Avodah Mailing List

Volume 27: Number 122

Mon, 24 May 2010

• 1. Re: Avos - milsei dachasidusa or not (was [Areivim] more RCA reaction) (Micha Berger)
• 2. Chessed and the Eitz haDaas (Micha Berger)
• 3. Two Ideals (Micha Berger)
• 4. Re: Two Ideals (Micha Berger)
• 5. onshin shelo nin hadin (Eli Turkel)
• 6. shavuot and YK (Eli Turkel)
• 7. Mitzvos and Morality (was: [Areivim] more RCA reaction) (T613K@aol.com)
• 8. Star-K on Worms in Fish (Yitzchok Levine)
• 9. Re: Why so few first-borns?? (T6...@aol.com)
• 10. Re: Tachanun (Arie Folger)
• 11. Re: Tachanun (Saul Mashbaum)
• 12. Re: Tachanun (Micha Berger)
• 13. Re: Star-K on Worms in Fish (Zev Sero)
• 14. is there morality outside of the Torah (Eli Turkel)

On Mon, May 17, 2010 at 04:50:00PM -0400, I wrote:
: Meaning: Avos is called avos because it refers to the categories which
: underly halakhah. It's not only no less aboud chiyuvim than the topics
: of the other mesechtos, it's about the chiyuvim that are themselves the
: reasons for the other chiyuvim. More fundamental.

: How different is Avos in content from the truths that R' Simlai said
: various nevi'im reduced the 613 mitzvos to -- asos mishpat, ahavas chesed,
: and hatznei'a lekhes im E-lokekha; or "simhru mishpat va'asu tzedaqah";
: "dirshuni vichyu!"; "tzadiq be'emunaso yichyeh".

Barukh shekivanti!

R Yehudah Amital makes a similar statement in Gush's recent Shavuos
mailing. http://www.vbm-torah.org/archive/chag70/shavuot70-a.htm

    Even though Rabbi Simla'i opened with a reference to the 613 mitzvot,
    some of the things mentioned in connection with David, Yeshayahu,
    and Mikha -- such as "walking humbly with God" and "shutting one's
    eyes from seeing evil" -- are not included among the six hundred
    and thirteen commandments! The verses cited here deal not only
    with mitzvot, but also with values -- values that are an integral
    part of the Torah. Mikha reduced the 613 mitzvot to three values,
    and these values have binding force just like mitzvot.

    Rabbi Chayyim Vital develops a parallel idea regarding character
    traits (Sha'ar Kedusha I:2):

        The good and bad traits depend on this soul; they are the seat,
        foundation, and root of the rational soul, upon which depend the
        613 mitzvot... It is for this reason that the character traits are
        not included among the 613 mitzvot. They serve, however, as the
        primary preparation for the 613 mitzvot... because the rational
        soul is not strong enough to fulfill the 613 mitzvot through the
        613 organs of the body, but only through the fundamental soul
        that is connected to the body itself... Hence, one must be more
        careful about bad traits than about fulfilling the positive or
        negative precepts. For when a person has good traits, he will
        easily fulfill all the mitzvot.

RYA also discusses R' Aqiva (ve'ahavta lereiakha) vs Ben Zoma (eileh
toledos ha'adam), values derived from halakhah (eg "The value of
gratitude is derived from the verse: 'You shall not abhor an Egyptian,
because you were a stranger in his land'"), the role of General Value
(what we've called here "Natural Morality", etc...

And, while on the subject of R' Aqiva vs Ben Zoma, YU's Shavuot-to-Go
from last year has a piece by R' David Horwitz on the machloqes and how
they relate to another theme that has been recurring lately -- Kant's
Categorical Imperative.
http://www.yutorah.org/togo/shavuot/articles/Shavuot_To-Go_
-_5769_Rabbi_Horwitz.pdf
or <http://bit.ly/atu86K>. In a recent blog entry I mention why it left
me unconvinced. But interesting none-the-less.

