The Shoemaker’s Children
‘If One Can Eat, One Can Sell’
(Pesachim 21a)
Before Pesach, we nullify our chametz and sell it to a gentile, generally using the rav of a shul as an agent. The rav stipulates with the purchasing gentile that the transfer of ownership will take place immediately before the prohibition against owning chametz begins on Erev Pesach.
When nullifying our chametz, we declare it to be ownerless and worthless like the dust of the ground. But if it’s worthless, why are we asking a rabbi to later sell this chametz on our behalf?
Why Both Procedures?
To answer this question, we must first answer another one: Why do we both nullify our chametz and destroy it? Why don’t we just do one or the other?
The answer is that nullification (bitul) alone is insufficient – for several reasons. First, if the nullified chametz remains in one’s house, one might forget later that it’s Pesach and accidentally eat it. Second, the nullification may have been ineffective since it depends upon an earnest resolution of the heart, and a person may be less than full-hearted when nullifying his chametz (Mishnah Berurah 431:2). Thus, the Sages required destroying chametz, not just nullifying it.
Where did the idea of selling chametz come from? The practice started in Europe where many Jews did business with beer or spirits, which are chametz (and the range of economic opportunities Jews could pursue at the time was very limited). Forcing a Jew to get rid of his entire stock of beer or spirits before Pesach would have been very costly to him, so the rabbis at the time permitted them to sell it to a gentile before Pesach and buy it back afterward (see Shaarei Teshuvah 448:3).
So they would sell the beer and afterward, on the 14th of Nissan, they would nullify the few crumbs of chametz that may have been overlooked during the bedikah.
In contemporary times, the opposite order is followed. We first nullify the chametz on the night of the 14th (and then again in the morning) and only afterwards do we sell our chametz. We therefore return to our original question: How can we claim our chametz is “worthless and ownerless” and then proceed to sell it?
This question was addressed by many prominent poskim and is found, among other places, in Sefer Mikra’ei Kodesh, p. 207. This sefer notes that although the sale comes after the nullification, the appointment of the rabbi to sell our chametz comes before it. At that point, our chametz is still valuable. Therefore, it’s appropriate to discuss terms of sale.
The Rabbi’s Chametz
This answer works very nicely for most of us. But what about the rabbi himself in relation to his own chametz? How can he sell chametz he already declared worthless? In fact, he perhaps can’t according to this answer, which is why some rabbis have the custom to nullify whatever remains of their chametz on the morning of the 14th after they have sold the chametz they know about (see Minchas Yitzchak VIII:41).