The korban todah, or “thanksgiving” offering described in the parsha (Vayikra 7:12), according to the Gemara (Brachos 54b), is the proper response to one of four categories of danger (though other situations may well be incorporated within them) from which one has emerged safely: 1) going to sea, 2) traveling in a desert, 3) enduring a serious illness and 4) being confined to prison. Those categories are based on Tehillim 107.
It’s both interesting and timely that the Jewish national thanksgiving which is Pesach involves each of those categories. A sea had to be crossed, a desert, subsequently, had to be traversed, Egypt is described by the Midrash as having been a virtual prison, from which no one had previously escaped, and the Jewish people are described as having sunk to the lowest spiritual level in Egypt — a sickness of the national soul — necessitating their immediate exodus from the spiritually decrepit land.
But something is strange here. The korban todah, unique among offerings, requires as an accompaniment four groups of flour-offerings. And, equally unique, one of those groups must be chametz, leavened breads. (Other flour offerings, aside from Shavuos’ shtei halechem, are not permitted to rise.)
And on Pesach, of course, chametz is forbidden not only to consume but even to own.
If Pesach is a national parallel of an individual’s korban todah, why would the latter include something that is anathema to the former?
What occurs is that the “illness” that a korban todah offerer survived was a physical one, whereas the national malady we experienced in Egypt was entirely spiritual. The inclusion of chametz in the todah-offering might reflect the fact that the danger was to bodies (chametz being associated with physical desires); the dearth of it on Pesach, the fact that the danger was essentially to our souls. (The Alshich, in fact, identifies each of the four flour-offerings with one of the todah- obligating escaped dangers, and associates “enduring illness” with the chametz offering.)
Soon enough, we will be celebrating Hashem’s rescue of our ancestors from the illness that was Egypt, a spiritual malady. And when we recount that history at our Pesach seder tables and declare our thanksgiving in Hallel, there will be nary a crumb of chametz to be found in our homes.
© 2026 Rabbi Avi Shafran