Volume 48 Number 16
Produced: Fri May 27 6:02:10 EDT 2005
Subjects Discussed In This Issue:
Baseball Hotdogs
[Batya Medad]
Heresy and Gender Roles
[Dov Teichman]
Honoring One's Parents, Rejecting Their Food
[Shoshana Ziskind]
Kibbud av va'em vis a vis kevod haberi'ot
[Nachum Klafter]
Kovod Habrios
[Perets Mett]
Lighting Shabbos Candles In The Summer
[Immanuel Burton]
Marrying one's late wife sister
[Robert Rubinoff]
Minyan & The Great Divide
[Mark Steiner]
Shabbos Brachos
[Y. Askotzky]
Weaving and Wearing of Tzitzit
[Shoshana L. Boublil]
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From: Batya Medad <ybmedad@...>
Date: Thu, 26 May 2005 21:56:41 +0200
Subject: Baseball Hotdogs
>From a NYTimes report:
The National Hot Dog and Sausage Council says baseball fans will eat
27.5 million hot dogs at major-league parks this year. Yankees fans have
a choice of Hebrew National or Nathan's skinless all-beef franks. The
same is offered at Shea Stadium, with the addition of glatt kosher
Abeles & Heymann hot dogs, sold only in the food court down the
right-field line.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/25/dining/25dogs.html
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From: <DTnLA@...> (Dov Teichman)
Date: Wed, 25 May 2005 20:07:59 EDT
Subject: Heresy and Gender Roles
<leah@...> (Leah Sarah Reingold Gordon) wrote:
<<Usually, when I am accused of heresy on M.J, it is based on something
that I have said and not on a straw-person "undercurrent". ;)>>
Perhaps I was not clear, I am not accusing you of heresy. I am saying
that, in general, "To transfer those feelings of sexism and patriarchy
to Judaism, is to have the gall to say that our greatest leaders and
poskim had an anti-female bias. The undercurrent is that Judaism as has
been practiced for thousands of years is flawed."
That, I believe, is a seemingly heretical belief, and often it expresses
itself in the desire to take a greater role in the synagogue (e.g.
Kaddish) or performing other male-bound commandments.
True, many women are sincere in their desire, honestly want to honor a
parent by saying Kaddish, and have no agenda. In my opinion, those women
ought to pursue a more appropriate way of expressing that and will
thereby bring greater merit to the deceased.
The source for saying Kaddish is based on a medrash that R. Akiva
rescued a man from Gehenom by having the man's son say barchu and
kaddish and having the congregation respond "Yehei Shemei Rabba etc."
The Ramoh in Shulchan Aruch Yoreh Deah 376:4 says that saying Kaddish is
a minimum meant for children or the ignorant who could not daven and an
even better way of elevating the soul of the deceased is by davening for
the amud. Others say that learning and teaching Torah is an even greater
merit. Why? Because the more a son fulfills his purpose as a Jew in
society and specifically, acts as a leader of prayer and publicly
sanctifies God's name through prayer and teaching/learning Torah, the
more the soul of a parent is elevated.
If we are looking to benefit the deceased shouldn't we look to those who
were most in touch with the spiritual realm for guidance as to what will
get us the most points upstairs? Men are told to say Kaddish and lead
services and learn Torah in order to urge them to bolster their role and
_obligation_ in Jewish society. This is the greatest zechus to the
Neshama. Women, therefore, also ought to strengthen and enforce their
observance of their commandments and their roles and obligations in
Jewish society.
In my opinion, it is not appropriate for a woman to assume another role.
Women do not lead a congregation in prayer, do not say barchu, are not
obligated to teach/learn Torah, and therefore having women say kaddish
is not the appropriate method of benefiting the departed soul.
I think it would be more fitting for a woman to pursue diligence in
_her_ realm of Judaism. "Kol K'vuda bas melech penima," the prestige of
the Jewish princess is her privacy (Psalms 45:14) Not the synagogue. The
desire to say Kaddish by a daughter or do something to memorialize the
deceased parent is a natural one, especially since we always associate
Kaddish with death and mourning. But I think the appropriate reaction
should be coupled with research as to what is the fitting way of
expressing that desire. There are plenty of things that women can do and
take upon themselves that fit into the spirit of the woman's role,
before resorting to saying kaddish. There are many mitzvos that are
uniquely women's mitzvos and those areas are surely more suitable. That,
I feel, will get the most points upstairs.
