Avodah Mailing List

Volume 25: Number 78

Thu, 21 Feb 2008

• 1. Yismach Moshe (SBA)
• 2. Avodah : connection (saul mashbaum)
• 3. Be Careful What You Wish For (Meir Rabi)
• 4. Re: FW: Be Careful What You Wish For (T613K@aol.com)
• 5. meal size (Michael Makovi)
• 6. Re: ketoret klaf (Akiva Blum)
• 7. Re: Baruch Shelo Asani Eved (Micha Berger)
• 8. Re: kashering chumras (Micha Berger)
• 9. Re: thought re tonight's RYReisman shiur (Micha Berger)
• 10. Re: [Areivim] Zayin adar (Micha Berger)
• 11. Re: assisted suicide (Micha Berger)
• 12. Hebrew grammar - anticipatory noun (Michael Makovi)
• 13. Re: Baruch Shelo Asani Eved (Zev Sero)
• 14. Love the ger - who? (Michael Makovi)
• 15. Re: [Areivim] Zayin adar (Zev Sero)
• 16. Re: Love the ger - who? (Zev Sero)

From: Micha Berger < >
 Cantor Wolberg wrote:
: Z.S. wrote: There's no mitzvah of simcha on Shabbos.

: Then how do you explain "Yismach Moshe. Yismach Moshe, but MRAH too is
described as being sameiach with something else "bematenas chelqo", not
simply because it's Shabbos.
>>

There are 2 pshatim for Moshe's Simcha.
1) "Ki eved neeman koroso lo" ie, that Hashem called him His faithful
servant.

Or 2) Referring to the Midrash which relates that while still in Paroy's
house he saw how the Jews were laboring 7 days a week, and he pleaded with
Paroy on their behalf saying that working them non-stop will kill off his
slaves and suggested that he give them one day a week off to recover their
strength.

Paroy agreed and asked MR which day they should be given, to which he
suggested Shabbos.

Later on when HKBH gave made Shabbos the day of rest, "Yismach Moshe" -Moshe
was happy that HKBH had approved of his choice of day.

SBA

RSZNewman
>>
please point me to a source  on the connection  between  the 3 issurim-  moving the baddim, lo yiznach hachoshen , and lo yikareah of the meil
>>
I can't answer the qustion at the moment. but I have such a good vort on
"lo yikareah" of the meil, from the Rogochover, that I want to share it
with the chevra.
The Rambam (Klei Mikdash 9:3) says that  one who tears the meil gets malkot
 because of "lo yikareah". Furthermore, the Rambam says, one who tears
*any* of the bigdei k'huna in a destructive way  gets malkot ; the
m'forshim say that this is from the pasuk "lo taasu ken Lashem...". The
obvious question is, since tearing the meil is assur even without the issur
of "lo yikarea", why is there any such an issur at all? What is the nafka
mina between these two issurim?
The Rogochover cites the gemara Shabbat 120b, which says about "lo taasu
kol m'lacha": "asiya hu d'assur,  ha gramma shari" Since the issur of
destroying any part of the Beit MaMikdash or its keilim is also formulated
as "lo taasu", this principle applies to that case as well: gramma is
patur.
However, the issur of tearing the meil is in the passive "lo yikareah".
Thus anyone who *causes* the meil to be torn violates this prohibition, and
is loke. Unlike most issurim, gramma is chayyav by the tearing	of the
meil.
I saw this in the 5 volume "Tzafnat Paneach al HaTorah", edited by R. M. Kasher.
Saul Mashbaum
 

There is a difference between "lo taasu ken" and "lo yikarea" which is
indicated by the active and passive voices in these commandments -- grama.
Grama would be patur in "lo taasu ken", which forbids active asiyah. But
"yo yikarea", being passive, means that someone who *causes* the meil to be
torn has violated this issur, and thus is chayav.
Saul Mashbaum
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Rbtzn Toby Katz said, "Miriam's "chutzpa" was the kind of imploring,
wheedling behaviour a charming child might show towards a doting parent."
[Meir Rabi] this interpretation does not appear to read easily in the words
Chazal use to describe what Miryam did and said. I think that even the most
liberal minded parent would be rather uncomfortable to hear their child
comparing their well meaning strategies and actions to those of an
established enemy of the Jewish people who intended and implemented plans to
destroy us wholesale.
And to twist the dagger, she is named PuAh to remind us and honour Miryam
for being brazen faced.
And the Torah celebrates this and preserves for posterity such behaviour. 

