36 April 18 • 2019
jn

Tradition varies about Pesach rules. 

Strict 
or Not 
Strict?

A 

dialogue overheard in more 
than one Jewish household 
goes like this: 
Husband: “I can’
t find my pen (or 
reading glasses or whatever). Have 
you seen it?”
Wife: “Don’
t worry, it will show 
up before Passover.” 
“It will show up before Passover,” 
of course, because the family will 
clean every inch of the house before 
the holiday, making sure the home 
contains not a crumb of leavened 
food (chametz) and, incidentally 
finding lost objects. The Mishnah, 
1,800 years ago, insists on searching 
every place where leavened food 
was brought (Pesahim 1:1); in 
practice, many Jewish householders 
go further, scrubbing even places 
where they anticipate finding no 
leavened food.
Rebecca Sorani of Rishon Letzion 
in Israel, writes, in a statement 
familiar to many other observant 
Jews: “I am sure most of what I 
do is unnecessary! Throwing out 
expired medications, washing 
every item of bedding in the 
house, cleaning out every drawer 
in bedrooms where we never bring 
food … washing the windows …” 
A local woman agreed with 
Sorani that her housecleaning 
during the month before Passover 
was unnecessary, according to 
Jewish law, but she added, “Without 
the motivation of Passover, I 
would never get around to spring 
cleaning.” 
Yehudis Brea of Oak Park 
sticks with the necessary Passover 
preparations. “I’
m at the stage of 

life that I only do what is absolutely 
necessary, thank God. The Pesach 
hysteria has long passed,” she says.
In other aspects of preparing for 
Passover, rabbis looking at books 
of Jewish law and ordinary Jews 
looking at what their grandparents 
did, have, over the years, decided to 
become more and more stringent. 
Perhaps this tendency originates 
with a statement attributed to Rabbi 
Yitzhak Luria, the 15th-century 
kabbalist: “One should follow all 
the strictures on Passover.”
A notable break from this 
tendency comes from none other 
than the Sephardi Chief Rabbi of 
Israel, Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef. 
As part of its routine duties, the 
Chief Rabbinate in Israel issues 
guidelines for how certified kosher 
kitchens in hotels should maintain 
standards over Passover. 
On March 26, journalist Hezki 
Stern, writing for Kikkar Shabbat, 
reported that Rabbi Yosef pulled 
this year’
s booklet of guidelines. He 
instructed Moshe Dagan, executive 
director of the rabbinate: “Do not 
print it. Let us consider this for a 
couple of more days and correct it.”
Rabbi Yosef observed that the 
authors of the guidelines “seek to 
follow the principle the stricter 
the better” and “introduced many, 
many strictures.”
“I do not know who did 
this, to be so strict with the 
people of Israel; things that are 
completely permitted, permitted 
by all opinions, they have been 
forbidden,” he says. ■

passover

LOUIS FINKELMAN CONTRIBUTING WRITER

MUSIC BY SARA BAREILLES
“LOVE SONG,” “BRAVE”


BroadwayInDetroit.com, ticketmaster.com, 800-982-2787 & box office 313-872-1000 
 
 7:30PM May 12

THE HIT BROADWAY MUSICAL BAKED FROM THE HEART

Happy Passover!

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P a t i o & C a s u a l F u r n i t u r e

7350 Highland Road (M-59)aterford 
www.PalmBeachPatio.com
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