Avodah Mailing List

Volume 25: Number 439

Wed, 31 Dec 2008

• 1. Re: Modern Day Sifrei Torahs (T6...@aol.com)
• 2. Cameras and AC on Shabbas (Harvey Benton)
• 3. Re: Cameras and AC on Shabbas (Micha Berger)
• 4. woman reading a ketuba (Eli Turkel)
• 5. Re: woman reading a ketuba (Micha Berger)
• 6. Re: woman reading a ketuba (Mike Miller)
• 7. sins of our forefathers (Eli Turkel)
• 8. amen to birkhot hashachar (Shlomo Pick)
• 9. Re: Rav Aviner on Amen Meals (Chana Luntz)
• 10. A Unique Contribution of Judaism (Yitzchok Levine)
• 11. Re: Rav Aviner on Amen meals (Doron Beckerman)
• 12. Re: woman reading a ketuba (Rich, Joel)
• 13. Re: woman reading a ketuba (Harry Maryles)

From:  Harvey Benton _harveybenton@yahoo.com_ (mailto:harveyben...@yahoo.com) 



>>A  number of sources indicate that the Sifrei Torahs we now
have in our  possession may not be the exact (letter for letter) same one as 
was
given  to Moshe Rabeinu:



Yerushalmi Taanit 4:2 and Soferim 6:4 mention  an episode
where 3 Sifrei Torah were found in the Azara of the Second  Temple
with varying texts.... 


Kiddusin 30a mentions the Vav of  Gachon as the middle letter
of the Torah. ....at the
time of the Gemara  they were not expert in chaser and yeter. 



The Rambam in Hil.  ST, 8:4 wrote about scrolls that had been
corrected using the Ben-Asher  scroll that he himself used.<<
[snip]
 
TK:  All your questions stem from one misconception.  As Rambam  formulated 
it, we say "Ani ma'amin be'emunah sheleimah shekol haTorah hametzuyah  atah 
veyadeinu hee hanesunah leMoshe Rabbeinu alav hashalom."  You  understand that to 
mean, "The Sefer Torah we have today is EXACTLY the same,  word for word and 
letter for letter, as the one that was given to Moshe  Rabbeinu.  Not one 
single mistake has EVER crept in or will ever creep in  or can ever creep in.  No 
sofer in history ever has copied a single letter  wrong or ever will, and 
every sefer Torah in the world is EXACTLY the same as  the one that Moshe Rabeinu 
received."
 
Then, since you understand Ani Ma'amin this way, when you find that some  
mistakes and discrepancies /have/ crept in over the years -- your faith is  
shaken and you don't know how you can say Ani Ma'amin anymore!
 
One major clue that you are misreading this Ani Ma'amin is that, as you  
point out, Rambam /himself/  "wrote about Torah scrolls that had been  corrected 
using the Ben-Asher scroll that he himself used"!  
 
Thus, even as he wrote the words of Ani Ma'amin, he himself was very well  
aware that changes /had/ crept in over the centuries and that not every sefer  
Torah -- and perhaps not even his own personal sefer Torah -- was demonstrably  
EXACTLY the same, letter for letter, as the one written by Moshe Rabbeinu.
 
If Rambam himself was aware that differences existed between different  
scrolls, how could he have written "shekol haTorah hametzuyah atah veyadeinu hee  
hanesunah leMoshe Rabbeinu"? Obviously, he did not understand "the Torah we 
have  is the same as the one given to Moshe Rabbeinu" to mean "the Torah we have 
is  identical in every single letter and no mistake or slight variation in 
spelling  has ever crept in."
 
What Rambam DID mean, I will discuss below.



RHB:   >> Gil Student 2001 in Parshas Vayera  Challenge and other
sources on Tikkun Soferim indicate that the Ktav of the  Torah (Ktave Ivrit or
Ktav Ahsurit) nowadays may be different that what was  given to Moshe 
Rabeinu.<<
TK:  It is known that the ktav we have now is not the same ktav that  has 
always been used, and this, too, is NOT included in "shekol haTorah  hametzuyah 
atah veyadeinu hee hanesunah leMoshe Rabbeinu."
 
