Volume 26 Number 10
Produced: Sun Mar 16 9:07:32 1997
Subjects Discussed In This Issue:
Care of Pets on Shabbos
[Steven Steinerman]
Cheating in Yeshiva
[Shoshana L. Boublil]
Kosher Animals
[Eliyahu Segal]
Mazal Tov - Enagagement
[Seth Ness]
Onkelos on Lo Tevashel Gdi
[Reuven Miller]
Prohibition to Own Pigs
[Ari Kahn]
Pronunciation and Tefilah
[Seth Kadish]
Simanei Taharah and Wallabies
[Binyomin Segal]
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From: Steven Steinerman <steinerm@...>
Date: Mon, 3 Mar 97 13:40:24 -0500
Subject: Care of Pets on Shabbos
Hi,
I have a friend who kept a fish (a Tiger Shark fish) in a aquarium
and last week for some reason the fish leaped out of the aquarium
through a small gap in the fishtank cover. Since this happened on
shabbos , my friend did not pickup the fish and put it back into the
aquarium. Instead, he and his 4 children poured water over the
fish in attempt to keep it alive until after shabbos (3 hours
latter). Sad to say, the fish died while the children watched.
My question is could he not have just put the fish back into the
fishtank in order so the fish would not die and suffer in pain.
What are the relevant laws involved in protecting pets on shabbos
(ie could a person hold a dog's lease to prevent the dog from
running to a street and possibly getting hit by a car)?
Thanks
<steve@...>
<steve@...>
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From: <toramada@...> (Shoshana L. Boublil)
Date: Mon, 17 Feb 97 07:56:36 PST
Subject: Re: Cheating in Yeshiva
In Israel in most Ulpanot and many religious girl highschools we use the
honor system with nearly 100% success rate:
The test is handed out and the teacher walks out of the room.
As this system has been in use for over 20 years, there are places where
if a student misses a test they can take the exact test they missed (not
a replacement) if they assure the teacher that they hadn't discussed it
with other students.
I'll leave the sit. in yeshivot to the men, but I was wondering (if they
don't) why don't they use the "honor system" from a young age to get the
students used to not cheating.
In my year group, at Bar Ilan U. we enacted the same system with full
success (where it was permitted) and teachers left the class during class
exams. No-one cheated!
Name: Shoshana L. Boublil
E-mail: <toramada@...>
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From: Eliyahu Segal <segaleli@...>
Date: Mon, 3 Mar 1997 13:34:43 +0200 (IST)
Subject: Re: Kosher Animals
> The ruler of his world (Hashem) knows that there are no other
> ma'aleh gerah that do not "split the hoof" other than the camel
> (and shafan and arnevet)"
> is very hard to evaluate, verify, or question becuase we do not have a
> good definition of "ma'aleh gera".
> Moshe Rayman
That was the gemara that I was thinking of. I didn't understand that
since (though you include it in the parentheses) it does not say 'other
than camel, shafan and arnevet?'
ELiyahu Segal
<segaleli@...>
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From: Seth Ness <ness@...>
Date: Mon, 3 Mar 1997 01:28:11 -0500 (EST)
Subject: Mazal Tov - Enagagement
hi,
I just wanted to announce my engagement to judy goldberg, not a member of
this list, but her email is <judith_goldberg@...>
beezrat hashem we will be married in august.
Seth L. Ness, Ph.D. Ness Gadol Hayah Sham
<ness@...>
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From: <millerr@...> (Reuven Miller)
Date: Mon, 3 Mar 1997 11:33:00 +0200 (WET)
Subject: Onkelos on Lo Tevashel Gdi
The Targum Onkelos translates "lo tavashel gdi..." (do not cook the ...)
in the three times it appears in the Torah as "lo tochloon" (do not
eat). The Talmud teaches that "lo tavashel gdi..." means do not cook
meat and milk together,do not eat and do not have benefit from that
which was cooked together. Why does the Targum _only_ translate "do not
eat"? I would expect either a literal translation of do not cook or a
different translation(do not cook,do not eat, do not benefit) on each of
the three times that this verse appears in the Torah. I ask this
question three times a year for a number of years. Can anyone help me?
| Reuven Miller |
| E-mail: <millerr@...> |
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From: Ari Kahn <kahnar@...>
Date: Mon, 03 Mar 1997 20:05:37 +0200
Subject: Re: Prohibition to Own Pigs
> The raising of pigs for any reason was banned during the war between
> Shlomtzion's sons. The ban commemorates one of the tragedies that
> happened during that war, when the daily sacrifice (tamid) had to be
> discontinued because the forces beseiged in Jerusalem ran out of sheep,
> and the beseiging forces, who had until then sent two sheep a day into
> the city for the tamid, one day sent in a pig instead. This incident is
> also one of the five tragedies commemorated on 17 Tammuz.
