The build-up to the Passover seders is tremendous. The cleaning. The purchases. The changeover. The strategizing in the kitchen. The matzah. The maror. The cooking. Finally, the seder. The family time. The four questions. The four sons. The kids. The friends. The afikomen hunt. The seder is such a big and beautiful deal!
Is the rest of Passover anti-climactic?
An answer might be found in a paradoxical and little known chapter in Jewish law: It is not a mitzvah, not commanded, to eat matzah on Passover, except for seder night.
Think back to the seder.
The blessing over the matzah was actually two blessings: one over the bread (ha-motzi; remember, matzah is bread, its just unleavened), and one over the eating of matzah. That second blessing acknowledges that it is a separate mitzvah to eat matzah and that blessing is made only at the seder.
Throughout the rest of Passover, there is no mitzvah to eat matzah. Yes, on the Shabbos of Passover, and on the last day(s) of Pass-over, the meals then are mitzvah meals, at which bread is eaten. We must eat matzah then. But thats only because every meal on Shabbos and yomtov (Jewish festivals) requires bread.
Not because of any special mitzvah to eat matzah.
What, then is the primary mitzvah of Passover?
Its not to eat leaven, not to eat chametz.
The primary marker of Passover is negative, not positive.
Its not to eat leaven.
This means that the entire holiday seven days in Israel, eight days in the Diaspora is a unified whole.
The entire holiday removes us from the routine of the rest of the year. Even Shabbos, even Sukkos and Shavuos, even Rosh Hashanah, are routine in comparison to Passover. On all those special days, not to mention on all the weekdays of the year, we may eat leaven.
Not so, Passover.
Judaism measures holiness negatively by what we refrain from doing. Holiness, kedushah, means separation. Separation from thievery, separation from adultery, separation from leaven, all create and convey a higher level of existence. In this sense, Passover is the holiest holiday because the separation is from a routine consumption of leaven that stretches over a whole week.
In this sense, Passover is hardly anti-climactic.
Yes, the seder is a climax.
Yes, the beginning of Passover is a tremendously special moment.
But think: all that changeover, all that strategizing in the kitchen, all that putting away of the leaven, is not for the seder alone. It is for the entire week of Passover.
The negative commandment, not to eat leaven, creates a period of separation and elevation that unifies the entire holiday of Passover.
No anti-climax here.
When Passover is over, I always feel a huge sense of loss. A different sphere of existence is coming to a close. A sense of looking in on this world, as if from a separate, higher place, is coming to a close. With others in the family, I lovingly put away the Passover items, wishing we could hold on to them just a few moments more.
What? An entire year? Yes, an entire year must pass before we have Passover again.
I always marvel: So long to prepare for Passover, and so short to put everything away. Such a big build-up. Such a quick shut-down. Its tough to let go.
That sense of loss testifies to an entire holiday, not just to the seder, exalted as it is.
Happy Passover.
All of it.
Enjoy!
Copyright © 2011 by the Intermountain Jewish News
