A Passover message to our communities from Rabbi Charley Baginsky and Rabbi Josh Levy, Co-Leads of The Movement for Progressive Judaism:
As Pesach approaches, many of us will be doing what Jews have always done at this time of year: cleaning, clearing, sorting, making space.
On one level, it is practical. Cupboards are emptied. Kitchens are prepared. Tables are set. Crumbs are discovered in places no crumb should ever have reached. There is something deeply familiar in the rhythm of these days, whether we observe every detail traditionally or simply mark the season in our own way.
But Pesach has never only been about cleaning the house.
Preparing for Pesach is also about preparing the self. The work of this season is not only to search our homes for chametz, but to notice what has built up in us too. What fear, grief, anger or exhaustion have we been carrying?
And this year, many of us are carrying a great deal.
It has been a year in which Jewish life has felt constricted. In Israel, families have once again found themselves moving between ordinary life and emergency, between family meals and bomb shelters. Many of us feel that exhaustion with them.
We have also watched with pain events in Jerusalem and beyond that should trouble anyone who cares about human dignity. The treatment of Christian worshippers during this holy season, the continuing violence in the West Bank, and the coarsening of public life in Israel make it harder and harder to speak about love of the country without also speaking about anguish and concern.
And here in Britain too, there is a weariness in our communities.
The burning of Hatzola ambulances was shocking not only because it was violent, but because of what was targeted: care, response, the infrastructure of saving life. For many Jews, it was a reminder of how exposed Jewish life can feel, even in the most ordinary moments.
All of this is happening in a public climate that feels increasingly narrow. There is less space for complexity, less patience for Jewish grief, less willingness to hold the fullness of Jewish experience.
That is why Pesach speaks so powerfully this year.
The Hebrew name for Egypt, Mitzrayim, can be heard as the narrow place, the place of constriction, where life feels hemmed in.
Pesach does not ask us to deny that place. It asks us to recognise it, and then, however slowly, to begin moving through it.
At the seder, we hold up the matzah and say:
Ha lachma anya: This is the bread of affliction that our ancestors ate in the land of Egypt.
The rabbis call it lechem oni – the bread over which we speak and tell our story.
Pesach begins not with certainty, but with speech. With the insistence that even in the narrow place, we do not lose our voice. That we name what hurts, and tell the story as it is.
Because there is so much that could leave us wordless, or push us into slogans. Jewish tradition asks something more demanding: to speak with honesty, to hold complexity, to keep telling a story that is not finished yet.
To clean for Pesach is not simply to remove crumbs. It is to make room. Room for memory, for difficult conversation, for those who feel fearful or alone. Room for the possibility that redemption begins not in certainty, but in truthfulness.
Pesach teaches that liberation is not only about where we are going, but who we are becoming on the way.
So as we prepare our homes, we might also ask what it means to prepare our hearts.
What do we need to clear away to make more room for courage?
What would it mean to loosen, even slightly, the grip of despair?
What would it mean to refuse both numbness and simplification?
That is deeply Jewish work.
Pesach does not ask us to arrive uncomplicated. It asks only that we arrive willing – to tell the story again, to listen to one another again, to believe that narrow places are real, but not ultimate.
So as we gather around our seder tables, may we be honest about what this year has held. May we have the courage not to look away from pain, our own or anyone else’s. And may this festival help us remember that Jewish life has always known how to carry burden without surrendering hope.
And if this year has taught us anything, it is how much we need to be together. That is one of the reasons we are so excited for Hineinu, our first national conference as the Movement for Progressive Judaism.
It will be a chance to gather across communities, to learn, pray, sing, reflect and reconnect – and to experience the strength, joy and possibility of this Movement in one place.
Hineinu will also be preceded by Shirei Chagigah, making it an extraordinary few days of music, learning, spirit and community.
At a time when being together feels more important than ever, we hope many of you will join us.
You can find out more and book here.
May this Pesach bring moments of steadiness, tenderness and renewal to all who need them.
Chag Pesach Sameach,
