Avodah Mailing List

Volume 08 : Number 042

Tuesday, November 6 2001

• Re: Talmud and science
• Re: Talmud and science
• Re: Shape of the Earth
• coins of Avrohom Avinu, Dovid and Shlomo hamelech
• limits of kedushah?
• Re: BhK
• Re: Birchas habonim
• Brisker Torah was techeiles
• Re: Ikkarim
• interesting more positive explanation of 'am hadomeh lachamor'
• Re: Talmud and science
• Re: Talmud and science
• RE: Talmud and science
• Re: Shape of the Earth
• Re: limits of kedushah?
• use of techelet
• Re: Confessions of a hyper correct leiner?
• chasidim harishonim
• Re: Chasidim harishonim
• Pliny and blue shellfish dyeing; Re: Micha's post on techeiles
• Re: Talmud and science
• Re: Talmud and science

Chana Luntz wrote:
>Just a query for clarification about what is being discussed here -
>what is generally held to be meant when describing "a baby born in the
>eighth month" as opposed to the ninth month or the seventh month.  Is
>the "first" month the month from conception until one month after
>conception, in which case, the eighth month is from  the date seven
>months after conception until eight months after conception, or is the
>first month the month commencing one month after conception - in which
>case the eighth month is the month commencing eight months after
>conception and ending exactly nine months after conception?

A normal pregnancy has the baby born in "the ninth month," which is really 
the tenth month, i.e. after nine full months.



Rich Wolpoe wrote:
>AIUI the prat that Haskafa rejects from Darwin is that Adam was evolved 
>from primates. The Torah states Vayivra es Ha'adam implying that Adam was a 
>new Briya not a derivative, although
>even this can be quibbled.

R. Menachem Kasher (Torah Shelemah, Bereshis ch. 2 no. 16) says that
evolution is untenable within the Torah hashkafah because of the midrash
(Chullin 60a; Rosh Hashanah 11a) that all of the animals were created
bekomasan, beda'atan, and betzivyonam. I'm not sure why he assumes that
everyone agrees to this midrash.

For some midrashim that seem to hint towards evolution, see Torah
Shelemah, Bereshis ch. 1 no. 792; ch. 2 nos. 14, 154; ch. 5 no. 33.

Gil Student

In a message dated 11/1/2001 7:23:25pm EST, Eli.Turkel@colorado.edu writes:
> As a trivial example because doctors can argue whether eggs are healthy
> to eat (it seems to constantly change) 

The point is eggs have ALWAYS been nuritious to eat and they have
always been full of cholesterol and are problematic for anyone with that
condition etc.

The point is the facts can be agreed upon, but the mindset detgermines
GOOD or BAD

Cholesterol and Lecithin are objective components of eggs - to name
just two.
The problem is the value judgments of what is healthy i.e. GOOD are
subejctive. That's the whole etiz hada'sh tov vara coming in to cloud
facts with judgments

Shalom and Regards
Rich Wolpoe
Moderator - TorahInsight@yahoogroups.com
"Knowledge without Insight is like a horse in a library" - Vernon Howard    

In a message dated 11/4/01 1:33:26pm EST, atwood@netvision.net.il writes:
> Also, IIRC there is a Tosephos on Avoda Zara that talks about the earth
> being a sphere (Rebi and Antoninus built a tower so high they could see
> the earth as a sphere...)

A different story is brought in Tos. D"H Kikadur A"Z 41a.

Kol Tuv, 
Yitzchok Zirkind

From: "Eli Turkel" <Eli.Turkel@colorado.edu>
> Can someone explain the recent daf yomi on the coins of avraham avinu
> that had zaken, zakena on one side and naar,naarah on the other side.

> Why would avraham be issuing coins? He was not king of any place?
> According to tosaphot they only had words on the two sides and no pictures
> - sounds like it is easy to forge.

I am not an expert in numismatics and am not learning daf yomi now.