 
 
In a message dated 2/19/2008, meirabi@optusnet.com.au writes:

>>she is named PuAh to remind us and honour Miryam
for being  brazen faced.<<


>>>>>>
not pshat
 
Rashi gives a completely different reason for the name (she cooed to the  
newborns soothingly),  and says nothing about her "chutzpa" but only says  what 
her argument was, and that Amram conceded she was right.  He says  nothing 
about her tone of voice but only her logic and also her nevuah -- that  she 
foresaw that her parents would have another baby and that he would be the  goel.

 

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





**************Ideas to please picky eaters. Watch video on AOL Living.      
(http://living.aol.com/video/how-to-please-your-picky-eater/rach
el-campos-duffy/
2050827?NCID=aolcmp00300000002598)
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Was: Arevim

>  To explain how he arrived at his conclusions, Rabbi Bodner states that a
> K'zayis means that the item is the size of an olive.  The Shulchan Aruch
> states that this shiur is a measurement of cubic volume, and explains that
> volume is measured by submerging an item in water and measuring the amount
> of water that it displaces.  =85an item having the cubic volume of .96 of a
> fluid ounce fills the requirement of a k'zayis for making a bracha achrona.
>In order to make a bracha achrona on a k'zayis, it must be
> consumed within Kdei Achilas Pras, which, according to Rabbi Bodner is
> l'chatchila is up to three minutes, and b'dieved, up to four minutes.
>

In terms of Rabbi Chaim Na'eh, Rabbi Moshe Feinstein, and Chazon Ish,
where does this fit?

Mikha'el Makovi

 
> 
> A friend of mine here in Manchester, a Talmid Chochom of 
> substance, has expressed reservation about this Ketoros on 
> Klaf Segulah.
> 
> This passage is a Bryso in the Talmud; by definition part of 
> Torah Sh'Baal Peh. There exits an ancient dictum that TSB"P 
> should remain and remembered in verbal form and not be put 
> into writing.
> 
> This dictum was suspended in extremis to prevent Torah to be 
> forgotten. To write down TSB"P for other purposes is less 
> than otiose: hence to use it for a "Segulah" is pointless or worse.
> 
> My friend has discussed the matter with a number of Gedolim 
> including R' Chaim Kanievsky, he tells me, and all concur.

Did that include Rav Moshe Sternbuch. I seem to recall seeing him once, when
I was much younger, reading ketores from a klaf.

Akiva

To answer RnTK's question -

The SA says that a geir does not say "shelo asani goy". The Rama
assures him that he may/should say the other two. Rather, at least as
explained by the MB. he should say "she'asani ger", as per "hanefesh
asher asu beCharan". Asiyah doesn't end at birth.

According to this pesaq, a geir can't say berakhos for the amud,
except for a minyan of geirim.

However, the MA and the SA haRav both say that al pi qabbalah, a geir
can say "shelo asani goy". I was told that Count Avraham ben Avraham
Potocki Hy"d, would have said "shelo asani nachri". IOW, that Gra held
accordingly, with the caveat that the Gra himself said "nachri" rather
than "goy". (How can you say "shelo asani goy"? Are we not the "goy
qadosh"?)

The reason why is either:

1- Geirim too were at Har Sinai, so in a sense geirim were born Jews
who just took a while to realize the fact. This is why the idiom is a
"ger shenisgayeir" -- the person was always omeid lihyos geir, even
before the geirus.

or:
2- The berakhah includes thanking HQBH for the possibility of geirus
and the resulting shift of neshamah.

With gilgulim, they aren't even mutually exclusive. The extra, Yehudi,
nitzotz haneshamah was separated off from the rest and subsequently
restored through geirus.

SheTir'u baTov!
-micha

-- 
Micha Berger             "Man wants to achieve greatness overnight,
micha@aishdas.org        and he wants to sleep well that night too."
http://www.aishdas.org     - Rav Yosef Yozel Horwitz, Alter of Novarodok
Fax: (270) 514-1507

On Fri, February 15, 2008 1:09 pm, Rn Shayna Livia Korb wrote:
: So he concluded - which is really good internal logic - that kashering
: means that you make something as hot as it would ever be, and then a
: little more - so the hottest stuff would ever be in your kitchen is
: boiling, and then you make it a little more with the metal. Because of
: this conclusion, at the end of kashering his oven, he throws a match
in.
: Maximum temperature it can go, plus a little more.

This is how I understood qabalaso kakh polto. With the added bit that
since you can't guarantee exact equality ("kakh") you have to
overshoot.

SheTir'u baTov!
-micha

On Sat, February 16, 2008 9:56 pm, Michael Poppers wrote:
: Hearing RYR talk about "galus m'chaperes avon," I couldn't help
: thinking of one "'prav'ing galus" example he didn't mention: CHaBaD
: shlichim.
: May all hol'chei d'rachim merit to have their t'filos answered.

Interesting choice of phrasing: The farmers and the kohein gadol would
not agree.

