The Communal Seder According to Halacha - Rabbi Chaim Shalom Deitsch shlita

00:02 Speaker 1 You’re listening to “Lema’an Yishme’u,” a podcast from Machon Halacha Chabad.

00:09 Speaker 2 Hello to our listeners. The subject we want to discuss, with Hashem’s help, is public Seders. As you know, the Rebbe instituted them—he called for them. When Rabbi Eliyahu visited the Rebbe, the Rebbe spoke with him about arranging public Seders. It was quite public; it had a real public impact. Rabbi Eliyahu came, and the Rebbe spoke with him about the subject. I think the Rebbe asked him to participate personally—anyway. Public Seders are one of the campaigns the Rebbe called for, and it’s well known that wherever there are shluchim around the world, the most basic and popular activity is the public Seder. You could almost say that it’s hard to call someone a shliach if he doesn’t hold a public Seder. And organizing public Seders takes a tremendous amount of work. We can’t help from afar with the work the shluchim put into them. But how can we take part from afar in such an important undertaking? By addressing the questions they have—and it’s hard to imagine how many different kinds of questions come up. In particular, the people attending may not be used, during the rest of the year, to sitting together for hours, eating and drinking. I don’t know if you realize that even in what you might call Charedi homes, where there’s a Shabbos meal and people sit, eat, and sing for quite a while, that isn’t always the norm. If someone is full after the first course, he may leave the table. But this idea of gathering together is very important. It’s difficult, but it’s very

03:03 Speaker 2 important. In any case, the shluchim ask for answers to many questions, and we’ll spend some time on the questions they raise. People find it hard to sit through the whole thing. So how do you arrange a Seder for them? After all, you want them to fulfill the mitzvah of the Seder. There are four cups, and something is recited over each one. The first cup is Kiddush—that’s easy. The second cup accompanies the main part of the Seder. In an ordinary home, that takes between forty-five minutes and an hour. So how do you arrange it for them? At one point, the shluchim in Russia made a request. Boruch Hashem, I myself have two children who are shluchim in Russia, but this was a general request: How can we arrange for people to say everything required by halacha in a shorter form? Interestingly, the Alter Rebbe already addressed this problem. It’s worth knowing that Shulchan Aruch, Orach Chaim, which covers the whole year, has a special section about conducting Seders on Pesach night for several households. Not public Seders exactly, but Seders in different homes. Section 484 is headed, “One who wishes to conduct the Seder in many homes.” In other words, he conducts the Seder in one home—the people don’t go to a central location—and then goes to another home. The section gives all the instructions: what he may say himself each time, and what he should make sure the people say. Among other things, it discusses the Haggadah and says: “Then he should say Mah

05:37 Speaker 2 Nishtanah and the entire Haggadah for them in a language they understand.” That means it needs to be translated into a language they understand. So, at the request of the shluchim in Russia, the Haggadah was translated into Russian. But the important part is what comes next: “Or he should explain to them the substance of what must be said according to the basic requirements of the law. See section 473.” That last sentence appears in parentheses added by the Alter Rebbe. If you’re conducting a Seder for people like this, some parts of the Haggadah are required by law, while others are customary, and in section 473 he sets out which are which. Incidentally, this is a novel ruling of the Alter Rebbe’s; others disagree. The Chida holds differently, and the Mishnah Berurah holds differently. According to the basic requirements of the law, he can tell them just the required parts. So we followed the shluchim’s request and produced a shortened Haggadah in Russian based on that guidance. What are the parts required by law? Now, where the Alter Rebbe says, “See section 473,” he also says that not only is there a distinction between what’s required and what isn’t, but you can convey the required parts without using the exact text printed in the Haggadah. You can explain their substance to the people—tell it to them in your own words. So we see explicitly that the Alter Rebbe took care to enable these people to fulfill the Seder according to halacha in a shorter form. That’s a very significant, and not widely known, point. We’re familiar with the short version of Birkas Hamazon called “Brich.” You may not know that, according to halacha, the “Brich” that people say is only an abridgment of the first blessing. That’s enough for children. But to say all of Birkas Hamazon in an abbreviated form,