Nevertheless the following thoughts occurred to me upon reading the
above question and perhaps they are of some value.

re why would Avrohom be issuing coins if he was not a King / ruler
- in the past issuing of currency was not always a governmental
function. Avrohom was a pioneer of sorts in this area I think.

re why the coins were made without images - perhaps the technology wasn't
too advanced then or it would be too expensive that way.

Mordechai

If one is in a Merchatz and a poor person asks him for money to buy bread,
he musn't give it to him ?
And if someone asks him to pass a bar of soap he mustn't give it to him ?
Is a person not obligated in Yichud HaShem in such places ?
You can't just make such a blanket statement that was must not do a
Mitzvah in a bathroom (etc.), it depends on what type of mitzvah.

kol tuv
yosef stern

In a message dated 11/2/2001 11:33:58am EST, avrahamyaakov@hotmail.com writes:
> I believe the term "one should not perform mitzvos in this place" is
> an incorrect statement, it is correct that one should not *learn Torah*
> in the bathroom but performing a Mitzvah (DEPENDING which type e.g. all
> Halochos concerning such a place) must/has to be done there if it arises.

Indeed this seems obvious in the sense that cheftza shel mitzva - e.g.
Tzitizis is muttar in a BhK While a chftza of kdusha - e.g. Tefillin -
is not.

Shalom and Regards
Rich Wolpoe
Moderator - TorahInsight@yahoogroups.com
"Knowledge without Insight is like a horse in a library" - Vernon Howard    

In a message dated 10/25/2001 8:13:04am EST, micha@aishdas.org writes:
> Actually, even according to the Ritva, this view isn't kefirah. After
> all, the Ritva also distinguishes between derashah and asmachta. In the
> former case, the derashah creates a din di'oraisa. In the latter, the
> asmachta suggests without mandating a potential dirabbanan or minhag,
> if we want to follow it....

Is this the same as Zecher l'davar i.e in contradiscintion to ray ledavar or 
is that a separate conecpt?

In general, it seems that remazim don't create imperatives nevertheless
they are widely used to confirm them. Some might say that these remazim
are ONLY mnemonic in nature. I sense that a remez is more than a mere
mnemopnic device but less than an imperative. It feels like somethiing
that is "bashert".

Shalom and Regards
Rich Wolpoe
Moderator - TorahInsight@yahoogroups.com
"Knowledge without Insight is like a horse in a library" - Vernon Howard    

In a message dated 10/25/2001 8:13:27am EST, Shlomoh Taitelbaum
<sjtait@surfree.net.il> writes:
> Incorrect, the Rambam writes clearly (in his letters) that his work
> was meant to be learned and understood on its own, without Gemara and
> mefarshim. Which Brisker believes the Rambam?

There are two dinnim in understanding the Rambam

1) As a Sefer for learning TSBP it needs no further elucidation

2) As a Sefer for figuring out peshat in gamara and answering Stiros
you need Brisker Torah!

All kidding aside, The Rambam's original intention AIUI was to to create
a definitive textbook of TSBP and to make Halacha accessible to the
average Jew. I never think he meant to replace deeper leanign amongst
Talmidei Chachamim.

What Brisk did was to read between the lines of the Rambam to figure
out what were the Ramba'sm premises that led him to say what he said

The unfortuante part of that derechi - IMHO - is that at times it winds
up revising the Rambam himself. It is at this point, I dissented
from the Brisker Derech. I still think it has tremendous value in
ferreting out the underlying presumptoins in a Gmara or a Rambam.
It reminds me of the Gmarops that describe the real un-articulated
machlokes tanna'im that explains the Machlokes behind the machlokes.
Brisker Torah does that too. For example see Mishanyos in Brachos re:
the different minhaggim btween BS and BH re: Se'uda The Gmara presumes
that there were underlying machlokeisin....

