Chametz

By: Camille Hasson

Ever wonder why we clean our closets or our bathroom drawers for Pessach? I highly doubt any of us ate breakfast in there or a delicious slice of pizza (unless u have a walk In and u hide your chocolates from your kids and eat them there), but even then it doesn’t need a good cleaning from Chametz. So why do we feel the need to clean the whole house and not just the kitchen?

Chametz has two meanings to it, the first being physical aspect which is leavening agents which are forbidden to eat on Pessach. The second is spiritual aspect which is the Yetzer Hara (evil inclinations )

When we were set free from Egypt we didn’t have time to let the bread rise and therefore we eat Matza to remind us of the food we ate and the rush we were in. But if you think of it… It was a new beginning for everyone as we were all slaves and that means that every Jew had to rediscover himself and find out who he really was. It is for that reason that he had to throw out his own spiritual Chametz in order to start fresh. To start his new life as a person and not as a slave.

Rabbi Frand tells a story about Rabbi Twersky. While he was sitting at the dentist office, waiting for his turn, he picked up a magazine and on the cover it said “how do lobsters grow”? Rabbi Twersky read the article. It said that when a lobster feels that his shell is too small he sheds it and grows a new one. Rabbi Twersky let the meaning sink in and came up with a beautiful thought. He said a lobster only knows to shed his shell when it feels too tight and only then he knows it’s time for a new one. But once the shell is gone, the lobster is at his most vulnerable state with nothing to protect him. And so he hides until the new shell grows. The same can be said about life… We grow as people when things get tough or when we are in a constant state of stress. Our brain tells us that it’s time to readjust. We have to shed our old shell and grow in a new one.

Throwing our Chametz out is essentially the same thing. HaShem was telling our ancestors to let go of past hardships – both physical and spiritual – shed that shell and once you’ve become that new person, the one you know you’re capable of being, then you start to grow a new shell.

On Pessach we work tirelessly to make sure every corner of our house is free of Chametz but it also gives us the opportunity to get rid of things that are old and no longer of use. That is a huge step in growing process. Just as the lobster sheds his shell when it gets too tight, we too need to take advantage of Pessach cleaning as a way to let go of things that are weighing us down. We take the week of Pessach and eat only Matza as it represents the bare necessities of life and we reflect on who we are and how we can improve. When the week is over, we are ready to start growing our new shell, one that will fit us both physically and spiritually.