Avodah Mailing List

Volume 31: Number 58

Fri, 05 Apr 2013

• 1. Re: (Areivim) Short Shabbat Hagadol Drasha (Chana Luntz)
• 2. shoresh of kitniyot (CMB)
• 3. Re: Chareish (Zev Sero)
• 4. Re: (Areivim) Short Shabbat Hagadol Drasha (Zev Sero)
• 5. Counting (Kenneth Miller)
• 6. Re: shoresh of kitniyot (Micha Berger)
• 7. kiniyot errors (Eli Turkel)
• 8. cheresh (Eli Turkel)
• 9. Re: (Areivim) Short Shabbat Hagadol Drasha (Chana Luntz)
• 10. Re: shoresh of kitniyot (Zev Sero)
• 11. Re: shoresh of kitniyot (Micha Berger)

RYL wrote on Areivim:

 

>>I believe I recall learning a Tosafos years ago that said that women
cannot be relied upon to clean properly for Pesach.  If I am
>>correct,  then how come in most families the majority of the cleaning for
Pesach is left up to women and gentile cleaning ladies?



And RTK replied:

 

>the answer is the women clean but the men do bedikas chometz

 

>ps I don't think it's that the women can't be relied on to wield mop and
broom, but that they can't be relied on to know the complicated halachos
well enough  -- but that would vary acc to the >woman.  Gemara talks about
the usual case

 

>cc to Chana Luntz for obvious reasons

 

Sorry, I saw RYL's original statement and wanted to reply, but was too busy
over pesach.

 

RYL has it a little backwards - the gemora (Pesachim 4a-b) says that women
(and slaves and minors) *are* believed regarding biur chametz - but that
this is only because biur chametz is a d'rabbanan, since d'orisa bittel
works and the rabbis believed these in relation to rabbinic matters - the
implication being that was biur chametz to be d'orisa (ie there was no
bittel) then women would not be believed.

 

Tosphos there on 4b d"h "hemenuhu" - asks on this why would women not be
believed if biur chametz was d'orisa - we believe women on lots of d'orisas
such as chala and ma'asering crops and nikur.  Their answer is that bedikas
chametz requires tircha gedola and, as the Yerushalmi states, women are
lazy, and hence, were it to be a d'orisa, for something that requires tircha
gedola women would not be believed, but since it is only d'rabbanan, women
are believed.

 

I do sometimes wonder if the real reason women go so mad pre Pesach (and
appear to have a different Shulchan Aruch as per RZS) is that they are
actually trying to disprove this Yerushalmi (see the Aruch HaShulchan in
Orech HaShulchan Siman 437 si'if 7 who states that "today our women check
more carefully and scratch after a tiny piece of chametz and wash and clean
all places and are more medakdek than the men". 

 

Two slightly different alternative answers to Tosphos' question are given by
the Ran and the Aruch (and as quoted in the Rema in Yoreh Deah siman 127
si'if 3).  The Aruch says that a woman is believed for d'orisas where there
is something definitely assur there - such as meat without nikur, or dough
without chala, but where there is a safek if there is something assur there
or not, d'orisa a woman is not believed, which is why for bedikas chametz,
where there might be chametz there, but there might not, then women would
not have been believed, had it not in fact been a d'rabbanan requirement.
And the Ran somewhat similarly says (among the other reasons he brings,
including Tosphos') that if it is certain that there is an issur, and it
needs fixing she is believed to fix it, but if there is a side to be
lenient, then a woman might go too easily towards the leniency, and would
not have been believed were it not merely a rabbinic requirement.

 

Note by the way that the Meiri has a long discussion on this in Pesachim 4a,
and brings various other opinions, including that indeed women are believed
on all Torah issurim, and this language regarding the rabbis believing in
rabbinic matters was for minors and slaves, as well as various other
attempts at reconciliation (eg women are believed regarding their own, but
not troubling themselves for others, a position he rejects etc).

 

In any event, the results of all of this are that women are believed
regarding bedikas and biur chametz.

