Passover (Pesach)

When it falls

Seven days (eight outside Israel) from the fifteenth of Nisan, the full moon of the first spring month, in late March or April. The seder is held on the first night, and outside Israel on the second too.

The Phala almanac gives the exact day for your own city; the lunar and solar rules above are what it computes from.

The story

The Exodus: the Israelites were slaves in Egypt, Moses demanded their release, and God sent ten plagues on Pharaoh, the last the death of every firstborn. The Israelites marked their doorposts with the blood of a lamb and the destroyer passed over their houses; that is the name. They left in such haste that the bread had no time to rise, and the flat unleavened matzah is eaten for the week in its memory.

The seder (order) is the family meal of the first night, built around the Haggadah, the book that retells the story so that each generation sees itself as having left Egypt. The youngest asks the four questions, four cups of wine are drunk, and the door is opened for Elijah.

How the day is kept

• The house is cleared of every trace of leaven (ḥametz) in the days before, ending with a candlelit search on the last night and a burning in the morning.
• The seder plate: a shank bone, a roasted egg, bitter herbs (maror), ḥaroset (a paste of apples, nuts and wine for the mortar of slavery), karpas (a green dipped in salt water for tears), and three matzot.
• The afikoman, a piece of matzah hidden for the children to find and ransom back, ends the meal.
• No leaven for the week: matzah replaces bread, and in Jerusalem the Western Wall holds the priestly blessing before tens of thousands during the intermediate days.

At the table

Matzah in every form, matzah ball soup, gefilte fish, brisket and ḥaroset in Ashkenazi homes; lamb, rice (among Sephardim) and haroset of dates in the Mizrahi and Sephardi traditions.

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