MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
Wednesday is the first night of Passover. Jewish families all over the world come together to eat the same foods, tell the same stories - or at least they usually do. Deena Prichep reports on how this year's Passover will be different from all others.
DEENA PRICHEP, BYLINE: Passover isn't just a holiday with a meal. The meal is the holiday. It's a ritual people make around the table.
MARISA JAMES: It's a moment of transmitting history but also transmitting identity, which is why it's so important to be with family.
PRICHEP: Marisa James is a rabbi at Congregation Beit Simchat Torah in New York.
JAMES: The Passover Seder is a very embodied learning experience and says, here; you're going to sit down and not just tell the story of the exodus from Egypt. You're actually going to do these steps that help you sort of feel a little bit like you're living it.
PRICHEP: But this year because of coronavirus stay-at-home orders, people have to find new ways to connect to old traditions.
Mara Gross set up a video cooking date with her mother, Barbara, from Portland, Ore., to Northern California, so Gross could figure out how to get her matzo balls as light and fluffy as her mom's.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
MARA GROSS: I separated the whites and the yolks.
BARBARA GROSS: Really?
M GROSS: Do you not do that?
B GROSS: Yeah, I put them together, and I just beat the hell out of it.
PRICHEP: Gross was really looking forward to learning these skills in person and celebrating together. Instead, they'll have a video conference Seder with cousins from around the country.
M GROSS: And so we're going get to combine and "be with," quote-unquote, family that we don't always get to celebrate with. And that's something that's pretty special. It's still not the same.
PRICHEP: Especially this year, when her mother just entered hospice.
M GROSS: I mean, it's hard not to get to be with family. It's hard not to be able to support my parents in what's a hard time for them. And it's hard not to get to be together for celebrations, you know? We only have so many of those, and we don't get that this year.
PRICHEP: People are feeling loss all around the world - of family, of health, of certainty. And Rabbi Marisa James says the story of Passover, while it's about freedom, is also about hard times and things you can't control.
JAMES: We're looking at these Israelites and saying, well, they're also leaving behind a time that is terrible. They're going through a time that is terrifying, and they have absolutely no idea what's going to be on the other side.
PRICHEP: But they keep moving. The Internet is currently filled with Talmudic-level debate about virtual Seders - the pros and cons of different platforms, memes about plagues, rabbinic discussions about whether orthodox practice allows technology at all. Seder tables will look different this year. Seder plates will, too. And Rabbi James says that's fine. Like all rituals, Passover isn't about stuff. It's about story.
JAMES: What are the things that help you express tears? What are the things that help you express building? What are the things that help you express renewal and joy? Those are the things on the Seder plate. You can take anything that is in your house, anything that is in your yard that symbolizes those things and tell a story. And that's a Seder. And that's a real Seder.
PRICHEP: James says we don't know where in the story we are right now. And maybe the bitter greens on the Seder plate will be dandelions from the backyard. Whatever shape it takes, James says, people can make their Passover holy, make the meaning they need. They can pick up their selves and their souls and move through the sea - this time of uncertainty - toward whatever is next.
For NPR News, I'm Deena Prichep. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.