Passover Seders at MIT: Getting the Story Right
This week is Passover. For Passover, Jews hold meals called “seders”. At a Seder, certain foods are eaten to commemorate the Exodus from Egypt— and in particular the original Passover— with a collection of stories and prayers and readings that vary a bit from household to household and are partly in Hebrew, partly in English. This essay is a story of three Seders. It starts with the worst and ends with the best. The best is also the most interesting, and where I put the moral of the story, so skip there if you’re short on time.
I. Oppression
MIT, like other colleges, has pro-Hamas students camping out on the college lawn in defiance of the time-place-and-manner rules that the college has for every other kind of demonstration. (MFSA has a very thorough and well-linked webpage describing, neutrally, Gaza-related stories at MIT specifically.) There is even considerable Jewish support for Hamas, on the Left. Thus, many (all?) of these college encampments have had Seders among the tents.
It would seem to be awkward for pro-Hamas people to hold a Seder, since it would be about how Jews were oppressed by an Egyptian government that tried to kill their babies; how God punished the Egyptians with the Ten Plagues, the last being the sudden deaths of their first-born sons; and how the Jews despoiled the Egyptians and left to start their own country, where they’d be safe from oppression.
To be sure, there are Christian Seders, versions of the Seder which add Christian motifs and symbolism. I’ve written one of those myself and my family’s used it a few times. The idea really does work, because Christians view themselves as the children of Abraham by adoption, and so the Exodus is our victory too. As the New Testament says,
Know therefore that they that are of faith, the same are sons of Abraham. And the scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand unto Abraham, saying, In thee shall all the nations be blessed. (Galatians 3)
and
As he saith also in Hosea, I will call them my people, which were not my people; and her beloved, which was not beloved. And it shall come to pass, that in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not my people; there shall they be called the children of the living God. (Romans 9)1
The famous ending line of the Passover Seder, “Next year in Jerusalem!” is echoed at the end of the last book of the New Testament:
And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea.
And I, John, saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.
And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God.
And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away. (Revelation 21)
Christians can have a Seder, even though Jews would disagree with some of it. The Christian Seder just adds new material to the Jewish Seder. In fact, a lawyer friend used to have Seders in L.A. back in the 80’s and a Christian like me fit in just fine. But what about in the pro-Hamas encampments? MIT grad student Thalia Khan took a look:
That Haggadah (Seder order of service) is from an organization called Tzedek Chicago, “which is proud to present our seder supplement for Passover 5784: “Hearkening to the Voice of Gaza”:
Given the unspeakably tragic violence ongoing in Gaza, we acknowledge that this Passover is radically different from all other Passovers. In response to this moral challenge, our supplement gives the voice of Palestinians a central place at the seder table this year.
The majority of readings in our supplement were written by Gazans and Palestinians from the Occupied Territories, each corresponding to different sections of seder. . . May these readings inspire us all to do what we must to end the genocidal violence Israel is inflicting on Palestinians in Gaza. Even in the midst of this unbearably dire moment, may we never give up on the vision of a just future for all who live between the river and the sea.
Tzedek Chicago wishes you a liberating Pesach.
Here are some excerpts:
• If we read the Passover story as a story of Jewish liberation alone or - God forbid - Jewish liberation at the expense of others, we will not have fulfilled the requirements of the Passover seder…
Along with homes, the Israeli military has destroyed and flattened massive tracts of farmland. We eat strawberries now, in solidarity with the people of Gaza and their historic, sacred relationship to their land. Together with karpas, let strawberries be our symbol of new life emerging out of the cold winter.
Pharaoh attempts to stem the Israelite birth rate by ordering the Hebrew midwives Shifra and Puah to kill every newborn boy. When they defy his order, Pharaoh orders that every newborn boy be cast into the Nile. In the midst of Israel’s genocidal assault on the people of Gaza, these verses now resonate with unbearable urgency.
What I found worst was what they did to Psalm 46. In the King James Version, its last part goes like this:
The heathen raged, the kingdoms were moved: he uttered his voice, the earth melted.
