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On the night of Passover Jews all over the world are united by the simple fact that they know that almost every Jew in the world, regardless of their level of observance at other times of the year, will be sitting around the Seder table, probably at home (although there is a growing trend to celebrate in hotels in Israel these days), with their family, extended family and friends. Along with circumcision, attending the synagogue for the High Holydays and the celebration of Barmitzvah, the Pesach Seder is a deeply ingrained experience in every Jew which binds them to their own past and their heritage.

When I was a child sitting at the Passover Seder table my mother would open the front door to symbolically allow Elijah the Prophet to enter our home invisibly. The children would look intently at the level of wine in the cup we had set out for him and would convince ourselves that it dropped, just a little bit, indicating that the visitor had come, had sipped and had left for the next Jewish house.

Of course, like Christians with Santa Claus, we never wondered how he could get round to all those houses at roughly the same time.

Like everything else on the Seder table the Cup of Eliyahu haNovi (Elijah the Prophet) has a deep significance for understanding how Passover has different levels of meaning which are of central importance to the core beliefs and practices of Judaism.

As with many other customs which have their roots in Talmudic times, there are different explanations by different sages as to the meaning and symbolism of the Cup of Elijah. These different explanations and discussions to not invalidate each other, on the contrary, they illuminate the deep richness of Talmudic scholarship, Jewish thought and aspiration.

It is incumbent on every Jew to drink four cups of wine (or grape juice for minors) at prescribed moments during the the Hagaddah (the common "script" used to conduct the home service at the Passover Seder table) recitation. There are different traditions regarding precisely when each cup is to be drink, but four cups it is for every Jew. So important is this "mitzvah" that every man, woman and child must fulfill it. The Talmud (Pesachim 10b) states that a poor person must even sell his clothes to be able to buy wine for Passover. So why so important?

The Four Cups symbolize different stages of the Israelites experience in the house of bondage and their final release. In addition, the sages tell us that the four cups represent four other periods

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