 


RHB:  >> Halachic issues such as making a bracha on a  Sefer Torah
(ST) by a sofer writing it, making a bracha on an Aliya,  reading a pasul ST
publicly on Shabbas...., and fulfilling the mitzvah of  writing a ST in cases 
of
doubt are all discussed, and for the most part  ruled leniently upon. See 
Shulchan Aruch OC 143:4, and Mishna Berura.  <<
 
TK:  As long as the Sefer Torah you are using is perfect to the best  of your 
knowledge and to the best of your ability, it is not pasul, you can make  a 
bracha on it, you can have an aliyah, you can read from the Torah.  You  are 
obsessing quite unnecessarily over slight differences, as you yourself  know 
from the very sources you yourself have cited, Shulchan Aruch and Mishna  Berurah.
 
 



RHB:  >>  Yemenite ST: The Yemenite ST has at  least 3 differences
(some say 9) when compared to our ST.
They make a  bracha on reading the Torah, and so do we. They may (I do not 
know) say Zot  Hatorah
during Hagbah, while we for sure do. Is
this incongruous?  How can we (and
perhaps they) both claim to have a correct version at  the same time? <<
 
TK:  "Vezos haTorah asher som Moshe lifnei Bnai Yisrael al pi Hashem  beyad 
Moshe" does NOT mean, as you seem to think, "This Torah which we are now  
holding up in our shul is EXACTLY IDENTICAL in every detail to the sefer Torah  
that Moshe Rabbeinu himself wrote."  What it does mean, we will discuss  below.





RHB:  >> If someone from a Sefardi or  Ashkenazi background, davened
at a Yemenite minyan, would he be allowed to  make a Bracha on an Aliya, 
seeing
as his mesorah is different?  <<
 
TK:  I believe the answer to that question is "yes."

RHB:  >>  Would he
have to fast if CV a ST was  dropped in front of him? (According to 
Sfardi/Ashkenazi tradition,  the
Yemenite ST
should be viewed as Pasul, and thus perhaps not  necessitating a fast.)  <<
 
TK:  An interesting halachic shaila, you would have to ask a rav if  that 
happened, but I believe, again, that the answer is yes, an Ashkenazi would  have 
to fast if a Yemenite sefer Torah was dropped.





RHB:  >> Rambam Pr. No. 8 and Zot Hatorah  said during Hagbah, both
state that the ST we have today is the same as  that was given to Moshe
Rabeinu.  If we say either of these  two
statements, and/or teach them to our children or Baalei Teshuvot (Aish  
Hatorah
is big on Rambam No. 8), are we (or the Yemenites or both) not over  on
1. Midvar Sheker Tirchak <<
 
TK:  No, it is not sheker to say "Our Torah is the same as Moshe  Rabbeinu's."

RHB:  >>  2. Ganeivas Daat and  <<
 
TK:  No, we are not deceiving anyone.

RHB:  >>  3. Lifnei Iver (in the sense that
they may  tell it to someone else) if in fact it turns out that someone does 
not
have  an accurate (to the letter) ST? <<
 
TK:  Again, we are not deceiving anyone.





RHB:  >>  We are not doubting that the  essence of the ST that we have
today is the same as what Moshe Rabeinu had,  but only that in actual Letters
and/or Script, it may not be 100% "exactly  the same." <<
 
TK:  The statement "our Torah is the same as Moshe's" MEANS "the  essence is 
the same and the wording is as close to identical as human error will  allow 
over the course of thousands of years."
 
