Avodah Mailing List

Volume 41: Number 4

Wed, 11 Jan 2023

• 1. Re: Subjectivity-from the OU (Micha Berger)
• 2. Re: Sheqel Kesef (Micha Berger)
• 3. Interesting chiddush of the Tzitz Eliezer about rishus ha'rabim (Ben Rothke)
• 4. Re: Subjectivity-from the OU (Zev Sero)
• 5. Re: Sheqel Kesef (Zev Sero)
• 6. Re: Who wrote Perush Yonatan? (Micha Berger)
• 7. Re: Gezeira Against Cloth Sukkos? (Micha Berger)
• 8. Re: Subjectivity-from the OU (Micha Berger)
• 9. Re: Mama Leah (Micha Berger)
• 10. Re: Sheqel Kesef (Micha Berger)
• 11. Re: Sheqel Kesef (Zev Sero)
• 12. taker but not giver? (Joel Rich)

On Fri, Jan 06, 2023 at 03:52:00PM +0200, Joel Rich via Avodah wrote:
>> Q. I am a finicky person. Many things that I find repulsive are innocuous
>> for most people. Is the halacha of bal teshaktzu established by the
>> reaction of most people or is it applied individually for each person
>> according to their sensitivities?
...
>> Thus, from both sources, it is clear that bal teshaktzu is relative to
>> each individual.

> Any overarching insights into when we look at the individual (as here)
> and when we say batla daato (we ignore his individual circumstances) and go
> by your average Yossi?

I wonder how a subjective definition of sheqetz would work.

In a lot and maybe even most cases, people don't do something they
consider all that gross. Rather, they take one step in that direction,
it seems normal after once or twice, and then the next step... And next
thing one knows, the person is doing something that would have made them
cringe when the downward spiral began.

This isn't an issue with a "teshaqtzu" that is defined by communal norm
or by objective Torah-derived kinds of behaviors.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 We are great, and our foibles are great,
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   and therefore our troubles are great --
Author: Widen Your Tent      but our consolations will also be great.
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF                      - Rabbi AY Kook

On Wed, Sep 21, 2022 at 10:56:04PM +0300, Danny Schoemann wrote:
> If coins didn't exist when the Torah was given, and for many centuries
> thereafter, how do we explain the Halocho of Chilul Maaser Sheini?

> It needs a coin for Chilul. Even an Asimon (a blank coin) doesn't qualify.

At the time I wondered if the need for a coin was a din deOraisa, just
because the basic mitzvah is. Like having a specific text fo bentching.
(And there is a dad joke in there, because a specific text is also called
a matbeia.)

On the other hand, I thougt it was more likely that the medrash about
Hashem needing to show Moshe a machatzis hasheqel makes the most sense
if coins weren't a thing yet, that even a prince of Egypt and king of
Kush would be familiar with the idea. And that perhaps even coinage
started with our minting them for machatzis hasheqel.

(And then I got lost in the question of "what is money?" Where in the spectrum
from barter goods to money does kesef=silver differ from kesef=money? But
to get back to why I am reopening the discussion...

There is news on that front. This came in on my JNS feed this morning
https://www.jns.org/israeli-researchers-uncover-earliest-silver-used-as-currency-in-levant/
Full text attached below.

Apparently when these pieces of silver were made, over 3,600 years ago --
or in the Seder Olam's timeline, around contemary with Avraham avinu -
coins weren't a thing yet, but precut silver sheqalim were.

Which fits my guess that Avraham paying with sheqalim that were "over
lasocher" refers to pieces of unstamped silver needing to be tested for
purity and weighed -- unless they were obviously beyond the minima and
acceptable to anyone.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 Rescue me from the desire to win every
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   argument and to always be right.
Author: Widen Your Tent                 - Rav Nassan of Breslav
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF                 Likutei Tefilos 94:964


[Title and subtitle]
Israeli researchers uncover earliest silver used as currency in Levant
The hoards date back more than 3,600 years -- to the Middle Bronze
Age -- or about 500 years before prior estimates.

[Image and caption omitted]

(January 8, 2023 / JNS) Israeli archaeologists announced on Sunday the
discovery of the earliest evidence of silver used as currency in the
Levant, an area including present-day Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria
and most of Turkey.

It is believed the silver relics, known hacksilber, a German term
indicating they were cut to specific weights, originated in ancient
Anatolia.