The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge. Selah.
Come, behold the works of the Lord, what desolations he hath made in the earth.
He maketh wars to cease unto the end of the earth; he breaketh the bow, and cutteth the spear in sunder; he burneth the chariot in the fire.
Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth.
The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge. Selah.
In the pro-Hamas seder, “To our traditional Psalms of joy and praise, we add this adaptation of Psalm 46”:
For the people of Gaza,
for the refugees,
for the dispossessed and displaced,
a song:
. . .
This nation that rages so mercilessly against you
soon will break under the weight of its own
overwhelming might
and you will find shelter and protectiona
at long last.
For there is a Power far mightier
than even the mightiest military;
bombs and tanks and drones
will be shattered into dust,
governments held to account.
I will bring you into the stillness
of my embrace
and you will know that I am with you
I will lift you up among the nations
I will return you in dignity and in love.
The One who abides with you
through this endless night
will accompany you through all harm
and bring you safely home.
You get the idea. The Seder is turned exactly upon itself, to be not a celebration of Israel’s victory over its enemies, but a prayer for Hamas’s victory over Israel; not a hymn of joy for the deliverance of Jews from savage oppression, but an accusation that Jews have been savagely oppressing Arabs. It reminds me of nothing so much as a Black Mass, a malicious parody of a Christian ceremony with everything done in reverse so as to gleefully mock and offend Christians.
II. Flight
The Hamas Seder at MIT was clearly against university rules, if only because it was part of a long-term land occupation that was against university rules. But MIT’s President, Sally Haxton, doesn’t seem to realize that if someone breaks a university rule, she has the power to make them stop, as we can see from this transcript:
. . . Last Sunday night, 30 or so students set up around 15 tents on the Kresge lawn. They also put up signs – some deeply critical of Israel, some expressing their support for the Palestinian people and their demands that MIT cut research ties with Israel. They have repeatedly stated their commitment to these views.
From the start, this encampment has been a clear violation of our procedures for registering and reserving space for campus demonstrations – rules that are independent of content – rules that help make sure that everyone can have freedom of speech.
. . .
Keeping the encampment safe and secure for this set of students is diverting hundreds of staff hours, around the clock, away from other essential duties.2
We have a responsibility to the entire MIT community – and it is not possible to safely sustain this level of effort.
We are open to further discussion about the means of ending the encampment.
But this particular form of expression needs to end soon.
Whether a university should tolerate Black Masses or Hamas Seders that abide by time-place-and-manner restrictions is an interesting question. One would think a less difficult question would be whether universities should tolerate Jewish Seders. Well, at MIT, the Administration seemed to be solving the problem of anti-semitism by making the Jewish students move their Seder away from the Hillel Center. At the Hillel Center, it would be right near the Hamas protesters who might be offended by it.
Jewish students received this letter
Not a good look. I do like Sally Kornbluth, who has shown both more spine and less pomposity than Rafael Reif, her predecessor as MIT President, but what a blunder!
III. Redemption
Actually, though, Sally Kornbluth hadn’t blundered. Or, rather, she’s blundered in a different and better way. One of the MIT Free Speech Alliance Jewish alumni is enough of a bigshot to be able to get through to her personally. Here’s what he reported from the conversation:
So, I asked Sally about moving the seder. She decided to host it at her place and had over 43 people from Hillel. The idea was to get into a more relaxed atmosphere. Personally, I agree that she should be doing more--like sifting through the protesters, having non-MIT affiliates charged with criminal trespass and going after them that way. And suspending or expelling the ones who are Tech-related.
So what President Kornbluth did was to invite all the Jewish students to a Seder at her house, the MIT Presidential mansion. That’s a great idea. Ideally, a Seder ought to be in a home, not in an institutional building like a Hillel Center, though one does the best one can.3 Surely every Jewish mother was happy that President Sally was taking care of her child who couldn’t come home for Passover!
The Hillel office sent out this memo later:
Hag sameach, even in these hard times.