 





RHB:  >>  Finally, should a Sofer be  required, in advance to inform
potential purchasers of ST and/or his  services, about the current situation
regarding ST? Should he be required  to
fully disclose, that the person purchasing a ST may only be fulfilling  the
mitzvah to write a ST in a Bidieved manner?
If he does not fully  disclose this, is the resultant sale tainted?   <<
 
TK:  It seems to you that there is a halacha -- or should be a halacha  -- 
something like this:  "A sofer is halachically obligated to  state, when selling 
a sefer Torah, that slightly different texts exist and that  until Eliyahu 
Hanavi comes, he cannot be 100% certain that the sefer  Torah he has written is 
identical to Moshe Rabbeinu's sefer Torah down to  the last kutzo shel yud."   
 
 
Since as you yourself wrote, the Rambam and many other authorities over the  
centuries were well aware that slight differences had arisen between different 
 sifrei Torah, why do you suppose that none of them until you ever thought of 
 codifying such a halacha?  Why do  you suppose there is no such  halacha in 
the Shulchan Aruch or the Mishna Berurah?





>>>>>
 
As I said at the beginning, all of your questions are really one, and all  
stem from the same misconception, which we have now cleared up.
 
So what then DO we mean when we say, "Ani ma'amin shekol haTorah hametzuyah  
atah veyadeinu hee hanesunah leMoshe Rabbeinu"?  What DO we mean when we  
publicly declare, "Zos haTorah asher som Moshe lifnei Bnai Yisrael"?
 
To answer that question, you have to consider what alternative, false  
beliefs Rambam was trying to counter with his formulation of "Ani  ma'amin."  If you 
did NOT believe that our Torah is Toras Moshe, what else  might you falsely 
believe?
 
Well, here is a news flash:  Wellhausen and the 19th century Bible  critics 
and Reformers were NOT the first people in history to deny the Divine  
Authorship of the Torah!
 
Many centuries before they ever came along, there were people who said that  
the Torah was made up by people and not by G-d.  There were people who  denied 
that Moshe had ever lived or that Ma'amad Har Sinai had ever  happened.
 
There were also people who believed that G-d had given the Torah to Moshe  
but who claimed that the Jews had deliberately falsified and changed the  Torah!
 
There were Christians who claimed that they were the "true Israel" and that  
the Jews had deliberately re-written and falsified their Torah to delete all  
references to their man-god, Yoshke.
 
There were Muslims who claimed that Avraham's true heir was Yishmael, and  
that it was Yishmael, not Yitzchak, who had been bound on the altar at the  
akeida.  They said that the Jews had deliberately rewritten and falsified  the 
Torah in order to remove Yishmael from his deserved place in the  Torah.
 
There were Sadducees and Karaites who denied the authority of the Rabbanim  
and claimed that the Rabbanim could not be trusted to faithfully transmit the  
Torah.
 
Every heresy of modern times -- the denial of the Divine authorship of the  
Torah, the claim that it was written by people for their own purposes, the 
claim  that the Rabbis wrote it to bolster their authority over the ignorant 
masses --  all had their precursors in earlier times.  And it is against these 
notions  that we declare, "The Torah we have is Toras Moshe."
 
Rambam wrote in one of the Ani Ma'amins, "Zos haTorah lo sehei  muchlefes."  
Some people read it literally, childishly -- and mistakenly --  as, "This 
Torah will never change" -- and if they find that Yemenite sifrei  Torah differ 
slightly from Ashkenazi sifrei Torah, their whole emunah is  shaken!  They start 
to worry about whether they are apikorsim because they  don't say "Ani 
ma'min" with a whole heart, or whether Rambam really meant it or  knew what he was 
talking about, and so on and so on.  
 
And all this angst is over a simple misunderstanding!  "Zos haTorah lo  sehei 
muchlefes" means "Our Torah will never be EXCHANGED for another  one."  The 
Christian claim of a 'New Testament' is false, there is not and  will not be a 
'New Testament' -- nor will Hashem ever exchange His Chosen People  for some 
other People.  There is never going to be a Torah in which Avraham  is tested 
with Akeidas Yishmael.  There is never going to be a Torah in  which the day of 
rest is Sunday.  There is never going to be a Torah in  which Jesus and 
Mohammed are prophets.
 
