Avodah Mailing List

Volume 08 : Number 011

Monday, October 8 2001

• Re: Tcheilet
• Re: WTC stories, Hashgacha pratis and kiddush HaShem
• Re: Back to Barekhu
• hakhel
• Re: WTC stories, Hashgacha pratis and kiddush HaShem
• Re: WTC and Tzniut
• WTC stories, Hashgacha pratis and kiddush HaShem
• Re: WTC and tzniut
• Re: Ramban on Malchus Yisrael
• Birchas Kohanim
• Birchas Kohanim
• Postscript to recent loss of gedolim
• Havdala in the Succa
• Re: Havdala in the Succa
• kvius in sukka
• succah/arba minim
• arba minim in succah
• bracha on arba minim-sukkah or shul
• Re: Lulav in the Succah

2 questions

1. Did anyone ever wonder about the medrash that korach dressed his followers 
in bgadim that were kulo tcheilet?  Where did he get the money or the 
tcheilet???

2. R' Mandel mentions the lack of  usage by the gedolim in the previous 
incarnation of this controversy.  Does anyone know if they stated the 
specifics of their objections? What do those who wear it today do with R' 
Mandel's "white only" objection?

SS
Joel Rich

I had protested:
>: But God did not stand back. How many more warnings about specific
>: terrorist cells and front groups operating in the USA did our country
>: need?  Terrorism experts inside and outside the govt new about them
>: for years.  Did God tell the airlines to skimp on security?  Did God
>: tell the INS to be lax about visas and enforcement?  Did God tell our
>: govt and people to be complacent?

Micha:
>Sounds like the old, "I sent you a rowboat, a door you could have
>used as a raft and a helecopter. What more do you want?"

It is!

>That's just shifting the question from how He allowed the terrorists
>to act, for their actions to be successful, and successful to a given
>group of people and not others. Now you have the same philosophical
>dilemma of how he allowed the gov't, the airlines, etc... not to act,
>for their inaction to allow for disaster, etc...

Allowing "not to act" is not God's responsibility.  We do have free
will and responsibility.  That's what we learn from the sixth day of
creation.

>If I understand your position correctly, I already stated my problem
>with it in the paragraph after the one you quote:
>> One is at first glance left with the conclusion that HKBH values the
>> bechirah of 19 suicidal individuals over the lives of thousands....

That did not address my position.  The terrorists had free will to
act.  The governmental authorities had free will to heed the advice of
anti-terror experts and to take appropriate measures.  The victims
themselves had very little choice, except that they with the rest of
us share in the responsibility of electing governments that choose the
authorities.  That citizens may suffer for the actions or inactions of
their governments is a fact of history and a consequence of God's
sharing dominion with humans. 

>But then, I have a problem with taking any position.

Every position is problematic.

Shabbat Shalom,
Jay S. Lapidus     http://jlapidus.tripod.com

From: "D. and E-H. Bannett" <dbnet@barak-online.net>
<...R' MechyF questioned why I quoted from the Baer-Strack edition
rather than the more modern Dotan edition which is based on many more
manuscript sources.... I stated that the quote being in rhyme was evidence
of it being authentic ben Asher and not a later copyist's addition. RMF
said that Dotan says just the opposite. IIRC, Dotan says that rhyme
is evidence that the text is more ancient -- as rhyme was a memory aid
before the texts were written down. Ben Asher might have been writing
already existing material from his predecessors. Prof. Dotan, of course
is an academic researcher. He does not accept that ben Asher is the
author of Dikdukei Hat'amim without proofs. IIRC, he even conjectures
that Dikdukei Hat'amim might have been written by ben Asher's students
or later ba'alei masora who were quoting their teachers or teachers on
material attributed to ben Asher. I don't think he considers rhymed text
to be a "later" addition>

