The Story is Ancient: the Hagaddah is a Work in Progress

For the past few years I have used a different Passover Haggadah each time I led the family seder. Of course it is easy to find a new Hagaddah since there are a tremendous number of different versions available from a wide variety of publishers. And each brings its own perspective. For example, there are haggadot that are more gender inclusive, there is a haggadah that is intended for vegetarians (the Hagaddah of the Liberated Lamb), and there is even a haggadah for those who are seeking spiritual enlightenment. Each begins with the traditional biblical text, but then interprets it in its own unique way.

At some point during the meal in past years, my family would begin their “review”of that year’s choice in Haggadah. Now there are two directions this conversation (read “critique session”) would usually go; either along the lines of “I didn’t really like this year’s Haggadah” or more likely something like “I really hated this year’s Haggadah.” “Like” or “love” are not words generally heard when referring to any year’s Haggadah.

Two years ago when we sat down for the meal, my family asked which Haggadah we were going to use. I replied, “We need to go into the den for that.” When we got into the den, the Seder plate (which is part of the ritual) was already there. “Okay so where’s the Haggadah?” someone asked. Without a word I turned on the large flat-panel TV and started the seder.

Yes, that year our Passover Haggadah came in the form of a Keynote presentation that I had put together. It included the prayers for service, along with a series of different images. I had also decided that if I was going to do something as “out there” as this, then I might as well make it fun and truly memorable. With that goal in mind, I included a few videos I had grabbed from YouTube, and I used a lot of family photographs. My golden retriever, Maisy, was still alive at the time, and she made a cameo appearance. I included a series of comments about various family members on certain pages, and of course, I used a few clips from the movie the 10 Commandments. It was silly, it was fun, it kept people engaged, and when I did not use it last year at Passover, my family almost rebelled.

Yes, I finally found a Haggadah they liked.

This year we will be using yet another new Haggadah, and thanks to Behrman House Publishers it is going to be a collaborative effort with other members of the family. Thanks to a nifty piece of web-based technology, you can now take Behrman House’s Family Haggadah and add your own images and text. The result is a truly personalized Haggadah. Even better, the system allows you to give access to others; you can choose whether to give them Read-Only permission or full editorial rights. I’m making one, and I will give my niece Talia and nephew Joey access so they can work on it with me from their home in the Boston area.

Here’s a quick walk-through of the first steps.

As the Web site explains, you can add a lot of text and personal pictures and spend a significant amount of time on it … or you can do just a few changes and have the process done in half an hour. You can then order printed copies of your very own, personalized Haggadah.

There are two versions available: the Standard Version gives you 34 pages with 50 images you can change, and it has 15 text areas that can be personalized. The Premium Version is a dollar more; it adds two more pages and the words and music to one of the best-loved Passover songs.

The customization starts right off the bat when you give your Haggadah a unique title.

As noted, you can also add people to work on it with you. If you only want to be able to show someone the pages you have personalized, you give them “View Only” access. This is good if, hypothetically speaking, you wanted to make sure your wife Elana is okay with the picture of her that you used in it. You can also give editorial access to others. When you do, they get an email invitation and can get to work right away.

You can also indicate how many books you expect to order.

The next page shows you the full layout of the Haggadah and the places where you can customize it. “My Text” indicates an opportunity to change or add text, while “My Picture” lets you add, crop and rotate images that are on your computer.

I should note that, as of this post, the system does not render properly if you are using Safari as your browser. However, it works just fine with Chrome.

To edit a text box, you simply click “My Text”. A window opens that offers a text area as well as the ability to do some minor text formatting.

To edit an image, you click “My Photo” and then upload a picture from your desktop. Once the image is in the browser you can rotate or crop it. I found the rotation feature a bit cumbersome to use, but it does work. You can also add, change or delete the text below the image.

So on the first page of the Haggadah, I was able to add an old picture of my niece and nephew at the top and change the title; I added personal text in the lower left corner, and I added a picture of my sister with her family on the lower right. Once I was happy with it, I was ready to either save it and close down, or move to the next page and begin editing.

What is great about the process is that you can always go back and rework a page. Nothing is written in stone until you purchase your haggadahs and check out.

It was quite a bit of fun to get started with creating this year’s haggadah, but I stopped after the first page. Why? Because I want this to be something I do with Joey and Talia. They are away this week, but we can get to work on it upon their return. Fortunately we have time.

The handy countdown timer on the ‘Build Your Own Haggadah’ homepage tells me that I still have 40 days left to finish and order it. Hmmm, there’s something rather biblical about that number, no?

