Avodah Mailing List

Volume 23: Number 99

Mon, 07 May 2007

• 1. Re: chumrah of Sefardim (Mike Miller)
• 2. Re: sweet chalot (mkopinsky@gmail.com)
• 3. Re: Parshas Behar (Bahar?) (mkopinsky@gmail.com)
• 4. Re: fashion models and opera singers (Zvi Lampel)
• 5. [Areivim] Lag LaOmer (Johnny Solomon) (Madjsolomon@aol.com)
• 6. Re: Did Shlomo HaMelech lie when suggesting the baby be cut? (mkopinsky@gmail.com)
• 7. Re: Did Shlomo HaMelech lie when suggesting the baby be cut in half (Zoo Torah)
• 8. Rabbi Eliyahu's holocaust comment was nothing new. A letter in the LJN (jameshanley39@yahoo.co.uk)
• 9. Re: Special Case of Name-Calling (T613K@aol.com)
• 10. Rabbi Akiva, his students, and lessons learned (Alan Krinsky)
• 11. SheLomo HaMelech Lied. Truth May Not be Extracted with Deception (Meir Rabi)
• 12. Keli Yakar - miracles (Daniel Eidensohn)

On 5/4/07, Ken Bloom <kbloom@gmail.com> wrote:
> I do this as much as possible. The sepharadi shuls here are makpid to
> only serve water challah. When I do say hamotzi on sweet challah, it's
> because I know I usually eat a lot of challah anyway, so I'll probably
> eat the necessary shiur to say hamotzi regardless.

Are we comparing water challah with sweet challah or egg challah?

Forgive my stepping into my wife's territory (we have an arrangement:
she kneads challah, I bake (aka time + test) it), but many water
challah recipes, perhaps most, also call for _some_ sugar. The water
is in contrast to egg, not sweet.

What exactly is the geder of sweet challah that ROY is referring to?

-- Mike Miller
Ramat Bet Shemesh

On 5/5/07, Eli Turkel <eliturkel@gmail.com> wrote:
> L'maaseh, if you are koveiah seudah, you have to make hamotzi (and do
> Netilas Yadayim) on the sweet chalah as well.  So why wouldn't it count
> for lechem mishneh?>>
>
> Because ROY paskens that keviat seudah is 216 gram (a lot of challah)
> and he paskens like the Chida against Magen Avraham that other
> foods are not included in the amount needed to be koveah seudah.
> Hence sefardim make mezonot on sweet chalah (unless they eat
> a lot of it) and it does not qualify for lechem mishneh
>
> Again the major question for me is what do sefardim in practice when they
> are invited out?
>
This is not that different from the case I've had a few times (including
this week) when I've stayed with people for shabbos, and they have not had
lechem mishneh for shalosh seudos.  (OK, that's significantly different
that at 3S you don't *really* need lechem mishneh.)  This time, my friend
whose family I was with recommended that I just take two pieces of matzah
and make hamotzi on that.  (Tying this back into the original discussion,)
that solution didn't work for him, since he is sfardi and matzah is only
mezonot for him, so he just didn't have lechem mishneh.

KT,
Michael

On 5/6/07, Mike Miller <avodah@mikeage.net> wrote:
> Does anyone know the name of this week's Sedra is not changed from
> Behar to Bahar, for the same reasons that Bemidbar becomes Bamidbar?

To the best of my knowledge, calling Bemidbar, Bamidbar is nothing more
than a mistake.  I guess Bamidbar rolls off the tongue better.  Behar
rolls off the tongue better than Bahar.

Tue, 1 May 2007 from: Elliott Shevin <eshevin@hotmail.com>
>> I believe the Heter was based on the fact that the faces of the women> in the play could not be seen from the seats that were being sold by> ACHDS and the sound heard was that of a microphone reproduction and> not their actual voices. <<

>It seems to me that as a practical matter, some of the actor's own voice 
will be audible, in addition to the sound system--although so little, it 
may be butil. <

When Rabbi Jay Marcus was the Rav of the Young Israel of Staten Island, he told us he ran an experiment in a theatre: He asked the people in charge to turn off the sound equipment for one moment, to see if he could hear the singing. He said he didn't. 