:-)BBii!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 Life is complex.
mi...@aishdas.org                Decisions are complex.
http://www.aishdas.org               The Torah is complex.
Fax: (270) 514-1507                                - R' Binyamin Hecht

While reading Shavuos to Go, this year's edition, I found the following
essay by our chaver R' Mordechai Torchyner.
http://www.yutorah.org/togo/shavuot/articles/Shavuot_To-G
o_-_5770_Rabbi_Torczyner.pdf
or <http://bit.ly/atu86K>. He writes about the connection between
Shavuos and chessed. Often cited is the idea that Rus, a book about
chessed, is read on Shavuos to highlight this connection. R? Torczyner
opens with a different point of connection:

    [A] midrash describing the scene atop Har Sinai places the credit
    not with Moshe, but with Avraham:

        At that moment the ministering angels sought to harm Moshe. God
        shaped Moshe's face to appear like that of Avraham, and God
        said to the angels, "Are you not embarrassed before him? Is
        this not the one to whom you descended and in whose home you
        ate?" God then turned to Moshe and said, "The Torah was given
        to you only in the merit of Avraham."

But what I found particularly intriguing is that RMT builds the
connection from the following observation:

        Adam and Chavah were charged with working in their garden and
        protecting it, and they would have been the sole beneficiaries
        of their work; every plant they grew, nearly every fruit they
        cultivated, was theirs to eat. (Bereishis 2) Only in one case were
        they told to labor benevolently without expectation of reward:
        The fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil would receive
        their care, but provide no benefit. All work for that tree would
        be purely chesed shel emet, kindness without any anticipation of
        reciprocity. This was their own opportunity to engage in olam
        chessed yibaneh, bringing into reality a world founded on
        kindness. Instead, though, the first human beings took that
        fruit for themselves.

The sin of the tree of knowledge was a flaw in chessed, in acting for
the other with no intent to get benefit from it. I would suggest that
this notion of chessed was in fact the very da'as the tree was supposed
to impart.

And it's not until we get to Avraham, who not only performs chessed
but commits to transmitting it down the generations that Hashem finds a
nation worth of the Torah. This is the reason why humanity required 26
generations between the giving of derekh eretz and the Torah.

:-)BBii!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             One doesn't learn mussar to be a tzaddik,
mi...@aishdas.org        but to become a tzaddik.
http://www.aishdas.org                         - Rav Yisrael Salanter
Fax: (270) 514-1507

Last from my hit parade of divrei Torah I really enjoyed over Shavous,
the following thought is from R Lord Jonathan Sacks
http://www.chiefrabbi.org/ReadArtical.aspx?id=1641

I commented once on Aspaqlaria
<http://www.aishdas.org/asp/2007/10/anger-and-the-golden-mean.shtml>
about the Rambam invoking two different ideals in Hil' Dei'os. In
pereq 1 he described the chakham, who always seeks the Golden Mean. But in
pereq 2, the description differs, we find cases (in particular avoiding
gaavah and kaas, but also in any middah which needs correction) where
one goes beyond the mean. This is the chassid.

Rabbi Sacks notes this as well, and uses this notion to explain an
apparent contradiction in the Rambam's discussion of the nazir. In Dei'os
3:1 the Rambam speaks out against asceticism, but in Nezirus 10:4 he lauds
the nazir for consecrating himself by swearing off these pheasures --
comparing the nazir to the prophet! R' Sacks generalizes the idea:

    These are not just two types of person but two ways of understanding
    the moral life itself. Is the aim of the moral life to achieve
    personal perfection? Or is it to create gracious relationships and
    a decent, just, compassionate society? The intuitive answer of most
    people would be to say: both. That is what makes Maimonides so acute
    a thinker on this subject. He realises that you can't have both --
    that they are in fact different enterprises.

    A saint may give all his money away to the poor. But what about the
    members of the saint's own family? A saint may refuse to fight in
    battle. But what about the saint's own country? A saint may forgive
    all crimes committed against him. But what about the rule of law,
    and justice? Saints are supremely virtuous people, considered
    as individuals. Yet you cannot build a society out of saints
    alone. Indeed, saints are not really interested in society. They
    have chosen a different, lonely, self-segregating path. I know no
    one who makes this point as clearly as Maimonides -- not Plato,
    not Aristotle, not Descartes, not Kant.

