We received our first invitation to a seder just before purim, normally I say yes, excited that someone actually wanted me at their seder and not the last minute desperate attempt to latch onto everyone’s already booked seders. However, this year is different, I recalled some expletive filled rant that I went on last year that went along the lines of “I’m hosting my own damned seder next year, enough of this 3 hour ma nishtana bullshit” or the likes of that.
So it has come to pass, I made it official by inviting several of my off the derech friends to the first night seder and looking around the shul and wondering who wouldn’t be put off by a 2 hour long seder that focused on rushing through the traditional lengthy explanations on why we wash for karpas and how kings leaned back in the day. I’ll be the first to admit that I’m no fan of the seder itself, but I particularly dislike people who spend as much time on hand washing and parsley dipping as they do on the entire magid. I was always told that the mitzvah of the seder was to tell about leaving Egypt.
So far, we have no actual guests, but I’ve informed the wife that we will do our own damned seder and after we finish, we can go crash the ones we turned down. I began to tell her of the few sedarim that my father, brother and I did together. They lasted no longer than 45 minutes and even that felt like too long.
The whole point of the hagadah was to provide the layman with a standardized format with which to be mekayim the mitzvah of sippur yetzias Mitzrayim. If you read through maggid, it only takes ten or fifteen minutes.
Of course, no just reads it. Every phrase is expounded upon. Which can be interesting, but not when you’re waiting to eat.
I think that maggid should be moved to during the meal. My Shabbos lunches often take a few hours because we’re sitting and talking while we eat. We can eat, read maggid, the kids can repeat all the stuff they learned in school, and no one will be grumpy or trying to hurry things along because they’re hungry.
Or if we can’t move maggid, because (because changing things is too Reform), at least read through maggid and then during the meal go through it again and discuss it then.
This post made me wish I lived near you
Da vaab and I were just talking about a trip to Seattle. I’m thinking we might change that and visit you guys instead.
I saw an article a year or 2 ago on one of the Hebrew chareidi sites either bhol.co.il or kikar.co.il talking about the Chofetz Chaim’s seder how it lasted about half hour to 45 minutes. Apparently there has been a departure from Mesorah since than.
Always one to hop somebody else’s seder train. By the way, Chabad usually has one, but they last like 3 1/2 hours.
“So far, we have no actual guests, but I’ve informed the wife that we will do our own damned seder and after we finish, we can go crash the ones we turned down”
nice
did you persuade her or not?