The Spanish Jewish Community celebrates the holiday of Pesach (Passover)

The Jewish community of Spain, composed of some 45,000 people, celebrates from this Wednesday, April 5, the holiday of Pesach, Passover.

For a week, until Thursday, April 13, Spanish Jews, like Jews around the world, remember the departure of their people from slavery in Egypt, 3,300 years ago, led by Moses, the passage through the desert for 40 years and the arrival in Canaan, the promised land. 

It is an eminently familiar festivity and one of the most solemn of the calendar.

It is a tradition to prepare for Pesach with a thorough cleaning. Families thoroughly clean their homes and some keep the daily kitchen utensils in the kitchen to replace them during Passover with special dishes.

During the week that lasts this great feast, fermented foods are not consumed in memory of the haste to leave Egypt, which prevented the making of leavened bread. Matzah (unleavened bread) replaces the normal bread.

The big date of Passover is the night of the Seder, the Passover meal, which this year we celebrate on Wednesday, April 5. This night is special because we remember as a family the chapter of the departure from Egypt, and we decorate the table with a special dish (keara) containing six symbolic foods that evoke the history of the Israelites:

Maror: fresh bitter herbs symbolizing the suffering of the people during slavery. Endive or lettuce is often used.

Jazeret: lettuce trunk symbolizing the harshness of slavery.

Jaroset: sweet brown paste, a mixture of various nuts, apples, honey...representing the mortar that the enslaved Israelis made in Egypt.

Karpas: usually a bitter-tasting vegetable (parsley or celery) that is dipped in salt water (representing tears) in memory of the sale of Joseph by his brothers, which was the cause of the exile in Egypt.

Zeroa: cooked chicken thigh or meat that recalls the sacrifice of the lamb made by the Israelites in Egypt.  

Beitzan: boiled egg in its shell symbolizing the sacrifice offered in the Temple of Jerusalem.

The youngest in the house asks about the meaning of the celebration and it is the explanation that recalls this chapter of history. It begins with the question: why is this night different from the others?

The Pesach Seder has a specific order and after the ritual, the Passover dinner is served.