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I am one of the countless American Jews who grew up with the Maxwell House Haggadah. I didn’t mind the two or three pages trying to sell coffee, because the rest of the Haggadah was filled with cool black-and-white illustrations of the ten plagues, the parting of the Red Sea, and other highlights of the Exodus. As every Haggadah is supposed to do, it helped the Passover story come alive.
But, of course, the Maxwell House Haggadah was just one edition among thousands. Just as the tradition of the Passover seder has survived through the centuries, so has the tradition of producing new versions of the Haggadah. The introduction to a recent example, The JPS Commentary on the Haggadah (Philadelphia, Jewish Publication Society, 2008), explains the tradition:
Of all the classic Jewish texts—the Talmud, the Jewish Bible, and the prayer book—the haggadah is the one most “alive” today. Jews continue to rewrite, revise, and add to its text, recasting it so as to maintain the haggadah’s relevance to their lives. . . . Since the early Middle Ages . . . probably the most typical way Jews have made the haggadah speak to their contemporary concerns and needs has been through the act of composing commentaries on it and then drawing on their elaborations and interpretations at the seder. (p. xi)
Messianic Jews, of course, are particularly invested in “elaborations and interpretations” at the seder, since so much of its symbolism evokes the story of Messiah Yeshua, which not only reached its culmination during Passover, but was deeply interwoven with the events of the festival itself. We’ll have a lot to gain from the JPS Commentary, which features an extensive historical introduction to all the elements of the seder, followed by the haggadah itself, in Hebrew and English, with a concise commentary at the bottom of each page. It’s not the sort of book that you read cover-to-cover (and definitely not a haggadah that you’d supply to every guest at your seder), but the sort to which you’re likely to return every year as you start thinking about Passover.
The development of the haggadah from its earliest traces in the Mishnah, through the Talmudic period, and into its flowering in medieval times and beyond, reflects the broader development of Jewish history in general. One example is the famous statement of R. Gamliel, “Whoever did not explain these three things on Passover has not fulfilled his duty. They are: Pesach, matzah and maror” (p. 99). The answer recorded in the Mishnah is far simpler than that in the haggadah:
Passover—for the Makom passed over the home of our ancestors in Egypt; bitter herbs—for the Egyptians embittered the lives of our ancestors in Egypt; matzah—for they were redeemed. (p. 30)
Commentator Joseph Tabory recounts how this simple explanation evolved into the more elaborate treatment in the haggadah, and how it got separated from its original context, which was a response to Ma Nishtanah (Why is this night different?), the Four Questions asked toward the beginning of the seder. Originally, the Four Questions were the Three Questions, related to the three mandatory foods of Passover mentioned by Gamliel, but they changed with the changing circumstances of Jewish life, and so did the rest of the haggadah.
In tracing such changes, the haggadah demonstrates Judaism’s genius in preserving and transmitting core biblical truths through shifting cultural conditions, indeed employing such conditions to convey those truths. The haggadah also demonstrates the limits of this adaptability. For example, Tabory provides a fascinating discussion of the afikoman. The term first appears in the Mishnah, which “declares that, after the paschal meal, one may not declare afikoman. This is to be understood as a reference to the revelry (epikomos) that was a common after-dinner feature at Greco-Roman meals” (p. 15). Originally this prohibition was meant to keep the sacred feast from degenerating into a not-so-sacred feast. Later, afikoman came to be understood as dessert, which was prohibited so that the lamb, or later, the matzah, would be the last taste that remained with one after the feast. Still later, “the piece of matzah that concluded the meal was first termed the afikoman, changing the term from something that was forbidden to something that was a positive requirement.”
Before Messianic Jews go back to the drawing board on our usual treatment of the afikoman, however, we should read Tabory’s footnote, “In recent times, several scholars have attempted to revive the theory of David Daube that the word ‘afikoman’ in the Mishnah is derived from a Greek word that means ‘he has arisen’ . . .” This is not the only hint in the commentary that the haggadah as we know it today may have been influenced by the early Messianic seder. For example, R. Gamliel’s emphasis on explaining the three mandatory foods may have arisen in response to “Christian,” that is Messianic Jewish, explanations of the matzah and wine at the last supper (p. 13).
In addition to an abundance of such material, the JPS Commentary provides a clear and well-organized version of the haggadah itself. Any haggadah will be assessed in part by its design as a book; its beauty, clarity, and ease of use. This version rates well, although it is not illustrated as most regular haggadot are. (It does include illustrations from other haggadot in a separate section.) Its original English translation is clear and readable, with two unique features, one positive and one negative. On the positive side, it translates the tetragrammaton as Adonai, to give it more of a sense of a personal (Jewish) name than the usual “Lord.” This usage allows for the translation of Elohim as “Lord,” which, Tabory claims, “better reflects its true meaning.” The negative feature is that the translation uses the archaic and too-pious “Thou” instead of “You” in the blessing formula, so that it reads, “Blessed art Thou, Adonai our Lord, King of the universe . . .” The rest of the blessing goes back to the normal “You” terminology. This seems quirky, but that's a minor complaint.
The haggadah’s balance of tradition and fluidity is a model for the Messianic Jewish community as we embrace both the continuity of Jewish tradition and the fluidity of ongoing renewal through the Spirit of Messiah. The JPS Commentary demonstrates the tradition-fluidity balance well, and should prove to be an important resource for pursuing this balance within our community. |
By Howard Silverman
By Julia Blum
