At my neighbors Seder last night, I pointed out that the the Nazis and their henchmen murdered six million Jews, including my extended family, and that they almost succeeded in killing my parents and grandparents, who survived the camps. I asked why God visited ten plagues on the people of Egypt, and zero on the German people. This ruffled some feathers at the Seder table, and two men responded by saying that there is no answer to this question. I wanted to point out that there is a very simple answer to this question: That there is no God. I did not say it out of tact, because my parents were at the table. But that is what I left unsaid. Also, during the reading of the Four Questions, one of them addressed the response of the Wicked Child, who said (speaking of Passover Seder), What does all of this mean to YOU? And I asked: So what, just because a child asks an inconvenient question, does that make them wicked? People hemmed and hawed and explained, Well, by asking What does this mean to YOU, the child sets himself apart from the faithful. And I asked, That is the sort of question I would ask. Ok, so there is a spirit of distance and incomprehension, perhaps even a spirit of rebellion. Does that make a child wicked? I was always like that, in part because of my having been raised a freethinker, and in part because of my autism. But I have seldom, if ever, intentionally hurt anyone. Does that make me wicked? Nobody was able to answer my question.
Posted on: Tue, 15 Apr 2014 15:13:20 +0000
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