Shalom and Regards
Rich Wolpoe
Moderator - TorahInsight@yahoogroups.com
"Knowledge without Insight is like a horse in a library" - Vernon Howard    

In a message dated 10/30/2001 10:09:38am EST, Meir.Shinnar@rwjuh.edu writes:
> That is, R Shapiro documents in great length, using both obscure (and some
> perhaps deservedly obscure) sources, as well as very mainstream sources,
> that the 13 ikkarim were not universally accepted. This documentation
> is independent of whether he is academic or Orthodox. The halachic
> consequences are of course dependent on the halachic methodology brought
> to bear on this data.

During the brief 15 minute period between the attack on WTC 1 and WTC
rumors abounded on the radio that the plane crash was an accident
reminiscent of the crash of a B-20 something into the Empire State
Buildign in the 1940's. Now there was a precedent and a svara and a hava
amina for a while that this theory was viable

The question is: can historians 500 years from now pull out the tapes
of the 15 minute interval to prove that "disposed of" theory?

If th WTC is too touchy how about a Jewish State in Uganda? Do you
think that because it was a serious proposalcirca 1901 it is still a
serous idea in 2001?

If you prefer a Torah based model there is an apparent machlokes tannaim
re: whether or not Shabbas and YT are zman Tefillin. Would you say that
if someone NOW wore Tefilin on Shabbas they are being Halachically serious
even though they could make a case for Tannaim having worn Tefillin?

There are many serious ideas that USED to have merit. So what's the point?

BTW, I jsut saw this interesting din in SA YD 242:10
Yesh mi shei'omer... it is assur to permit something that is "tamu'ah"
that appears to the Rabbim that he permitted the prohibitted.

I myself have been admonished privately for posting "radical" ideas no
Mail Jewish because the audience there is not up to handling such ideas.
I was told that since Avodah was a higher level audience I had more
leeway to say things that are unconventional. {Micha probably gets
agita because of this one! <smile>}

Im kein, consider this. The Sridei Eish discussed many innovative ideas
in private communications. They were never meant for public consumption.
Publishing these letters IIRC was quite controversial - not because they
were inaccaurate - but because they were not meant to be publicized.

Similarly, even if the Ikkarim can be challenged by some valid sources,
it would seem to me that discretion is in order lest the masses draw
improper conclusions.

It is one thing to say to the public: "Various details of The ikkarim
were debated by scholars as to their preciese Definitions. As such
there are some legitimate gray areas"

vs.

"Early authorities rejected the Ikkarim as normative" - IOW implying
because they did therefore so can you!

I recall an old adage, "Chachamim hizaharu bedivrecihem!"

Shalom and Regards
Rich Wolpoe
Moderator - TorahInsight@yahoogroups.com
"Knowledge without Insight is like a horse in a library" - Vernon Howard    

Since we just read in the Torah 'shivu lochem po im hachamor' in the end
of Vayeira in the parsha of the aqeidah, I think it is kidai to mention
a vort I heard a while ago at a conference about Noachides held in
Manhattan (at CSL - IIRC it was around March 5760).

One of the best speakers (perhaps the best IMHO) was Rabbi Michael Katz,
former Rabbi in (Chattanooga?) TN, who came into contact with Noachides
there and became an advisor of sorts to them.

He said that we are taught by Chaza"l that the nearim that Avrohom said
'shivu lochem po im hachamor' to were Yishmoel and Eliezer - 'lads'
that were part of the camp / entourage of Avrohom Avinu, as opposed to
totally foreign / opposing people.

If we think about it, the chamor is the only (?) animal that is
not kosher, but yet has a mitzvah connected to it - namely pidyon
peter chamor. So, in a way, it is a bridge between the kosher and
non-kosher. So, he said, the same with the Noachides - they are a bridge /
in the middle between am Yisroel, chosen by Hashem for a special mission,
and the rest of the world......

This gives 'am hadomeh lachamor' a much more positive flavor than it
had in the way many thought of it in the past, I believe....

