The
idea for this type of beginning was inspired by his haggadah. Most
simply, I use it to create wonder. As we are
supposed to be not only telling, but also reliving the story, I think
it’s important to begin at the beginning. My hope is that it will
immediately transport people to sacred space.

JH: How is this seder different from the ones you may have grown up with or
experienced elsewhere?

CL: While most haggadahs I’ve seen talk about the immediacy and the
importance of telling the story as though it happened to you, they
never seem to help with this. I wanted the story to reach out to
people and bring them along with it. I probably focus less on
various laws and rabbinical sayings, and more on the experience.

I wanted to create a haggadah that would allow me to have a seder
that I really enjoyed and found spiritually moving. As I have found
more and more people whose spiritual beliefs and practices are
similar to my own, I also hoped that it would serve them
too.

JH: You tell the story by having participants voice the different
biblical characters: Joseph, Moses, Miriam. Shifrah, Pharaoh, Serach.
Is there a particular character who speaks to you personally?

CL: I think they all speak to me pretty strongly, but Nachshon and
Serach are the ones who really reach out to me right now. I was
inspired to add Serach (the old woman who shows Moses where Joseph’s
bones lie) after reading her story in Sisters at Sinai. Nachshon is
the old man who has faith and walks into the water, refusing to die a
slave when given a choice to be free. I always get misty when we get
to this part of the story. Both are people who have lived long lives
as slaves and now are getting to taste freedom.

Pharoah is also a key player and his perspective deserves to be
heard, even if we disagree. It’s important to always be willing to
listen to the point of view of our enemies. As for Tziporah (Moses’
wife) and Batyah (Pharaoh’s daughter), I feel they are both adopted
into the tribe of the Hebrews and so their stories deserve to be told
as well. These women shaped our culture, even if they were not born
into it.

JH: How did you choose Lev haOlam as the name of deity in the haggadah?

CL: Heart of the Universe is a term that my group, Becoming, uses. In
the first version of the haggadah I used the traditional blessings
and switched between masculine and feminine, as well as using several
names for deity. I wanted to settle on a single name to use that
moves beyond male and female. Heart of the Universe, Lev haOlam,
seemed like the perfect choice.

JH: Say a little bit about the kaddish you wrote and why you decided to have a
kaddish in the haggadah.

CL: I wanted to have a kaddish in the haggadah as a response to the
principle that we never gloat over the deaths of our enemies. One criticism of Passover that
I have heard is that the holiday is all about gloating in the defeat
of our enemies. I think taking that moment to acknowledge the fallen
in our moment of victory is incredibly important.

The traditional mourner’s kaddish focuses on praising G-d. I always
saw it as a prayer for the living, to remind us that death is a part
of life and while we, as the living, need to mourn, we also need to
continue to live. I was inspired to write my kaddish by the death of
a respected Wiccan high priestess. The words just came to me the
morning that I learned of her death. I wrote this kaddish as the
voice of the departed, imploring the living to let her/him go and
move on with their lives.

JH: What do you like best about your haggadah?

CL; The change from “Elijah’s cup” to the Prophet’s cup is near and
dear to my heart. I love the addition of a Miriam’s cup to many
seders, but I didn’t like that many people discarded
the Elijah’s cup. It also got me thinking that there are a lot of
other prophets that deserve to be honored. I immediately thought of
Aaron: why don’t we honor him? He spoke for Moses and became the
priest of the people. Offerings are a big part of my spiritual
practice through Becoming. I love being able to incorporate an
offering into the seder. After the seder, we take the prophet’s cup out to my garden ritual
space and pour it out with a blessing.

JH: What is the most meaningful moment of Passover for you?

CL: The first time I made my own matzah, was probably one of the
most incredible moments I’ve ever had for Passover ever. As I was
cursing the timer, and trying to decide how much I cared about
sticking to those 18 minutes I had an epiphany. My brain connected
the 18 minutes to the actions I was doing. I realized that the
“bread of affliction” was the bread of life, as 18 is the numerical equivalent
of the word for life in Hebrew. I was so shocked by the connection
that I blew a whole batch. Now, as I make matzah I pray for life,
peace, and happiness for all who eat it. For me it’s one of the most
magickal and spiritual moments, not only of Passover, but of the year.

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