I don't want to leave the impression that rhyming per se was considered,
one way or the other, evidence of the specific authorship or even of
the date. Yes, rhyming origin may well stem from a pre-writing stage,
or, as dotan also suggests might stem from an early writing stage. Indeed
dotan certanly considers the material in the diqduqei hat'tamim quite
early, indeed predating ben asher. But rhyming rules were continued for
many hundreds of years (e.g. rabbeinu tam's grammer rules, etc. etc) and
thus can hardly date anything. As for ben asher's authorship -- we need
to understand what authorship means. It could well mean -- and probably
does -- that ben asher is being personally credited with the editorial
activity which put the composition together from the many versions, rule
lists, etc that he had in front of him. After all, the first sentence in
diqduqei hat'tamim (at least in the only four MS which credit him at all)
credits him specifically as the guy who "hichbir"ed the book. recall the
machloqes of rashi and rambam on the nature of rebbe's mishnoh activity.

As for the first sentence which credits ben asher's editorship (i.e. in
those ms. that have it), it is clear that ben asher himself could not have
penned it, so it must be a later accretion. The various ms are sorted
by dortan into two broad bins with characteristic differences. There
are also differences between ms on items such as numbers of chapters,
rules etc. Furthermore there are also very clear literary indications of
multiple sources within the individual ms (incompatible inconsistencies,
names, etc) pointing to ancient sources which the author(s)/editor(s)
confronted. In fact dotan seems somewhere between agnostic and positive
on the question of ben asher's personal involvement. In any event, since
you feel that: < To me, "earlier" meant more authentic.> you should feel
comfortable with this work.

Mechy Frankel                       W: (703) 588-7424
michaeljfrankel@hotmail.com         H: (301) 593-3949
michael.frankel@osd.mil

Unpublished Hakhel essay based on some stuff we discussed here.

KT,
YGB

Hakhel: Forging a Kahal
Rabbi Yosef Gavriel Bechhofer

Were the Beis HaMikdosh standing today, we would be gathering this Sukkos,
upon the conclusion of the Shemittah year: men, women, children and the
convert in our midst, to perform the mitzvah of Hakhel, to hear and to
learn, so that we might acquire the awe of G-d, our Lord, to enable us to
preserve and perform all that is written in the Torah (Devarim 31:11-12).

Although the Torah itself is not explicit on the subject, Chazal (cited
by Rashi) tell us that the mitzvah of Hakhel consisted of the king
reading the entire Sefer Devarim from atop a wooden platform constructed
especially for that purpose.

But we have, unfortunately, no Beis HaMikdosh. We are bereft of the
mitzvah of Hakhel.

We might relate a relevant Chassidic tale here. It is said that when
the Ba'al Shem Tov zt"l wanted to work a yeshu'ah [salvation] for Am
Yisroel he would go to a certain spot in the forest and recite a certain
tefillo, and would thus accomplish that yeshu'ah. When it came time for
the Ba'al Shem Tov's successor, the Mezritcher Maggid zt"l, to beseech
Hashem for a yeshu'ah, he said: "We no longer know the tefillo to recite,
but we still know the location where the Ba'al Shem Tov went to daven"
- and the Maggid would go to that spot in the forest, and the yeshu'ah
would be accomplished. When the Maggid's disciple, Reb Yisroel of Ruzhin
zt"l found it necessary, in his turn, to request HaKadosh Baruch Hu's
intervention, he would say: AWe no longer know the tefillo, nor do we
even know the location where my predecessors went to work their wonders,
but we know how to relate the story." He would relate the story, and
the yeshu'ah was accomplished.[1]

It is presumptuous for us to think we might accomplish the equivalent
of the mitzvah of Hakhel with a discourse on some related thought.
Nevertheless, we must attempt to accomplish what we can, and beseech
HaKadosh Baruch Hu to provide us with some measure of that awe that He
would bestow on the participants in Hakhel.

At the root of the term "Hakhel" that the Torah employs to describe this
mitzvah is the word "Kahal." The word Kahal is one of several words the
Torah uses when discussing various groupings of the Jewish people. Other
terms include "Bnei Yisroel," "Beis Yisroel," "Yisroel," "Bais Yaakov,"
"Am," "Goy," "Eidah" - and the list goes on.

