Avodah Mailing List

Volume 32: Number 80

Wed, 07 May 2014

• 1. Re: 5 iyar, chu'l (Harry Maryles)
• 2. Re: 5 iyar, chu'l (Micha Berger)
• 3. Re: silk-screened sifrei torah (STAM) and megillot (Micha Berger)
• 4. Re: [Areivim] 5 iyar, chu'l (Kenneth Miller)
• 5. Re: 5 iyar, chu'l (Harry Maryles)
• 6. Re: Women wearing Tefillin (T6...@mail.aol.com)
• 7. Is there one halachic truth? (David Wacholder)

On Tuesday, May 6, 2014 2:49 PM, Zev Sero <z...@sero.name> wrote:
> On Areivim, Shifra Goldmeier wrote:
>> And regarding hallel -- if the entire country of Israel (the religious
>> parts of it), can say Hallel with a bracha in shul on the first night of
>> Pesach, as per the minhag eretz yisrael which most people here seem to
>> follow, than why is saying hallel, even with a bracha, not justified for
>> Yom Haatzmaut (by, day at least, if not also by night)?

>Because saying hallel on Pesach night is a mitzvah, actually a chiyuv,
>while saying it on 5 Iyar, or 6 Iyar, or whenever is not. This chiyuv
>should be fulfilled at home at the seder, but then we have a problem with
>the bracha....

The Meiri in the last chapter in Pesachim tells us that an individual or
community is overtaken by a Tzarah (disaster of any kind or any source)
and is miraculously delivered form it -- then there is a Mitzvah to
recite Hallel at the time of the redemption and on its anniversary each
year. That it is a Mitzvah but not an obligation means that we do not
recite the blessing for Hallel. But one may indeed institute saying Hallel
for himself and saying it is considered the fulfillment of a D'Oraisa --
a Torah based Mitzvah!

HM

On Wed, May 07, 2014 at 08:39:07AM -0700, Harry Maryles wrote:
: The Meiri in the last chapter in Pesachim tells us that an individual or
: community is overtaken by a Tzarah (disaster of any kind or any source)
: and is miraculously delivered form it -- then there is a Mitzvah to
: recite Hallel at the time of the redemption and on its anniversary each
: year....

RnSG was discussing Israel, so that answer works. But what about saying
Hallel in chu"l?

I used to be of the opinion that beni chu"l ought to say Hallel on Yom Y-m
but not Yom haAtzma'ut. In terms of saving the Jewish community of the US,
to speak of an example I know /something/ about, 1948 did nothing to slow
down the disaster that cost us millions to assimilation, and counting.
However, 1967 and the Jewish Price it engendered at least turned kiruv
into a movement. (Although from a mathematical point of view, it's no
deliverance -- there are 60 intermarriages for every BT...)

Also, this wouldn't justify saying Hallel the day after, as in this
you. It would support RSGoren's shitah that moving the day of celebration
should not include moving the day of Hallel. (Think megillah reading
among residents of kefarim; they might read on the prior market day, but
the other mitzvos hayom remain on the 14th.)

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Today is the 22nd day, which is
mi...@aishdas.org        3 weeks and 1 day in/toward the omer.
http://www.aishdas.org   Chesed sheb'Netzach: Do I take control of the
Fax: (270) 514-1507                 situation for the benefit of others?

Reviving a thread from 12 years ago.
http://www.aishdas.org/avodah/getindex.cgi?section=S#SIL
K%20SCREENED%20TORAH%20SCROLLS

The topic is R' Abadi's silk screen "scentil" of a seifer Torah which
can then be used for writing the text using a roller full of ink --
both quick and far less chance of error. The process, as he (or his son)
describes it at <http://kashrut.org/scrollproject>:
    ... The Sofer starts by purchasing some of the highest quality Klaf
    (parchment). The Klaf is checked, tested, and cut to size. The Sirtut
    (engraved lines) is scored to the exact depth, thickness, height, and
    length. Silk screens are created with the exact lettering. Computers
    are utilized to achieve a perfectly balanced page using proportionate
    letters. No need for elongated or squished letters to reach the end
    of the line. The screens are placed on top of the Klaf in an exact
    position to meet the Sirtut. The Sofer then puts ink on the screen,
    and applies the ink by hand passing a squeegee across the Klaf. In
    a matter of seconds this Klaf has a full page written perfectly. The
    page is then dried. After the pages are all written, they are sewed
    properly and the new Torah scroll is ready to use.....

