16 Apr EVERY LAST CRUMB

The Large Hadron
Collider (LHC) is the
world’s largest and
most powerful
particle accelerator.
The circumference of
the collider is 16.565
miles, and it contains
thousands of magnets. It was built in
collaboration from over 10,000 scientists
and hundreds of universities as well as
more than 100 countries and it cost $4.75
billion.
In 2009, the collider overheated and
shut down. Scientists were perplexed and
investigated what went wrong. The
problem was found at a compensating
capacitor, one of the points where the
mains electricity supply enters the
collider from above ground. Sitting there
was a bird munching on a baguette. It
turns out a crumb had fallen into the
collider causing the overheating. 10,000
scientists and $5 billion dollars couldn’t
stop the impact of one crumb.
The power and potency of a crumb is at
the core of Pesach. The Talmud
(Pesachim 29b) tells us chametz is
forbidden in the smallest quantities, and
that while in many cases with prohibited
food we apply the concept of “bittul” –
nullification of a small amount amidst a
much larger amount – when it comes to
chametz, one crumb is not nullified, even
in a thousand parts.
The Meor Einayim (Tzav), Rav
Menachem Nochum of Chernobyl,
points out that the letters in the words
“chametz” and “matzah” are almost
exactly the same. The mem and tzadi are
in both words, the only difference is that
Chametz has a ches, and Matzah has a
hay. The only difference between those
two letters, a hay – ה – and a ches – ח– ,
is a tiny little line, a speck of ink. That
mashehu of a line seems so insignificant,
so seemingly inconsequential it is easy to
dismiss. But the truth is that mashehu is
what makes all the difference between
the words chametz, or matza.
Says the Meor Einayim, the yetzer hara
works not by convincing us to violate a
major boundary or commit an egregious
mistake. It works perniciously by telling
us that something is only a mashehu, it’s
tiny, insignificant, what difference does it
make? What does it matter if you come a
bit late to shul or schmooze a little during
davening? Does Hashem really care if a
mashehu of what you declare as a
business expense aren’t really? Is a
mashehu of lashon hara really going to

hurt anyone?
Slowly, those small things add up until a
person doesn’t recognize himself
anymore. On Pesach, chametz is assur
b’mashehu to teach us how important
everything, even what seems so small,
truly is. One crumb can bring a $5 billion
dollar machine to a grinding halt, and
one crumb of yetzer hara can corrupt an
invaluable neshama.
The Be’er Heitev in his commentary on
Shulchan Aruch quotes the Arizal who
says that a person who is careful about a
mashehu, a negligible amount of chametz
on Pesach, is guaranteed not to make a
mistake the whole year.
I don’t read this statement as a
metaphysical promise as much as a
strategy for change. If over Pesach you
can learn to be disciplined even about the
“mashehu”s of life, if we can learn not to
dismiss or minimize the small things, we
will live our most disciplined selves.
Don’t underestimate the impact of a
crumb. One mashehu, a drop of ink, is
the difference between a hay of matzah
and a ches of chametz. Don’t let the
yetzer hara convince you not to care
about the mashehu.
But maybe the message of Pesach is not
only the danger and damage of even a
crumb, a mashehu. If a mashehu matters,
if it can make all the difference, then isn’t
it true that a mashehu of a mitzvah or of
a good thing also matters, it means
something, it makes a difference. The
meaning of mashehu works in both
directions.

The typical approach to self-
improvement or changing habits is to set

a large goal, then try to take big leaps to
accomplish the goal in as little time as
possible. But this method often ends in
burnout, frustration, and failure. Instead,
focus on a mashehu at a time, continuous
but steady, slow, incremental
improvement.
It is so easy to dismiss the value of
making slightly better decisions on a
daily basis. Making mashehu
improvements isn’t going to make
headlines, but it makes a difference.
ְו ְִהִיא ֶׁשָׁעְָמְָדָה :recite we ,Haggadah the In
ַלֲַאבֹוֵתֵינּו ְו ְָלָנּו. ֶׁשֹּׁלּא ֶאֶָחד ִּבְּלְָבָד ָעַָמד ָעֵָלֵינּו
amad is what say Tzaddikim ְ.לְַכַּלֹוֵתֵנּו
aleinu l’chaloseinu, what stands to
destroy us? An attitude of she’lo echad
bilvad, I am just one person, this is just
one mitzvah, this is just one daf of
Gemara, one perek of Tehillim, one

