Volume 52 Number 16
                    Produced: Thu Jun 15  5:44:29 EDT 2006


Subjects Discussed In This Issue: 

All-Night "Learning"
         [Hillel (Sabba) Markowitz]
Battery Farms and Eggs (2)
         [David Maslow, Robert Rubinoff]
Gabbaim
         [Perry Zamek]
Good Gabba'im
         [Shmuel Himelstein]
Kedusha to Yerushalyim Shel Zahav
         [Ken Bloom]
Rema
         [Andy Goldfinger]
Staying up on Shavuot night
         [Dr. Josh Backon]
Staying up on Shavuot night - for women?
         [SBA]
Twin Bar Mizvah Boys
         [<Danmim@...>]
Women saying kaddish (2)
         [SBA, Avi Feldblum]
Women saying Kaddish - clarification
         [PM]


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From: Hillel (Sabba) Markowitz <Sabba.Hillel@...>
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2006 21:37:02 -0400
Subject: Re: All-Night "Learning"

> From: Alan Rubin <alan@...>
> It is the staying up and then davening at Neitz that is the most
> disruptive. If one feels it is worthwhile staying up to learn is there
> really any value in the early davening?

Many people would be unable to get up properly for the regular minyon if
they go to sleep after having been up all night.  As a result, it would
be better for them to daven before going to sleep.  There are also many
people who do not daven at neitz only because they cannot get up every
day that early.  Since they are already up ...

Also there is the concept of zrizim makdimim l'mitzvah.  If one is up
for the early minyon, then one should go to it, assuming that he is not
needed at the later one or expected their in his zman kavuah
(established time).

Hillel (Sabba) Markowitz | Said the fox to the fish, "Join me ashore."
<Sabba.Hillel@...> | The fish are the Jews, Torah is our water.

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From: David Maslow <maslowd@...>
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2006 11:05:02 -0400
Subject: Battery Farms and Eggs

I worked for many years with fertilized eggs and developing chick
embryos and would like to expand on the many accurate responses to David
Ziants comments on the origin of eggs from battery farms. As was pointed
out, the eggs are natural, but come from chickens that never have
contact with roosters.  Thus, unlike eggs from chickens that have
contact with roosters, where the blood spot may arise from a developing
chick embryo, the blood spot in eggs from chickens that have not had
contact with roosters (as in battery farms), may only arise from blood
released at the time of the rupture of the ovum (yolk) from the ovary
prior to its coating with layers of albumen ("egg white"), membranes and
the shell before being laid.  This difference may explain the different
halachic approach to the two types of blood spots.

David E. Maslow, Ph.D.

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From: Robert Rubinoff <rubinoff@...>
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2006 11:12:54 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: Re: Battery Farms and Eggs

I'm not sure why people keep referring to this as a "leniency".  My
understanding is that it is only *fertilized* eggs that are prohibited.
If an *unfertilized* egg has a blood spot, only the *blood* is
prohibited; the rest of the egg is fine after you remove the blood spot.

In the past, when there were usually roosters around, there was no way
to tell for sure if an egg with a blood spot was fertilized, so you had
to assume that any egg with a blood sport was prohibited.  But with
factory-farmed eggs, the chance of an egg being fertilized is
negligible, so you can assume that a blood spot is not from
fertilization.  (Of course, at least in the US, nowadays eggs are cheap
enough that it's not a big deal to throw away an egg with a blood spot.)

Robert

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From: Perry Zamek <perryza@...>
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2006 12:59:19 +0200
Subject: Re: Gabbaim

Carl Singer makes the comparison between a good gabbai and, lehavdil, a
good referee during a sporting event.

I would compare him to a well-trained stage manager, whose job is to
have everything, and everyone in the right place at the right time. You
can always tell the good gabbaim from the poorer ones - the good ones
make sure that the guy opening the aron for the piyyutim on yamim noraim
is there exactly 5 seconds before he has to open the curtain - every
time.

And, having been a gabbai, I know just how hard it is to get things to
always run smoothly.

Perry Zamek

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From: Shmuel Himelstein <himels@...>
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2006 12:37:51 +0300
Subject: Good Gabba'im

This reminds me of what I once learned in a management course:

The best executive is one who can be out for a few days, with no one
noticing.  The worst executive is one who can be out for a few days,
with no one noticing.

Shmuel Himelstein

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From: Ken Bloom <kbloom@...>
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2006 23:12:25 -0500
Subject: Kedusha to Yerushalyim Shel Zahav

I've seen at several different Sepharadi synagogues, that the chazan and
the kehilla sing "hu eloheinu" in the Musaf Kedusha to the melody of
"Yerushalyim Shel Zahav". How did this minhag take hold? Was the melody
first used for Kedusha or for Yerushalyim Shel Zahav?

--Ken Bloom

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From: Andy Goldfinger <Andy.Goldfinger@...>
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2006 08:00:31 -0400
Subject: Rema

Martin Stern writes:
"I understood that we hold that 'uvenei Ashkenaz yots'im beyad Rema!"

Let's all remember that the Rema is a big maikil.
He is Isserless.

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From: Dr. Josh Backon <backon@...>
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2006 18:51:50
Subject: Re: Staying up on Shavuot night

Why all night ? Think of the verse "v'hagita bo yomam va'LAYLA" [caps
mine]. Maybe once a year, Erev Shavuot, Zman Mattan Torateinu, we should
at least make an attempt to learn all night.

