The Pesach Time Tunnel

We reviewed what we had learned last Sunday about the 15 steps (rituals) of the Pesach seder, and how Talmudic era Rabbis described how our bodies as well as our minds and souls will travel back in time to Egypt if we follow each ritual in order (seder) and with kavana (intention). In that sense, the rituals become "dials" which we turn in a time machine, directing the machine to take us back to the final moments of slavery in Egypt (feeling the sting of the taskmaster's lash on our backs and the bitterness of slavery), and allowing us to experience the very first moments of freedom and the birth of our nation.

We then sang the "Kadesh U'r'chatz" song that we had learned on Sunday (the lyrics to which are the names of each of the steps) a couple of times over. As a final activity, each student decorated a "Pesach Time Tunnel" sheet by coloring in the letters of the names of each ritual and making a simple drawing to remind them what was involved in each ritual. The children brought these home at the end of the session, hopefully to have on hand during your own seders.

As the students focused on the activity, I played a recording of the Sephardi version of  the "Kadesh U'r'chatz" song on Tuesday...

and on Wednesday...

On Wednesday, we had a surprise visit from the third and fourth graders in the Bonim (Builders) track while we were working on the Pesach Time Tunnels. Tamar's students entered the room carrying crates, and then shared with us that they had made one crate for each 3rd-6th grade classroom. Here's what they told us the crates were for:

We finished each session in the Shira classroom, singing Pesach songs with the Shira and Y'tzira students, led by Eric. As it happens, one of the songs he taught us was the "Kadesh U'r'chatz" song, and he even taught us hand signals to use for each ritual. What a perfect review for our own Edot class activities over the past couple of sessions!

Remember that this coming Sunday JQuest will hold just one session, from 9:00 to 11:00 a.m., and then we'll be on Spring/Pesach break until classes begin again on Tuesday, April 18th and Wednesday, April 19th.

Let me take this opportunity to wish you all a very happy Pesach holiday, which begins the evening of Monday, April 10th.

CHAG PESACH SAMEACH

Bene Israel Handprint Amulets and Pesach

During the week day sessions last week, we completed our unit of study about the Jews of India by re-creating hand print amulets that a Bene Israel couple would make during a special ceremony called the Mehndi that took place three days before the wedding ceremony.

During this ceremony, the right hands of both bride-to-be and groom-to-be were smeared with henna or saffron dye, considered by many cultures to have "anti-demonic" properties, then the hands were pressed against a wall inside the home. Once the prints had dried, the "Evil Eye" was painted in black in the center of the palm, and good luck symbols were painted around the prints. As with all other edot (Jewish Diaspora communities), the Bene Israel borrowed from the surrounding culture, which in this case was Hindi and Buddhist. Peacocks, elephants, and lotus flowers were often painted onto amulets (representing beauty, strength and purity of heart and mind, respectively). During the ceremony, one or more of these images would be painted onto the wall around the hand prints. Then Jewish symbols of holiness and good luck would be added to the Indian symbols - the Hebrew letters "chet" and "yud" (spelling the Hebrew word for life - Chai), the Hebrew letter "shin" (representing the first letter of one of God's names - Shaddai) and the ancient menorah were the three most commonly used symbols. Beginning in the late 15th century, with the arrival of Sephardi Jews from Spain and Portugal (known in India as the Paradesi Jews or White Jews), the Chamsa (the five-fingered amulet borrowed from the Muslim cultures of Arabia and North Africa) began to appear, and in the early 19th century, the Magen David (Jewish Star) was often painted on the wall as well. The hand prints thus became permanent home amulets, ensuring a happy marriage for the couple and protection for the woman and baby during childbirth.

When the Bene Israel and other Jewish communities in India began to move to Israel in the early 1950's, they sold their homes to non-Jews. To this day, the hand prints and the Jewish as well as Indian good luck symbols remain on the walls of many of these homes.

First, the students traced their hand onto a piece of white paper.

Then it was time to choose an Indian symbol to draw free-hand or trace onto the corners of the paper.