SheTir'u baTov!
-micha

Another source, RHSchachter's devar Torah just sent out by TorahWeb
<http://www.torahweb.org/torah/2008/moadim/rsch_adar.html>.

Also, I see the Rambam says that mazal teleh is defined by the vernal
equinox (roughly March 21). This means that mazalos are associated
with 1/12 of the solar year, not the month and not the sidereal year
(one rotation of the starry backdrop, which differs by the solar year
by a day every 71 years, which is how the vernal equinox can move into
D'li, causing "the dawning of the age of Aquarius").

Even though we talk as though it has something to do with the chodesh
and the galgal mazalos, the Rambam uses a definition that involves
neither.

The same is implied by Rashi, Eiruvin 56b. Rashi says that tequfas
Tammuz begins on the longest day of the year, appx June 21, and
therefore the sun is farthest south. Similarly, tequfas Teves is
shortest, furthest north. However, the gemara says that the
northernmost mazal is Eglah and the southernmost is Akrav, not Gedi
(mazal Teves) and Sartan (mazal Tammuz).

This is because the solar year lost 3/4 of a mazal or so from matan
Torah to Chazal, and another 1 mazal from the tannaim until today. But
according to Rashi and the Rambam, the physical mazalos have nothing
to do with the influence of the mazal. (Much like the 6th hour and
Maadim?)

In addition, the imprecision of the calendar causes a second slippage.
There are now years in which Nissan is the 2nd month of spring, not
the first. As there are 6 seasons, Nissan would still be within Aviv;
even if it's a stretch to call the non-initial month the "Chodesh
ha'Aviv". So, even by the solar definition of mazalos, not every
Nissan is mazal Teleh.

When the calendar was made, Adar II would always be the last month
before the vernal equinox, and thus always be mazal Dagim. The
siderial year is a non-issue, and the halachic calendar didn't lost a
day against its origins yet. Today, there are years (like this one) in
which Adar II is in Teleh, and Adar I would be Dagim.

SheTir'u baTov!
-micha

-- 
Micha Berger             "Man wants to achieve greatness overnight,
micha@aishdas.org        and he wants to sleep well that night too."
http://www.aishdas.org     - Rav Yosef Yozel Horwitz, Alter of Novarodok
Fax: (270) 514-1507

I thought the relevent din WRT Shimshon was Milkhemes Mitzvah. In a
milkhamah, sacrificing the few to save the many is the norm. Even if
it's sacrificing oneself for the opportunity to destroy the entire
Pelishti nobility in one fell swoop.

SheTir'u baTov!
-micha

>  1- Geirim too were at Har Sinai, so in a sense geirim were born Jews
>  who just took a while to realize the fact. This is why the idiom is a
>  "ger shenisgayeir" -- the person was always omeid lihyos geir, even
>  before the geirus.

I'm not sure, but I suspect that perhaps it is a Hebrew idiom to name
a noun anticipatorily for its verb. For example, hanofel falling
without the parapet (with the exception of Rabbi Yishmael) - the
person who is going to fall is called the faller. Perhaps similarly,
we call a gentile who is going to convert, the convert who converts?

Any grammar curmudgeons know about this?

Mikha'el Makovi

Micha Berger wrote:

> This is why the idiom is a "ger shenisgayeir" -- the person was
> always omeid lihyos geir, even before the geirus.

I've never understood this particular proof, from the fact that it
doesn't say "nochri shenisgayer".  It seems to me that "ger shenisgayer"
is exactly parallel to "ketinok shenolad".  Had the memra been "ger
shenisgayer ke'ubar shenolad" then the proof would make sense, because
"ger" would have been shown to be parallel to "ubar".  But since he is
being compared to a "tinok", the term used had to be "ger" not "nochri",
and it would have been so even if the baal hamemra did *not* consider a
ger to have been in any way Jewish before his giyur.

-- 
Zev Sero               Something has gone seriously awry with this Court's
zev@sero.name          interpretation of the Constitution.
                                                  - Clarence Thomas

It seems impossible to deny that the word "ger" doesn't mean, strictly
speaking, a convert, but rather anyone who is a stranger or foreigner
or alien. Indeed, Avraham and Moshe call themselves gerim, and we are
described as having been gerim in Egypt, and obviously no conversions
were involved. So it seems that apparently, ger means an alien or
immigrant, but we presume that the ger being spoken of is davka an
alien/immigrant who converts and not simply stam a ger. Similarly,
when we say (in English) that converts are XYZ (insert any halacha of
gerim), we presume a convert to Judaism and not one to Buddhism.

