Avodah Mailing List

Volume 35: Number 109

Sun, 03 Sep 2017

• 1. Electronic Communications to People in Israel During Their Shabbath (David Havin)
• 2. Re: Why is it customary for women and not men to light the Shabbos candles? (Ben Waxman)
• 3. Re: Why is it customary for women and not men to light the Shabbos candles? (Akiva Miller)
• 4. Re: reactionary takanos and gezeiros (Akiva Miller)
• 5. Re: reactionary takanos and gezeiros (Sholom Simon)
• 6. Re: reactionary takanos and gezeiros (Zev Sero)
• 7. Re: Electronic Communications to People in Israel During Their Shabbath (Zev Sero)
• 8. Re: Why is it customary for women and not men to light the Shabbos candles? (Zev Sero)
• 9. Machlokes in Mishnayos, why? (Marty Bluke)
• 10. Re: what mitzvos did Avos follow? (Mandel, Seth)
• 11. Re: reactionary takanos and gezeiros (Micha Berger)
• 12. Re: Machlokes in Mishnayos, why? (Zev Sero)
• 13. Re: Machlokes in Mishnayos, why? (Marty Bluke)

Is it permissible to send electronic communications to people in Israel
during their Shabbath?

Does it make a difference whether the communication is via e-mail, fax,
text (SMS) or WhatsApp?

David Havin
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I think that words like "original sin" are a bit bombastic. The issue 
here is that we (the people living in the present) are living in a 
reality that was affected by poor choices made in the past. Adam and 
Chava may started this type of ripple effect when they ate the apple but 
it didn't stop with them. You don't have to be a kabbalist to understand 
that we live in this reality.? So Chava did something wrong and women 
today light candles as way to somehow correct that mistake. Whether 
lighting candles is symbolic and meant to teach us something, or if it 
is a real tikkun is another story.

Ben

.

I wrote:

> In simple terms: If a woman has the role of homemaker, then
> lighting the lights is part of that!

and R' Yitzchok Levine asked:

> Am I to deduce from this that if the man has the role of
> homemaker, then he should light the Shabbos candles?
> ...
> Given that roles today are much different than they were in
> the past, does this mean that who lights the Shabbos candles
> should be shared, one week the man and one week the women. (I
> am simply playing the devil's advocate here.)

The Shulchan Aruch that I cited (263:3) did not make any reference to
Chava, only to women's traditional role in the home. If a family has
non-traditional roles, I think they should carefully examine the
side-effects of this, and at least consider the re-assigning of who
lights the candles. To avoid this topic is to stick one's head in the
sand. "We've always done it this way" is often counter-productive.

I have heard of some families (younger than mine) where the husband
recites kiddush for everyone, and the wife recites hamotzi. I am not
advocating this, but I *am* saying that if one wants to reject it, he
should come up with a better reason than it being non-traditional. For
example, if non-family are present, some might consider this
non-tzniyus.

But in every case, we should all acknowledge that this is not like
Shofar or Kriyas Hatorah: When it comes to Kiddush, Hamotzi, and
Neros, the chiyuv upon men and women is absolutely equal, and in
theory there is no impediment to either being motzi the other.

> Do you know of anyone who lights the Chanukah neiros (which
> are usually oil with wicks), puts them out and then lights
> with the brochos?  I have never heard of this. If there is
> no problem with Chanukah neiros, then why is there a problem
> with Shabbos neiros?

As I see it, the only "problem" with a brand-new oil wick it that
takes some time for the fire to "catch". I don't see this as a real
halachic problem with constituting a hefsek between the bracha and the
lighting; it is more of a practical problem of the bother and effort,
but mostly the time delay in a close-to-Shabbos situation, and that
does not apply to Chanukah.

My personal practice is that on the first night of Chanuka, after the
wicks have become messily soaked with oil, I squeeze the oil out of
the tip, and separate the threads from each other. This makes them
much easier to light. On subsequent nights, I do *not* replace the
wicks. Instead, I pull the wick up a bit so that I do indeed have a
pre-lit tip for lighting. The new ner for the night is last night's
shamash. And the new shamash for tonight will be a new wick, with the
oil squeezed and threads separated. (Ditto for when there is no more
wick to pull up and it needs to be replaced.)

Akiva Miller

.

