Laws of the Night of the Seder - Rabbi Shraga Noson Dahan shlita

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

00:09 Speaker 2 Hello and welcome. Today we’re going to talk a little about Seder night—how it’s structured and what it’s all about. Seder night, as its name suggests, is a night with an order, a seder, so that we don’t forget any of the details of the story of the Exodus from Egypt, from beginning to end. There are many details, so we’ll talk a little about the basic idea and the structure. Its framework is the four cups, which mark our passage from one stage of Seder night to the next. What, really, is Seder night about? There are two important things. First, remembering that we went from slavery in Egypt to freedom, and reflecting on what freedom means. Second, passing the story of the Exodus from Egypt from generation to generation. It’s a Torah mitzvah, right? “So that you remember the day you left the land of Egypt all the days of your life.” We have to tell it, right? Tell your son and your grandson. We have to tell this story. So Seder night is about two things: remembering that we went from slavery to freedom, and telling it to your children. We have to tell the coming generations and pass on this special message of the Jewish people’s departure from Egypt. To bring this to life, our Sages arranged for us—or rather, the Torah, sorry, commanded us—to do several special things on Seder night. First, the korban, the Pesach offering. When the Beis Hamikdash stood, the Jewish people would come to the Beis Hamikdash on the afternoon of Erev Pesach, after checking for chametz and getting rid of it—after burning the chametz. The kohen would slaughter the Pesach offering, and everyone would begin preparing their offering in their own place. They would eat it in groups. But when would they eat it? In the evening; they prepared it on Erev Pesach. The Pesach offering was central. Its taste would remain in our mouths and remind us of the passage

02:00 Speaker 2 from slavery to freedom. It’s called Pesach because Hakadosh Boruch Hu passed over the houses of our ancestors. That saved us and brought us out of Egypt. The second thing is matzah, because our ancestors’ dough in Egypt did not have time to rise. The whole story of the Exodus from Egypt is contained in this special story of the matzah. The third thing is maror. Maror recalls the hard labor we endured in Egypt. We no longer have the Pesach offering today. We do still have maror, but today it’s a mitzvah instituted by the Sages, because it was connected to the Pesach offering. So the one mitzvah we still have from the Torah is eating matzah. We’ll talk more about the Pesach offering shortly: we would eat it at the very end of the meal so its taste would remain in our mouths. We wouldn’t eat anything afterward. That was called afikoman. Nothing is eaten after it. But today, when we have no Beis Hamikdash and no Pesach offering, we eat matzah, and matzah is the last thing in our mouths before we go to sleep on Seder night. That is the afikoman. So let’s continue and talk a little more about Seder night. Sorry—first, the minimum amount of matzah one must eat is a kezayis. We’ll discuss that later. Let’s begin with the four cups, because the first thing we do when we start the Seder is drink the first of the four cups. That’s different from an ordinary Shabbos, when the person making Kiddush says it for everyone to hear, and that person drinks from the cup—most of the cup. A cup has to hold the required measure, eighty-six cubic centimeters, or grams, which is roughly the same thing. It may be a little less, but eighty-six is easy to remember because it’s the numerical value of the Hebrew word for “cup”: kaf is twenty, vav is six, and samech is sixty—eighty-six altogether. “I will raise the cup of salvation and call upon the name of Hashem.” So we need a cup of the required size and must drink at least most of it, all right? But not just drink it. When we finish Kiddush, we drink the cup while reclining to the left. Later we’ll discuss what happens if we didn’t recline. We drink the four cups over the course of reciting the Haggadah. Together with eating the matzos, this expresses freedom and joy. But just before that,

04:02 Speaker 2 we put a Seder plate on the table. It holds the symbols of the festival, helps us keep things straight, and constantly reminds us of what this festival is about and its main mitzvos. For example, the shank bone recalls the Pesach offering. Ashkenazim take a piece of chicken and roast it; Sephardim may even use a piece of an animal’s foreleg. Don’t worry, it isn’t a Pesach offering. We cannot bring a Pesach offering at present, while we are still ritually impure through contact with the dead. This is a reminder of the Pesach offering. We also put there, uh, pieces of matzah—not pieces, sorry, the matzos go underneath, sorry. We put karpas on the plate. Karpas might also suggest the manner of free people: before a meal, they eat a little vegetable to prepare the stomach. That’s how kings behave. But there’s another reason: so the children will ask, “What’s this?” We take karpas and dip it in salt water. Why? We also have maror, which, as we said, recalls the bitterness and hard labor. There’s also charoses, recalling the mortar used when our ancestors built the—uh, when they worked at backbreaking labor. And we have an egg. Why an egg? The egg represents the Chagigah offering. When the Beis Hamikdash stood,

