Unlike Other Nights : Russian immigrants got a taste of liberal Judaism at a Passover Seder. Many didn’t know the ritual, a rabbi said, but ‘they have experienced an Exodus from bondage in the Soviet Union.’

To many of the elderly Jews who gathered for the Passover Seder at Temple Israel of Hollywood, the ritual gefilte fish, matzo pudding and roast chicken were familiar fare from long ago.

Older ones among the 450 immigrants from the former Soviet Union remembered the blessings over wine and matzo from their young days in Russia before World War II, before state atheism and the horrors of the Nazi occupation tore apart a web of tradition that had sustained Jewish life for centuries.

Others had been to the Chabad Russian Synagogue, a bustling center of Orthodoxy in West Hollywood, where bearded rabbis in black hats and coats teach strict observance to ancient law and custom.

So Wednesday’s gathering was hardly a breakthrough, but it was notable for its locale. Temple Israel is linked with the Reform movement, the most liberal wing of Judaism in America, whose outreach efforts among the large and growing Russian community have been more low-key than Chabad’s.

Temple Israel’s regular services, conducted largely in English and Hebrew, cannot be easy for most elderly immigrants to understand, although Senior Rabbi John Rosove said 50 to 100 former Soviets often attend weekly prayers on Friday nights.

The Chabad synagogue, led by rabbis who are native Russian speakers, has been most visible in its outreach to Russian immigrants, most of whom, especially the young, had no religious training in the previously atheist former Soviet Union. But the rabbis of Temple Israel have not ignored the thousands of recent immigrants who live near its sanctuary. It is located at the quiet end of Hollywood Boulevard, just east of La Brea Avenue.

The temple has hosted a Seder in Russian for the immigrants for seven years, ever since the influx began in earnest, and Rosove said attendance has grown steadily.

“For many of them, I suspect, this is the first Seder,” Rosove said, “although in their own lives they have experienced an Exodus from bondage in the Soviet Union.”

“In every generation everybody is supposed to see themselves as though they themselves went to freedom, but we’re so jaded,” said his colleague, David Swartz.

“This is the sixth Seder I’ve been to this week, but when I see how much it means to them, and the cost they’ve paid to come here for freedom, it makes the story come alive.”

Interpreters, a singing guitar-player and a Russian-language fact sheet helped explain the proceedings at the Seder, a ritualized meal where the flight of the ancient Hebrews from Egypt is retold through symbols like salt water and bitter herbs.

“So many of them don’t know what we’re doing,” Rosove said. “They may be familiar with matzo, but the order of the meal is totally foreign and we’re glad to introduce it to them. Hopefully in the years to come they’ll feel more comfortable and they’ll start to have Seders of their own.”

The eight-day Passover holiday ended Saturday night.

Matzo, a flat, crunchy, almost tasteless bread, is a reminder of the harsh fare of the ancient slaves, and of the speed with which they fled Pharaoh’s Egypt for 40 years of wandering in the desert.

“My father made every year a Seder,” said Brayna Kofman, 70, who came to the United States with her husband, Lev, from Ryechitsa, a town in Belarus, two years ago. “Maybe there are some people who don’t know about it, but we always had a Seder.”

But Gittel Gold, 64, who came from Odessa, a major port in what is now Ukraine, two years ago, said she had little contact with Jewish religion before coming to America in 1990.

“I like this a lot because in the Soviet Union we never saw anything like it,” she said. “We felt persecuted and we were afraid to go near the synagogue. All we knew was the word zhid (a derogatory slur). We had no Seder, no Passover. Maybe on the Yom Kippur we fasted, but at Pesach (Passover) we had gefilte fish and that was all.”