Avodah Mailing List

Volume 40: Number 23

Mon, 04 Apr 2022

• 1. Re: who determines norms? (Micha Berger)
• 2. Re: Can one kasher plastic bowls and utensils for Pesach? (Micha Berger)
• 3. Re: What did Moshe Rabenu get angry about? (Toby Katz)
• 4. Chamets - Whiskey & Vinegar (Rabbi Meir G. Rabi)
• 5. Re: Chamets - Whiskey & Vinegar (Zev Sero)
• 6. Re: Rabbi not answering a question (Akiva Miller)
• 7. Re: [Areivim] Making a siyum in 90 minutes (Micha Berger)

On Sun, Mar 20, 2022 at 06:45:25AM -0400, Akiva Miller via Avodah wrote:
> R' Joel Rich asked:
>> I once posted: I've never really resolved myself how I feel
>> about the concept that the first people who do something are
>> sinners but if enough of them do it becomes the norm and
>> acceptable. Thoughts?

...
> You are asking about the transition from assur to muttar.
> Please consider the transition from optional to required.
> 
> In other words, the first people who choose to do a certain act, or to do
> something a certain way, are mere individuals who have no effect on the
> public. But if this thing catches on, and enough people do it, it may
> become an official minhag which others are then required to follow. At
> exactly what point in time does this change occur?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sorites_paradox

    Sorites paradox

    The sorites paradox ... (sometimes known as the paradox of the
    heap) is a paradox that results from vague predicates. A typical
    formulation involves a heap of sand, from which grains are removed
    individually. With the assumption that removing a single grain does
    not cause a heap to become a non-heap, the paradox is to consider
    what happens when the process is repeated enough times that only one
    grain remains: is it still a heap? If not, when did it change from
    a heap to a non-heap?
    ...

In the real world, most sets are fuzzy, and so they are subject to the
Sorites paradox. Which is I think what RJR's and RAM's cases have in
common.

In terms of resolution, I am inclined to agree with Rt CL -- motive.

The problem with crossdressing is gender roles. Which is why plucking
gray hairs or wearing a man's sword can be examples.

The problem with minhag is perishah min hatzibbur, or when two tzibburim
are involved, forming agudos agudos, and in the classical case of minhag
avos -- al titosh toras imekha. (Yes, I realize the irony of the fact
that minhag *avos* is pinned on darshening *imekha* as umaskha.)

When is one taking a grain of sand away from these piles of sand? When
was is doing so in order to specifically reduce a pile.

Kayadua, I think that in general halakhah deals with things as percieved
in contrast to things as they empirically are. One of my examples is
the power of shinui sheim to define what is nolad on shabbos or in the
CM case of acquiring something through shinui.

And so, I would *guess* that in general, even when the motive isn't the
defining feature, halachic sets would go by normal speech. Of course, this
is an infinite regress, as one can ask how many people have to consider
something a pile in order for it to still be considered a pile. Some
unascertainable rov? But I think in practice, this rule would reduce
the number of safeiq cases.

The sorites paradox is often a source of safeiq. Like in the Yerushalmi's
version of the debate as to whether the leavening of rice and water
qualifies as chameitz. Either they are arguing about something easily
testible by experiment, or they did the experient and the result was in
the fuzzy edges of the set "chimutz".

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 The goal isn't to live forever,
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   the goal is to create so mething that will.
Author: Widen Your Tent
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF

On Mon, Mar 28, 2022 at 12:25:32PM +0000, Prof. L. Levine via Avodah wrote:
>     Q. Can one kasher plastic bowls and utensils for Pesach?
...
>                                                     Many in America have
>     the minhag to follow Igros Moshe and not to kasher plastic. However,
>     if one does not know if that is their minhag, it is the position of
>     the OU poskim that one may be lenient if there is a need.