06:08 Speaker 2 we brought a Chagigah offering—but an offering, not an egg. True, but sadly we have no Beis Hamikdash. We’re sorrowful and mourn its loss. The egg symbolizes mourning. It’s round, like a cycle. It reminds us that life goes in cycles. Sometimes we go through difficult times, but afterward, with Hashem’s help, Hakadosh Boruch Hu comforts and strengthens us. In the words of comfort spoken through the prophet, Hakadosh Boruch Hu promised us that the Beis Hamikdash will be rebuilt speedily in our days, and we will once again merit to come to the Beis Hamikdash and bring offerings, including the Chagigah offering. This egg symbolizes our return to those good times—and even better ones. We put the Seder plate on the table and begin Seder night, as we said, with Kiddush. In Kiddush we speak of our great privilege to be the Jewish people, the chosen people: Hashem raised us above every tongue, chose us from among every people, and granted us the privilege of leaving Egypt, in remembrance of the Exodus from Egypt. “For You chose us and sanctified us from among all the peoples.” Finally, we also say Shehecheyanu: that He has kept us alive, sustained us, and brought us to this time, this special time. Then everyone sits, takes their cup, and drinks at least most of it—preferably all of it—while fully reclining. Why four cups? To add joy, because there is no rejoicing without meat and wine. So here we have wine—but there’s a mitzvah like that on every Yom Tov. True, but on Seder night we want that joy at every stage of reciting the Haggadah. We drink a cup at Kadesh, another at Maggid, right after telling the Haggadah, another when we finish the meal at Shulchan Orech, and another at the end of Hallel. At each stage of the Haggadah, we bring in this special joy through wine, a symbol of freedom, great joy, and thanks to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. There’s a mitzvah to recline. Why? Because

08:14 Speaker 2 The Torah says, “And He brought us out from there.” So we need to truly feel that we are free—not just our ancestors; we are free. To make that feeling evident in our behavior, the Sages instituted reclining. But nowadays we sit on ordinary chairs. Perhaps reclining was once what kings did, but today even an important king sits in a chair—perhaps an upholstered one, but still a chair. So yes, there is a reason behind the view of the Sages who said that we don’t need to recline today, because we have chairs. Still, that is not the view we follow. We follow the Shulchan Aruch and most of the early authorities, who say we must recline when drinking the wine. How do we recline? Simply lean slightly to the left. You can lean on your left arm and drink. All right? Don’t forget: the left side. Now, matzah also needs to be eaten while reclining. But what happens if someone ate a kezayis without reclining? He has not fulfilled the mitzvah as the Sages instituted it, so he has not fulfilled his obligation completely. That is why he must go back and eat another kezayis. But he has already fulfilled the Torah obligation, because he ate matzah. So he will not make the blessing again—“Blessed are You, Hashem our G-d, King of the universe, Who has sanctified us with His commandments and commanded us concerning the eating of matzah”—but he will eat again while reclining. Even if he has already said Birchas Hamazon, he should wash his hands again, make the blessing, and eat a kezayis while reclining. But as I said, he does not repeat the blessing over eating matzah. Why? Because, as I told you, according to two of the early authorities, the Raavyah and the Ramban, he has already fulfilled his obligation by eating a kezayis even without reclining. Someone who forgets to recline while eating korech—we’ll talk about korech shortly, when we take several things together and eat them while reclining—does not need to go back and eat it while reclining. That is because some say korech is not eaten while reclining, since it contains maror. When it contains maror, it

