54 | MARCH 30 • 2023
N
ear the beginning of
the seder at your house,
if you have a child
in attendance, the child asks
questions. That makes sense.
According to the Torah, you tell
the story of the Exodus “when
your children ask” (Exodus
12:26).
According to the Mishnah, if
the child does not know enough
to ask, then the father prompts
curiosity by observing “How dif-
ferent is this night from all other
nights” (Pesahim 10:4).
Those prompts appear in the
Haggadah as four scripted ques-
tions, one about matzah, one
about bitter herbs (maror), one
about reclining and one about
dipping. Asking about matzah
and bitter herbs makes sense, as
the Torah commands us to eat
the Paschal meat with matzah
and bitter herbs (Exodus 12:8).
What about reclining and
about double dipping? The Torah
does not mention either one. So,
how did they get into the seder?
We know about reclining.
Maimonides explains that reclin-
ing expresses freedom (Laws of
Leavened and Unleavened Bread
7:7). In their description of a
typical banquet, ancient rabbis
explain that the guests recline on
couches (Tosefta Berakhot 4:8).
The servers then bring a low
table with food for each guest.
This description matches Greek
descriptions of banquets.
The word “recline” includes
the Greek word for couch, klinai.
The guests reclining at a Greek
“symposium” (literally “drinking
together”) were men of the upper
classes; the entertainers might
include female and male dancers,
musicians or comedians.
At our seder, the men must
recline and all the important
women, too. Rabbi Moshe
Isserles rules that “all our women
are considered important” (Orah
Hayyim 472:4). We recline to
demonstrate we are not slaves,
but free men and women.
Today’s seder looks a lot like
the Greek symposium, but we do
without the comedian (Greek:
komikos). Maybe the Mishnah
means “no comedians” by the
mysterious “we do not have
Afikomen after the Paschal meal”
(Pesahim 10:8).
When the guests first arrive,
they receive a cup of wine and
some hors d’
oeuvres (Greeks,
Romans and rabbis agree) —
hors d’
oeuvres such as vegetables,
fish or capons, each with a sauce.
At the seder, we dip twice: the
vegetable karpas (parsley) in salt
water or vinegar, and the bitter
herb maror in charoset.
Some Sephardi recipes for
charoset seem just like Roman
sweet-and-sour fruit sauces. Don
Yitzhak Abarbanel, who served
Spanish and Portuguese royalty
in the 15th century, explains:
“On this night we must dip
twice,
” and this demonstrates
that we are noble and princes
and the leaders of people, since
we eat our food improved by
dipping sauces, for this is the
delight of princes.
The Mishnah reads: “On all
other nights, we dip once; on
this night, twice” (Pesahim 10:4).
Our Haggadah has: “On all other
nights, we do not even dip once.
”
According to the Talmud, Rav
Safra, a Babylonian rabbi of the
early 4th century, instituted the
change because we do not dip.
Maybe rabbis in Israel under
Roman rule began their fanciest
meals by dipping a delicacy in
sauce, and Babylonian rabbis
under Sassanian Persian rulers
did not.
Rav Safra himself, however,
frequently traveled to Israel,
which perhaps undercuts this
speculation.
All Will Be Revealed
Dipping
parsley in
salt water is
a longtime
Passover
tradition.
Finding the roots of dipping and reclining
traditions on Pesach.
LOUIS FINKELMAN CONTRIBUTING WRITER
Trader Joe’s Matzah
JTA
For millennia, Jews have
eaten matzah. And for years,
Jewish patrons of Trader Joe’s
have been able to purchase
matzah off the shelves of the
tiki-themed grocery chain —
which has gained its own qua-
si-religious following.
Now, for the first time ever,
Trader Joe’s will be selling
matzah under its own famous
private label.
The grocery chain, with
more than 500 stores nation-
wide, has gained a cult-like
following in its 56 years of
operation, including no small
number of Jews who keep
kosher. The store stocks a
number of Jewish, Israeli and
Middle Eastern foods — from
an “everything but the bagel”
spice mix to spicy zhoug sauce
to kosher-certified turkeys
ahead of Thanksgiving and
frozen latkes.
Some shoppers said they
were excited about the new
offering, while others won-
dered whether it would be
any different from the matzah
Trader Joe’s has sold in previ-
ous years. Still others said that
by putting its name on one of
the most quintessential Jewish
foods, Trader Joe’s “signals that
Pesach products have gone
mainstream,” in the words
of Susan Robinson, a mem-
ber of Kosher Trader Joe’s, a
Facebook group with more
than 63,000 members.
PASSOVER