Yarchei Kallah 5763, Kfar Chabad

00:00 Speaker 1 And on the second day of Rosh Hashanah, he enters the shul and says: “Why has the son of David, the son of Yishai, not come?” It is a verse in I Shmuel: “Why has the son of Yishai not come to the meal, either yesterday or today?” So he explains why Moshiach, the son of David, has still not come. “Either yesterday”—on the first day of Rosh Hashanah—“or today”: because it is “to the meal.” All their prayers are really about the meal, about their bread. But they do not think about the exile of the Shechinah, that it is in exile. I’m afraid I’ve already taken a lot of time, so I’ll be a little brief. I want to point out something very important here, and with it I also want to answer a question I asked at the beginning. The holy Or Hachayim—perhaps everyone is familiar with it, but I want to focus on this point a little. He comments on the verse, “If your brother becomes impoverished and sells part of his ancestral property, his nearest redeemer shall come and redeem what his brother sold.” This is talking about ancestral land that a person sold. Within a year it can be redeemed, so a relative can redeem it. That is the plain meaning of the verse. He explains it this way: “If your brother becomes impoverished” refers to Hakadosh Boruch Hu, as it says, “Do not forsake your friend and your father’s friend.” “And sells part of his ancestral property” refers to the Beis Hamikdash, which is Hakadosh Boruch Hu’s inheritance. “His redeemer shall come” refers to the tzaddikim. The task of the tzaddikim is to redeem the Shechinah. He continues—and now I’m quoting his words: “The redemption will come through awakening people’s hearts,” awakening their hearts. And he should say to them: “Is it good for you to sit outside?” Meaning, outside your Father’s table, exiled from your Father’s table. “And what pleasure can life in this world hold for you without the heavenly company?” What sort of pleasure is there in life—in a coarse, material life with no connection to spirituality and wondrous things? When you were

02:21 Speaker 1 gathered around your Father’s table before the destruction, we were all gathered around our Father’s table. The Shechinah was openly revealed. In the Beis Hamikdash, people saw so many miracles. The service of Hashem was complete. The Jewish people lived in quiet and comfort, in peace and tranquility. No one oppressed them; no one harassed them. And when he awakens them to reflect on these things, “the imagined desires will consequently become less important in their eyes.” That is the task of the… of the tzaddik. “And he will awaken in them a spiritual longing.” In other words, on the one hand they are immersed in the desires of this world. The task of the tzaddik is to lift them out of that deep immersion in worldly desires and awaken in them a spiritual longing. And with that, once he awakens that spiritual longing in them, everyone will want to rise up and leave the exile. That, essentially, is the task of a leader of the Jewish people. And he concludes with words of fire. This is how he ends: “All the masters of the land, the great leaders of Israel, will have to give an accounting, and Hashem will demand of them redress for the affront to the forsaken House.” In other words, someone who does not work to awaken the Jewish people so they will not be so immersed in imagined desires, and to awaken in them a spiritual longing that will make them want to rise up—once they want to rise up and know that they can truly do so only through the coming of Moshiach, through the Geulah, they will genuinely demand of Hakadosh Boruch Hu that they do not want the exile. And then Hakadosh Boruch Hu will surely give them the Geulah. This seems to parallel what the Rebbe said: “What more could I have done to awaken them to cry out ‘Ad mosai’—‘How much longer?’—in earnest?” That is the true task of a leader of the Jewish people, of a Rebbe: to awaken the community so that the community itself cries out. The Rebbe cannot do that crying for us. The Rebbe can do everything, everything for us—move worlds for us, bring about whatever salvations are needed, shower us with endless, infinite light. But this one point, “And they cried out to Hashem”—the Rebbe cannot cry out for us.

04:47 Speaker 1 We have to do that. That is what the Rebbe cried out about. And that is what the Rebbe sought for decades: that people should truly cry out, that the community should cry out, so that Hakadosh Boruch Hu would see. Everyone knows the story about Rabbi Soloveitchik, who was asked to become a rabbi and did not want to. The Brisker Rav, sorry. They sent people to persuade him, and he did not want to. He said, “Look, everything is fine. I lack nothing.” That was until a simple Jew stood up and cried out, “But twenty thousand people are waiting for you!” Then he went into his room, put on his coat and told his wife, “I’m going. Twenty thousand people are waiting for me.” So if Hakadosh Boruch Hu hears that Jews insist and truly demand from the depths of their hearts that they want the kingdom of the House of David, that they need Moshiach, then surely Hakadosh Boruch Hu will give him to them. And that is the Rebbe’s task: to awaken us, the people, to cry out. But the Rebbe cannot cry out for us. There is an important quotation here, though I don’t seem to have time for it. Where are the organizers? Do I have a little more time? Rabbi Brod, do I have a little more time, or…? Do I have a little more time, or can I continue? All right, yes. So I’ll quote just one point I had in mind. Well, I’ll just conclude. There are several very important quotations here, but time does not allow for them. I want to conclude. I asked a question, and I want to return to it. The point is that what we see both in the Rebbe’s words and in the prayer of Kiddush Levanah is something very simple: once there is “And they will seek Hashem their G-d,” there is no doubt that Moshiach will come. It is an essential condition. If the Jewish people ask for the Geulah, then certainly, without the slightest doubt, it will come. But what is the question? What will the Geulah look like? What will we look like? Which is more important?

07:16 Speaker 1 Is it that the Geulah should come because of our demand and request, or that Heaven should have to show mercy? And even without that condition, I cannot decide whether the Jewish people at least demanding the Geulah is an essential condition, or whether we have reached a point where Hakadosh Boruch Hu will waive even that. Moshiach needs to come even without it. But still, there is no doubt that when the Geulah comes because of our demand and request, it is far loftier than one that comes out of necessity from Above. That is why the verse says, “And they will seek Hashem their G-d”: because if they ask, they will certainly receive. But when the Geulah comes in response to our request, it is a much loftier Geulah than an ordinary one. May Hashem put it in our hearts to truly come to this realization and reflect on what we need to reflect on—and there is plenty to reflect on. To the point—and this is one of the quotations I have not yet cited—that the heart becomes so full of distress, or of longing, depending on the direction, of longing for the Geulah, that it bursts out. It cannot stay inside the mouth; it bursts out on its own, like a sigh: “And the Children of Israel groaned under the labor, and their cry rose up to G-d.” May we merit to see the Rebbe come to us and redeem us immediately, right now.

09:01 Speaker 2 Thank you very much to Rabbi Naftali Vaknin. Really, the whole point of Chassidus is that everything should be genuine and inward, coming from the heart. Ah, the pages you received are for now, because the booklet for the whole day will be coming from the printer shortly, with what will be studied and source references for the entire day. For now, we have only received the pages for the Torah teachings Rabbi Vaknin and Rabbi Gofin taught us. The Rebbe wants every matter to be connected with Torah, prayer and tzedakah. So there is a tzedakah box here. Anyone who wants to can put a coin in it. Soon people will even come around and give everyone a coin as shlichus mitzvah money to give to tzedakah. A year ago, a Jew took part with us here who, a few days later, some time afterward, he… I don’t remember whether he took part here or at another gathering. He pointed out to me that the Rebbe wants every event to include communal prayer as well. It was Rabbi Zalman, Rabbi Zalman Lavan[?], a”h, and he asked that we say a chapter of Tehillim together, in addition to the Torah teachings we study in depth, as a prayer—although Rabbi Vaknin’s entire talk was a prayer. So there is a chapter of Tehillim, following on from what Rabbi Vaknin spoke about: the Rebbe’s chapter of Tehillim, which says, “From the sound of my groaning, my bones cling to my flesh.” I invite Rabbi Shlomo Mizrachi to say the Rebbe’s chapter of Tehillim with us. Rabbi Shlomo Mizrachi. There is no more important rabbi than you here in the audience. What can we do? So come and say a chapter of Tehillim.

10:51 Speaker 13 A prayer of the afflicted man when he is overwhelmed, and pours out his plea before Hashem. Hashem, hear my prayer, and let my cry come before You. Do not hide Your face from me on the day of my distress; incline Your ear to me. On the day I call, answer me quickly. For my days have vanished like smoke, and my bones are scorched like a hearth. My heart is stricken like grass and has withered, for I have forgotten to eat my bread. From the sound of my groaning, my bones cling to my flesh. I am like a pelican of the wilderness; I have become like an owl among ruins. I lie awake, like a solitary bird on a roof. All day long my enemies taunt me; those who rage against me swear by my name. For I have eaten ashes like bread, and mixed my drink with tears. Because of Your fury and Your wrath, for You lifted me up and cast me down. My days are like a lengthening shadow, and I wither like grass. But You, Hashem, remain forever, and Your remembrance is from generation to generation. You will arise and have mercy on Zion, for it is time to favor her; the appointed time has come. For Your servants cherish her stones and favor her dust. The nations will fear the name of Hashem, and all the kings of the earth Your glory. For Hashem has rebuilt Zion; He has appeared in His glory. He has turned to the prayer of the destitute and has not despised their prayer. Let this be written for a later generation, so that a people yet to be created may praise Hashem. For He looked down from the height of His sanctuary; Hashem gazed from heaven upon the earth, to hear the groaning of the prisoner, to release those condemned to death; so that the name of Hashem may be declared in Zion, and His praise in Jerusalem, when peoples gather together, and kingdoms, to serve Hashem. He weakened my strength along the way; He shortened my days. I said: My G-d, do not take me away in the midst of my days; Your years endure through all generations. Long ago You founded the earth, and the heavens are the work of Your hands. They will perish, but You will endure; all of them will wear out like a garment. Like clothing You will change them, and they will pass away. But You remain the same, and Your years will not end. The children of Your servants will dwell securely, and their descendants will be established before You.

14:24 Speaker 21 Thank you to Rabbi Shlomo Mizrachi from Rechovot. As we know, the matter of “Ad mosai?”—“How much longer?”—and the outcry for the Geulah: in that well-known sicha, the Rebbe asked us, “Do everything in your power,” things that are “lights of Tohu, but in vessels of Tikkun.” It turns out that this is not just about how to cry out; it is also a whole matter concerning the Geulah and the coming of Moshiach. The concept of lights of Tohu in vessels of Tikkun is a broad subject explained in Chassidus. I would like to ask the mashpia here in the yeshiva, our host, Rabbi Schneur Zalman Gopin, to speak about and explain this concept in Chassidus: lights of Tohu in vessels of Tikkun. Meanwhile, until the booklet arrives—I see the booklet has already arrived—there are sheets for anyone who wants to look into the subject of lights of Tohu in vessels of Tikkun.

