Taanit Bechorot - the Fast of the Firstborn

A Fast Day Where Nobody Fasts

The days leading up to Passover are filled with insane amounts of activity: cooking, cleaning, setting up the seder, preparing to see family…but right before the holiday arrives, we have a strange thing that seems to be completely counter to all of the festive preparations. 

The rabbis declared that the day before Passover, Erev Pesach, would be an eternal fast day for anyone who is firstborn, known as Ta’anit Bechorot (the Fast of the Firstborn). Taanit Bechorot commemorates the tenth and final plague in the Passover story – when God killed all of the firstborn Egyptians but spared those of the Israelites.

But why do firstborns have to pause, in the midst of all the hustle and bustle of preparing for Passover to have a fast day? Isn’t Passover supposed to be a joyous time? Why do we have a fast day right before the holiday? 

And if the timing of the fast day isn’t weird enough, there is another thing about Ta’anit Bechorot that is super strange: most firstborns don’t actually fast! 

You see, there are lots of ways to “get around” the fast. Most people avoid fasting by joining in a seudat mitzvah, a special kind of religious meal, whose joy actually overrides the fast. And it’s a pretty accepted practice. In fact, I can’t recall ever hearing of anyone who actually ended up fasting on the day before Passover! 

So now I’m even more confused. Not only is the timing of the fast day really strange, but if firstborn children don’t actually end up fasting before Passover, why have the day in the first place? And what about the rest of us, the middle children and youngest children - is this day meant to have any meaning at all?  Overall, what should we be thinking about on this day, and what is the reason why our sages felt it was a necessary prelude to Passover?

Understanding the Fast of the Firstborn 

To understand why our sages declared this commemorative day, we need to pay attention to the  idea of the bechor, the firstborn. Because, when you think more deeply about this theme,  this idea of the firstborn bookends the Passover story.  Before any of the ten plagues, at the outset, God warns Pharaoh that if he doesn't let the Israelites go, God is going to kill the firstborns of Egypt. He tells Moses: “בְּנִי בְכֹרִי יִשְׂרָאֵל - My firstborn child is Israel” (Exodus 4:22). God seems to take the idea so seriously that Egypt is threatened with the death of their firstborns for daring to trifle with God's firstborn! And indeed, the tenth plague is exactly that - an attack against the Egyptian firstborn children. 

So clearly the theme of the firstborn is such a key theme to the Passover story. But why did it necessitate a special commemorative fast day? Watch this video where Aleph Beta scholar Beth Lesch explains the meaning of Taanit Bechorot and what it means to be a firstborn nation of God.