April 11, 2006 > Passover by Praveena Raman "Why is this night
different from any other night?" On the evening of April 12,
Jews the world over will ask this question as family and friends
gather for a Passover Seder. The "Haggadah" will be read to
guide the assemblage through song, prayer and stories to
celebrate the Jewish people's deliverance from slavery in
ancient Egypt. Jews celebrate the flight of the Israelites from
Egyptian slavery in the 1200's B.C. According to the Book of
Exodus, about 3000 years ago, Moses was asked by God to free the
Israelites who were enslaved by the Egyptian Pharaoh, Ramses II.
The Pharoah did not listen to Moses' plea and would not set the
Israelites free. Ten different plagues, blood (Dahm), frogs
(Tz'fardaya), lice (Kinim), beasts (Arov), cattle disease
(Dever), boils (Sh'chin), hail (Barad), locusts (Arbeh),
Darkness (Choshech) and Plague of the First Born (Makat
B'chorot), were unleashed on the people of Egypt to punish them.
Before the tenth plague, the plague of the fi