Translation by Yehoshua Siskin
How did the Seder -- which means "order" -- get its name?
After all, the Seder is chaotic. There are matzah crumbs everywhere, plenty of spilled wine, guests we may hardly know, and texts in Hebrew and Aramaic that we may barely understand. Nothing here is in order. Rabbi Shneur Ashkenazi says that while order may be absent from the Seder table, the story we read concerns God bringing order into the universe -- when the evil taskmasters received their punishment, and those who were slaves went free.
As Rabbi Ashkenazi explains: "If tonight we sit down on the same exact date that we left Egypt 3,335 years ago, this means that there is order within history. All of our brutal enemies became nothing more than entries in Wikipedia, while we are still thriving and writing about their demise.
Once a year we perpetuate this order as we renew the commitment to our ancient and eternal faith. On this night, once a year, we are reminded that amidst the constant change going on around us, the baffling confusion, and the ephemeral passing scene, the order that exists in the universe can never be in doubt."
Have a kosher and happy Pesach filled with order.
