I read that during a seder, one is commanded to, among other things, eat lamb. I’ve been vegan for the past two years, does this mean I can’t celebrate Passover without breaking a commandment?
I’ve been eating vegetarian and vegan seders for 30 years. The biggest commandment is to eat matzah, so as long as I eat matzah, and nothing leavened, and noother forbidden foods (I “converted” to Sephardism doring Passover about 10 years ago so I could have beans and rice, and so my son could eat soy-based meat if it didn’t have gluten in it (hard to find, but it exists).
It is possible to wrap the shankbone in aluminum foil, or to put a turnip on the seder plate. I have had everything from bean dishes made according to Sephardic recipes, as well as quiches with matzah meal crusts, and matzah lasanga (surprisingly good)
There is a lot of commentary that once the Temple was destroyed, and there was no paschal offering, the commandment to eat lamb fell by the wayside. There is also commentary that Jews will be vegetarian in the third Temple (Messianic) era. So I’m just practicing.
Besides, many seders I have been to do not serve lamb, they serve chicken or brisket.
copperwindow:
The commandment to eat lamb was specifically the passover sacrifice in the Holy Temple in Jerusalem. After the Temple’s destruction in or about the year 70, sacrificial service stopped, and will not be re-started until the Messiah re-establishes it.
As a matter of fact, among Ashkenazic (Eastern European) Jews, the current custom is not only to not eat lamb at the seder, but not to eat any kind of roasted meat, so that we remember what we’re missing by not having a Holy Temple.
There is a principle to rejoice on holidays, and that “there is no rejoicing without meat and wine.” Some interpret that as sacrificial as well, which would mean there’s no issue with a vegan seder these days. Others say that there is a commandment to have meat as part of one’s holiday meals, which would include the seder meal, so according to those authorities, a vegan seder would not be quite correct.
Veganism and The Jewish Dietary Laws.
There, as to OP: ummm…
My wife is vegan, as is one of my kids. They’ve not had any problems with Passover, especially now that we’re eating beans and legumes as part of our Passover diet.
It matters why you are vegetarian or vegan, I suppose. Someone who has given up meat for health reasons, but really likes meat, maybe should make an exception on the holidays, if not being able to eat meat with everyone else makes them unhappy on a holiday.
Me, personally, I don’t like meat. I became a vegetarian because I don’t like the taste of meat. If I were forced to eat meat, it would make the holidays upsetting for me, and I would come to dread them. That’s the wrong frame of mind for the holidays.
We have close friends who are vegetarian (lacto-pisco-ovo variety). I think they started it when the wife converted but did not want to get into separate dishes. So they eat fish (but no shellfish of course) and have often invited us for a seder. They use something like a celery stalk as a stand-in for the shankbone, but otherwise the seder is pretty standard. Oh, and they don’t bother with kosher wine. The knaidlich soup is vegetable based, of course. They would eat gefilte fish, but the commercial varieties are the pits and home made is very time-consuming. I know, I used to help my grandmother with it and my mother never bothered. The main meal is likely to be fish.
You are not a vegetarian if you eat fish.
And you’re not really a vegan if you are doing it for the health benefits.
Well, I actually never heard of anyone vegan for health, but I know people vegetarian for health. They eat only fat-free dairy, and bake with egg replacers, or egg whites only. They may eat eggs with the yolk, but limit them, and do it for the iron.
I don’t know what else you’d call them. It’s true they wear leather shoes, but I still wouldn’t say “You’re not a vegetarian if you wear leather,” even though I personally don’t, because I think it’s gross.
I mean, seriously, what else can you call them?
Someone who eats fish, though? definitely not vegetarian.
Albeit, when I first gave up meat, I didn’t know that made me a vegetarian. I thought because I still ate eggs and cheese I was just a non-carnivore. I hadn’t heard the word “vegan.”
If you’re not Jewish, copperwindow the commandments don’t apply to you. If you are Jewish, I assume you’ll be following up with your rabbi (or a rabbi, anyway), but I’m pretty sure that since Jews are commanded to celebrate the Passover, and there are several commandments about how to do so, you’d be far more compliant with the Torah by keeping the rest of the Passover commandments and breaking only the one to eat lamb (if this commandment is in fact operative according to your rabbi) than by ignoring all of them.
The important thing is that no true vegan in Scotland uses sugar processed with bone char in his oatmeal.
We’ve roasted a beet instead of a lamb shank. The trickiest is matzah balls, which use eggs. But I’ve worked around that. Eating matza is the only real critical element. My son dated a vegan, so wanted to make sure there were good things for her to eat, even if the whole meal wasn’t vegan.
I’ve never eaten lamb at a Seder. It’s always chicken or brisket.
That would be a pescetarian.