Salt and Honey
Why does every qorban have salt, but you aren’t allowed to offer anything with honey?
Salt is used to enhance existing flavors. Honey is used to change them to something sweeter.
Category: Machashavah
For the Jews There was Light
“לַיְּהוּדִ֕ים הָֽיְתָ֥ה אוֹרָ֖ה וְשִׂמְחָ֑ה וְשָׂשֹׂ֖ן וִיקָֽר׃
The Jews enjoyed light and joy, happiness and glory.”
The gemara explains that … Orah means Torah, Simcha is Yom Tov, Sason is Beris Milah, and Yeqar – Tefillin.
So then I had to ask: Why doesn’t the pasuq just get to the point and say, “ליהודים היתה תורה, יום טוב, מילה ותפילין”? Why use code words?
Tefillah Meanings: And We Corrupted
A central facet of Judaism is that we are all interconnected. That my existence gets value from my ability to be of benefit to others. But that interconnectedness isn’t an unmitigated positive. It can be abused. We can use it to hurt others. Or to corrupt them.
Perhaps this is why Chazal associated הִרְשַֽׁעְנוּ – making others evil – with the connecting -וְ. Rather than being arbitrary, it was the natural sin to confess when the word “and” comes to mind.
Tiqanta Shabbos
This week I’d like to discuss three seemingly unrelated questions about the words of the tephillah: The focus of Shabbos Mussaf davening is the paragraph that begins “Tiqanta Shabbos…” What most readily jumps to...
The Possible Origin of the Schlissel Challah
The week after Pesach, it’s hard to obtain yeast. Sourdough was gotten rid of before the holiday. Fleischman didn’t invent a way to make dry active yeast yet. You had to get rid of all your starter dough.
Easiest thing to do is skim the yeast off of beer. (The term for this yeast layer is “barm”, for what it’s worth.) Problem is, that’s way too much. So, you put some metal into the dough, as metal slows down yeast. Likely a key — right size, handy.
Looking to the Future
But as for me, where I get all messianic and hopeful is when I see pictures of Chareidim making tzitzis for soldiers. … We have taken a huge step forward towards the messianic ideal. I gave but one illustrative example of how much this disaster has prodded us forward. Maybe…
Is that a donkey’s hoofbeats I am hearing?
PoseiqGPT?
Dear R Dr Bryode (Cc: Avodah),
Over Shabbos, I read your article about getting ChatGPT to discuss whether a kohein in a same-sex marriage may go up to duchen….
First, a large language model isn’t an AI in the sense of having a good representation of what it is talking about. Words are assigned strings of numbers, vectors, that do correlate to the word’s usage. So that king minus male will bring you to a similar vector as queen minus female. And GPT has a system for using context to distinguish the uses of the word “flies” in
“Time flies like an arrow, but
fruit flies like bananas.”
Tish’a beAv – the Mo’eid of Divine Inaction
The chaburah at Zelmele’s Kloiz is now learning Derashos haRan, the third derashah. I wanted to continue a conversation we had there, in light of today being Tish’ah beAv. The following is based on...
Derashos haRan – Derashah #3
The chaburah at Zelmele’s Kloiz started the Ran’s third derashah Thursday, June 8th, 2023. It is now ongoing at our usual time, 8pm Eastern Daylight Time.
In this derashah, the Ran discusses Moshe, Aharon, the nature of nevu’ah, Moshe’s special kind of nevu’ah, the urim vetumim, and the first mitzvos given to the Jewish People — counting months from Nissan and of Pesach.
So you shall not veer…
The Medrash about Qorach rhetorically asking of Moshe why a tallis that is made of tekheiles would need one more tekheiles thread for tzitzis ties the mitzvah of tzitzis to the next story in the Chumash – Qorach. The words of the parashah about tzitzis tie it to a slightly earlier story – the meraglim. ,,,
Derashos haRan – Derashah #2
The chaburah at Zelmele’s Kloiz finished the Ran’s second derashah… The Yaaqov – Eisav conflict plays out three times … Meanwhile the Ran continued the theme he introduced in the first derashah about Maaseh Bereishis, and the interface between the spiritual world and our physical one….
