ואכלו את הבשר. לכך נהגו העם לעשות בליל פסח שלש מצות זכר לשלש סאין שאמר מהרי שלש סאים ופסח היה. ויש אומר זכר לשלשה אבות ובציעתה זכר לקריעת ים סוף וירדן שנבקע בפסח ונברך על הפרוסה אכילת מצה כדאי' בפסחים מה דרכו של עני בפרוסה ושני טיבולין על ב' טבילות שטבלו יליד בית ומקנת כסף. ד"א כנגד שתי הזאות אחת על המשקוף ואחת על המזוזות. ד"א כנגד דם ברית ודם פסח שנאמר מתבוססת בדמיך. ובערבי פסחים מוכח שהן להיכרא דתינוקות שהיו רגילין לאכול ירקות לאחר אכילה לקנוח. והשתא קא אכלי קודם סעודה. ישאלו מה נשתנה ועוד היכר אחריתי כי כשיראו בשאר ימים טובים שלא ישתו קודם רק כוס א' ועכשיו מוזגין כוס ב' אז ישאלו וכן מסיק התם וכאן הבן שואל. וחרוסת זכר לטיט ונותנין בו תפוחים זכר לתפוח כדכתיב לעיל תחת התפוח עוררתיך ומיני תבלין דומין לתבן זכר לתבן ואגוזים ושקדים שמלבנין החרוסת זכר לטיט שעושין מסיד שהוא לבן. וכן הביא בערבי פסחים תבלין זכר לתבן חרוסת זכר לטיט ב' תבשילין זכר למשה ואהרן. ד"א דג כנגד לויתן. ביצה כנגד זיז שדי. ובערבי פסחים מסיק אחד זכר לפסח וא' זכר לחגיגה. ד' כוסות כנגד ד' גאולות והוצאתי והצלתי וגאלתי ולקחתי וכוס חמישי דהיינו למאן דצריך למשתיה הוא כנגד והבאתי שגם הוא גאולה כדא' אינשי מאן דמליה שחרריה ומסר כל דידיה בידיה אי לא אייתיה לבי דריה מאי אהני ליה פי' עבד ששחררו רבו ומסר לו גביעו בידו אם לא הביאו לבית דירתו מה מועיל לו כל הטובה ה"נ אם לא הביא הקב"ה אותן לארץ ישראל מה היה מועיל להם היציאה של מצרים. ד"א ד' כוסות כנגד ד' ישועות ה' מנת חלקי וכוסי. כוסי רויה כוס ישועות אשא ישועה לא נאמר אלא ישועות א' לימות המשיח וא' לעוה"ב. ד"א כנגד ד' כוסות שאמר שר המשקים ליוסף. ד"א כנגד ד' כוסות התרעלה שעתיד הקב"ה להשקות לעכו"ם שנא' קח את כוס החמה ונאמר כי כוס ביד ה'. וכן כוס חמה ביד ה' דכתיב גבי בבל. ונאמר ורוח זלעפות מנת כוסם: ואכלו את הבשר, “they are to eat the meat;” this is the reason why the people established the custom to take three unleavened loaves of bread on the evening when the meat of the Passover would be consumed. It was a reminder of the three measures of flour Avraham told Sarah to use when baking cakes for what turned out to be the three angels, one of whom predicted when she would give birth to Yitzchok. (Genesis 18,6) The date happened to be that of the first day of Passover, (in the future) as we know from the fact that on the same evening Lot welcomed two of these angels and served them unleavened bread. An alternate version of the significance of the three matzot on our seder dish is that they are to remind us of the three patriarchs. The reason why we break the middle one of these three matzot in half is that it symbolises G–d having split the sea of reeds in half to enable the Jewish people to cross it and escape the pursuit of Pharaoh and his army. We pronounce the special blessing over one half of this middle matzah, as related in the Talmud tractate Pessachim folio 115, as a reminder that it is called the “bread of the poor,” meaning that a poor man does not have a whole loaf of bread at his disposal. The reason why we perform two “dippings” on that night is to serve as a reminder that when becoming officially Jewish after performing the circumcision, both the people themselves and their slaves immersed themselves in a ritual bath. An alternate interpretation is that we had to dip the blood of the Paschal lamb and sprinkle it on the lintel and upright posts, mezuzot, of our homes, to insure that the firstborn Jews would not be killed on that night, as were those of the Egyptians. We recite a further reminder of this by quoting from the Book of Ezekiel, that our redemption was linked to our being kept alive by offering that blood (Ezekiel 16,6). One of the reasons why this ritual is performed on that night is to encourage the children at the table to ask why we perform so many strange