The Effect of Chametz
Shabbat Chol Hamo’ed Pesach
The halacha dictates that even the smallest amount of chametz, even something far smaller than a k’zayit, will forbid an entire mixture that it is mixed into. Why is it only regarding chametz on Pesach that we encounter such stringency, and not regarding any of the other foods forbidden by the Torah, such as non-kosher meat, or meat and milk, which are annulled when they account for less than a sixtieth of a mixture?
Birth of a Nation
The Maharal (Gevurot Hashem 39) writes that yetziat mitzrayim was like the birth of the Jewish nation. Before the exodus, we were not one nation, and additionally, since in Egypt the Jewish people descended to the 49th level of impurity, and were unworthy of being allowed to exist, they would need to be ‘reborn’ in order to purify themselves. Furthermore, all the seminal events that transpired afterwards through which they developed as a nation, such as matan Torah, the forty years of wandering in the desert, and entering Eretz Yisrael, could only occur after they left Egypt. Obviously then, Pesach is the festival on which we celebrate our birth as a people.
The Severity of Chametz
Now let’s return to the subject of chametz. Our Sages teach us that chametz represents the evil inclination (yetzer hara), specifically the negative character trait of arrogance, whose origins is the swelling of pride and self-inflation, much the same as chametz is the leavening and rising that takes place within bread. The matzah represents the opposite – it is lechem oni, the bread of affliction, or lowliness, which can be seen as a parallel to humility. The Arizal goes further with this connection to the yezer hara, stating that one who is careful with chametz on Pesach will have special help in not sinning during the rest of the year.
If Pesach represents the day of our birth, we must view the state of the nation during these days as a newborn baby. In a smuch as a newborn is extremely sensitive to various foods, germs etc, more than an adult or even a more developed child, so too the Jewish people are extra sensitive on Pesach to the influences of the yetzer hara. Although we may not feel any different on Pesach, on a deeply spiritual level we must be extra careful to the influences that chametz has on our spiritual development during the rest of the year.
For this reason, we do not even eat the smallest amount of chametz, even when mixed into something else. In fact, whilst we are only commanded to eat matzah on the first day of Pesach, and on the subsequent days we do not have a specific commandment to do so, chametz is nonetheless in its severity the entire Yom Tov. This indicates the extent to which Pesach, the birth of our nation, is tied to the sin of eating chametz.
May Hashem help us to eradicate the yetzer hara from within us, including the elements of arrogance which lie at the root of many of the sins we may fall into, and may we be assured of the promise of the Arizal that we will not sin the entire year!
שבת חוה"מ שלום וחג שמח!
Rabbi Gad Bouskila