RL JS notes that the same answer could be invoked to explain the Rambam's
contradictory attitude toward nezirim. Society must be based on wisdom, on
chakhamim. A society of nazirim wouldn't work. However, the nazir pursues
the ideal of the chassid, which is a holy choice for those called to it.

:-)BBii!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             I long to accomplish a great and noble task,
mi...@aishdas.org        but it is my chief duty to accomplish small
http://www.aishdas.org   tasks as if they were great and noble.
Fax: (270) 514-1507                              - Helen Keller

I just sent a post which said (in part):
: I commented once on Aspaqlaria
: <http://www.aishdas.org/asp/2007/10/anger-and-the-golden-mean.shtml>
: about the Rambam invoking two different ideals in Hil' Dei'os. In
: pereq 1 he described the chakham, who always seeks the Golden Mean. But in
: pereq 2, the description differs, we find cases (in particular avoiding
: gaavah and kaas, but also in any middah which needs correction) where
: one goes beyond the mean. This is the chassid.

I forgot that I'm sitting on a possible maqor for the Rambam -- Shabbos
125a:
    A beraisa was repeated before Rava bar Rav Huna: Someone who kills
    snakes or scorpions on Shabbos, the spirit of chasidim are not
    content with him. He said to him: And those chasidim, the spirit of
    chakhamim are not content with them.

Thus we see a concept of two different balances between conflicting
priorities (here, between risk and shemiras Shabbos) -- the chassid and
the chakham. The Chassid hyperprotects Shabbos in ways the Chakham finds
incorrect.

This in turn might be related to the Chassidim haRishonim and their
initial refusal to fight with the Makabiim on Shabbos (Makkabiim I 2:39),
although they did later join (v. 43).

(BTW, you might recall that last Chanukah I was fascinated by this
movementm and even suggested that Yosi b Yoezer ish Tzereidah was a
member, as he is called "chassid shebikehunah" (Chagiga 2:7) and is
crucified about the same time as the slaughter of the Chassidim haRishim
discussed in the Seifer haMakkabiim mentioned above.
See http://www.aishdas.org/asp/2009/12/1st-chassidim.shtml )

But in any case, the defining feature of a Chassid wasn't only his
davening 9 hours a day, or his shemiras Shabbos. It was also his concern
for others, "The early Chassidim would hide their thorns and broken
pieces of glass in the middle of their fields 3 tefachim [roughly one
foot] deep, so that it would not [even] stop the plowing." (BQ 30a)

It appears the Chassidim haRishonim and the Rambam Hil Dei'os were
describing the same ideal.

:-)BBii!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Here is the test to find whether your mission
mi...@aishdas.org        on Earth is finished:
http://www.aishdas.org   if you're alive, it isn't.
Fax: (270) 514-1507                        - Richard Bach

On Sun, May 16, 2010 at 11:14:32PM +0300, Eli Turkel wrote:
: I recently saw the Ran on Sanhedrin 91 in the din of kipa that he says
: explicitly that this is only a n emergency rule but one cannot make
: a permanent rule since even a prophet cannot introduce new regulations.
: Therefore the Ran concludes that kipa
: must be a halacha to Moshe from Sinai...

Why couldn't he consider it derabbanan -- of which there are many new
refulations?

And for that matter, even the 7 tuvei ha'ir have the right to punish in
ways not mandated in Mes' Makkos. So I fail to see the whole chiddush
involved in kippah, where we have an actual Sanhedrin running a Jewish
community in EY.>>

The Ran learns that Kipah is part of dinei melech. So he disagrees with Micha
about 7 tuvei hair. The Ran would claim that 7 tuvei hair can only make
emergency rules for punishments but cannot introduce new rules
that are permanent such as kipa

As I have said several times before according to many (most?) achronim
we accept a kinyan that the merchants use but we cant have a rule that
no kinyan is needed even if that is common practice. ie there are limits
as to what common practice or 7 tuvei hair can introduce.
Since we no longer have a Sanhedrin it is only theoretical what they could do

-- 
Eli Turkel

<<A different question -- was the Torah received on Shavuos, or on Yom
Kippur?