Zvi Lampel


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In response to Yitzchok Levine's mailing, please be aware that it is the  
custom of the Spanish & Portuguese (S&P) Jews' Congregation in London to  use the 
term Lag LaOmer. This term is featured in their siddurim. Furthermore,  the 
customs of this congregation were examined by Rabbi Shem Tob Gaguine in his  
Keter Shem Tob. There in Vol. 1 pgs. 724-725 you will find a lengthy examination 
 of which Nussach is most correct, LaOmer or BaOmer, where he brings  
extensive proofs to support the S&P custom. 
 
Johnny Solomon



   
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On 5/6/07, Daniel Eidensohn <yadmoshe@012.net.il> wrote:
> R, Meir Rabi wrote:
> >
> > Did Shlomo HaMelech lie when he proposed that the baby be cut?
> >
> > The Gemara Shevuos 31 defines MidVar SheKer TirChok as misrepresenting
> > that two witnesses exist thereby inducing an admission, rather than
> > presenting a single witness which only requires that an oath be taken,
> > and we are fairly sure he will swear falsely. There is no suggestion
> > that any testimony is presented, the fake witness just comes along to
> > BD and just by impression, convinces the admission of the defendant.
> >
> >  One would have thought this a fantastic outcome, no lies, false oaths
> > and true restitution. But we are wrong, this is bad, evil and sinful.
> >
> > Now, how was the ploy utilised by Shlomo HaMelech any different? He
> > threatened to cut the baby thereby discovering the true mother.
> >
> Just asked this question to Rav Nosson Kaminetsky. He replied that his
> father Rav Yaakov Kaminetsky said that it was not a lie. Shlomo HaMelech
> in fact was prepared to cut the baby in half. But at the same time
> Shlomo HaMelech was fully convinced that the threat to do so would cause
> the resolution of the question and thus he would not have to follow
> through on his threat.
>

I'm assuming that this understanding is based on the king's broad power
to execute anyone whom he sees fit, without being bound to the specific
rules of beis din.

My chavrusa actually used that idea as a possible answer to the entire
question. In general the king is not bound to the rules of court
proceedings (such as the previous pasuk - Naki V'tzadik al Taharog, which
prevents you from killing someone who is guilty but was mistakenly
acquited in court - a king can kill such a person). Why is he necessarily
bound to the halacha of Midvar Sheker Tirchak?  The question of lying
still exists on the moral plane (and I think Rav Yaakov Kamenetsky's
answer satisfactorally deals with that issue), but on the halachic plane,
perhaps it isn't even a question.

KT,
Michael

R. Daniel Eidensohn

>Just asked this question to Rav Nosson Kaminetsky. He replied that his 
father Rav Yaakov Kaminetsky said that it was not a lie. Shlomo HaMelech 
in fact was prepared to cut the baby in half. But at the same time 
Shlomo HaMelech was fully convinced that the threat to do so would cause 
the resolution of the question and thus he would not have to follow 
through on his threat.

Doesn't this make things worse? Fine, so he didn't lie, but he was perfectly
willing to actually kill an innocent baby?

Natan Slifkin

****
Learn more about Torah and the natural world at www.zootorah.com

Rabbi Eliyahu and the holocaust comment. A letter in the LJN . 3rd May
2007, from Joseph Feld (remember that name!)

" .............Unfortunately Boyden {somebody a that wrote a letter the
week before} connects what happened to him with former [sephardi] Chief
Rabbi [Mordechai] Eliyahu's 'ignorant' comment linking the holocaust to
the rise of reform judaism in Germany. Far from being 'ignorance' or
even original, Rabbi Eliyahu's remarks are part of the long rabbinical
tradition. The maggid of Kelm (who died in 1899) said, "because of the
sin of Geiger's reform code of jewish law, another law will come from
Berlin. It will say that every Jew without exception, must die"
Rabbi Meir Simcha HaCohen of Dvinsk (who died in 1926) writing in his
work Meshech Chochma on Leviticus Chapter 26, spoke of a cycle of jews
trying to become to oassimilated and their host society rejecting them. he
refers to the last stage before the destruction as the generation that
"thinks of Berlin as his jersualem", He aded "the fierce storm of
detruction will emanate from Berlin and leave but a scant remnant. The
survivors will disperse to toher ountries and Torah will strike new
roots". In 1929 the Chofetz Chaim ( who died in 1933) , spoke of
the twelve million who died worldwide in the Great War of 1914 to
1918. "Twelve million? that's child's play! The real thing will begin
in ten years" These rabbis merely alluded to the opinions of rabbici
giants of earlier generations. "
by
Joseph Feld