R' Sholom Simon asked:

> Can anybody think of a secular (ideally, American) law or
> common custom/practice that is done in order to distinguish
> ourselves from some other group/idealogy?

R' Micha Berger's response of yichud is a great example of where
secular society has grasped the importance of gezeros which help
protect us from ourselves. Similarly, secular society understands the
concept of Mar'is Ayin and Chashad, and they express this in the term
"Appearance of impropriety". (There's even a short Wikipedia page with
that title.) But I don't think either of these is what RSS was asking
for. He wants examples where the purpose is specifically:

> in order to distinguish ourselves from other groups (often,
> from Jewish breakaway groups).
>
> Probably the most famous one is to eat hot food on shabbos
> (to distinguish ourselves from tzadukim).

The answer that first came to my mind is that the original American
colonists adopted various practices to distinguish themselves from
their European origins. I'm sure there were others, but the main one
that comes to my mind is the spelling differences between British and
American English. For example, the Wikipedia article "Comparison of
American and British English" says: "One particular contribution
towards formalizing these differences came from Noah Webster, who
wrote the first American dictionary (published 1828) with the
intention of showing that people in the United States spoke a
different dialect from Britain, much like a regional accent."

Akiva Miller

PS: Along similar lines, I have long searched for a secular idea that
is similar to our concept of l'chatchila and b'dieved, where we are
uneqivocally supposed to do it one way, but the other way is
grudgingly acceptable after the fact. (Speeding limits are *not* a
good example of this. The policeman will probably not stop you for
going slightly over the limit, but he certainly could. That would be a
Chetzi Shiur at most - a clear violation, even if not a punishable
one.) If anyone has good examples, please start a new thread.

At 06:07 PM 9/1/2017, Micha Berger wrote:
>Jewish: Yichud.
>Contemporary cutlure: NYC PS (I think) and many colleges have a policy
>about a teacher not closing the door when alone with a student of the
>opposite gender.

Thanks -- but I'm looking more for something that is intended to separate
us (us "regular Americans" -- whatever that is) from a people or nation
or ideology that we find distasteful.

An example, actually, just came to mind as I was typing this: when
American changed from the noun of "frankfurter" to "hot dog" during WW-I.
(Or, "freedom fries". Uggh).

I'm looking for a law or practice that *separates/distinguishes" (havdil)
- your example is more like a "fence."

The closest example I can think of is not secular.  Mennonite (including 
Amish) men shave their moustaches to express their rejection of all 
things military, because when their customs were formed soldiers wore 
moustaches.


> PS: Along similar lines, I have long searched for a secular idea that
> is similar to our concept of l'chatchila and b'dieved,
There's the principle "de mimimis non curat lex", but that's more like 
chatzi shiur, which civil law considers mutar lechatchila.

-- 
Zev Sero                May 2017, with its *nine* days of Chanukah,
z...@sero.name           be a brilliant year for us all

On 02/09/17 05:39, David Havin via Avodah wrote:
> Is it permissible to send electronic communications to people in Israel 
> during their Shabbath?
> 
> Does it make a difference whether the communication is via e-mail, fax, 
> text (SMS) or WhatsApp?

If you know they won't break shabbos to read it, or at least you don't 
know they will break shabbos to read it, then I don't see a problem. 
"Ee ata metzuveh al shevisas keilim".  It's not shabbos for you; it is 
shabbos for the remote instrument that you are manipulating, but that is 
not a problem.  The same would apply to operating a waldo that's in a 
place where it's shabbos; it's shevisas keilim, which BH says is not a 
thing.


-- 
Zev Sero                May 2017, with its *nine* days of Chanukah,
z...@sero.name           be a brilliant year for us all

On 02/09/17 15:09, Ben Waxman via Avodah wrote:
> I think that words like "original sin" are a bit bombastic. The issue 
> here is that we (the people living in the present) are living in a 
> reality that was affected by poor choices made in the past. Adam and 
> Chava may started this type of ripple effect when they ate the apple but 
> it didn't stop with them. You don't have to be a kabbalist to understand 
> that we live in this reality.

But that *is* the Xian doctrine of Original Sin.  The important 
differences are in the nature of the damage done, and whether there's 
anything we can do about it.

