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Wednesday, March 28, 2007

Pasech

(inspired by a visitor who came to this blog, googling for "Pasech 2007", and another one, googling for "pasech things")

In a couple of days, Ashkenazim who insist on adopting the Israeli street pronunciation will celebrate the Chag ha-Pasech, which is also known as the Passover holiday after Shmelke Passover, rebbe of the Passau chasidim, who innovated this in 1954 and was later known as Samwil al-Basaawi, only to get a lot of trouble with that name after he made aliya.

The most prominent feature of the holiday is to get rid of kometz, none of which may be found in the house of a Passever chosid. Ah, what joy fills the family's hearts when, aided by a candle and a quill, the books are searched for this evil remnant of the ghetto Jew, a ceremony known as bedikas kometz.

The rishounem, scholars between 1956 and roughly 1957, debated whether a kometz koton falls under the prohibition, too, as there exists an isser mashu. Today, the consensus is to apply the criterion "a dag wouldn't eat it".