The Seder Plate
The placement and symbolism of the items on the seder plate.
By Jill Jacobs
The Passover Haggadah demands that each person see him or
herself as having personally come forth out of Egypt. Accordingly, the seder is
one of the most sensory-heavy rituals
of the Jewish year. During the seder, we don't just tell the story of the Exodus,
we see, smell, feel, and taste liberation.
Many of the elements of this sensory experience appear on
the seder plate (k'arah), which serves as the centerpiece of the seder
table. The seder plate traditionally holds five or six items, each of which
symbolizes a part (or multiple parts) of the Passover story:
Karpas--a green vegetable, most often parsley. Karpas
represents the initial flourishing of the Israelites during the first years in
Egypt. At the end of the biblical book of Genesis, Joseph moves his family to
Egypt, where he becomes the second-in-command to Pharaoh. Protected by Joseph's
exalted status, the family lives safely for several generations and proliferate
greatly, becoming a great nation. The size of this growing population frightens
the new Pharaoh, who enslaves the Israelites, lest they make war on Egypt. Even
under slave conditions, the Israelites continue to reproduce, and Pharaoh
eventually decrees that all baby boys be killed. In the course of the seder, we
dip the karpasin salt
water (Ashkenazi custom) or vinegar (Sephardi custom) in order to taste both the
hope of new birth and the tears that the Israelite slaves shed over their
condition.
Karpas also
symbolizes the new spring. One of the names for Passover is Hag Ha-Aviv or the
holiday of spring. Right around Passover the first buds emerge, and we look
forward to the warmth and sense of possibility that accompany the beginning of
spring.
Some Ashkenazi Jews use a potato for karpas, as green vegetables were not readily available in
Eastern Europe.
Haroset--This mix of fruits, wine or honey, and nuts
symbolizes the mortar that the Israelite slaves used to construct buildings for
Pharaoh. The name itself comes from the Hebrew word cheres or clay. Ashkenazi
Jews generally include apples in haroset,
a nod to the midrashic tradition that the Israelite women would go into the
fields and seduce their husbands under the apple trees, in defiance of the
Egyptian attempts to prevent reproduction by separating men and women.
Sephardic recipes for haroset allude to this
fertility symbolism by including fruits, such as dates and figs, mentioned in
Song of Songs, the biblical book that is most infused with images of love and
sexuality.
Maror--This bitter herb allows us to taste the
bitterness of slavery. Today, most Jews use horseradish as maror. Originally,
though, maror was probably a
bitter lettuce, such as romaine, or a root, such as chicory. Like life in
Egypt, these lettuces and roots taste sweet when one first bites into them, but
then become bitter as one eats more. We dip maror into harosetin
order to associate the bitterness of slavery with the work that caused so much
of this bitterness.
Hazeret--A second bitter herb, used in korech or
the Hillel sandwich, which consists of matzah and bitter herbs (some add haroset as well). Many Jews use
horseradish for maror and
romaine lettuce or another bitter green for hazeret. Others use the same
vegetable for both parts of the seder, and do not include hazeret on the seder plate at all.
Z'roa--A roasted lamb shank bone that symbolizes the
lamb that Jews sacrificed as the special Passover offering when the Temple
stood in Jerusalem. The z'roa does not play an active role in the seder,
but serves as a visual reminder of the sacrifice that the Israelites offered
immediately before leaving Egypt and that Jews continued to offer until the
destruction of the Temple. Vegetarians often substitute a roasted beet, both
because the red of the beet resembles the blood of the sacrifice and because
the Talmud mentions beets as one of the vegetables sometimes dipped during the
seder.
Beitzah--A roasted egg that
symbolizes the hagigah sacrifice, which would be offered on every
holiday (including Passover) when the Temple stood. The roundness of the egg
also represents the cycle of life--even in the most painful of times, there is
always hope for a new beginning.
Placement
There are a few traditions regarding the arrangement of
items on the seder plate. Most commonly, the maror is placed in the middle of the plate. The hazeret is at the six o'clock
position followed by, moving clockwise, karpas
(seven o'clock), beitzah (11
o'clock), z'roa (one o'clock),
and haroset (five o'clock).
On the Table
In addition to the items on the seder plate, the seder table
should also have three pieces of matzah wrapped or covered in a cloth
and a container of salt water or vinegar in which to dip the karpas. Some seder plates have a
compartment for matzah underneath, or include space for salt water among the
other symbols. In most cases, though, matzah and salt water or vinegar sit
near, but not on, the seder plate.
Many contemporary Jews add additional items to the seder
plate to symbolize modern liberation struggles. The most common new item is an orange,
which honors the role of women and/or gays and lesbians in Jewish life. The
orange symbolizes the fruitfulness that these previously marginalized
communities bring to Jewish life. Some Jews place an olive on the seder plate
to signal hope for eventual peace between Israelis and Palestinians.
One way to encourage participation in the seder is to ask
each guest to bring one item that, for him or her, represents liberation. Participants
might bring family heirlooms that remind them of their family's immigration
story, newspaper stories about current liberation struggles, or other symbolic
objects. Each guest should place this item near the seder plate and, at an appropriate
time in the seder, explain its significance
Rabbi Jill Jacobs is the Rabbi-in-Residence for the
Jewish FundS for Justice.