Now then, the question I have is, does anyone say that "ger"
halachically includes ger toshav? I invited some controversy earlier
on Avodah with my claim that Mesechet Gerim chap 2 does so. I think
that Sifra, on the other hand, explicitly says that love the ger means
only a ger tzedek. Rashi to Shemot 22:20 (I think) says that a ger
includes any foreigner, even a Jew from another town - I don't know
what his source is (anyone?) but he doesn't seem to limit ger to ger
tzedek. The Gemara AFAIK, never says that love the ger is davka ger
tzedek; it says don't taunt him for previously eating pork, but it
never says which kind of ger it means. Does anyone know anything more
about this?

I know that Vayikra 25:35 speaks of the ger and the toshav. Rashi says
the ger is ger tzedek and toshav is ger toshav. Presuming this is from
the Gemara, it would imply that halachically, a ger in the Chumash is
davka a ger tzedek, because ger toshav is apparently the stam toshav
in the Chumash according to this line of interpretation. Anyone know
any Gemara sources on the "toshav"?

In any case, from where do we get the mitzvah to love a ger toshav
(love the ger, or somewhere else), and how (if at all) is it
distinguished from loving re'acha and the ger?

Rav Hirsch to Shemot 1:14 speaks of our gerut in Egypt, and he then
goes into the mitzvah of loving strangers in Israel. He mentions
nothing of accepting the Torah, only of accepting the 7 Mitzvot, so he
seems to conceptually link "for you were gerim in Egypt" (and
therefore love the ger) to not only the ger tzedek but also the ger
toshav. In his perush to Shemot 12, verses 45 and 48, on the other
hand, he distinguishes between the two. In 19 Letters and Horeb, he
waxes extensively about loving all of humanity and one's gentile
neighbors, and the perush by Rabbi Joseph Elias suggests Rav Hirsch
held one can be a ger toshav without a kabbalah before a beit din.

Related to this is an anecdote from Gemara class: After a shiur on
vehavta l'reacha kamocha, going through all the sources
(interestingly, we never saw Rashi on the pasuk, but we did see Rashi
on the Gemara about Hillel and the gentile-on-one-foot), someone asked
about loving the gentile. After giving his personal answer (b'vadai
one should love all humanity, even all creation, but the Torah only
requires, legally, what is most feasible for the average person - this
is from a Rav Kook sort of perspective), my rav quickly said "Mikha'el
Makovi can give anyone a list of sources that "ger" actually means a
gentile [for the mitzvah of loving a ger]" before he ran out the door.
Now, unfortunately, I *don't* have a list of sources for this (but
apparently my teacher does?), but boy, does he know me well! As an
aside then, when he tells me I should go to Yeshivat Maale Gilboa next
year, I'm inclined to take him for his word.

Mikha'el Makovi

Micha Berger wrote:

> Even though we talk as though it has something to do with the chodesh
> and the galgal mazalos, the Rambam uses a definition that involves
> neither.

Actually it does.  The Galgal Hamazalos is the 9th sphere, not the 8th.
The mazalos are signs, not constellations.  A sign is a 30-degree arc
of sky, regardless of what stars are in it.  The Rambam explicitly
acknowledges the precession of the equinoxes, and characterises it not
as a process that causes the sun to move slowly through the constellations
but as one that the constellations to move slowly through the mazalos.

He says the mazalos were named for the constellations that began entering
them at the time of the mabul, almost two "ages" ago, and since around
the time of the 2nd churban the constellation Pisces has been in the
sign of Aires, while the constellation Aires has been in the sign of
Taurus.  In 200 years or so the constellation Aquarius will move into
the sign of Aires, but it will remain the same sign it was before.

-- 
Zev Sero               Something has gone seriously awry with this Court's
zev@sero.name          interpretation of the Constitution.
                                                  - Clarence Thomas

Michael Makovi wrote:

> Now then, the question I have is, does anyone say that "ger"
> halachically includes ger toshav? I invited some controversy earlier
> on Avodah with my claim that Mesechet Gerim chap 2 does so. I think
> that Sifra, on the other hand, explicitly says that love the ger means
> only a ger tzedek. Rashi to Shemot 22:20 (I think) says that a ger
> includes any foreigner, even a Jew from another town - I don't know
> what his source is (anyone?) but he doesn't seem to limit ger to ger
> tzedek.

Sorry, that is not at all what Rashi is saying there.  His comment is
not on the first clause, "veger lo toneh", but on the second clause,
"ki gerim heyitem be'eretz Mitzrayim".  Rashi's intended five-year-old
audience might well wonder what our ancestors converted to in Egypt,
so Rashi explains that "ger" just means stranger.  He does not in any
way hint that the commandments on how to treat gerim apply to Jewish
travellers.

-- 
Zev Sero               Something has gone seriously awry with this Court's
zev@sero.name          interpretation of the Constitution.
                                                  - Clarence Thomas


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