15:22 Speaker 13 The concept of lights of Tohu in vessels of Tikkun is, of course, explained in connection with Yaakov inheriting Esav. In Tohu there were abundant lights and few vessels; in Tikkun, fewer lights and many vessels. Yaakov’s source is in the world of Tikkun, while Esav’s source is in the world of Tohu. What will happen after the work of refinement has been completed is that Yaakov—and Yaakov’s task, of course, is to refine Esav; the work of Tikkun is to refine the sparks that fell from Tohu—at the conclusion of that refinement, Yaakov will inherit Esav. Tikkun will inherit Tohu. In other words, the lights of Tikkun, which has many vessels, will inherit the abundant lights of the world of Tohu. Then there will be true completeness and integration: abundant lights and many vessels—the abundant lights of Tohu and the many vessels of the world of Tikkun. That is what is explained, and that is what the Rebbe is alluding to briefly here in the well-known sicha of 28 Nissan: lights of Tohu and vessels of Tikkun, the abundant lights of Tohu and the many vessels of Tikkun. We will focus here on just one point in this matter of the lights of Tohu and the vessels of Tikkun: that the abundant lights of Tohu will be enclothed in, and shine inwardly within, the many vessels of Tikkun. This seems to require an explanation. What needs explaining? We know what is explained about the problem that caused the shattering of the vessels in the world of Tohu: in the world of Tohu there were abundant lights and few vessels. But it is explained that the problem was not only... Why the double expression, “abundant lights and few vessels”? It seems perfectly clear: if you say the vessels are small, then naturally the lights are abundant. If you have a small cup, a little goblet, and you want to pour wine into it from a large barrel, then you have too little capacity in the vessels. That little goblet cannot hold a barrel of wine, so naturally the lights are abundant. Why use both expressions? Rather—

17:45 Speaker 13 The double expression tells us there are two problems here. One problem is that there are few vessels. There is another problem: abundant lights. What is the problem with having few vessels? It means that the vessels cannot contain, as we said before, the great light that is present. That is “few vessels.” The problem is with the vessel. In other words, the light itself is the kind of light that could shine within a vessel, that could be enclothed in a vessel. But the problem is with the vessels: there are no vessels capable of receiving this light. That is a problem with the vessel; that is called “few vessels.” Then an additional point is made: besides this, there is another problem—“abundant lights.” What does that mean? The problem is not only with a vessel that cannot receive the light. There is something about the light itself: the light is incapable of shining within a vessel. If the light cannot shine within a vessel, it does not matter what kind of vessels there are. This is not a problem with the vessel; the problem lies with the light, which cannot shine there. That is what “abundant lights” means. In fact, the usual explanation in the Rebbe’s maamarim of “abundant lights” is [unclear]. It is a kind of light that cannot shine in vessels. Why can’t it shine in vessels? Why? Let’s put it simply: the nature of light is that it is attached to its source. It senses its source, senses it keenly, and therefore it always has a great longing to become absorbed in its source. As we say in Tanya, the light wants to become absorbed; it has a desire and longing to become absorbed in its source. Now, in Tohu—this is true of every light. But when Tohu is described as having “abundant lights,” what does that mean? It means that the attachment is extremely strong, and the longing to become absorbed in the source is exceptionally great. It is a very,

19:37 Speaker 13 very powerful longing to become absorbed in the source. So this light has no connection to being enclothed in a vessel; it cannot and does not want to be. It does not matter what vessel you might want it to be enclothed in. It is moving upward, not moving toward being drawn down and conveyed into a vessel. That is what “abundant lights” means: the problem lies with the light, which cannot shine within a vessel. The size of the vessel will not help. So a question arises: what good will many vessels—the many vessels of Tikkun—do? There may be many vessels, and perhaps that will solve the problem of having too few vessels, but it does not address the light. The light will not be enclothed in them anyway, because by its very nature it is not suited to shining within a vessel. So we will try to understand this one point, just this point. We will try to understand it. To do that, let us look at what Chassidus teaches about the claims, the argument, between Korach and Moshe. What was Korach’s mistake, what did he claim, and what did Moshe Rabbeinu answer him? And why is this relevant? Because, as explained in Likkutei Torah, this is what Korach wanted. What Korach wanted—he truly wanted it—was... what did he want? He wanted these abundant lights we are discussing to shine in the vessels of Tikkun. He wanted those abundant lights already, right now. And Moshe Rabbeinu answered him that now was not the time; it is not possible to receive those abundant lights now. So the whole argument between Korach and Moshe relates to this subject, helping us understand what the abundant lights of Tikkun are. We will try to understand what Chassidus says there, and on that basis try to understand our own subject. When we look through the explanations in Chassidus of Korach’s claim, we find several explanations, including explanations—not different explanations. Well, there are...

21:35 Speaker 13 There are a number of explanations. That’s fine—there are seventy faces to the Torah. But some explanations seem to contradict each other completely. What did Korach want? The answers seem opposed. That is harder to accept. Several arguments and explanations are fine, but contradictory explanations present a problem. First, let’s see what Likkutei Torah says in Parshas Korach, where we began discussing this. There is a very long maamar there, and it brings the Midrash about Korach’s claim: Does a tallis made entirely of techeiles need tzitzis or not? Does it need even one thread? He argued that it did not need tzitzis. The tallis itself was enough. If it was entirely techeiles, why would it need tzitzis to fulfill the obligation? The tallis itself was better than the tzitzis. The Zohar, though, says that Korach’s complaint concerned Aharon’s beard. The sons of— the Levi’im were commanded in Moshe’s day, at the time of the Mishkan, to shave the hair of their heads and beards, leaving them without hair. But Aharon—“like the precious oil upon the head, running down upon the beard, Aharon’s beard”—had a full beard. Korach was jealous of Aharon’s beautiful beard, of his hair, as the expression goes. So what was his argument? Why should Aharon have a beard? Aharon, too, did not need one. Hair was not needed at all. Likkutei Torah connects Korach’s two claims: they share a single point. As the maamar explains at great length, a tallis alludes to a makif, an encompassing light. That is the plain idea of a tallis: it surrounds a person equally. It is not divided into a section for the head and a section for the arms. A tallis surrounds the entire

23:46 Speaker 13 body equally. It is a makif. Tzitzis, by contrast, allude to a pnimi, an inward light. A thread is thin and directed toward a particular place, so it is also contracted to fit the place it needs to illuminate within. Thus tzitzis allude to a pnimi. The law concerning a tallis and tzitzis is that the tzitzis must be “of the same kind as the corner.” We learn this in the Gemara from the words “of the corner”: the tzitzis must be made of the same material as the tallis. For a wool tallis, the tzitzis must be wool; for a linen tallis, linen; and for a tallis of another fabric, that same fabric. In other words, the quality of the tallis must be visible in its tzitzis. Look at the tzitzis and you will recognize the tallis: they must be of the same kind as the corner. What does that mean inwardly, in the deeper meaning? We have explained that the tallis is a makif and the tzitzis are a pnimi. What does “of the same kind as the corner” mean here? The pnimi must be of the same kind as the makif. When you look at the pnimi, you should see the makif within it. The makif should shine within the pnimi and be visible there. How can that happen? The maamar gives several explanations. Briefly, how can the makif shine within the pnimi? It does not happen without effort. On one hand, it requires an extraordinary contraction—a very severe contraction, like the contraction represented by hair. As is known, that contraction is so great that the vitality in the hair bears no comparison to the vitality at its source. You can cut hair without feeling pain. Hair thus alludes to a very great contraction. But the purpose of the contraction, the contraction of hair—when will we hear

26:02 Speaker 13 the whole idea? What is the idea of hair? We are talking about hair. It represents a very severe contraction. Why? At what point in the order of hishtalshelus, in holiness, is such a severe contraction as that of hair used? Why is an ordinary contraction not enough? The order of hishtalshelus also involves contraction. Every descent from the brain to the hands involves a contraction of vitality. Vitality flows from the brain to all the limbs, and that itself is already a contraction. But the contraction represented by hair is so severe that the vitality changes. Why does the order of hishtalshelus need a contraction that seemingly changes the very nature of the vitality? When is it used? Precisely when the flow comes from an exceedingly high level, above the order of hishtalshelus. A level that high cannot be received through ordinary contraction, through merely reducing it. However much you reduce it, its source is beyond hishtalshelus; its source is infinite, without limit. However much you change it, it remains without limit. So a very severe contraction, like that represented by hair, is necessary. Yet the point is that its source remains exceedingly high—its source is infinite—so its essential quality does not change. True, there is an enormous contraction, and outwardly the vitality appears to have changed. It appears to be a change in its very nature. But since we are dealing with something unlimited, as the saying puts it, “Without limit is, after all, without limit.” If something of that infinity remains, its quality remains unlimited. That is the idea of hair. This is also, incidentally, the whole idea of the Thirteen Attributes of Mercy. What are the Thirteen Attributes of Mercy that feature so prominently

28:13 Speaker 13 in Selichos? If they refer to thirteen channels of flow, these are the thirteen tikkunei dikna, the thirteen strands of the beard through which the flow extends from Kesser to Chochmah. Hair represents a very great contraction of that flow, yet this is called the Thirteen Attributes of Mercy—such an exalted revelation. This is what we pray for in Selichos and on Rosh Hashanah, and what we ask for in Selichos and on Yom Kippur: the Thirteen Attributes of Mercy. These thirteen attributes are thirteen channels flowing through hair, through a very great contraction. But that is precisely the point: when is hair used? When the source is infinite, making this great contraction necessary. At the same time, despite the great contraction represented by hair, because the source is infinite, its quality remains infinite even after the contraction. That is the idea of hair, and that is what it means to draw the makif into the pnimi. Though the contraction is very great, the quality does not change; it retains the quality of the makif. It remains “of the same kind as the corner.” Look at the hair, at how greatly it contracts the flow: its quality remains that of the makif, of infinity. That is the idea of hair—drawing the makif inward through the contraction represented by hair. Korach came and disputed this. Why do we need the pnimi? Let us receive the abundant light directly; let us receive infinity, the unlimited, without contraction. Let us receive infinity as it is. Why do we need contraction? That was his argument. And here it says what Moshe Rabbeinu answered him. Let’s look inside now, at section four, near the top: “Moshe Rabbeinu, peace be upon him, answered him that even a tallis made entirely of techeiles must have threads attached to it, because the fundamental purpose of the mitzvos is to draw down a revelation of the Master of the world below, and that”

30:18 Speaker 13 What does it say? [unclear] Not just the level of hairlike strands, but the drawing down and revelation below of an inner light from above the order of hishtalshelus. This happens specifically through the strands, which draw the light into the heart inwardly. And although the strands are a form of constriction, that is precisely how a higher influence, from above the order of hishtalshelus, is drawn down inwardly. It can only happen through hairlike strands and threads; otherwise it could not be drawn down and revealed below. [unclear] What do we understand from this? What did Korach want? Korach wasn’t looking for light to be drawn down below. He wanted only makif, encompassing light, without the inner light. What does that mean? He wanted makif alone, not inner light; that isn’t drawing anything down below. So what was his argument? There’s no need to draw anything down below. He didn’t want that. He wanted ratzo without shov—an upward yearning without a return. That was Korach’s argument. In other words, as we study this passage of the maamar, what are we meant to understand? Korach didn’t want shov, the work of tikkun, of drawing things down below. Just the opposite: he wanted abundant, encompassing lights, very lofty levels, going beyond all bounds and leaving the limitations of the world. Perhaps, at first glance, it’s like the spies, who wanted to occupy themselves only with spiritual things, without shov—the opposite of tikkun, of mitzvos, of working within the world. That seems to be something like what it says in Likkutei Torah. Now we’ll see a second explanation from the Rebbe. The maamar quoted here as well is “Hasam Nafsheinu Bachayim,” [unclear], in Sefer Hamaamarim Melukat, volume 3. It’s a long, detailed maamar of the Rebbe, and I think it’s the source for this maamar. There the Rebbe explains what Korach wanted. He brings

