WHEN PESACH STARTS ON A SATURDAY NIGHT

SOME SPECIAL NOTES CONCERNING A PASSOVER THAT BEGINS ON SATURDAY NIGHT.

There are all manner of rules that come into play this year (and, by the way, again in 2005!) when Passover begins on a Saturday night. Here are things you need to know:

The search for Chametz (Bedikat Chametz) is done on Thursday night with all the appropriate blessing and formula for nullification.

Burning Chametz (Biur Chametz) takes place on Friday morning, but the nullification is NOT recited.

Final nullification (Bitul) takes place on Shabbat morning. That is to say, we recite the final Bitul on Shabbat.

The sale of Chametz (Mechirat Chametz) should take place no later than the 13th of Nisan (Friday, April 6th). Chametz to be eaten on Shabbat is not included in the sale.

The main problem that people will encounter will be how to make motzi on Shabbat. After all, our homes will already be kosher for Passover and the food we eat on that Shabbat will have been cooked in Passover pots. So how do we do motzi? What do we use?

The first option is to use challah or challah rolls. We suggest the following: Keep the bread in plastic. Use plastic utensils and disposable plates, etc, for the Shabbat meal. Cover the table with a disposable tablecloth and put the challah on a plate on that tablecloth. Make Kiddush and motzi as you regularly would. At the end of the meal, throw away all the disposables and put the challah back in the bag. Do the same thing on Shabbat day and after the meal flush the crumbs down the toilet or dispose of them in the garbage or allow a Gentile to come to your home and take the leftovers.

There is a further problem with this solution. We cannot eat chametz after a certain hour on erev Pesah. How, then, do we eat challah for the Shabbat main meal? The only way is to daven early (on the East coast that will mean about 7:30am) so that we can eat the challah early enough in the day.

Many people are unhappy with this solution. Rabbinic texts (Shulchan Aruch, Rabbi Moses Isserles’s commentary, and Igrot Moshe to name a few) speak about another possibility.

We are not allowed to eat matzah from Purim to Passover. But that only refers to matzah shel mitzvah (i.e., the matza we will use at our seder). Matzah ashira (egg matzah) is not included in this category. Matzah ashira is matzah made with fruit juice and eggs.

According to Rabbi Moshe Feinstein (Igrot Moshe, Orach Chaim, Siman 155) we can eat egg matzah on the Shabbat preceding Passover and that will suffice for motzi! Igrot Moshe, OC, 3:32, notes that egg matzah is measured in terms of the quantity that is generally eaten during the course of a full meal.

That is to say, we must eat as much egg matzah as we would eat bread at any other Shabbat meal.

The Kosher Nexus realizes that many people, quite frankly, would much rather not have to worry about breadcrumbs messing up the kashruth of an otherwise scrupulously KP home. Therefore, we suggest that those people use the egg matzah for the Shabbat preceding Passover, but NOT TO USE IT AGAIN THROUGHOUT THE HOLIDAY.

Seudah Shlishit (the third Shabbat meal) can be fruit so that we don’t fill up too much prior to the seder.

Please note that no preparations for the Seder may take place on Shabbat.
Either finish your preparations before Shabbat, or do them after Shabbat and before the Seder.