Avodah Mailing List

Volume 31: Number 169

Tue, 01 Oct 2013

• 1. Re: who do you ask to explain a pasuk (Zev Sero)
• 2. Re: who do you ask to explain a pasuk (Ben Waxman)
• 3. Re: who do you ask to explain a pasuk (Micha Berger)
• 4. Subject: Re: How many Korban Pesachs could be sacrificed in 1 day (hankman)
• 5. FROM BITTER TO SWEET TO P'SHAT (cantorwolb...@cox.net)
• 6. Re: FROM BITTER TO SWEET TO P'SHAT (Micha Berger)
• 7. Re: FROM BITTER TO SWEET TO P'SHAT (Lisa Liel)
• 8. Re: who do you ask to explain a pasuk (Zev Sero)
• 9. Re: FROM BITTER TO SWEET TO P'SHAT (Micha Berger)
• 10. Re: LeiSheiv (Kenneth Miller)
• 11. Why does it matter who blows the shofar? (Eli Turkel)
• 12. couple more questions (saul newman)
• 13. dubious minhagim (Eli Turkel)
• 14. Re: evolution of man m'makom (T6...@aol.com)
• 15. Re: LeiSheiv (Liron Kopinsky)

On 30/09/2013 4:14 PM, Ben Waxman wrote:
> Rav Yehoshua Reiss, in an article in the book "Hi Sichati" in which
> he reviews the history of learning Tanach in Am Yisrael, brings the
> following story:
>
> Rav Hai Gaon was learning with his students and they came across a
> pasuk from Tehillim (141:5). There was a difference of opinion about
> its meaning. Rav Hai told Rav Mazliach to go to the Catholic
> (monestary?) and ask him how he explains this verse.

And then what?  Maybe the idea was to ask them and decide the opposite.


-- 
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

Rav Yosef ben Yehuda Even Inqin, Hitgalut Hasodot V'Hofaot HaMeorot, 
Y-M, page 495.

Ben

On 10/1/2013 12:36 AM, Lisa Liel wrote:
> What's his source for this story?
>

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On Mon, Sep 30, 2013 at 05:36:21PM -0500, Lisa Liel wrote:
: On 9/30/2013 3:14 PM, Ben Waxman wrote:
:> Rav Yehoshua Reiss, in an article in the book "Hi Sichati"...
:> Rav Hai Gaon was learning with his students and they came across a 
:> pasuk from Tehillim (141:5). There was a difference of opinion about 
:> its meaning. Rav Hai told Rav Mazliach to go to the Catholic 
:> (monestary?) and ask him how he explains this verse.

: What's his source for this story?

The 1893 Warsaw edition of R' Hai Gaon's Shir Musar Haskel has a toledos
hamechaber by a R AH Weiss that includes the story as well. Starts at
the last sentence on pg 27
<http://www.hebrewbooks.org/pdfpager.aspx?req=48114&;st=&pgnum=27>.
He cites (indirectly, but gives his sources) R' Matzliach ben Albatzeq
haDayan's own collection of stories from RHG's life.

The point RAHW makes with it is that RHG was firmly in the qabel es
ha'emes mimi she'omro camp.

R/Dr/Lord J Sacks also has the story in Clash of Civilisations, pg 42.
He gives the same citation RBW already gave: R' Yosef [ben Yehudah] ibn
Aknin, peirush to Shir haShirim, pg 495. RYiA was a talmid of the Rambam.
(And he is NOT R' Yosef ben Yedudah from Ceuta, the student the Moreh
was written in reply to.) But even that is centuries after RHG.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Man can aspire to spiritual-moral greatness
mi...@aishdas.org        which is seldom fully achieved and easily lost
http://www.aishdas.org   again. Fulfillment lies not in a final goal,
Fax: (270) 514-1507      but in an eternal striving for perfection. -RSRH

Either RMarty Bluke or R?n Chana Lutz wrote:

?Maybe they held like Rabbi Natan (Pesachim 78b) ......? (about one Pesach for all of klal Yisrael),

Chaim Manaster notes:
That only means that they were yotzei the bringing of the Pesach so that
they would not be chayov kareis, but they where not all yotzei achilas
Pesach (an asei) unless they actually ate a kezayis of the Pesach. Clearly
you still need a large number of korbonos.