32:12 Speaker 13 the whole thing. First he quotes the words of our Sages: “Anyone who perpetuates a dispute transgresses a prohibition, as it says, ‘And he shall not be like Korach and his company.’” In other words, what was Korach’s problem? He perpetuated a dispute. Perpetuated it. Not that he created a dispute. The dispute already existed. He just kept it going, so that, G-d forbid, no one would come and reconcile the sides and make peace—so that the dispute would remain. He didn’t create the dispute; he just kept it going. That’s the wording: “Anyone who perpetuates a dispute transgresses a prohibition, as it says, ‘And he shall not be like Korach and his company.’” What does that mean? Which dispute did Korach perpetuate? We’re not talking about foolish people here. What does it mean that he perpetuated a dispute? Which dispute did he want to keep going? The meaning is that he wanted to preserve the root of every division in all the worlds. That is what happened on the second day of Creation: “And G-d separated the waters that were above the firmament from the waters that were below the firmament.” Hakadosh Boruch Hu made a division. He separated the upper waters from the lower waters. What do waters represent? Waters represent pleasure, as it says in Tanya: water gives rise to all kinds of pleasure. Water is pleasure. The upper waters are a higher pleasure—spiritual pleasure, G-dly pleasure. There is G-dliness there. The lower waters are physical pleasure, the pleasures of the material world. Before the separation, the lower and upper waters were mixed together. So while the lower waters were mixed with the upper waters, the lower was not entirely lower and the upper was not entirely upper. It’s like wine: before the dregs settle to the bottom, they are still mixed into the wine. So the choice wine isn’t yet fully wine; it isn’t clear. And the dregs aren’t really waste, either, because they’re still mixed into the wine. They are

34:26 Speaker 13 not truly waste. That was the state of the lower waters while they were mixed with the upper waters. So the pleasure of the lower waters wasn’t so low. The physical wasn’t entirely physical, and the spiritual—the G-dly pleasure—wasn’t entirely spiritual, entirely G-dly, because the two were mixed. “And He separated”: Hakadosh Boruch Hu made the division. He separated them, and that produced the extremes. The upper waters became entirely upper, because the lower waters were removed from them. It’s as though you removed the dregs from the wine: the wine becomes clear, choice wine, the choicest of the choice—entirely upper. On the other hand, the lower waters were separated from the upper waters. Physical pleasure was separated from spiritual pleasure, so now it was only physical; it became completely like dregs, truly physical. That is what this separation accomplished. What was the purpose of “And He separated”? What are we trying to gain by separating the lower waters from the upper waters? It makes the lower waters cry out. Perhaps this also follows on from what we discussed earlier: the lower waters cry out to Moshe. The lower waters weep: “We want to be before the King.” In other words, before “And He separated,” we were part of something; we, too, had a connection. Now You’ve separated us, distanced us, and we’ve become entirely physical. We’ve been distanced completely from the truth. So the lower waters weep. We want to rise upward. And what happens through that? Through their weeping and their intense longing to be included in G-dly pleasure, in the upper waters—[unclear]—through that longing itself, they already rise and become included in the upper waters. They become nullified to the upper waters. Then we can ask: what have we gained over the state before “And He separated”? The lower waters were mixed with the upper waters then, too. What have we gained after “And He separated”? Because before the

36:40 Speaker 13 separation, the lower waters were mixed into the upper waters, but the upper waters themselves were not fully upper, as we discussed. It was something in between. Now that we’ve separated them, the upper waters have become entirely upper. And because the lower waters became entirely lower, they became so distant that they developed a great thirst to be included in the upper waters. When they are included in the upper waters, they are included in waters that are truly upper. That is the intention. That is the ultimate purpose of “And let it separate.” That is why Hakadosh Boruch Hu made the separation. In general, then, this is a separation between the spiritual and the physical, or between G-dliness and the physical. “And He separated.” What is the purpose of all this? What is physicality here? Through “And let it separate,” a situation was created in which the physical is completely distant from G-dliness. The goal is for the physical to develop a longing to be included in the spiritual, to be included in G-dliness. That is “And let it separate.” What did Korach want? As we said, Korach wanted to perpetuate the dispute. To leave the—there is a division. We separated the upper waters from the lower waters, G-dly pleasure from physical pleasure, spirituality from physicality. So what did we say the goal was? For the lower waters to rise again, to be included in and united with the upper waters. No. Korach wanted to perpetuate it: let’s leave the division in place. In other words, let this separation between the lower waters and the upper waters remain. Why? What was his reasoning? Why leave it that way? Because he argued: why do you want the physical to become nullified to the spiritual? After all, as is known, the root of the physical is higher than that of the spiritual. Let the physical remain physical. It is physical; let it stay physical, in its own place. When you say that the physical must be included in the spiritual, you lose the distinctive quality of the physical, whose root is higher. On the contrary, you make it subordinate and secondary to the spiritual. Korach says: No.

38:46 Speaker 13 Korach argued: Leave them as they are; maintain the division. Leave the division in place, so that the physical remains separate in its own right, because its source is higher. That was Korach’s argument, and there is a basis for it, because in the future that is indeed how things will be. As is known, the source of the physical will be revealed, and it is higher than the source of the spiritual. That is how it will be in the future. So he wanted to bring about now what will happen then. What was his mistake? What was [unclear]? What was it? It wasn’t such a grave mistake, but what was the mistake? To reach that state, in which the physical becomes a vessel and its own inherent quality is revealed, the physical must first be subordinate to the spiritual. As long as the physical stands on its own, it is not subordinate to the spiritual. Take the body: for the body’s advantage over the soul to be revealed in us, the body must first be nullified and subordinate to the soul. Then the body will be refined through that, and it can reach a point where its source shines within it—its own inherent quality, which is even higher. But if, from the outset, the physical is not subordinate to the spiritual, and a person immediately begins to focus on its own quality, it will remain separate. He will not be able to sense his physical existence as it is at its source. He will sense himself as he is on his own: merely physical, merely a person driven by desires. First you need to [unclear], refine your desires a little so you can become a vessel for the spiritual. Rabbi Vital [?]—certainly, this is the idea of “all your deeds should be for the sake of Heaven” and “know Him in all your ways.” What does “all your deeds should be for the sake of Heaven” mean? It means that your deeds—worldly matters, eating and drinking, all the affairs of

40:53 Speaker 13 the world—are subordinate to heavenly matters. Why do I eat? The food has no purpose in itself; I eat so that afterward I’ll have the strength to learn and daven. Why do I go to work and do business in the world? Not because those things have a purpose in themselves, but so I’ll have money to educate my children, give tzedakah, and fulfill Torah and mitzvos. In other words, the physical is subordinate to the spiritual. That is “all your deeds should be for the sake of Heaven.” And “know Him in all your ways”—what does that mean? That in your ways themselves, in your worldly affairs, you already see G-dliness. I go to work because in the work itself, in worldly matters, I see G-dliness even more than in my learning. Although worldly matters are physical, their source is higher. So I see G-dliness in them themselves even more than in Torah and davening. The order, then, is that first there must be “all your deeds should be for the sake of Heaven.” First you have to feel that everything involving the body and the world—eating, drinking, business, and all our dealings with worldly matters—is subordinate to the spiritual, to Torah and mitzvos, to serving Hashem. Only afterward will your physical activities, your eating and drinking, be clarified and refined, and your money will be clean money. Your work and all your dealings with the world will be more refined. Then you can reach a state in which you see the physical as it is at its own source, which is even higher. But if you start right away, without “all your deeds should be for the sake of Heaven”—you’ve learned Chassidus, and you immediately jump to “the physical is higher than the spiritual; if so, I don’t need the spiritual.” You go and involve yourself with the physical itself, making it an end in itself. Then your physical existence will be as it is when separate, not as it is at its source, and that is the opposite of the entire point. So this is what Moshe

42:39 Speaker 13 told Korach: You are right that the physical is higher, but that comes after following the proper order, in which the physical must be subordinate to the spiritual. That was the mistake; that was Korach’s dispute with Moshe. What do we understand from this maamar? What did Korach want? Was Korach seeking spirituality, ratzo—the upward yearning—or, on the contrary, was he seeking practical action? What was Korach seeking? Korach said: Why is that necessary? On the contrary, action is the main thing. The physical is higher than the spiritual. So we must engage in practical mitzvos. We must engage specifically in worldly matters, not spirituality. Moshe said: No, the physical must be subordinate to the spiritual, to serving Hashem. And Korach argued for practical action, for worldly matters. That is the opposite of what we learned in Likkutei Torah: that Korach wanted ratzo without shov—the return—and did not want to engage with the world at all. Yes. All right, I’m just summarizing the apparent contradiction between the two places. In Likkutei Torah, we understand that Korach did not want worldly matters at all. He wanted ratzo, an encompassing light, without vessels. An encompassing light, ratzo. There is no need to engage in worldly matters, no need for practical mitzvos. But in this maamar we see explicitly the opposite: Korach wanted the other extreme. He wanted specifically practical mitzvos without spirituality. And as is known from the Rebbe’s sicha in Likkutei Sichos, volume 4, where the Rebbe explains the phrase “the feet ran” and what Korach wanted, it says explicitly there that Korach wanted practical mitzvos without Havayah, as it says in the maamar we are learning now. So we have a contradiction between two explanations. What did Korach want? And as I said, these aren’t just two different explanations; they are opposites. Here it comes out that he wanted only ratzo, only the spiritual, without—and there, specifically practical mitzvos. Which is the main point? Let’s put it this way. Let’s say

44:40 Speaker 13 one thing. Consider the difference between Tohu and Tikkun. Tohu is ratzo, like Nadav and Avihu. Nadav and Avihu represent Tohu: ratzo without any shov. Tikkun is shov. What does it mean that Tikkun is shov? In the terminology used, Tikkun means lights within vessels. That is what Tikkun means. Tohu is lights without vessels; Tikkun is lights within vessels. What does “lights within vessels” mean? What did Tikkun argue for, seek and demand? “Lights” means G-dliness—the revelation of G-dliness within vessels. In other words, it is possible to make vessels that can receive G-dliness. We can be vessels for G-dliness. That is the meaning of “lights within vessels.” That is what Tikkun argued for, sought and accomplished: that there be lights within vessels, that there be light, a revelation of G-dliness, the infinite light within vessels. What is the innovation here? What are you saying when you say “lights within vessels”? I’m saying that it is possible, and necessary, to be a vessel for the infinite light. We can be vessels for G-dliness. It is possible. Such a vessel can exist; it can be this way. One can be a vessel for G-dliness—lights within vessels. In other words, [unclear] it can be [unclear] of Hashem among us: a created being can be thoroughly physical and yet become a vessel for G-dliness. Through refinement, through correcting his character traits, through refining himself and his portion of the world, a person refines his animal soul and his portion of the world, and in this way makes a vessel for G-dliness. Lights within vessels—that is what Tikkun argued for. We can be vessels for the Infinite, vessels for G-dliness. And that is the work, the work of Tikkun. What must you do? You must make vessels for G-dliness. Give [unclear].