The silver hoards were unearthed during excavations in Israel's Shiloh,
Megiddo and Gezer, as well as Tel el-`Ajjul in the Gaza Strip, and date
back more than 3,600 years -- to the Middle Bronze Age -- or about 500
years before prior estimates, according to researchers from the University
of Haifa and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

To identify their source, an isotopic test was performed and the results
compared to the composition of ores of known origin, as well as to other
silver objects.

That the pieces of silver were unpolished -- suggesting that they were
not used as jewelry or ornamental objects -- and generally found together
wrapped in cloth and kept in pottery, indicates they were used as a form
of payment.

The discovery shows that cities across the Middle East engaged in more
extensive trade than previously thought, paying for large purchases such
as for land with silver.

One shekel is believed to have been equal to approximately 16 grams
of silver.

The findings were published in the Journal of Archaeological Science.
Jewish News Syndicate

R' Yosef Gavriel Bechhofer gave a shiur this week in Passaic on the
topic of the use of power/telephone wires for city eruvin.

He shared an interesting chiddush of the Tzitz Eliezer about rishus
ha'rabim. When it comes to defining a rishus ha'rabim of 600,000 people,
Rav Waldenberg said that people in cars don't count. That would mean that
a street like Ocean Parkway would not be a rishus ha'rabim according to
Rav Waldenberg.

Video of the shiur is at
https://rygb.blogspot.com/2023/01/the-use-of-powertelephone-wires-for.html


----------



Date: Sun, 8 Jan 2023 00:09:17 -0500
From: Zev Sero <z...@sero.name>

Ocean Parkway does not have 600,000 people a day traverse it even if you 
do count those in cars.

On 6/1/23 08:52, Joel Rich via Avodah wrote:
> Any overarching insights into when we look at the individual (as here) 
> and when we say batla daato (we ignore his individual circumstances) and 
> go by your average Yossi?

This doesn't seem difficult to me.   Had the Torah said "Don't do 
disgusting things", then we could and probably would say that the issur 
is on things that are objectively disgusting, and it's irrelevant 
whether they disgust you. (And since "objectively disgusting" is a 
contradiction in terms, we would resolve it as things that disgust most 
people in your culture, and then we would discuss how one determines 
that, and what do we mean by "your culture", and we'd get lost in the 
woods and never come out, just as in many other halachos.)

But the Torah doesn't say that.  It says "don't disgust *yourselves*. 
Thus it seems to me that the Torah explicitly says that your own 
subjective sensibility is the standard.  If it disgusts you, don't force 
yourself to do it, e.g. on a dare, or because you're hungry and there's 
nothing else, or because everyone else is doing it and you don't want to 
stand out.  But if it doesn't disgust you, then the fact that it 
disgusts everyone else around you is irrelevant.  Thus we find the 
gemara saying that "nefesh hayafa", which counterintuitively seems to 
the *in*sensitive soul, may do things that a person of normal 
sensitivity may not.


-- 
Zev Sero            ?Were we directed from Washington when to sow
z...@sero.name       and when to reap, we should soon want bread.?
                    ?Thomas Jefferson: Autobiography, 1821.

On 9/1/23 10:21, Micha Berger via Avodah wrote:
> There is news on that front. This came in on my JNS feed this morning
> https://www.jns.org/israeli-researchers-uncover-earliest-silver-used-as-currency-in-levant/
> Full text attached below.
> 
> Apparently when these pieces of silver were made, over 3,600 years ago --
> or in the Seder Olam's timeline, around contemary with Avraham avinu -
> coins weren't a thing yet, but precut silver sheqalim were.

My understanding of hacksilver is that they were not pre-cut to standard 
weights, but rather cut on demand.  If Avraham owed Efron 400 silver 
shekel, and the only silver he had handy was a 500-shekel candlestick, 
he'd just cut a piece off that looked like about a fifth of its weight, 
and then weigh it and adjust as needed, and give Efron the remainder. 
Efron would end up with a mutilated piece that could not be used as a 
candlestick, but was fine as currency, and he'd add it to his hoard.

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


> Which fits my guess that Avraham paying with sheqalim that were "over
> lasocher" refers to pieces of unstamped silver needing to be tested for
> purity and weighed -- unless they were obviously beyond the minima and
> acceptable to anyone.