Some Rishonim believe there are multiple words with identical meanings in
the Hebrew language. The great Acharonim, however, including the Malbim
zt"l and Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch zt"l have inculcated within us the
other view, that there are no synonyms in Lashon HaKodesh. Thus, if the
Torah uses various terms to discuss the Jewish nation, they each must
possess distinct and separate meanings. It is, therefore, axiomatic,
that if the Torah chooses to base the description of this mitzvah on
the word Kahal, that the mitzvah be specifically to recreate a Kahal.

The connotation is clear. In Devarim 4:10 Moshe Rabbeinu relates
that Hashem Yisborach had commanded him, in gathering the nation for
Mattan Torah: "Hakhel li es ho'Am." In Devarim 9:10, Moshe calls the
day of Mattan Torah: "Yom Ha'Kahal." Obviously, the event of Hakhel
is meant to be a re-enactment of Mattan Torah. Yet what is a Kahal in
contradistinction to all the other terms used to describe the Jewish
people?

Exploring here the full gamut of terms that we began to note above
is not possible for us. Let us analyze one continuum of terms:
Goy-Am-Eidah-Kahal.[2]

An inferior description of a national entity is that of "Goy." Moshe
Rabbeinu describes the process of redemption from Egypt as "goy me'kerev
goy" - a nation from the midst of another nation. On that phrase Chazal
(Vayikrah Rabbah 23:2) comment that "these were not circumcised and those
were not circumcised." Obviously, the term goy connotes a parallel between
ourselves and the nations of the world, and implies a national identity
bereft of any national idea - an association based on some commonality,
perhaps, at a minimum, the unique names, language and garb that the
Israelites retained in Egypt.[3]

A notch above the term "Goy" is the term "Am" - a term that is, in its
very spelling, related to the word "Im" - "With."[4] A national idea
or ideal bonds the Am. For us, Am Yisroel, that national ideal is the
mission with which Hashem charged us at Har Sinai: "Mamleches Kohanim
v'Goy Kadosh." It is not enough for us to be a goy. At a minimum, we
must be a Goy Kadosh. Kehuna and Kedusha are our leitmotifs.

Still, both Goy and Am are abstractions: They describe the status of
the people as a nation, and do not address the conduct of the people at
a given time. For that purpose the Torah uses the terms Eidah and Kahal.

"Eidah": A group convened for a specific purpose (the Malbim says
that "Eid" in the Torah always connotes two witnesses because the two
witnesses are a mini-eida, and Rabbi S. R.Hirsch [5] postulates that
they connect to "yo'ad" - designation). Nevertheless, an Eidah can be
an "Eidah Ro'oh." The term defines a lower form of gathering, and thus
related to the word "Eider" - a flock or herd.

"Kahal": A group convened in a religious or refined manner.[6] The
purpose of many mitzvos is to transform "Adas Yisroel" into a Kahal
Hashem, or "Kahal Adas Yisroel."[7] The purpose of Hakhel was to forge,
again, that Kahal.[8]

So where does all this leave us? Well, this year, Hakhel would occur
upon the evening of the second day of Sukkos, the first evening of Chol
Ha'Mo'ed in Eretz Yisroel. Some of those lucky enough to be in Eretz
Yisroel this Sukkos may find some alternate way to commemorate Hakhel. The
overwhelming majority of our nation, however, will find itself with but
themselves and their thoughts. We must emulate Reb Yisroel of Ruzhin in
this respect. Perhaps, as we sit in our respective Sukkos, we might go
through a thought process roughly as follows:

Klal Yisroel starts as a Goy. A nation among nations. Endowed, albeit,
with great potential from the Avos, but externally undifferentiated.
At Har Sinai, Hashem assigned us our national mission: We became an Am. An
Am amongst seventy other Amim, with whom we relate in ways symbolized
by the seventy plus one parim sacrificed during Sukkos (Sukkah 55b),
and in the verse that concludes the Hoshanos: "So that all the nations
of the world will know that G-d is the L-rd, there is no other."