46:57 Speaker 13 Torah and mitzvos. What do you need to do? All our work is, ultimately, to make a vessel for G-dliness. Then someone from Tohu comes along and argues: Lights in vessels? Can there be a vessel for G-dliness? How can there be a vessel for G-dliness? G-dliness is the infinite light, without limit. “No thought can grasp Him.” How can there be a vessel for G-dliness? Can G-dliness be digested? Can there be a vessel for G-dliness? How can there be a vessel for G-dliness? There cannot be a vessel for G-dliness—and yet there is. But wait, we have to do something. There is Torah and there are mitzvos; there are all kinds of aspects of avodah. There are all kinds of things we have to do. Yes, you have to do them. True, but what we do does not, in the simple sense, make us vessels for G-dliness. It is not that we have made ourselves inherently fit for G-dliness to shine within us. Rather, that is what Hakadosh Boruch Hu wanted. It is by way of a hint, as it is written: If we do such-and-such, if we put on tefillin, then Hakadosh Boruch Hu will be drawn into the world. If you wear—put on—tzitzis, then G-dliness becomes clothed in the world. Blow the shofar on Rosh Hashanah. What connection is there between the tefillin you put on and drawing G-dliness into the world? There is no inherent connection. The tefillin are vessels because I made them as tefillin: two fingerbreadths by two fingerbreadths, about four centimeters square. So that is a vessel. And if I make tefillin four centimeters by two centimeters, they will no longer draw it down. Why? Because that is not a vessel. What is the difference? Is one more of a vessel and the other less of a vessel? Is there any inherent connection between these things at all? Rather, this is what Hakadosh Boruch Hu wanted: Do this, and His light will be drawn down. But it is not a vessel in the usual sense. I just wanted to mention an interesting distinction

48:43 Speaker 13 that the Rebbe makes in the maamar Basi Legani 5712: the difference between what happens in our mind and heart through love of Hashem and what happens to physical objects through the mitzvah we perform with them. We put on tefillin; we use a shofar or an esrog. So what? Does the esrog undergo some refinement and change? Is there an inherent connection? Does the light become internally invested in it, so that the esrog changes and becomes a different esrog, the tefillin become different tefillin? You see no difference at all. In our mind, when you contemplate G-dliness, the mind changes. The mind becomes more refined. When you feel love of Hashem, a feeling of holiness in your heart, your physical heart changes and becomes more refined. In other words, here we have an example of the mind and heart being vessels. They are suited to it, and it has an effect on them. Physical, practical mitzvos are not vessels in that sense. That is simply what Hakadosh Boruch Hu wanted. So that is what... This is, in fact, the disagreement between Tohu and Tikkun. The one who holds by the world of Tikkun argues: Lights and vessels—we must make vessels for G-dliness, and we can make vessels for G-dliness. Tohu comes and cries out: How is that possible? How can you make vessels for such lights? What do we understand from this? This is the question about the world of Tohu. Does the world of Tohu reject practical mitzvos? Does it reject serving Hashem in actual practice down here? It does not. The world of Tohu does not say that we do not need practical mitzvos or that we do not need to serve Hashem in practice. It does not say that. We must serve Hashem, but it says: Do not think that what you do becomes a vessel for G-dliness, as though there were an inherent connection between G-dliness and your avodah, between G-dliness and your soul. That is what Tohu argued. We have to fulfill the mitzvos. We have to fulfill everything. Yes, that is the difference. I am just summing up the difference between Tohu and Tikkun. Both say that we must perform mitzvos

50:45 Speaker 13 in actual practice. So what is the difference? Is the mitzvah we perform a matter of lights and vessels, like the example in the maamar Basi Legani—the mind and heart, which are vessels for G-dliness? Or must we do everything required because that is what is written, because Hakadosh Boruch Hu wanted us to do it, without thereby building vessels? When you perform a mitzvah, does the physical object become a vessel for G-dliness? What did you do? What did you do to it? There is no inherent connection between the two things, but that is what we must do. That is the disagreement between Tohu and Tikkun. Accordingly, everything falls into place: Korach’s argument, and the two maamarim we studied—what it says in Likkutei Torah and what it says in the maamar. When Likkutei Torah says that Korach did not want there to be a drawing down below, that does not mean he wanted lights with no drawing down below at all. Yes, he wanted a drawing down below, but not as an inner light. That is why the wording says, “so that the drawing down and revelation below should be in the form of an inner light, internally.” Korach also wanted practical mitzvos. But what did he argue? That there did not need to be threads. That is the whole idea of the threads and hairs we mentioned earlier. Threads signify an inner connection. Hairs allude to an inner connection. In other words, the threads and hairs make it possible for lights to be contained in vessels, for G-dliness to be present internally. And Korach argued—what did Korach argue? Korach argued: Why do we need threads and hairs? Why bring it through an inner channel? No, why do you need an inner connection? So that there can be a drawing down internally into vessels? G-dliness cannot be drawn down into vessels. It cannot.

52:56 Speaker 13 G-dliness cannot be contained in vessels. So what do you want? I want the encompassing light as it is, without limit. But how can I receive that limitless encompassing light? How can I receive it? You cannot receive it internally. You can receive it only as an encompassing light. Do what you need to do. Put on tefillin, give tzedakah, keep Shabbos, blow the shofar. Actual deeds—action is the main thing. Through that, you draw down the infinite light, because that is what Hakadosh Boruch Hu wanted, even though there is no inherent connection between what is drawn down and your avodah. It is not an inner light. That was Korach’s argument. There cannot be an inner light; Korach was, in fact, making the argument of the world of Tohu. To this, Moshe Rabbeinu answered that the intent is the world of Tikkun: the light should be drawn down internally, and this can happen only through threads and tzitzis. And that is the idea of... Yes. So that is what he wanted. And that is the point. We have already gone on quite a bit... And that is the point about lights. In a word: abundant lights in abundant vessels. “Abundant vessels” means making vessels. Even though those abundant lights are limitless... All right, we are here, and we need to keep this brief. We will just sum up the point. If so, “abundant lights” does mean a revelation of the encompassing light, a limitless revelation, but first it must be internal, internal. That means through avodah—like we said earlier, “The heavens are Hashem’s heavens.” We must work on our souls and on the world in such a way that there will be vessels for G-dliness. That is the idea of making a dwelling place in the lower realms: that there be vessels for G-dliness. And this comes through avodah as Chassidus guides us, as the Rebbe guided us throughout the years—with regard to Torah study, performing mitzvos, spreading the wellsprings, and the mitzvah campaigns. All these activities

54:46 Speaker 13 are ways of making vessels, so that there will be vessels for G-dliness. But for the idea to be complete—and we did not have time to discuss this—the vessels must be abundant vessels. We need to understand what “abundant vessels” means. We did not get to that this time. They must be abundant vessels capable of receiving the abundant lights without ultimately shattering. I hope Hashem will help us see all of this with our physical eyes very soon, with kindness and mercy.

55:15 Speaker 22 Thank you very much. I want to welcome everyone again. I see the shliach from Mitzpe Ramon has arrived. There are Jews here from Petach Tikva, Netanya, the Chabad neighborhood in Lod, Kiryat Gat, Rechovot, and many other places around the country. So, according to the program, we’ll take a break now. True, there is a lot of light and not enough vessels! We’ll take a break, and downstairs they’ve prepared a lavish lunch for anyone who wants it. And even for someone who doesn’t want it, who can’t be bothered to go eat lunch—sharing a bite brings people closer. Outside there are also plenty of pastries and drinks for anyone who wants them. With Hashem’s help, we’ll continue the program in half an hour. We’ll continue, with a lot of light and not enough vessels, to study Torah together. He doesn’t stop to contemplate it, yet he gives up his life and endures torture. In chapter 19, the Alter Rebbe goes on to explain this: “The soul of man is the lamp of Hashem,” and the nature of a flame is to rise constantly, seeking to be absorbed in its source. So too, a Jew’s nature is to want to leave the body and cleave to his source. Therefore, even among the wicked and the sinners of Israel, the wisdom within the soul can be hidden, as though asleep, only until they face a test of faith in Hashem. When they face such a test, they immediately cast everything aside. As it says, “Hashem awoke as from sleep.” They overcome the kelipos and the desires of this world, whether for permitted or forbidden things; they reject them and choose Hashem as their portion and their lot. Although all their lives they were under the sway of their hearts, when they face a test of faith, all the kelipos fall away. The Alter Rebbe brings several verses and concludes chapter 19 by saying that the light of Ein Sof is so powerful within a Jew’s soul that he will not even perform an outward act against Hashem—not even bow to an idol while not believing in it at all in his heart. Nor will he speak falsely about

58:03 Speaker 22 the oneness of Hashem, even if his mouth and heart are not in agreement. So much so that, in the final lines of chapter 19, because a Jew does not want to be separated from Hashem, even the wicked and the sinners are unwilling to touch even the outermost edge of the impurity of idol worship. That is true even in their outward garments—speech or action—without any belief in the heart. In other words, what are chapters 18 and 19 about, in a couple of words? Because of the wisdom within his soul, a Jew, in any situation, is unwilling to deny Hashem at all. Even if he thought otherwise his entire life and was caught up in desires and so on, when he faces a test, he leaves everything behind and chooses Hashem as his portion and his lot. He won’t even perform an outward act against Hashem, even when his mouth and heart are not in agreement. In any event, the wisdom within a Jew’s soul is so powerful that he won’t even perform an outward act against Hashem, even without any belief in his heart. That is what these chapters are discussing. It comes up many times in Chassidus, in the maamarim of Baal HaShilgani[?] and elsewhere: the way the wisdom within a Jew’s soul works. It is something intrinsic to a Jew, an intrinsic nature. They often give the analogy of the nature of a flame, but that is a physical nature. Here we are talking about an intrinsic nature. The question people immediately ask when you give a Tanya class, wherever the classes are given, is: in practice, we see that it doesn’t always work that way. True, these are isolated cases. But over the generations, rachmana litzlan, there have been Jews who did not withstand this test. Certainly there were Jews whose mouths and hearts were not in agreement, who did it without wholehearted conviction. But there were Jews who bowed to idols, and some who did so while, outwardly at least, their mouths and hearts appeared to be in agreement.