"The Torah we have is the same one that was given to Moshe Rabbeinu"  MEANS:  
Hashem wrote the Torah and gave it to Moshe, and we have faithfully  
transcribed and transmitted it, down through the centuries, to the best of our  
ability.  We are the true heirs of the Dor Hamidbar, we learned the  Torah from our 
parents and we will teach it to our children, ad bias goel,  we are loyal and 
faithful to the Torah and we have always been loyal and  faithful to our holy 
Torah.  "Ha'azinu hashamayim va'adaberah...."  --  Heaven and earth bear 
witness that we are the same people who received the  Torah, we are the sons of 
Yisrael, and we still keep the Torah that Moshe  Rabbeinu taught us.  "Torah 
tziva lanu Moshe, morasha kehillas  Yakov."



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

-------------------- 



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Micha Berger wrote that RDCohen said that opening a front door on S (air
cond) is different than  possibly triggering the cooling mechanism on a
manual water fountain.	Why is it different?	 Also I read online that R.
Moshe said that the issue of Ktav on S doesnt apply bc the Ktav on video
cameras isnt durable.... but nowadays vcameras record their images onto
DVDs or VHS which IS durable... so wouldn't that be a problem?

On Tue, Dec 30, 2008 at 08:54:46PM -0800, Harvey Benton wrote:
: Micha Berger wrote that RDCohen said that opening a front door on S
: (air cond) is different than possibly triggering the cooling mechanism
: on a manual water fountain. Why is it different? ...

I tried to explain this in that post. There has to be some threshold in
which "too likely" becomes pesiq reishei. He held that the water 
fountain crossed that line but the front door didn't.

:                                                  Also I read online
: that R. Moshe said that the issue of Ktav on S doesnt apply bc the Ktav on
: video cameras isnt durable.... but nowadays vcameras record their images
: onto DVDs or VHS which IS durable... so wouldn't that be a problem?

The kesav isn't on the disk or tape, it's on the screen when one of the
two is shown. The tape's recording is invisible, and the disk is just
one rainbow of sub-visible dots vs another. Displaying a picture from
them would be the actual kesivah. And that's not permanent.

For this reason, RDLifshitz said in shiur that a sheim appearing on a
computer monitor is like Chazal's case of one written in the sand at
the beach, below the tide line. The bits on a disk don't matter. It will
inevitably be erased, so it lacks qedushah now.

By that definition of writing, there is no kesivah of a permanent record
in our case either.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Between stimulus & response, there is a space.
mi...@aishdas.org        In that space is our power to choose our
http://www.aishdas.org   response. In our response lies our growth
Fax: (270) 514-1507      and our freedom. - Victor Frankl, (MSfM)

any problem with a woman reading a ketuba at a wedding?

-- 
Eli Turkel

On Wed, Dec 31, 2008 at 11:19:49AM +0200, Eli Turkel wrote:
: any problem with a woman reading a ketuba at a wedding?

The only reason to read the kesuvah is to provide a pause. There can't
be a problem with who reads it, in terms of the validity of the wedding.
(RHS infamously phrased it that the wedding would be no worse "even if a
parrot or a monkey would read the ketubah", a phrasing that was intended
to be innocent, but was irrationally taken by his detractors as comparing
women to animals.)

The usual issues about feminism, slippery slopes and public appearances
vs "kol kevudah" do come up, though.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Man is a drop of intellect drowning in a sea
mi...@aishdas.org        of instincts.
http://www.aishdas.org                         - Rav Yisrael Salanter
Fax: (270) 514-1507

On Wed, Dec 31, 2008 at 11:19 AM, Eli Turkel <elitur...@gmail.com> wrote:
> any problem with a woman reading a ketuba at a wedding?

