Hillel Center Program Associate Robyn Berkowitz, center, laughs as she tries to scoop ice cream as physics junior Johnathan Gross and chemistry freshman Sarah Schwartz help at the Hillel Center Wednesday evening at the Ice Cream Sedar. The event was to pre-celebrate Passover, which starts next Monday, and different parts of the ice cream sundae represent the story of Passover.
The chocolate egg symbolizes life. The candy-coated licorice Good & Plentys symbolize bitterness and slavery. And the purple milk shakes are filling in for the wine.
It’s only a sampling of the menu featured at Wednesday’s Ice Cream Seder night at the Hillel Student Jewish Center, 360 Charles St., where about 30 students gathered to get into the holiday mood for the upcoming Passover Seder on Monday.
Passover Seder begins the Jewish holiday of Passover, which runs through sundown April 5.
“You can’t eat a lot of the stuff during the actual holiday,” said Casey Weiss, a social work junior who helped plan the event. “And who doesn’t like ice cream?”
Seder is a two-night meal eaten while listening to the story of Passover, which tells of the Jewish people escaping to freedom from slavery in Egypt.
Throughout the rest of Passover, which lasts eight days, no food that takes time to rise, such as crackers or beans, is supposed to be eaten in remembrance of the Jewish people who were forced to flee their homes so quickly they didn’t have time to wait for their bread to rise.
“The food is very symbolic,” said Whitney Harris-Linton, the Hillel Center’s Jewish learning coordinator. “It’s a traditional meal.”
Depending to what degree people practice their faith, Harris-Linton said leavened food will be banned from the house, which will then be cleaned.
Dishes and silverware must be changed so there is nothing left on it.
“I don’t eat anything not kosher,” special education junior Brenda Cole said.
“We move (leavened food) to the outside fridge.”
The story of Passover is read from a prayer book, which also has been changed for the ice cream seder.
“The regular book, the Haggadah, is the story of Passover. Ours isn’t,” Weiss said.
“We say all the same prayers, but we use candy.”
Weiss said chocolate Seders are popular as well, which the Hillel Center hosted about two years ago.
The dessert Seders help get students in the spirit of Passover, as well as teach them about the traditions associated with the holiday, said Rabbi Michael Zimmerman from Kehillat Israel Congregation, 2014 Forest Road, in Lansing.
“I think (dessert Seders are) a good thing if it’s going to get people interested and aware in the wonderful tradition that we have,” Zimmerman said.
Although psychology senior Shira Glogower said she has attended chocolate Seders in the past, Wednesday marked her first ice cream Seder experience.
“I think the meaning was changed, but it was still meaningful,” Glogower said.
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