Why are we celebrating zeman matan Toraseinu is we weren't ready to
truly accept it until the 2nd luchos -- on Yom Kippur? And don't chazal
say that the Torah associated with the first luchos was different in
kind, tht the whole concept of TSBP starts with the 2nd luchos? (R'
Chaim Brisker famously discusses this notion.) So the Torah as we have
is isn't even what was given on Shavuos!>>

I believe the Bet Halevi claims shavuot is when we received Torah
she-bichtav and YK when we received Torah She-be-al peh.
I think RYBS has a discussion extending this but I have to look it up

-- 
Eli Turkel

 
 
redirected from Areivim at moderator request
 
From: Eli Turkel _eliturkel@gmail.com_ (mailto:elitur...@gmail.com) 

>> There  is also the opinion of Yeshaya Leibowitz that there is no
connection at all  between mitzvot and good or moral. <<

-- 
Eli  Turkel
 
>>>>>
 
 
I cannot understand or process such a statement.  
 
Think of the many exhortations to treat widows, orphans and converts justly 
 and charitably -- often with a reminder, "You know the heart of a stranger 
 because you were strangers yourselves in Egypt."
 
Look at the Haftara of Tisha B'Av, from Yirmiyahu: "Mi ha'ish hechacham  
veyaven es zos...Who is the wise man who can understand this?...al meh avdah  
ha'aretz?...why was Eretz Yisrael destroyed and left desolate, her people  
scattered to the four corners of the earth?  Vayomer Hashem, al azvam es  
Torasi....Hashem says, it is because they abandoned My Torah.....Al yis-hallel  
hachacham bechachmaso, ve'al yishallel hagibor bigvuraso....Let not the 
genius  pride himself on his intellect, let the hero not pride himself on his 
strength,  let not the wealthy man pride himself on his wealth....Rather if 
someone wants  to pride himself on anything, let him pride himself on 
studying and knowing  Me...Ki Ani Hashem oseh chessed mishpat utzedakah 
be'aretz...For I, Hashem, do  chessed, justice and charity in the land...ki ve'eileh 
chafatzti ne'um  Hashem...This is what I desire, says Hashem."
 
"Azvam es Torasi" is here equated with abandoning chessed, mishpat and  
tzedakah.  And there is "no connection at all between mitzvos and  good or 
moral"?!
 

--Toby Katz
==========





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Below is the recent Star-K post regarding 
checking for bugs in fish. It is from 
http://star-k.org/cons-vegdetail.php?ID=74

I found the listing under "only the variety of 
fish found on the following list may be used 
without any need for inspection" of gefilte fish 
and minced fish sticks surprising.   After all, 
one could conceivably use some of the varieties 
of fish listed under "should NOT be used" in the 
making of gefilte fish and/or minced fish. 
Indeed, A & B sells (or at least did sell) salmon 
gefilte fish. See 
http://www.gefiltefish.com/product.asp?id=1&;subid=58&productID=445

Presumably the fact that the fish is ground up 
and therefore the worms are also ground up is why 
the Star-K lists gefilte fish and minced fish as 
being OK, no matter what kind of fish these 
products are made from. IIRC, there was something 
about pureeing strawberries that might be bug infested and then using them.

I am not sure exactly how grinding or pureeing 
works halachically so that one may use the 
result. True, one can no longer see the worms or 
bugs, but why is one allowed to do this 
l'chatchila?  Is it not being mevatel an issur up front?

YL


----------



Checking Instructions

Please note the following regarding all Star-K 
insect checking instructions: When applicable, 
guidelines apply to produce grown and purchased 
in the United States. Checking procedures in other countries may be different.

May 18, 2010

Recently there has been much discussion about the 
fish worms called Anisakis. These worms/parasites 
have been found in certain species of fish. Some 
Gedolei Eretz Yisroel have ruled that these worms 
are halachically prohibited and, therefore, those 
species of fish must be inspected prior to use. 
Since we at Star-K strive to have our kosher 
certified products accepted by all kosher 
consumers, Rabbi Moshe Heinemann has instructed 
Star-K establishments and mashgichim that only 
the non-problematic fish be used. Until we issue 
policies and procedures for inspections (as we 
have for vegetables and fruit) the problematic 
species of fish - fresh, frozen or canned - will 
not be used, even with kosher certification 
(unless prior approval is given by Star-K.)