acts during that evening instead of proceeding from kiddush to Motzi, breaking bread, directly. Normally, vegetables used to be eaten as a kind of dessert, whereas on this evening we commence with them. We never drink two cups of wine before eating bread, whereas on this evening we make a point of drinking two cups of wine before eating any bread (matzah). As soon as the child sees us pouring the second cup of wine he begins asking questions. The concoction known as charosset that we dip the bitter herbs in, is a reminder of the mortar that was used in the bricks, i.e. its colour. It is composed of ground apples, commemorating an apple in Song of Songs 8,5, in which G–d is described allegorically as having overturned an apple tree at Mount Sinai, at the time when the Jewish people accepted the Torah, having thus aroused the Jewish people to respond with their famous נעשה ונשמע, “we will perform the laws of the Torah as soon as we will hear what they are.” It also contains different spices, resembling in appearance the straw that the Egyptians had withheld from them after Moses had asked Pharaoh for a short vacation to celebrate a religious festival. Our author cites different interpretations of the various items on the seder plate nowadays when we cannot celebrate the real thing, one being the egg the other a roasted bone, the one symbolising the chagigah offering, offered by each pilgrim who came to Jerusalem on that festival, the other symbolising the Paschal lamb, unfortunately also not available while we are in exile. The four cups of wine drank on that night are in commemoration of the four stages of the redemption. The respective words on the Torah are:והוצאתי, והצלתי, וגאלתי, ולקחתי אתכם לי, “I will take you out, I will save you, I will redeem you, and I will acquire you as My people.” (Exodus 6, 6-7.) The fifth expression there, i.e. והבאתי אתכם אל הארץ “I shall bring you to the land, etc.” is actually the purpose of the whole redemption. As per the proverb “when a master releases his slave into freedom, and he gives him a cup of wine to drink, unless he also brings him to a house where he can enjoy that wine as a free man, the whole exercise was in vain.” While we have been deprived of our land being in exile, we do not drink the fifth cup indicating that we look forward, to doing so, the sooner the better. Another way of looking at the ritual of drinking the four cups: They symbolise four different redemptions. Each “cup” has been mentioned in our Scriptures as such, in Psalms 16,5: ה' מנת חלקי וכוסי, “the Lord is my allotted share and portion;” also in Psalms 23,5:כוסי רויה, “my cup is abundant.” The third time we find this reference to our “cup” in Psalms 116,13: כוס ישועות אשא, “I raise my cup of deliverance.” In that verse the reference is not to a single deliverance, but to multiple deliverances. Both refer to the deliverance in the days of the messiah and the world to come respectively. (Compare Jerusalem Talmud, tractate Pessachim, chapter 10, halachah 1. Yet another interpretation about why we drink four cups of wine on the night of the seder. It is a reminder of the four cups that Pharaoh’s chief of the butlers told Joseph about that he had seen in his dream (Genesis 40, 11-13). Still another interpretation sees in the four cups a reference to the four cups of poison that G–d will force the gentile nations to drink in the future, which the prophet Jeremiah has spoken about in Jeremiah 25,15-18. These cups are also referred to in Psalms 75,9 as well as in Jeremiah 51,7 and in Psalms 11,6 as pointed out in the section of the Jerusalem Talmud we quoted earlier.