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Urchatz
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Why do we not say a bracha?

Urchatz is the part of the seder when we wash our hands before eating the karpas and we don't say a bracha. Are you always, that one person who says a bracha when washing your hands for urchatz? Whats up with that? Why don't we say a bracha?

A lot of people say we don't say a bracha because we are just washing our hands so our hands are pure and not tamei. The people who say that aren't wrong. In the time of the Beit Hamikdash people washed their hands every time before eating any wet vegetable or fruit.

Another answer is we want the children to ask questions. This is true. The children play a big role in the Pesach seder. The youngest child asks the four questions, and there are four different sons. The wise one, the wicked one, the simple minded one, and the one who doesn't know enough to ask.

What the two answers are saying is we don't say a bracha so the kids can ask, “Why do we not say a bracha?” Then we can answer. We are washing so our hands are pure not for eating bread.

These two explanations are very different from each other. The second explanation is like part of the first one. The children should ask you “why?” And then you can give them a logical answer. The first explanation is showing us where it comes from and where we remember it from. The second explanation is an answer for the moment the children should ask at that time.

Here we learn that we are still doing things what the Jewish people did in the Beit Hamikdash. It is good we have an opportunity to do this because this is what they did in the time of the beit hamikdash every time they ate a wet fruit or vegetable but we only do it during the seder.
haggadah Section: Urchatz

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