>Zev Sero Don't blame me, I voted for Harry Browne
><zsero@...>
my recolection is thst this issur is only in Erez Yisrael, it is
worthwhile noting that the other issur associated with this passage is
studying Greek Wisdom.
Ari Kahn
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From: <skadish@...> (Seth Kadish)
Date: Tue, 18 Feb 1997 04:11:03 GMT
Subject: Re: Pronunciation and Tefilah
Carl Sherer wrote in regard to my posting:
>It also goes without saying that virtually all of the so-called
>"Litvishe Yeshivishe" community in Israel davens in Ashkenazis, despite
>the fact that much of the conversation in the Chadarim takes place in
>Sfardit (in fact, when our younger son went to Mechina in one of the
>Chadarim in Yerushalayim, we had to specially request, along with
>several other parents, that he be taught the difference between a Komatz
>and a Patach when he was learning how to read).
>
>At the very least I think it can be said that "yesh lohem al mi
>lismoch." (They have upon whom to rely).
Carl is absolutely right. It is not even a matter of "yesh al mi
she-yismokhu" but clearly and absolutely permitted. When I read over my
posting, I saw that I wasn't clear that there is no halakhic issue
whatsoever involved here. The fact that I cited three teshuvot probably
made it sound like there was a halakhic issue, but the exact opposite is
actually the case: All three teshuvot make it clear that which
pronunciation to choose, or changing pronunciation, is NOT a matter
involving any kind of prohibition. Furthermore, even if "al titosh
torat imekha" has some sort of halakhic weight here (and it is not at
all clear that it does), the point of these teshuvot is that it does not
apply to Israelis who switch to modern Hebrew pronunciation for prayer
and Torah reading. This is because (in the words of Rav Uziel zt"l):
"they have not changed it... but it has changed in their mouths." In
other words, the Israeli pronunciation was already a fait accompli, even
for prayer, once it became the normal means of communication in society.
My point in my posting was that this has clear implications for kavvana:
if kavvana is to mean what one says to God as he would mean it to a
human king, then he should say it God as he would say it to a human
king. The point is not to *recite* the text, but to *talk* to God with
it, a real conversation. For Israelis, this would mean the sounds of
"normal" spoken Hebrew.
As I said in my first posting, many Ashkenazim who move to Israel and
become comfortable in spoken Hebrew still do not change, and this may be
because they think there is a halakhic prohibition. There is not. It
may also be because they have not taken the issue of kavvana into
account. That is why I raised it.
However, not everyone is the same, and what motivates kavvana in one
person may not do so for another. For myself, I know that to pray with
a different system of pronunciation than the one I speak Hebrew in would
be devastating for my kavvana. I know that there are many others like
me because it was for these people that Rav Uziel wrote his teshuva,
subsequently approved of by Rav Unterman and Rav Ovadia Yosef. As is
clear from Rav Uziel, the consideration is especially for those who are
widely involved in Hebrew-speaking Israeli society. However, even for
them there is clearly not a halakhic requirement to change to Israeli
pronunciation! Especially if an Israeli does not find the kavvana
consideration a reason to switch away from the Ashkenazic one, there is
no NEED for him to do so. One person even told me that she finds a
distinctive pronunciation only for prayer and not for general
conversation to be an assett that actually HELPS her kavvana. That is
excellent, and so she shouldn't switch. The issue is one for each
individual to decide for himself, based on his own kavvana (even though
I suspect that Rav Uziel's comment reveals an intuition about what works
best for most people). And as Carl correctly pointed out, the list of
those who do not change in Israel includes Gedolai Yisrael and their
families.
In short, the issue is not halakhic, but a matter of individual choice.
I suggest that kavvana may be a strong additional factor in favor of
switching, especially for Ashkenazic Israeli yeshiva students who may
never have considered its ramifications. I even suggest that there may
be a certain amount of illogic or inconsistency in not switching, since
"it has already changed in their mouths" for things besides prayer. But
not everything is logical consistancy: the desire to preserve the
ancient tradition of one's family or society may be reason enough for
some people do decide not to change after aliya, and even to teach their
children to read this way, despite connsiderations of kavvana and
integration into wider Israeli society. I hope that even those, like
myself, who have have decided to make the switch, will still feel pangs
of loss and nostalgia for the way their Hebrew used to sound.
