I’ll share a thought/vort I said last year by the Pesach Seder on the Rasha, of the Arbah Bonim (4 sons). The Baal Hagadda tells us “hakeh es shinov”, knock out his teeth, and tell him if he was in Mitzrayim he wouldn’t have been redeemed because of his heretical attitude.
Why knock out his teeth, since when do we encourage violence? And isn’t it at least good that he came to the Pesach Seder, and sat there with the family, why do we act so agressive?
So perhaps the answer is, and this is intended to be in a humorous vein, that if this Rasha spit out mocking tones, and is making fun of our Avodah, of the Pesach seder, and all the mitzvos, then it is safe to say that he really has no intention of being an active participant. We can expand this assumption that if he has no interest in the seder, he surely didn’t prepare for Yom Tov. And if he didn’t clean for pesach, and do necessary preperations for Yom Tov, then he DEFINITELY didn’t do the last step right before the zman achilas chometz, something we all do: brush his teeth! So very nice he’s there by the pesach seder, but he’s got peices of chometz in his mouth!! therefore, hakeh es shinov, first get rid of the chometz in his teeth.
🙂