Kol tuv
Chaim Manaster
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Today we benched Rosh Chodesh Cheshvan.

It's the only month we insert the adjective "mar" before "cheshvan."

We all know the traditional reason given why we insert the word "mar"
before this coming month.

However, I've come up with another reason that I would like to share.

Rashi calculated that Noah enters the ark (at which time the flood
rains begin) on the 17th of Cheshvan.
Hence, the association of Cheshvan with the destruction of the world
could be looked upon as quite a "bitter" event.

May our Cheshvan be as the 27th of Cheshvan exactly one solar year
later than when Noah entered the ark.

According to Rashi's calculation, it was one solar year and 11 days
later on the lunar calendar which was the 27th of Cheshvan
when the ground was fully dried and Noah left the ark. May we live to
see mar Cheshvan become matok Cheshvan.

I have been made aware by R' Micha that
    the real name of the month is Marcheshvan, from the Babylonian
    "Merach Shevan", or "8th Month".

     Just like when going from Hebrew to Aramaic, shin often becomes
     tav (shalash -> telas) and tzadi often turns into ayin (beitzah ->
     bei'ah), between Hebrew and Babylonian, mem often switches with yud
     and vav. So our "yareiach" is their "merach", and our "shemini"
     is their "shevan". But unlike October, Marcheshvan really IS the
     8th month.

Nevertheless, many of you know I love d'rash. It does serve a valuable
purpose, as long as it's not purported to be the actual p'shat.

On Sat, Sep 28, 2013 at 09:45:32PM -0400, cantorwolb...@cox.net wrote:
: Today we benched Rosh Chodesh [Marc]heshvan.

In addition to the original derashah of the "Mar" in the beginning of
"Marcheshvan", Cantor Wolberg suggested:
: Rashi calculated that Noah enters the ark (at which time the flood
: rains begin) on the 17th of [Marc]heshvan.
: 
: According to Rashi's calculation, it was one solar year and 11 days
: later on the lunar calendar which was the 27th of Cheshvan
: when the ground was fully dried and Noah left the ark. May we live to
: see mar Cheshvan become matok Cheshvan.

A third possibility:

Melakhim I 12:32, "Vaya'as Yarav'am chag bachodesh hashemini..."

Yeravam tried to move Sukkos from Tishrei to Marcheshvan. This pereq
probably is describing a general campaign to revive Egyptian Apis worship
and Cheit haEigel.

Quoting myself from <http://www.aishdas.org/asp/2007/06/angels-and-idols.shtml>
which itself was based on an earlier version posted to Avodah and the
replies it garnered:

   ... In Egyptian mythology, the minor deity that purportedly pulled the
   cart of prayers up to heaven and blessings down to mankind was Apis,
   a bull (or man with a bull head). Oxen were towing animals in their
   society. In Egypt, Apis was the courier of prayers to the other gods,
   and of blessings to man. It is quite plausible that they thought that
   without Moshe, they needed a new conduit to G-d, and therefore turned
   to Apis.

    Apis's holiday was on the 15th of the 8th month. There were two
    temples at the far sides of Egypt, Memphis and Heliopolis, that had
    representations of Apis, golden bulls, in front of them.

    Yerav'am, when he founded the Malkhus Yisrael, needed to establish
    a new religion that would free them from being tied to Yehudah and
    the Temple in Yerushalayim. Among his changes were that he shifted
    Sukkos from the seventh month to the eighth, and he built temples
    in Beis-El and Dan with bulls in front of them. It would seem that
    a pretty conscious imitation of Apis worship was still around.

