We have been celebrating a lot of holidays over the past month including Yom Haatzmaut (Israel’s Independence Day), Lag BaOmer (the 33^rd day of the counting of the Omer), Yom Yerushalayim (Jerusalem Day) and Shavuot.

There is a holiday that you may have missed. The holiday takes place on the 14^th day of Iyar and is called Pesach Sheni, a Second Passover.

Why do we need a Second Pesach?

In Bamidbar 9:9-11 we read: “God spoke to Moshe saying: Speak to B’nai Yisrael, saying: any person, if he will be impure from a corpse, or is on a distant road, whether among yourselves or for your descendents, he shall perform the Peasch offering for God in the second month, on the fourteenth day in the afternoon he shall perform it. Together with matzot and marror they shall eat it.”

According to Rashi, the simple definition of “distant” is that the person was outside of the courtyard of the Beit HaMikdash (Temple).

A Midrashic interpretation would be that the person is on a “distant road”, further than Modiin where they would not have the opportunity to reach the courtyard of the Beit HaMikdash in time.

Gur Aryeh points out that Pesach Sheni is just to make up for the Korban Pesach (offering). We presume that the regular mitzvoth of Pesach such as destroying the Chametz and eating Matza were observed on the ”regular” Pesach in Nisan.
Pesach Sheni is not a Yom Tov and owning Chametz is permitted.

In sentence 13 we are warned: “The person who is pure and was not on the road and refrained from performing the Pesach offering that soul shall be cut off from its people, for the offering of God he did not bring in its proper time; that person shall bear his sin.”

We see here that second chances are given to those who are sincere but not for those who try to take advantage of the situation.

Although we no longer have the Korban Pesach, many Israelis still commemorate Pesach Sheni by eating Matzah.