0135 - History of the Rebbe's Haggadah

00:01 The Rebbe wrote his Pirosh on the Haggadah in the year תשי"ו, which is 1946, before the Nesius. And the way the Haggadah was printed, that on one side of the page was the text of the Haggadah, on the other side was the Rebbe's Pirosh. Because the text of the Haggadah was not reprinted. It was a copy, a photostat of the way the Haggadah was printed in the Seder Hatorah. So the Rebbe's Pirosh was on the other side. If the Rebbe lo-wrote a lot on a certain Inyan, so then there were two pages in a row with the Rebbe's Pirosh. That's how it was printed then. תשי"ז, the Rebbe wrote His Safas to the Haggadah. On different pieces of the Haggadah, he wrote the Safas, and a small kuntres came out of a few pages, and the title was His Safa Haggadah Shel Pesach. And there you had different three pages of His Safas. תכ"ג, which was the Shnas Hakan of the Alter Rebbe, a hundred and fifty years from the Hisdalkus of the Alter Rebbe, so the Rebbe wrote more His Safas. And this time it was basically His Safas on different pieces of the Haggadah that has a connection to the Alter Rebbe. And all these years, the Haggadah was called Haggadah Shel Pesach Im Likutei Minhogin Ve-Timim. And eventually, all these His Safas were printed together. That means that the next His Safa that they gave out, they gave out the Haggadah as it was printed originally, but printed in the back were

01:21 the first His Safas, and then after that, the other His Safas. In the end of the Chofes, some of the Bochum came with an idea. Since by then there were a lot of mugiedike sichas from the Rebbe which have a shachas to the Haggadah, so they decided, let's connect- collect all these sichas and make a kuntres of these different sichas that have a shachas to the Haggadah. So they Poshut copied and paste b'gashmiyas, made copies of the different sichas, pasted it in such a way with a hemshich with the Seder of the Haggadah, and gave out a kuntres. Came to תשל"ג, this is 1973, the members of the Vaad La'ofot Hasichas came with an idea. Maybe now that since there are many, many more sichas of the Rebbe muger which have a shachas to the Haggadah, sichas on Parshas Shemos, Va'eira, Bo, bechol many sichas that have a shachas to the Inyanim of the Haggadah and Yetzias Mitzrayim, maybe we should print a new Haggadah. And this time it will be a sefer, a bound sefer. In front will be the Rebbe's Pirosh on the Haggadah, and in the back will be His Safas of all the sichas that have a shachas to the Haggadah, al pi Seder of the Haggadah, and also all the mich- Michtovim K'lolim that the Rebbe wrote throughout those years till תשל"ג. On Pesach, for Pesach, would be also printed in the back of the Haggadah. So we wrote into the Rebbe a shailah whether we could do it, and

02:41 there were the few questions there. Number one, should we do it? Does the Rebbe maskim that we should do it? Put the, uh, sichas and the letters in the back and make it together with the Haggadah. Number two, what we wanted to do was take all the His Safas that the Rebbe wrote both times, that there are different pieces of the Haggadah. Instead of staying as a His Safa, we should put it all in its place, each piece to put it inserted in the place where it belongs. And another thing what we wanted to do is that the Rebbe's Pirosh should not be on a separate page. Normally, when you have a text and you have a Pirosh on the text, so the Pirosh is on the bottom of the page. On top you have the text, and on the bottom you have the Pirosh. We wanted to do the same thing here also. Take the text of the Haggadah and put it on top, and then proportion make the pi- Pirosh of the Rebbe on the bottom. So we all asked the Rebbe these shailas. Also, we would have changed the name. Till then it was called the Haggadah Shel Pesach Im Likutei Minhogin Ve-Timim. This time it would be called Likutei Im Likutei Minhogin Ve-Timim Uvyurim. So we asked the Rebbe all these shailas. So on the general idea, the Rebbe answered, "Penoch im bim'eid." It's a very good idea. And then he wrote, "But somebody should be magiya to check it over