-- 
Zev Sero                May 2017, with its *nine* days of Chanukah,
z...@sero.name           be a brilliant year for us all

The Rambam in Hilchos Mamrim (1:4) writes:
"When the Beis Din Hagadol was in existence there was no machlokes in
Israel
...
They would come to the Beis Din at the entrance to the Azara. If they knew
[the din] they would tell them, if not everyone went into the Beis Din and
asked.
...
If the matter was not clear to the Beis Din they would discuss the issue
until all agreed or they they would take a vote and follow the majority and
tell the petitioners this is the halacha"

The Rambam is based on the Gemara in Sanhedrin 88 which states the
following:
"At first there were no arguments. Any question would be brought to the
local Sanhedrin. If they couldn't answer, it would be brought to the
Sanhedriyos outside the Mikdash, and if needed, to the Beis Din Hagadol.
The Beis Din Hagadol was in Lishkas ha'Gazis from (the time of) the morning
Tamid until the afternoon Tamid. On Shabbos and Yom Tov, they would sit in
the Cheil (just outside the Azarah). If they had no tradition about the
matter, they would vote to decide. After there were many Talmidim of Hillel
and Shamai that did not learn enough from their Rebbeyim, many arguments
arose, as if there were two different Toros in Yisrael (Beis Hillel and
Beis Shamai)."

There are 2 obvious questions on the Rambam (and really the Gemara):
1. The Beis Din Hagadol was in existence throughout the period of the
Tannaim, the Gemara in fact related that they left their place in the
Lishkas ha'Gazis 40 years before the destruction of the Beis Hamikdash. If
so how can the Rambam write When the Beis Din Hagadol was in existence
there was no machlokes in Israel when Hillel and Shammai and their students
had disputes that were unresolved when there clearly was a Beis Din Hagadol
in existence?
2. Why didn't the Beis Din Hagadol resolve the disputes between Hillel and
Shammai and their students and in fact all of the disputes in the Mishna?
Why did they let Machlokes fester? Their clearly was a Beis Din Hagadol for
most if not all of the period of the Tannaim.
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From: Sholom Simon <sho...@aishdas.org>
Sent: Friday, September 1, 2017 5:17 PM
> The following are universally accepted
> 1] AAvinu [howsoever we explain his Jewish status] followed all Halacha
> and even Minhag

> Is this the case?
...
> So... what about later in time (late Rishonim and onwards)? Did everyone
> accept Rashi's view, or did some old by Rashbam, Ibn Ezra, et al?

As in many things, the Rambam seems not to have been noticed. This is
distressing, because the Rambam tries to present things according to
halokho, not according to medrash. As he says in his introduction to
the Tenth Pereq of Sanhedrin in Perush haMishnayot, medrash is almost
never to be taken literally, but rather comes to teach us things (but
says that most Jews don't understand that).

For halakhic purposes, the Rambam explains in Hil. M'lakhim 9:1, that
Adam haRishon observed 6 things that he was commanded. One was added
after the Mabbul, so yielding 7 mitzvos that Noah and his descendents
were commanded to observe. Avraham Avinu was also commanded concerning
Milah, and he took upon himself the obligation to daven Shacharit.
Yitzchak added another two, and Ya'aqov another two.

When rabbis say that Avraham observed all 613 Mitvot, it is obviously
not meant literally: many, many of the 613 only came into force after
King Shlomo built the BhM. Before that, there were a whole set of other
mitzvot (such as that the Kohanim and only the Kohanim wereto take apart
and assemble the Mishkan, and that the L'viyim and only the L'viyim
were to carry the parts of the Mishkan). These were commandments from
HQBH, but not part of the set of 613. When the BhM was built, those
mitzvot disappeared and new mitzvot, which are part of the 613 count,
came into effect. So before that no one "observed" the 613. And some
of the 613 are only applicable to Kohanim, and some only to L'viyim,
and some only to Yisra'elim, so there was no person ever who observed
or could observe all 613 mitzvot.

So when we say nowadays that Jews are commanded to observe 613 mitzvot
it does not mean that any person is commanded to observe all 613; it
means that there exist 613 mitzvot.

Every Jew is commanded to learn all 613, however. So it is possible
that the Avot learned all 613. But most of them were not technically
mitzvot then, because they were given to Moshe Rabbeinu on Har Sinai,
and before that no one was commanded to do them.