Sometimes we are not acting in complete accordance with this lofty
destiny: Then the Torah calls us an Eidah. We strive for the high level of
achievement that the term Kahal connotes. To attain that level requires
unity. The unity that Sukkos implies in the combination of the four
species representing the four types of Jews, and in the Gemara Sukkah
27b that all Yisroel might sit in one Sukkah. A unity that could only
emerge from a year-long hiatus from cultivating even the holy soil of
Eretz Yisroel, a Shemittah year immersed in Torah and Avodas Hashem.[9]
That unity includes all believing Jews: The one who is a little too
Litvish, the one who is a little too Chassidish, the one who is a little
too Yekkish; the one who is a little too Hungarian; and the one who is
a little too Sefardi. The one who is a bit too modern; and the one who
is a bit too farfrumpt. The one who talks too much in Shul, and the one
who is too strident with those who talk a little in Shul. The one who
lived through the Holocaust, and his or her great-grandchildren.

Were there to be a Beis HaMikdash, we would all be standing together
- men, women and children - reenacting Kabbolas HaTorah Ak'ish echad
b'lev echad."[10] We would be hearing our king, representing our unity,
intoning the words that comprise the basis of our unity.

Contemplating these thoughts, you might gaze up at your Schach, and remind
yourself of the Ananei HaKavod, the clouds of glory that, according to
one opinion, the Sukkah represents.[11] Those clouds likely connect to the
clouds that enveloped Har Sinai at Kabbolas HaTorah. They encompassed all
the nation then, and throughout the forty years in the Midbar. Perhaps
you might just imagine all of our collective Schach intertwining, as
if we were all united in person, forging the Kahal ha'Kadosh that the
Hakhel accomplished. Doubtless the thought will then cross your mind:
"Me k'Amcha Yisroel Goy echod bo'oretz."

Rabbi Yosef Gavriel Bechhofer, a frequent contributor to these pages, and
his family recently moved from Chicago to Monsey, and Rabbi Bechhofer will
be the Rosh Yeshiva of Beis Medrash Horav Shmuel Yaakov, a cooperative
venture of the IDT Corporation and Touro College in Newark, NJ. Rabbi
Bechhofer would like to use the opportunity of this paragraph to inform
the JO readership that a corrected and expanded Hebrew version of his
most recent essay, written in conjunction with Rabbi Ari Zivotofsky
(March, 2000), on the Rabbi Sa'adia Gaon - Rabbi Aharon ben Meir Calendar
Controversy, will appear in the forthcoming volume of the Yeshurun Torah
journal. Rabbi Bechhofer would also like to inform the readership that
just before leaving Chicago, the Shiur in Daf Yomi Yerushalmi that
he wrote about in the Nov. >97 issue, successfully completed Talmud
Yerushalmi (tapes of the entire cycle are available), and a siyum,
under the auspices of the Daf Yomi Comission of the Agudath Israel of
America was held in July.

_______________________

[1] We might also apply here the principle of "U'neshalma porim sefoseinu"
- Yuma 86b.

[2] An indispensable tool for the amateur linguist and philologist is the
"Ya'ir Or - HaCarmel," two works generally bound together, the former by
the Malbim himself, the latter a compendium of his comments, culled from
all of his writings, on the definitions of words and the differences
between synonyms. Much of what we propose here (and much more than we
have proposed here) may be found under the various relevant entries in
the HaCarmel, although we have deviated from the Malbim's explanations.

[3] Perhaps "Ummah" and "Lashon" and other even "lower" terms are based
on commonalities in only some of these areas.