Two quick online maareh mekomos:

http://www.torahweb.org/torah/2004/parsha/rsch_dvorim2.html - RHS's
famous parrot and monkey quote
http://www.5as.org/content/default.asp?artid=207 - A somewhat more modern view

My own personal take; given that the primary point of reading the
kesuba is to have a hefsek; what better way to be mafsik than by doing
something controvertial which will force everyone to start whispering,
talking, interrupting, and maybe even walking out? ;)

I don't know what the minhag hamakom is in Israeli (non-chareidi,
obviously) circles is; in America, all the non-chareidi weddings I
attended always had a non-trivial chareidi population, and I never
actually saw this in practice. I'm sure it's done, however, and I find
it hard to argue why it's wrong for communities where women regularly
address large mixed crowds in a formal religious setting.

-- Mike Miller
Ramat Bet Shemesh

<<we always debate the validity of the hagiographic approach to
history that seems to be a frum tenet.
deleting details that are not in step with current halachic mores
seems to be universally acceptable. the converse--making things up for
a good purpose--
is i think seen as less or not acceptable.>>

Just read a dvar Torah where it is mentioned that we have stories in
the Torah that shed a bad light
about the avot. All of their "sins" are relatively minor like Abraham
lying about Sarah being his sister etc.
However when it comes to Jacob's sons the Torah seems to stress the
bad parts. The actions of Shimon & Levi
in Schechem are condemned, the sin of Reuven, according to Chazal, is
not as bad as described. Yehuda
and Tamar is described without hiding anything. The fights between
Yosef and his brothers are displayed in full glory.

--
Eli Turkel

in referrence to:
>Is  this really such a new thing?
>To me, it sounds extremely similar to the  practice of some men who who 
recite Birchos Hashachar out loud, which I've  been told is for the specific 
purpose of accruing zechus to the people who  answer Amen. (I'm not talking about 
the chazan, but about people who say these  brachos aloud from their seat in 
shul.)
>I believe that is also new [or new-ish]
 
Actually the custom to answer amen is quite old, recorded in the bei yosef
to the tur OH, section 6, found in the SH OH 6:4, agree to by the posekim,
see shulkhan aruch harav and aruch hashulkhan ad loc.
shlomo 
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RTK writes:

> I believe that is also new [or new-ish]
>  
> I think the main impetus behind the "amen fad" was the
> campaign of an  
> unfortunate young woman who was dying of cancer and spent her 
> last years trying  to 
> spread the message, in the hopes it would give her a zechus 
> and a  refuah.  I 
> don't remember her name but I think she wrote a book, or 
> maybe  somebody wrote 
> a book about her.

There might perhaps be some similarities to the practice in a Sephardi shiva
house, however, where it is traditional for those coming to be menachem avel
to eat (unlike in an Ashkenazi shiva house) - with the rationale (as it was
explained to me) being so that those coming will make brochos over the food,
the merit of which somehow accrues to the deceased.  It is thus customary to
have a range of foods to offer those coming to the shiva house so as to
enable as many different brochos as possible.  This practice is, however,
less about the answering of amen than of enabling the making of the brochos
themselves.  On the other hand, unlike these others, I doubt that this
custom is new (or even newish).

I rather wonder though how these Amen parties (which seem from the
description to involve a fair amount of screaming out of amen) deal with the
halacha that one should not answer amen louder than the original blessing
(Orech Chaim siman 124 si'if 12 Brochos 45a) based on the pasuk gadlu
l'Hashem iti?
  
> 
> --Toby Katz

Regards

Chana

The following is from the new translation of the Hirsch Chumash.

Bereishis  46  1 Yisrael set out with everything 
that he had and he came to Be?er Sheva, and he 
offered meal offerings to the God of his father Yitzchak.

