c. 1997 Religion News Service

(Rabbi Neil Gillman teaches Jewish philosophy at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York. He is the author of”The Death of Death: Resurrection and Immortality in Jewish Thought”(Jewish Lights).)

UNDATED _ What do eggs, wine, bread (or matzah), telling a story, and the coming of the Messiah have in common?

They are all central features of the Jewish Passover and the Christian Easter. The commonalities in how the two faiths observe these sacred times are striking.

The heart of the Jewish observance of Passover, from the time of the Bible to our own, is the responsibility of parents to tell the story of the Exodus from Egypt to their children, and if there are no children to themselves.

All of these strange Passover rituals, such as eating unleavened bread and tasting bitter herbs, elicit some form of the question, “What is this all about?” or, as we ask today, “Why is this night different from other nights?” Those questions provide a “teaching moment” for the parent to tell the story.

We are even told just how to tell the story: “According to the understanding of the son, his father instructs him. He begins with the disgrace and ends with the glory.” Our telling of the story of the Exodus, then, should follow a specific structure. We may tell the story any way we wish as long as we “begin with the disgrace and end with the glory.”

We are also given the very words to use as a summary for the story. These words capture the structure of disgrace-to-glory even more explicitly. We are to thank the Lord because God “… brought us out from bondage to freedom, from darkness to great light, and from servitude to redemption.”

Each of these sets of polarities underlines the movement from disgrace to glory.

But the biblical texts read by Christians in the week preceding Easter _ the Passion narratives _ also tell a story. This time, it’s the story of Jesus’ death and resurrection.

And what is the transition from the crucifixion of Jesus to his resurrection if not from disgrace to glory? Indeed, each of the polarities listed above could just as easily be applied to the experience of the first Christians.

They, too, experienced the transition from Jesus’ apparent defeat to his ultimate triumph, from the enslavement of sin and death to redemption. Jews celebrate this transition in the course of one evening meal; Christians, over three days. But the felt experience is identical.

When I ask Christians what they are supposed to do between Good Friday and Easter morning, they invariably respond: “We wait.” That waiting captures perfectly the transitional feel of the experience.

It is, in fact, the Christian version of the Jewish practice of identifying Passover eve as “a night of vigil,” the Jewish version of the Easter vigil.

In each case, the telling of the story is accompanied by symbols.

The egg symbolizes birth _ in Judaism, of the Jewish people, and in Christianity, of the Messianic age. Jews welcome Elijah, the herald of the Messianic age into their homes on Passover eve, for the redemption from Egypt is the guarantor of the future, ultimate redemption to come.

Bread and wine are the central symbols of the Christian Eucharist, and Jews drink four cups of wine and eat the unleavened bread on Passover eve.

One further parallel between the two celebrations is striking: In both instances, the celebration of the redemption is contemporary, not historical. These events are happening to us today, not only to our ancestors.

On Passover, Jews recite: “In every generation, one must so regard himself as if he came out of Egypt, for it is written, `And you shall explain to your son on that day, it is because of that which the Lord did for me when I came forth out of Egypt. (Ex. 13:8).”’

It was not my ancestors alone who came out of Egypt, but me as well, and this “me” applies to every Jew in every generation.

And what is it that Christians exclaim on Easter morning? “Christ is risen!” they say. Not that Christ was risen, or had risen, or rose, but rather, that he is risen. Jesus’ resurrection is not an event in the past, but one that happens again and again, every Easter morning.

Indeed, not only on Easter and Passover, but rather every day.

Jews are required to remember the Exodus every day of their lives (Deut. 16:3), and Christians celebrate the resurrection at every Communion service.

It is clear that both the Jewish celebration of the Passover and the Christian celebration of the resurrection are not simply historical narratives, but rather re-enactments. In telling the story, we recapture the experience of our ancestors for ourselves. The telling is our re-entactment.

The structural parallels between the two experiences could not be closer. They are basically the same festival. But why are we surprised? Jesus himself and the early Christians were all Jews. They knew Judaism from the inside. Why shouldn’t they have used their Judaism to understand their own experience?

The commonality between these two rich and ancient religious traditions should foster the greatest possible mutual respect and recognition between the two communities.

MJP END GILLMAN