10:19 Speaker 2 perhaps reminds us of bitterness, and according to some opinions reclining is not required. True, the practice from the outset is to recline for korech, but if someone forgot, he can rely on the opinion that it is not required. And if you ate the afikoman—which is the last taste of matzah after Birchas Hamazon—before Birchas Hamazon, after the meal, sorry. If you ate it without reclining and can easily eat another kezayis, eat another kezayis of afikoman while reclining. But if that is difficult, since eating the afikoman is a mitzvah instituted by the Sages as a remembrance of the Pesach offering, you can rely on the opinions of the Raavyah and the Ramban, who say that reclining is not required at all nowadays. If someone drinks one of the four cups without reclining, there is a disagreement here. According to the Shulchan Aruch, he must drink that cup again while reclining. The Rema, Rabbi Moshe Isserles, whose ruling Ashkenazim follow, says there is a problem: if you drink again, you will end up drinking more than four cups—five, six, seven. You are adding to the mitzvah the Sages instituted, and adding is forbidden. There is a prohibition against adding to a mitzvah. That is a serious issue. So what do we do? If it is the second cup, before the meal, and you drank it without reclining, drink another cup now, because it may be seen as drinking as part of the meal anyway. During the meal, you may drink as much as you like. That is regarding the second cup. But if someone mistakenly drank the first, third, or fourth cup without reclining, he should not drink another cup. Otherwise, it would look as though he were adding to the cups the Sages prescribed. That would be a kind of presumption, of arrogance—adding things we were not commanded to do. And we can rely on the view of the Raavyah and the Ramban, who say there is no requirement to recline at all nowadays, because we sit on

12:21 Speaker 2 chairs. This halachah appears in the Shulchan Aruch, section 472, [unclear]. Yes, so that’s that. After making Kiddush, we wash our hands: the washing before karpas. We wash without making a blessing, because the karpas is a food dipped in liquid—we will take it and dip it. Why do all this? Mainly so that the children will ask questions. So we take a vegetable. Why? To do something different. Usually, you know, we eat vegetables during the meal, after washing our hands. On Seder night, we do so before washing our hands for the meal. So there are actually two differences on Seder night: we eat a vegetable before the meal, and we wash our hands twice—once for eating matzah and once earlier, for karpas. Also, eating the vegetable before we recite the Haggadah gives the Seder meal great importance. As we said, we are like royalty, and that is how we begin, with a fine vegetable to nourish body and soul. We dip the karpas in salt water or vinegar and make the blessing Borei pri ha’adamah, intending it to cover the maror we will eat later as well. And we eat a small amount. Why a small amount? Because if we eat a larger amount, we may need to make a blessing afterward. We don’t want to enter into a doubt, so we eat a small amount. The Rambam says one may eat a kezayis—that one should eat a kezayis—but we do not follow his view. Seemingly, according to Rabbeinu Yitzchak’s view, we would have to make a blessing afterward, while according to the Rashbam we do not make a blessing afterward, because the blessing over karpas is also intended to cover the maror. We know something else is coming soon, and we have it in mind. We can rely on that, but it is preferable from the outset to eat less than a kezayis. “If one ate more than a kezayis of karpas, he should not make a blessing afterward,” because we rely on the opinions we mentioned, that perhaps

14:29 Speaker 2 the maror was still in his mind. When there is doubt about a blessing, we are lenient and do not make it. That is the view of the Maharil cited in Shulchan Aruch 473. Next, we break the matzah. Why do we break it? First of all, to get the children interested. But there is another reason: poor people do not have money for a whole loaf; they have pieces. So we break it—it is the bread of affliction—and keep the larger piece for the afikoman, setting it aside. Some put it away for the afikoman and leave the other piece. Why do we do this? As we explained, it reminds us of the poverty we experienced in Egypt. What do we do with the afikoman? We need to remember why we have three matzos. On the one hand, the bread of affliction is broken, not whole. On the other hand, every Shabbos and Yom Tov, when we make the blessing over challah, we need at least two loaves, so now too we need two whole matzos. We have one matzah, another matzah, and the broken matzah in the middle, because it is the bread of affliction and symbolizes it. As we said, we save the larger piece for the afikoman and wrap it in a napkin. Why? In remembrance of what the Torah says when we took the matzos: “The people carried their dough before it had risen, their kneading bowls bound up in their garments on their shoulders.” So we wrap it up. Some also have the custom of placing the afikoman on their shoulder. Then we put it away to be eaten toward the end of the meal, in remembrance of the Pesach offering. In some families, the children search for the afikoman and receive a gift at the end. The main idea is to keep everyone awake on Seder night, including the children. It is a very great mitzvah. Now we say Maggid, the Haggadah. What do we say in the Haggadah? We tell the story of the Exodus from Egypt. Questions need to be asked, so we uncover the Seder plate. Some also lift the plate and even say, “In haste we left Egypt; this is the bread of affliction that our ancestors ate,” or follow various other customs.

