How NOT to make yourself crazy (and malnourished) during Pesach

For many Ashkenazic Jews, figuring out what is okay to eat during Pesach is to negotiate a minefield of anxiety and judgment. 

One of my particular pet peeves centers around the issue of kitniyot, or legumes. Halachically speaking (according to Jewish law), there is nothing wrong with eating kitniyot, which includes beans, lentils and rice. However, many Ashkenazic Jews do not eat these foods because, about 600 years ago, Ashkenazic rabbis declared them forbidden. Their rationale goes something like this: legumes swell when they are cooked, making them too similar to leavened foods like bread, therefore we must ban them just to be extra careful we don't violate the Biblical laws of Pesach kashrut, which, for those of you unfamiliar with the food prohibitions associated with Passover, are even more stringent than regular kashrut. (For a great article about how some Orthodox Jews are reclaiming their right to eat kitniyot, check this out.)

I was raised in an assimilated Reform household, and the only Passover food restrictions we observed were not to eat bread and bread products for eight days. I had no idea there were so many other restrictions associated with Pesach until I became an adult, and I adjusted my observance to a certain extent. 

For many Jews, what (or what not) to eat during Pesach is as much a matter of minhag (custom) as it is a desire to follow Biblical law, or be "a good Jew," however you define that. Hence the reality that many Jews deny themselves the protein nourishment and the delicious flavors of beans and lentils, (not to mention rice), because they are operating from a place of minhag, a mindset that says, "This is how I've always done it, this is how my mother did it, it's not for me to change that, and if I did I'd be consumed with guilt."

Minhag can be a wonderful thing, providing continuity in one's personal observance of and connection with many Jewish practices. In this instance, however, I'm going to risk offending some of my Jewish friends when I say that refusing to eat legumes, and freaking out about having legumes even be present at any seder you may attend (most folks I know do potluck seders these days; it's just too much work to expect the host to do it all), is misguided and detracts from the whole point of Pesach, which is to celebrate our liberation from slavery in the company of friends and family.

I find myself going back to something Rabbi Arthur Waskow said in an interview I did with him for my "Jews, Food and Ethics" show on KBOO last Sunday. He made the point that changes to Jewish practice over time tend to be adopted based on whether they are life-affirming. In other words, does eating kitniyot enhance your enjoyment of Pesach? Does it decrease your anxiety about whether you are "doing it right?" If so, eating kitniyot is a life-affirming practice and should become part of your observance if you want it to be. Waskow also made a good analogy to feminist Judaism here: he said that when feminist Jewish practices first began surfacing, in the 1970s, many reacted by saying, "Not with my Torah, you don't!" But over time, it was found that including women's participation in rituals that had traditionally been limited to men was found to be life-affirming (I tend to think of it as simply more fair and practical, but I'll yield to Waskow's definition), so the practices were adopted. Today, even in some Orthodox communities, women's roles have expanded, and women's full participation is now de facto in the other branches of Judaism.

I respect the minhag of following minhag. But I also know that Judaism is an interpretive tradition that has evolved over the centuries, and so I believe it is equally Jewish to question or change one's minhag when it becomes burdensome, (especially when it is not based on halachah), and diminishes, rather than enhances, the joy of celebrating the Jewish holidays.

Chag sameach.