Dov Teichman
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From: Shoshana Ziskind <shosh@...>
Date: Thu, 26 May 2005 09:26:57 -0400
Subject: Re: Honoring One's Parents, Rejecting Their Food
Since I've had to go to non kosher keeping relatives a few times, and
we've come up with good solutions, I'm not sure what all the difficulty
is. It does help that I've been told I can double wrap things and cook
them in their oven. Also, on one trip to visit my sister I brought
along two cutting boards/knives for fleishig and milchig, bought plastic
items to use when I got there, got stuff at the kosher store and voila.
Okay sometimes we ate differently it wasn't a big thing.
My mother wanted to cook me brisket so she called a Rav who lives by her
and she told her what to do, and she went to the store earlier and got a
lot of plastic items to use to put aside for me. Personally, lhatchila I
would have wanted to be there when she's cooking food I'm going to eat
but it worked out okay. If there's love and proper communication, and
asking shailos to a LOR, and so on, I think this doesn't have to be such
a major deal, IMO.
If your parents really want to cook for you let them, but obviously call
a Rav. If they say you can get aluminum pans and double wrap them then
that helps a lot. If you visit them a lot get cutting boards, knives
and other things and put them in a box. Yes, this might involve you,
sticking around to make sure nothing gets treyfed but then the relatives
are happy as they could cook for you etc.
Hope this makes sense.
Shoshana Ziskind
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From: Nachum Klafter <doctorklafter@...>
Date: Thu, 26 May 2005 08:17:13 -0400
Subject: Re: Kibbud av va'em vis a vis kevod haberi'ot
I wrote:
> Again, if your parents offer you food which is truly prohibited
> me-derabanan (and all the more so me-de-oraitah), it is forbidden
> to eat it. Kibud Av-Ve-Eim is not a dispensation to transgress
> biblical or rabbinic prohibitions.
> However, it is simply not true according the halakha that one is
> allowed to consume food which is "only" rabbinically forbidden in
> order to avoid hurting one's parents' feelings.
Ira L. Jacobson <laser@...> responded:
> How does the rule that kevod haberi'ot dohe mitzvot derabbanan
> (overrides rabbinical commandments) apply in this case?
It does not. Parents being annoyed or hurt that their newly observant
children will not eat non-kosher food which they have prepared is not a
case where kavod ha-beriyot applies as a principle. The halakha does
not grant veto power to parents, friends, or relatives to object to our
performance of mitzvot de-rabbanan based on their subjective feeling of
being being insulted. It need not be insulting, and certainly not all
parents would be insulted (as I can testify from personal experience).
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From: Perets Mett <p.mett@...>
Date: Thu, 26 May 2005 13:10:39 +0100
Subject: Kovod Habrios
Ira Jacobson quoted:
> However, it is simply not true according the halakha that one is
> allowed to consume food which is "only" rabbinically forbidden in
> order to avoid hurting one's parents' feelings.
and asked:
> How does the rule that kevod haberi'ot dohe mitzvot derabbanan
> (overrides rabbinical commandments) apply in this case?
as has already been explained by another contributor, kovod habrios does
not mean respect for someone else. It means saving **oneself** from
acute embrrassment.
Chazal, on a few occasions (listed in a previous message), relaxed their
rules to save people personal embarrassment.
Perets Mett
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From: Immanuel Burton <iburton@...>
Date: Thu, 26 May 2005 11:54:40 +0100
Subject: Lighting Shabbos Candles In The Summer
The Shul which I attend has decided to daven on Friday evening at 7:10
during the summer. This presents a problem when the earliest time for
lighting Shabbos candles is after 7:10. At the time of writing I think
the earliest time in London is 7:22, and in early July this moves to
7:36.
This arrangement would not be a problem for a family, as the husband
could go to Shul at 7:10, and the wife can light the candles at the
appropriate time. However, as a single man, this presents me with a
problem, as I can't attend Shul on time and light Shabbos candles.
