Pesachim 100 - 106
- When the weekday meal extends into Shabbat
- Covering the loaves and making kiddush
- The need to follow kiddush with a meal at the same place
- Whether changing the place of eating or drinking necessitates making a new blessing
- When two blessings can be made on the same cup of wine
- Text of havdalah when holiday follows Shabbat
- Order of blessings in regular havdalah
- Why we make a blessing on the wine used for birkat hamazon aside from the one we already made
- The candle used for havdalah
- The “son of saints” and how many “separations” are mentioned in havdalah
- The effect of Shabbat on the preceding meal and on ma’aser (tithing)
- Making up for kiddush and havdalah not made in time
- Eating and drinking before havdalah
- Rules regarding the cup of wine used for birkat hamazon
- Kiddush at night and in the day (the “great kiddush”)
- Kiddush on wine or bread
- If eating before havdalah rules out making it afterwards
All the Differences in the World
- Pesachim 104a
Havdalah, that special praise to G-d which a Jew says in his prayers and repeats over a cup of wine at the conclusion of Shabbat, is based on our Sages’ interpretation of the Torah command to “Remember Shabbat to sanctify it” as requiring us to declare the holiness of the day with kiddush at the beginning and havdalah at its end.
The essence of this praise is a declaration of the separation that G-d made between Shabbat and the weekdays, and we do this by listing three classical separations. First and most important is the “separation between the sacred and the secular” which is reiterated at the conclusion of the blessing as “between the seventh day and the six days of labor” and focuses on the difference between Shabbat and the weekdays. The other two separations mentioned are those “between light and darkness” and “between and the nations”.
There were Talmudic Sages who expanded the number of separations to seven. They added the separations “between pure and impure”, “between the waters above and the waters below” (at the time of Creation), “between the kohanim and the Levites” and “between the Levites and the Israelites”.
As regards the text of the conclusion, there was a minority opinion that it should praise G-d as “the Sanctifier of Israel”. This was rejected, however, in favor of “Who separates between the sacred and the secular” which is a reaffirmation of the separation mentioned at the outset as the essence of this declaration.
What the Sages Say
“The first three days of the week are considered as being after the Shabbat before them, while the last three are considered as being before the Shabbat following them. This allows one who did not make havdalah on Motzei Shabbat to still make it during the first three days following.”
- Rabbi Zeira
Pesachim 106a
