There are two prevailing "authorized customs as to how we arrange the five or six (this also depends upon custom) items, or simanim, on the Seder Plate.
One "authorized" tradition might be termed maximal utility: There is a principle in Halachah that ein ma'avirin al hamitzvot, We do not "pass over" (the opportunity to do) mitzvot. Therefore, if we have a number of items each of which is associated with a different mitzvah, we should arrange them in such a way that when we first reach for one of them, our hand first encounters the item needed first, the second item second, and so forth. The application of this principle to the items on the Seder plate yield one of the traditional arrangements, that associated with the Rema {Rabbi Moshe Isserles} (and most commonly with the tradition of five simanim - Karpas, Maror, Charoset, Beitzah, and Zeroa)
The second tradition might be called maximal symbolism. Each of the six simanim are associate with one of the ten Kabbalistic sefirot. When the three matzot are added, plus the Seder plate itself, then we have a total of ten items, corresponding in compelling fashion to each of the ten classical sefirot. As the six simanim (the ones listed above, plus chazeret) are seen to correspond to the "emotional" sefirot, from Chesed through Yesod, and as those sefirot are most frequently represented in their relationships with one another, we arrange the simanim on the Seder plate in like fashion. This arrangement has the simanim arrayed as two sets of points on the vertices of triangles set point down, one above the other. An upside down triangle is the shape of the Hebrew vowel segol, and the two triangles, taken together, represent the flow and interaction beween the sefirot.
There is, however, an unacknowledged third manner of arranging the simanim. This approach can be called maximal aesthetics. Since the classic plate is round, and since there are six items to tastefully display, many people have adopted the practice of arranging the simanim in a beautiful, symmetrical fashion, equally spaced along the rim of the plate. Some Seder plates come equipped with six small plates which fit into wells, each decorated appropriately.
But how can this be? There are two and only two authorized arrangements - this third arrangement is a Johnny-come-lately, perhaps born of ignorance of the tradition, and such developments have been pruned by the Sages throughout the ages.
Or not. "Leave Israel alone - if they are not themselves prophets, then they are the descendants of prophets". The Jewish people have a say, even if technically speaking they're "wrong". (There's that other, parallel statement - "Leave Israel alone - it's better they violate accidentally rather than intentionally") The aesthetic balance of engaging the entire people as an entity, in the living dynamic of customs forged and destroyed in the furnace of the people's unconscious, intuitive core, claims its place in the order of the day, presented on a platter to Jews emerging from Egypt!
Rav Yehoshua Kahan
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Rav Yehoshua Kahan is a teacher at Yeshivat Bat Ayin. He has held pulpits in Knoxville, Tennessee and Los Angeles, and served as educational director of Livnot U'Lehibanot. He blogs on Parashat Hashavua here |