Your Pesach List:
- Shabbos Hagadol is this week
- Sell your chametz
- Let us gift you shumrah matzah - reply to this email
- Last chance to RSVP for the seder! Please do so now at www.chabaduptown.org/seder
- Check for chametz Thursday night - read for the why
- Firstborns: Hear a siyum or you gotta fast on Friday, March 30 - see schedule below
- Check out the complete Pesach schedule online
On Sunday, CTeen made Challah with seniors and sang songs while Helena Barker played on the piano. A labor of love - for loaves of love! - PICS
Tuesday is Education & Sharing Day: Education tends to be geared towards financial success and prosperity. In times like these, it has become increasingly clear that our youth need to be educated towards morals, ethics and conscience. Let's use this moment to reflect on these ideas on Education and Sharing Day.
Marking forty years of observance and coinciding with forty years of Torah Day School of Houston, Mayor Sylvester Turner, joined cities throughout the USA and beyond declaring March 27, 2018 as Education and Sharing Day for Houston, Texas on the anniversary of the Lubavitcher Rebbe's birth. The Mayor's proclamation calls on Houstonians to use this "opportunity to pause and recognize our responsibility to ensure that our young people have the foundation necessary to lead lives rich in purpose and fulfillment".
- For the first observance in 1978, Vice President Walter Mondale & Senator Ted Kennedy were among the many US leadership. Rabbi Shimon Lazaroff attended the event in Washington D.C. as well.
- For the school year of 1977-78, the Nelkin family were the founding students of Torah Day School.
The Tools for Bedikas Chametz: In pursuit of a better self and a better world
On the night before Pesach, on the eve of 14 Nissan, we check our homes for chametz. We check for chametz not only physically, but, spiritually as well. Many stories are told of great tzaddikim who would spend many hours checking for chametz in their small and humble homes.
How does one go about checking for chametz internally?
The difference between the Hebrew letters of Chametz חמץ and Matzah מצה is only a drop of ink that attaches and changes the Ches of Chametz to the Hey of Matzah, representing a humble Yud 1. Yud is the gematria, the numerical value, of ten. According to the Arizal 2, ten pieces of Chametz are placed throughout the home as we search and find the ten physical pieces that will go up in flames the next day. Spiritually, we examine and search through the ten levels of the spiritual DNA of our existence, the ten levels, sefiros, of the neshama 3.
How does one achieve this introspective humility, transforming from the inflated Chametz, to the humble Matzah?
Perhaps we can find the answer in the very tools traditionally used to search and burn with the chametz, the feather, wooden spoon 4 and beeswax candle 5.
Through these seemingly crude tools, we are actually joining together all strata of modern existence, as taught in Kabbala and Chassidus 6: Domem, Tzomeiach, Chai & Medaber. Loosely translated as the mineral, organic, animal and human kingdoms. As we walk the halls and rooms of the home, we are the human (Medaber), using the feather from a bird (Chai), wooden spoon from a tree (Tzomeiach) and a candle of beeswax (Domem).
This year, let’s be sure to search everywhere that we may have experienced chametz, examining the ten levels of our soul as in interacts with the four kingdoms of existence. May we succeed to work together to perfect ourselves, our community and the entire world.
Shabbos Hagadol, Parshas Tzav
Friday, March 23
Candle Lighting & Mincha at 7:17 pm
Services at 7:30 pm | RSVP for Shabbat Dinner
Shabbos, March 24
Chassidus at 9:00 am
Services at 10 am
Followed by Shabbos Kiddush & Farengen
Mincha at 7:15 pm
Customary First Portion Haggadah Review
Maariv, Havdalla & Shabbos Ends at 8:11 pm
Living Torah
Sunday, March 25 - Shacharis at 8:30 am, Followed by the real BLT = Bagels, Lox & Tefillin
Monday, March 26 - Shacharis at 6:45 am
Thursday, March 29 - Shacharis at 6:45 am
Friday, March 30 - Shacharis at 6:45 am - Siyum for Fast of Firstborns
Have a good Shabbos!
Rabbi Chaim & Chanie
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- Chukas HaPesach Hakatzar, 8.
- Pri Etz Chaim, Shaar 21, Perek 5. Note the language used in Gemara Pesachim 10a, “placed ten and found nine”.
- Processed through the intelligence: Chochma, Bina and Da’as (Chab”ad). Followed by the emotions: Chessed, Gevurah and Tiferes (Chag”as). Applied through the expressions of Netzach, Hod, Yesod and Malchus (Nehi”m). For more on this subject, see at length in Tanya Likkutei Amarim.
- Hagaddah Shel Pesach Im Likkutei Ta’amim, Minhagim Ubiurim.
- Shulchan Aruch 433:2.
- Tanya Likkutei Amarim 38, elaborated in Iggeret Hakodesh Epistle 20.