pumpkinfoodproject
pumpkinfoodproject
Pumpkin Project: Food and language
1 post
Final Project
Don't wanna be here? Send us removal request.
pumpkinfoodproject · 7 years ago
Text
Passover: Jewish Identity and Family Dynamics
Ah, festivals. Depending on the family dynamics, having the whole family gather would mean enjoying each other’s company while feasting, or elders politely asking about marriage while facing your aunt’s frosty stare because she hasn’t forgiven you for eating all her cookies two years ago.
via GIPHY
And then there’s the special “only once a year” food; you enjoy it but will never otherwise consume it once the festivities are over. Festivals, however, aren’t only just for stuffing your face, they play a bigger role in family dynamics and identity. Say, for example, the Passover.
The Passover is a Jewish festival celebrated on the 15th day in the Jewish month of Nissan. It lasts for seven days and marks the beginning of the harvest in Israel, and is a “celebration of freedom” (Sherman, 2002). The Hebrew word Pesach, which the word Passover was taken from, is formed from the words for “pass over”, referring to the origin story where God passed over Jewish homes and spared their firstborn while killing the firstborn in Egyptian households. 
If you’ve watched The Prince of Egypt, you’ll be familiar with the origins of the Passover. 
via GIPHY
Enslaved in Egypt for and made to do hard labour, the Israelites were oppressed to the point where they were forced to make their own mortar for bricklaying because the Egyptians figured giving them just bricks would be too easy (Exodus 5: 6-18). In a series of events that led to their freedom and the Exodus, the pivotal point is the very first Passover. God literally passed over houses of the Jews and killed all the firstborn in Egypt, prompting Pharaoh to let the Israelites finally leave (Exodus 12: 29-31). 
Before the Passover, God gave instructions (as seen in the strip below) that were to be followed strictly; else the household would follow the fate awaiting the Egyptians. Before the Passover, all articles with yeast were to be removed from every Jewish home. For the Passover meal itself, there are 3 important points, Pesah, matzah, maror, the lamb, the bread without yeast and the bitter herbs, respectively.  Pesah represents the sacrifice made so that God would pass over their homes, maror to remember the bitter lives under the Egyptians, and matzah as a symbol of the Jews’ liberation.
Tumblr media
Following God’s command from Exodus 12:15, the removal of chametz (leaven bread) from homes begins several days or weeks before the Pesach. The removal of chametz symbolises the haste in which the Israelites had to leave Egypt. On the night of the 14th of Nissan, B’dikat Chametz – a search for any leftover chametz - is done. There is a tradition of scattering 10 pieces of chametz before the search, and once all the chametz left is found, a passage is recited to invalidate any unknown, unfound and unremoved chametz. On the morning before the Pesach, all the chametz in anyone’s possession is burnt as per Biyur Chametz, which is the commandment to burn chametz, and the passage is once again recited after the burning.
On the first night of the Pesach, the Jews and their families partake in the Seder, which means order in Hebrew. The Seder is a kind of ritual because there are specific tasks and passages to be said and read in a particular order, which is recorded in the Haggadah (prayer book). There are 14 parts to the Seder (as seen in the infographic below), each with a symbolic meaning, which is explained throughout the course of the meal. This explanation serves a purpose of bringing forth awareness that the food is not “just food”, but a greater part of Jewish culture, identity and history. “Most Jews see the Passover as a symbol of family and Jewish people as a whole” (Sherman, 2002), because the fact that millennia of Jews had celebrated, are celebrating and will celebrate the Passover in the same exact manner creates a sense of belonging and identity as a Jew not only in the present but with the past as well. The responsibility of carrying out the Seder the same as it were in the past, along with the changes made due to the changing world presents the Seder “as if it had always existed”(Brumberg-Kraus, 1999). 
Tumblr media Tumblr media
via https://staff.ncsy.org/education/education/material/KnmorURTIr/passover-seder-cheat-sheet/
Firstly, there is the Seder plate, whereby the food is placed in the order as shown in this picture below.  After the temple was destroyed by the Romans, the Pesah sacrifice was no longer observed and is replaced with a shank bone on the seder plate. The charoset symbolizes the mortar that the Israelites made in Eygpt. The vegetables and the bitter herbs represent the bitter and backbreaking work the Israelites were subjected to, and the salt water the tears shed during the aforementioned labour. The roasted egg takes the place of the pre-holiday offering the Jews made in the temple. The Aramaic word for egg, bei’-ah, closely resembles the Aramaic word for desire, which in this case is translated as God’s desire to free the Israelites. 