1:00:17 Speaker 22 There were such cases. The obvious question has two parts. First of all, if we are speaking about an intrinsic nature, how can an intrinsic nature change? A person is a person, not an animal. No matter how much he plays at it, he cannot become an animal. When we speak of “an actual part of G-d above,” it is a Jew’s intrinsic nature to have the pintele Yid, the Jewish spark, and that cannot change. It can be lost to sight; it can be covered over. That is why the Alter Rebbe takes such pains to explain here that all of this lasts only until the person faces a test. When he faces a test, that’s it. Suddenly the truth is revealed, and he chooses Hashem. So how is it that, in practice, we see that this was not always exactly how things went throughout the generations? The truth is that the Alter Rebbe himself writes in chapter 18—and these are his words: “Therefore, even the most frivolous of the frivolous and the sinners of Israel give up their lives to sanctify Hashem’s name, for the most part.” The Alter Rebbe himself says “for the most part.” Those are his words. But that itself is difficult; that itself needs explaining. What does “for the most part” mean? Is this a matter of statistics—one hundred percent, except for half a percent who are different? We’re not talking about a sample or anything like that. We’re talking about something intrinsic. It would be like saying that one hundred percent of people are human, but some people are animals. A person can behave in a way that is unworthy of a human being, but he cannot change his essential nature as a human being. There can be no exception to that—not one in a thousand or one in a million. If he was born to a mother and father and belongs to the species that speaks, the human species, then he is a human being. So this is not

1:02:15 Speaker 22 a matter of a majority and a minority, because it is intrinsic. He was born human, he speaks, so he is a human being. You can argue about his behavior, but you cannot argue about what he is, about his essential nature. It is a fact. And this intrinsic nature of Jewish souls is much stronger than the nature of a physical human being. Because a human being [unclear], but a Jew’s intrinsic nature cannot be lost. It is eternal, forever. It is a Jewish soul. It cannot be lost. It cannot disappear anywhere. So what does “for the most part” mean here? The Alter Rebbe doesn’t—he doesn’t go into it. He doesn’t explain. In chapter 19, he explains the wonder of the wisdom within the soul. He says that even in the outward garments, a Jew won’t do it. But why is that true “for the most part”? How can there be a majority and a minority here? What? How can there be a minority? How can there be even one exception? What is the explanation? We must say that it does not mean that this minority lacks the wisdom within the soul. Rather, there is some particular problem affecting that minority. The person really is a Jew, and everything we learned in chapters 18 and 19, and everything we learned in Chassidus about what a Jew is, still applies. Yet there can be some particular technical problem, so to speak, that prevents him from withstanding a situation that calls for mesirus nefesh, even in the case of idol worship. That is despite the Alter Rebbe’s statement that even the wicked and the sinners of Israel, when pushed into a corner, choose Hashem as their portion and their lot. There is, in fact, a letter that explains this. I’ve seen a few brief explanations in which the Rebbe discusses it, but before that, there is a letter from the Frierdiker Rebbe that is also very interesting. It appears in the Frierdiker Rebbe’s Igros Kodesh.

1:04:30 Speaker 22 No, I don’t see that they made a copy of it here. All right, there’s a letter from the Frierdiker Rebbe to Rabbi Hutner. He had a yeshiva, apparently a somewhat modern yeshiva, and it seems they brought in various books that weren’t entirely kosher. So the Frierdiker Rebbe writes to him that those books must be destroyed. It’s in Igros Kodesh, volume 8. The Rebbe writes to him as follows: “May Hashem grant us the merit of seeing the stature of the Jewish people raised, and of cleansing the Jewish street of every trace of impurity brought about by the heretics who incite and lead others astray. May Hashem have mercy on their souls, and may the point of Jewishness within them be revealed—in those heretics, inciters, and misleaders of every kind.” That is the Rebbe’s wording. “As is known in the name of His Holiness the Alter Rebbe, of blessed memory, who said: One must curse the bodies of the heretics, which have grown strong from eating non-kosher food, and their intellect and character traits, which do not allow the point of Jewishness to be revealed—the yechidah of the soul, which is present even in sinners—both in their bodies and in their souls.” That is the Rebbe’s wording in the name of the Alter Rebbe: one must curse the bodies of the heretics, who strengthen themselves by eating non-kosher food, and their intellect and character traits, which prevent the expression of the point of Jewishness, the yechidah of the soul that everyone has, even sinners, in both body and soul. The letter continues: “On this, our teacher the Baal Shem Tov, of blessed memory, explained the statement, ‘Even though he has sinned, he is a Jew’: A Jew has never converted out of Judaism, and a non-Jew has never converted to Judaism. The one who converted out was a non-Jew to begin with; he did not have a yechidah. The one who converted to Judaism was a Jew to begin with; he had the yechidah of the soul.” He cites the Baal Shem Tov’s explanation of “Even though he has sinned, he is a Jew”: a Jew never

1:06:48 Speaker 22 converts out of Judaism, and a non-Jew never converts to Judaism. The one who converted out was a non-Jew to begin with; he did not have a yechidah. The one who converted to Judaism was a Jew to begin with; he had a yechidah. “May Hashem grant us the merit of removing the concealments, so that the point of Jewishness is revealed, turning even the utterly wicked into tzaddikim.” Hashem should help remove the concealments and reveal the point of Jewishness, so that even the wicked are revealed as tzaddikim. That is the wording attributed to the Baal Shem Tov. Don’t look for it in the Baal Shem Tov’s name in Hebrew. This needs an explanation. The Baal Shem Tov says there is no such thing as a Jew converting out of Judaism, and no such thing as a non-Jew converting to Judaism. Regarding the latter, the Rebbe actually cites this as the precise point of the novel interpretation: “a convert who converted.” Why don’t we say “a non-Jew who converted”? Because he already has a Jewish spark. That is why we say “a convert who converted,” not “a non-Jew who converted.” As for the second part, where he says that if you saw a Jew who converted out, there is no such thing—the Baal Shem Tov said, “A Jew has never converted out of Judaism.” Such a thing has never happened. It has never happened in history. “The one who converted out was a non-Jew to begin with; he did not have a yechidah.” Here we need to explain a little what the Baal Shem Tov means. What does it mean that the person who converted out was a non-Jew and did not have a yechidah? In other words, you see a particular Jew who was born to a Jewish mother and so on, as usual, and, may Hashem protect us, he strayed from the path and chose idol worship. And not only did he choose idol worship; he converted out of Judaism. Whether there is a distinction here between idol worship and conversion out of Judaism, I don’t know how to get into those distinctions. Perhaps conversion is a further stage, but he chose idol worship and converted out. So the Baal Shem Tov says, of course,

1:08:53 Speaker 22 he was not a Jew; he did not have a yechidah. Why are you surprised? He never had a yechidah, so there is no question at all. What does it mean that he did not have one? In other words, if you see a Jew worshipping idols who has converted out of Judaism, that is a mistake: he is a non-Jew. Even though he was born to a Jewish mother, he was not a Jew; he did not have a yechidah. That is what the Baal Shem Tov says. To say that this is what the Rebbe means in Tanya by “for the most part” rather than all of them—that the minority refers to those who converted out of Judaism—is not what Tanya means. Why not? Because Tanya is speaking about Jews. Tanya is speaking about Jews. It says: “Therefore, for the most part, the sinners and rebels among Israel” behave this way. According to the Baal Shem Tov’s words, that person is a non-Jew. So he is not being discussed at all. We aren’t talking about him. If he’s a non-Jew, he’s a non-Jew. We need to understand what the Baal Shem Tov is saying. What does such a case mean, and how can you make a generalization that every Jew who worships idols and converts out of Judaism is a non-Jew? That he did not have the yechidah of the soul despite having been born Jewish? This needs explanation. What does it mean? And the whole wording of this letter needs explanation. We must curse the heretics, and after cursing them, the Baal Shem Tov says they are actually non-Jews. If they are non-Jews, why must we curse them? “One must curse the bodies of the heretics and the inciters and misleaders of every kind,” and [unclear] in the Baal Shem Tov’s name, who testified, and so on. If he is a non-Jew, why must we curse him? Let him be a non-Jew and convert out of Judaism. [unclear] Why does it matter? But certainly, that is not what Tanya means when it says “for the most part,” and this requires explanation. Because we want to understand how we have seen Jews

1:10:49 Speaker 22 to whom something like this happens—how we have seen someone who is a Jew in every respect, according to everyone, and yet in practice we see that such cases can occur. And the Alter Rebbe himself says that it is so “for the most part,” meaning there is another, smaller group. There is an explanation. The explanation that the Rebbe writes—this is the Frierdiker Rebbe. There is an explanation from the Rebbe in Likkutei Sichos that we saw this week, on Parshas Re’eh, in the sicha about an idolatrous city in volume 9. Likewise, there is a sicha in volume 17 about someone sold to a non-Jew, sold into the service of idolatry. He can be sold to serve the attendants, to chop wood, but he cannot be sold to the idol itself. We also just saw this in the sicha on Parshas Re’eh. And the Rebbe writes as follows: “This presents no difficulty, because Jews have the power of free choice, which derives from Hashem’s Essence, before which nothing can stand, and this power cannot be prevented. A Jew is therefore not bound by any limit. That is why a Jew can choose, G-d forbid, not only to commit other sins, about which he says, ‘I am still a Jew,’ but even to worship idols, though this is contrary to his nature. For the free choice of Jews also comes from that which nothing can obstruct; it is not [unclear]. Therefore, it can even enter the illusion of idolatry, which is the opposite of absolute oneness.” The Rebbe writes here, and also in volume 17, that a Jew cannot worship idols. But we see that he can. A Jew can choose idolatry, not only other sins. With other sins, it is because he is mistaken: he thinks he is still Jewish. But what did we learn in chapter 19, in Basi Legani, regarding idolatry? There,

1:13:08 Speaker 22 He can mistakenly think that he is still within Judaism. But here, on the contrary, he would be separating himself, and to that he will not agree. That is what we learned in Tanya, in Basi Legani, and in other places. Yet we see that it does happen. The Rebbe says that because a Jew has the power of choice—a power that comes from Atzmus, with nothing to hold it back—a Jew can, G-d forbid, choose idolatry and worship an idol, even though that is contrary to his nature, because of free choice. This, too, needs explaining: What does it mean that he can worship an idol because of choice? If he can do that, then what was the Rebbe discussing here in chapter 19? We learn constantly in Chassidus that with any other transgression, a person can tell himself, “I am still a Jew; I am still within Judaism.” But there is a point of truth that he will not give up. When it comes to idolatry, he stands firm. Yet here the Rebbe goes a step further and says that, because of choice, he might choose idolatry and even worship an idol. What does that mean? Is the power of choice higher than the chochmah of the soul, than the yechidah of the soul? In other words, a Jew can choose idolatry—and that is something. We are talking here about different levels. The power of choice is a power; everyone has choice. So through choice he can choose something contrary to the chochmah of the soul. But then what about mesirus nefesh and everything the Rebbe discussed in chapter 19? In the end, can you do otherwise because you have the power of choice? If I can do otherwise through choice, then what is the point being made in chapter 19? What are we talking about here? This needs explaining: What does it mean that choice makes it possible? What—

1:15:11 Speaker 22 makes this different from other transgressions? There is another place where they asked the Rebbe about this, in the notes in this book. It appears in the book on Tanya by Chitri[?], in Rabbi Yoel’s Likkutei Biurim. They asked the Rebbe how such a thing could be possible. The Rebbe answered in half a line. They asked the Rebbe about the fact that it actually happens. The Rebbe’s wording was: “For this is without any belief in the heart at all.” In parentheses: “End of chapter 19.” “For this is without any belief in the heart at all.” And the Rebbe cites the end of chapter 19. Let’s see what it says there. We read it earlier. At the end of chapter 19 it says that the light of Ein Sof, the chochmah of the soul, has such great and powerful strength to rebuke and repel the sitra achra that it cannot touch even his garments—thought, speech, and action. Thus, he will not even bow to an idol, though he does not believe in it at all. Likewise, he will not speak falsely about the oneness of Hashem, even if his mouth and heart are not in agreement. At the end of the chapter, his will is so strong that he fears touching even the edge of the impurity of idolatry, G-d forbid, which is contrary to faith in the one Hashem—even with his outer garments of speech and action, without any belief in his heart at all. What does the Rebbe write at the end of chapter 19? That the power of the chochmah of the soul is such that he will not even perform an outward act against Hashem. He will not so much as touch the edge of the impurity of idolatry, even with his outer garments, without any belief in his heart at all. In other words, the power of the chochmah of the soul keeps him from touching even the edge of the impurity of idolatry, even outwardly—in thought, speech, or action—and even without any belief in his heart at all. That is the Alter Rebbe’s wording. The Rebbe writes, “For this is without any belief in the heart at all,” and cites the end of chapter 19. That is the Rebbe’s reference. But at the end of chapter 19 it says—