A few years ago, I found instructions on the internet for drawing elephants, peacocks, and lotus flowers. This made the process of drawing the good luck symbols much, much easier!

I had found copies of a ketuba (Jewish marriage contract) of a couple who were married in Mumbai in 1913 (then called Bombay), decorated with two peacocks. Some of the students used those peacocks as models for their drawing.

Below are some of the completed amulets. I'll laminate all the hand print amulets when they're completed, and then hang them up in our classroom which will become a very safe place to be, indeed!

Yesterday, we had a very full schedule each session. After I read two chapters from "The Circlemaker," we began to learn the first two questions of the "Mah Nishtana" section of the Pesach Haggadah. Using props from our Hebrew Through Movement program, the students were able to "act" out the two questions by holding up or pointing to the props.

"Mah nishtana HA'LAYLA ha'zeh...?" ("How is this NIGHT different...?") Zach points to the photo of the Moon, representing the word, "LAYLA" (NIGHT).

"...meekol ha'LEYLOT?" ("...from all the NIGHTS?") Abby points to the photo of the different phases of the Moon, representing the word, "LEYLOT" (NIGHTS).

Here's Maddy doing the same.

"She'be'chol ha'leylot anoo ochleen CHAMETZ OO'MATZA..." ("That on all the nights we eat leavened food and matza...") Here's Jack holding up the CHAMETZ (a challah bread from our Shabbat HTM props) and MATZA.

"...ha'layla ha'zeh, koolo MATZA." ("...this night only MATZA.") Jeremy's holding up the HTM Matza prop.

"She'be'chol ha'leylot, anoo ochleen SH'AR Y'RAKOT..." ("That on all the nights we eat all kinds of greens...") It's hard to see in the photo, but that's a bunch of parsley Jeremy's holding up to represent the greens.

Once we had practiced the two questions a few times over, we still had time to practice our usual HTM vocabulary with some Pesach twists:

Callen, la'seem hagada shel Pesach al ha'rosh. (Callen, put a Passover haggadah on the head.)

Callen, la'seem yad al ha'rosh shel Maddie v'hagada shel Pesach al ha'rosh; Maddie, la'seem yad al ha'beten shel Callan v'l'hachzeek hagada shel Pesach ba'yad ha'sheynee. (Callen, put a hand on Maddie's head and a Passover haggadah on the head; Maddie, put a hand on Callen's stomach and hold a Passover haggadah in the second hand.)

Zach, leekpotz al regel echad la'keeseh. (Zach, jump on one foot to the chair.)

We also reviewed our Israel and its environs geography. Michael, l'hatzbee'a al eretz levanon. (Michael, point to the Land of Lebanon.)

And continued to practice recognizing written Hebrew words in our classroom. Maddie, l'hatzbee'a al ha'meela "rosh." (Maddie, point to the word, "rosh" - it means "head" and was one of the words for our "letter of the week" last week - RESH.

Then it was time to begin our Pesach unit of study. I had prepared a table with those ritual items involved in the 15 steps of the Pesach seder. The students all sat around the table, as we went through each of the 15 steps using the "Student's Haggadah" book.

Pesach is a spring holiday, and there's no doubt that spring is here, just looking at the magnificent oak tree outside our classroom window!

After lighting our "yom tov" (holiday) candles using the Hebrew Through Movement candlestick and candle props and commands ("...l'hadleek ner shel yom tov"), the first step of the seder is the Kadesh (Aramaic for Kiddush).

The second step involves washing the hands without saying the blessing.

Third step: Karpas - dipping a green vegetable (in our case, parsley) into salt water and eating it after saying the blessing "...borey p'ree ha'adama." ("...who creates the fruit of the earth.")

Then comes "Yachatz" where the middle of a pile of three cakes of matza is taken out, divided in half, and replaced on the pile (one half becomes the hidden Afikoman) - Joey is doing the honors here.

 Jumping ahead in this photo, we come to the "korech" step, in which "maror" (bitter herb) is put between two pieces of matza to make a sandwich.