Even if there was a standard of "over lasocher" silver that didn't need 
to be tested for purity, evidently it still needed to be weighed, since 
the Torah says "vayishkol", not "vayimneh" or "vayiten".

-- 
Zev Sero            ?Were we directed from Washington when to sow
z...@sero.name       and when to reap, we should soon want bread.?
                    ?Thomas Jefferson: Autobiography, 1821.

On Thu, Dec 29, 2022 at 02:55:30PM +0000, Motti Yarchinai via Avodah wrote:
> In many chumashim, there is a commentary on Targum Yonatan headed "Perush
> Yonatan." Does anyone know who wrote it, or t least when (approximately)
> it was written?

Are you referring to the Peirush al Targum Yonasan veTargum Y-mi,
written by R David b Yaaqov of of Szczebrzeszyn (if I got the spelling
right, it looks like it should be that based on the Cyrillic).

If so, here is what Prof Louis Ginsberg said about him, the full
Jewish Encyc entry:
    Polish scholar; known only as the author of a commentary on the
    so-called "Targum Jonathan" and "Targum Yerushalmi" of the Pentateuch
    (also known as "Targum Yerushalmi I." and "Targum Yerushalmi II."),
    and on the Targum Sheni" of the Book of Esther. It was published in
    Prague in 1609, but there is a record of a former edition printed in
    the same place in 1537, which would place the author in the first half
    of the sixteenth century. The commentary, which is really a glossary,
    was reprinted in Prague in 1781, and again in 1789. Steinschneider
    ("Cat. Bodl." No. 4816) denies the existence of the edition of 1537.

> Note, I don't ask who wrote the Targum Yonatan itself, because
> no-one knows...

One bit of trivia: It almost certainly post-dates Islam, since Yishma'el's
wife is given as "Fatima" (Bereishis 21:21). But the idea that Yishma'el's
wives were Fatima and Aisha wasn't a thing until Muhammad's wife Fatima
and daughter Aisha.

(Pirqei deR' Eliezer (30:6) also calls the wife from Egypt that Hagar found
for Yichma'el "Fatimah".)

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 Life isn't about finding yourself
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   Life is about creating yourself.
Author: Widen Your Tent                   - Bernard Shaw
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF

Three weeks ago, on Fri, Dec 23, 2022 at 8:43 -0500, R Akiva Miller wrote:
>> Altogether, the treatment smells like a gezeira based on
>> avoiding a risk, and not "merely" advice to not do something
>> risky.

...
> *My* opinion is that we have far too many minhagim which are mislabeled as
> halachos, and far too many d'rabanans which people mistakenly think to be
> d'Oraisa. And therefore, I prefer not to take something I see in a sefer
> (no matter how much authority that sefer has) and decide on my own to call
> it a Gezeira D'rabanan. (If someone *else* assigns it that label, that's a
> different story.)

I think you're reversing cart and horse.

The reason why I think it's a gezeira is because the AhS already says that
we are worried about cloth-walled Sukkos even if they're well tied down.
In other words, the chumerah you're afraid of is already there, which to
me implied it must be a gezeira.

So, rather than being reluctant to label this rule a gezeira because people
might take it too stingently, I am seeing that rabbanim took it stringently,
and figured they must have considered it a gezeira.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 "Man wants to achieve greatness overnight,
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   and he wants to sleep well that night too."
Author: Widen Your Tent            - Rav Yosef Yozel Horwitz, Alter of Novarodok
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF

On Mon, Jan 09, 2023 at 06:38:56PM -0500, Zev Sero via Avodah wrote:
> But the Torah doesn't say that.  It says "don't disgust *yourselves*...

I didn't think "teshaqtzu" was hitpa'el. I would have taitched "don't
be disgusting". Being, not doing, but also no emphasis on one's own
impressions of what is or isn't disgusting.

But your examples of pushing oneself to do something disgusting "on
a dare" of because you're hungry enough do address my question about
when would a subjective standard of gross ever apply to a person's own
actions. I pictured a person always redefining disgustingness before
acting that way.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 "As long as the candle is still burning,
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   it is still possible to accomplish and to
Author: Widen Your Tent      mend."
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF        - Anonymous shoemaker to R' Yisrael Salanter

On Sat, Jan 07, 2023 at 10:53:42PM -0500, Akiva Miller via Avodah wrote:
> But no. Instead, Yaakov deliberately chose to describe Sarah as Avraham's
> wife, and Rivka as Yitzchak's wife, and to leave Leah undescribed.

