3.25.13 Adam 2B@ the Life Ball (Vienna), Helsinki Soundcheck

forward.com/articles/172959/an-orange-on-plate-for-women-and-spit-out-seeds/   Interesting how things get turned around. if this doesn't belong here ,feel free to delete

Mayumi, So sorry for your loss. You and your family are in my thoughts.

Ditto --- I need to start the stockmaking soon.

We added an orange a number a years ago, much to my father-in-law's dismay. It was controversial at first, now it is a "tradition".

Susanna Heschel is a friend of my husband's and has confirmed this is a accurate story:

In the early 1980s, while speaking at Oberlin College Hillel [the campus Jewish organization], Susannah Heschel, a well-known Jewish feminist scholar, was introduced to an early feminist Haggadah that suggested adding a crust of bread on the seder plate, as a sign of solidarity with Jewish lesbians (which was intended to convey the idea that there's as much room for a lesbian in Judaism as there is for a crust of bread on the seder plate).

Heschel felt that to put bread on the seder plate would be to accept that Jewish lesbians and gay men violate Judaism like hametz [leavened food] violates Passover.

So at her next seder, she chose an orange as a symbol of inclusion of gays and lesbians and others who are marginalized within the Jewish community. She offered the orange as a symbol of the fruitfulness for all Jews when lesbians and gay men are contributing and active members of Jewish life.

The story of the orange at Seder: www.myjewishlearning.com/holidays/Jewish_Holidays/Passover/The_Seder/Seder_Plate_and_Table/Orange.shtml

<dl><dt>Chag Sameach (KHAHG sah-MEHY-ahkh) This is Hebrew for "joyous festival" and the most common holiday greeting for Passover. 
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