If this process makes a kosher seifer Torah, then anyone with $10k can
have their own seifer 9" Torah (15" seifer - $18k).

Today I saw in the AhS 32:37 an issue I couldn't find in the archive.

The MA says (s"q 23) that if a drop of ink happens to fall onto the kelaf
in a way that makes part of the intended letter, one may not complete
the letter from that drop, but one has to cleap up the drop and write
it from scratch the whole letter has to be al yedei kesivah.

Although the AhS notes that in EhE 125 he writes that some do allow
a gett where a letter is written that way, but that's because a gett
doesn't need qedushah, only "lishmah" (quotes in the AhS).

So the first question I had was what interferes with calling this kesivah:
that dripping is not writing (as implied by the reisha), or that the
drip was not by human intent and therefore no one gave it qeduasshah
(which one can argue from the seifa). Because here too we have ink hitting
parchment by something other than pen-strokes, but it is by human action
with kavanah lesheim sta"m.

The MA's source is the Y-mi Gittin 2:3 vilna 11b "'kasav' -- lo
hashofeich, 'kasav' -- lo choqeiq." So even a gett would seem to be pasul
even with intent. And the followup case in the gemara is the people of
Medincha who would do secret writing in mei milin, and the recipient
would pour ink minus eifetz on it. Which isn't 100% the same as the silk
screen case, but prety close. Nor is it being claimed that this is the
sole case of shofekh being excluded by the derashah.

Second question, which is still open for me... is a roller over a
silk-screen "hashofeikh"?

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Today is the 22nd day, which is
mi...@aishdas.org        3 weeks and 1 day in/toward the omer.
http://www.aishdas.org   Chesed sheb'Netzach: Do I take control of the
Fax: (270) 514-1507                 situation for the benefit of others?

On Areivim, Shifra Goldmeier wrote:

> And regarding hallel - if the entire country of Israel (the
> religious parts of it), can say Hallel with a bracha in shul on
> the first night of Pesach, ... than why is saying hallel, even
> with a bracha, not justified for Yom Haatzmaut (by, day at
> least, if not also by night)?

Just because Hallel is said on one happy occasion, that does not
necessarily indicate that it should be said on all other happy occasions.
This is similar to the fact that we say Shehecheyanu on some happy
occasions, Hatov V'Hametiv on other happy occasions, and neither on yet
others.

The halachos of each are different, and it is important to thank G-d in the
appropriate way on each such occasion. Giving too much thanks for a small
favor can be as bad as giving insufficient thanks for a big favor. Same
thing for giving the wrong sort of thanks.

R' Zev Sero answered:

> Because saying hallel on Pesach night is a mitzvah, actually a
> chiyuv, while saying it on 5 Iyar, or 6 Iyar, or whenever is not.
> ...
> In early Iyar, though, there is no chiyuv, no mitzvah, no proper
> minhag instituted by those with authority to invent new minhagim
> that at least Ashkenazim can say a bracha for, there's nothing.
> And we do not have the right to say hallel "stam"; "kol ha'omer
> halel bechol yom" is not a good thing. ...

I would agree that no authority has instituted a NEW chiyuv or mitzvah in
this regard. But there are authorities who have ruled that the occasion
fits into PRE-EXISTING rules about saying Hallel. This is a hotly-debated
subject, and depending on who is considered to be a legitimate authority,
this view might be in the minority or even in the extreme minority. But it
does exist.

Akiva Miller
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On Wednesday, May 7, 2014 1:24 PM, Micha Berger <mi...@aishdas.org> wrote:
> I used to be of the opinion that beni chu"l ought to say Hallel on Yom Y-m
> but not Yom haAtzma'ut. In terms of saving the Jewish community of the US,
> ... 1948 did nothing to slow down the disaster
>        ... 1967 and the Jewish Pride it engendered at least turned kiruv
> into a movement. (Although from a mathematical point of view, it's no
> deliverance -- there are 60 intermarriages for every BT...)

> Also, this wouldn't justify saying Hallel the day after...

What I posted here reflects the opinion of RAS and is from a much longer
essay on the subject of YhA.

RAS told me that YhA is far more significant than YY. Heh Iyar is
the day that we got EY back for the first time since Churban Bayis
Sheni. As important as YY and the return of Har HaBayis is, that is not
as significant as YhA. RAS did not therefore say Hallel on YY. But he
did say it on YhA.

He also said that one should say it on Heh Iyar (and not any Nidcha as
was the case this year) since that is the anniversary of the actual date
that we got EY back in our hands.

