Passover 2025
Passover begins on Saturday night, April 12. Please read on for information about Pesach at Temple Beth-El, your homes, and beyond.
Sale of Chametz through Temple Beth-El
The Chametz Sale has concluced for 2025.
First and Second Seder
If you have space at your seder table this year, or if you're looking for a seder to attend, Rabbi Michael will try to make matches between hosts and guests - please be in touch with Rabbi Michael to let him know number of people, location, date, and any other helpful details - the sooner the better.
Seventh Night Seder at Temple Beth-El
6:15 on Friday night, April 18, 2025. Register at this link! Deadline is Tuesday, April 15 at 3 PM.
Passover Service Schedule at Temple Beth-El
General Passover Resources
Exploring Judaism.org is a new website from the Conservative movement with a wealth of accessible information. Their Passover landing page is here.
MyJewishLearning's Passover resources are rich, with something for everyone.
The Hartman Institute has articles, videos, and podcasts on Passover, including a new supplement for this year.
Guidance on Passover Cleaning and Kashrut
Passover Guide from Rabbinical Assembly for 5785 (pdf). This is a mainstream guide to Passover practice that sticks to what is actually required under Jewish law, rather than stringent customs that make holiday preparation unnecessarily challenging.
Questions and answers about keeping kosher on Passover from the Conservative movement
Pesah and Continued Kashrut Slavery: A Conceptual Reflection by Rabbi Aaron Alexander contains further detail about the thinking going into some of the Passover Guide's approach.
Sephardic Pesah Guide 2025 (pdf) - particularly useful for those who eat kitniyot (beans/rice/legumes) on Passover.
Recipes
The Nosher's collection of Passover recipes.
Vegetarian and vegan Passover recipes from MayIHaveThatRecipe.com
Haggadot and Seder Materials
Returning Favorites:
Haggadahs-R-Us is a good source of a variety of haggadot.
Recustom.com (formally Haggadot.com) lets you compile your own custom haggadah.
Velveteen Rabbi's Haggadah for Pesach by Rabbi Rachel Barenblat
HIAS Haggadah with material on Passover and refugees
T'ruah's Human Rights Haggadah can be used as a seder companion or source of readings as well.
The Israeli liberal Orthodox group Tzohar has released a guide for celebrating Pesach and the seder with loved ones with dementia. (Note that if you scroll down below the document preview, there is a Download button to obtain the entire PDF.) While some of its concerns are specific to Orthodox and strictly-observant Conservative practice, there are also compassionate and helpful suggestions that are broadly applicable.
Poems around the Seder Table: Rachel Korazim curated this collection of poetry from many sources for the seder - attributions are within.
National Council of Jewish Women has published The Five Women of the Exodus: A Feminist Supplement to the Haggadah
The JDC has a global Passover toolkit here.
New for 2025 (more to come…)
What do we do differently at a Saturday night seder?
2025 introduction to the seder from HIAS
Supplements from Passover 2024:
Not A Haggadah Passover reader from Exploring Judaism
The Long Redemption: A Reader From Israel For Pesah 5784 (from Mechon Hadar)
Al Pedut Nafsheinu - Internal Redemption: Pesah Reader 5784 (also from Mechon Hadar)
The following is drawn from a list of 2024 Passover haggadah supplements compiled by the JTA and posted on the Forward's website - the full article is here.
- Under the direction of Rabbi Mishael Zion, the Hartman Institute produced an extensive supplement that includes contributions from people directly affected by Oct. 7 and an essay by prominent Israeli author David Grossman.
- Rabbi Menachem Creditor and Ora Horn Prouser, the CEO and dean of the Academy of Jewish Religion, edited a supplement that begins, “I am at the seder, but my heart is in October.”
- The Schechter Rabbinical Assembly in Israel crafted a supplement that is available in Hebrew and English and includes poetry written during a daylong conference about adapting Passover for the current moment.
- A digital supplement by New York City’s Reform Central Synagogue centers poetry written by Israeli poets since Oct. 7; while the Reform movement has released its own.
- Rabbi Joshua Kulp created a supplement that draws on the haggadahs produced in Israel’s early years by its kibbutz communities, some of which were attacked on Oct. 7.
- An international coalition of what its members call “the religious left” put out a reader meditating on the themes of the seder through an Israel-and-human-right affirming lens.
- The supplement from Bayit includes several poems including one that reimagines the four children of the haggadah as contemporary Jews: “Today the Four Children are a Zionist, a Palestinian solidarity activist, a peacenik, and one who doesn’t know what to even dream.”