08:14 Speaker 2 we searched and found that the rabbi from Omer—what’s his name?—had found an abridgment of all of Birkas Hamazon. He published it, and it was translated into Russian. That made it shorter. So the Haggadah had already been shortened, and that helps a great deal. It accords with halacha, as Rabbi Reiv [unclear] says. But there are other parts that take a long time. Then there’s the meal. All right, the meal isn’t difficult, though not everyone wants to wait through everything. But after the meal comes Birkas Hamazon, and that can be shortened as we said. The shortened Birkas Hamazon is really a summary rather than an abridgment. Then comes Hallel afterward, with the fourth cup. The main issue is that some people don’t have the patience to sit until the end. And what happens? The fourth cup is drunk right at the end. So the shluchim asked how the fourth cup could be fulfilled in a way that would make it easier for people to stay, hear Hallel, and say the rest. That’s one kind of question. Another question concerns the cup poured for the Haggadah. You pour the cup and recite the whole Haggadah over it, telling of the Ten Plagues and everything that happened in Egypt, while the cup stands ready. Now, when do you drink it? After you finish everything—after the blessing that concludes, “Who redeemed Israel.” People

10:44 Speaker 2 For people who aren’t used to it, a cup sits there for close to an hour—and in some places even longer—while they tell the story of what happened. And there’s a cup of wine, or more accurately, a cup of grape juice. So they taste a little, then a little more, and a little more. By the time they’re supposed to drink the cup, the cups are empty. So if you want them to fulfill the mitzvah of the four cups, you have to give them another cup. Now, there are public Seders, like in Thailand, for example, with two thousand participants. Yes. He’s from Jerusalem, a Jerusalem kid. And [unclear], yes. He was a student at [unclear], yes. Two thousand—something like two thousand participants. I don’t know how it will be this year, with everything going on. So go pour another two thousand cups. It’s not simple. What, then—should you not pour the cup during Maggid? Not do what it says in the Haggadah? How does that work? As the rabbi says, what is required by the strict letter of the law? Here we come to both this question and the previous one. How do we connect them? There are two things here: reciting the Haggadah and drinking. What exactly is the connection between them, and what place does each have? How do we define it so we know how to arrange things? So let’s start with the foundations in the Gemara. The Gemara says that if a person drinks all four cups at once, he has not fulfilled his obligation. In other words, for the mitzvah of the four cups, there have to be recitations in between. The Alter Rebbe puts it this way—this is a halachah in Shulchan Aruch: One must drink the four cups in order. That is, between the first and second cups, and between the third and fourth, one must pause

13:13 Speaker 2 to recite the Haggadah and Hallel; and between the second and third, one must pause to eat matzah and recite Birkas Hamazon. If one did not pause between them for these things, but drank four cups one after another, one has not fulfilled the obligation of the four cups. Rather, they all count as one cup, and one must drink another three cups in the order that will be explained. If there were no pauses for the Haggadah—he didn’t say the Haggadah and drank one cup, then drank another—he hasn’t fulfilled the obligation. It counts as just one cup. So the recitation is necessary. Let’s put it this way: After the meal, a person wants to leave. If not for this halachah, we’d tell him, “Before you go, have another cup for the road so you won’t be thirsty.” He might agree to drink another cup. But to drink the fourth cup, he has to stop and say Nishmas and Yishtabach, and say “For His kindness endures forever”—the entire passage. In the Gemara, these are called the Egyptian Hallel, the Great Hallel, and the blessing of song. There’s a lot to say. If not for this halachah, we’d give him the fourth cup before he leaves. But if he also has to recite something, how much does he have to say to meet at least the minimum requirement? That’s the problem. And it brings us to the previous question: if you put a cup of wine on the table, he drinks a little, then a little more, then a little more. So it was poured at the right time, but it didn’t last until the end. Does it have to be there the whole time, or can it be poured at the end from the outset? In fact, if

15:29 Speaker 2 we look at the heart of the question, it’s the same in both cases: How exactly do we define the combination of recitation and drinking? During the rest of the year, we also have Kiddush and Havdalah. They, too, combine a cup with a recitation. But there it’s clear that the main thing is the recitation. We have a mitzvah to make Kiddush and a mitzvah to make Havdalah. The Sages ordained that they be recited over a cup, just as with Birkas Hamazon over a cup. We see that if there’s no cup, we recite Birkas Hamazon without one. In other words, the main thing is the recitation, which should be said over a cup. The cup lends importance to the recitation. But on the night of Pesach, that doesn’t seem to be the reason. If it were, one cup would be enough for everything: we could take a cup, say everything that needs to be said, and fulfill the obligation. But no. We want a cup for the Haggadah and a cup for Hallel; and if he didn’t recite those passages, there was no pause, so he hasn’t fulfilled his obligation. You’re familiar with how the Mishnah Berurah cites the Maamar Mordechai, who says that these pauses can be made with other things; they don’t have to be specifically what’s written here. But the Alter Rebbe himself says that this does not appear to be the view of other sources, including the Eliyah Rabbah. He says explicitly that if one did not pause between the cups for these things, one has not fulfilled the obligation of the four cups. So these particular things are necessary. There’s another clear proof that the drinking goes together with the recitation: another halachah in section 25.

