Volume 66 Number 28
Produced: Tue, 03 Jan 23 13:33:22 -0500
Subjects Discussed In This Issue:
Aliyah minhag question
[Yisrael Medad]
Halachic process
[Micha Berger]
Hashoel shelo mida'at - borrowing?
[Micha Berger]
Same sink for meat and milk
[David Ziants]
The Grandchild Clause In The Law Of Return
[Susan Kane]
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From: Yisrael Medad <yisrael.medad@...>
Date: Sat, Dec 24,2022 at 01:17 PM
Subject: Aliyah minhag question
Yaakov Shachter writes (MJ 66#27):
> Looking away while reciting the 1st brakha is obligatory pursuant to the Rm"a
> on Orax Xayyim 139:4; he says that one should look to one's left, not to
> one's right.
I checked. The R'ma reads in Hebrew "el hatzad ... v'nireh li sh'yafoch panav
l'smolo". That should mean in normative translated Hebrew into English:
"to the side ... it would seem to me he should turn his face to his left".
I would think that is a recommendation. In any case, the Choftez Chaim adds
there:
"there are Achronim who wrote that turning one's face is not correct as it
is as if he is showing that he is not making the blessing on what is to be
read".
I trust I am obeying the Scriptural commandment in Leviticus 19:15.
--
Yisrael Medad
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From: Micha Berger <micha@...>
Date: Tue, Dec 27,2022 at 03:17 PM
Subject: Halachic process
Joel Rich wrote (MJ 66#24):
> Jonathan Haidt uses the analogy of the elephant and its rider as a metaphor
> for the relationship between our reason and our emotion (passions)...
R Yitzchaq Sher, in his pesichah to the Slabdka Alumni edition of Sefer Cheshbon
haNefesh (and included in most subsequent editions, pg 32, par #4 in Feldheim's
bilingual edition), likens mastering the yeitzer hara to training an elephant.
The yeitzer hara, after all, is nothing but the animal aspect of our own selves.
And like any other animal, it needs to be trained, not taught. And RYS also
talks about a person's inability to force an elephant to do something it doesn't
want to.
There is a copy on Google Books at:
https://www.google.com/books/edition/%D7%97%D7%A9%D7%91%D7%95%D7%9F_%D7%94%D7%A0%D7%A4%D7%A9/dx0OsRAffDQC?&gbpv=1&pg=PA32&printsec=frontcover
Tir'u baTov!
-Micha
--
Micha Berger
http://www.aishdas.org/asp
Author: Widen Your Tent
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF
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From: Micha Berger <micha@...>
Date: Thu, Dec 29,2022 at 05:17 PM
Subject: Hashoel shelo mida'at - borrowing?
Joel Rich wrote (MJ 66#15):
> The Shulchan Aruch allows one to borrow another's tallit or tfilin on the
> assumption that one would be happy to have another do a mitzvah with his
> property.
>
> Questions: What if you have past history which might indicate this might not
> be a good assumption? ...
See the Arukh haShulchan OC 637:5 about using someone else's sukkah without
asking. From yesterday's Arukh haShulchan Yomi:
http://aishdas.org/ahs-yomi
The Taz says ustama kein hu [presumably] people are okay with your using their
sukkah to fulfil a mitzvah when it is unoccupied. But not im maqpid [if he does
care] or he is using his sukkah already, as mistama [presumably] he would care
about others joining him when he's eating.
(Maybe we are worried they're too polite to say they're bothered?)
Either way, notice when it comes to sukkah, the rule only applies if we don't
have reason to believe the owner would object.
Tir'u baTov!
-Micha
--
Micha Berger
http://www.aishdas.org/asp
Author: Widen Your Tent
https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF
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From: David Ziants <dziants@...>
Date: Mon, Dec 26,2022 at 01:17 PM
Subject: Same sink for meat and milk
I sometimes comes across scenarios which makes me feel a bit halachically
insecure, and I want to mention a particular scenario (without giving away any
personal or organisational information concerning this), and am interested in
receiving input from the group.