1:17:42 Speaker 22 seemingly, the opposite. At the end of chapter 19 it says that the power of the chochmah of the soul is so strong that he will not even perform an outward act without believing in it in his heart. That is its power. That is the point of the chochmah of the soul: even outwardly, you stand by the truth; even outwardly, you are unwilling to separate yourself from Hashem. And those are the Alter Rebbe’s words: “even without any belief in the heart at all.” They asked the Rebbe how such a thing could happen, and the Rebbe answered, “For this is without any belief in the heart at all,” citing the end of chapter 19. But chapter 19 seemingly says the opposite. We need to understand the explanation. Not even an explanation—this is not a challenge. We simply need to understand what the Rebbe’s answer to the question was. What was the question, and what was the answer? Let’s try to understand a little, based on what is written in the sichos. What is the yechidah of the soul? The difference between nefesh, ruach, and neshamah on the one hand, and chayah and yechidah on the other, is that nefesh, ruach, and neshamah are internal faculties, faculties a person uses every day. A person has senses, emotions, and intellect. From time to time, a person can also awaken the encompassing powers of chayah and yechidah within himself. But it is rare for someone to awaken those powers. Usually it happens either on Yom Kippur or because something occurs. A Jew could live his entire life without the yechidah of his soul ever being awakened. Even a Jew who follows Torah and mitzvos and is careful with both minor and major obligations may serve Hashem using only nefesh, ruach, and neshamah, never drawing on chayah, much less yechidah. Awakening it requires a particular merit, an arousal, or special circumstances. Chassidus says that the yechidah is concealed not because of the animal soul. The yechidah is concealed in its own right. Its concealment exists—

1:19:53 Speaker 22 even in relation to the G-dly soul. In other words, even for a Jew whose animal soul is dormant, as with a beinoni, the yechidah still does not awaken, because it is inherently concealed. It says that there is a double concealment: one caused by matters of the body and the animal soul, and another because the yechidah itself is concealed. It is not like a person’s sense of taste when he eats. A person’s senses, or his thought, intellect, and emotions, are all faculties that can be awakened. But awakening the yechidah of the soul requires something special—an arousal, a particular merit. So what is the point about idolatry? When a Jew is pressed into a corner and suddenly faced with idolatry, it becomes a question of “Am I a Jew or am I not?” Then something within him awakens: the chochmah of the soul. And it is not by his own strength, but through the power awakened from above—the chochmah of the soul—that he chooses Hashem. Let’s take a simple example. We learned in the Gemara about a child taken captive and raised among non-Jews who forgets the very existence of Shabbos. Chazal ask: What does it mean to forget that Shabbos exists? How could a person forget that? It could be a convert who converted through a beis din, was immersed, and then lived among the nations, or it could be a Jew taken captive as a child and raised among them. Take that child, a Jew, for example. He was taken captive and raised somewhere at the edge of the world among non-Jews. They took him there when he was an infant, after his bris. He was raised there his whole life. G-d forbid, may Hashem have mercy, they educated him in another religion. They told him it would benefit him and give him things, as idol worshippers mistakenly believed it could help—

1:21:52 Speaker 22 them. As they said, “Since we stopped burning incense to her...” They thought it could help them. That is how this Jew grew up. He does not know that he is Jewish, but he is a Jew, one hundred percent Jewish. It is like the example Chazal give of someone who has forgotten the very existence of Shabbos and knows nothing of any Shabbos. They discuss how many sin offerings he is liable for—one or several. But this is a case Chazal discuss. Now this Jew reaches the age of thirty or forty and is told to bow to an idol. Why wouldn’t he? On the contrary, all his life he was taught that bowing to it would benefit and help him, that it was a good thing. Can we say about him everything we have discussed here? The Rebbe speaks here in Tanya about the power of the chochmah of the soul to withstand a test concerning faith in Hashem, when the chochmah of the soul suddenly awakens. This exile reaches even the level of chochmah. In the Rebbe’s words: “But when they face a test concerning faith, which transcends reason and touches the very soul, he awakens from his sleep.” This person has not faced a test at all. What test? The statement says that when someone faces a test, he withstands it. But this person is not facing a test. He does not know what test we mean. What are we talking about? What test? From infancy he was taught to bow elsewhere, may Hashem have mercy. So what test of faith in Hashem is he facing? For him, there is no test here at all. Certainly the Rebbe was not speaking about the possibility that such a person is among the wicked and the sinners. He falls into the category of a child taken captive and raised among non-Jews, and that is not who we are discussing. After all, we are not talking about something like, as he says, putting your hand in a fire—putting your hand in a fire. So presumably, even—

1:23:46 Speaker 22 A person who has never seen fire in his life—even so, Hashem has implanted something natural in him. From the heat or something like it, he will not put his hand into the fire, even if he has never encountered fire before. After all, these are natural instincts Hashem implanted in human beings. But when we speak about the faculty of chochmah in the soul, we are not talking about some natural instinct connected to the body. It is connected to the essence of the soul, and certain forces are needed to awaken it. So this Jew has not been awakened at all. He is not facing a test at all; the Alter Rebbe certainly was not speaking about him here in Tanya. To explain this a little more fully: when this Jew bowed to an idol, in the Rambam’s words, it was “without any faith in his heart at all.” What does that mean? He has no idea what this is about. Take the concept of a child raised in captivity, in a form closer to us: a Jew born into a Jewish home, yes, but brought up all his life thinking he is simply a human being. He does not know the meaning of “You have chosen us from all the nations.” He does not know what it means to be an actual part of G-d. He has not learned Tanya, he has not learned [unclear], he has not learned Chassidus. Even someone who has learned all that needs to work to actually feel it, but at least he knows what he needs to do, what he needs to strive for, what he needs to feel. But this person has learned nothing about it; he knows nothing. To him, rachmana litzlan, a Jew and a non-Jew are the same kind of person. They are two people—one person and another. He has no idea of the wonder, the richness, of what a Jew is. So if this child raised in captivity is faced with idol worship—

1:25:30 Speaker 22 and he chooses something else, that is not a test of faith either. He is not facing a test of faith in Hashem. The Alter Rebbe uses the example of idol worship because, generally, for a Jew who was brought up in the proper way, idol worship is the test of faith. That is the test: “Am I a Jew or am I not a Jew?” That is where he is tested. So when he faces this test of faith—am I a Jew or not?—and he has some understanding of what a Jew is, he will choose Hashem. As for that child raised in captivity, once someone tells him about his Jewishness, he will surely return to his source. No one has told him yet. Then there is the Jew at a second level: he does not know what a Jew is, but to him, for example, being a Jew means having a bris milah. We see that even the staunchest heretics have a bris milah performed. There is chametz on Pesach; there are all kinds of examples. What do these examples we see among such Jews mean? With these things they feel: “Here I am definitely a Jew. If I cross this line—if I do not have a bris milah, or I eat chametz, and so on”—each one feels, “That is it for me; I am leaving my Jewishness behind.” So when he faces a test of faith in Hashem, when he truly comes to the test—“Am I a Jew or am I not a Jew?”—he will choose Hashem. The question is how to bring him to that test, how to get him to that point. The Rebbe speaks about the power of choice. Everything the Rebbe says about the power of choice—I am keeping this brief; there are others speaking. I am only stating the point, and the explanation needs to be expanded. Everything the Rebbe says about the power of choice: choice—

1:27:18 Speaker 22 means that a Jew can choose otherwise throughout his life, whether he is a child raised in captivity like the first example, or one like the second example, who knows, “I am a Jew,” but does not know the essence of being a Jew. He can choose other things throughout his life. By virtue of the power of choice, he can choose other things. But once he faces a test that touches him personally—“Am I a Jew or am I not a Jew?”—if you press that point and awaken the yechidah of his soul, then, where you have awakened the yechidah, he will certainly choose Hashem. So you see, broadly speaking, Chassidus says that our task, when it comes to idol worship, is to awaken the yechidah of the soul. Generally, for most Jews, idol worship awakens the yechidah of the soul; and once the yechidah is awakened, there is no opposing force to match it. The Rebbe Rashab writes in Hemshech 5666 that in the yechidah there is no choice. In the yechidah there is no choice. All choice is in nefesh, ruach, and neshamah. Once the yechidah of the soul shines forth, there is no opposing force to match it. Chayah has a counterpart on the side of opposition. Yechidah has no such counterpart. There is no such thing. Once you have awakened the power of the yechi—once you have succeeded in awakening his yechidah, there is nothing to oppose it. Opposition is not possible there. As we see in stories, there were all kinds of heretics, staunch heretics, who, when told to burn a Sefer Torah, G-d forbid, [unclear], were also prepared to give their lives al kiddush Hashem. For them, too, there were certain points at which their souls made them feel: “Here I am a Jew, and I will not agree to this,” even though for years they had lived differently and done other things. But a point of truth awakens within them. Just two words: the choice the Rebbe speaks about, the power of choice the Rebbe speaks about, is so great, and as it is explained—

1:29:10 Speaker 22 regarding the power of choice, a person really can choose idol worship. In theory, a person can choose idol worship even if he is not a child raised in captivity. He can be an intelligent person who chooses it on ideological grounds. He understands; he has the power of choice, and he can choose actual idol worship. But even this Jew, who apparently does so on ideological grounds—when does that apply? When the yechidah of his soul has not been awakened. When the yechidah of the soul is awakened, when the faculty of chochmah in the soul discussed in chapter 19 is awakened, there is no question of choice there. He will not touch idol worship, even in its outward forms. And even without any faith in his heart at all, he will not. The Rebbe says in the answer we mentioned: this is “without any faith in his heart at all.” When you see a Jew worshipping an idol, it is because there is no faith in his heart at all. He is not doing it because he has an ideology and understands what he is doing. That cannot be, because if he understood that he was cutting himself off—that is, if his yechidah had been awakened—he would choose Hashem. It is without any faith in his heart at all. If it is without any faith in his heart at all, can that happen? If a person worships an idol for ulterior motives—he is promised money, given honor, offered a livelihood—then he is not worshipping it for its own sake. He has some ulterior motive. And more than that, even if he is not doing it for an ulterior motive, it is still without any faith in his heart at all. It cannot be something inward; it will never be faith in his heart. Whenever a Jew worships an idol, it will be without any faith in his heart at all. Because if the point of his soul discussed in chapter 18 awakens in his heart, such a thing cannot happen. We must therefore say that if you have met such a Jew, you have not yet awakened the yechidah of his soul, and he