17:45 Speaker 2 A father is obligated to educate even young children in the mitzvos by giving them the cups to drink in the order that will be explained. Young children also need to be educated. Now, you have children who have reached the age of chinuch—both boys and girls. Everyone participates in the mitzvos of the Seder night. So they, too, need to be educated and given wine to drink. Grape juice is fine, yes. But how should they be educated? By giving them the cups in the prescribed order—that is, together with the recitation. The child doesn’t have to say it himself; he can listen. But suppose a child wants to play and says, “You carry on saying the Haggadah, and when it’s time to drink, call me and I’ll drink.” That isn’t enough. It has to be in this order, so he also has to listen. How much does he have to hear for it to count as a pause? The Alter Rebbe says even more. What does it mean to have reached the age of chinuch? People don’t always know exactly what that means. They think there’s a certain age: at that age a child has reached chinuch, and before it he hasn’t. But that’s not really how it works. The original halachah is that each mitzvah depends on whether the child is capable of performing that particular mitzvah. For example, when should you educate a child to take a lulav? The Mishnah says: A young child who knows how to shake it must be educated in the mitzvah of lulav. The same applies to every mitzvah. For example, when should you begin educating a child to wear tzitzis? It says explicitly in halachah: when he can hold the tzitzis during the recitation of Shema. That’s what it says in halachah. The Mechaber or the Rema, the Mishnah Berurah—not just the Eliyah Rabbah. The general principle is written there. But if he can’t do that, there’s no need yet to educate him in tzitzis. In other

20:05 Speaker 2 words, the mitzvah of chinuch is assessed separately for each mitzvah, according to its requirements. Now what does the Eliyah Rabbah say about educating children in the four cups? He says: This means that they have reached an age when it is appropriate to educate them to listen to what is said over the cups. For example, they understand the sanctity of Yom Tov, so it is appropriate for them to hear Kiddush. They also have enough understanding to grasp what they are told about the Exodus from Egypt, so it is appropriate to educate them to hear the Haggadah. Likewise, one must educate them to hear Birkas Hamazon, which is recited over the third cup, and the conclusion of Hallel and the Great Hallel. In other words, as long as the child doesn’t understand what’s being said, there’s no need to educate him in it. So if he understands Kiddush—understands that it’s a holy day—he is obligated, for purposes of chinuch, in just one cup, not four. If he also understands what he’s told in the Haggadah, he is obligated in another. And if he can also understand an explanation of Hallel, he is obligated in the third. It all depends on his level of chinuch. We see explicitly that you don’t say he has reached the age of chinuch simply because he can drink. Not every child can drink a cup: there’s a required amount in the cup and a required time in which to drink it. That isn’t what it depends on. It also depends on his being able to understand what is said. So again, we see the connection between the recitations and the drinking. They go together. If both the recitation and the drinking are necessary, we have to ask again: How can a group of people who aren’t used to sitting for several hours fulfill the mitzvos properly? If we don’t look for solutions—one of the shluchim who asked me about this put it this way: “I start

22:13 Speaker 2 The Seder with four hundred people, and I end up reaching forty. So he would want all four hundred to fulfill the... You know, for some people, the whole idea of education is something—what shall we call it?—something human, something Jewish and human. But the education we had in Chabad, the original meaning of education, is really to educate the child... No, not to educate; I’m talking about older people. It’s really about a Jew fulfilling the mitzvah. It’s not... In today’s Tanya, which we learned today, it says that a great light shines through every act of a mitzvah. There’s no question about it. The mitzvah has to be done. With your permission, I’ll tell a story I told him earlier. A Jew told me about... Earlier I spoke about tefillin. I’ll tell you another story about the Chanukah campaign. A Jew told me that he used to live in Migdal HaEmek; today he lives in Jerusalem. He wasn’t—he isn’t connected to Chabad. He isn’t originally from Chabad, but he’s a capable person, and his father is a rosh... his father is among the Litvaks. But he lived in... So on Chanukah he would go out from Migdal HaEmek to nearby places and make sure Chanukah candles were lit. He went into a kiosk and made the offer. The woman selling there started shouting at him. Then suddenly, out of an inner door, came an older man with a ponytail, who looked about sixty. A ponytail—an unusual-looking fellow. Apparently the kiosk was attached to a home, there among the roads. He said, “Why are you shouting?” She told him that this man had come to light Chanukah candles. He said, “So why not? Let him light.” Well, he was the boss. So,