Bivrakha,
Seth Kadish
Rehov Hartuv 4/3, Netanya
(09)882-3994
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From: <bsegal@...> (Binyomin Segal)
Date: Tue, 18 Feb 1997 01:02:38 -0600
Subject: Simanei Taharah and Wallabies
Mottel Gutnick writes:
*Wallabies aren't kosher. No great revelation, you might say, but did you
*know that they chew the cud, which, of course, is one of the two simanei
*tahara (signs of a kosher animal) listed by the Torah?
...
*Well, when I was a young lad attending high school in the (Lubavitch)
*Yeshivah College in Melbourne, one of our teachers often used to make
*great stock of the point that the Torah (Lev. 11.4) enumerates by name
*four exceptions to the animals possessing these simanei taharah. (The
*Torah says that they may not be eaten because they display only one of
*the two simanim, not both.) He claimed that to "this very day"
*naturalists, zoologists and explorers the world over have never
*discovered any other species that fits into the category of those four.
*
*This, he claimed, constituted a 'proof' of the divine authorship of the
*Torah. How else, he asked, could Moshe on his own (or later writers for
*those who maintain that there were other authors) have been certain that
*no other such exception existed anywhere on earth? Without
*aforeknowledge of this, surely it would have been more prudent to make
*it clear that these were merely examples, not an exhaustive list
*...
*I have always thought it was dangerous for religion to claim
*corroboration for the 'authenticity' of its beliefs from scientific
*'evidence', because when such corroboration goes up in smoke, as it
*often does when newly discovered facts displace old assumptions or when
*old theories are found to be untenable, it does not prove or disprove
*anything about the belief, but it certainly discredits those who place
*stock in such 'proofs'.
There's a bit to say here - some of it already alluded to in Eliyahu
Segal's post.
First, your rebbe was not the inventer of this claim, the gemara makes
it in the gemara in Chullin (59a-60b) {BTW the gemra makes a similar
claim re fish ie that all scaled fish have fins in Niddah 51b). And
while it's true that a rabbi today should be careful about making claims
to proof - the gemara was making this claim to prove what they knew was
true from a reliable source - G-d Himself. In fact the Torah itself
makes a claim that is meant as a way to demonstrate the Torah's validity
- that in the 6th year produce will triple - and it says explicitly that
this is for those who don't belive.
As to how we can answer the "kasha" (difficulty) of finding a new
species, there are 2 possibilities (again both alluded to by Eliyahu
Segal).
1. It is indeed an animal that chews its cud, and is listed in the
Torah. There are three animals listed in the Torah as chewing cud -
camel, shafan, and arnevet. It seems clear that even in the time of the
gemara the exact identity of these second two animals was
unclear. Certainly in modern hebrew they mean hare and rabbit - but
almost just as clearly that is _not_ what the torah meant. So _perhaps_
marsupials is the translation of one of these two words.
2. It is also clear however that there are differences between the "cud
chewing" of ruminants and the cud chewing of other animals - among them
rodents (hares, rabbits) and marsupials. A look at a scientific text
should clarify that. This is in fact why the trranslation of shafan and
arnevet is so difficult. In the family of ruminents - as described by
science - there is (so far) only a camel and kosher animals. Other
animals which "chew their cud" are similar (and therefore perhaps the
shafan and arnevet) but are different as well.
Finally Eliyahu Segal writes:
*Also if anyone can help me, I remeber reading a quoted gemara. It starts
*off 'and was moshe a hunter'(vichi moshe hayah..). It asks why does the
*torah mention that the pig was the only one that had cloved hooves and
*answer to show the beauty of the torah(I am not quoting). The
*interesting thing is that the gemara also asks why just the camel or
*something like that.
As far as I can tell you are remembering the gist of the gemara i quoted
above that spans 2 pages in chullin. the bit about moshe as a hunter is
at the end and referes to much biological info that was referenced in
the preceding pages.
the bit about the camel and the pig being unique is at the beginning -
and when the gemara mentions the camel both rashi and tosfot adds that
the gemara means all 3 but is using the camel as a general
reference. one might speculate that the gemaras choice was due to the
fact that even then the identity of the shafan and arnevet was unclear.
hope this all helps
binyomin
<bsegal@...>
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End of Volume 26 Issue 10
