[Avodah] Chametz and Matzah

[Akiva Miller via Avodah]

Pesachim 35a tells us that “things which can come to chimutz, a person can
fulfill his chiyuv of matza with them; this excludes those which come not
to chimutz, but to sirchon.”

This thread is not about the details of that rule, but its source. The
gemara there bases it on Devarim 16:3:

> Lo sochal alav chametz
> Shiv'as yamim tochal matzos

> Do not eat chametz with it
> For seven days you will eat matzos

Unfortunately, I don't see any logical connection between the two phrases.
After all, if the pasuk had said, "Do not eat carrots; you must eat beef,"
would that lead us to conclude that carrots and beef have similar
definitions? However, the truth is that the phrases don't *need* to save
any logical connection. If Torah Sheb'al Peh says that this is how Torah
Sheb'ksav chose to connect the definitions of chametz and matzah, it's just
one of many similar cases. (I don't know whether this particular limud is
called a "hekesh" or something else, but I hope my point is clear.)

So I am not saying that the gemara was wrong for deriving these definitions
from that pasuk. What I *AM* asking is why the gemara points to that pasuk,
when there is a different pasuk it could have used instead. In my view,
there is another pasuk that makes the very same point, but much more
clearly, in a very pshat way. Why should we resort to a lomdishe
juxtaposition of phrases, when the Torah explicitly defines the words for
us? The pasuk I'm referring to is Shmos 12:39:

> Vayofu es habatzek asher hotziu mimitzrayim ugos matzos
> Ki lo chametz
> Ki gorshu mimitzrayim v'lo yachlu l'hismameah

> They baked the dough that they took out of Egypt into loaves of matza
> Because it did not become chametz
> Because they were expelled from Egypt and couldn't delay

Isn't the definition clear? "It became matza because it did not become
chometz." Matzah is what you get when you take something that *could*
become chometz, but you bake it before it gets to that point.

How much clearer can it be, presuming that the Author wants a historical
narrative, and not a legal text? If the word "ki - because" was missing, my
argument would be much weaker, but it is *not* missing, and it is the
cornerstone of my argument: It became matza *because* it did not become
chametz. Chametz and matza are one and the same, differing only in that one
is baked prior to chimutz (which prevents chimutz from happening), and the
other does undergo chimutz. If dough does reach chimutz, getting baked
later is irrelevant. Baking is relevant only to preventing chimutz, which
is what creates matza: "They baked it into matza, because it did not become
chametz."

But I can't find anyone who explicitly connects Shemos 12:39 to the
definitions of chametz and matza. Even if there is some weakness to this
pasuk, and Devarim 16:3 is truly stronger, I would think that this would be
mentioned in the gemara. Pesachim 35a should have said something like, "And
R' Ploni retorted, Why do you cite Devarim, when we already have Shemos?
But R' Almoni answers that Shemos is actually weaker because of..." Does
anyone know of anything like this?

Akiva Miller
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