16:40 Speaker 2 Various things like that, but the main thing is for the children to ask questions. “What is this strange thing?” There are customs that, if we’ve lifted the Seder plate and the child still doesn’t realize there’s something to ask about, we remove more things from the table until the child says, “What’s this? What are you doing?” The child needs to ask Mah Nishtanah. This is important; it’s a mitzvah: “When your child asks you tomorrow, saying…” He needs to ask. So he stands and asks, “Why is this night different from all other nights?” Why do we dip twice? Why do we recline? Why do we eat only matzah, and only certain vegetables during the Seder? We’re told what to eat. Why all of this? That’s the question. We’ve done things that make the children wonder, and then the fathers or the adults need to answer them. What do they answer? Well, the entire Haggadah. Do you know why? “In the beginning, our ancestors were idol worshippers.” We need to answer them by telling them the story of the Exodus from Egypt. That is the obligation. Since there are so many details, our Sages established the order of the Haggadah for us. It’s arranged and structured, so we can follow it and not miss anything in the remarkable, fascinating story of the Exodus from Egypt. So it’s an obligation, an obligation to tell the story of the Exodus from Egypt, and whoever tells more about the Exodus from Egypt is praiseworthy. We open the Haggadah with several examples showing just how praiseworthy that is. But the mitzvah is to tell the story of the Exodus from Egypt. Everyone needs at least to say the Haggadah aloud. Someone who only thinks about its words has not fulfilled the obligation; the words must be spoken. If an adult over bar mitzvah age reads the Haggadah and I intend to fulfill my obligation through the story he tells, I certainly can fulfill it that way. But it is a mitzvah to say the words aloud if you can. In any case, if a child

18:39 Speaker 2 reads the Haggadah, everyone certainly needs to say its words aloud themselves to fulfill their obligation and take part in reciting the Haggadah. When several families sit together, every father does not have to tell the story separately to his son. That’s certainly a good thing, but if one person tells it to everyone, that’s also fine, because the story of the Exodus from Egypt is being told. The three minimum things that need to be explained—said—to fulfill the obligation of reciting the Haggadah are Pesach, matzah and maror. What does it mean just to say “Pesach, matzah and maror”? It means explaining what Pesach is about. Why is there a mitzvah of the Pesach offering? Why is there a mitzvah of matzah? The Pesach offering is because Hashem passed over our ancestors’ homes, and because we left Egypt. Why matzah? Because their dough did not have time to rise; we left quickly, in haste. And why maror? Because we were made to do hard labor. Now we understand what it means to go free. So we need to say these three things and understand their meaning: Pesach, matzah and maror. If we’ve explained all three, we’ve essentially told the story of the Exodus from Egypt. Do we need to recline while reciting the Haggadah? The answer is no. It’s true that reclining is the way of kings and a sign of freedom, but if we recline while reciting the Haggadah, perhaps we won’t say it properly or won’t concentrate. Have you ever seen someone talking while sitting on a sofa? He’s already half asleep and not focused. Sit properly in chairs at a table, with the Haggadah open in front of you. Then we can recite it with our heads clear, concentrating as we praise and thank Hakadosh Boruch Hu with joy and happiness. There are other customs during the Haggadah: when we say “This matzah,” we lift the matzah; likewise with “This maror,” and so on. When we say “blood, fire and columns of smoke,” we also use a finger to take some wine out of the cup. And likewise when we say “Detzach, Adash, Be’achav,” the initials of blood, frogs, lice, wild animals, pestilence, boils, hail, locusts, darkness and the plague of the firstborn. And when we say the Ten Commandments—the ten plagues, that is—we also take out wine for “blood, frogs, lice” and the rest. Some people don’t use a finger; instead, they pour a little from the cup into a vessel. Some, following the Kabbalah, even regard that vessel as [unclear], so they use a disposable bowl for this. Altogether, we pour out drops sixteen times. May Hakadosh Boruch Hu have mercy on us: whatever might have had to be poured out should be poured out with those drops instead. May Hakadosh Boruch Hu grant us good news, with Hashem’s help, a great victory, and peace and calm. May no Jewish blood be spilled, G-d forbid. This is the wine of Seder night, when we recall the Pesach offering. So many died in Egypt, and so many have died throughout the generations. “And I said to you: By your blood, live; and I said to you: By your blood, live.” What we want now is true life, with holiness, purity, long life and good years. On Pesach we say Hallel. Why do we say Hallel? To sing praise: we left Egypt, so we thank Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Every Jew needs to see himself as though he personally left Egypt and needs to give thanks. So when we finish the Haggadah, we say Hallel. But unlike the usual times, when we say all of Hallel at once, we divide it: part at the end of the Haggadah, and the rest right after Birchas Hamazon. Why? Because the Pesach offering was eaten during the recitation of Hallel. Today we have no Pesach offering; we eat the afikoman. So we say Hallel before, we say Hallel afterward, and in between we eat the