Does anyone have any comments on the following thoughts I've had
concerning this conundrum:
(1) As a member of the Shul, am I bound to bring in Shabbos with that
Shul's congregation? If I am and I want to light Shabbos candles, then
the only way to do so would be to come late to davenning, or miss it
entirely at the height of summer. (As far as I am aware, the standard
davening times for all the Shuls near my home is 7:30, which would still
present a problem when the latest earliest time is 7:36.)
(2) Is there any meaning to lighting the candles without the brachah
before the earliest candle lighting time, and then attend davening at
7:10? Are there any grounds for reciting the brachah when I return from
Shul?
(3) If I have been invited out for Friday evening, can I ask the hostess
to have me in mind when she lights her Shabbos candles?
Immanuel Burton
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From: Robert Rubinoff <rubinoff@...>
Date: Thu, 26 May 2005 10:56:02 -0400
Subject: Re: Marrying one's late wife sister
> >> I, too, would be interested in hearing a halachic basis. Perhaps it
> >> developed in imitation of the practice of a man marrying his late
> >> brother's widow to "build up his brother's house."
>
> >A secular argument based on sociobiology or social Darwinism would note
> >that an aunt is more likely to show concern for the orphaned children
> >than would an unrelated stepmother.
My mother's mother died when my mother was four years old in 1922, and
my grandmother's sister came over from Poland to Toronto to marry my
grandfather, because she didn't want her sister's children to be raised
by a step-mother who didn't care about them. (She had gone through that
experience herself.)
Robert
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From: Mark Steiner <marksa@...>
Date: Thu, 26 May 2005 13:41:06 +0300
Subject: RE: Minyan & The Great Divide
Since my wife is a descendent of R. Yaakov Ettlinger, z"l,
author of teshuvos Binyan Tziyon, I have a vested interest in his being
quoted correctly. I think, in fact, a perusal of the entire teshuva
(hadashot 33, not 23) gives quite a different impression than the
opinion attributed to him in a recent posting.
What he actually says is: a person who refrains from touching
wine handled by a sabbath desecrator [in our time] is to be praised
("tavo `alav berakha"). One who is lenient, however, has also a basis
("yesh lo `al mah sheyismokh", since sabbath descrators in our time may
not be the same type as in former generations, cf. the entire responsum
for details)--unless (a) the violator knows the laws of the sabbath, and
(b) brazenly desecrates the sabbath before a minyan of Jews.
This is exactly the attitude I'd like to see among members of
this list: empathy for both opinions.
Mark Steiner
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From: Y. Askotzky <sofer@...>
Date: Thu, 26 May 2005 13:25:30 +0200
Subject: Shabbos Brachos
As far as I am aware, common practice is to bentch children prior to
kiddush. We do it after singiing shalo-m aleichem and eshes chayil. In
between kiddush and washing doesn't seem appropriate if it will cause
delay. However, if each child receives his/her brachah on their way to
wash that would seem to cause little delay if any.
kol tuv,
Yerachmiel Askotzky
certified sofer & examiner
<sofer@...> www.stam.net 1-888-404-STAM(7826) 718-874-8220
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From: Shoshana L. Boublil <toramada@...>
Date: Thu, 26 May 2005 18:38:16 +0200
Subject: Re: Weaving and Wearing of Tzitzit
> From: Jack Gross <jbgross@...>
> >> We have medieval paytanim who praise their wives as "great weavers of
> >> tzitzit". They couldn't have woven them if they weren't wearing
> >> them.
>
> Untrue.
[del]
> Women are p'turot [exempt] from tzitzit, and may l'chatchilla wear a
> four-cornered shawl without them. The Poskim are divided as to whether
> women are eligible to create (spin the thread or tie them) Tzitzit.
In highschool, our rabbi spent over 3 months during Halachah lessons
teaching us all the rules on how to sew the tzitzit garment and weave
the tzitzit. He was very clear in that he expected us to make the
tzitzit so that our husbands would wear them. The idea that we, as
women would want to wear tzitzit never dawned on him.
Of course, with mass-production, I don't know anyone who actually sews
her own husband's tzitzit <g>, though weaving the tzitzit is still
optional.
Shoshana L. Boublil
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End of Volume 48 Issue 16