HM

On Wednesday, May 7, 2014 1:24 PM, Micha Berger <mi...@aishdas.org> wrote:
>>I used to be of the opinion that beni chu"l ought to say Hallel on Yom Y-m
>>but not Yom haAtzma'ut. In terms of saving the Jewish community of the US,
>>... 1948 did nothing to slow down the disaster
>>    ... 1967 and the Jewish Pride it engendered at least turned kiruv
>>into a movement. (Although from a mathematical point of view, it's no
>>deliverance -- there are 60 intermarriages for every BT...)
>>
>>Also, this wouldn't justify saying Hallel the day after...

> The idea that elderly women shouldn't go to shul because young women 
> have to take care of small children seems a non sequitur to me.[--TK]

From: Ben Waxman <ben1...@zahav.net.il>
> The idea that young women shouldn't go to shul because there are young 
> children is a non-sequitur to me. Have hubby go to the early minyan 
> (assuming that there is one) and he can take care of the kinder later in 
> the morning. At least make sure that she has time for part of shul.

If a woman /wants/ to go to shul, it would certainly be a chessed on her
husband's part to enable her to do so in the manner you have suggested.

However, women are not obligated to go to shul, and there is a very
good reason for that. The Ribono Shel Olam created a world with both
men and women in it, and His Torah likewise is a manual for a world with
both men and women in it. Men and women are not interchangeable units,
not in the world and not in the Torah.

This thread has meandered from "women wearing tefillin" to "women going to
shul" in that wonderful way Avodah threads tend to do. But I will tell you
that one sub-theme uniting the elements of this wandering thread is the
resentment felt by too many women at the realities of biology and Torah.

A woman's desire to daven in shul can be a very holy, pure desire to
connect with Hashem -- I mentioned how Rebetzen Kanievsky went to shul
every day, three times a day. But if her desire to go to shul turns into
a power struggle with her husband, it can turn into a fire that consumes
their sholom bayis. If her small children seem a burden to her and if
her role as a mother is a source of anger, there is trouble in Paradise.

On that intersection where hashkafa, halacha and personal desires meet,
there is no one right way to go for every woman. A woman has to ask
herself (as a man has to ask himself), first and foremost, what is the
best path at this point in her life for avodas Hashem? A woman actually
has more latitude than a man -- to daven more, or less. To go to shul,
or not. To learn Torah, or not. Certainly her tastes and preferences are
important. But ultimately it shouldn't be about "what do I want?" but
"What does He want?"


[Email #2]

From: menucha <m...@inter.net.il>
> Once we are talking about non sequiturs, the one that bothers me is 
> healthy women who are not pregnant or nursing not fasting because they 
> were/will be pregnant.

In the Litvishe world they tend to be strict about this and generally
require women to fast, but I remember my father z'l telling me that
chassidim are very lenient about women fasting. The reason is that they
have a strong desire for women to be as strong and healthy as possible,
to have many children -- and healthy children!

They want to make conditions as easy as possible for mothers, knowing that
their work is hard work, 24/7. They want women to have the strength and
the patience to be able not only to bear children, but to take optimal
care of their children with a positive attitude. There is a wish and a
drive to bring more and more Jewish children into the world, children
with healthy, happy mothers.

Nowadays when so many women work outside the home, in addition to their
domestic duties, it seems to me that there is more reason, not less, to
be lenient about women fasting. This presupposes that there are halachic
sources that allow such leniency -- which I assume there are. If a woman
stays up all night with a fussy baby and then has to go to work in the
morning to support her kollel husband, she needs extra koach. Personally
my heart breaks when I see a new mother going back to work and leaving
her infant behind, but that's a whole nother thread.

Today the scientific community is more aware than ever of the necessity
for women to be healthy /before/ becoming pregnant. For example, they tell
young women to load up on vitamin B9 (folic acid) even before becoming
pregnant, and in the US, by law, manufacturers even add B vitamins to
breakfast cereal, in order to prevent birth defects like spina bifida.

Even when there is no long term negative consequence to fasting at all,
just having a woman be strong for one day so she can have the koach to
deal pleasantly with her children is desirable. I understand that there
are both halachic and hashkafic aspects to this question, and I am not
paskening for anyone. I'm just saying that "healthy women who are not
pregnant or nursing not fasting because they were/will be pregnant"
is NOT a non sequitur.

--Toby Katz

?
In practice:
What my LOR will  rule - that will be the absolute truth. Mara DeAtra -
master of specific location determines the Absolute Truth. Normalcy is
restored, all is well with the world.