The Yahrzeit of Shemu’el haNavi
[A] custom arose, as recorded by the Radvaz, to come to Nabi Samwil, the traditionally identified location of his gravesite, tonight, on his yahrzeit. A bit north of Yerushalayim. And there children would get their first haircuts. When Shemu’el was weened, he was sent to the Mishkan to live. And he was a nazir, who did not cut his hair his entire life. So there is a logical connection between Shemu’el haNavi and haircuts. Also moved into the Mishkan after he was weened and he grew up there, thus giving the navi a connection to toddlers turning into boys, as well.
Yachatz – Broken Matzos
When Moshe counts the Jews, each man of military age contributes a half-sheqel … One of the Ran’s themes in his first derashah is the idea that a compound will generally be superior to the components. … The Ran continues that what is true for elements and compounds is true for individuals and the community. … There is a similar theme to the step of Yachatz in the Seder.
Parashas Tzav and the Book of Mrs. Job
Vayiqra is about the qorban as performed by the person bringing it. Tzav is the qorban as performed by the kohein. These are two totally different things. Each of us live in our own world.
We have a book of Iyov, which tells the story of the tragedies Iyov lived through. But Iyov’s wife? There is no book explaining her tragedy. Nor that of his children. Those would have been very different books with very different stories. Every person impacted by an event is a protagonist in and of themselves, and Hashem insures that their experiences and duties make sense for them within their own perspective.
Derashos haRan – Derashah #1
All the chaburos in which we learned the first derashah of Derashos haRan are now available on YouTube!
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLG3qHos5M39LStfXgit4J_FN4EamgQFEo
….
If I were to summarize the topic, the Ran opens with the idea that…
The True Hero
Don’t picture a single jar of oil found amidst the rubble. The Beis haMiqdash wasn’t trashed, it was perverted into a Temple of Zeus. … That single jar oil needed to be searched for because it had been hidden. Who hid it?
Dispelling the Dark
So, Adam saw the return of darkness, the same darkness the opening medrash identified with the spiritual decimation attempted by the Hellenists in the years before Chanukah. He mourned and fasted for 8 days. We have 8 days, but with an opposite theme — mourning and fasting are prohibited, and praise and gratitude dominate. And in both cases, the message was only seen in retrospect, the next year.
There is one major difference: Adam concluded that the darkness and the return of light was just “the natural cycle”. In Chanukah, we initiated the light manually, and Hashem responded with a miracle. Where Adam saw Hashem’s Light in nature, we see Him bestowing it in a covenantal union with us.
Adam was the start of this world. The Jewish People were given the Torah, handed a burning torch, to bring light to the world that follows.
Aggadic Stories and Peshat – Narrative Styles
Midrash makes for far more 2-dimensional people than you have in peshat. Let me explain with a mashal. The first Star Wars series was a classic Hero’s Journey plotline. And the characters — good...
Universal Hashgachah Peratis (notes)
Back in 2002, Rav Yitzchok Zirkind zt”l (COLlive obituary) brought the last Lubavitcher Rebbe’s Igeres (Igeres haQodesh 1:93) to the attention of the gang at Avodah. I was motivated to summarize it on list,...
Rav Shlomo Wolbe, “Frumkeit – Relationship ep. 26
Wednesday night (Sep 28th, 2022) the Beyond Meaningful Relationship – Relationshipful Meaning chaburah chaburah discussed Rav Wolbe’s essay titled “Frumkeit”, found in Alei Shur vol II, pp 152-155. (Warning: he actually comes out against!)
Rav Eliyahu Dessler, Qunterus haChessed (sec. 1 ch. 3- sec. 2, end) – Relationship ep. 24-25
Wednesday nights (September 14th and 21st, 2022) the Beyond Meaningful Relationship – Relationshipful Meaning chaburah completed our study of Rav Dessler’s Qunterus haChessed.