Rabbi Heinemann recommends that consumers follow 
the same policy. Therefore, only non-problematic 
fish should be used until guidelines for 
inspection are issued. As with all halachic 
issues, people should follow the guidance of their personal Rav.

Updates will be posted on this site.

Policy

The following lists are based on research by 
<http://www.kehilasyaakov.org/Fish.html>Rabbi 
Gershon Bess. Note: Please READ CAREFULLY since 
there are some species of fish that appear on 
both lists. Their acceptability or 
non-acceptability depends on where they 
originate. We have no information about fish not included on this list.

Until further notice, only the variety of fish 
found on the following list may be used without any need for inspection:
    * Carp
    * Flounder - Only Fluke, Georgia Banks, Channel
    * Gefilte Fish
    * Herring fillet
    * Lox - Farm Raised [if wild, would state "wild?]
    * Minced Fish Sticks
    * Pike
    * Pollock - Atlantic
    * Red Snapper - Eastern or Atlantic only
    * Salmon - Farm Raised (e.g. Atlantic, 
Norwegian, Chilean, New Zealand, British Columbia )
    * Sardines - from Morocco, Philippines, Portugal
    * Sea Bass ? Striped Bass, Grouper (Mexican), Blue Nose (New Zealand)
    * Tilapia
    * Trout
    * Tuna
    * Whitefish - Michigan-Lake Superior
    * Whiting

Until we issue policies and procedures for 
inspections (as we have for vegetables and fruit) 
the following species of fish (fresh, frozen or 
canned) should NOT be used (even with kosher certification):
    * Butterfish
    * Cod - Scrod, Hake
    * Flounder - Yellow Tail, Wild Dabs, Black Backs, Turbot, Yellow Fin Sole
    * Halibut
    * Pollack ? Alaskan ? Fillet fish sticks or patties
    * Red Perch
    * Red Snapper - Pacific
    * Sable a.k.a Black Cod - including Smoked
    * Salmon, Wild - Fresh/Frozen/Canned ? All types
    * Sardines ? Norway, Scotland
    * Sole
    * Yellow Fin Sole
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SBA
> Can somebody explain how is possible that from shishim  riboy yiden  aged 20
> -60 there were only 23 thousand  bechorim

> Most were probably married to at least one wife and possible  more.
> If they all had children 50% would be boys - thus there should be at  least
> 300 000 bechorim???

Another similar question has to do with the 22, 000 Levi'im who "ransomed"
22, 000 first-borns, and then there were an additional 273 first-borns who
were "extra" and had to pay five shekalim each. (This is from last week,
P' Bamidbar.) But if you count up all the numbers from when Gershon,
Kehas and Merari were each counted, and add them up, you find *22, 300*
Levi'im (not 22, 000 as a later pasuk says) so there should have been
plenty of Levi'im, and no bechor should have needed to pay five shekalim.

Rashi answers this by saying that the 300 extra Levi'im were first-borns
themselves and therefore had to "ransom" themselves so to speak, and
thus were not available to ransom other bechorim.

So far so good, but now take out your calculator. There were 22, 300
male Levi'im and only 300 of them were bechorim?! What's the ratio?

Even if we say that half of all children are born into a family where
the first born is a girl, that would leave us with 11, 000 Levi'im in
families where the first born was a boy, yet there are only 300 bechorim
-- a ratio of one bechor for every 37 later-born boys!

A typical Levi wife had 37 sons?! (And presumably an equal number of
daughters?!)

Eliyahu Kitov discusses this at length in his Sefer Haparshios, a lot
to say but I'm too tired and busy right now. However, bottom line, he
himself admits in a footnote that his answers are not fully satisfactory.
Al regel achas we are of course talking about nissim, not a natural rate
of increase.

