Avodah Mailing List

Volume 40: Number 29

Thu, 28 Apr 2022

• 1. Re: Gluten Free During Pesach (Akiva Miller)
• 2. Re: R' Yishmael-Kaddish (Micha Berger)
• 3. Brisker Torah and Design Patterns (Micha Berger)
• 4. Re: Gluten Free During Pesach (Akiva Miller)
• 5. Gluten free oats (Rabbi Meir G. Rabi)
• 6. Re: Gluten free oats (Micha Berger)
• 7. Re: Gluten free oats (Akiva Miller)
• 8. Re: Gluten free oats (Micha Berger)
• 9. Re: Gluten free oats (Akiva Miller)

.
R' Meir G Rabi wrote:

> I find it V difficult to believe that you have personally seen
> [presumably in the USA] Certified Gluten Free foods which
> contain oats. Is it possible that they were oats that had the
> gluten removed? Would be indebted if you might send a pic.

Yes, what I've seen is in the USA. But from the wonders of the internet,
you might be able to see some of these items too.

I couldn't remember the brand name at first, but it comes up pretty easily
when searching either Amazon or Google for "gluten free oat bread". (Of
course, search engines being what they are, the results also show gluten
free breads which lack oats, and oat breads which aren't gluten-free.)

The one I had purchased a few years ago is from "Katz Gluten Free". I've
seen it in many Jewish groceries, and you can see it also at
www.katzglutenfree.com. The package says it is "Certified (GF) Gluten
Free", OU Pareve. It also has a hechsher from Rabbi Yuda Yerachmiel Halevi
Gruber, and next to his hechsher it says "Birkaso Hamotzi". (Some other
products might be shehakol.) On the website, their FAQ page says "All our
Oat products contain 50%+ oat flour in the GF flour mix and are Hamotzei."

Another kosher one (hechsher of Rabbi Yechiel Babad) that I see on Google
is "Baum's Gluten Free Oat Challah Bread".

I have no idea whether these are regular oat flour which had the gluten
removed, or whether they are from a particular strain or variety of oats
that has no gluten to begin with.

There are others brands too, especially if you want to include those that
don't claim to be kosher.

Akiva Miller
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On Thu, Apr 21, 2022 at 02:17:35PM +0200, Arie Folger via Avodah wrote:
> RJRich asked:
>> Anyone know why we aren't chosheish to say r' chanaya mishna prior
>> to this [at the end of Korbanot --AF] kaddish to have a dvar aggadita?

> ...       , the Kaddish at the end of Korbanot follows both halakhah and
> aggadah/derush (the actual beretta "Rabbi Yishma'el Omer). So do we need to
> recite the additional devar aggadah of Rabbi Chananya ben Aqashya?

I would think the final beraisa is still halakhah. After all, if you
have a machloqes about the middos of derashah, you could end up with
different pesaqim halakhah lemaaseh.

But what I was planning to write in response to the original question
that the point is simply to have aggadita at the end, and the Yehi
Ratzon serves the same purpose. I therefore would propose a slightly
different question: Is there a reason for which aggadita is used to cap
which halachic discussion?


Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 Today is the 9th day, which is
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   1 week and 2 days in/toward the omer.
Author: Widen Your Tent      Gevurah sheb'Gevurah: When is strict justice
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF                          most appropriate?

In preparation for this week's catching-up on work, I got ahead on
my Arukh haShulchan Yomi (AhSY) over Pesach. But now I have a couple
of minutes to share an obsersation I made while learning OC 436:13-14
(from tomorrow's / Tue 26-Apr's AhSY).

I think that someone whose learning is dominated by Brisker lomdus would
have nodded when learning the first 3/4 of se'if 13.

According to one opinion in the SA's se'if 3, a person who is moving out
of property owned by a non-Jew less than 30 days before Pesach without
having a new home before Pesach has to do beqidas chameitz. According to
the other opinion, added by the Rama in the name of the Tur, he doesn't --
it's the non-Jew's, after all.

In #13, we are set up a classical gavra-cheftza distinction:

The first opinion is saying his chiyuv of bediqah is still attached to
the first home, And the second is saying it's a chiyuv on the cheftza
of the home, and therefore a non-Jew's home would be exempt.

But then he asks the questions the Taz rejects the first opinion with:

1- Since when is bediqah a chovas haguf?

2- And if it is, why only if the home was a non-Jew's? His personal
chiyuv wouldn't be satisfied if the home were returned to a Jewish
landlord? (Me: I would think that this is only if he doesn't make the
landlord, who would have a chiyuv on the same house, his shaliach.)