A few students were a bit hesitant about tasting the maror...

Once in the mouth, they quickly discovered why horseradish is frequently used in Ashkenazi households for the maror. It does bring forth the tears and bitter feeling of slavery!

As we came to each succeeding step, each student had a chance to read the Aramaic name of the ritual and the description of the ritual involved in that step.

Once we went through all 15 steps, I read through the names of each of the rituals, and the students discovered that they rhymed. To help them learn the ritual steps of the Pesach seder by heart, I then introduced the Sephardi (Spanish/Portuguese Jewish) melody to the "Kadesh U'r'chatz."

(It's the second of the two recordings at the bottom of the page, sung by Rebecca Pardue.)

Yesterday's tefillah session in the Sanctuary was very special, in that it was the final Creative Tefillah session led by sixth graders for this school year. The theme to which the students, including our Edot students Ashley and Emily, fit the prayers was "school." YASHER KO'ACH to all the sixth graders who have participated in the Creative Tefillah sessions this year.

The Bene Israel Jews of India

Today, we focused our attention on the second and largest wave of Jewish immigration to India, that of the Bene Israel. We viewed a YouTube video about them, which shares the filmmaker's belief that they were descendants of the Tribe of Zebulon, one of the "Ten Lost Tribes of Israel," which was part of the Kingdom of Israel before its conquest by the Assyrian Empire in 722 B.C.E.. To this day, members of the Bene Israel insist that they are not "Yehoodeem" (Judeans), but rather are "Israel" (i.e. descended from the Kingdom of Israel). The Bene Israel themselves believe they are descended from 7 couples who were rescued from a shipwreck off the coast of India by none other than Elijah the Prophet, and to this day they venerate the Prophet in the midst of all their holiday and life cycle ceremonies.

Once we had viewed the video about the Bene Israel, I shared another YouTube video which shows members of the Bene Israel participating in a Malida ceremony, which is the ceremony that venerates the Prophet Elijah. Once the students had seen the ceremony, and understood the meaning behind it, we prepared the poha rice dish used during the ceremony, which is also called "Malida." I used a very simple form of the recipe:

Pour 1 cup of the Poha rice flakes into a bowl, then pour enough cold water over the flakes to cover them completely. Wait 4 minutes, then drain the flakes of as much water as possible. Add 1/4 cup sugar, 1/4 cup unsweetened coconut flakes and 1 tsp. of cardemom spice to the flakes, and stir carefully until all the ingredients are absorbed into the flakes.

We then spooned the mixture into the middle of a paper plate onto which I had put apples, pears, bananas, dates and oranges.

Then it was time for us to "re-enact" the Malida Ceremony itself:

 During the coming week day sessions, we'll be learning about, and re-creating, a Bene Israel amulet which can be found on the walls of Bene Israel homes in India to this day.

The Jews of Cochin and Pesach Stumpers and Challenges

We began our unit of study about the Jews of India during the past two weekday sessions. I shared with the students that there were 3 major waves of immigration of Jews to India over the past 2,000 (perhaps even as far back as 3,000) years.

The first wave of Jews were those who eventually settled in the City of Cochin in the Kerala District of southwest India. We focused on this group this week. I introduced them to the students by showing a two-part YouTube video called "The Heritage of Cochin Jews." The video shared the history and culture of Cochini Jews, as well as the move of most of the community to the modern State of Israel in 1953 and their integration into Israeli society. During the late 15th century, Sephardi Jews who were exiled from Spain in 1492 began to make their appearance in Cochin. Though small in number, they had an out-sized influence on the culture of the Cochini Jews.

The second major immigration wave consisted of Jews who called themselves the "Bene Israel" (Children of Israel), but who were called the "Shanwar Teli" by non-Jews around them (meaning the Sabbath Oil Pressers, since they brought the art of oil pressing to India and observed the Sabbath as a rest day). They settled further north, near the City of Bombay, and claimed to be descended from 7 couples shipwrecked along the coast, and rescued by none other than the Prophet Elijah. We'll be studying them in more detail this coming Sunday.