And of the women buried in Me'aras haMachpeilah, only Lei'ah had a cowife.
Maybe Yaaqov wasn't going to call her "ishti -- my woman" (to be more
literal) if the relationship wasn't exclusive. Possible?

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

On Mon, Jan 09, 2023 at 06:17:19PM -0500, Zev Sero via Avodah wrote:
> My understanding of hacksilver is that they were not pre-cut to standard
> weights, but rather cut on demand...

Then the author of the article misused the term. This was a sack of precut
sheqel-weight pieces of silver, which is what made the find so interesting.

    That the pieces of silver were unpolished suggesting that they were
    not used as jewelry or ornamental objects and generally found together
    wrapped in cloth and kept in pottery, indicates they were used as
    a form of payment.

....
> > Which fits my guess that Avraham paying with sheqalim that were "over
> > lasocher" refers to pieces of unstamped silver needing to be tested for
> > purity and weighed -- unless they were obviously beyond the minima and
> > acceptable to anyone.
> 
> Even if there was a standard of "over lasocher" silver that didn't need to
> be tested for purity, evidently it still needed to be weighed, since the
> Torah says "vayishkol", not "vayimneh" or "vayiten".

Good catch!

There was something else in the article I should have brought attention
to:
> One shekel is believed to have been equal to approximately 16 grams
> of silver.

Which is shitas haRambam. (Translating Hil' Bekhoros 8:8 to modern units.)

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 Like a bird, man can reach undreamed-of
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   heights as long as he works his wings.
Author: Widen Your Tent      But if he relaxes them for but one minute,
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF    he plummets downward.   - Rav Yisrael Salanter

On 10/1/23 16:23, Micha Berger via Avodah wrote:
> On Mon, Jan 09, 2023 at 06:17:19PM -0500, Zev Sero via Avodah wrote:
>> My understanding of hacksilver is that they were not pre-cut to standard
>> weights, but rather cut on demand...

> Then the author of the article misused the term. This was a sack of precut
> sheqel-weight pieces of silver, which is what made the find so interesting.

That's  not in the article.   And the accompanying picture seems to 
belie it.  Those pieces don't look like they're anything like the same 
mass. The one in the middle looks like it's less than half the mass of 
the one on the left, which in turn looks like it's no more than a third 
of the one on the right.


>      That the pieces of silver were unpolished suggesting that they were
>      not used as jewelry or ornamental objects and generally found together
>      wrapped in cloth and kept in pottery, indicates they were used as
>      a form of payment.

None of which says what you read into it, that they were all supposed to 
be the same weight.  All it means is that it's like the similar hoards 
found in Europe; miscellaneous bits of silver, cut from larger items, 
ugly and useless, and hidden away all together. When the owner owed 
someone two-and-a-half shekel he'd sort through his bag of miscellaneous 
silver looking for one or more pieces that together would weigh about 
that much, and if they were a little over he'd just cut some off until 
the weight was right, and throw the leftover little bit back in the bag.

-- 
Zev Sero            ?Were we directed from Washington when to sow
z...@sero.name       and when to reap, we should soon want bread.?
                    ?Thomas Jefferson: Autobiography, 1821.

I heard an interesting comment from a Rabbi during a recent shiur. He
stated that he had been contacted by an international bone marrow registry
telling him that he was a partial match and to come down for further
testing. He consulted with a number of poskim and they told him he was not
required to get tested. He told one posek that if the recipient was an frum
Jew, that he would do it. The posek told him, very good. The general
response from the poskim was based on the fact that since the majority of
likely recipients were not Jewish, he didn?t have to do it. (I?m guessing
due to lo taamod only being for Jews)

I suppose we have a similar ethical question with heart transplants ? if we
won?t donate, but will take. It seems to me in this case there?s an
additional halachic issue. It appears to me that if there?s a partial
match, you can?t look at the general population of registrants and ask
what?s the likelihood the person is Jewish, since the partial match gives
us some further information and we would have to use Bayesian statistics to
determine whether in fact the assumption that the majority of likely
matches were not Jewish should be updated for the additional information
that there is a partial match. Any thoughts?

KT
Joel Rich
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