Fruit Futures February 6, 2025 Q I made a bracha on an apple, and while…

Bais HaVaad on the Parsha, Parshas Bo
First to Fast
January 30, 2025
Excerpted and adapted from a shiur by Rav Moshe Yitzchok Weg
And every firstborn in the land of Mitzrayim shall die…
Shmos 11:5
The minhag is that firstborns fast on Erev Pesach. The Tur says the reason is because Hashem spared the Jewish firstborns during makas bechoros while their Egyptian counterparts died.
The Shulchan Aruch cites one view that female firstborns should fast on Erev Pesach. The Rama says our minhag is that they don’t. The Shulchan Aruch’s source is a Midrash (Shmos Rabbah 12:28) that says female bechoros in Egypt died along with the males.
Why does the Rama reject that view? The Biur HaGra answers that the fast was instituted only for those firstborns who have kedushas bechorah. Since females do not have the halachic status of bechor, they aren’t subject to the fast.
The Levush offers another answer. He notes that the Midrash says that in Egyptian homes with no firstborn, the eldest child died. If so, he asks, in a home today where no bechor resides, why doesn’t the eldest fast? He answers that although female firstborns and eldest household members died, the primary target of the plague was male firstborns—as is evident from the fact that only they are mentioned in the Torah—and only the primary targets need to fast.
If a non-Jewish firstborn converts to Judaism, should he fast on Erev Pesach? The question may hinge on the above dispute: According to the Gra, only people with kedushas bechorah fast, and a ger doesn’t have kedushas bechorah. But according to the Levush, the fast is for people who would have been primary targets of the makah in Mitzrayim, and he is in that category.