Seder - Renewing Faith Through Jewish History - Essay Sample

Introduction

The Seder is a spiritual event carried out by the Jewish to commemorate the departure and relief from bondage under the Egyptians. This historical event is estimated to have taken place in the 13th century. The Jewish take great caution of the Seder because it reminds them of the fulfillment of God's promises on Mount Sinai to give them their land. Currently, Jewish people view the Seder as a historical celebration that renews their spiritual strengths through reliving the exodus. In Judaism religion, the Passover Seder is a prelude that shows God's nature of keeping promises no matter the time He takes to fulfill them. The Passover Seder is a celebration involving readings, singing, and use of wine and performance of other Passover customs as par with the God's command including passing the historical stories to the young generation, eating of the unleavened bread and staying indoors to demonstrate the passing over of the angel of death. The miraculous deliverance of the Jewish from the hands of Egyptians estimated to have been performed around 3000 years ago. During the special event, Jews appear as if they are coming out of Egypt, which was the land of oppression and slavery. The event reminds the Jewish about the ten plagues that God released to Pharaoh and the Egyptians (Epley, 2009 p.34)

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Judaism religion, commonly known in Hebrew as "Yehudah," comprises Jewish beliefs, cultures, and traditions. The Jewish consider Judaism as the establishment of God's agreement with the children of Israel through observing and keeping the covenant. This religion observes a variety of practices, cultures, theologies, and the Israelites' civilization. Judaism contains larger texts, including the texts of Torah, Midrash, and the popular texts of Talmud. This religion is among the religions which believe that God, through His servant Moses, gave the people of Israel commandments which were to be observed to the latter. Currently, Judaism is represented by several groups such as the Orthodox, Reform Judaism, and the modern Orthodox. The differences resulted in the spallation of Judaism religion into sub-branches as a result of differences in approaches to the law of the Jewish, state significance, and the reduction of authority of traditional Rabbinic. Some of the sub-groups under the Judaism religion, e.g., the Orthodox view Torah as unchangeable, and there is a need to follow them to the latter. Some other sub-groups of Judaism believe that Torah laws and commandments can be reformed depending on the current prevailing situations. Judaism, which comprises almost 17.4 million people globally, has been declining in its operations because of the historical reformation in the way of enforcing the Judaism law in courts, which are currently considered as voluntary. The Judaism traditions, cultures, and texts have greatly impacted much influence on the current way of worship in both churches and mosques (Coleman, 1995, p.127)

From my point of view, the Seder is of great importance in the lives of the Jewish because it includes lively themes like family unions, attainment of social justice, and the need for freedom for the ones that are still under slavery in the modern days. The Seder is significant in the lives of the modern Jewish because it reminds them of the greatness of their God that led Egypt, the land of oppression. In modern life, the Passover Seder is significant because it reminds the Jewish of their power to overcome physical, social, economic, and spiritual limitations. The Jewish feel relieved because they believe they have heaped over, leaving their troubles, difficulties, oppression, and injustices in Egypt, and this grants them the freedom of mind and soul. The modern importance of the Seder is seen in its symbols, and in most cases, it is discussed openly addressing the need to stay a free and happy life away from human enslavement. The Jewish Seder plays a major role in commemorating and meditating on God's word through developing and passing over the historical stories of deliverance to the children and sharing Bible scriptures with others. Even though the exact time when the Passover event took place is not mentioned, the Jewish and other religions including Christianity and Islamic use the historical event to preach peace and freedom throughout the world

The Jewish Seder is a period ritual that is performed annually to mark the remembrance of their freedom from captivity in the land of Egypt. The Seder is practiced to develop and keep a connection between Jewish and miraculous actions of God on the day of deliverance. The people mark the Seder to remember the wrath of God on Pharaoh and the Egyptians which resulted to the historical release of the supernatural plagues including: "boils, hails locusts, frogs, blood water, flies, lies, the mysterious killing of livestock and the killing of the Egyptians firstborn sons" (Exodus 11:1-2). The Passover Seder is performed to facilitate the enhancement of bonds between the Jewish and God through meditation on the good deeds that God did to their fore-father' lives while still in slavery. The Seder is also a communal ritual because it involves the coming together of households, families, and temple gatherings to mark the celebration of their deliverance together. Also, the Seder is an imitative ritual because the Jewish people symbolically remember the miraculous deliverance from Egypt, the land of oppression. The Jewish remember this special event by strictly adhering to the laws and commandments that they received from God through His servant Moses on Mount Sinai (Grimes, 1982, p. 101)