A lot of news about campus events circulated over the first two days of Passover, when the Hillel offices were closed and we were offline for the holiday. Not all of the news correctly reflects events, and I want to set the record straight on a few points.
As you probably have heard, a tent city went up on Sunday evening on Kresge Oval, in “solidarity” with the Columbia University protestors and subsequent student arrests. With protestors at Columbia and other campuses calling for violence, and in some cases, perpetrating violence, as well as delegitimizing Zionists, which they use as a code word for Jews who are not expressly anti-Zionist, I was immediately concerned.
MIT Hillel had a scheduled first-night seder in W11, the Religious Activities Center, which borders Kresge Oval. President Kornbluth reached out to me on Monday morning, and offered to open her home, Gray House, to the Hillel community for that evening’s seder. Fifty undergraduate and graduate students from the MIT Jewish community sang, reflected, remembered those who could not be at a seder this year, and celebrated our people’s redemption from Egypt and the strength of Jewish people with the President in her home. We did not flee. We were not chased away. This was an invitation that we graciously accepted and are thankful for. It was an honor and a beautiful evening.
Regarding the continued and evolving protest, Jewish students who were around for the beginning of Passover experienced the protestors in various ways – many with fear and anxiety knowing what has been happening around the nation (and, yes, there is also a group of anti-Zionist Jewish students involved in the protest). To date, no one’s physical safety has been threatened. We are here for our students, however they need us.
The MIT administration is meeting about the tent protest multiple times a day. I understand this is their top priority. I believe that they are trying to avoid the violence other campuses have experienced. But, I am not privy to those conversations, and have nothing more I can report back at this time about their planned steps. I am among many voices who continue to push the administration for meaningful – serious – consequences for those students breaking community rules, including oft-repeated “time, place, and manner” restrictions – and to communicate to all of us that those steps are indeed being taken. When there is news to report, I will, of course, do so.
Meanwhile, I reiterate all that I wrote to this community in my newsletter just before Passover: “We know that one of the most powerful ways to counter antisemitism is by building and nurturing a vibrant Jewish community.” In addition to the seder hosted at Gray House, Hillel staff trained and supported students who ran twelve Jew-It-Yourself “home” seders in their dorms, living groups, and off-campus apartments. On Wednesday night, we partnered with the MIT LGBTQ+ Rainbow Lounge on a Rainbow Seder. As in every time of our history, our community used Passover to connect, to ask hard questions, to try to feel redeemed, and to express gratitude. We are proud Jews and undeterred.
I am grateful for this thriving community, and that we can provide Jewish MIT students meaningful Jewish experiences. As I taught at my own seder just before we sang Dayenu: expressing “it would have been enough” – even when each step clearly describes an incomplete liberation – teaches us that we still can feel awe, gratefulness, and a sense of freedom in the present, even in the midst of unfolding history.
Next year may we all be free.
Hag sameach,
Rabbi Michelle H. Fisher SM '97 (V)
Executive Director
The “Jew-it-Yourself” seders are a good idea with an incredibly corny name, and the Rainbow Seder hardly comports with Leviticus 20:13.4 But having the students over for dinner was just the right thing to do.
When I heard it, though, I decided I had to Substack on it. Sally Kornbluth had committed a blunder. The blunder was not cowardice, but overmodesty. It was a “good” blunder, because for once, a modern American college president had failed to put the Public Relations Guy in charge. She “failed in the right direction”, as my pastor said after a deacon had to be subjected to church discipline for vandalizing an abortion clinic.5 She did not toot her own horn. Such modesty is a virtue in private persons, but in a grandee it is a vice. People should know when you are doing a good job, just as they should know when you are doing a bad job. Transparency is important even when what you’ve done is admirable rather than shameful. We must encourage Jews like Sally not to be so shy of publicity.
Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house. Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven. (Matthew 5)
What I would have done was to add a note of mystery and suspense to the initial memo, saying that the reasons for the change must be left cloudy for the moment, but all would soon be revealed. Then I would have planted the story in The Tech (the student newspaper), The Boston Globe, The Wall Street Journal, and The New York Times, or promised an exclusive if necessary.
