Sunday, May 08, 2005

Take four cups of wine and call me in the morning

For the doctors out there, from my father's remarks last night:

Two weeks ago, we celebrated the festival of Pesach, the commemoration of our people’s liberation from slavery. As we read through the Haggadah, I was struck by the fact that a number of the elements of the Passover Seder are reminiscent of the daily routine of the physician.

We wash our hands, ask a lot of questions, usually more than four, encounter a diverse group of people, including the educated, the challenging or skeptical, the simple and those unable to furnish a helpful history. We listen to a narrative, recount plagues, these days called diseases, and are sometimes up a good part of the night, like the Rabbis of B’nai Brak. We search for the hidden, and cannot complete the task until it is found. Hopefully, we free the patient from the hardship of disease, and then rejoice if and when we are successful. Dayenu.

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