1:30:46 Speaker 22 He chose all his life to do the opposite. So that may be why the yechidah of his soul has not yet been awakened: because of what he has chosen all his life. Even now, as he makes his choices, he may still not recognize that point within himself. This relates to the Rebbe’s letter. The letter needs to be explained on its own terms, but it actually reinforces everything we’ve been saying. In the letter, the Rebbe says that they must be cursed. Why cursed? What is the purpose of curses? When do we curse someone? We learned in chapters 29 and 30 that curses are used when it is necessary to awaken what is deep inside a person. [unclear], like the spies and so on. So the curses are meant to awaken the Jewish spark. The Rebbe says there, regarding those who incite others and those who deny the faith, that they must be cursed because they have eaten non-kosher food—to awaken the Jewish spark within them. About this, the Baal Shem Tov says that a Jew cannot truly be that way, because he is a Jew, and so curses and rebukes can help him. As we learned in Tanya, they can help. If you saw a Jew who truly converted out of Judaism, it would mean that he was really a non-Jew and truly an apostate. In other words, [unclear]. The Baal Shem Tov says: It is astonishing what a Jew is. Shout at him, curse him, do whatever you can. [unclear]. May Hashem protect them, have compassion and mercy on them, so that their Jewish spark will awaken. Those who incite others must awaken. But there is such a thing as an apostate. So if there really is a case where nothing has helped—I don’t know if there is such a thing, but if there is—then he really is such a person. But you must conclude that if you know he is a Jew, don’t believe that he is an apostate. If you know he is a Jew, keep working with him; keep using curses—meaning rebuke. The point is to reveal his

1:32:27 Speaker 22 inner self, because such a reality cannot exist. In other words, the Rebbe wants to say that there is no such opposite reality: a Jew is always a Jew. There is no such thing. We discussed this in its extreme cases. But we do need to talk about it and explain it at some length, because there are several explanations here. The answer and the question of free choice are connected, and there are a number of details to it. To put it briefly, I also recently saw something from the Rebbe on Purim 5710, where the Rebbe speaks about this during the farbrengen. There, the Rebbe says that when we find that such a thing can happen, it is because there was kareis—because the person has already been cut off from his source, such a thing can happen. That is what the Rebbe says. He was cut off; he experienced kareis. So it is possible for a Jew not to... The Rebbe says that, from the standpoint of his inner self, it may be possible, but he may have been cut off from his source. Even this idea of a Jew being cut off from his source cannot apply to the yechidah of the soul. Kareis can apply only to nefesh, ruach and neshamah. It cannot apply to chayah and yechidah. In the letter, the Rebbe cites the Arizal that everything written about kareis applies only to nefesh, ruach and neshamah; kareis cannot apply to the yechidah. So for now, as long as the yechidah has not been revealed in him, this can happen on the level of nefesh, ruach and neshamah, since he has been cut off. Elsewhere, the Rebbe relates a story about the Baal Shem Tov, who wept over Shabbtai Tzvi. They asked him why he was crying, and he said that as long as a limb is still attached, even if it is hanging loose, it can still be reconnected. But if it has been severed at its root, then it is lost. So it is written that the Baal Shem Tov wept over Shabbtai Tzvi. In other words, the weeping can be over a situation of

1:34:06 Speaker 22 kareis: he chose the concerns of this world to such an extent that he was cut off. But what part of him was cut off? Kareis applies only to nefesh, ruach and neshamah. His mind no longer works as a person’s should, nor do his heart and emotions. So you have to dig deeper. But it can only be a kind of loss, as in the saying, “Who is a fool? One who loses what he is given.” It can be a loss, a very great loss, but he cannot lose it completely. Rather, a loss means that the thing is lost but still exists. You have to search for it. So he has lost what was given to him. For now, it is in a state of being lost, but that cannot happen to chayah and yechidah. It is a matter of loss because, at the level of yechidah, there is no concept of free choice. Of course, I should add a qualification: Chassidus says that there is choice even at the level of yechidah, but there it is something entirely different. It is not the kind of choice we usually mean. At the level of yechidah, the choice is one in which he cannot but choose Hashem, Who is One. He must. And... there is choice at the level of yechidah, but there is no opposing force there. There is no opposing force at the level of yechidah. The concerns of this world have no place there. It is just that there is a concept of choice even there, and the Rebbe explains at length in a sicha what choice at the level of yechidah means. But in any event, it is a kind of choice in which he cannot but choose Hashem.

1:35:22 Speaker 23 Thank you very much. May the yechidah awaken within each and every one of us, and through our awakening the yechidah, may we merit the revelation of the collective yechidah of all the Jewish people. Moshiach—the revelation of Moshiach is the revelation of the yechidah. Rabbi Ofen from Jerusalem, a mashpia at Beis Yosef and a mashpia in Tzfas, will speak about the novel insight of Rabbi Levi Yitzchak, in whose honor and memory this entire Yarchei Kallah is being held. This entire Yarchei Kallah honors the Rebbe’s father. By Divine Providence, the thirty-nine volumes of Likkutei Sichos—“tal tal techayeh,” the thirty-nine volumes without the supplements—conclude with ten explanations by the Rebbe of Likkutei Levi Yitzchak. Rabbi Levi Yitzchak wrote notes on Igeres Hateshuvah during his exile, before his passing, in the place where he was exiled. From just a few lines that he wrote, the Rebbe develops an entire sicha and explains the whole subject of teshuvah in a completely different light. In light of Rabbi Levi Yitzchak’s words, the Rebbe explains teshuvah. We will ask Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Ofen, Rabbi Fitche Ofen, to explain one or two of these points about teshuvah, based on Rabbi Levi Yitzchak’s novel insight and the Rebbe’s explanations of Igeres Hateshuvah. Rabbi Ofen.

1:38:33 Speaker 24 We are now approaching the month of Elul, the month of teshuvah, so it is fitting to explain a little about teshuvah in general. Along the way, we will also mention a note by Rabbi Levi Yitzchak. First of all, according to the mystical teachings, there are two levels of teshuvah: teshuvah tata’ah, lower teshuvah, and teshuvah ila’ah, higher teshuvah. What does that mean? As we see in Igeres Hateshuvah, the Alter Rebbe says that the mitzvah of teshuvah according to the Torah is simply to abandon the sin. That is, a person must resolve wholeheartedly never to return to his folly, to rebel against His blessed sovereignty, or to transgress the King’s commandments again, G-d forbid—whether positive commandments or prohibitions. There is both a leniency and a stringency here. When the Alter Rebbe says “simply to abandon the sin,” he cites Tractate Sanhedrin—and this is also brought elsewhere in connection with Tractate Kiddushin—that if a man betroths a woman on condition that he is completely righteous, but he is found to be completely wicked, she is betrothed, because perhaps he contemplated teshuvah in his mind. In other words, if he contemplated teshuvah, he became completely righteous. He changed from one extreme to the other in a single hour, in a single moment. Seemingly, we could ask about this: earlier, the Alter Rebbe mentions three categories of atonement. Now, if he transgressed a positive commandment, we understand, because it says, “He does not move from there before he is forgiven.” But if he transgressed a prohibition, for which it says that Yom Kippur atones, how can he be completely righteous if he has not yet been atoned for? This itself raises another question. If someone committed a sin, say deliberately, he might think: Why should I do teshuvah now? In any case, I will not receive atonement until Yom Kippur. So he will leave his teshuvah until the eve of Yom Kippur. Would it be right to say such a thing? Here we have to make a distinction, as the Rebbe explains the

1:42:56 Speaker 24 We need distinguish between atonement and teshuvah. Teshuvah means that from now on, he opens a new page. That is the sense in which he is completely righteous: from today onward, his Torah and mitzvos are welcome Above. This is in contrast to the verse, “But to the wicked, G-d said: What right have you to recount My statutes?” When someone is on the level of a wicked person, his Torah and mitzvos are not wanted Above. So we say that if he has even one thought of teshuvah—meaning that he abandons the sin from now on—he is truly completely righteous. He has opened a new page. Atonement is an entirely different concept. It concerns repairing the past. And repairing the past is a novelty, a tremendous novelty: a Jew has mastery over the past because he has a G-dly soul that transcends the bounds of time. He can therefore repair not only the present and the future, but also the past. That is the novelty when we say, “His deliberate sins become like inadvertent sins,” or “His deliberate sins become like merits.” That concerns the past. The Rebbe also points out that we find teshuvah among the people of Nineveh. They did teshuvah, and Hakadosh Boruch Hu relented and annulled the decree. “Nineveh shall be overturned” was a decree; through their teshuvah, the decree was annulled. Well, what happened to the deliberate sins they had committed in the past? Did those become inadvertent sins or merits? Nothing of the sort. They remained deliberate sins. It was only because they improved their conduct from then on that the decree was lifted. So we can understand the question we asked earlier: If a Jew committed a sin in Cheshvan and will receive atonement only on Yom Kippur, is there any point in his doing teshuvah before he receives atonement, before Yom Kippur? After all, he will not yet be atoned for. The answer is simple. First of all, teshuvah means that from now on he will be an ehrlicher Yid, a righteous Jew—“completely righteous,” in the language of the Gemara. As for atonement,

1:46:40 Speaker 24 that is another matter. It is the repair of the past. There is also a demanding aspect here. Regarding teshuvah, the Alter Rebbe says: “That he not return again to his folly, rebelling against His kingship, and that he never again transgress the King’s commandments, G-d forbid, whether positive commandments or prohibitions.” Here, too, there is a demanding aspect. On the one hand, we say that abandoning the sin alone is enough. The Rebbe explains that this is so even without confession. Although there is a positive commandment from the Torah to confess and ask forgiveness, it is not a prerequisite for teshuvah. This is reflected in the precise wording, “Perhaps he thought of teshuvah in his mind”: even if he merely thought of teshuvah and did not confess, he is transformed from completely wicked to completely righteous. What, then, is the role of confession? It completes the teshuvah, and it is a Torah commandment. The completion of teshuvah is what brings atonement, and confession is part of that. As the Tzemach Tzedek explains it: every sin gives rise to a kelipah. The desire and craving give rise to the soul of the kelipah, while the act of sin gives rise to its body. By uprooting the desire, a person nullifies and kills the soul of the kelipah. When he needs to erase the body of the kelipah as well, that is where confession comes in. An act nullifies an act. Although confession is speech, Hakadosh Boruch Hu regards it as an act, because moving one’s lips is considered an act. This is a novel point made by our Rebbe. So on the one hand, simply abandoning the sin is enough; confession is something additional. But abandoning the sin is enough for him to be completely righteous: he resolves that from now on he will not do it. What happened in the past does not matter here; it makes no difference whatsoever. This point, this transformation from completely wicked to completely righteous, has no bearing at all on what happened in the past. It can happen in two minutes, in a single moment. But what does the Rebbe say here? The Alter Rebbe—

