The wars of the world rage on even as faiths and traditions are observed

Forty-five years ago, I lived in Surabaya, Indonesia, which has the world's largest Muslim population spread across hundreds of islands.

- J Brooks Spector

Although Indonesia is predominantly Muslim, millions of Christian Indonesians trace their roots to Portuguese, Dutch and German missionaries from the 16th to 19th centuries.

Indonesian Muslims are descendants of early conversions initiated by South Asian merchants and traders from the 14th century onwards. These conversions supplanted the Hindu faith, which had previously replaced Buddhism and earlier spiritualities.

In that vast religious tapestry, the one thing I did not expect to encounter was a synagogue. A few weeks before the holiday of Pesach (Passover), I was approached to lead a seder, the ritual meal and retelling of the biblical story of the Hebrews' exodus from Egypt over 3,000 ago.

I hadn't led a seder, let alone participated in one, in decades. Nevertheless, I agreed to carry out this responsibility and so began trying to source copies of the seder prayer ritual text, the hagaddah, not easily obtainable in Surabaya, obviously. Several friends in the US sent me spare copies and I even found someone in the US Embassy in faraway Jakarta who had several to spare.