Btw, I think I heard a vort somewhat similar subsequently (which also
gives am hadomeh lachamor' a much more positive flavor than it had in
the way many thought of it in the past).

Tangentially, I have read from fans of Donkeys (speak to people from the
American Donkey and Mule Society / see their websites, e.g.) that they
get a bad rap (e.g. they are stereotyped as 'dumb' and slow animals,
etc.), which is not deserved. Perhaps / I suspect that this unfair
negative stereotype of donkeys may have influenced the perhaps unduly
negative interpretation by some of 'am hadomeh lachamor'.

Comments?

Mordechai

In message <F912fScvKqPgynYFVJT0000d557@hotmail.com>, Gil Student
<gil_student@hotmail.com> writes:
>A normal pregnancy has the baby born in "the ninth month," which is really 
>the tenth month, i.e. after nine full months.

In that case, the due date that is given by the hospital system would
seem to fall within the eighth month halachically.  That is, the
definition of a full term baby as defined by modern medicine would seem,
if your definition is correct, to be incapable of surviving according to
the halacha.  In fact, according to modern medicine, a full term baby is
any time up to three weeks before the due date (ie from 37 weeks), which
according to your definition covers most of the eighth month.

Regards
Chana
(who has just discovered that her baby, arriving at 38 weeks was an
eight month baby according to this definition of an eight month baby.)

PPS if an eight month baby is born - halachically ought he to have
a pidyon haben? My son did, and it was not one of the questions we
were asked.

I wrote:
>A normal pregnancy has the baby born in "the ninth month," which is really 
>the tenth month, i.e. after nine full months.

Forget what I wrote.

Gil Student

From: kennethgmiller@juno.com [mailto:kennethgmiller@juno.com]
> My recollection is that halacha presumed 8th month babies to be
> non-viable, but that 7th month babies *are* viable. If my memory is wrong,
> I apologize. But if I have it right, then either (a) they did collect
> statistics but nishtaneh hateva, or (b) the presumed non-viability of
> 8th-month babies was based on something other than statistics.

As I recall, my brother in law, Dr. Eddie Reichman, in his article in
Tradition (I believe "The Rabbinic Conception of Conception") wrote that
non-Jewish medicine at the time of the gemara believed that 7th month,
but not 8th month, babies are viable. It would be interesting to find
out when the non-Jews changed their minds.

Kol tuv,
Moshe

Akiva Atwood wrote:
>The diameter of the earth (as a sphere) was first calculated well before 
>Rabbeinu Tam (COSMOS goes into the history of the calculations).

Of course. But that does not mean that it was the normative view,
particularly in Ashkenazic areas where the church had tremendous influence
over scientific pursuits.

Would you expect rabbonim to follow a renegade scientist, even if he is
later proven to be correct? I would expect them to follow the accepted
theories of the universe.

Gil Student

From: "yosef stern" <avrahamyaakov@hotmail.com>
> If one is in a Merchatz and a poor person asks him for money to buy bread,
> he musn't give it to him ? ...
> You can't just make such a blanket statement that was must not do a
> Mitzvah in a bathroom (etc.), it depends on what type of mitzvah.

I believe it is only Kavod-related mitzvot that are out-of-place in
such a place, i.e. standing up for a Talmid Chochom etc.. Otherwise,
remember Dovid HaMelech's chagrin at being bereft of mitzvot, until
remembering his Milah.

Stuart Goldstein  

On Thu, Nov 01, 2001 at 06:21:22PM +0000, Seth Mandel wrote:
>: Whatever the explanation, it does not change my other point: that the
>: Litvishe roshei yeshiva were open to new ideas, and not as subject to
>: communal pressure, did not wear the Radzyne t'kheles even as a sofek.

[Micha Berger:]
> My point was not that they could be subject to communal pressure, but
> that such pressure existed; that the inyan at the time was the subject
> of heated argument.