    Thus, the notion that the golden calf was a product of the same
    mentality, and thus an attempt to replace Moses would explain why
    they chose the animal they did. The connection between Yerav'am's
    religion and the eigel is made explicitly by Tanakh. Yerav'am's
    language on consecrating his bulls even parallels that of the Jews
    when the eigel was completed:

        And he [Aharon] received it [the gold] from their hands, and
        shaped it with a graving tool, and made it a molten calf; and
        they said: "These are your gods, Israel, which brought you up
        out of the land of Egypt."
                        - Shemos 32:4

        The king [Yirav'am] took counsel, and made two golden calves;
        and he said unto them: 'You have gone up to Yerushalaim too much,
        here are your gods, Israel, which brought you up out of the land
        of Egypt."
                        - Melachim I 12:28

I then contrast this to the qeruvim on the aron, which are related to the
topic in that one of the faces of the chayos in Yechezqeil 1:10 is an ox,
in v. 15 chayos are identified with keruvim, and in v. 22 that face is
replaced by that of a person. And the Chaldeans worshiped a god called
Kirub, who was a bull with a human face. And my conclusion:

    I would therefore suggest that this middleman god is a single thread
    of pagan thought -- be it Apis, Kirub, the eigel, or bulls at Malkhus
    Yisrael. They are a misunderstanding of the notion of keruvim.
    ...
    There were two utensils in the first Beis haMidash that had images on
    them -- the aron had keruvim and the legs to the laver that Shelomo
    made. Both share a law -- they were not made of a separate piece
    welded on. The keruvim had to be of the same gold, part of the lid
    of the aron; not welded, but of the same piece. Thus making it clear
    that they were secondary to the Torah the aron houses and not
    worship-worthy gods in their own right.

This was based on the beginning of the Rambam Hil' AZ, that the oldest
gods emerged from the worship of actual members of HQBH's "entourage".

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             You want to know how to paint a perfect
mi...@aishdas.org        painting?  It's easy.
http://www.aishdas.org   Make yourself perfect and then just paint
Fax: (270) 514-1507      naturally.              -Robert Pirsig

On 10/1/2013 9:06 AM, Micha Berger wrote:
> Melakhim I 12:32, "Vaya'as Yarav'am chag bachodesh hashemini..."
>
> Yeravam tried to move Sukkos from Tishrei to Marcheshvan. This pereq
> probably is describing a general campaign to revive Egyptian Apis worship
> and Cheit haEigel.
>    

I think it's more likely that that pasuk indicates Yeravam adding an 
extra Adar.  Doing that would have made his celebration of Sukkot in 
what he called Tishrei actually take place in Marheshvan, and there've 
been other times in history when those rebelling against the Sanhedrin's 
authority have done ibbur ha-shanah differently.

Granted, it's possible that he had both of these in mind.  But a lot 
rides on how much Yeravam wanted to change religiously.  I suspect that 
with so many Jews who were raised with the Torah, he wouldn't have 
simply gone over to avodah zarah mamash.  The egels he made were 
pesalim, no question, but he still claimed that they represented Hashem, 
who took us out of Egypt.  A new king, even a popular one like Yeravam, 
probably wouldn't have been in a position to make too many changes too 
quickly.  And forcing our calendars out of synch would have helped keep 
the people from going to Yerushalayim, which we know was one of his 
priorities.

Lisa

On 30/09/2013 11:44 PM, Ben Waxman wrote:
> On 10/1/2013 12:36 AM, Lisa Liel wrote:

>> What's his source for this story?

> Rav Yosef ben Yehuda Even Inqin, Hitgalut Hasodot V'Hofaot HaMeorot, Y-M, page 495.

The sefer is available here: http://www.otzar.org/wotzar/book.aspx?149815
but only the first 40 pages are viewable for free.


