It’s been a crazy week. The world with all its worries and bothers is still clamoring for your attention. The first step is to forget all that. Leave it behind. Enter into a timeless space, where you, your great-grandparents and Moses all coincide.

Begin with a full cup of sweet red wine. A full cup of hundreds of generations of rejoicing and tears and celebration and wisdom and… of doing just what you are going to do tonight.

Barukh attah Adonai eloheinu melekh ha-olam,
asher bachar banu mikol am veromemanu mikol lashon,
v'kideshanu b'mitzvotav. Vatiten lanu Adonai eloheinu b'ahavah
mo'adim l'simchah, chaggim uzemanim l'sason,
et yom chag hamatzot hazeh, z'man cheruteinu,
mikra kodesh, zikher litziat mitzrayim.
Ki vanu vacharta v'otanu kidashta mikol ha'amim,
umod'adei kodshekha b'simchah uvesason hinchaltanu.
Barukh attah Adonai, m'kadesh Yisrael v'hazemanim.

"Blessed are You, Adonai our God, King of the Universe, who chose us from all peoples and exalted us from all tongues, and sanctified us with His commandments. And You gave to us, Lord our God, with love appointed times for gladness, festivals and times for joy, the day of this festival of Matzah, the time of our freedom, a holy convocation, a memorial of the exodus from Egypt. For you chose us and sanctified us from all the nations and the festivals of your holiness in gladness and in joy you gave us a heritage. Blessed are You, Adonai, who sanctifies Israel and the seasons."

Drink the cup of wine while seated, reclining on the left side as a sign of freedom.


haggadah Section: Kadesh