Speaking balebatishly for a minute... Anyone who has seen how rapidly
plastic picks up indelible stains really has a hard time understanding
where there is room to be choleiq with RMF. The rate of beli'ah is
experimentally verifiable to be quite high. Potentially comparable
to Chazal era pottery, although I cannot be sure since I never served
on pottery the way they made a keli cheres. Definitely possible, and
certainly at least similar, in terms of RMF pasqening lechumera because
we just don't know.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 Be happy not because everything is good,
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   but because you can see the good side
Author: Widen Your Tent      of everything.
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF

 In Avodah Digest, Vol 40, Issue 22 dated 3/29/2022?
?From: Akiva Miller <akivagmil...@gmail.com>????>> ....Rashi
(Bamidbar 31:21) lists several cases where Moshe Rabenu got angry,causing
him to err, and Rashi lists this incident among them. In otherwords, Moshe
got angry, and this caused him to be mistaken about thehalachos of that
korban.?My problem is that I don't understand this sequence of events.
Exactly whatwas it that caused Moshe to get angry? Prior to the moment when
Moshe sawthat korban, he had no cause for anger, and had not yet forgotten
thehalacha. In the next moment, when he did see the korban, his
reactionshould have been, "they did it perfectly". But instead, pasuk 10:16
tellsus that Moshe saw and got angry. Why??There seems to be some kind of
paradox going on, or a reversal ofcause-and-effect. Moshe would get angry
only as a result of mistakenlythinking that the korban was done
incorrectly. And he would make themistake of thinking that it was done
incorrectly only if he was alreadyangry. Which came first, the chicken 
 or the egg? <<?Akiva Miller
??>>>>?Ohr Hachaim asks exactly the same question about the
sequence. The pasuk seems to suggest that Moshe forgot the halacha and then
got angry, while Rashi says he got angry and therefore forgot the halacha.?
But if so, then what was he angry about in the first place?
?If you have the patience to wade through it, Ohr Hachaim suggests several
possibilities, maybe this, maybe that, at great length.? One is that Aharon
had burned the chatas without consulting Moshe first, which is the sin of
poskening before your rebbe.? The halacha that Moshe forgot was that one
may so posken if his psak is based on a kal vechomer from something he
learned from his rebbe.? I warn you the reasoning goes on at great length
with many twists and turns, and I confess I didn't totally follow it.? But
it should give you a good feeling to know that the very question you
thought of on your own was a question asked by the great Ohr Hachaim.
?--Toby Katzt6...@aol.com?=============?______________________________
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Chamets and Vinegar - What's the Story?

Question
May we use vinegar made from Chamets derived alcohol during Pesach? It's a
bit of a long story.

Introduction
Yeast is a tiny living organism that is literally everywhere other than in
?clean rooms? for manufacturing microscopic integrated circuits, and
specialised medical laboratories. Yeast organisms are microscopic and float
invisibly in the air we breathe and water we drink. In tinned foods they
and other pathogens are destroyed by heating after the tin is sealed.

Without yeast we would have no wine, liqueur, beer, whiskey, vinegar, bread
or penicillin.

Yeast organisms live, eat and reproduce and are often noticed as ?bloom? a
whitish powder at the stem of plums and grapes, where nectar seeps from the
fruit. It is actually a yeast colony which grew from a single random yeast.

Yeast consumes sugar and produces alcohol. This is known as fermentation.
The sugar is either from sugary foods such as apples, grapes, plums etc. or
converted from starch found in potatoes, wheat, rice, corn etc. Yeast in
the right circumstances, also makes Chamets but only when acting upon these
5 grains; wheat, barely, rye, spelt or oats. Wine and apple cider which are
also fermented with yeast are not Chamets because they are free of the five
grains.
The Chamets Prohibition

The Torah prohibits eating and/or owning Chamets during Pesach which can be
made only from the five aforementioned grains. Bread, the most famous
Chamets, is made from a dough of such flour which, being sticky and
elastic, captures the carbon dioxide gas produced by the yeast and inflates
many thousands of tiny ?pockets? which in turn ?inflates? the dough causing
it to ?rise?. This gives bread its soft, spongy, chewy texture. It is also
the metric by which Halachah determines that dough has become Chamets.