At our shul in Jerusalem, we have a Shiur by the Rav for about an hour
(11 pm to midnight) and then each person learns by himself or with a
chabura (not chavruta) [chabura: where one prepares a topic with
references and the group learns together]. Our chabura which included
some rabbanim reviewed Hilchot Taarovot in Shulchan Aruch Yoreh Deah.
It's an exhilarating experience.

A dozen people leave the shul at around 04:00 am to walk to the Kotel in
time for the first "vatikin" minyan. The other 20 (I call us the
"geriatric ward") stayed for our vatikin minyan at 04:45 am.

Although there was some soda and cookies, everyone was learning. There
were no wild kids running around, no shmoozing.

Josh Backon
<backon@...>  

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From: SBA <sba@...>
Date: Thu, 15 Jun 2006 01:15:58 +1000
Subject: Re: Staying up on Shavuot night - for women?

From:  (Rabbi Meir Wise)
> Staying up on Shavuot night is a time honoured custom = minhag. Staying
> up on Seder night until overtaken by sleep (or the students say that it
> is time for shacharit) is a Din= law recorded by the Shulchan Arukh. So
> it seems that many people have their priorities wrong.

Good point.
(Similar - being maavir sidra 'shnayim mikra ve'echod targum' is a Din.
Daf Yomi is a wonderful idea.  However I think we'd be surprised at how
many DY learners don't know or don't care about the chiyuv of SMVT...)

>Having said that I used to return home and chap a few hours sleep ready
>to look after my children while my wife went to shul.<<

You have ANY source that require or even suggest that women should learn
(or say Tikun Leil Shovuos - which BTW was the original idea/minhag) on
Shovuos night?

SBA 

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From: <Danmim@...>
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2006 18:31:33 EDT
Subject: Re: Twin Bar Mizvah Boys

question;twin bar mizvah boys who are going to be bar mizvah on the same
shabbos and where both boys want to say the entire haftorah with the
brachos. what is the halachic method to accomplish this.

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From: SBA <sba@...>
Date: Thu, 15 Jun 2006 01:13:01 +1000
Subject: Women saying kaddish

From: Joseph Kaplan <>
>Martin Stern wrote about a woman saying kaddish:
>> Someone should explain to her in the most tactful and empathetic way
>> that it is a much greater zekhut for her parent to do extra chessed in
>> their memory rather than say kaddish.
>
>While this is, of course, the position of some (perhaps even many or
>most), there are others who say that it is perfectly permissible for
>women to say kaddish.  Indeed, R. Aron Solovietchik writes in one of his
>books that one should NOT do what Mr. Stern suggests;..reasoning
> is that  if we tell women they can't do things that they are
>allowed to do, we will lose credibility and they will not listen when
>they are told not to do things they really are not allowed to do.

I suppose it depends on the type of woman SAS was referring to.

[SBA, by SAS did you mean to say RAS = Rav Aaron Solovietchik? Mod.]

If it is someone is borderline with shmiras hamitzvos, that can be a
valid reason to squeeze some sort of hetter.

But I would think that an average frum woman, when told that virtually
all poskim are not in favor of women saying kaddish and this has not
been done by 99.9% of women in the past 2000 years, she would accept
this without too much heartache.

Does anyone disagree that in a case where there is no son - paying a
needy Jew to say a kaddish or 2 and learn a mishna daily - would bring
the merit of Torah, Avodah and gemilas chasodim to the niftar.

SBA

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From: Avi Feldblum <feldblum@...>
Date: Thu, 15 Jun 2006 
Subject: Women saying kaddish

> Does anyone disagree that in a case where there is no son - paying a
> needy Jew to say a kaddish or 2 and learn a mishna daily - would bring
> the merit of Torah, Avodah and gemilas chasodim to the niftar.

In the case where there is a son, would "paying a needy Jew to say a
kaddish or 2 and learn a mishna daily bring the merit of Torah, Avodah
and gemilas chasodim to the niftar"? If yes, then I would clearly agree
that doing so with no son would also bring that merit. I'm not clear
that this question has any relevence to the question of whether or under
what circumstances it is a positive (or neutral) halachic activity for a
daughter to say Kaddish for a parent. If it is a positive halachic
activity, and she desires to do so, then it would seem to me that she
should be allowed to do so. If it is a negative halachic activity, she
should be discouraged from doing so. If it is a neutral halachic
activity, it needs to be balanced with other community implications and
the call made by the LOR. The last statement is also true with the
previous two cases.

Avi

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From: PM <phminden@...>
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2006 11:38:28 +0200
Subject: Re: Women saying Kaddish - clarification

Martin Stern wrote:
>> Regarding skipping qaddish, my understanding is that the qaddish after  
>> `Aleinu leshabe`ah **needs to be** recited according only to the Rema  
>> and no other poseq.  Does anyone else hold that way?
>
> I understood that we hold that 'uvenei Ashkenaz yots'im beyad Rema!'

Polin. Also, nobody seriously claims that Ashkenazim (Poilishe or
others) go by only one pousek, and entirely by him.

ELPhM

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End of Volume 52 Issue 16