Strangers in strange land: Immigrant on Pesach

The Passover seder begins by welcoming anyone who is hungry, an idea that comes straight from the Book of Exodus (23:9), which states, “You shall not oppress a stranger, since you yourselves know the feelings of a stranger, for you also were strangers in the land of Egypt.” 

Later in the Torah, Leviticus 19:33 says, “When a stranger resides with you in your land, you shall not do him wrong.” Leviticus 19:34 repeats this refrain, “The stranger who resides with you shall be to you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt; I am the L-rd your G-d.”

The immigrant experience is different for everyone, said Aaron Gershowitz, senior director for U.S. programs at the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS). He told JNS.org that the challenges of an individual’s journey often depend on the environment they are leaving and the community to which they are relocating.

Take Inge “Irene” Brenner. She escaped from Nazi Germany on Dec. 28, 1938, for Havana, Cuba. From there, she traveled to the U.S., arriving to join her husband in April 1939 at age 19. She immediately took up work at a small factory where she steamed hat plumes. Her employer provided her with the required documentation to book passage for her mother, father, and sister to the U.S. Due to lack of funds, the family lived together in a tiny apartment in New York.

“When I left Berlin I was 19 and completely single-minded, [telling myself] ‘I must get out and save myself and my parents’,” Brenner recalled. “We just couldn’t have existed anymore. That is what happened to the rest of my family that didn’t get out — all of them were murdered in the gas chambers. There was nothing else I could do but make it. You just had to make it.”

Gershowitz said “the economics of surviving” often mark the first several years (or longer) of the immigrant experience. It is only after that period that immigrants become more like others — focused on family life, a career, and a future for their children.