dollar of tzedakah, one moment of
being my best. An attitude of echad
bilvad, it is just one thing, something
small, inconsequential, it doesn’t
matter, that attitude stands to destroy
us.
We have to realize a crumb can
destroy, a mashehu of chametz is
assur, but a mashehu of a mitzvah, a
mashehu, a moment of nobility,
righteousness, discipline,
spirituality, moves the cosmos, can
change the world, can change your
life, and that of your family.
This Pesach, as we sit at our Seder
tables, hostages are still being held,
soldiers are still fighting on our
behalf. While we mark our freedom,
some are in shackles and others are
heroically fighting to liberate them. After
more than six months of this war and this
situation, fatigue can set in, and it feels
hard to sustain the intensity of prayer,
contributions, advocacy, and earning
merits. Now is when it is critical to
remember that even a mashehu, a small
measure of effort, of caring, of prayer
and connection matter.
This past week, Iran launched hundreds
of drones and missiles with the intent to
cause severe harm and damage to our
people and our homeland. While the
swift and successful defense by Israel

and its allies seemed almost matter-of-
fact, the minimal damage caused by the

attack was nothing short of miraculous.
If one Iron Dome radar-guided missile is
off by a mashehu, the attacking missile
could cause catastrophic loss of life.
Similarly, none of us know how much of
Hashem’s benevolence is due to the
merits of our own mashehu contributions,
our small acts of learning, davening,
kindness, and righteousness.
A mashehu of mitzvos matters to
Hashem and is measurable over time in
us. Like the Jews in Egypt, many of us
are enslaved, not to external oppressors
but to our own habits and patterns,
between us and Hashem, us and others,
or even with ourselves.
In the beginning, there is basically no
difference between making a choice that
is a mashehu, 1 percent better or
mashehu, 1 percent worse. But as time
goes on, these small improvements or
declines compound and you suddenly
find a very big gap between people who
make slightly better decisions on a daily
basis and those who don’t. In Atom
Habits, James Clear shows that if you get

one percent better each day for one year,
you’ll end up thirty-seven times better by
the time you’re done.
In one of the most inspirational stories
in Shas, Chazal describe how Rebbe
Akiva was a shepherd, a laborer, an am
ha’aretz. At age 40, he didn’t even know
how to read the aleph-beis. One day,
while sitting by a brook, Akiva noticed a
steady trickle of water hitting a rock. It
was only a drip, it was a mashehu, but it
was constant – drop after drop after drop.
Akiva observed something incredible: A
hole had been carved out by that steady
drip of water. He wondered how that
could be. He concluded: If something as
soft as water can carve a hole in solid
rock, how much more so can words of
Torah – which is hard as iron – make an
indelible impression on my heart.
That marked a turning point in Rebbe
Akiva’s life. He committed himself to
Torah study and went on to become the
greatest sage of his generation, producing
24,000 talmidim and later a group of
students who were the transmitters of
Torah Sheb’al Peh. Akiva became Rebbe
Akiva because he noticed a mashehu of
water and grew a mashehu at a time.
This Yom Tov we are pledging to
liberate ourselves from bad habits, to
make meaningful changes. We are
dedicated to do so in the merit that the
matzav for our people improves, that
miracles of salvation happen in our days.
If you want to change the way you live,
how you learn, daven, treat others, it isn’t
by hoping to wake up one morning and
being radically different.
One crumb can shut down a collider and
one crumb can start up your life. Make
the decision to grow a mashehu, 1% each
day, and by next Pesach you will be at
least 37% better.