I am reminded of something from my profession, computer programming. For
a while one of the top buzzwords was "Design Patterns". People noticed
that certain ideas were being used and reused, and they came up with
ideas about how to catalog them to make it more obvious when to use
one of them and when not. One of the observations that caused backlash
was that programmers that overused standard Design Patterns were less
likely to be creative. Why innovate a solution if there is a known one
that could do the job? And if it isn't as clear or efficient as what
you could have come up with, how would you know -- you never bothered
coming up with the idea in order to do the comparison!

Gavra vs cheftza is a Design Pattern for resolving sugyos. Something
true of the whole idea of classic Brisker chaqiros. Note that Rav Chaim's
original derekh didn't focus on any specific set of oft arising chaqiros;
this is a later innovation anyway.

And so I fear that too many guys learning today would never have thought
of the Taz's questions, because they would be too enthralled by the
beauty of the gavra-cheftza chaqira.

Whereas in Telzher derekh, where even if you end up with a Design Pattern
chaqira you still have to understand *why* this din has that chaqira,
a talmid would be less likely to fall into that trap.

And so the typical bachur is Brisk-thinking and would never get to RYME's
sevara for the first shitah: If this is the nearest thing the Jew has
to a home, and no non-Jew moved into the house, the home is thought of
as the Jew's and therefore the chameitz in it is still his! Maybe not
for bal yeira'eh -- the bitul of chameitz left behind is pretty total --
at least for the asei of bediqah.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 Today is the 9th day, which is
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   1 week and 2 days in/toward the omer.
Author: Widen Your Tent      Gevurah sheb'Gevurah: When is strict justice
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF                          most appropriate?

(a postscript to my post of a few minutes ago).

PS: Baruch Hashem, I have no gluten sensitivity that I'm aware of. I became
aware of the oats problem a few years ago when I purchased a loaf of the
Katz's bread (that I mentioned above) thinking that it would make
convenient sandwiches for lunch, as netilas yadayim is very difficult where
I work. Alas, I got home and opened that package, and that's then I
realized the problem.

(This was a few years ago, and I don't remember whether (a) I was too
focused on the "Gluten Free" to notice that it was a loaf of "Oat Bread",
or whether (b) perhaps the bread had an innocuous name and I would have
remained ignorant had I not happened to read the ingredient list.)

Caveat emptor. Knowledge is power. The same way that lactose-intolerant
people need to be aware that "pareve" might not be a sufficient guarantee
for their health, so too do the rest of us need to know that "gluten-free"
might not mean what you think.

Akiva Miller
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Thank you for your post.

from https://www.shop.gfoats.com.au/pages/frequently-asked-questions
Q. So why aren?t they labelled gluten free?
A. Due to restrictions in the current Australian labelling laws, we are
unable to make a claim on packaging that any product containing oats are
gluten free. However we have our latest Gluten Free Test results displayed
under the compliance tab with corresponding batch numbers to show you that
these oats are tested to <3ppm.

The Elisa Testing Equipment for the detection of gluten cannot evaluate
less than 3ppm. All products on the market that are labelled gluten-free in
Australia will test to <3ppm which equates to ?0? or nil detected.

Oats are naturally GF becoming contaminated at the farm if grown close to,
or from being processed in facilities with gluten grains.

Oats are sourced from GF Harvest in Wyoming, USA. No gluten has been grown
on their land for at least 2 years. All machinery and storage are
exclusively non-gluten. Each field is thoroughly inspected, at least six
times during the growing season to ensure no stray glutinous species are
growing in the field.

which rekindles the Q = are oats one of the five grains?



Best,

Meir G. Rabi

0423 207 837
+61 423 207 837
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On Tue, Apr 26, 2022 at 05:32:12AM +1000, Rabbi Meir G. Rabi via Avodah wrote:
> which rekindles the Q = are oats one of the five grains?

To me the question is multi-part:

1- Does "chameishes minim" and the idea that all 5 are subtypes of chitah
& se'orah have anything to do with biology? If so, Rashi's identification
of shibboles shu'al is a non-starter. Biologically, oats are an entirely
different thing.

2- Does the difference between chameitz and sircha really boil down to
gluten? If chameitz had a scientific definition similar to "leavened",
then why the limitation on which liquids are in the dough? Again, if it
is, oats cannot be one of the 5 grains, as they have no "gluten"; the
topic of this discussion until this hijacking post.

(Tangent: Dew and other water are considered different liquids, e.g. in
makhshirei tum'ah. Would dough made with dew only be assur derabbanan?)