> Today, even given recent discussion here, the same is not true. The
> usability of murex does not threaten communal unity.

I do not find this whole argument very convincing. First as we have
already heard numerous gedolim wore techelet in the past without
making it public. We have no way of knowing how many other achronim
did also. At least some people on this list also wear techelet without
publicizing it. I have heard from Ptil techelet that a number of major
rabbinical figures in the charedi world wear their techelet privately
without publicizing it.

Whether they do this for halachic reasons for because of public pressure
we cannot tell.

However, it is clear that one cannot use the public appearance of techelet
as a measure of its acceptance.

Eli Turkel

In his comments on RMF's remarks on pronunciation by different eidot,
R' Seth wrote re: R' Zalman Hanau's rule that a sh'va merahef is a sh'va
na' <<R. Zalman Henua, who was condemned by g'dolim of the time, became
something of a standard, both in the changes in nusah which he invented,
and in his rules of grammar: whoever the Lyubavitche chasidim got to put
in the niqqud to their siddur followed R. Zalman's rules, which were a
complete fabrication.>>

I am not defending the Chabad adoption of RZ"H's sh'va na' but would to
point out that they are not alone.

My old Chore "Siddur Hashalem" (printed in Europe before WWW) also marks
the sh'va na' according to RZ"H. Also the Hebrew Publishing Co siddurim
of my childhood had a horizontal line above the sh'va na' by the same
discredited shitta.

And to make the story more interesting, the Keset Hasofer (Chelek Bet)
of R' Shlomo Gantzfried of KSA fame also follows RZ"H.

So, despite the GR"A's rejection, R' Zalman was quite successful for a
some 200 years before going out of style.



Re: the Teimani pronunciation, R' Seth wrote << have almost a Litvish
holam, excuse me, kheilem.>>

The Teimanim are not homogenous. The kheilim is the norm In the southern
part of Teiman, but in the San'a vicinity, (as I remember posting some
years back in Avodah) the kholam sounds more like a Galitzianer khoilem
but with the lips more scroonched up.

R' Seth, your heritage is showing, Not all Teimanim are Litvaks, Some,
the elite of San'a, are Galitzianer. Is my heritage showing?

David

 sadya targum wrote:
>Why do we assume that the 3-hour period was the norm? The chasidim
> harishonim may have been a small group of unusually pious men..

See Shulchan Aruch Horav Hilchos Talmud Torah chap.4 #6 where he says
that the only reason that the chasidim harishonim were permitted to
spend so much time in their Teffilah is because they already learnt the
complete Torah and Torahsom Mishtameres Beyodom. But other people who
have not reached such levels were not permitted to take so long because
learning Torah is greater. (look there for the details).

kol tuv
yosef stern

To my question:
> Why do we assume that the 3-hour period was the norm? The chasidim
> harishonim may have been a small group of unusually pious men, while 
> the average person davened just as quickly as we do nowadays. Surely 
> today, too, there are tzadikim whose davening takes inordinately longer
> than the average.

Micha Berger responded 
> As RCS noted, the gemara notes the 3 hours period, but only comments
> on the abnormality of the one hour preparation time.

First of all, what the g'mara asks is "if they spend nine hours
in t'fila, how is their Torah preserved and when is their work
accomplished?" (Showing, incidentally, that the hours mentioned are
literal, and not, as someone suggested, unspecified time periods.)
The question was the whole nine hours, not just preparation time.
In any event, even if the question is about the preparation time,
there is still no indication that the one-hour t'fila was the norm.
It may have been the practice of a very limited group of chasidim,
while the average person may have spent no more than we do today.
Why the assumption of generational decline?

R. Shlomoh Taitelbaum wrote:
From my unpublished response to Dr. Singer's article:
>"And we can clearly deduce from the classical scholars that the color
>blue was produced from the purple snail.