(Yet with each Levi wife having sixty or seventy children, Shevet Levi is
still smaller than the next-smallest shevet?! Kitov talks about this too)

(BTW -- not discussed in Sefer Haparshios, but just my own thought --
you could have a HUGE number of births and then a HUGE number of deaths
and end up with a small number of people, net.)


From: Micha Berger <mi...@aishdas.org>
On Sun, May 16, 2010  at 01:27:45AM +1000, SBA wrote:
: From: AMK
:> Can somebody explain how  is possible that from?shishim riboy yiden  aged 20
:> -60 there were  only 23 thousand bechorim

We discussed this before. See RGStudent's first  post to Avodah (1999)  at
http://www.aishdas.org/avodah/vol04/v04n089.shtml#08

and the  discussion (2002)  at
http://www.aishdas.org/avodah/
getindex.cgi?section=P#PROPORTION%20OF%20FIRST%20BORNS%20TO%20ALL%20BNEI%20
YISRAEL
(or  http://bit.ly/9Xk8Oz )

I read this after I sent in my post on the subject.  I see that in his  
1999 post,  RGS asked a somewhat similar question to my question,  about the 
ratio of first-born to later-born Levi'im.  Here is part of what  he wrote 
there:
    I was thinking that many of the firstborns were killed during Makas
    Choshech but the question arises why they died so disproportionally
    to the rest of the nation. R. Aryeh Kaplan in The Living Torah
    suggests that many Jews did not observe the first Pesach and did
    not put blood on their doorpost. Therefore, their firstborns
    were killed in the makkah. He also suggests that maybe Hashem
    intentionally caused women to give birth to girls first but does
    not offer any explanation as to why Hashem would do this.

--Toby  Katz
==========

RZS wrote:
> AFAIK the only time it can be said is immediately after shmoneh
> esrei, and if you missed that opportunity you can't say it later.

I would restate that. You can say Tachanun anytime you want (it's a
mixture of Tanakh citations, a chapter of Tehillim, and prayer based
on lashon Tanakh - what's the problem with that? Assuming you want to
express yourself in prayer).

However, as far as fulfilling the meaning and being effective in the
way of Ta'hanun, it only has that status and that effect immediately
after the 'amidah, and provided one didn't interrupt even with talking
(see Tur or SA, memory fails right now, but it's either in one of both
of them). Obviously, the repetition of the 'amidah is not meant for
keeping up with the day's forecasted stock prices.


RMB wrote:
> Tefillah is an excercise in becoming the kind of person who
> can relate to the A-lmighty and has the right priorities. That's
> why we say what AKhG ("umeihem kamah nevi'im") told us
> to say as developed by Chazal and geonim. Also, why the
> verb is in the reflexice (lehitpallel).

Eh, the act of reciting ta'hanun is also reflexive: lehit'hanen (occurs,
for example, in Esther 4:8).

Kol tuv,
-- 
Arie Folger,
Recent blog posts on http://ariefolger.wordpress.com/
* Helping Patients Face Death, She Fought to Live
* Neuer Audio-Schi'ur, zum 91. Psalm
* Significant Recent Manuscript Finds
* Ansprache anlsslich des G"ttesdienst in der historischen Synagoge von Endingen
* Burgeoning Jewish Life in Central Europe
* Raising Consciousness by Dressing Babies Outrageously

RMBerger discussed the relationship of tachanun to t'filla.

RYBS discusses this topic in Al HaTshuva,in the Chapter "Tshuva and B"Chira
Chofshit",
pp 244 -249, in the section entitled "The prayer of the public and the
prayer of the individual". The concluding passage is as follows:

>>>
There are two forms of prayer according to Chazal. One form is the universal
prayer, the prayer of Everyman. All people need food, health; all need
forgiveness for their sins; man feels loneliness and turns to the Almighty
to redeem him. This prayer is the same for all, great and small alike, as
the Rambam puts it "[Chazal instituted a fixed text for the Amidah] so that
all people's prayers should be well-formulated, and the prayers of those of
poor speech the same as those of fine expression".
In this prayer, one prays with the congregation, and asks for those needs
everyone has. This is tfilat ha-amidah, the silent, communal prayer.