[4] This is one reason why Dr. Isaac Breuer zt"l, the subject of one of
our earlier essays here, preferred the term Am Yisroel to that of Klal
Yisroel, inferring, as it does, our national mission and destiny. While
explaining why specifically the king reads the parashiyos at Hakhel, Rabbi
Shlomo Fischer shlita writes (Derashos Beis Yishai vol. 1, siman 14):

This issue is readily understood based on a major principle of the Torah,
although one, for some reason, not enumerated by the Rambam among the
Thirteen Principles in his Commentary on the Mishna Perek Cheilek.It is,
in truth, the most fundamental principle of our belief, and it is built on
solid foundations, explicit in Torah, Nevi'im, Kesuvim, and throughout
Chazal in the Talmud and Midrashim, in prayers and in blessings, in
kedushos and in havdolos, all of which were formulated by Chazal... and,
it is that HaKadosh Baruch Hu chose us to be a unique nation, as it is
said: "And you shall be for Me a holy kingdom, a nation of priests." As we
say in the Birchas HaTorah: "Who chose us from amongst all the nations and
gave us His Torah." If so, the Torah is not the purview of individuals,
but the Torah of the Klal of the Jewish people.

This is a wonderful matter: That an entire nationality ["Ummah"],
men, women and children, smart and dumb, together form a holy nation
["Goy"], and every member of the Jewish people is a limb in the body
["Shiur Kommah"] of Knesses Yisroel that in turn comprises the Shechinah
[Divine Presence]. This is the reason why all Jews are responsible for
one another...

Thus, the Rashba (in a responsum), the Ikkarim (4:40), and the Maharsha
in Kiddushin 39b all write regarding the principles that there is
no reward for mitzvos in This World, and that a Tzaddik may suffer a
bitter fate while a Rasha enjoys a good lot, that all this pertains
only to individuals. It is concerning Klal Yisroel, that the Torah and
the Nevi'im, and [especially] the second paragraph of Shma are explicit,
that when the Jews fulfill Hashem's will He rewards them in This World -
and that when they sin He punishes them in This World. For Klal Yisroel,
reward and punishment in This World are natural consequences.

[5] At the begriming of the twelfth chapter of Shemos, where the Torah
juxtaposes Kahal, Eidah, Yisroel. The Artscroll Stone Chumash cites
Rabbi Hirsch there as well.

[6] The Sidduro shel Shabbos at the end of Shoresh 6 Anaf 1 explains
the statement in Tehillim "Tehilaso b'Kahal Chassidim" that through
Kahal, the gevuros become chasadim. He explains that in KH"L the H =
the five gevuros, and the K-L = the five chasadim (5x26 [Shem Havaya"h]
= 130. Note the significance of other 130's, such as "Tzam" - fasts
turn gevuros into chasadim). He alludes to the custom during davening,
(at least) of clasping one's left hand with and enveloping it in the
right one - enveloping gevuros in chasadim.

If we may be permitted to digress, and indulge in some "free association":

We may identify the central theme of Purim as the idea of "NiKHaLu
ha'Yehudim" as the fundamental idea of Purim. Many incidents in the
Megilla took place in various forms of "chatzer." The first place in
Tanach that Adar is mentioned is in Parashas Mas'ei: "Chatzar Adar."

The Chatzer is the Outer World, removed from the direct presence of the
King - whether it is Achashveirosh or the King of Kings.

Chatzer also tells us how to deal with the Hester Panim inherent
in that distance from Hashem. The R represents "Rah," the Evil that
springs from the concealment of Hashem's presence. CHaTZeR = Chetz Rah,
split the Rah in half. Half Rah = Kahal (270/2 = 135). The response
to Rah, and the manner in which one breaks through that concealment,
is by unifying the Kahal (135) in Tzom (136), Kol (136), Mammon (136)
- the KHL plus the agent of yichud (known in gematriyah as the "kollel").