The last group of Jews to arrive in India were the Baghdadi Jews who, as their name indicates, came from Baghdad and other areas of Iraq. They were merchants and traders and were invited by the British in the 19th century to settle in the major cities of India during British "Raj" (England's occupation of India). They were, for the most part, Sephardi Jews (descended from the Jews of Spain and Portugal).

We ended both weekday sessions with the Shira and Y'tzira students, learning Pesach (Passover) songs with Eric, our weekday music teacher. He reviewed all four verses of the "Mah Nishtana" (The Four Questions recited by the youngest child at the seder ceremony), and taught us to sing the answer to the questions - "Avadeem Ha'eenoo; ata b'nei choreen!"("We were slaves; now we are free!") We also sang the spiritual "Let My People Go" and had a fun time singing the "Dayenu" song.

And since Pesach is just four weeks away (the first seder takes place on Monday evening, April 10th), I put up a new set of stumpers and challenges on our holiday bulletin board.

The Stumpers: (worth 1 sticker)
1.  Where does the word "Charoset" come from?
2.  According to the Talmud, what is the only way a seder can succeed?
3.  How have some seders and haggadot been changed to make them more meaningful to us today?
4.  Why did the Rabbis include "Had Gadya" in the Haggadah?

The Challenges: (worth 5 stickers)
1.  Name the 15 parts of the Pesach (Passover) seder by heart.
2.  Name the 10 plagues by heart.
3.  Say (or sing) the final verse of "Had Gadya" by heart in English.

Remember that 20 stickers = a $10.00 Toys 'R Us gift certificate!

Purim Carnival

And so the big day finally arrived yesterday - our LAFTY Purim Carnival. As it happens, yesterday was the 14th day of the Hebrew month of Adar, a/k/a Purim Day. The sun was shining, and colorful costumes and booths could be seen everywhere - in the Social Hall as well as outdoors on the lawn. This was my 15th Purim Carnival at Isaiah, and I am not exaggerating when I say that I think this was definitely one of the very best!

We began the day in our classroom. I read two chapters from "The Circlemaker," and then we played "In the Manner of the Word," a game we've played in class before. We came up with 9 action sentences relating to the Purim story which I wrote on the white board (a great review for our Purim unit of study), and then brainstormed 13 adverbs to write next to the sentences. One student went out of the room for each round of play, and another student pointed to the "word" (the adverb) that would have to be acted out for that round. We then let the student who went out of the room back inside, and that student had to try to figure out which "word" had been chosen by having volunteers act out one or more of the sentences. This is the perfect game to play if you want to get into a hilarious and crazy mood - which we wanted to do just before going to the Purim Carnival festivities.

Here's Michael choosing "stupidly," and below is a video of Joey acting out "Esther wins over King A.'s heart" "in the manner of the word" - in this case, "stupidly." (It was Callen who went outside and now had to figure out which word was chosen.)

Now it was Callen's turn to choose the "word," and he chose "evily" (we made some words up!).

And Jeremy is choosing "weirdly." Below is Michael acting out "King A. commands all single girls in his kingdom to participate in a beauty contest" in the "manner of the word" - in this case, "weirdly."

Then it was time for us to go up to the Sanctuary to join the other classes and parents and siblings for the 2017 Purim Carnival.

We were greeted by "Jester" Bill as we entered the Sanctuary.

Once most of the people had found their families and taken their seats, we began to sing Purim songs, led by Rabbi Greninger and Cantor Korn. The lyrics were on the big screen, so everyone joined in.

And when we had all gotten into the Purim mood singing Purim songs and making a lot of noise with the graggers, it was time for the "Frozen" Purim shpiel (play) to begin. Below is a taste of how it began.

The shpiel, performed by teachers and clergy, was a very big hit, and there was still much more to come. It was followed by two parades - the first was made up of younger children, all decked out in costumes:

And the second parade was made up of older children, also decked out in costumes. At the end of each parade, the children gathered up on the bima.

The younger group and...

