Pesach - Welcoming the Stranger

Emma Lazurus, The New Colossus

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Rabbi Bradley Shavit Artson, The Ethical Significance of Passover

In fact, one of the most frequently repeated explanations for a variety of laws in the Torah is "...for you were strangers in Mitzrayim, and the Holy One liberated you with an outstretched hand." Because we were strangers in Mitzrayim, we know what it is like to feel unwanted or unnoticed. We know the pain of silent rejection and the courage it takes to enter a room where you know no one.

This is no theoretical issue. Each Shabbat, and at every communal event, strangers summon up their courage to engage the Jewish community. Maybe they need to say Kaddish for a loved one, or perhaps they just want to learn or join in a social action initiative. Perhaps they don't feel they fit the mold (a vision of some perfect family perhaps). Whatever the reason, we always have strangers in our midst.

Who is supposed to greet those strangers? Whose job is it to make sure they have the right handouts, that they are not sitting alone, that someone is there to talk with them and to introduce them to people already established there?

Each one of us was a stranger in Mitzrayim, and each one of us must take the initiative to ensure that no stranger ever feels unwelcome in any Jewish gathering. The first step, then, is to realize that if you don't look for strangers, no one else will either. If you don't get up to say, "hello, may I sit with you?" no one else will either. It all depends on you.

Adina Koch, Keshet's Haggadah Insert

When we return to the story of Pesach year after year, our maggid (story), we return to a reminder of from where we have come. Our parent wandered. Our ancestor searched for a place to call home; out of which we emerged as a nation and a community. As Jews, we are blessed with a tradition that teaches us to stretch what it means to be family and on all days of the year to welcome the orphan, the widow, and the stranger. The lesson is especially salient on Pesach, as we open our doors and invite all who are hungry to come and eat. Food, however, may not be the only nourishment our bodies and souls are craving.

When we recall our slavery in Egypt, so too are we called to notice the oppression in our midst; the Egyptians of our day treat those who are LGBTQ harshly. Those in our LGBTQ community suffer from higher than average rates of abuse, homelessness, harassment,. For some of us, just walking down the street poses a threat to safety that others never need consider. None of us are exempt from being in the role of Egyptian. We may believe we have just cause for persecuting those who are different, we may do so without intent to harm, and we may do so with our silence. Yet our story teaches that it is our responsibility to recognize oppression and cry out for justice. The Torah teaches us that as human beings we are created b’tzelem elohim—in the image of God. The divine spark is in each one of us, and we each have the power to hear those who cry out and witness their pain, to extend our hands and stretch out our arms to those who are still in a narrow place. Some years it might be us, or the people we love, who need those open arms and a strong hand.