Maybe not so clear. Apparently, nobody outside of the "murex trunculus is
chilazon" camp seems to think that conchylia was blue. In the academic
literature the question is over the exact shade of purple. I'm not aware
of any that suggest it is blue. While it is certainly accepted by many
that the source of Pliny's conchylia is murex trunculus(MT), this is
understood to refer to the natural dye produced by MT, a blue-purple.
Irving Ziderman uses this as support for his position that techeiles is
really blue-purple, the MT dye without conversion to straight indigo
(though I don't see how "proof" that MT was used to dye blue-purple
automatically makes it techeiles). I don't see your jump to blue as very
logical. If Pliny wanted to say blue, he had other words available to
him. You yourself say that the color blue for heliotrope was denoted by
"caeruleum". Blue was not a difficult color to describe - he had choices
(also lividum, which means "bluish"). He used those words elsewhere to
mean blue. Or he could have likened the color to the heliotrope. He was
able to clearly convey the color blue in different ways in other places,
and yet here he uses conchylia. Obviously this was a color that was not
well described by other words. You say that conchylia comes in several
colors, including "heiliotrope (blue), mallow and violet flowers".. Yet,
Pliny seems to be speaking of a specific color, especially considering he
then describes the process. If he wanted to imply the heliotrope (blue)
type of conchylia, he could have said it. The natural blue-purple color
of MT would however have been more difficult to describe, and conchylia,
which includes various colors in the blueish-purple-violet range would
seem to be a good choice. Note that the conchylia color clearly does
not mean a deep indigo blue, as Pliny says about conchylia "much admired
paleness, avoiding deep coloration" (IX,LXIV,138).


R' Micha wrote:
>Today, even given recent discussion here, the same is not true. The
>usability of murex does not threaten communal unity.

"Threaten communal unity" - seems  a bit late for that!  Certainly what
Radzyn went through is not being repeated.  There are many reasons for
this.  Of course, part of it is because the reaction is always the biggest
the first time, so it is not a new subject now.  Part of it may be because
in general I think we are more apathetic as a people nowadays and generally
don't get as heated.  Another reason, however, does a lot to explain what
happened during the times of the Radzyner when he and his group were
attacked so viciously (they were banned from some mikvehs, not buried in
some cemetaries, and there were at least questions about whether they were
posul l'eidus).  When I was a bochur (can't recall what century that was),
another bochur told me he had heard Rav Nachman Bullman say that there was
great opposition to the Radzyner because of the ongoing problem with the
Maskilim, and that it was dangerous for orthodox to look like they were
making major changes.  I think this is very insightful.  It helps to
explain the violent response of some to the Radzyner, and further explains
why some would only wear it privately and not let it be known.

R' Micha also wrote:
>On Fri, Nov 02, 2001 at 11:03:28AM -0500, Mendel Singer wrote:
>>: 1.	Comes up once every 7 or 70 years. 
>>: Rabbi Herzog considered this to be an important criterion. His candidate,
>>: Janthina, had a periodicity, and he devotes a fair amount of space to
>>: this idea in his dissertation. Currently, there is no reasonable way to
>>: explain how murex trunculus fits this description...

>And yet it did. Or at least, in the trash heaps of shells, murex
>shells are found in bands. It would seem that they were harvested
>only in certain periods, with regular breaks in between.

>I do not claim to know why.

Actually, it seems they were harvested until there weren't any and moved
on. They could move back when the supply was replenished. However,
nothing suggests an unusual, sudden abundance or periodicity of years.
I wouldn't reject MT strictly on this, however. It can be hard for us
today to know that in ancient times a species would on rare occasions
suddenly become extremely plentiful. The difficulty in applying this
criterion is the reason I believe the Rambam did not mention this in his
halachos of tzitzis. We do know of various species that have had unusual
abundances during this century. Someone once told me about a web site
mentioning this. Remarkably, one of these species is the.....common
cuttlefish (sorry, I did not see murex listed - don't recall if any
Janthina species were listed). There were occasional reports during the
20th century of mass invasions of cuttlefish, and/or mass strandings of
cuttlefish shells in or off the North Sea. see for example:

http://www.abdn.ac.uk/eurosquid/interest2.htm
http://www.wildlifetrust.org.uk/cornwall/species/cuttle.htm

When this was pointed out to me I consulted some experts in cephalopods
and was directed toward several sources. Apparently in 1950(?), off
the North Sea, there were so many cuttlefish bones on the shoreline that
they formed a large band across the beach and was notes in The Times.

