In the weeks before Passover, Rabbi Yosef Landa and the team at Chabad.org face a unique logistical challenge. Like most rabbis, Landa contends with the Passover needs of his community. At the same time, the rabbi orchestrates the sale of leavened goods for hundreds of thousands of Jews across the globe through Chabad.org’s online chametz sale service.

For more than two decades, Landa—director of Chabad of Greater St. Louis—has been at the helm of what has grown into one of Judaism’s largest digital services. This year alone, more than 100,000 people are expected to use the online tool to fulfill the pre-Passover tradition of selling their chametz—leavened products forbidden during the holiday.

Nowadays we take for granted the tools and services that can be found online, but when Chabad.org first launched its chametz sale portal back in the late 1990s, it was groundbreaking.

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“Our mission is to help Jews with whatever they need in their Jewish life, and we realized that for many people there were significant barriers to sell their chametz,” Landa recalls. “There are many people who live far from a Jewish community, and others don’t have rabbis. When we realized we could facilitate this important part of Passover preparation online, we knew it was a no-brainer.”

The chametz sale portal took off immediately, growing in popularity as more and more of the world went online. Today, people from around the globe sell their chametz via Chabad.org, from American Samoa and Antigua to Western Sahara and Zimbabwe.

It ought not come as a surprise that Chabad.org invented the idea of selling chametz online. Afterall, Chabad.org not only predates Amazon.com, but also such other early tech titans as Yahoo, eBay and The New York Times’ web presence. Launched in the fall of 1993, Chabad.org was one of the first 500 websites created after the birth of the web.

“It was novel and revolutionary to sell, or authorize such a sale, online, even though it’s perfectly fine halachically,” explains Landa. “Now, we do most of our business online and it is mainstream and has the support of major rabbis and halachic decisors.”

How to Sell Chametz Online

It is forbidden to have chametz in one’s possession or even to own it during Passover, and the practice of selling one’s chametz to a non-Jew before Passover with the reasonable expectation of getting it back after the holiday is discussed in the Mishnah, tractate Pesachim.

While the tradition of selling one’s chametz to a non-Jew has been around for at least that long, it accelerated in the Middle Ages among businessmen who traded in leavened products such as beer or other spirits and could not afford to rid themselves of their inventory each year. Eventually, as people had more chametz stored and it became increasingly difficult to simply destroy it all, the practice to sell one’s chametz became popular among individuals.

While authorizing a rabbi to make the sale is straightforward, the terms of the contract are complex, and should only be done through a competent rabbi. Hence, it became the practice of rabbinic scholars in each community to take responsibility for selling the chametz of the Jews in their community to a non-Jew.

As the numbers of Jews who learn about their heritage continues to grow around the world, especially in places with little or no traditional Jewish observance, the time-honored tradition of selling one’s chametz before Passover is growing as well, with thousands of people estimated to be selling their chametz for the first time this year. The sale is done through a formal contract with the rabbi acting as the agent. All the seller needs to do is fill out the appropriate sales form and be sure that the not-for-Passover food is stored away by the appropriate time of the day before Passover.

But implementing this ancient practice through modern technology required careful navigation of Jewish law.

“Usually transferring ownership of mitaltlin [‘movable property’] requires meshichah [a physical act of acquisition], which doesn’t happen with chametz sales,” Landa explains. “The chametz remains in the domain of the Jew, and the rabbi makes sure that the sale is done correctly. That remains unchanged when you do it online. You’re giving the authorization to the rabbi to sell it in the proper way.”

From the beginning, the most complex challenge of Chabad.org’s service was accounting for global time zones. Since chametz must be sold before the time that it becomes forbidden in each location, Landa worked with the Chabad.org team to develop a sophisticated network spanning continents.

“We need to sell chametz in thousands of locations, and make sure it’s sold before the time chametz is forbidden on the afternoon before the first Passover seder,” he says. “We overcame that by connecting with Chabad rabbis in different time zones that we work with, and in each place, it’s sold right before that point.”

This careful orchestration involves rabbis across 11 regional zones. “There’s one individual—myself—who gets the authorization to sell, and included in that is the authorization to appoint an agent as well. I then designate an agent in the appropriate time zone for wherever it needs to go,” Landa explains.

When users fill out their location on the form, Chabad.org automatically assigns the sale of their chametz to a rabbi in the appropriate time zone. Based on each user’s location at the onset of the holiday, the system not only arranges for the chametz sale but also provides helpful personalized information with the time for burning chametz on the eve of Passover as well as holiday candle-lighting times. The Chabad.org system also allows users in Israel—where Passover is 7 days for residents but many visitors mark the traditional 8 days—to note how many days they need their chametz sold for. Based on that, a rabbi will ensure it is bought back when the user needs it.

Today, the online form is available in eight languages—Italian, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Russian, German, Hebrew and English—allowing Jews around the world to participate regardless of linguistic barriers.

“The system continues to evolve,” Landa shares. “It took time for us to iron it all out, and we keep making it better and better. We’re always learning, and have meetings every year to discuss feedback from the past year and how to make it an even smoother experience going forward. People always have questions, and we always make ourselves available to help.”

Click here to sell your chametz for Passover!