(in the british jewish press, letters from Joseph Feld and Amnon goldberg
are v interesting)

 
 

>>An anecdotal raayah for the same psak, would be a story I've  heard 
many times of where the baby's father (grandfather?) was near death,  
and they wanted to delay the bris until after, so that they could 
name  the baby after him.

The rav's psak was to do the bris sooner, rather than  later, so that 
the mitzvah would be an additional zechus for his. They did  so, and 
the patient recovered. (Anyone recall this story, and who it was  
about?)<<


Akiva Miller


 
>>>>
Heard a slightly different reason /not/ to delay the bris, viz., that the  
malach Rephael comes to every bris to heal the baby and as long as he was there  
anyway, would heal the grandfather too.  (I don't know how this would work  
if the grandfather was in the ICU rather than in the same house with the baby  
but I think the story happened a long time ago.)



--Toby  Katz
=============



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According to tradition, Rabbi Akiva's 12,000 pairs of students died 
in a plague during the Omer period because they did not show each 
other proper respect. We are meant, it would appear, to learn a 
lesson from this devastating failure in interpersonal behavior. And 
the downfall of the students is all the more striking given Rabbi 
Akiva's emphasis on treating each other well. In hearing the story 
again this past Shabbos, I wondered why the focus and the lesson were 
on the students. What about Rabbi Akiva? He emerges to educate a new 
generation of scholars, but what about his role in his students' 
failings? I of course do not mean myself to offer a critique of Rabbi 
Akiva. But my question is whether or not any traditional sources do 
offer a critique? First of all, does anyone suggest that Rabbi Akiva 
bore some responsibility for the sins of his students? After all, in 
our times, when a child does not thrive in school we no longer assume 
the problem must be with the child--there are different styles of 
learning, and not all teaching methods draw out the potential of all 
students. And secondly, even if Rabbi Akiva was not at fault in any 
way in terms of his teaching or educating or supervision of his 
students, should he not have realized what was going on and stopped 
it well before the situation reached its tragic end? Again, I do not 
wish to present this as a critique--rather, I wish to know if anyone 
has come across any sources discussing such issues?

Alan Krinsky
adkrinsky@netzero.net

 

R Daniel posted: Just asked this question to Rav Nosson Kaminetsky. He
replied that his father Rav Yaakov Kaminetsky said that it was not a lie.
Shlomo HaMelech in fact was prepared to cut the baby in half. But at the
same time Shlomo HaMelech was fully convinced that the threat to do so would
cause the resolution of the question and thus he would not have to follow
through on his threat.

 

This is most disturbing. Is it possible that one may [plan to] murder an
innocent, or if it was not yet 30 days old and is not quite murder it is
still no great Mitzvah, in order to promote justice?

 

If our greatest lesson in these matters is the lie of HKB"H which was
permitted since it was in order to preserve/promote peace, then why can this
not be used as a principle to permit lying and certainly misrepresentation
in order to expose truth? Why does the stratagem of Sh"HaMelech not gain its
legitimacy from HKB"H?

 

BTW, HKB"H lied when it was really unnecessary since there was no need to
say anything besides "Why did Soro laugh?" 

 

 

meir

 

 

 

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I am looking for the source of the story about the Keli Yakar about how 
he saved his family from death after they were thrown in a pit. He was 
born in the pit and there was a special glow associated with him. This 
caught the notice of the proritz who had thrown the family in the pit as 
punishment. They were freed because he was given to the poritz.

Daniel Eidensohn


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