 

However, the Magen Avraham in Orech Chaim Siman 437 si'if katan 8 and 437
si'if katan 14 says that l'chatchila one should not rely on women.   And it
is after the Aruch HaShulchan in Orech Chaim Siman 437 si'if 7, brings this
Magen Avraham that he states, as I mentioned above, that "today our women
check more carefully and scratch after a tiny piece of chametz and wash and
clean all places and are more medakdek than the men", the implication being
that the fundamental thrust of the Magen Avraham is related to this (but
that the metzius is, at least today, no longer true).

 

However there is also another factor involved, which the Mishna Brura raises
(and he would seem to be explaining the Magen Avraham like this).  In the
vast majority of cases, in households where standard halachic relationships
apply, the chametz in the house is owned, halachically, by the man and not
the woman - ie she is searching for chametz which is not in fact hers.  And
given that there is a machlokus as to whether in fact one can make a
shaliach to do bittel on one's property - because it is a bit odd to appoint
somebody to declare one's property hefker and dust of the earth, and while
the majority view is that indeed a person can make a shaliach to do their
bittel, it is better not to, and it is better not to appoint a shaliach to
do their bedika, even though b'dieved they can. And hence for a man to have
his wife do the bedika, effectively he is making her a shaliach for his
chametz, which is not ideal.  And this understanding of what the Magen
Avraham is getting at makes sense given that he goes on to say and "like in
the Meharil and in Tosphos in Eruvin who writes that in their houses they
are believed but to send them [ie as a shaliach] to do a thing they are not
believed even d'rabbanan".  (Note by the way that the Meiri here in Pesachim
does not like this argument regarding shlichus and eidus, based on the fact
that a woman loses her kesuba if she says that some cohen fixed the kor for
her, and if a man is not entitled to rely on his wife on this, then how can
she justifiably lose her ketuba, he ought never to have relied on her in the
first place).  And while the Shulchan Aruch does rule that if a man is not
able to be home, and even if he did not command his wife to do the bedika
and bittel, and she does it anyway, that is acceptable, and the Mishna Brura
explains this as being based on ishto k'gufo, nobody appears desperately
keen on relying on this except in extremis.  So it certainly sounds from the
Mishna Brura (Siman 434 si'if katan 19) where he concludes that a widow,
since her chametz is fully within her ownership, is just like a man, is
understanding the whole sugya in this manner, ie the reason not to rely
l'chatchila on women and particularly one's wife as per the Magen Avraham is
because the chametz is fundamentally not hers, and that just as it is not
ideal to rely on a shaliach, it is not ideal to rely on ones' wife, despite
ishto k'gufo and the ability to create shlichus.

 

Regards

 

Chana

 

 

 

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 ive seen in many article about kitniyos and I was wondering if kitniyos
really translates to" little things" or is it a separate word meaning
legumes? Is it just a 'coincidence" that the shoresh of the word kitniyos
is 'kattan' - small in hebrew - or is there actually some reason for this
connection?
Every one else that I have spoken with is not aware of any connection.
So I guess that I was wondering if anyone (any grammarians?) knew of any
"source" for this connection."
thanks
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On 4/04/2013 7:17 PM, Micha Berger wrote:
>   A cheireish is someone who is sane, but can't be taught
> enough of the facts that allow a pragmatic definition of right and wrong.

Then what of the person who grew up normal and then lost his hearing and
his voice?  He's just as much a cheresh as one who grew up that way, and
yet he knows all the facts he needs to.

-- 
Zev Sero               A citizen may not be required to offer a 'good and
z...@sero.name          substantial reason' why he should be permitted to
                        exercise his rights. The right's existence is all
                        the reason he needs.
                            - Judge Benson E. Legg, Woollard v. Sheridan

On 4/04/2013 7:16 PM, Chana Luntz wrote:
> In the vast majority of cases, in households where standard halachic
> relationships apply, the chametz in the house is owned, halachically,
> by the man and not the woman ? ie she is searching for chametz which
> is not in fact hers.