[7] It is beyond the scope of our discussion to get into all possible
applications, but we should note several areas that allow for additional
analysis: The difference between Hashem's brocho to Yaakov Avinu
in Parashas Vayishlach, where Yaakov is blessed to have a "Kahal
Goyim" vs. his relating of that brocho to Yosef in Parashas Vayechi,
where Yaakov restates it as "Kahal Amim"; the differences between the
places where the Torah speaks about Einei Ha'Eidah vs. Einei Ha'Kahal;
the differences between the penalty of Kareis from the midst of the Am
vs. Kareis from the Kahal; the superficial redundancies of Bamidbar 10:3
vs. 10:7, both of which describe the process of gathering the people via
the trumpets, but one of which uses Eidah while the other uses Kahal;
and, the interplay of Eidah and Kahal in the parashiyos of Adas Korach,
and, especially, Mei Merivah; and, finally (for now), the rarity of the
verb form of Eidah vs. the frequency of the verb form of Kahal.

[8] While we must be cautious extrapolating from English translations,
it is interesting to note that the English translation for Eidah is
Aassembly" while the translation of Kahal is "congregation."

Through the miracles of modern technology (and the DBS Torah CD-Rom
Library), we may now know that the Ramchal zt"l in Adir ba'Marom vol.
2, Bi'ur Chalom Daniel classifies the three levels as Kahal, Eidah,
Yisroel, and has them correspond (in reverse order) to Nefesh, Ruach,
Neshomo, which, in turn, are linked to Mo'ach, Lev, Kaveid, the acrostic
of which is MeLeKh. Elsewhere (Taktav Tefillos 91, 178, 483) he draws
correspondences to the three Avos, to Kohanim, Levi'im and Yisroelim,
and more.

[9] Indeed, Rabbi Shlomo Fischer (ibid.) proposes that it is not that
Hakhel follows Shemittah, rather, the entire Shemittah year serves as
preparation for Hakhel.

[10] Rashi, Shemos 19:2. If you have a bit more time, please consider
this: Hakhel (in the Sefer HaChinuch's listing) is the penultimate
mitzvah; the ultimate mitzvah is the writing of a Sefer Torah. We have
a mesorah that there are 600, 000 permutations of the Torah's letters,
and that Yisroel is an acrostic: "Yesh Shishim Ribbo Osi'os LaTorah." It
seems that the two mitzvos are linked.

[11] A good idea in any event, as made explicit right at the beginning
of Messeches Sukkah.

On 5 Oct 01, at 10:47, Jay Lapidus wrote:
> But God did not stand back. How many more warnings about specific
> terrorist cells and front groups operating in the USA did our country
> need?  Terrorism experts inside and outside the govt new about them
> for years.  Did God tell the airlines to skimp on security?  Did God
> tell the INS to be lax about visas and enforcement?  Did God tell our
> govt and people to be complacent?

No, He didn't. But isn't that the classic definition of hester panim
and leaving us to "mikreh?" That Hashem stands aside and doesn't
protect us and allows the world to do whatever it decides to do. "Af
ani elech imachem b'chamas keri," with the root of keri being "mikreh"
or "coincidence?" That doesn't make what happened the product of human
ideas - it makes it the product of Hashem leaving us and exposing us to
the actions of others, which is itself a punishment which should call
for cheshbon ha'nefesh, and not for saying "G-d didn't do it and we
could have prevented it."

Of course that's only one possibility - the other is that Hashem
specifically wanted this to happen for reasons that we do not yet
understand (and won't until bias Mashiach when all becomes clear). It
seems to go without saying that too would call for a cheshbon ha'nefesh
on our part.

-- Carl

Please daven and learn for a Refuah Shleima for our son,
Baruch Yosef ben Adina Batya among the sick of Israel.  
Thank you very much.

Carl and Adina Sherer
mailto:sherer@actcom.co.il

> Here is a radical idea: Every time one of us sees a picture of ground
> zero s/he should think about what s/he as an individual has done that
> might have contributed to the tragedy and what have s/he has done as an
> individual since 9/11/01 to prevent it from happening again. If you think
> the cause was pritzus, then consider the way you dress...