I can see this being a lot of fun for us, and best of all when Passover arrives we’ll get to use a Haggadah that we all created together. We’ll see how the “Haggadah of the Year Tear Down Session” goes this time around. 

TSTI South: February 22, 2011

Seth Abramson, Mazel tov on Your GRAMMY!

Congrats to TSTI member Seth Abramson, awarded a Grammy on Sunday night for co-producing the best large jazz ensemble album of the year: “Mingus Big Band Live at the Jazz Standard.”

Two More Must-Reads on the Uprising in Egypt

There are two op-ed pieces in today's New York Times that are important pieces offering insight and raise no small degree of concern with regard to recent events in Egypt.The first comes from Yossi Klein HaLevi and the second from Thomas Friedman. The first paragraphs along with links to the full pieces can be found below.

Israel, Alone Again?

By YOSSI KLEIN HALEVI

Published: February 1, 2011

Jerusalem

ISRAELIS want to rejoice over the outbreak of protests in Egypt’s city squares. They want to believe that this is the Arab world’s 1989 moment. Perhaps, they say, the poisonous reflex of blaming the Jewish state for the Middle East’s ills will be replaced by an honest self-assessment.

But few Israelis really believe in that hopeful outcome. Instead, the grim assumption is that it is just a matter of time before the only real opposition group in Egypt, the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood, takes power. Israelis fear that Egypt will go the way of Iran or Turkey, with Islamists gaining control through violence or gradual co-optation.

Read the rest on the NYTimes

B.E., Before Egypt. A.E., After Egypt.

By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN

Published: February 1, 201

RAMALLAH, West Bank

I’m meeting a retired Israeli general at a Tel Aviv hotel. As I take my seat, he begins the conversation with: “Well, everything we thought for the last 30 years is no longer relevant.”

That pretty much sums up the disorienting sense of shock and awe that the popular uprising in Egypt has inflicted on the psyche of Israel’s establishment. The peace treaty with a stable Egypt was the unspoken foundation for every geopolitical and economic policy in Israel for the last 35 years, and now it’s gone. It’s as if Americans suddenly woke up and found both Mexico and Canada plunged into turmoil on the same day.

“Everything that once anchored our world is now unmoored,” remarked Mark Heller, a Tel Aviv University strategist. “And it is happening right at a moment when nuclearization of the region hangs in the air.”

This is a perilous time for Israel, and its anxiety is understandable.

Read the rest in the NYTimes.

Jonathan Schanzer's Take on the Egyptian Uprising

This past fall one of our guest for a Shabbat Scholar Dinner was Jonathan Schanzer.   Jonathan is a Middle East analyst and vice president of research for the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and the author of Hamas vs. Fatah: The Struggle for Palestine, the only book on the market that chronicles the Palestinian civil war. His Web site offers some good insight into what takes place in the Middle East and I wanted to share his two most recent posts with all of you. Among the paragraphs of particular note...

Interestingly, the Arab leadership that may be next to go is the Palestinian Authority, led by Mahmoud Abbas in the West Bank. The release by al-Jazeera of documents revealing that the PA was prepared to make certain concessions to Israel have sparked anger across the West Bank as well as the Gaza Strip, where the more radical Hamas holds power. As one Palestinian analyst noted, the streets of the West Bank have been largely quiet, but it may only be a matter of time before Palestinians make known their revulsion at their leadership. In what appears to be a pre-emptive step, the PA announced it will hold local council elections "as soon as possible." The PA has not held elections since 1996, and the move seems inextricably tied to the unrest through the region.

How Far Will Egypt Tumult Spread? 

by Jonathan Schanzer

Politico February 1, 2011

Immediately after the fall of Tunisia's 23-year dictator, Zine al-Abedine Ben Ali, analysts warned of a domino effect across the Arab world. Would-be democrats in other Arab countries reasoned that if a small country like Tunisia could topple its dictator, perhaps the strategy could be replicated in larger Arab states.

In the days following Ben Ali's flight to Saudi Arabia on January 14, several brave souls did the unthinkable and immolated themselves to protest their regimes. Their goal was to set off the same reaction that took place in Tunisia, stemming from the shock and rage surrounding the plight of Mohammed Bouazizi, the rural street peddler who set himself alight after authorities shut down his produce stand -- his only livelihood. Since then, there have been four self-immolations in Algeria, at least nine in Egypt, one in Mauritania, one in Saudi Arabia, and another report of one in Tunisia.