What of the clause in the (Ashkenazi) tena'im, that says "veyishletun
benichseihon shaveh beshaveh" (they shall control their property equally)?
Does that not make the chametz just as much the wife's as the husband's?

-- 
Zev Sero               A citizen may not be required to offer a 'good and
z...@sero.name          substantial reason' why he should be permitted to
                        exercise his rights. The right's existence is all
                        the reason he needs.
                            - Judge Benson E. Legg, Woollard v. Sheridan

In the thread "kitniyot", R' Zev Sero wrote:
> Shmita is rather like kidush hachodesh, in the sense that
> it depends on an actual count...

R' Micha Berger questioned:
> I know there is a chiyuv to count, but does it /depend/ on
> counting?

I would just like to point out an example of where we have a chiyuv to count, but the result does NOT depend on that counting: Sefiras Haomer and Shavuos.

Here's my logic: Let's suppose that Shavuos does depend on Sefiras Haomer.
Next, let's imagine a case where not a single Jew in the world counted
Sefira that year. If such a thing would happen, and Shavuos depends on
Sefira, then that year would not have a holiday of Shavuos, and any melacha
we did would be mutar.

I posit that this situation has actually been happening for many centuries,
according to the poskim (and I believe they are in the majority) who hold
that Sefiras Haomer is only d'rabanan nowadays. According to this view, our
Sefirah is only a sefirah d'rabanan, and so it would seem to me that our
Shavuos would only be a Shavuos D'Rabanan - and not a Shavuos D'Oraisa.

Obviously, this is a false conclusion. No one would say that our Shavuos
has only a d'rabanan validity. Thus we conclude that something was wrong
with our initial presumptions. Specifically, it must be that Shavuos does
NOT depend on Sefira, and it will occur fifty days after Pesach whether we
count those days or not.

(But there's another possible solution: Some years ago, I mentioned these
ideas here, and I think it was R' Micha Berger who suggested that even if
our Sefira is only a Chiyuv D'Rabanan, it still might accomplish a Kiyum
D'Oraisa, and give Shavuos its validity by that route even if Shavuos
*does* depend on Sefira.)

Akiva Miller

____________________________________________________________
Fast, Secure, NetZero 4G Mobile Broadband. Try it.
http://www.netzero.net/?refcd=NZINTISP0512T4GOUT2

On Fri, Apr 05, 2013 at 08:36:24AM +0200, CMB wrote:
:  ive seen in many article about kitniyos and I was wondering if kitniyos
: really translates to" little things" or is it a separate word meaning
: legumes? ...

You might have better luck joining meso...@aishdas.org , a list dedicated
to the mesoretic text, the text of the siddur, diqduq and the like. There
are people there who know this kind of thing and who aren't on
Avodah. Volume is "occasional", not like Areivim or here.

Well, according to Richard J Israel at <http://www.site38.com/dickisrael/kitniot.htm>:
    In general, kitniot are those small (kitniot - from katan) seeds or
    beans which look a little like grains and which need to be cooked to
    be eaten. Though frequently translated as legumes, aside from peas
    and peanuts, they are NOT legumes. And some legumes, like alfalfa
    leaves which can be used for salad, ARE NOT kitniot. Legumes are
    plants whose root nodules make nitrogen. Since "teensy-weensies"
    or "tinies" are not translations that are very likely to make it
    into ordinary English parlance, the most appropriate translation
    for kitniot, it seems to me, is kitniot.

He convinced the author of Balashon blog, R David Curwin, who quotes
the above at <http://www.balashon.com/2006/04/kitniyot.html>.

Thus, it would seem the minhag's name actually refers to its similarity
in size to any of the 5 grains -- whether that can cause an error,
or causes them to be stored in the same facilities, or whatever your
favorite explanation for qitniyos might be.