24:52 Speaker 2 So he began to light the Chanukah candles. He had said in advance that he also had... he’d come with a violin, and he’d brought latkes too. In any case, yes, yes, let him light. “What are Chanukah candles?” the man asked. What are they? So he explained that there had been a miracle. It’s astonishing: a sixty-year-old man here in Israel had no idea what Chanukah was. As you can hear, he told the story with amazement, but that was the reality. The man didn’t know what it was. Apparently he hadn’t grown up here, because they tell the story in every kindergarten. Apparently... In any case, a sixty-year-old Jew who spoke fluent Hebrew knew nothing about Chanukah. So he prepared the menorah and gave the man the honor of lighting. He began: “Boruch, boruch atah, atah...” He had given the Jew the honor of lighting, and in the middle of the blessing the man burst into tears, without any explanation. He didn’t know what Chanukah was. That was the power of the holiness of the mitzvah, of the blessing over the mitzvah. Already during the blessing, his soul was stirred. Do you know where that Jew is today? This is what he told me: he’s a Jew who puts on tefillin every day, began eating kosher, and keeps Shabbos—all from the holiness of one mitzvah. That is really how the Rebbe educated us. When the campaigns first began, the Rebbe once expressed dismay that someone had asked, “So what if a person puts on tefillin just once?” I think that was what the Rebbe was upset about. The Rebbe said, “What? What kind of question is that? A person put on tefillin once—that’s worth a lifetime!” And I think the Rebbe said, “He’s no longer...

26:56 Speaker 2 He’s no longer in the category of a person who has never put on tefillin. He did it once.” In short, the Rebbe taught us to approach education not the way some people understand it: to make it nice, to make it something Jewish, something—what shall we call it?—a pleasant sort of Judaism. No. It’s the holiness of the mitzvah. So we really have to make sure that a Jew fulfills the mitzvah properly. Now, what exactly can we do from afar to help those who are working with people in practice? How do we make sure they fulfill the mitzvah, and that the four cups they drink are four cups according to halachah? As we said, the Alter Rebbe himself says that one may shorten the Haggadah and say what is required by the basic law. That version already exists in Russian. I once helped someone who called me—even this week—because he was looking for the Haggadah that also exists in Hebrew. In short, he couldn’t find it, and asked if I knew where it was. I know that it was prepared. When they prepared the Russian Haggadah, they also prepared something similar in Hebrew, with the passages that the Alter Rebbe says must be recited by the basic law. That concerns the Haggadah portion. In the final part of the Haggadah, over the fourth cup, one also has to... In the Gemara’s plain discussion, there are several opinions about what is said over the fourth cup. There is the Egyptian Hallel, the Great Hallel, and Birchas Hashir. It consists of three things. The Egyptian Hallel is the regular Hallel we say. Then there is the Great Hallel, with its refrain “for His kindness is everlasting,” and Birchas Hashir, which is Nishmas. Those are three parts. It

29:38 Speaker 2 really consists of three parts. There is room to say—and I haven’t yet found a proof—that to fulfill the requirement of the cup, one of the three is enough. To do everything required in the first instance, he has to say all three. If he says only one, he hasn’t done that. But what concerns us right now is the difficulty of keeping him there. We want him at least to fulfill the mitzvah of the four cups if he can’t say everything. For the fourth cup, he needs to say one of the things the Sages instituted. So there is room to say that one of the three is enough for the fourth cup, because the Gemara itself records a disagreement: one says to recite this Hallel over it, and another says to recite that Hallel. That’s why we say them all; that’s how the Gemara puts it. So there is room to say that, although we say them all because we don’t know which to follow, if the question is how to be at least sure that he has drunk the fourth cup—not that we prepared a cup and in the end he didn’t drink it—then apparently one of them is enough. It is certainly enough as far as an interruption is concerned, and you have also said Hallel over the cup. You didn’t say one Hallel over it; you said the other. The easiest option, I suggest, is to say what the Gemara calls the Great Hallel. It begins, “Give thanks to Hashem, for His kindness is everlasting,” and has twenty-two... We say it every Shabbos before Baruch She’amar. If he recites that Hallel over the cup, it would seem that he has fulfilled the requirement of the cup.