Homiletically: Malbim claims that the "Elokecha not Elokeichem Defense" is
based on Contracts. "Naaseh VNishma" was consent, but until the effective
date of  the Covenant they were Eino Metzuveh. The Covenant only became
effective Upon Delivery of the Luchot! Once the Luchot were "dropped" , the
BY retained their "Status quo ante" and never advanced to their new
Covenanted status. After the Eigel, they remained Bnai Avraham. They were
to blame only for not allowing the Covenant to take effect! That was Moshe
Rabeinu's defense, as per Malbim.

Segueing - about the Luchot:

Were the Luchot delivered as one big unit? Or - were they delivered as
individual letters and paragraphs? Perhaps the Gmara Midrash concept that
 Luchot with parts of letters hanging miraculously in place - and readable
from all angles - tells us a message. To attach to One Hashem, there could
be only One Covenant, and One Klal Yisrael an eternal being - and only One
Torah.

Homiletics aside, for each specific letter, what is the  "Law of the
Letter"?

Micha-One and Micha-Two both stood at Har Sinai, debating the Luchot.


According to  Micha-One: Moshe saw the Luchot blank, and saw the writing of
each stroke of each letter. In proper order, that became Luchot Habrit.

Au contraire says Micha-Two: Moshe was given the entire Luchot as a
finished product.  The Almighty showed Moshe FINISHED letters! He
holistically read whole letters!

Micha-Two adds:. Compare with Shekel shown to MR, and the New moon, or the
Menorah. The letter is shown whole - the result.  pictures a world before
the first Sofrim-SchoolThe scribe is then asked to copy - express in ink
what he saw on the Luchot.



Existentially - let this be Aleph!
Let this be Yud! IMHO - my uncorroborated idea - a Yud is a dominant body,
with only secondary extensions. The right bottom extension needs "humilty"
shortness - so we curve it left.
Let this be Vav! Vav is a head-leg dyad, the leg needs the double-height of
the head [two Kulmuses in vernacular] - to gain its individuation/equality,
but not more. It cannot be "specially lengthened".

Let this be Nun Sofit! The leg is clearly lengthened and extended. [Heads
up - do you begin the leg from center - or from bottom right? We are
ignoring that.]

Let this be Zayin! The head becomes clearly defined as intact - a
rectangle. The leg starts from under the middle - then thickens mid-depth-
and thins at bottom!

Rav Aharon Cotler Ztz"al in one of the early ShU"T collections, and the
Meiri in his Sefer [the main source Beit Yosef had in these Halachot] both
say that - for example - a SHin is Shin - whatever base it has - flat
pointed etc. - as lon g as it projects "Shin-i-ness" - it is a shin. there
is no list of technical requirements at all.

Let us go allegory - every Jew is a Jew, a unique Shechina. A shin is a
Shin.  More "controversial" - yes - A Tzadi/Tzadik with reverse-Yud
[mirror] on top - is not an existential issue!  It reflects on the Sofer's
normative competence only.

When Sofer writes the Sefer  Torah - Sofer must adhere to norms, but they
are only norms for the writer! Once it is a Shin - it is moot which base
the Sofer followed.

Sofrim are trained by Micha-One! None that I know of ever saw
Shlosha-Sfarim-Niftachim. Rashi and any pre-RabiYehudahHachasid Sefer - had
only Micha-Two to follow.


Make three cases.

CASE ONE: A long legged Reish eventually  becomes a Chaf Sofit.
CASE TWO: VERY long leg of Vav becomes Nun Sofit
CASE THREE: Shortened Vav becomes Yud.



Micha did not use my Case Two - too long a leg, an overly elongated Vav
looking like Nun Sofit [caveat from the source MB is quoting  - - if and
only if it looks like a Nun Sofit].
Properly proportioned, even a giant Vav - it is completely fine.

Micha-One - pre-shift at first said that the Unidentified OT is a QUESTION
OF FACT, an "objective truth".

Micha-Two a/k/a Micha-Shift says it is "entirely existential", as in "I
call them as I see them" (the baseball umpire's motto).


Micha-One uses a "Sofer-Kopp" - the young scribe is taught the Normative OT
- the ideal way that it is preferred he write. That includes the aggregate
of all written rules of Safrut. From that standpoint, there [normatively
only!] is a proportion which is PASSUL.

David-One-Point-One
[The Greeks discovered that to attain the appearance of a straight column,
one must make the top thicker, to fool the eye.]