:-)BBii!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Today is the 10th day, which is
mi...@aishdas.org        1 week and 3 days in/toward the omer.
http://www.aishdas.org   Tifferes sheb'Gevurah: When does strict
Fax: (270) 514-1507                  judgment bring balance and harmony?

<<To *me*, the question of which version was actually held by the Rambam is
mildly interesting, but only academically. For paskening purposes, there is
a much more important and valuable question that needs to be discussed: How
did subsequent authorities react to this Rambam?

If subsequent authorities saw a certain text, and they made no comments,
then it seems to me that they sort of "ratified" it. If they saw an
opinion, and no eyebrows were raised, then it passed muster, and became the
accepted halacha. Halachic literature is filled with places where an
authority says, "He couldn't possibly have meant that. He was either
mistaken, or there is typo." Much (most?) of the time, this happens even
without any archeological evidence (i.e., early manuscripts) to support the
claim that the earlier authority had erred. It is all based on the opinion
of the later authority, together with whatever evidence he can bring, such
as other comments elsewhere from that same author. In my experience, this
is the essence of the halachic process. Halacha k'basrai - we follow the
later authority. And WHY do we follow the later authority? It is because
the passage of time allows errors to be discovered, debated, discussed, and
corrected. >>

Rabbi Sperber gave a lecture at the Torah Umaddah meeting to explicitly
disagree with this approach. He brought a case in CM (didnt give the exact
place) where the Ramah paskens like a Yad Ramah. Unfortunately the Ramah
didnt have access to the original Yad Ramah and the source he used skipped
3 lines in the Yad Ramah so yielding a strange psak. CI (in Vilna) wrote a
lengthy piece to justify why the Ramah was still right even though the Yad
Ramah never said any such thing. R. Shimon Shkop responded by saying one
simply had to change the psak since it was in error. In several places ROY
paskens like a Meiri against SA on the grounds that the SA didnt see the
Meiri.

We pasken like basrai only when the the later authority saw the early
opinions and disagreed. If however, they had no access to the original or
the original was corrupted then it makes no sense to pasken like basrai.
In various places Minchat Chunuch and also Ketzot and Nesivot discuss
issues already discussed by Ramban and Rasdhba in their chiddushin.
However, these achronim had no access to the theses chiddushin. Should we
pasken like a minchat chunukh against a Ramban that he didnt know because
he is basrai?

Rabbi Sperber argued that using modern day tools eg archaeology, philology
etc we understand gemarot that were not clear to previous generations. He
personally was not happy with using certain items for matzah or maror based
on midunderstandings of the gemara.

While some on the list like to mention the CI on manuscripts I personally
find that in practice almost no one follows that shitah (which didnt exist
before CI). Today Meiri is a standard sefer in all yeshivot as is Tosafot
haRosh. Even much of Rabbenu Channel was unknown for many centuries. As I
previously mentioned the new editions of the SA correct many mistakes that
occurred over the years. Should we pasken like a misprint in some version
of SA? Though they quote CI in their introduction in practice they ignore
the opinion.

I am reminded of the famous joke of some gadol who comes to heaven and
wants to speak to the Rambam. He asks his question and the Rambam answers
that he never said the halacha and it is a misprint. The gadol responds
that that is no way to answer a difficult Rambam.
There are many brilliant divrei Torah to answer contradictions in the
Rambam that appear only because of misprints.

.

-- 
Eli Turkel
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> I doubt they did such a thing.  Rather, the metzius is that most deaf
people
> are not also mute.  Their speech may not be easily intelligible, but it is
> recognisable as speech.  And of course today there are cochlear implants
that
> effectively cure a cheresh.

There is a machloket between RSZA on one side and CI and RMF on the other
side whether a
hearing aid solves the peoblem of a cheresh for peroblems like hearing
megillah. CI and RMF consdider it normal hearing while RSZA argues they are
hearing electrical signals and not sound.

