Last week I wrote for TOI partner paper, The Jewish News. The article was a rare moment of personal vulnerability, reflecting on the genuinely sad reality of how normalised terrorism, war, and antisemitism have become for my young children. It ended with a glimmer of hope, though not as much light as I would have liked. Having focused on the personal challenge of raising Jewish kids and navigating those conversations at the right time, I want to flip the coin…

Until a recent JPR study, Seder Night was the most celebrated Jewish occasion globally. I’d argue it still is. When you consider that there are only one or two opportunities to celebrate Seder Night – depending on your tradition and geography – compared to eight nights of Chanukah, the maths still puts it firmly at the top. That’s ahead of the big names of Yom Kippur, Rosh Hashanah, even Shabbat.

But here’s the thing about the Seder, it is different for everyone, and I mean everyone. It is one of the only Jewish occasions where virtually every household does something slightly different. For some, it’s a family meal with a little Matzah. For others, it’s heated debate stretching late into the night. Some households write their own Haggadah. Some use identical copies around the table. Some have a completely different haggadot for each participant. No matter what your seder looks like, whether you go through all 15 steps of the seder, just focus on telling the story and eating matzah, or anything in between, the inspiration drawn from this coming together in a Jewish tradition is envigorating.

The Seder is, in many ways, a perfect microcosm of global Jewry. We all call it the same thing, but everyone’s experience is slightly – or sometimes drastically – different. And yet there is something intangible that makes every Seder feel faintly familiar. A song, a tune, a phrase, a prayer. Something that connects every Jew to each other, however unfamiliar it might first appear.

For centuries, Jewish communities have competed with one another. There is an underlying “my Judaism is more legitimate than yours” attitude that runs through so many of our spaces. But working with Jewish communities across the Commonwealth, I’ve come to realise two things: this attitude is deeply damaging, and it is also far from universal.

The vast majority of communities I work with celebrate the differences within their ranks. They learn from them, adapt what works, and sometimes respectfully challenge what doesn’t.

If we try to export what we consider the “right” form of Judaism to communities like these, we are destined to fail, and honestly, perhaps we deserve to. We need to meet people where they are. We can share our Judaism, we can celebrate difference, and we can learn from one another. But we must listen before we speak. As the old adage goes: God gave us two ears and one mouth for a reason.

At the Commonwealth Jewish Council, that is our fundamental ethos. We meet communities where they are. We support them to develop in the way they choose. We build partnerships that are long-lasting and genuinely serve the communities they exist for. It isn’t without its challenges. Sometimes it means working with communities that others wouldn’t recognise, or stepping into spaces that feel wildly unfamiliar. But that is something to be celebrated, not feared.

So this Pesach, whether your Seder is a quiet family meal or a religious debate that runs into the early hours, hold onto this: there is so much more that unites our global Jewish family than divides us. And those who hate us simply cannot be allowed to define us.

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)