I have a book on my shelf entitled, 300 Ways to ask the Four Questions. It’s a book that was lent to me by a friend, I'm embarrassed to admit, a couple of years ago -- I’ve been far too lax in returning it (BTW, if it’s owner is reading this public confession – my apologies, I haven’t forgotten that it’s yours. It’s sitting quietly in my office ready to be returned).
When the book was first offered to me, I was so excited -- 300 variations on the Four Questions! Wow. My excitement was palpable...yet that palpable excitement was quickly replaced with disappointment. It is a fascinating book, mind you. It presents the Four Questions in, literally, 300 different languages along with nuggets of information about the languages, each community represented, and the translators; and, the book is accompanied by two educational DVDs. What more could one expect? But, I thought it was going to be a book that offered 300 textual variations, not just translations, on the standard Four Questions that have been recited by the youngest Jews present at our seder tables at least the since the Middle ages.
The Four Questions are intended to draw out the telling of our story of redemption, so that the story and its lessons can be taught to the next generation. My daughter was recently asked by one of her Judaic Studies teachers, “If the Rabbinic sages were given the opportunity to add a ritual or object to our contemporary Passover seder that would further its meaning, what would you suggest?” My daughter's response, "a dictionary!" "Why?" I asked her. "To represent constant learning." (yes, I'm a proud mama!) The first thought that came to my mind: "have the adults ask the questions!"
What would you ask? The task of formulating questions requires a certain degree of curiosity and learning in and of itself. So, what questions would you ask in order to better understand our ancient and modern history? And, what lessons do you want your kids to learn from this history and from you? I look forward to the variations that arise during your seders!
A question that I have asked myself, yet hesitate to ask even here is "Why would a culture with so many redeeming qualities have as an essential mythos a likely fictional account of oppression and subsequent redemption?".
ReplyDeleteObviously, this question pre-supposes many things, and the simplest reply is to state that the story is allegorical and therefore doesn't afford historical analysis. I can certainly accept that answer as a doctrinal point and thus unask the question.
If, however, the question is a worthy one, there is one compelling reason I think it matters. As there are "xmas and easter" christians, so too are there "yom kippur and pesach" jews. We could probably all do well with some honest attonement, but why the duty bound requirement to steadfastly teach a people that they are descended from a long line of persecuted victims?
A sociologist - like Hoffer, for example - would say that a mass movement can exist without a leader but cannot exist without an "evil" as those who allegedly enslaved the jews. Even if this is so at Hoffer's level of description, it seems a poor moral foundation, and worst of all instills a sense of otherness, persecution, and martyrdom as a defining feature of a people.
I can't but think that the millennia long, stunningly faithful, mandated retelling of this story can only serve to add divisiveness to a world which already has an overabundance.