So what does the Torah mean when it says that Avraham observed "mishmarti,
mitzvotai,chuqqotai v'torotai" (sic, not "toratei) in Chapter 26? The same
thing that it means in 18:19 "for I know him, that he will command his
children and his house after him to obeserve the way of the Lord." There
is no question that Avraham Avinu was ALSO commanded to observe what
Chazal include in the term "Derekh Eretz" and the Rambam explicates in
Hil. De'ot Pereq 6, which included such basic things as proper behavior
and middot (and one of the main goals of the Aishdas organization, and
nowadays is called "mussar"). Chazal say that all of those things have
to come before Torah, i.e. before learning rest of the Torah. And, as
Micha the founder of Aishdas can tell you better than anyone, there are
so many, many things that one has to learn and focus on to observe these
most basic of the commandments. So Avraham would have had his hands full
teaching people those. Did he also learn all the mitzvot that would be
given later? He was a novi, and so perhaps could, but one cannot say that
he "observed" them in the literal sense, because how could one "observe"
a law that had not yet been instituted and was not even applicable?

Rabbi Dr. Seth Mandel

On Fri, Sep 01, 2017 at 06:41:27PM -0400, Sholom Simon via Avodah wrote:
: An example, actually, just came to mind as I was typing this: when
: American changed from the noun of "frankfurter" to "hot dog" during WW-I.
: (Or, "freedom fries". Uggh).

Given the nature of America, thix is going to be rare. I would have
recommended looking to European examples, but recently Europe has taken
to bending over backwards to be welcoming rather than to preserve their
national ethnicity.

I think this topic has become non-PC. Nationalism is even a dirty word
in some circles; viewed as faschism, or fascism-lite.

You might disagree, or not, but can we take this any further without
running afoul of rules about discussing politics?

But I hope that at least relating the two topics will provide something
to think about.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             "Someday I will do it." - is self-deceptive. 
mi...@aishdas.org        "I want to do it." - is weak. 
http://www.aishdas.org   "I am doing it." - that is the right way.
Fax: (270) 514-1507                   - Reb Menachem Mendel of Kotzk

On 03/09/17 09:51, Marty Bluke via Avodah wrote:
> 2. Why didn't the Beis Din Hagadol resolve the disputes between Hillel 
> and Shammai and their students and in fact all of the disputes in the 
> Mishna? Why did they let Machlokes fester? Their clearly was a Beis Din 
> Hagadol for most if not all of the period of the Tannaim.

They *did* resolve the BH/BS disputes.   Every time they voted BH won 
whatever was the subject of that vote, except the day BS had the 
majority and passed their 18 gezeros.  The question is why they didn't 
resolve everything else too.   Particularly the machlokes over smicha 
which continued throughout the period of the zugos.  Perhaps out of 
kavod for both the Nassi and the Av Bes Din none of the other 69 wanted 
to contradict either of them.

-- 
Zev Sero                May 2017, with its *nine* days of Chanukah,
z...@sero.name           be a brilliant year for us all

On Sun, Sep 3, 2017 at 8:58 PM, Zev Sero <z...@sero.name> wrote:

> On 03/09/17 09:51, Marty Bluke via Avodah wrote:
>
>> 2. Why didn't the Beis Din Hagadol resolve the disputes between Hillel
>> and Shammai and their students and in fact all of the disputes in the
>> Mishna? Why did they let Machlokes fester? Their clearly was a Beis Din
>> Hagadol for most if not all of the period of the Tannaim.
>>
>
> They *did* resolve the BH/BS disputes.   Every time they voted BH won
> whatever was the subject of that vote, except the day BS had the majority
> and passed their 18 gezeros.

That does not sound like the Sanhedrin voted.  The Sanhedrin had a fixed
group of 71 members, it did not matter how many talmidim someone had. It
sounds like they had a vote of the Chachamim not the Sanhedrin.

> The question is why they didn't resolve everything else too.
>  Particularly the machlokes over smicha which continued throughout the
> period of the zugos.

Yes that is exactly the question. Why didn't they resolve all of the
Machlokes in the Mishnayos.

> Perhaps out of kavod for both the Nassi and the Av Bes Din none of the
> other 69 wanted to contradict either of them.

Wouldn't that violate the issur of lo tasuguru mipnei ish?

>
>
> --
> Zev Sero                May 2017, with its *nine* days of Chanukah,
> z...@sero.name           be a brilliant year for us all
>
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