Rav Eliyahu Dessler, Qunterus haChessed (ch. 9-12) – Relationship ep. 23
Wednesday night (August 24th, 2022) the Beyond Meaningful Relationship – Relationshipful Meaning chaburah continued our study of Rav Dessler’s Qunterus haChessed chapters 4 through 6 (pp. 35-39)…. This week we saw how …[g]iving leads to love, far more than the other way around.
Rav Eliyahu Dessler, Qunterus haChessed (ch. 7-8) – Relationship ep. 22
Wednesday night (August 24th, 2022) the Beyond Meaningful Relationship – Relationshipful Meaning chaburah continued our study of Rav Dessler’s Qunterus haChessed chapters 4 through 6 (pp. 35-39)…. This week we saw how …[g]iving leads to love, far more than the other way around.
Rav Eliyahu Dessler, Qunterus haChessed (ch. 4-6) – Relationship ep. 21
Wednesday night (August 24th, 2022) the Beyond Meaningful Relationship – Relationshipful Meaning chaburah continued our study of Rav Dessler’s Qunterus haChessed chapters 4 through 6 (pp. 35-39)…. This week we saw how …[g]iving leads to love, far more than the other way around.
Rav Eliyahu Dessler, Qunterus haChessed (ch. 1-3) – Relationship ep. 20
Wednesday night (August 17th, 2022) the Beyond Meaningful Relationship – Relationshipful Meaning chaburah started our study of Rav Dessler’s Qunterus haChessed ,,, chapters 1 through 3 (pp. 32-35). In them, Rav Dessler talks about the potentials in a person for nesinah and netilah — giving and taking. These potentials have more to do with attitude and motive than the actual action…
Rav Shelomo Wolbe, Olam haYedidus (part 6, conclusion) – Relationship ep. 19
Wednesday night (August 10th, 2022) we completed our study of both versions of Rabbi Shlomo Wolbe’s essay Olam haYedidus. … [It] concludes with a discussion of zarus (estrangement) and akhzarius (cruelty,which Rav Dessler explains as a contraction of akh-zariyus – an extreme estangement). Our alienation from other people, from G-d and even our “need” to stay busy and never have to build a relationship with ourselves. Something to think about when singing “Mah yedidus menukhaseikh — How much affection inheres in your rest!” at the Shabbos table!
Rav Shelomo Wolbe, Olam haYedidus (part 5) – Relationship ep. 18
The Beyond Meaningful Relationships – Relationshipful Meaning series at the kloiz meets on Wednesday nights at 8pm EDT. If you missed anything or just want to join mid-stream, there are always the posts in...
Rav Shelomo Wolbe, Olam haYedidus (part 4) – Relationship ep. 17
The Beyond Meaningful Relationships – Relationshipful Meaning series at the kloiz meets on Wednesday nights at 8pm EDT. Even if you missed the discussion so far, this week was a great time to start!...
Shemos: From Vigilante to Lawgiver
A post on Facebook by Jeremy Phillips raised the question of why Hashem chose a vigilante to be His lawgiver. He got me thinking. Hashem even lauds Moshe’s vigilantism in the Torah when he...
Reconsidering The Aruch HaShulchan
Any exploration of the Aruch HaShulchan must first consider this question: Is halacha a set of rules that we follow or the system by which we reach those rulings?
The Source that a Reshus haRabbim Requires 600,000 People
The following is based on an article by Rav Mordechai Yehuah Leiv Zaks in no. 27 vol. 6 (1953) of HaPardeis. (H/T Eruv Online blog.) All of our community eiruvin rely on Rashi’s opinion...
When a Paradox is not a Disproof
The GPS is an amazing thing. The chips in it work because of the physics of semiconductors, and the fact that the energy the electrons can absorb or emit come in fixed quantities. All...
Zos Chanukah
Rashi writes on Bamidbar 30:2: “Zeh haDavar — This is the Idea“: Moshe gave nevu’ah with “Koh amar Hashem — Like this said Hashem, ‘Like in the middle of the night’” (Shemos 11, about...
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