SPECIAL FEATURE: PESSAH AND EASTER
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 3
PESSAH IN THE JEWISH TRADITION
Since we are delivered, our bodies too should be freed. This implies a liberation of our bodies and souls. A diet. This aspect is very significant today, although meals and eating have at all times been of great importance. There is a very striking difference between the heathen banquet of the Greek tradition, which could both be orgiac and philosophical and the Seder Pessah, the meal of Pessah in which every ingredient has a meaning referring to life and death and life beyond death : egg [death and life], shankbone [zero�a] or the offering, Bitter Herbs [Maror] or bitterness of the lives of the ancestors [we have an historic and spiritual memory]; the Harosset [mortar] made of nuts, apples, dates, spices, raisins and wine symbolizes the mortar used to build the houses for the Egyptians; Karpas [vegetable] is any vegetable like boiled carrots or potatoes dipped in salt water to arouse the curiosity of the children toward the event. Hazeret [more bitter herbs] stresses that dipping into bitterness we receive sweetness of the Lamb, the unleavened bread and all the ingredients.
The unleavened bread should be eaten exclusively during this period of eight days and are called Matzot. This is a light unleavened bread. The Word, with different vowels corresponds to Mitzvot [Commandments]. God�s Commandments are as light as this specific paschal bread [see below [�Leavened � Unleavened�].
THE SEDER OR THE MEAL
It should be noted that The Jewish tradition connects in a very tight way different elements that we separate in our daily life : a] to account something that happenend to someone, a nation, a social body and b] a meal expressing an offering linked to salvation, i.e. the use of various ingredients c] the questioning of our destiny and its prophetic aspect.
The Seder or Paschal Meal as it is performed today includes the account of what God did to the ancestors in the Land of Egypt. This account is called the Hagaddah, i.e. the recount or story of those who were saved. In the course of this account which developed over the centuries, some phrases are pronounced in the present tense :� Haynu avadim� [We are slave in Egypt�] or Zekhor [Remember that you are slaves�]. This is very significant in order to understand what Jesus accomplishes when He partakes His Last Supper with His Disciples : this is not a story from ancient times, this is actual, present and drifts to future actions.
Mah Nishtanah
The Meal begins by a question uttered by the youngest boy [please note that Jesus took the children and placed them in front of Him and said that anyone who will not be like those will
PLEASE CONTINUE TO PAGE 5
HOW to contact us?