31:42 Speaker 2 So one can say that there was a recitation over it. That’s what I can suggest. As for shortening the Haggadah, a great deal of work was put into it. We simply need to obtain it, if the Hebrew version is still available. In any case, the Russian version certainly exists. And there’s a good suggestion—my son told me they came up with it there, and we can learn from it. According to halachah, one person can recite the Haggadah and everyone else can listen; each person doesn’t have to say it. But instead of having one person recite the whole Haggadah, they take turns. One says a section, then another says a section. That way, a large part of the group participates. When each person says a part, he’s involved, either reciting or listening with everyone else. Yes, that makes it possible. And as we said, when we fulfill the mitzvos of Seder night—Seder night is, after all, the time of the Exodus from Egypt. It is known from Chassidus what “Egypt” means: it isn’t only a particular place. As the Tanya says, a person must mention the Exodus from Egypt every day. That isn’t just recounting what happened then. In a sense, every Jew’s soul is in Egypt. Mitzrayim, Egypt, is related to meitzar, a narrow place. The Tanya says explicitly that by doing what we have to do—fulfilling the mitzvos and...—we bring the soul out of Egypt. So when, at the time of the Exodus from Egypt, on Seder night, people fulfill the mitzvos according to halachah, the holiness of those mitzvos will help us and all the Jewish people leave that narrow place. Then Jews will be able to fulfill the mitzvos properly from the outset, and in the most beautiful way, without our having to give them special suggestions. But in the meantime

34:25 Speaker 2 We need to, as the Rabbi said—meanwhile, we should try to help them do what they can. Give them the essentials in a shorter form, and afterward, once they have the strength that comes from the holiness of the mitzvos, they themselves will see to doing more. And I want to tell you that this is the basis for the Rebbe’s approach when he launched the tefillin campaign. Today’s generation doesn’t know this exactly, but some people objected and said: If you get people used to putting on tefillin and saying Shema, they’ll stop davening Shacharis, because they’ll say, “Oh, that’s enough.” But the Rebbe did not accept that. So if you ask for a source, here we see it in what we say in the Haggadah. The Alter Rebbe says to tell them the things they are required to say according to the basic law. In other words, if you see that someone can only do what the basic law requires, don’t say, “I want him to do everything.” Let him do what the basic law requires. Now, the Rebbe spoke several times about not glossing things over for people who don’t know, telling them, “It’s all right, just do this.” No. But on the other hand, when someone comes to do a mitzvah, the Alter Rebbe says explicitly that he should do what the basic law requires. So it is our duty to learn this, at least when it comes to education. Education is for people who are not... People treat section 84 as though it were for children. It isn’t a section for children. It’s a section for people who... a section about mivtzoim. Throughout Orach Chayim, there are sections about mivtzoim. And you should know who arranged this whole order, who its source is: the Rif. The Rif was the Rambam’s rebbe. In other words, already in that generation there were people who found it difficult to say the entire Haggadah, and he said they should say what was required.

36:47 Speaker 2 So there is a whole order set out by the Rif and the Alter Rebbe. It is brought at the end of the Tur, which gives the entire order, and the Beis Yosef and the Alter Rebbe added a number of things. And this is an addition of the Alter Rebbe’s: make sure they do what the basic law requires, and with Hashem’s help, through the holiness of the mitzvah, they will do more. If a person does the mitzvah, its holiness will accompany him and give him strength. One mitzvah leads to another, and he can come to observe all the mitzvos—not only what the basic law requires, but the additions as well. And something very important for a Chabad chossid to know: there are tunes in the Haggadah, like “Al Achas Kamah Vechamah.” So a Chabad chossid might think that if someone doesn’t want to say the whole Haggadah, at least he should sing “Al Achas Kamah Vechamah.” You should know that where the Alter Rebbe indicates this, that part of “Al Achas Kamah Vechamah” is only a custom. It is not required by the basic law, so that is something you can leave out. Someone who thinks education means giving a person just the pleasant feeling of it all might think that “Al Achas Kamah Vechamah,” “Dayeinu, Dayeinu,” is the highest priority. According to the Alter Rebbe, your first priority is to make sure he does what the basic law requires. Later, during the meal, you can sit and sing “Al Achas Kamah Vechamah.” Yes, the meal should be joyful. But when saying the Haggadah, the first thing is to make sure he fulfills the mitzvah of saying the Haggadah. And as we said, every mitzvah has holiness. One mitzvah leads to another, and with Hashem’s help he will do more mitzvos—like the person we mentioned who began keeping kosher because of one Chanukah mitzvah. May we merit, as we say at the end of the Haggadah, to eat of

39:05 Speaker 2 the Pesach offering and the other offerings. At the end of every Pesach. May we merit to live to see how the Pesach offering is truly prepared as it should be in the Beis Hamikdash, and—