[Avodah] Pesach mitzvos at night

[Michael Poppers]

In Avodah V37n31, RSS asked:
>  Most mitzvos are done by day.  Most Pesach mitzvos are done at night.
Are there any deeper reasons for this (beyond halacha and/or "the geula
started at night")?  <
On Mesorah recently, I mentioned:
[[  note what RNW quoted *b'sheim haGRA* here
<https://www.aish.com/tp/i/m/48936372.html> (stanza "THE ANOMALY OF THE
FEMALE FORCE") ]]
By and large, "layla" portends problems.  "[H]alayla hazeh" of *g'ulas
Mitzrayim* (as well as the "layla hahu" that began the turn towards *qiymu
v'qiblu*) was, by contrast, beneficial like *or*.  We begin the
mini-process of killer-Bs (*b'diqah*, *biyur*, and *bittul*) at night, but
it is "or l'14", a night that qualitatively is day.  *Yachol mib'od yom*?
Nope, has to be at the time of "zeh", the *layla hazeh* that is like *or*.

Quoting from "Parsha Potpourri" V14n29 by R'Ozer Alport:
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מה נשתנה הלילה הזה מכל הלילות (מגיד)
Near the beginning of the Maggid portion of the Haggadah, the youngest
child present asks the
Mah Nishtanah, a series of four questions that highlight atypical actions
we do at the Seder that differ
from our conduct on all other nights of the year. However, the Vilna Gaon
points out that the expression
מה נשתנה הלילה הזה מכל הלילות seems to be grammatically incorrect, for the
word לילה is feminine – as
evidenced by its plural form לילות – in which case the question should be
worded .מה נשתנה הלילה הזאת
The Vilna Gaon explains that the concept of night symbolizes difficulty and
suffering.
Accordingly, the word לילה should be feminine. However, in situations where
the darkness is actually
beneficial, it is transformed and becomes masculine. In this case, the
Zohar HaKadosh (Vol. 2 38a)
teaches that on the night of the Exodus from Egypt, a tremendous light
shone that was as bright as day,
and Dovid describes it as (Tehillim 139:12) לילה כיום יאיר – a night that
shines like the day, with the verb
יאיר in the masculine. On this night, it only appeared to be dark, but in
reality, it was a remarkably joyous
time that was analogous to day. We allude to this by referring to the Seder
night as הלילה הזה , a לילה that
is compared to יום (day), a word which is masculine.
However, the Torah Temimah vehemently disagrees with the Vilna Gaon’s
explanation, for he
maintains that the original question does not present any difficulty. He
writes that although the word לילה
appears to be feminine, it is an exception to the rules of grammar and is
in fact masculine, as we find in
the Megillah that when Achashverosh’s sleep was disturbed, it is described
(Esther 6:1) as בלילה ההוא
נדדה שנת המלך , not בלילה ההיא , which would be the feminine construct.
If so, why is לילות the plural of לילה , which seems to indicate that it is
feminine? The Torah
Temimah notes that there are other clearly masculine words that follow this
pattern and are similarly
exceptions in this regard, such as בכור (firstborn), which becomes בכורות
in the plural, making it appear to
be feminine even though it is in fact masculine, and so too is the case
with לילה and .לילות
To resolve the dispute between these two great Rabbinical authorities, Rav
Yisroel Reisman
suggests that the Vilna Gaon’s logic regarding the night of the Exodus also
applies to the night of
Achashverosh’s interrupted sleep, which was also a positive seminal moment
in the Megillah worthy of
being likened to the masculine יום . He adds that since Chazal teach us
(Berachos 60b) that everything that
Hashem does is ultimately for the good, every difficult episode in our
lives that presents itself as dark
לילה is actually a יום full of light waiting to be discovered and revealed.

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Gut Moeid/Mo'adim l'Simcha!
and all the best from
*Michael Poppers* * Elizabeth, NJ, USA
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