...the older one.

Finally, it was time for everyone to go to the Social Hall, where they could stand in line to buy tickets for the food and games, and enjoy a really fun carnival.

One of the first booths you might come across was the food booth. There, you could use your tickets to buy hamantashen, cotton candy, pizza, chips, dried fruit snacks, popcorn and/or cold drinks.

There was a slight problem figuring out how to get the popcorn machine to start, but it was soon figured out! (That's Max, our Edot Sunday morning T.A. discussing the problem with Maimone, our Y'tzira teacher.)

And if you've never seen cotton candy being made, here's a bit of a "behind-the-scenes" peek (I'm not sure if there was more cotton candy on the cone or on her arm!).

The lines quickly formed at all the booths. Here's the line for the "Fishin' " game.

You could try your hand at "Pin the Hamantaschen on Haman" game...

...or get your face painted...

...and even your arm!

Outdoors you could try your hand at sponge or ring toss games...

...or get a chance to dunk Ian in a tank of VERY cold water! Below is a clip of Ian waiting for someone to hit the bulls-eye mark and send him plummeting into the tank!

For the young crowd, you could see if you could jump high enough to hit the ceiling in the Jump House.

Back inside, there was a silent auction offering baked goods, art, and services offered by the 7th graders to raise money for their trips and other activities...

...and you might not recognize him, but here's our own Michael in disguise as a Star Wars trooper, standing in front of the "Adopt-A-Book" booth. Here, families could choose a book to "adopt," raising money for our library.

There were also fun contests - here's the hoola hoop contest...

...and here's the cake walk contest (and our own Gabby set to start walking as soon as the music begins).

Once you had played a few games and won a bunch of prize tickets, you could mosey over to the prize table to pick out your "loot."

With so much to do, it was no wonder that some of us felt a need to find a quiet corner every now and then for a well-deserved break (Bill and Erica taking five here).

Some chose to enjoy some delicious pizza at the tables set up in the room.

And, of course, it was nice to see everyone enjoying themselves and shmoozing. If you looked carefully, you could find our teachers doing just that:

Jacob, our Kindergarten teacher and Sarah, our 2nd grade teacher...

...Siena, our Special Needs Aide and Yardena, our Hebrew Through Movement teacher...

Our Bonim teacher, Tamar, and first grade teacher Alicia...

Daniella, our Administrative Assistant for Youth and Education and Maimone, our Y'tzira teacher...

...and here's Heather, our Omanut teacher...

...and Yardena again with Tammy, our second Hebrew Through Movement teacher.

Here's Melissa, our Librarian, with a volunteer at the "Adopt-A-Book" booth.

I found our cooking teacher, Stephanie, working at the food booth with Rabbi Shanks...

...and caught up with Rabbi Miller conversing with some of our younger congregants outside.

Back inside, I found Jojo, our Teva teacher, connecting with a possible future Teva student.

And if you looked carefully, you might even have seen a Queen Esther running around with her very lo-tech digital camera which ran out of battery just after this photo was taken of her sans camera.

And so my 15th LAFTY Purim Carnival came quickly to an end. For the first time that I can recall, there were still lots of people at the Carnival at its official ending time of 12:30, and I think the only thing that finally got them back out into the real world was the fact that we ran out of cotton candy.

YASHER KO'ACH to all the LAFTY members who worked so hard to prepare for the Carnival, ran all the booths and cleaned up at the end. Your efforts were not in vain!  

Now that Purim is behind us, we have only four weeks to prepare for Pesach (Passover). And before the holiday arrives, we'll have learned all about the 15 steps of the Pesach Seder, how to chant the "Mah Neeshtana" and a lot of Hebrew Through Movement vocabulary relating to Pesach. 

But first, buckle up your seat belts, because we're about to travel a great distance from the European continent of the Ashkenazeem to the Indian subcontinent, where we'll stop long enough to learn about the history and culture of the Bene Israel Jews - or, as they were called by their non-Jewish neighbors, "The Shanwar Teli" ("The Oil Pressers").