Large Heirloom Edition: 13.75 x 9.75 inches
Gripping Illustrations with over 60 full-page and in full-color.
The Passover Haggadah, the text that is meant to guide one through the
Seder night, is almost as old as the holiday itself. It tells a story of
ages ago, removed by millennia from our modern lives. And how can Jews
relate to an ancient persecution when we are not seventy years removed
from the cataclysm of the Shoah?
Escape Velocity
works under a very simple assumption: The Haggadah is the one source
Jews use, on the one night they have, to express, and be impressed, by
their faith. Escape Velocity sees to it that the Haggadah lives
up to that promise. It strives to find relevance in a story few Jews can
relate to. It recognizes the intent of the text and places enormous
demands on it to not only be a good read, but for it to be a good feel
for it to be felt: deeply.
Escape Velocity is a how-to
of sorts. It sets an example of how to bring one's self to the Seder
table and intertwine the richness inherent in each of us with the poetry
and song found throughout the Haggadah. It reveals an ancient tale
which is told by the wise and the pious, but one that is meant to be
read and listened to by the Jew of today. It is a celebration of
synthesis between the wisdom of the ancients and modern man s unique
vantage point - a post-Apocalyptic vantage point. When the Haggadah is
read through the eyes of such a generation, it takes on an existential
tone and moves from a commemoration of an event in the past, to a
celebration of our lives in the now .
Escape Velocity s
commentary, its design, as well as its illustrations all work to uncover
a dynamic, riveting opportunity to connect with ones faith and impart
that faith to others. It reveals a Haggadah of existential proportions,
perfectly suited for a people of extra-ordinary circumstances. In the
end, Escape Velocity teaches us that we have more in common with
our ancient ancestors than we think. Our emerging from the dark shadow
of the Shoah makes the exodus of our people from Egypt a blueprint of
sorts for our modern lives.
The Jewish people has rarely known a
time where their hopes and dreams were not ripped from their tightly
clenched fists and tossed out a window like a handful of magic beans.
Indeed, history has been less than kind to the chosen ones. As the
Passover Haggadah declares: In all ages they rise up against us to
destroy us ... . Expulsion. Crusade. Pogrom. Pick your persecution; the
Jew has known it.
Yet somehow one gets the feeling that recent
times have taken knowing to new levels. Never before have so many been
so close to so much unabashed, raw evil. Never before have so few
survived, been pushed so far and left with so little. The Holocaust:
more than crusade, more than pogrom, even more than genocide was no less
than deicide. And although faith was never wholly rational, it was now
reduced to the ridiculous, and the faithful left wide open to ridicule.
These are the times in which we find ourselves. And suddenly, the very
fact becomes an imperative. In these times, we must find ourselves! The
Seder night then becomes the battleground where man s stare must
penetrate his own heart, and without missing a beat his heart must
courageously return the gaze.