This grown adult doesn’t know how to ask

This year, for the first time, I’m thinking about the four children in the Haggadah differently.

We all know the wise child — sharp, inquisitive, sincere. We understand the wicked one too, even if we don’t like to admit it. Maybe that child acts out because they’re in pain or because they feel alone. Still, the Haggadah reminds us that they are a child. The goal isn’t to shame or exile them — it’s to teach them not to show up next year in the same way.

But for years, I lumped the simple child and the one who doesn’t know how to ask into the same category. I assumed the simple one was, well, simple. Uncomplicated. A little bland. No deep questions, no inner world I needed to enter. And the one who doesn’t know how to ask? I figured ignorance was bliss. If you don’t ask, you don’t get hurt. Right?

But this year, I feel differently. This year, I can’t stop thinking about the She’eino yodea lishol — the one who doesn’t know how to ask.

I spend much of my days asking questions — probing ones, nuanced ones, difficult ones, and “so what?” questions. I’ve had many field days doing this throughout my educational career and beyond. We also generally have a Jewish tradition of asking questions and yearning to learn and know more.

But this year, I’ve found myself unable to ask anything at all.

Maybe it started on October 7th or the long 549 days since. Or maybe it was learning about what happened and is happening to hostages ripped from their homes and loved ones. The images that burned into our collective memory. The waiting. The unbearable silence.

There are questions I’ve asked this year that have broken me.
Are they still alive?
How could they?
How could we?
What if?

But there are also the questions I cannot ask — the ones that catch in my throat and paralyze my mind. The unknown is terrifying, excruciating, and — God help me — awful. And sometimes I wonder: Is knowing worse?

The She’eino yodea lishol isn’t dumb. They’re not naïve. They are overwhelmed. Silenced. Grieving. Sometimes, they are afraid that asking will destroy them. And maybe this year, so many of us are that child.

Maybe this child’s lesson is not about encouraging them to ask, but simply about showing up for them, sitting beside them, holding space for silence, and holding their hand until they are ready to ask — or simply ready to be asked.

This year, I don’t know how to ask.
And this year, that feels like the truest thing I can say.