What is the law when a little bit of Chamets is diluted in non-Chamets?
Let?s say we have a mixture of potato and Chamets in which the Chamets is
not discernible.
One violates the prohibition of consuming Chamets if a Kezayis of Chamets
is consumed within the time an average person takes to eat an average
textured bread of a given mass; known as a Peras [between 2 - 9 minutes;
see
https://www.star-k.org/articles/kashrus-kurrents/425/the-guide-to-halachic-food-measurements/]
- ????? ????? ???? ???? ??? ????? ???? ??? ?? ?? ?? ?? ???? ???? ????? ???
??? ?????? ??? ?????? ??? ??? ?? [Mishneh Berurah 442:1]

However, the prohibition of owning Chamets depends on how it is packaged.
One may own hundreds of small containers, in total, many hundreds of
Kezaysim of Chamets, without transgressing the prohibition if there is less
than a Kezayis in each container -  ????? ?? ???? ??? ???? ???? ???? ????
??? ????? ?????? ???? ??? ??? ?? ??????? ?? ?? ?? ???? ??? ?? ???? ???? ???

In beer production it is not the gas produced by the yeast we are
interested in but the alcohol it produces [which actually kills it;
depending on the type of yeast, between 12 and 17% - yes, alcohol is toxic]
Beer, fermented from wheat and or barley, is Chamets even though the gas is
not captured and nothing gets inflated. These beverages as well as wine,
use sulphites, chilling or heating to kill the yeast and halt fermentation.
The taste of the fermented wheat and or barley is an intrinsic element of
beer, making it Chamets even though there is no wheat or barley present.

Although the Torah prohibits even less than a Kezayis of a prohibited food,
that is inapplicable where the prohibited food is not discernible and
Battel in a mixture.

Whiskey and Bourbon - Chamets?

Bourbon and whiskey begin their life pretty much the same as beer,
fermentation of wheat and or barley. However, the initial product is
fermented to its maximum alcoholic value and then distilled which separates
and concentrates the alcohol. After a couple of distillations, it is almost
100% pure, colourless and purified to the point that there is no
discernible difference between alcohol derived from wine, potato or wheat.
Colour is often added to whiskey [E150a, spirit caramel and need not be
disclosed] but not to bourbon. [bourbon must be aged in new wooden oak
casks whilst whiskey must be aged in used wooden casks] Both gain colour
and flavour balance from ageing in charred wooden barrels which are
regularly recharred. Alcohol percentage is achieved by diluting with water.

Since halacha permits hanging meat to dry in the warm zone above a stove
even when it is enveloped by steam of milk cooking on the stove [YD 92:8 -
???????? ??????? ????????? ??? ???????? ???? ?????, ????? ????????????
???????? ????????? (???????? ?????? ?????? ???). ????? ??? ??????????
???????? - the only restriction being that the steam be less that Yad
Soledes when it contacts the meat] it is reasonable to assert that alcohol
distilled from Chamets is not Chamets just as the steam is not dairy. The
Poskim however maintain that it is Chamets.

It seems that the ruling that distilled alcohol, is Chamets [Mishneh
Berurah [442:4] - ???? ??? ????? ????? ???? ??? ?????? ???????? ???? ???
???? ???? ???????? ??? - ?the consensus of the Poskim is that ?Yayin Saraf?
- ?wine? meaning beer, that burns or perhaps that is processed with heat
i.e. distillation - when produced from one of the 5 grains is more
intensely Chamets than diluted Chamets?] is predicated upon the fact that
in years gone-by it was a crude process [between 40% and 50% alcohol]
resulting in a finished product that still retained the taste and flavour
of the Chamets it was distilled from.

We are now ready to address our opening question: if the alcohol from which
vinegar is processed is Chamets, is the vinegar also Chamets?
The OU advises that it is. Therefore, only KLP vinegar and foods containing
KLP vinegar may be consumed during Pesach. As we learned, it may also not
be owned during Pesach. Furthermore, a penalty prohibits benefiting from
any Chamets owned by a Yid during Pesach.

However, the OU argues this penalty is not applied to USA produced vinegar
because: A] in the USA vinegar is not usually made from wheat alcohol; B]
even if wheat alcohol is used it is most likely diluted with other
non-Chamets alcohols to the point of being Halachically Battel -
insignificant and inconsequential; C] domestic table vinegar (50 grain) is
further diluted, approx 95% water; D] as an ingredient in pickles, mustard,
salad dressing, horseradish etc. it is further diluted.

The leniency however, extends only to permitting their use after Pesach in
spite of it being owned by a Jew during Pesach.