RSZA did not consider in his day cochlear implants.  Indeed some poskim
claim that a cochlear implant is different than a hearing aid and is OK
even according to RSZA. However, R. Asher Weiss disagrees and says that it
makes no difference if the device is external or internal to the body it is
still generating electrical signals and so is not considered as hearing
sounds.

It is interesting to note that RSZA in his teshuva apologies for the pain
he causes to the deaf person because of his pask but says he has no choice.
However, his appreciation of the matter is great and not like others who
are just machmir and dont consider the impact of the psak.

-- 
Eli Turkel
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I wrote:
>> In the vast majority of cases, in households where standard halachic 
>> relationships apply, the chametz in the house is owned, halachically, 
>> by the man and not the woman - ie she is searching for chametz which 
>> is not in fact hers.

And RZS asked:

>What of the clause in the (Ashkenazi) tena'im, that says "veyishletun
benichseihon shaveh beshaveh" (they shall control their property equally)?
>Does that not make the chametz just as much the wife's as the husband's?

I don't think anybody really seems to take that clause seriously.  The only
person I am aware of who actually darshened this clause is Rav Shternbach in
Teshuvot V'hanaghot Krach 2 siman 760 (and those he quotes there).  And he
thinks it just means that if the husband has a high standard of living, the
wife gets that too, not that she has any power to sell or make hekdesh the
property or any real baalus in it (he seems to regard it somewhat
differently vis a vis giving tzedaka - see Teshuvot V'hanaghot Krach 4 siman
219).  But certainly the discussion in the Magen Avraham and the Mishna
Brura (who surely was aware of these kinds of tanaim) etc is all predicated
on (at most) the reshus that the husband gives to deal with his property (or
perhaps ishto k'gufo), without any mention of tanaim changing things (note a
various points there is a reference that if the woman lives in another room
she should check and nullify that room - see eg Pri Megadim Eshel Avrham
siman 436 si'if katan 14, but that does not extend to the entirety of the
property).


-- 
Zev Sero               A citizen may not be required to offer a 'good and

Regards

Chana

On 5/04/2013 6:08 AM, Micha Berger wrote:
> Thus, it would seem the minhag's name actually refers to its similarity
> in size to any of the 5 grains -- whether that can cause an error,
> or causes them to be stored in the same facilities, or whatever your
> favorite explanation for qitniyos might be.

This line of reasoning is impossible, because the name is not of the minhag
but of (most of) the things it covers.  The name predates the minhag by at
least 1000 years.

-- 
Zev Sero               A citizen may not be required to offer a 'good and
z...@sero.name          substantial reason' why he should be permitted to
                        exercise his rights. The right's existence is all
                        the reason he needs.
                            - Judge Benson E. Legg, Woollard v. Sheridan

On Fri, Apr 05, 2013 at 11:53:27AM -0400, Zev Sero wrote:
> On 5/04/2013 6:08 AM, Micha Berger wrote:
>> Thus, it would seem the minhag's name actually refers to its similarity
>> in size to any of the 5 grains -- whether that can cause an error,
>> or causes them to be stored in the same facilities, or whatever your
>> favorite explanation for qitniyos might be.

> This line of reasoning is impossible, because the name is not of the minhag
> but of (most of) the things it covers.  The name predates the minhag by at
> least 1000 years.

Yes, the first usages are tannaitic, according to Bar Ilan's library:
Once in the Sifra, twice in the Sifrei, once in the mishnah (Uqtzin 1:5),
5 times in the Tosefta.

But the minhag is associated with this term for small, grain-sized
foods. Not some other word that would cover beans and whatever else
the minhag started out covering. The word existing doesn't compell it
being used as a category-name for the minhag. And the same attitude
that would choose "bitty things" as the defining feature for the minhag
is consistent with its subsequent growth to include a growing list of
non-legume bitty foods.

:-)BBii!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Today is the 10th day, which is
mi...@aishdas.org        1 week and 3 days in/toward the omer.
http://www.aishdas.org   Tifferes sheb'Gevurah: When does strict
Fax: (270) 514-1507                  judgment bring balance and harmony?


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