Certainly interesting, if not more.


Lastly, R. Micha wrote:
>On Fri, Nov 02, 2001 at 01:58:59PM +0000, Seth Mandel wrote:
>>:                     I continue to believe that the evidence is not much
>>: better than it was 85 years ago. The only change has been that it has
>>: been discovered that you can make a color fast dye of the right shadeof
>>: blue from Murex....

...
>RMT and I made each argued, using very different arguments, that the
>possibility of making such a dye is a critical point and potentially
>sufficient proof.

I have to agree that the discovery of the ability to make blue dye
from murex is indeed significant, and thereby deserving of attention
and review.

However, just as we have now discovered how to dye blue from murex,
who knows what other secrets of dyeing blue will yet be discovered.
This is hardly sufficient proof. To say that murex had to be it because
otherwise the Gemara would have warned us about it is, as has been said
before, illogical. Natural murex trunculus dye was worth far more than
indigo, and plant indigo was readily available. Certainly no reason for
the goyim to use murex to dye blue, nor for that matter, counterfeiters.
Why would a counterfeiter substitute murex indigo when he could use
cheaper plant indigo? The Gemara does not warn us about theoretical
fakes. The Gemara only needs to warn us about fakes that were actually
a problem in practice.

Why would someone choose to use murex trunculus derived indigo blue as
a fake techeiles instead of plant indigo blue?

mendel

On 5 Nov 01, at 17:08, Chana Luntz wrote:
> PPS if an eight month baby is born - halachically ought he to have
> a pidyon haben? My son did, and it was not one of the questions we
> were asked.

Why would you think not? We wait a month to make sure the baby is not
a nefel. As I understand the Gemara, the only difference between an
eight-month baby and a seven or nine-month baby was that we were not
mechalel Shabbos for it because R"L it was a chazaka that it would not
live. But the metzius that the baby lived to be a month should be oiker
the chazaka and cause us to treat that baby like any other.

-- 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.

In message <200111052337.fA5NbdS07556@lmail.actcom.co.il>, Carl and
Adina Sherer <sherer@actcom.co.il> writes
>On 5 Nov 01, at 17:08, Chana Luntz wrote:
>> PPS if an eight month baby is born - halachically ought he to have
>> a pidyon haben? My son did, and it was not one of the questions we
>> were asked.

>Why would you think not? 

Because I wasn't (still aren't) sure at what point the baby is regarded as
viable and the muzta restriction lifted. My best guess would have been
that the same month used for pidyon haben would be the defining test -
but it wasn't clear to me that that ought to be the case.

>We wait a month to make sure the baby 
>is not a nefel. As I understand the Gemara, the only difference 
>between an eight-month baby and a seven or nine-month baby was 
>that we were not mechalel Shabbos for it because R"L it was a 
>chazaka that it would not live.

Yes, but at what point is the chazaka lifted - one week, two weeks,
three weeks, all its life?

> But the metzius that the baby lived 
>to be a month should be oiker the chazaka and cause us to treat 
>that baby like any other. 

So are you saying that for each shabbas up to a month the baby should
be muktza, but that after a month it would not? An alternative might be
when it went into the nineth month (which for an eight month baby would
be before the pidyon haben). On the other hand, maybe for a normal
baby we need a month to see that it is not a nefel, for a baby with a
presumed status of nefel we need longer.

Regards
Chana

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