What is too far away for PESACH?


Numbers 9
6 There were certain men, who were defiled by the dead body of a man, that they could not keep the Passover on that day: and they came before Moses and before Aaron on that day:
7 And those men said unto him, We are defiled by the dead body of a man: wherefore are we kept back, that we may not offer an offering of the LORD in his appointed season among the children of Israel?
8 And Moses said unto them, Stand still, and I will hear what the LORD will command concerning you.
9 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,
10 Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, If any man of you or of your posterity shall be unclean by reason of a dead body, or be in a journey afar off, yet he shall keep the passover unto the LORD.
11 The fourteenth day of the second month at even they shall keep it, and eat it with unleavened bread and bitter herbs.


When this group of men came to Moses with the problem of TAMEI LENEFESH, ritual impurity by coming into contact with a dead body, Moses understood that they had performed the MITSVAH SHEL CHESED. The MITSVAH of Love is so called when any Jew performs a necessary act for the dead such as caring for the body or burying it. It is called the MITSVAH of Love because it is done without any ulterior motive. When we do a MITSVAH for a person, an unbidden thought may enter our mind that in some future time, the recipient of the MITSVAH will do a MITSVAH for us in return. When we do a MITSVAH for the dead, we understand that the MITSVAH will never be repaid. It is a MITSVAH LESHMA, a good deed done only for the sake of doing it. Therefore Moses understood the feeling of injustice these men felt when the TORAH told them that their impurity prevented them from sitting down with the rest of Israel to celebrate the SEDER.

Moses went to inquire of God, asking why these men should suffer exclusion from PESACH when they had done the MITSVAH of Love. God considered and saw the justice of the complaint. He told Moses that if a Jew is TAMEI LENEFESH, contaminated by a corpse, or if he/she is DERECH RECHOKAH, off on a journey, too far away to get back to a Jewish community in time for Passover, that he/she should celebrate the Passover on the night of the full moon on the following month, IYAR. During the time of the Temple, that's what all Jews in the community who were ineligible to celebrate PESACH RISHON [primary Passover] did. They celebrated what has become known as PESACH SHENI [secondary Passover].

At first glance, this seems to satisfy the problem that Moses presented to God but it really raises an additional question or problem. Moses simply asked God about TAMEI LENEFESH. Why did God raise the issue of DERECH RECHOKAH? Let's think about that.

I can understand TAMEI LENEFESH. It's really not your fault. You are in a room and suddenly someone in the room dies and you are TAMEI. But DERECH RECHOKAH? You are too far away? Doing what? On business? On vacation?  Wait a minute. That Jew has the same LUACH [calendar] that I have. He can look in it and know when Passover is coming and he can plan NOT to go traveling so that he WON'T be too far away from a Jewish community to get back in time for the SEDER. If he plans a trip which coincides with Passover, thereby showing a disregard not only for the holiday but for the Jewish community as well, why reward him with a second chance at celebrating the holiday?

The world does not work that way. In most situations, if we are late, we have to bear the consequences. If I make a reservation to fly to Israel and my flight leaves at 5pm, and I get to the EL AL desk at 6pm, and I tell the EL AL clerk that I was too far away and can he put me on the next flight, what will he say? He will say, No, your flight was scheduled for 5pm and EL AL is not responsible for your carelessness.

And besides, we don't get a second chance to do any other holiday, not SHAVUOT, not SUKKOT, not ROSH HASHANNAH, and not even YOM KIPPUR which you'd think a Jew might expect to engage in along with the community. So why PESACH? Why is this holiday different from all other holidays that we celebrate?

The TORAH doesn't tell us why but we might speculate. If we had to choose a holiday that would be symbolic of and represent the entire religion of Israel, what would it be? The natural choice is PESACH. PESACH is the birthday of the Jewish People. Without PESACH, there is no Jewish People. Without PESACH, there is no other holiday.
It's from PESACH that we count the days to SHAVUOT. The entire Jewish calendar hangs on when PESACH falls. PESACH falls on the night of the full moon of the month of NISAN which God told Moses was to be the first month of the Jewish year. Although ROSH HASHANNAH falls in TISHREI, the OTHER beginning of the fiscal year, NISAN is our spiritual and ethnic new year. NISAN is the specific new year for Jews while TISHREI is the new year for the world at large. ROSH HASHANNAH falls on the night of the new moon, that is, when the moon is invisible, and Passover falls on the night when the moon is at full strength. The moon is the symbol of Israel. And Passover falls in the month governed by Aries. Aries is the symbol of Egypt at its greatest strength. It represents the PANTHEON of Egypt. On the night of Passover, God and Israel unite to form an invincible power over and against the spiritual power of Egypt. Passover is the most important festival in the life of a Jew. It the festival, not only of MATSAH and MARROR, but of blood shed by the enemies of Israel so that Israel might find new life. It cannot simply be bypassed.

Once I asked a rabbi what he thought the SEDER was. He told me that the SEDER is a Divine Drama. I thought about the significance of the word "drama" in its simplest  
meaning, in its Shakespearean meaning. Simply put, a drama is a play. And the SEDER certainly has all the characteristics of a play. It has a script [the HAGGADAH]; it
has characters [the wise son, the bad son]; it has props [MATSAH, MARROR, KARPAS]; and it has distinct acts [the MAGID and the meal and the after-meal]. It just needs actors.

But the SEDER, as we know it, is not the PERFORMANCE of the play. It is only the REHEARSAL. At the end of the SEDER, the script reads, KA-ASHER ZECHINU LESADER OTO,
Just as we have merited to REHEARSE this play this year, KEN NIZKER LA-ASOTO, so may we merit performing it next year. And the only proper place to perform it is in Jerusalem, with a rebuilt Temple. And who knows whether the King will tell us that we have been rehearsing long enough and now He wishes a command performance of the real thing? And if that is so, all we actors must be sure to know our lines, and if some of the actors are out of town on rehearsal night, we will just have to provide them another night to rehearse.

The TALMUD asks, "What is the meaning of the expression DERECH RECHOKAH?" What does it mean that a Jew is too far away? The following example is given. A Jew is standing outside the door of the Temple, or of a synagogue. He puts his hand on the door knob to open the door and go in. But then he changes his mind. He turns around
and walks away. That Jew is DERECH RECHOKAH. He is too far away from his People! If you ask him, Why didn't you simply open the door and go in?, he says, I cannot. I am TAMEI LENEFESH, I am defiled by a dead body. If you ask him, Who died?, he replies, I did! It's then that he has to be made to understand that a Jew can never be dead to his People no matter how far he has strayed. And he can never be too far away. PESACH is just the holiday to remind him of this. There are so many Jews who never do a Jewish thing during their year. But on PESACH, they insist on coming together with other Jews to celebrate Passover. They insist on eating MATSAH.

There is another MITSVAH SHEL CHESED, a deed of Love that we can perform. That is, if we know of a Jew who has nowhere to go on the night of the full moon of NISAN, we can make sure that he or she has a place to go, and we can let every Jew know that this night and this holiday are different from all other nights and holidays.

AMEN


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