A poem for the season
Can we agree on humanity, goodness, freedom, justice, and peace?
Books keep me company while I write. Among them is a slim, gray cloth-bound volume without a title on its narrow spine, published in 1923, over a century ago. Inside the back cover, written in my father’s distinct draftsman’s hand, is his family name—a name that traces back several generations to a Lithuanian village.
Embossed on the plain cover are the words “Union Haggadah ~ Revised.” The haggadah is a religious text that guides Jewish families through the annual Passover Seder rituals as they gather around the table for the ceremonial feast. This version was published in 1923 by the Central Conference of American Rabbis after the world endured the Great War, which we now know as World War I. American Jews lived in a time of relative peace, unaware their European relatives would be nearly exterminated by Nazi Germany.
With the Great War in the recent past, American rabbis embraced post-war optimism. They saw a country poised for peace, prosperity, and women’s rights at the beginning of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s presidency. Despite rampant antisemitism toward Jewish immigrants in the United States, the people were free to practice their religion openly in America, a land they now called home. The American rabbis in 1923 expressed their belief that rather than a matter of war or religion, “The question is one of humanity, civilization, and truth.”
In one seder ritual, “The Door is Opened for Elijah.” A child opens the door to welcome the ancient prophet whose presence is a symbol of hope and comfort. The instructions were simple: Open the door, praise the Lord, acknowledge His great mercy and enduring truth, and close the door.
The final lines of the Union Haggadah express the hopes of American Jews: “May God lift up His countenance upon our country and render it a true home of liberty and a bulwark of justice. And may He grant peace unto us and unto all mankind. Amen.” Americans of all faiths envisioned an America of liberty and justice.
At seders everywhere across America, participants lifted their glasses, sipped the wine, and said, “Amen,” closing Haggadahs for yet another year.
Several few years ago, in response to a prompt to write “found poetry” from a source pre-dating 1929, I wrote “Union Haggadah, Revised 1923” after rediscovering my father’s book on my shelf. The poem was published by Ritualwell* online (2024), all of its words originating from the 1923 text.
But by 1942, American rabbis amended the original by printing a single folio to be inserted after page 62. In this new “Ceremonial for Opening the Door for Elijah,” a question-and-answer dialogue between child and adult is included:
A Child (asks): Why does Elijah come?
“Tyranny sat on the throne,” explains the 1942 text. “The heart of the world was pitiless as a stone.” And the people in bondage were comforted by the hope that “a better world would come.”
Child: When will this better world come?
“That is a mystery…” answers the 1942 text.
Child: Has Elijah come? I do not see him.
“He cannot be seen. He comes as the goodness that is in the hearts of men. He is justice. He is brotherhood. He is peace,” wrote the rabbis in 1942, darkness descending.
I share this now, during this week of Passover, to acknowledge our troubled times affirm, despite our differences, a common desire for goodness in our hearts, justice and peace in the world, and a resurgence of global humanity.
Please leave all else outside the door.
If you would like to listen to my reading of the poem—recorded today in a voice compromised by nasal congestion!—you may do so here. Scroll down for the printed text. The poem’s final line comes not from the seder ritual itself, but from additional rabbinic text in the 1923 book.
♦ UNION ♦ HAGGADAH ♦ Revised 1923
Thou shalt tell thy son
I went forth out of Egypt.
Making real to our generation the ever fresh
embittered life of bondage,
the story of our deliverance,
to awaken national consciousness—
—idealism of generations
to face and honestly meet
the needs of our own day.
On Sabbath eve, begin here:
On weekdays begin here:
not of form but of essence,
the Order of Service.
Setting the Table:
the best China and silver, adorned with flowers, visible symbols, living word.
a. Three matzos in the folds of a napkin.
b. The roasted shank bone (of a lamb).
c. A roasted egg.
Also a piece of horseradish, a bit of haroses—
clay of apples, almonds and raisins, cinnamon and wine
—a spray of parsley,
a dish of salt water,
a cup of wine.
Praised art Thou, King of the Universe
who kept us alive, sustained us,
brought us to this season, created the fruit of the vine.
Dayenu! It would have been enough for us.
After the Meal: A Madrigal of Numbers
Who knows Thirteen? I know Thirteen: Thirteen
Attributes of God; Twelve Tribes; Eleven Stars; Ten
Commandments; Nine Festivals; Eight Lights of Hanukkah;
Seven Days of the Week; Six Days of Creation; Five Books
of Moses; Four Mothers of Israel; Three Patriarchs; Two
Tables of the Covenant; One God of the World.
The Door is Opened for Elijah.
Next year all men may live together in freedom as brothers.
The Door is Closed.
The question is one of humanity, civilization, and truth.
*Link to publication of Union Haggadah (Revised 1923): A Found Poem - Ritualwell
I enjoyed this. I very much want to say YES, we can agree on humanity, goodness, freedom, justice, and peace!! But oh my do we have our work cut out to get there. This work you are doing is certainly part of it. Thank you.
So, like, where is your reading. I always am more attentive to nuances and intended communication when YOU read your work. (As you well know, I have a love/hate relationship with poetry.)