Passover 5772

Horseradish is intense, bold, biting.  It shocks the mouth, overpowers the mind, and clears the sinuses.  It’s also the most important Jewish moment of the year.

Horseradish is maror, the bitter herb.  It takes its place on the seder plate along with the other foods, but it acts differently from them.  They remind us of our ancestors’ plight-and-flight; maror lets us experience it.

Maror allows us to experience suffering, dis-ease, and misery.  When we eat maror, we get direct, physical knowledge of discomfort--even those of us who like it!  We go one better than “walking a mile in the shoes” of those who suffer—we taste a bit of their pain.  We identify with the sufferer.

The challenge is to taste the bitterness all year long.  Why do this?  So that when, in the coming year, we cross paths with a homeless person, we will taste helplessness.  So that when we hear of disaster, we will taste despair.  When we learn of oppression, we will taste brutality.  When we taste these things, we identify with the victims.  We cannot look away.  Indeed, we are required to act on their behalf.

Maror is an exercise in radical empathy.  Take a big bite.

I wish you a sweet—and bitter—Passover.