None of these incidents started the chain reaction that took place in Tunisia, but Arab protesters are still trying to replicate the Tunisian model of regime change. Egypt appears closest, with protests against the 30-year rule of Hosni Mubarak now in their eighth straight day. The estimated 300,000 protestors who have flocked to the streets today have made clear that they seek nothing less than an end to the regime. Indeed, Mubarak's announcement that he will not seek reelection in September 2011, coupled with promises of liberalization, may not be enough to placate them.

The media is now awash with reports that Jordan may be next. On Tuesday, after three straight Friday protests, King Abdullah II sacked his entire cabinet. The King is now in dialogue with the Jordanian Muslim Brotherhood, operating under the Islamic Action Front, about political and economic reforms. While such measures are long overdue in Jordan, the cabinet shake-up smacks of a last-ditch effort to salvage legitimacy, and follows identical but unsuccessful moves by Mubarak in Egypt and Ben Ali in Tunisia. For now, however, Jordan appears to be stable.

Rumors are now circulating that protests may be on the way in Syria. A "day of rage" is set for Saturday. But it's hard to imagine that the Syrian population will rise up, as the country is an absolute police state. Indeed, one Syrian analyst suggests to me that the calls to protest may simply be a trap set by the regime to identify and root out dissidents.

A more troublesome spot is Yemen, where more than 3,000 protesters came out in the country's south on Monday, demanding a change in leadership. Yemen's president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, has been in power since 1978. At 32 years, his term has outlasted those of both Mubarak (30 years) and Ben Ali (23 years). While protests have gone on for much of the past week, the regime does not appear to be in imminent danger.

Interestingly, the Arab leadership that may be next to go is the Palestinian Authority, led by Mahmoud Abbas in the West Bank. The release by al-Jazeera of documents revealing that the PA was prepared to make certain concessions to Israel have sparked anger across the West Bank as well as the Gaza Strip, where the more radical Hamas holds power. As one Palestinian analyst noted, the streets of the West Bank have been largely quiet, but it may only be a matter of time before Palestinians make known their revulsion at their leadership. In what appears to be a pre-emptive step, the PA announced it will hold local council elections "as soon as possible." The PA has not held elections since 1996, and the move seems inextricably tied to the unrest through the region.

The importance of Egypt, however, cannot be overstated. Cairo is the capital of the Arab world. If Mubarak's regime crumbles, it could lead to contagion, and more chaos to follow.

Mubarak Won't Run Again--What's the Effect?

by Jonathan SchanzerPolitico February 1, 2011

Hosni Mubarak's announcement sparked immediate outrage from the Egyptian protestors, who have stated repeatedly over the last several days that they seek nothing less than his ouster.

President Obama made the right call in urging Mubarak not to seek reelection, but he may have inadvertently made the situation more dangerous. If Mubarak serves out his term and elections take place in September - seven months from now - it will be almost a surefire recipe for the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood.

The Brotherhood is the only party that has the financing, infrastructure and ability to mobilize. Egypt's other opposition parties are in shambles, having been suffocated by the Mubarak regime for decades. Seven months is not enough time for them to prepare to compete in elections.

But things don't have to go that way. The president can still ask Mubarak to step aside and allow for the creation of a transitional caretaker government, backed by the military, which can maintain order on the streets, create a safe political space, and then guide the nation to democracy. The caretaker government would preside over a period during which the Egyptian people can draft a new constitution - not just amend it, as Mubarak suggested in his speech - and prepare for genuinely fair elections.

The longer this transition period lasts - within reason - the stronger the opposition parties can become. This would mitigate the power of the Muslim Brotherhood and other groups that reject democratic principles, without completely excluding them from the political process.

Former International Atomic Energy Agency chief Mohammed El Baradei backs this plan, and so does the constellation of reform factions that tapped him to speak in its name. But ElBaradei himself would not need to lead the cabinet. Newly-installed vice president Omar Suleiman (or another known quantity) could also do so.

But the key to this is the Egyptian military. It has earned the trust of the people. Indeed, it has not fired a shot on the protestors. If it can preside over this process, it can guarantee that the power of the transitional leader is kept in check, so a peaceful democratic process can unfold.

Yes, this plan carries risks. But so does inaction. If Mr. Obama accepts Mubarak's plan and allows elections to take place in September, the Muslim Brotherhood will be poised to fill the vacuum. This could result in two equally miserable scenarios: the rise of a Muslim Brotherhood government, or new strong man tapped by the West to bring it down.