This is another form of prayer, the individualistic one. In this prayer the
uniqueness of the
individual is reflected; and this is the supplication (tachanun) *after*
prayer. Chazal did not set a fixed text for this form of prayer, since they
sought to preserve in this form of prayer the essential independence of the
individual supplicant.

These  two forms of prayer are a mirror of the wondrous paradox of the human
existence. On one hand, each person is like all others, and on the other
hand he is unique, lonely, independent, separate from all others. He is like
a sefer Torah [discussed above by RYBS.
SM] - all have exactly the same text, but each is in a different handwriting
...

>>>

The next section of this drasha is titled "Man's uniqueness". Ayen sham.

Saul Mashbaum
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On Sun, May 23, 2010 at 05:05:44PM +0200, Arie Folger wrote:
: Eh, the act of reciting ta'hanun is also reflexive: lehit'hanen (occurs,
: for example, in Esther 4:8).

You omitted the obvious case, the title word of parashas VaEschanan.

As noted on Mesorah, hitpa'el isn't always reflexive. The pasuq RAF
cites, where it's "lehischanein lo" (to Achashveirosh), would appear
to be more likely an example than the instances of "lehispallel el..."
Alternatively, it's an implication that the appeal to Achashveirosh's
sympathy involve more than words. That she use herself.

As for MRAH, the gap between what one ought to request, that which we
inculcate through tefillah, and that which he actually would request,
tachanunim, didn't exist. This whole discussion of modes of tefillah
wouldn't apply.

Still, the thing we do after davening gets the verb "amar". The series of
techinos from which we got "E-lokai Netzor" are each introduced by "basar
tzelosana amar hakhi". So, the existence of a hitpa'el for other uses
of the verb doesn't impact our discussion of the mitzvah of tachanunim
in particular.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             The waste of time is the most extravagant
mi...@aishdas.org        of all expense.
http://www.aishdas.org                           -Theophrastus
Fax: (270) 514-1507

Yitzchok Levine wrote:

> I am not sure exactly how grinding or pureeing works halachically so 
> that one may use the result. True, one can no longer see the worms or 
> bugs, but why is one allowed to do this l'chatchila?  Is it not being 
> mevatel an issur up front?

A complete creature is not batel; an incomplete one is.  There is no
problem of mevatel issur lechatchila, since you don't know that there
are any worms in the first place.

-- 
Zev Sero                      The trouble with socialism is that you
z...@sero.name                 eventually run out of other people?s money
                                                     - Margaret Thatcher

moved from Areivim
<<As Jews, do we believe that there is such a thing as obvious evil? I think
not - I think that Jews believe that good and evil are defined by Hashem,
and we interpret His will by reading the Torah.

And who defines what that moral sensibility should tell us? You say cows are
for meat; I say cows are sentient beings who feel pain>>

Benjamin Whichcote quotes Abraham who tells G-d that G-d Forbid that
G-d should kill the innocent with the guilty - Shall then the judge of
the whole earth
not do justice? This makes sense only if there is a justice that
applies also to G-d,
otherwise the question is circular.

Abaye says the purpose of the Torah is to promote peace. So Abaye assumes
that peace is an objective value. R Saadia Gaon in his introduction to
Emunot veDeot says that most mitzvot could be discovered by man given
enough time and interest and this seems to be the opinion of R. Bachya
(from RAL).

The Mechilta quotes R Issi ben Akiba that if killing a nonJew was
prohibited before Sinai then certainly Sinai can not permit something
that was forbidden. Again assumes there are basics which the Torah
could not permit and we know it is basic since it was prohibited
befroe the Torah was given.

In Eruvin R. Yochanan states that without the Torah we could learn
modesty from the cat, chastity from the dove etc. As Moshe indicates
one could turn this around. Obviously R. Yochanan feels there are
absolutes that we would learn without the Torah.

To quote Whitehead (again from RAL) What is universal is the spirit
which should permeate any behavior system ...
RAL quotes the pasuk from Yirmiyahu
";But let him that glorieth, glory in this, that he understand and know
me for I am the Lord who ecercises mercy,justice and righteousness in
the earth for these I desire says the Lord"

--
Eli Turkel


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