That is why Korban Shlamim, the ?peace offering? of a family life blessed
by God, is a distinctively Jewish offering. The idea of being absorbed
in God, being devoted to God, dawns also on non-Jewish minds. But
the idea that everyday life can become so thoroughly pervaded by the
spirit of God that one can eat and drink and, while doing so, behold
God (cf. Shemos 24:11); the idea that all our family rooms become
temples, our tables altars, and our young men and young women priests
and priestesses ? this spiritualization of everyday private life is a unique
contribution of Judaism.

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Apropos RET on making a Beracha on water people drink to swallow medicine
(where one should not), I thought it K'dai to be M'orer something else I've
seen people do with water that I don't think is correct. Sometimes when
there is a Safek Berachah on a particular food, where it might be Shehakol,
I've seen people take some water to cover the Shehakol side of the Safek.
This water is not being drunk L'tzmao and therefore should not require any
Beracha at all.
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On Wed, Dec 31, 2008 at 11:19 AM, Eli Turkel <elitur...@gmail.com>
wrote:
> any problem with a woman reading a ketuba at a wedding?

Two quick online maareh mekomos:

http://www.torahweb.org/torah/2004/parsha/rsch_dvorim2.html - RHS's
famous parrot and monkey quote
http://www.5as.org/content/default.asp?artid=207 - A somewhat more
modern view

My own personal take; given that the primary point of reading the kesuba
is to have a hefsek; what better way to be mafsik than by doing
something controvertial which will force everyone to start whispering,
talking, interrupting, and maybe even walking out? ;)

I don't know what the minhag hamakom is in Israeli (non-chareidi,
obviously) circles is; in America, all the non-chareidi weddings I
attended always had a non-trivial chareidi population, and I never
actually saw this in practice. I'm sure it's done, however, and I find
it hard to argue why it's wrong for communities where women regularly
address large mixed crowds in a formal religious setting.

-- Mike Miller
Ramat Bet Shemesh
_______________________________________________


I made the same argument (re: hefsek) but it is usually trumped by what
I call the giving aid and comfort to the enemy argument.
You might find this article of interest
http://media.www.yuobserver.com/media/storage/paper989/news/2008/12/30/T
houghtsOfStudentLeaders/Women.In.The.Framework.Of.Halakha-3581376.shtml
My response was : Women/halacha - IMHO the general current YURabbinic
thinking is that anything that seems to give a positive response to
something that could be construed as feminist generated (or worse
conservative generated), even if there are many women who want it for
all the right reasons, will not be viewed positively (a la R' Moshe's
Tshuva)
One may think this is good or bad, but , that is the shikul hadaas as of
now. Sara may think it wrong, but how do you get it changed(imho only by
convincing rabbis over time that the change is really coming from within
not from without). Btw imho the same thing applies to heksher tzedk.

R D Gottlieb of Shomrei emunah makes a similar against meta argument.

KT
Joel Rich
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--- On Wed, 12/31/08, Eli Turkel <elitur...@gmail.com> wrote:

any problem with a woman reading a ketuba at a wedding?
==============
?
I don't see why there should be. The only purpose for reading a Kesubah is
as a Heker to seperate the Kiddushin from the Nissuin. There is no Halachic
purpose for reading a Kesubah. 
?
I'm not even sure why any of the Sheva Brachos of Nesuin can't be made by
women. Since both men and women are obligated in the Birchas Nesuin, a
woman can be Motzie a man with these Brachos just like a man is Motzei a
woman.
?
That said, I could see how there would be major objections from
people?based on custom. When people are not used to seeing women doing
these kinds of things?- it can be pretty shocking. 
?
But I see no technical Halachic probelm with it at all. It would seem to be
no different than a woman addressing a mixed audience at a banquet. And
while there are plenty of RW Orthodox organizations that do not allow that,
there are plenty of Orthodox organizations that do - and they?are attended
by the very same RW rabbanim?who do not allow it at their own
organization's banquets. And to the best of my knowledge there has never
been any protest of any kind by them - Halachic or otherwise - against
organizations that allow women to speak.
?
HM

Want Emes and Emunah in your life? 

Try this: http://haemtza.blogspot.com/




      
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