> Let's get away from figuring out the big picture because we can't fix it
> anyway which makes all the pilpul of the last few days about the tznius
> of Osama'a wife a big bitul zman. We can however fix ourselves and hope
> that is enough to keep the Empire State building standing.

You don't think this was exactly the type of response that R' Elya, R'
mattisyahu and others were arguing for?!

<<A third issue is that of cheit and blame. As mentioned here and
discussed at some length on Areivim, a number of our gedolim have
associated various chata'im with the tragedy. In particular, they
contrasted Islamic tzeni'us (to whatever extent it's not just chitzoniyus)
with the values we have assimilated here in Galus America.>>

My impression was that the gedolim who spoke did not intend to fix
the cause for the tragedies, but what we can learn from them. Fixing
the cause requires nevuah, learning from them requires introspection.
We have access to the latter but not to the former.

Gershon
gershon.dubin@juno.com

Yitzchak Zlochower wrote on Areivim:
>Some have given a positive response to the proposition, "If you were
>certain that god was malevolent, would you still serve him?" The
>expressed attitude was that we would still be obligated by virtue of
>having been created by this god to follow all the rules of the torah.
>Such an attitude, it seems to me, is both unworthy and illogical. If
>god - my spelling is deliberate - truly were malevolent, then all the
>biblical stories of his interaction with humans would be false. The
>torah would then be a mere product of human imagination, and would not
>logically bind us to any belief or practice. Why, for example, should
>we believe him to be the creator of all? If we still believed in a
>moral lifestyle, it would be due to its perceived intrinsic value -
>not from some allegiance to its allegedly amoral author.

Unless one accepted the medieval proofs for the existence of G-d and His 
creation of everything.  If one did, then one would still feel obligated out 
of hakaras hatov to worship Him in the best way possible.

Gil Student

_________________________________________________________________
Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp

On 5 Oct 01, at 9:23, Gil Student wrote:
> The Ramban I've seen R. Hershel Schachter quote does not say all of that.  
> He says (Shichechas HaAsin 4) "Shenitztavinu lareshes ha'aretz... velo 
> na'azvah beyad zulaseinu min ha'umos o lishmamah."  From the fact that we 
> cannot leave the land desolate, it is inferred that there is a status to 
> Jewish "control" over the land i.e. malchus.

Why are you equating control with malchus? 

-- Carl
Carl and Adina Sherer
mailto:sherer@actcom.co.il

From: Micha Berger <micha@aishdas.org>
<<As for the tune intelf -- a hefsek in what sense? It doesn't cause 
hesech hada'as, and it's not adding words to the HKBH's matbei'ah>>

I think it does cause hesech hada'as, at the very least for the kohanim
who are being prompted by the shatz, and respond minutes later.

Gershon
gershon.dubin@juno.com

[From Micha Berger: -mi]
<<However, it's the gemara's idea to say something about a bad
dream while the kohanim are up on the duchan...>>

Yes, but it only became universal when duchanim became a Yom Tov only
thing; what I heard is that between yamim tovim you must have had
at least one bad dream. In the Gemara's formulation it is not at all
clear that the kohanim waited just in case anybody in the tzibur had a
bad dream.

Gershon
gershon.dubin@juno.com

We had discussed recently the idea attributed to Rav Yisrael Salanter
that recently deceased gedolim constitute the beis din shel ma'alah.
Rabbi Moshe Scheinerman mentioned in this connection that the three such
gedolim who were mentioned here, Rav Pam, Rav Miller and Rav Gifter,
all were American born or raised, and as such are "mechayev" the rest
of American Jews to set their sights higher.

Gershon
gershon.dubin@juno.com

From: "Carl and Adina Sherer" <sherer@actcom.co.il>
<<What about that nature constitutes a kevius? For example, it is -
AFAIK universally - accepted that one does not make a bracha on sleeping
in the Succah. Yet most people spend several hours sleeping>>

According to what has been quoted from RSZA, that the chiyuv to sleep
in the sukka is to GO to sleep, once you're asleep you're patur, that
doesn't hold, the chiyuv is not for several hours.

