Passover is just about over. Despite news reports of matzah shortages across the country, our family managed to acquire enough boxes to make it through the holiday, with even a few pieces to spare.

If have noticed that I and a lot of my family and friends who observe the basic rules of Passover are getting quite grumpy and fatigued. Our daily routine of toast or a bagel and coffee for breakfast has been replaced by the mostly colorless, odorless, and tasteless matzah cracker, which must be slathered with butter/margarine, and jam to give it some pizazz.

Making a sandwich with matzah is a lesson in futility. Most of the contents of such a concoction end up in your lap with the first bite. There are two exceptions to these culinary disappointments. The first is matzah brei, a dish of scrambled eggs and matzah. The second is matzah balls, usually served in…

With Passover around the corner, I am instantly transported back to my childhood. Some of my most favorite and enduring memories are from seders past with my family. Many of these memories have nothing to do with the actual celebration of the Exodus from Egypt, but rather my cousins reenacting scenes from Saturday Night Live, or my sister giving an impromptu lip sync performance to the music of the Pointer Sisters (I did grow up in the ‘80’s).

So what makes these trivial moments so vivid?

Well, it’s all in the way we observe this tactile holiday. In a nutshell, Passover is the celebration of the Jews’ freedom from slavery in Egypt. On the first and second nights (Passover is 7 days), we have a ritual feast called a seder.

Myjewishlearning.com sums it up:

During the seder, we don’t just tell the story of the Exodus, we see, smell, feel, and taste liberation.

Guided by…

Steve Giegerich’s story in the Post-Dispatch, Passed Over? Students bow out (04/02/08) relates a tale that is an example of the inevitable conflicts which will occur between civil society and religious observance.

Jewish students who wish to participate in a state wide competition are faced with the choice of either preparing for Passover, which begins at sunset on Saturday, April 19, or participating in the competition and barely making it back home in time to begin the Passover celebration. As the article makes clear, each student is making his/her own choice.

The problem is, in a society which struggles to encourage diversity and understanding, some of us will be forced to make choices which violate our personal religious standards. We may think that we are guided by a civil or secular calendar, but nothing could be farther from the truth.

Our current conventional calendar is a product of the religious…