Among the Jewish, the Seder ranks as second among the list of the celebrated holy days in the spiritual calendar. The Passover Seder is of great significance to the lives of the Jewish people because they commemorate and meditate on how God delivered them from an estimate of 400 years of bondage in the land of Egypt. This is as a result of the calling of Moses by God to set the people of Israel free from slavery to the Promised Land, as quoted in the Haggadah, "If God has not delivered us, we would still have slaved." Secondly, the Jewish value the Passover Seder because they witnessed the power of God as a result of the miracles He performed during the Passover (Coleman, 1995, p.87) Thirdly, the Seder reminds them of the reaffirmation of God's covenant with their forefather Abraham. God had promised them that He would fulfill the covenant He made with Abraham, and the fulfillment of the Passover showed that Israel was a holy and chosen nation of God. Besides, the Jewish people celebrate the Seder to remember how God delivered the people of Israel and showed them land that belonged to them. For many years, the people of Israel wandered in the desert after God had delivered them, but He did not forsake them because He was determined to fulfill His promise "A good and large land in which to dwell as a nation." (Exodus 3:8). The Seder is also celebrated by the Jewish people to remember how God, through His servant Moses revealed the coming Messiah who would be rejected and put to death for the sake of humankind salvation and the Jewish can figure out the sacrificial death of the prophesied Messiah (Schilbrack, 2004, p.98)

Even though the Jewish Seder is observed to the latter by Jewish people in remembrance of the great deliverance power of God, the misunderstandings concerning the culture, traditions, and the history of the event, there is a myth that the Seder is full of Jewish culture and traditions, and it purely talks about the styles of the Jewish lives. The Torah, Mishnah, and the Talmud contain the whole Jewish history surrounding the Passover, which includes specification of meals, passing over of the historical tales to the younger generation, and the slaughtering of lambs. As a result, scholars argue that there may be chances that the Seder is developed from the Jewish culture but transferred to generations with a different meaning. The second myth that surrounds the Seder is that the historical circumstances of the Passover are not accurate, and there is a hot scholarly debate concerning the age and the time of the events. That is, in the Seder.

There is no revealed evidence of the archeologists concerning the enslavement of Israelite people, deliverance. There is no clear evidence concerning the total number of Israelites wandering in the desert of Sinai for almost forty years. The third myth surrounding the Passover is the fact that most of the Jewish focus on trying to answer four questions concerning the night of the Passover instead of the one known question, which is indicated in the Haggadah "Why is a night different from all other nights?" The questions about the food, the slaughter of lambs and the children are argued as mere observations (Goldenberg, 2000, p. 67)

The Passover Seder has marked with the sharing of the symbolic foods carefully selected according to the great command of God. First, the Jewish people consider the roasted shank bone from lambs, which symbolizes commemoration and meditation of the sacrifice their forefathers offered during the night of deliverance. Secondly, the Jewish consider a roasted egg, the symbol of springtime, renewal of mind, and soul. The roasted egg represents sacrifice offered to God during the proceedings of the Second Temple. The third simple is the eating of the bitter herbs, which symbolizes the hard life their forefathers passed through during the slavery period in Egypt. The saltwater is used to represent the tears and the sweat of their forefathers during the enslavement period. The Jewish drink four cups of grape wine to commemorate the four promises that God made while they were still under slavery in Egypt. The Seder plate is used to hold six items of significance to the Seder, which include; the major, shank bone, roasted egg, karpas, the charoset, and the chazeret. These symbols serve a greater purpose in the lives of the Jewish people (Grimes, 1982, p. 108)

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