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Thursday

י"ח אדר ב’ התשפ"ד

Thursday
י"ח אדר ב’ התשפ"ד

חיפוש בארכיון

Mitzvah 385) To separate Challah

Parshas Shelach

“You shall separate the beginning of your doughs as Challah!” (Bamidbar 15:20)

It is a positive commandment to separate Challah from every dough and to give it to the priest, as it says “You shall separate the beginning of your doughs as Challah!”.

Amongst the roots of this commandment are that since the life of a person is dependent on his food, and most people live on bread, Hashem wanted to give us the merit of doing a constant good deed with the bread, so that blessing will rest on the bread because of the commandment which has been fulfilled through it, and through this we will get merit in our souls. Through this the dough will be food for the body and the soul. Another achievement is that the priests, who are the servants of Hashem, and occupy themselves constantly with His service, will be able to live from this donation without any effort. With regular Terumah of grain, they have to sieve it and grind it etc., whereas here it is ready to eat.

This commandment applies to both men and women, but biblically it only applies in the holy land, at a time when most of Klal Yisrael are there. Rabinically there is an obligation to separate Challah in the rest of the world, so that this law will not be forgotten. Since the law is only to stop it being forgotten, the custom is to be extremely lenient, in that even from an enormous dough one only separates a piece the size of an olive, which is then thrown into the fire, and not eaten at all.