This weekend was the jewish Holiday Pesach or Pass Over.  For American Jews it is one of the most celebrated holidays, mainly because it does not consist of going to temple but rather having a seder, or a dinner.

This year I went to two seders, one at my house and one at my grandparents house.  A seder is basically a very ,very long dinner with only certain foods that must be eaten in a certain order while reciting certain prayers and telling the story of Pass over.

Pass Over is celebrating the jews release from bondage in Egypt.  It is the story of Moses freeing the Jewish slaves in which he proclaims the famous well-known line “Let My People go.”

During the seder the entire story is retold while we remember what our ancestors went through long ago.  We eat only unleavened bread to symbolize the jews frantic escape in which they did not have time to let their bread rise and rather put them on their backs and the sun cooked them into Matza.

Pass Over has much more significance to the world today then just being a jewish holiday.  On Pass Over we reflect on how blessed we are to live the lives we live and we thank our ancestors for enduring the harshness of slavery so that we may not have to.  We also discuss the world of today and how slavery is still very much alive today and what we can do.