At home, I have separate sinks for meat and milk and it has been this way from
after I moved apartment 15 years ago. From around 7 years ago, after a
renovation, the sinks are now even on different sides of the kitchen and not
next to each other. Before then, in my old apartment, there was only one sink,
and then we were careful to have for the sink two bowels for washing up, one for
meat and one for milk, and were careful to put kitchenware in the relevant bowel
- and parev [i.e. neither meat nor milk] utensils were always washed in the air
I think (and also if they were washed separately in one of the bowels, I was
told it would not matter).
The scenario that I am presenting, is that there is a kosher (and shomer
shabbat) apartment where the rav of the organisation who runs the apartment
allows the same sink to be used for both washing up meat and milk without a
bowl, or without even putting down a mat at the bottom of the sink which I know
many people are lenient with. The nature of the apartment is that the people
living there are very disciplined in washing everything up after every meal and
keeping the environment clean between meals, and in any case they tend to eat
meat only on Shabbat and eat parev or milk during the week. The temperature of
the hot water coming out the tap is more than "yad soledet" [i.e. luke warm] -
and I know this because when I visited there I put my hand under a hot water tap
and had to withdraw it.
When I asked my local rav, he said it was okay but I felt from the tone in his
answer that he felt it was not ideal. I also see that Rav Eliezer Melamed in
P'ninai haHalacha allows using the same sink when only one sink is available
(and he sees putting a mat down on the bottom of the sink as a stringency
concerning what it seems he describes as basic halacha when only one sink) :-
https://ph.yhb.org.il/17-25-12/ (In Hebrew)
This though, seems substantially more lenient than what I have seen over the
decades, in normal religious households that have one sink. Any thoughts...
BTW, I respect Rav Eliezer Melamed as a posek although sometimes I, and also
others I know, feel relative to what has been learnt elsewhere, that he is too
lenient on some things and too stringent on others. My understanding is that he
is associated with the chardal (charaidi dati le'umi) and Merkaz haRav Kook
circles having been brought up in the Bet El yeshiva in the Shomron (and I spent
around three months as a teenager learning there during my gap years just when
it was being set up in the late 1970s).
David Ziants
<dziants@...>
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From: Susan Kane <adarconsulting@...>
Date: Sun, Dec 25,2022 at 02:17 PM
Subject: The Grandchild Clause In The Law Of Return
In response to David Tzohar (MJ 66#27):
If fewer than 100 people with one Jewish grandparent make aliyah every year, why
bother passing legislation that reduces peoples feeling of connection to Israel
and increases conflict within the Jewish people?
Those of us who do not live isolated Diaspora lives regularly meet people with
Jewish parents and grandparents who are not being raised Jewishly. In my
experience halachic Jews are no more likely than non-halachic Jews to remain
within the Jewish community if their parents or grandparents were not practicing
Jews. However, programs with flexible requirements like Birthright have had an
impact on whether people identity Jewishly. Many people are also aware that they
are Jewish enough to be accepted by the State of Israel and it is a point of
curiosity and pride for them. It gives them a connection to the State of
Israel, however tenuous. It also reminds them that regardless of how they
identify or what they believe, anti-Semitism is their problem too.
There are many examples of people with Jewish heritage - not raised as Jews -
who saved Jews during the Shoah, helped the early State of Israel and who
continue to support Israel today. You cannot underestimate the effect that
Jewish ancestry has on people. There are even groups for people who discover
unknown Jewish heritage through DNA testing. The knowledge of secret Jewish
ancestry - often paternal - is significant enough to cause people to seek out
support and even to change their understanding of their own identity.
I respect - of course - Israelis' right to determine their own immigration laws.
It goes without saying that this decision will be made by those with Israeli
citizenship alone. It seems to me though that the goodwill and connection
created by the current policy seems worth whatever problem might be created by
100 new Israeli citizens annually.
Susan Kane
Silver Spring, MD
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End of Volume 66 Issue 28