Tumblr media
In a meal ritual like the Seder there are 3 components: “things shown, things said and things done.” (Brumberg-Kraus, 1999) For example, the bitter herb (things shown), the 4 questions (things said), and the eating of the food (things done). 
The Jews are commanded to tell the story as if as they were personally delivered, and this retelling along with the consumption of the food (things done) - the same as what their ancestors ate - reinforces their identity as Jews (Brumberg-Kraus, 1999) through consistency with the past (Sherman, 2002). The “things said” have a heavier implication on the family. It is the duty of the youngest member of the family to ask the 4 questions, and the process of handing over this duty to one even younger is considered a rite of passage from childhood to adulthood (Sherman, 2002). 
"Things done” (or the willingness to) affects how a person is accepted into the family (Sherman, 2002). The absence of one man during Seders results in the family treating him as an outsider despite his relations with them through marriage.
It is also interesting to note that the Gentiles, that is, the non-Jews, have deliberately made measures over the years to avoid being associated with this Jewish festival. In Christianity, it is recognised that Jesus was crucified on Passover in the Bible; His last meal was the Seder. However Easter and the Passover do not coincide, and the reason for that dates back to the early church. There were 2 fractions of churches then; Eastern and Western. The Eastern churches only celebrated Christ’s crucifixion (on the Passover), while the other only celebrated His resurrection (the Sunday following the Passover).
Tumblr media
via https://chasingalion.com/index.php/spiritual-library/56-topical-studies/lords-supper/21-timing-of-the-last-supper-crucifixion
 The conflict in dates was a sore point for the Christians, as it seemed that they were not united enough to even celebrate their important holiday on the same day as a whole. Therefore, at around A.D. 190, it was declared that the only true date for Easter was the resurrection date, and all who celebrated it on Passover were to be excommunicated and labelled as “Judaizers”. Being labelled as such was a declaration that these people were anything but Christian, and the Eastern churches that ignored this decree were thus isolated. 
However, the date for Easter still relied heavily on the Jewish calendar, and in order to further distinguish themselves as separate from Jews and the synagogue, the Emperor Constantine the Great decided to use the vernal equinox as a marker for Easter instead of the Passover. This distinction was important to the church; because of the anti-Semitic sentiments during that time, having the reliance on the “detestable” Jews and their practices was seen as unworthy. To further isolate the church from the Jews, Easter was to be always celebrated on “the Sunday following the full moon which coincides with, or falls next after, the vernal equinox.” (Zerubavel, 1982), ensuring that Easter will never fall on the same day as the Passover. 
Tumblr media
via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSa-QHMMdQU
The effects are enormous on the group identity for both Christians and Jews, because special holidays not only divide one group from the other, it also presents a unique point for group members to relate to each other. Therefore, this desire to disconnect the church from the Jewish practices and traditions only strengthens the fact that the Passover is uniquely Jewish, not only to the Jew himself but to the others around him.
Sources:
Brumberg-Kraus, J. (1999). ‘NOT BY BREAD ALONE…’: THE RITUALIZATION OF FOOD AND TABLE TALK IN THE PASSOVER SEDER AND IN THE LAST SUPPER. Semeia, (86), 165-191. Retrieved November 21, 2017.
Passover - Pesach: History & Overview. (n.d.). Retrieved November 21, 2017, from http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/passover-history-and-overview
Sherman, S. R. (2002). Chapter 14 The Passover Seder: Ritual dynamics, foodways and family folklore. In Food in the USA: A Reader (pp. 193-204). Routledge. Retrieved November 21, 2017. 
The Seder Plate - The ingredients and the order of placement. (n.d.). Retrieved November 23, 2017, from http://www.chabad.org/holidays/passover/pesach_cdo/aid/1998/jewish/The-Seder-Plate.htm
Zerubavel, E. (1982). Easter and Passover: On Calendars and Group Identity. American Sociological Review,, 47(2), 284-289. Retrieved November 21, 2017.
0 notes