3- If the answer to both of those questions is no, minim and chameitz are
both based on sociology and how humans relate to the kind of grain and the
kind of leavening, or anything else but biology and chemistry... Then and
only then can we can ask whether oats qualify.

I hear that oats and barley are often grown together. Maybe that's the
basis of Rashi's position. In people's minds, they are parts of a single
crop.

Or maybe the majority of rishonim are correct.

Tangent: BTW, often with a third partner -- beans. Thus the English
children's song about "Oats and Beans and Barley grow". Which changes
the whole way I would look at qitniyos. If oats are a min of barley
by farming association, why are beans only assur by minhag and not as
deOraisa as oats? Or, because it is a less common member of the crop,
at least derabbanan!)

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 Today is the 10th day, which is
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   1 week and 3 days in/toward the omer.
Author: Widen Your Tent      Tifferes sheb'Gevurah: When does strict
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF                judgment bring balance and harmony?

.
R' Micha Berger wrote:

> 1- Does "chameishes minim" and the idea that all 5 are subtypes
> of chitah & se'orah have anything to do with biology? ...
>
> 2- Does the difference between chameitz and sircha really boil
> down to gluten? If chameitz had a scientific definition similar
> to "leavened", then why the limitation on which liquids are in
> the dough? ...

I won't pretend to have *learned* it, but I did *read* the first few pages
of the Yerushalmi on Challah, and I'm fascinated by it. I recommend it to
anyone who has access to the ArtScroll, especially English page 1b1.

If I'm understanding it correctly, while it is true that chitah and se'orah
are mentioned in the Torah by name, the other three grains aren't, and
Chazal had no problem conducting experiments, to find empirical evidence
about which grains produce chimutz and which produce sirchon. These
experiments were so extensive that the Yerushalmi mentions some grains
about which the evidence was inconclusive and/or debated. It even talks
about whether a chopped apple in dough can develop chimutz.

Why is this discussion in Challah instead of Pesachim? The Mishna Challah
opens with the assertion that only doughs of the Five Minim are obligated
in challah, and that this is learned from a connection of "lechem-lechem",
teaching us that only the sort of lechem that is relevant to Pesach (i.e.,
can become chametz or matzah) is the sort of lechem that is relevant to
challah.

So my answer to RMB's first question is that the difference between the
Five Grains and All Other Grains has nothing to do with Torah, and
everything to do with Science.

There is no Mesorah, or Halacha LMoshe Misinai, or anything like that,
which instructs us about the difference between chametz and matzah. Rather,
Chazal knew chimutz when they saw it, and they knew sirchon when they saw
it, and (despite some inconclusive or arguable datapoints) that is the sum
total of what we have to go by. Their peer-reviewed findings were published
in the Yerushalmi, subject to the interpretations of sages through the
centuries. Tze Ul'mad about  the five grains, and about other grains, and
about mei peiros, etc etc etc.

And my answer to RMB's second question is: Your very question illustrates
how little we know about this stuff. To the best of our knowledge, mei
peiros are mostly water and should therefore cause chimutz, but in fact
they cause sirchon (Rambam as cited by MB 462:4 and Shaar Hatziyun 462:3).
Maybe we have been fooled and gluten has nothing to do with chimutz; or
maybe gluten does cause chimutz but the sugar content inhibits it. Who
knows? Who even has a way of figuring it out?

To figure it out, we would have to find someone who can tell the difference
between chimutz and sirchon by looking at it. And they died ages ago. I am
reminded of a conversation we had here a few years ago, regarding whether
modern kitchen utensils absorb flavors like Chazal's utensils did. It is
very tempting to say that ours are much smoother and cleaner, but without a
proper Control Group it is all just conjecture.

Akiva Miller

PS: RMB also asked:

> (Tangent: Dew and other water are considered different liquids,
> e.g. in makhshirei tum'ah. Would dough made with dew only be
> assur derabbanan?)

Mechaber 466:5 says that dew *IS* machmitz. See there for several other
water-based liquids which are or are not machmitz. (BTW, I'm no expert in
this. I simply googled "chametz dew", and the sixth hit was exactly what I
was looking for.)
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On Tue, Apr 26, 2022 at 10:07:53PM -0400, Akiva Miller via Avodah wrote:
> If I'm understanding it correctly, while it is true that chitah and se'orah
> are mentioned in the Torah by name, the other three grains aren't, and
> Chazal had no problem conducting experiments, to find empirical evidence
> about which grains produce chimutz and which produce sirchon...

I disagree. This is how I understood the gemara. (Which I did learn,
but only at daf yomi pace and 2 cycles ago.)