-- 
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 Tue, Oct 01, 2013 at 09:58:47AM -0500, Lisa Liel wrote:
>                                           The egels he made were  
> pesalim, no question, but he still claimed that they represented Hashem,  
> who took us out of Egypt.

He echoed the language Aharon did at the eigel. So my notion was that
just as the eigel was a mistaken idea of needing to replace Moshe with
a different go-between, so were Yeravam's agalim.

As opposed to the notion of keruvim.

In any case, I think that setting up two temples at opposite sides of
the country with bovine idols is too reminicent of Apis worship to be
coincidence. (The idea that the eigel was related to Apis is RSRH's, but
I'm elaborating greatly from his short comment.) Apis, herald of Ptah -- a
middle-man deity. Even though Yeravam made agalim rather than adult bulls.

Reiterating that point allows me to reply to your opening paragraph:
> I think it's more likely that that pasuk indicates Yeravam adding an  
> extra Adar.  Doing that would have made his celebration of Sukkot in  
> what he called Tishrei actually take place in Marheshvan...

Yes, but (as RSRH writes) intentionally making the holiday in Marcheshvan
would make the ersatz the same date as the weeklong celebration of Apis's
birth. Another element that to my mind makes the parallel compelling.

The way I see it, the eirev rav brought Apis worship with them, which
then made the eigel a logical way to replace Moshe, and the idea was
not obliterated from Benei Yisrael until the end of Malkhus Yisrael. Not
introducing anything new at all.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             A cheerful disposition is an inestimable treasure.
mi...@aishdas.org        It preserves health, promotes convalescence,
http://www.aishdas.org   and helps us cope with adversity.
Fax: (270) 514-1507         - R' SR Hirsch, "From the Wisdom of Mishlei"

Rabbi Meir G. Rabi asked:

> Sleeping is not permitted out of the Sukkkah, even a short nap
> as it is deemed to be always a matter of Kevius, ...
> Yet Surprisingly, we do not make the Beracha for sleeping.

I think I might once have heard that the bracha is omitted because one is cannot be sure that he will in fact fall asleep.

But that will not work according to Rav Shlomo Zalman Auerbach. His shita
(in the Halichos Shlomo) is that one must GO TO sleep in the sukkah, but
need not BE asleep in the sukkah, because once one is already asleep he is
like a shoteh who is patur from mitzvos. (Thus, the old riddle about which
mitzvos one can be mekayem b'Kum v'Aseh while asleep, would not encompass
sukkah, according to RSZA.)

Based on that sevara, he says, for example, if the yeshiva's sukkah is not
large enough to accommodate everyone, then several people should GO TO
sleep in the sukkah, and then once they are sleeping, others should gently
remove them from the sukkah to allow them their turn.

Perhaps there's another logic at work for why the bracha is not said on sleeping in the sukkah?

Akiva Miller
____________________________________________________________
Do THIS before eating carbs (every time)
1 EASY tip to increase fat-burning, lower blood sugar & decrease fat storage
http://thirdpartyoffers.juno.com/TGL3131/524adf39e0235f384233st03vuc

<<The mitzvah is to hear, rather than to blow.  Lishmoa` kol shofar, not
liskoa` bashofar.  This is why one is yotzei with a stolen shofar; blowing
it is an avera but listening to the sound is not, and the mitzvah is the
listening.  Since this is so, why is it that one can't be yotzei if the
blower is not obligated in the mitzvah?  Why can the tokea` not be a woman,
a katan, or even a nochri, or even a mechanical system that pumps air
through
a kosher shofar?>>

Just a note that this is a machkloket rishonim. The opinion quoted is that
of Rambam and in fact many ask on the Rambam why cant a monkey blow the
shofar. The usual answer is though the mitzvah is to hear the shofar it has
to be a shofar blast from someone who is chayav.

-- 
Eli Turkel
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1. when do people switch back from honey to salt ?  is it  universally
 shmini atzeret? simchat tora? the next day?