We will end with some philosophy. The moral of the story is this:
Question: If a tree falls in a forest, and nobody is there to hear it, does it make a sound?
Answer: No— not unless there’s a press release.6
That doesn’t quite do it, though. We need some elaboration to convey the idea in full:
Question: If a tree falls in a a forest, and 44 people are there to hear it, does it make a sound?
Answer: No, not unless there’s a press release.
Footnotes
Romans 11 puts this most movingly, the Jews being the fruitful olive tree and the Gentile converts being the wild tree:
And if some of the branches be broken off, and thou, being a wild olive tree, wert grafted in among them, and with them partakest of the root and fatness of the olive tree; Boast not against the branches. But if thou boast, thou bearest not the root, but the root thee.
Thou wilt say then, The branches were broken off, that I might be grafted in.
Well; because of unbelief they were broken off, and thou standest by faith. Be not highminded, but fear: For if God spared not the natural branches, take heed lest he also spare not thee. Behold therefore the goodness and severity of God: on them which fell, severity; but toward thee, goodness, if thou continue in his goodness: otherwise thou also shalt be cut off.
And they also, if they abide not still in unbelief, shall be grafted in: for God is able to graft them in again. For if thou wert cut out of the olive tree which is wild by nature, and wert grafted contrary to nature into a good olive tree: how much more shall these, which be the natural branches, be graffed into their own olive tree?
How much do the MIT protesters cost in dollars? 100’s of hours of staff time at, say, $50/hour, very conservative for Boston police and college administrators, would be only $5,000 per 100 hours, but my guess would be more like 40 employees at 40 hours each, for 1,600 hours and $80,000. I’ve also been wondering about our situation here at Indiana University, where President Pam Whitten addressed a similar situation by calling in the state police with automatic weapons and arresting protesters even before they had a chance to break any rules. The campus police, city police, county jail staff, and state police with their armored fighting vehicle must have cost a lot, though I hope they didn’t spend much on the two-man sniper team on top of the Union who let someone walk up three flights of stairs and come up onto them unobserved. The photographer could have taken them out with a pistol and then used the sniper rifle with its tripod and sniperscope to do a nice little massacre of state police, pro-Hamas protesters, and Chabad House Jewish counterprotesters on the lawn below.
Of course, sometimes seders do have to be institutional. I knew an old Lutheran navy chaplain who served on a submarine in Japanese waters in World War II. He told me he held a seder on the sub for a young Jewish sailor. The boy was so happy, and his mother was overjoyed when she found out about it later.
“If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall surely be put to death; their blood is upon them.”
In that case, the deacon had gone off and vandalized the clinic without telling anyone in advance, even his wife, because he knew they’d say no. He was severely rebuked, and was contrite, but he had at least erred on the side of rash bravery instead of on the side of overtimidity. The judge was surprised to see what the church people said in court; he said that almost always, the church either abandons the offender, or minimizes his offense; saying he was totally wrong but appealing for a low penalty is rare.
This is a take-off on the old philosophical conundrum whose history Wikipedia tells well. Bishop Berkeley said in 1710, “The objects of sense exist only when they are perceived; the trees therefore are in the garden... no longer than while there is somebody by to perceive them.” Wikipedia also says,
In June 1883, in the magazine The Chautauquan, the question was asked, "If a tree were to fall on an island where there were no human beings would there be any sound?" They then went on to answer the query with, "No. Sound is the sensation excited in the ear when the air or other medium is set in motion."
My formulation in these jokes is very up-to-date, but do not mistake my hyperbole for Foucultish post-modernism. I am not saying that reality does not exist, and our world is imposed on us by The Narrative, which in turn is created by whoever is most powerful and clever. Rather, people don’t know the truth automatically, or just because they should know; you have to tell them and make it as easy as possible for them. Avoid the fate of the codfish.
The codfish lays ten thousand eggs, The homely hen lays one. The codfish never cackles, To tell you what she's done. And so we scorn the codfish. The humble hen we prize. Which only goes to show you, It pays to advertise.