David-One-Point-One  uses the bends of  "perception" to accept the
normative approach only in principle. In the real world, ruler even
calipers only indicate. It is the "Greek ideal" of an appearance of having
the length, which then [hopefully] gives it the appearance of Vav-i-ness.
 Should the leg be erased, there comes a point where it has lost
"Vav-i-ness" - it may then become a Yud [assuming it has Yudd-i-ness, and
assuming this is a Zero-Sum call, either Yud or Vav.

David-Two proposes that says Short-Vav  may become neither Vav nor Yud -
just a nullity. Does it look like a "Too Short Vav" or like nothing? If
there is no alternate letter to mistake it for - we mentally alter the
letter to put it into a framework. That subconscious "normation" would
count. the letter is worth a discount from the seller, but pulls through.


Words cannot describe graphics without technical vocabulary.

David-Three now takes a position that is Daat Yachid, and existential. The
top of  a Chet of Rashi was a strong horizontal line over two vertical
legs. All agree so far.
Raaviyah,from thence Or Zarua found a Rabeinu Tam letter - instructions to
his private Sofer.
"When you write my new Esther ... give me a Chatoteret - a hump in the
middle of the top. Later authorities had a question of approach.

David-Three and Micha-Two said very simple - do both. Have a half-thick
rise in the middle - the Chett will serve both - Rashi and his
great-grandson can economize and use one Megila!  If you think about it -
why did Rabeinu keep it secret? why is there no big Tosafot about this? It
must be that existentially - no generation gap - Rashi and Rabeinu Tam
consider it a straight across kosher Chet-Top.
If so - asked - do we rule like Rabeinu Tam - answer Micha-Two and
David-Three DO BOTH!

Micha-One and David-One and Sofrim angrily dispute the above!  If it says
DO LIKE RABEINU TAM - you must - DO LIKE RABEINU TAM!  Higher - higher -
higher -
at least almost as tall as the top of a Lamed. To show your RT-allegiance,
make the hump into an angle and use the thin flourish thin lines for the
Chatoteret!

There is a warning from the Maharik - he once saw a Chet and said that the
Chatoteret was too thin and too far out of line to be kosher.  [ agrees
with Micha-Two and D-3?]

The Tzemach Tzedek Lubavitch had an amazing fight with a Sofer. Sofer-X
[identified by the bump on top of his head]  invalidated a Sefer Torah etc.
- because - the Chet-tops were "a slash" straight across.  The TzTzL
angrily defended the Rashi Chet. The foundation is Micha-Two and
David-Three. Existentially it is even more Chett than the RT version!  It
is a valid identity of OT CHETT, still Kosher - correcting it in Tefillin
will not make a problem of Out-Of-Order writing.

If there were a Sofer-Union then, they would have picketed.

Clearly, Rabeinu Tam had no intention of insulting the Megilah of his
grandfather!  He preferred the extra feature, the hump,  He never intended
to go to the extremes of putting all old STM into Genizah and rewriting
them! He did not make a Safeik! He added another Chumra.

In the Or Zarua, the short fat edition  has two types of Chett showing
these two interpretations. Reb Yom Tov Milhausen is the one who ruled to
follow Rabeinu Tam. His ruling was never "dis-ambiguated".



Child Labor note:  In order to be fit to judge special STaM letters - the
child must be trained to read - on kosher Ktav Ashuri only!  If he thinks
Kaf Sofit is a long Dalett, he will not identify it properly. Similar with
Reish and Chaf Sofit.

We have protected this child from the printed word, and he has only Siddur
with Otiot STaM, so that he knows his Chaf Sofit.  Otherwise the LOR must
make his own call.

In practice:
What my LOR will  rule - that will be the absolute truth. Mara DeAtra -
master of specific location determines the Absolute Truth. Normalcy is
restored, all is well with the world.













But writing this reply made me shift my position.


In our case there is no doubt about the objective truth. We know exactly
what the shape of the letter is, and how far down the leg goes. What we
are trying to determine is entirely existential -- what is the more
reasonable or common subjective assessment of the ink in question --
does it qualify as a yud or as a vav?

We could have made the issue objective: the shiur of a leg of a vav is
at least 1 or 1.5 kumulsim (think the width of the head's side-stroke)
beyond the bottom of the head, and any shape where the leg is less than
that shiur is a yud. But we didn't.

So I do have to back off my original claim: it's not an issue of relying
of halakhah-specific rules of eidus over determination of fact, it's not
even an issue of fact.

-- 
David Wacholder
Cell: 917-742-7838
Email: dwachol...@gmail.com
dwachol...@optonline.net
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