The burden of proof is on the one who says there was a machloqes in
metzi'us. So let's see if that is really the most compelling read of
the Y-mi.

The Yerushalmi (Challah 1b; Pesachim 17a) records a dispute between
the Chakhamim, who said that chameitz cannot be made from rice flour,
and Rabbi Yochanan ben Nuri who said that it could. So, the gemara
suggests, "So check it!" A scientific determination! But it turns out
they did check it, but the two sides disputed about "iqar bediqasah --
the essence of the check." I took this to mean the argument was over
how to explain the result.

It is science's job to define the possible physical states reality
could be in. It is the poseiq's job to tell us which of those states
are included in a halachic statement, and which not.

To the Rabanan, the physical state they saw when they looked at
what happened to rice dough was in the halachic set of states we call
"sirchon", to Rabbi Yochanan ben Nuri, the result is "chimutz". Knowing
the science is not enough to know how to categorize it halachically.
We can have a machloqes about how far from wheat flour and water the
"chameitz" line goes, while still knowing exactly how far from it rice
flour and water is.

Besides, if chameitz were experimentally defined, wouldn't wheat with 100%
apple juice also be chameitz deOraisa?

(BTW, I apply similar reasoning to "death". Science can define and
show us how to determine brain death, brain stem death, cessation of
signals from the brain to the lungs and or heart, end of breath, final
heartbeat... But it cannot tell a poseiq when someone is halachically a
"meis", which of those states qualify.)

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 Today is the 11th day, which is
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   1 week and 4 days in/toward the omer.
Author: Widen Your Tent      Netzach sheb'Gevurah: What is imposing about
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF                          strict justice?

.
R' Micha Berger wrote:

> The Yerushalmi (Challah 1b; Pesachim 17a) records a dispute
> between the Chakhamim, who said that chameitz cannot be made
> from rice flour, and Rabbi Yochanan ben Nuri who said that it
> could. So, the gemara suggests, "So check it!" A scientific
> determination! ...
> ...
> To the Rabanan, the physical state they saw when they looked at
> what happened to rice dough was in the halachic set of states
> we call "sirchon", to Rabbi Yochanan ben Nuri, the result is
> "chimutz". Knowing the science is not enough to know how to
> categorize it halachically. ...

RMB is presuming that chimutz and sirchon are halachic categories. That
idea had not occurred to me; from the context of the story, I had presumed
that they are scientific (linguistic, culinary) categories. But now that I
am thinking about it, I don't think there is any real evidence to support
either view. All we really know from the Gemara is that they disagreed
about what conclusions can be drawn from the experiment, even though they
both saw the results with their own eyes. This does not prove that
chimutz/sirchon don't have objective scientific definitions - It is an
everyday occurrence that scientists disagree about how to interpret the
results of their own experiments!

To what may the matter be compared? Let's take an example of dam nida. Two
qualified people look at the same stain, and one feels the color is tamei
while the other feels that the color is tahor. One possibility is that they
would both describe that color the exact same way, but one understands that
particular shade to be tamei while the other holds that shade to be tahor.
There is no disagreement about the facts, only about what RMB might call
"the halachic set of states we call 'tamei'".

But there is another reason they might disagree. It could be that they
perceive the color itself differently. One looks at it and feels that the
particular shade of red is in the tamei category, but the other looks at
the same stain and feels that it isn't really red at all, but that it looks
more like another color. If that sounds crazy, look again at "The dress". (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_dress)

> Besides, if chameitz were experimentally defined, wouldn't
> wheat with 100% apple juice also be chameitz deOraisa?

Logically, you're making a good point. Logically, apple juice (with its
high water content) ought to cause chimutz just like water does. But it
seems to me that our culinary experience has proven to all of us that it
doesn't.

It seems to me that some defining characteristics of leavened bread is its
fluffiness and stringiness. Can you explain to me why mei peiros fails to
put those qualities into the dough? The overwhelming majority of breads
contain significant amounts of water, and the overwhelming majority of
cakes and cookies contain no water at all -- except for the water that's in
the eggs, and the juice, and the milk. Why don't these other ingredients
give cake batter properties similar to bread dough?

(I still remember when I first learned about Pas Habaa B'kisnin, and the
differences between Hamotzi and Mezonos. One day I spent about an hour or
two in the supermarket, looking at the ingredients of almost every package
of bread, cake, and cookie in the store (both kosher and not). I was amazed
at how almost every single bread had significant amounts of water, while
only a few cakes and cookies had even small amounts.)

Akiva Miller
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