Haggadah for the Liberated Lamb

Rating:
Summary: One of the first vegetarian seders
Review: The "liberated lamb" here is the Passover sacrifice. This Haggadah (Passover liturgy) was one of the first (if not THE first) to create a seder that focuses on vegetarianism and animal rights. The author does a nice job of examining the horrible conditions that animals live under in modern factory farms, and compares that to the oppression of slavery in Egypt. In this area, the Liberated Lamb does very well, and gives us much to think about.

However, the Haggadah fails in the same area where many such alternative liturgies fail, namely, liturgical requirements. While there can be a great deal of leeway in re-telling the Exodus story on Passover, certain elements MUST be there, or the seder ceremony is not kosher. One absolute requirement is that the celebrants must mention three things: Matzah, Maror, and Pesach. "Pesach" refers to the lamb sacrifice -- which this haggadah never mentions at all, not even to condemn it. My sense is, that Ms. Kalechovsky was so offended by the very idea of sacrificing a lamb, that she preferred to excise the idea completely. Unfortunately, that omission renders the entire seder incomplete -- if this is the only text being used. For that, I'm docking it a star.

Still, there is some very good material here. My recommendation would be to use "Haggadah for the Liberated Lamb" as a source book for supplementary readings around the seder table, but use a more traditional text to actually lead the seder itself.

Rating:
Summary: One of the first vegetarian seders
Review: The "liberated lamb" here is the Passover sacrifice. This Haggadah (Passover liturgy) was one of the first (if not THE first) to create a seder that focuses on vegetarianism and animal rights. The author does a nice job of examining the horrible conditions that animals live under in modern factory farms, and compares that to the oppression of slavery in Egypt. In this area, the Liberated Lamb does very well, and gives us much to think about.

However, the Haggadah fails in the same area where many such alternative liturgies fail, namely, liturgical requirements. While there can be a great deal of leeway in re-telling the Exodus story on Passover, certain elements MUST be there, or the seder ceremony is not kosher. One absolute requirement is that the celebrants must mention three things: Matzah, Maror, and Pesach. "Pesach" refers to the lamb sacrifice -- which this haggadah never mentions at all, not even to condemn it. My sense is, that Ms. Kalechovsky was so offended by the very idea of sacrificing a lamb, that she preferred to excise the idea completely. Unfortunately, that omission renders the entire seder incomplete -- if this is the only text being used. For that, I'm docking it a star.

Still, there is some very good material here. My recommendation would be to use "Haggadah for the Liberated Lamb" as a source book for supplementary readings around the seder table, but use a more traditional text to actually lead the seder itself.