20:45 Speaker 2 of, of the wine out. And also when we say “Datzach, Adash, Be’achav”—the initials of blood, frogs, lice, wild beasts, pestilence, boils, hail, locusts, darkness, and the plague of the firstborn. And when we say the Ten Commandments—those ten, the ten plagues—then again: blood, frogs, lice. Some people don’t use a finger; instead, they pour a little directly from the cup. Some, following Kabbalah, are particular about the vessel, so they use a disposable bowl for this. Altogether, we pour out those drops sixteen times. May Hakadosh Boruch Hu have mercy on us: whatever might have had to be spilled from us, let this be spilled instead. May Hakadosh Boruch Hu grant us good news, with Hashem’s help, a great victory, and peace and tranquility. May no Jewish blood be spilled, G-d forbid. After all, this is the wine of Seder night, when we speak of the Korban Pesach—so many died in Egypt, and so many have died throughout the generations. “And I said to you: By your blood, live; and I said to you: By your blood, live.” What we want now is real life, with holiness, purity, long life, and good years. On Pesach we say Hallel. Why do we say Hallel? Because we sing praise: we left Egypt, and we thank Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Every Jew must see himself as though he personally left Egypt, and must give thanks. So as soon as we finish the Haggadah, we’ll say Hallel. But unlike the usual times when we say all of Hallel at once, we divide it: part at the end of Maggid, and the rest right after bentching. Why? Because the Korban Pesach was eaten during the recitation of Hallel. Today we have no Korban Pesach; we eat the afikoman. So we say part of Hallel before, we’ll say the rest afterward, and in between we’ll eat the

22:40 Speaker 2 matzah in remembrance of the Pesach offering. There’s another reason we divide Hallel: this way, we drink all four cups in the best manner, while praising Hakadosh Boruch Hu. At Kadesh, we praised Hakadosh Boruch Hu; we ended Maggid with Hallel; then Birchas Hamazon is said with praise and thanks to Hakadosh Boruch Hu; and then the fourth cup is accompanied by Hallel. That’s the main part of the Haggadah. I’ll now go through a few more points briefly. We finish the Haggadah and eat the maror. Each person eats the required amount of maror, at least a kezayis, without reclining, and recites the blessing first. After that, we wash our hands and recite the blessings for eating matzah and Hamotzi lechem min ha’aretz. We eat at least a kezayis, and it’s good to eat two kezaysim, while reclining. I’ll also remind you what happens if someone doesn’t recline. And that amount needs to be eaten in a very short time, around four or four and a half minutes, so that we fulfill this great, important and beloved mitzvah of eating matzah. After that comes korech. Korech was the practice of Hillel the Elder: he would take Pesach, matzah and maror—the Pesach offering, the matzah and the maror—wrap them together and eat them. That’s why he would say, “In remembrance of the Pesach offering”—no, sorry, he would wrap them together and eat them. So we put charoses in there. Ashkenazim shake off the charoses so the matzah won’t become soaked. Sephardim put on charoses, enjoy it too, and eat it. After eating korech, we’re already at the Yom Tov meal. We bring out delicacies, fish, meat and wine, and we rejoice and sing songs, rejoicing greatly in the joy of Seder night. Just before we finish the meal comes our last course. If you want ice cream, have it,

24:51 Speaker 2 but afterward we eat the final course, the afikoman. Each person eats at least a kezayis of afikoman while reclining. It doesn’t all have to come from the piece we set aside earlier as the afikoman. You can eat a little of that if you want, but add matzah from other pieces so you have at least 28 grams. If that’s difficult, you can have a little less, down to 20 grams, but you need to eat that amount within four and a half minutes. Importantly, the afikoman should ideally be eaten before midnight. After eating the afikoman, we fill our cups again and say Birchas Hamazon. At the end of Birchas Hamazon, we drink the third cup. Then we say Hallel with joy and gratitude to Hakadosh Boruch Hu, drink the fourth cup, and pray that Hakadosh Boruch Hu accept our special Seder night. We want the prayers and mitzvos we’ve performed to be pleasing before Him. And may we merit, with Hashem’s help, to eat of the Pesach offerings next year in holiness and purity, to see the offerings and the burnt offerings, and to live in true freedom next year in a rebuilt Jerusalem.