An Early Taanis Bechoros - Rabbi Moshe Aharon Broida shlita

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

00:09 Speaker 2 Today we’ll discuss what happens if a firstborn forgot to attend a siyum on the Fast of the Firstborn when the fast was moved up to Thursday. Someone showed me a new book from the Chabad Halacha Institute called Halacha Lema’aseh, on the laws of Pesach. Chapter 17 gathers the laws of Erev Pesach that falls on Shabbos. But the laws of the Fast of the Firstborn when it is moved up appear there only briefly, in section 2: in this calendar arrangement, the fast is moved up to Thursday. The book does not mention two further laws that we’ll discuss today. First question: What if a firstborn forgot, or didn’t know, that the fast had been moved up to Thursday? On Friday morning, someone tells him that the Fast of the Firstborn was yesterday. Or he woke up late on Thursday, after the siyum meal had already ended. Must he make up the fast on Friday, or attend a siyum on a tractate? Or can the fast not be made up on Friday? That’s the first question. Second question: What if he didn’t attend a siyum on Thursday? He did fast that day, but it’s hard for him to continue fasting until after bedikas chametz, which, in this year’s calendar arrangement, is performed on Thursday night. The law is that once the time for bedikas chametz arrives, one does not eat until after the search. May a firstborn who fasted eat as soon as the fast ends, on Thursday night, or must he wait until he himself finishes bedikas chametz? The answer to the last question is stated explicitly in the Alter Rebbe’s Shulchan Aruch, siman 470, section 7. If it is hard for a firstborn to fast until after bedikas chametz, there are two options. First, he may taste a little before the search, because the prohibition on eating before the search applies only to a meal. Or, second, he may instruct someone else to search for chametz, and then he may eat as soon as

04:07 Speaker 2 the fast ends. In practice, because of the principle that it is preferable to perform a mitzvah oneself rather than through an agent, which the Alter Rebbe mentions in the laws of bedikas chametz, siman 432, section 8, the firstborn should first search one room or one corner himself. He can then instruct someone else to continue the search, and he may eat. As for our first question, there is a sicha of the Rebbe printed in Likkutei Sichos, volume 17, page 66, and also in volume 40, page 193. The Rebbe discusses this at length and demonstrates that when Erev Pesach falls on Shabbos, the fast is moved to Thursday. Someone who did not fast on Thursday does not need to fast or attend a siyum on Friday, because the obligation has passed and cannot be made up. This differs from an early Fast of Esther, when Purim begins after Shabbos. The Rema rules in siman 686, section 2, that someone who did not fast on Thursday because of a bris milah or the like may make up the fast on Friday. That is because the Fast of Esther was established for 13 Adar, the day they gathered for battle. Its move because of Shabbos is therefore a change and addition to the original enactment, so it can be made up on Friday. But with the Fast of the Firstborn, the original enactment was itself a postponed fast. As stated in Shulchan Aruch, siman 470, section 1, the fast commemorates the miracle of the firstborn being spared from the Plague of the Firstborn. That miracle took place in Egypt on the night of 15 Nissan, not during the day on 14 Nissan. The fast is moved earlier, to 14 Nissan, Erev Pesach, because fasting is forbidden on Yom Tov. So when it is moved to Thursday because one cannot fast on Shabbos, that is not a change or addition to the original enactment, which was itself moved to 14 Nissan. Therefore, in practice, someone who did not observe the Fast of the Firstborn when it was moved to Thursday cannot make it up and does not fast on Friday. And really, it is

07:54 Speaker 2 interesting that the editors of Halacha Lema’aseh omitted these laws from their book. True, Likkutei Sichos volume 40 was only just printed, but the law we mentioned also appears in volume 17, which was printed long before Halacha Lema’aseh came out. I now see that the editors did cite Likkutei Sichos volume 17 there, but only in connection with another law: a boy who becomes bar mitzvah on Erev Pesach that falls on Shabbos must fast on the preceding Thursday. Perhaps the editors included only commonly encountered laws. In their view, it may seem unlikely that a firstborn would forget or not know that the fast had been moved to Thursday, or would wake up after the siyum meal had already ended. But not everyone is born on 14 Nissan either, yet the book addresses whether a boy born on 14 Nissan must fast on Thursday when Erev Pesach falls on Shabbos. And since we have a representative of the Chabad Halacha Institute with us, I’m sure he’ll ask the book’s editors to add the two laws we discussed today to their next edition.