2.  yamim noraim  leyning  nusach--- are  there different minhagim as to
whether  the  maftir  and YK  mincha leyning  uses this tune  or not?
 what about  on hoshana rabba and  simchat tora leyning ?   have heard it
used for both
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<<> The Chozeh of Lublin, R' Naftoli Ropshitzer, and the Sanzer Rav (R'
> Chaim Halberstam, the Divrei Chaim) all called the minhag dubious because
> the Chemdas Yamim was. And therefore lemaaseh there are Chassidim who do
> not say LeDavid. So, the accusation does have legs. Even if you disagree
> with it, I wouldn't call a decision of the Chozeh "very dubious".>>

Just to point out that Le-Dovid is not the only common minhag that some
rabbis objected to. In particular yifdal is common in many shuls but
nevertheless the Ari and others (including RYBS) objected to saying yigdal
on various grounds

Of course there is the old argument over "praying to the angels" that
appears in selichot. Many objected while others (including RSZA) justified
the minhag.

-- 
Eli Turkel
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>> R Schwab (in Mayan Bais shoaiva on breshis 2'23) says  explicitly that 
there
were human like creatures alive before Adam who looked  like pple, planted
and harvested as pple do, could reproduce with Adam, etc,  but did not have
the neshama of Adam harishon.

As I've mentioned  previously, this approach still requires us to say that
all these pple  mysteriously died out somehow and the world is now only
populated by Adam's  descendants (all goyim are today are considered human,
descendants of Adam,  capable of converting and becoming Jewish, etc)<<

Mordechai  cohen







>>>>
In the generations between Adam and Noach many people were born and as  
others have noted, they may have been the products of matings between humans 
and  these other human-like creatures.   Noach and his wife may  well have had 
some forebears who were these non-human beings.  Of  course except for the 
hybrids -- Noach, wife, sons and daughters-in-law -- the  rest of that 
non-human population as well as all the humans died in the  Mabul.
 
 
Unless the Mabul was not global?  Maybe Australian aborigines, South  
Pacific islanders, and American Indians are the descendants of those long-ago  
non-humans -- who didn't die in the Mabul?  Possibly this is apikorsus.  I 
know that when it was first suggested on Avodah years ago, I said  it was 
apikorsus. Though I was using the word loosely, I later regretted  having said it 
at all.  Especially since I myself am now agnostic on the  subject of 
whether the Mabul was a world-wide phenomenon.  Maybe it was and  maybe it 
wasn't. (IIRC Chazal say Eretz Yisrael was spared.)
 
What I would like to ask R' Schwab about those pre-Adam non-human  
humanoids is, did they wear clothes?  Did they have language and  culture?  Did they 
have art, cities, music?  Or did they live  more like modern-day primates 
of the mountains and jungles? 
 
 
--Toby Katz
..
=============


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On Tue, Oct 1, 2013 at 5:40 PM, R Akiva Miller <kennethgmil...@juno.com>wrote:
> Rabbi Meir G. Rabi asked:
>> Sleeping is not permitted out of the Sukkkah, even a short nap
>> as it is deemed to be always a matter of Kevius, ...
>> Yet Surprisingly, we do not make the Beracha for sleeping.

> I think I might once have heard that the bracha is omitted because one is
> cannot be sure that he will in fact fall asleep.

> But that will not work according to Rav Shlomo Zalman Auerbach. His shita
> (in the Halichos Shlomo) is that one must GO TO sleep in the sukkah, but
> need not BE asleep in the sukkah, because once one is already asleep he is
> like a shoteh who is patur from mitzvos....

That Shita is Rabbeinu Tam (you can find it in Berachos in the sugya
dealing with Birchat HaTorah). I don't think that needs to contradict
with RSZA. Even if one is obligated to fall asleep in the sukkah,
one still has no guarantee that they will actually be able to do so,
and thus we don't make a bracha in case.

Kol Tuv,
~Liron

-- 
Liron Kopinsky
liron.kopin...@gmail.com


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