You can’t have a dinner without food, and celebration dinners need several courses. Such is the case with a Passover seder.
There are six types of food on a traditional seder plate.
- Maror and Chazeret: These are two types of bitter herbs. They represent the bitterness of the life of slavery that the Jews lived through in Egypt. I will use horseradish for my maror and maybe romain lettuce as my chazeret.
- Charoset: This actually sounds super tasty. It’s a mixture of different fruits, nuts, and spices (depending on your tradition), usually held together with honey. It represents the mortar used by the Israelites to build for the Egyptians. I’m going to find a good recipe for this.
- Karpas: Another bitter herb that is dipped in salt water. The salt water represents the tears shed by the Israelites during their captivity. I will use parsely.
- Zeroh: A lamb bone to represent the Passover sacrifice. These days people use chicken sometimes, and since I probably won’t find lamb, I’ll use chicken.
- Beitzah: This is a hard boiled egg meant to symbolize the festival sacrifice. I have read that this is also dipped in salt water.
There are two other elements at a seder. One is the matzoh, the unleavened bread. On the night of the original Passover, the Isrealites had to be ready at a moments notice to leave and therefore had no time to wait for bread to rise. On your matzoh plate, you will have three stacked wafers. At one point in the ceremony, the middle wafer is broken and the larger piece is hidden for later, representing the coming Messiah (for me, His second coming). The other two represent the two loaves of bread that were taken to the temple on festival days.
The other element is the wine. There are four cups which represent the four promises of God to his children. The first one, Kiddush, means “I will bring you out.” Number two is Maggid which means “I will save you from their work.” Birkat Hamazon, or “I will redeem you”, is number three. The fourth cup is Hallel – the Cup of Praise. These are spread out in the ceremony, and obviously I won’t be drinking more than a few sips each time!
I love the Christian symbolism that becomes very obvious when you begin to think about it. One of the preparations that in Jewish homes took place a while ago is getting rid of the chametz (yeast) in your home. The New Testament talks about purging the old leaven in many places. Cups three and four can be particularly meaningful to the Christian. Many of the foods can have Christian symbolism as well.
I’m looking forward to my “feast” tomorrow. And if I have time, tomorrow’s post will briefly outline the ceremony as a whole. Friday I’ll try to bring it back around for the Christian applications I found.
-j
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