03:50 very good." And the Rebbe was maskim that we should insert the His Safas into its proper place, each piece into its proper place. The Rebbe also agreed that we should put the Pirosh on the bottom of the page, and on top should be the text of the Haggadah. When we started working on it, so they started making, taking the text of the Haggadah. It wasn't gonna be re-typeset. It was also gonna take the same print, but just cut it and paste it and have parts of it on top, and then the Rebbe's Pirosh also cut and paste and put on the bottom. It should be in proportion that the Pirosh should be on those Inyanim which are on top of the page. But it turned out that the Rebbe's Pirosh, the way it's printed, the page is wider than the page of the text of the Haggadah. So if we would put the text of the Haggadah on top and the Rebbe's Pirosh on the bottom the way it was printed, just cut and paste, the Pirosh would stick out on the sides wider than the text of the Haggadah on top. So we didn't know what to do. It looked a little bit funny. So we had a whole discussion, and an idea came up that we should make a frame on top, that around the text of the Haggadah, there should be a little bit further a frame, and that will even out the page, that the top will be even to the

05:04 bottom, to the Pirosh of the, the width of the Rebbe's Pirosh, the way it's printed. So we made a sample of one page, gave it in to the Rebbe. Asked the Rebbe if the Rebbe's maskim it should look like this, because some said it's not nice. This looks like a, a book for children with a design on top. And some said, "No, it looks nice." And the Rebbe agreed that it's nice. And that's how it was printed. So the sefer came out for that Kiddush, for that Pesach, and it was a pretty thick sefer, a bound sefer, and that's how it was. It was called Haggadah Shel Pesach Im Likutei Minhogin Ve-Timim Uvyurim. The Rebbe's Haggadah was in the front, and then after that, and with the, the Haggadah was in the front with the, the Haggadah, the Pirosh on the bottom and the Haggadah on top and with all the things inserted in the right place. And at the back, there were a whole lot of sichas that have a shach- mugiedike sichas that have a shachas to Inyanim of the Haggadah. Then you had the Rebbe's letters, Michtovim K'lolim, up to that year that were printed in the sefer. The sefer came out before Pesach, and the sefer, thousands of copies were printed already, and one copy obviously was given into the Rebbe. And when the Rebbe looked at it, he saw at the back the last words of the whole sefer, which is a ha'arah on the last letter, michtev koli. So

06:17 the last words were-- last ha'arah was concerning why we don't say Shehecheyanu by a bris, and it says, "Mishem tzoreh dyenuke," because of the zwar of the baby. So the last words are, "Tzoreh dyenuke." So when the Rebbe said-- saw it, the Rebbe wrote that you should make a chesem shel gumi, make a rubber stamp, and r- the rubber stamp should say, "Leshono haba b'Yerushalayim," and take every sefer, and after the end, stamp the words, "Leshono haba b'Yerushalayim." Therefore, anybody who has that chitzor from Tov Shin Lamed Gimel, looks at the back, will see that it says, "Stamp afterward Leshono haba b'Yerushalayim." And you have to sit and stamp every sefer, even though there are thousands of seforim printed already. And the reason is because it has to be mesaymim betev. You have to finish off only with good. You can't finish off with something that's negative. And the Rebbe was very, very much makpid on that. I remember once in one of the shailas we asked the Rebbe on the fabrengen, and the last words of the shaila, of the page, finished-- of the whole few pages that we wrote, finished off with something negative. The Rebbe with his Ktav Yad Kodesh wrote in big words, "Umesaymim betev." I saw also a photostat that peo- many people saw it, that when the Rebbe saw the sefer Beis Yisroel from the Ger Rebbe, one of the kruchim, one of the volumes, and at the end, the last words finishes off with something that's not so

07:33 good. So the Rebbe wrote with his handwriting on the sefer, "Umesaymim betev." So the Rebbe was very much makpid. So the Rebbe said that we should print, make a stamp, and stamp in every sefer, "Leshono haba b'Yerushalayim." And that's when the Haggadah came out as already as a volume, as a bo- as a bound volume. Years later, when there were many more sichas already mugit from the Rebbe by, um, anyonin which are related to the Haggadah. So the next he saw, these sichas were put in also, so the volume became bigger. Then years later, the volume became bigger because more sichas were put in, until finally, the last they saw it, it had to be divided into two volumes. And there was a different Seder since it was divided in different two volumes. There was a different Seder already. So now the way it is, is in two volumes. But it all started with the Rebbe's first Haggadah, Tov Shin Vav, and then it w- developed into later on, Tov Shin Lamed Gimel, with the first bound, and then the other chitzors later till now. It's mamesh, it's such a gevalt a big sefer that it had to be turned into two volumes.