However, this calculation works only for vinegar packaged for domestic
purposes. The prohibition of owning Chamets applies if within any container
there is a Kezayis of Chamets. In the case of a dilution of 95%, there will
be a Kezayis [let?s say 200ml] of vinegar in a container larger than
2,600ml. If only half of the Kezayis of vinegar is Chamets, there will be a
Kezayis in a container of more than 5,200ml. In the industrial and
commercial domains, vinegar is stored in containers of many hundreds if not
thousands of litres and contains many Kezaysim of Chamets.
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On 30/3/22 00:39, Rabbi Meir G. Rabi via Avodah wrote:
> 
> However, this calculation works only for vinegar packaged for domestic 
> purposes. The prohibition of owning Chamets applies if within any 
> container there is a Kezayis of Chamets. In the case of a dilution of 
> 95%, there will be a Kezayis [let?s say 200ml] of vinegar in a container 
> larger than 2,600ml. If only half of the Kezayis of vinegar is Chamets, 
> there will be a Kezayis in a container of more than 5,200ml. In the 
> industrial and commercial domains, vinegar is stored in containers of 
> many hundreds if not thousands of litres and contains many Kezaysim of 
> Chamets.

You are forgetting steps A and B.  Even in a 100-litre container there 
is most likely no chametz at all, and if there is by some chance any 
chametz it was most probably batel in other alcohol even before the 95% 
water was added.

-- 
Zev Sero            Wishing you a happy and kosher Pesach, and a
z...@sero.name       healthy season appropriate to your hemisphere

.
R' Joel Rich asks whether "mutav sheyihu shogegin" and "Halacha v'ain morin
ken" apply when one is asked a direct question.

I'm not sure exactly what he means, but here's my guess: If we would be
totally literal and mechanical, we'd have to admit that these concepts
could be construed as ziyuf haTorah. These rules allow a rav to give the
impression that halacha is somewhat different than it truly is. These *are*
established rules, and they *are* allowed, but only as a b'dieved, to
prevent something worse from happening. So it seems that he's asking
whether these principles can be used only in an indirect manner (in which
case the falsifying of Torah is less overt, and dependent on the
interpretations of the people involved). Or perhaps these principles can
even be used when one is asked a direct question, in which case the
falsifying of Torah is totally overt, which could cause grave problems down
the road.

My first answer is that this very question ought to be an ample
demonstration that paskening cannot be made into a mechanical algorithm, as
we have discussed so many times. Even if the paskening of a particular
question might be straightforward, its application in the real world
oftentimes is not.

My second answer is that yes, these principles - and others - do indeed
apply even when one is asked a direct question. To me, this ziyuf haTorah
-- which I concede is important and even *required* if the rav sees the
situation as important enough to require it -- is very similar to another
very commonplace situation, that of exaggeration. It is very common to see
things like "Mitzvah ABC is more important than any other mitzvah!", when
in fact, there are situations where that mitzvah is set aside for another.
Or, "Aveirah XYZ is worse than any other aveirah!", when in fact, there are
situations where XYZ is the lesser evil.

All this goes to show how the Torah is not an object that can be digitized
and algorithm-ed, but it is a Toras Chaim, which lives and breathes by the
teachings of our teachers, who must judge each situation as it comes, based
on the totality of what they know and (perhaps more importantly) what they
*feel*.

Akiva Miller
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On Sun, Apr 03, 2022 at 10:00:47PM +0000, Prof. L. Levine via Areivim wrote:
> For a bechor stuck at home. See attached video first.
> 
> *Harav Asher Weiss Shlit"a on Making Your Own Siyum (for Taanis Bechoros) in under 90 minutes*
> 
> *Harav Asher Weiss Shlit'a*: So let me say this, *if you can actually
> do a Siyum, that's preferable*. One of my Talmidim had a great idea,
> & he recorded himself the entire Meseches Makkos Yerushalmi, it's the
> shortest Mesechta in Shas.
...

I am wondering whether that really works, or if we're taking a Corona heter
and turning into a norm.

After all, where is the simchas mitzvah that would underly making a
se'udah? Is someone really making a se'udah over completing 90 minutes
of learning? (Although if someone really does feel that simchah over 90
minutes of learning, kol hakavod!)

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha


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