Gershon
gershon.dubin@juno.com

Akiva Miller wrote in Avodah V8 #8:
>A full reviis is a seudah for Kiddush B'Makom Seudah,

The Rishon LeZion, Harav Ovadia Yosef, requires two revi`iot in such a 
case: the first for the qiddush, and the second that serves as the se`uda.

IRA L. JACOBSON
mailto:laser@ieee.org

In Biyur Halacha v'yayin the Mishnah Brurah says it's a machlokes poskim
if a rviis of wine is mchayeiv sukka and seems to lean to be stringent
for both sides of this issue.

Shlomo Goldstein

From: "Carl and Adina Sherer" <sherer@actcom.co.il>
<<Yes, but if there's a Succa available and I can get to it and back in
time, I run out and use the Succa,>>

You'd love the davening in Chaim Berlin, where the davening is held up
for some 30-45 minutes while EVERYONE goes to the yeshiva sukka to make
the beracha before hallel.

I also bentch lulav in the sukka before going to shul, but only the first
two days. I usually daven vasikin during chol hamoed and it's too early
to bentch beforehand. I do not go back after davening, once I've already
been yotze before hallel.

Gershon
gershon.dubin@juno.com

In regards to bentching lulav in the succah (btw why is it succah and not
sukkah) Rav Moshe has a teshuva in which he says the proper way to do it
is to bentch lulav before hallel since the ikkar mitzvah is the nanuim
of hallel. This was pointed out to me by the rav of my shul. However, the
Mishna Berurah has a comment that there is a minhag to bentch lulav in the
succah k'vasikin. When I pointed this out to my rav he said tzarich iyun.
The 2 questions I have are 1) according to mishna berurah is it davka
vasikin or any time of the day 2) according to Rav Moshe one should not
even do the nanuim before hallel. You should wait for hallel.

The Rav (Alter Rebbe) writes in his Siddur (printed in the Thilas
Hashem Siddur p.240): Min Haddin in should be said just before Hallel,
but because it's a Mitzvah Min Hamuvchar to take the 4 Minim in the
Sukkah and 1 would not be permitted to leave Shul to go to the Sukkah
(Mipnei Takionas Horoi-im)- he should take the 4 Minim in the Sukkah in
the morning before Davening.

kol tuv
yosef stern

On Fri, Oct 05, 2001 at 11:48:59AM -0400, Leah and Menachem Brick wrote:
:                         The Rav once commented that we hold the esrog
: and lulav together as a sign of our desire to put the esrog back on to
: the Eitz hadaas. I wonder if that could also be part of the rationale
: to the minhag to benching in the Succah. The scach being gidulei karka
: and not being of any material that could be mekabel Tumah.

Note that the esrog is defined as being "ta'am eitzo upiryo shaveh".
Which connects the esrog to the ideal of "eitz peri" rather than the
imprefect "eitz oseh peri".

Also, according to the idea in Tosafos that "tapu'ach" refers to the
esrog, not the apple, the phrase "Chakal Tapuchin Kaddishin" describes
Shamayim using an Esrog Orchard as a metaphor. And a point raised when
discussing CTK is that the orchard leaves its odor on those who pass
through. For example, this expression appears in the description of the
smell of Eisav's garment. But, if we say that it's the esrog -- ta'am
eitzo upiryo shaveh, the odor of the orchard will be that of the esrog.

(See also <http://www.aishdas.org/asp/succos59.html> where I tie
in a R' Kook on day three and some other ideas.)

-mi

-- 
Micha Berger                 "The most prevalent illness of our generation is
micha@aishdas.org            excessive anxiety....  Emunah decreases anxiety:
http://www.aishdas.org       'The Almighty is my source of salvation;  I will
Fax: (413) 403-9905          trust and not be afraid.'" (Isa 12) -Shalhevesya

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