1:50:03 Speaker 24 the Alter Rebbe’s wording is: “And that he never again transgress the King’s commandments, G-d forbid, whether positive commandments or prohibitions.” Here there is a demanding requirement: it is not enough for him to resolve not to repeat the particular sin he committed. He must resolve to accept the yoke of the Kingdom of Heaven anew, not to commit any sin—not to neglect a positive commandment or transgress a prohibition. And what, seemingly, is the explanation for this? Why is it not enough to make a resolution about the particular sin he committed? This is the point of teshuvah tata’ah: accepting the yoke of the Kingdom of Heaven upon himself. The reason he sinned was that he had cast off that yoke. If he had borne the yoke of Hakadosh Boruch Hu, then even if he had a desire to sin, he would have controlled himself because of that yoke. So he needs to repair the reason he came to commit the sin in the first place. That is why he must accept the yoke of the Kingdom of Heaven anew, with regard to both positive commandments and prohibitions, so that he will never again transgress the King’s commandments. True, the Rebbe says in a sicha that this does not mean that if a person cannot resolve to keep all the mitzvos, he should despair and say, “I can’t do teshuvah.” In another sicha, the Rebbe explains that when a Jew makes a resolution about even one thing, Hakadosh Boruch Hu accepts that too. But for teshuvah to be complete, he really must resolve to keep everything. It is like what the Rebbe says about the mitzvah campaigns: we do not tell a person that putting on tefillin is all he needs to do. We tell him that he needs to fulfill all 613 mitzvos, but in his present situation he can manage only one mitzvah. So he should start with that. The same applies to teshuvah. Teshuvah means that you really

1:53:03 Speaker 24 need to resolve to keep everything. But even if you have resolved to do just one thing, Hakadosh Boruch Hu accepts it, given that a person proceeds from the easier to the more difficult. In any case, that is the definition of teshuvah. The Alter Rebbe then goes on to say, regarding teshuvah tata’ah, that it must be sincere and wholehearted. How does it become sincere and wholehearted? Accepting the yoke in practice is not enough. That kabbolas ol needs to be built up, made strong enough to last. That is why, in chapter 7, the Alter Rebbe adds that there is a true and upright way to arouse compassion and humble what is within him. Why is this necessary? He has already made his decision. He has resolved not to return to his folly and transgress the King’s commandments. Why does he need compassion? And why does he need to break the kelipah of his heart? Because, as we said, he needs to repair the reason a person came to sin at all: he gave in to the desires of his heart. That needs to be undone, so it needs to be broken. This is expressed in two ways. Kabbolas ol involves two things: accepting the yoke of the Kingdom of Heaven. First, he needs to feel the kingship of Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Second, he needs to humble his own sense of self—to humble the servant’s sense of self, so that the servant is subject to the king and accepts his master’s yoke. First, he needs to know and feel that this is his master and that he is subject to Him. But that is still not enough. A servant prefers to be free of restraint, and if his urge to be unrestrained is too strong, knowing who his master is still will not hold him back. So kabbolas ol also requires humbling the servant’s sense of self before his master. That is the idea of arousing compassion for G-dliness, so that, so that when compassion for G-dliness becomes established in his heart

1:56:41 Speaker 24 in his soul, that shows that G-dliness shines in his soul. That is why it troubles him and he feels bitter about it. And when he has a broken heart, he humbles his sense of self. Up to this point, this is teshuvah tata’ah, the lower level of teshuvah. What is teshuvah ila’ah, the higher level of teshuvah? That comes next. I’m starting in the middle of chapter 8. He says: “And once a spirit has passed over him and purified him, his soul can then return to Hashem Himself, rising higher and higher to its source and cleaving to Him in a wondrous unity, as it was united with Him in perfect unity before He breathed it forth from His mouth to descend below and be clothed in a human body. This is like a person breathing out: before the breath leaves his mouth, it is united with his soul. And this is complete teshuvah.” What is teshuvah ila’ah about? It follows from that. After he has been purified, there is nothing separating him from Hakadosh Boruch Hu. As it says, “Your sins separate”—he has removed that barrier, so he can return. So in the word teshuvah, teshuvah ila’ah means cleaving to Hakadosh Boruch Hu as the soul did before it descended into the body. In other words, together with the body, he returns to the state the soul was in before its descent. How does that express itself? He speaks here of studying Torah out of love and awe. Afterward he explains that the love and awe must be intellectual, and then he goes further: “With all your soul”—every part of the soul must cleave to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. The emotions cleave to His attributes and the intellect to His intellect; thought to His thought, speech to the word of Havayah. Action is the act of tzedakah. There seem to be two points here. There is a saying of the Rebbe Maharash about lechatchilah ariber, and the Rebbe applies it to teshuvah tata’ah—primarily in relation to teshuvah ila’ah. There are two levels of teshuvah. First, as we explained, it would seem that before beginning the avodah, there must be teshuvah tata’ah, to remove what separates him from Hakadosh Boruch Hu, and after

2:00:52 Speaker 24 that must come teshuvah ila’ah. But there is the approach of lechatchilah ariber: one must begin from the outset with teshuvah ila’ah. As we said, on the level of sod, teshuvah ila’ah means “returning the higher hei.” The higher hei refers to binah. As we emphasized earlier, teshuvah tata’ah is the lower hei, malchus—accepting the yoke of Heaven, kabbolas ol malchus Shamayim. Teshuvah ila’ah is binah. What is the connection between returning the higher hei and binah? We said earlier that returning the higher hei means reaching a level of unity with Hakadosh Boruch Hu, as his soul was before Hakadosh Boruch Hu sent it down. Before Hakadosh Boruch Hu breathes out the breath, it is united with the soul. What does that have to do with binah? Because it is the higher hei. The explanation, as is well known, lies in the difference between intellect and emotions. Emotions involve a sense of self, while intellect involves selflessness. Why? Intellect seeks to grasp an idea as it truly is, without the person mixing himself into it. With emotions, it is the opposite: his relationship to something depends on how he feels about himself. What is love? Something is good for me, so I want to draw close to it. With fear, I want to distance myself from it. So emotions begin with a sense of oneself, a sense of “I.” Intellect, by contrast, is understanding the thing as it is without bringing oneself into it. When a person is absorbed in an idea, he forgets about himself. He is immersed in the subject itself. So in serving Hashem, it works like this: the avodah of the emotions is what a person feels. “The nearness of G-d is good for me,” so he wants to draw close to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. The avodah of the intellect is that he goes beyond the bounds of his own existence and grasps G-dliness as it is. Therefore, when we speak of a person cleaving to G-dliness as his soul does at its source—as part of the name Havayah, before it became a separate entity—there must be the avodah of the intellect, bittul, so that G-dliness shines in his mind. We’ll discuss the final teaching of Rabbi Levi

2:05:53 Speaker 24 Yitzchak. On what is written in chapter 9, he quotes: “This is what is written in Tanna D’vei Eliyahu: If a person committed a sin and became liable to death before Heaven, what should he do to live? If he was accustomed to reading one page, let him read two pages; if he was accustomed to studying one chapter, let him study two chapters. This can be compared to a rope that was severed and then tied together again: at the knot, it is doubled and redoubled. So it is with the rope of His inheritance.” This is the Alter Rebbe’s wording in Igeres Hateshuvah. And Rabbi Levi Yitzchak says: “These are two knots, one on top of the other, making it a lasting knot. That is why it is doubled and redoubled: doubled because he reads two pages, and redoubled because he studies two chapters.” Rabbi Levi Yitzchak focuses on the words “doubled and redoubled.” “A rope that was severed and then tied together again: at the knot, it is doubled.” What does “doubled and redoubled” mean? He says it means both reading two pages and studying two chapters. That is “doubled and redoubled.” Seemingly, that is not the straightforward meaning. The straightforward meaning, as Tanna D’vei Eliyahu says, is: if he was accustomed to reading one page, let him read two pages. That is speaking about someone accustomed to reading. If he was accustomed to studying one chapter, let him study two chapters. But it is not speaking about doing both. Here Rabbi Levi Yitzchak understands it to mean both: a page and two chapters. That is a new interpretation. So why does Rabbi Levi Yitzchak interpret it this way? And if we say that it is precise in the Alter Rebbe’s wording, the question is why the Alter Rebbe interprets it this way. After all, the plain meaning in Tanna D’vei Eliyahu depends on whether he was accustomed to reading or to studying. The Rebbe explains this here. First, we need to understand another point. It says: “If a person committed a sin and became liable to death before Heaven, what should he do to live?” Why ask what he should

2:09:27 Speaker 24 do to live? He should do teshuvah. How did we get to “if he was accustomed to reading one page, let him read two pages”? Let him do teshuvah, and that’s it. But there is a sin for which a person becomes liable to death before Heaven: the sin of blemishing the bris. About this it is said that teshuvah tata’ah is not enough, and Reishis Chochmah says that teshuvah ila’ah is needed. That is what Tanna D’vei Eliyahu is speaking about: “What should he do to live?” The atonement for this sin, which brings about “and live,” comes through Torah study. As we said earlier, teshuvah ila’ah helps in this matter, and that means studying Torah out of love for Hashem. But what is the explanation? There is another question here. We said earlier that the difference between teshuvah tata’ah and teshuvah ila’ah is that first one must remove what separates a person from Hakadosh Boruch Hu—“your sins separate”—and then he can reach the cleaving of teshuvah ila’ah and be attached to G-dliness. So the question is: if this sin requires teshuvah ila’ah, then he cannot remove the barrier of “your sins separate” until he has achieved teshuvah ila’ah. How, then, can he reach that state of cleaving? After all, cleaving comes only after “a spirit has passed over him and purified him.” The rope is still severed. How can he reach that state of cleaving if teshuvah ila’ah is required? Are we saying that his get and his hand come into being at the same time? How could that happen while he has not yet been purified of this sin? The rope has still not been reconnected, so how can he reach that state of cleaving? How can he reach teshuvah? The Rebbe explains that this is precisely the meaning of Rabbi Levi Yitzchak’s statement that “doubled and redoubled” refers to two knots, one on top of the other. In other words, teshuvah ila’ah involves two knots. These are two levels of teshuvah: teshuvah tata’ah and teshuvah ila’ah, with teshuvah ila’ah above teshuvah tata’ah. These are two knots—when we say there are two knots, then

2:12:57 Speaker 24 That is an enduring bond. So what does that mean? The second knot makes the first knot enduring. This is the halachah: a single knot is not considered a knot at all, and therefore on Shabbos one may tie it and untie it. But if he ties another knot on top of the first, it does not mean that only the second knot is enduring. That is not the point. The point is that the second knot causes the first knot, too, to become enduring. That is the precise meaning of the wording “doubled and redoubled”: two knots, one on top of the other. The first knot, too, is doubled—that is, lower-level teshuvah, too, gains permanence, and this comes through the additional knot of higher-level teshuvah. Accordingly, this resolves the question. We say that rectifying the sin requires Torah study, higher-level teshuvah. What is the explanation? We have been saying all along that one must correct the cause that led him to sin. Earlier, we said that lower-level teshuvah means simply abandoning the sin, accepting the yoke of the kingdom of Heaven. But for that to be genuine and wholehearted, accepting the yoke in one’s actions is not enough. He must subdue his heart, because that was the cause that led him to sin: he yielded to the desires of his heart, and he needs to correct that. There are things that cause a blemish in the mind. He separated himself not only through his heart but through his mind as well. Here, it touches the innermost life of his soul, so he needs the mind to grasp it. Then his lower-level teshuvah will be an enduring bond. In other words, the point here is to strengthen his acceptance of the yoke so that his lower-level teshuvah will endure. He will not yet reach higher-level teshuvah as it is in its own right, after he has made the correction. That will come later. But the correction itself is that the lower-level teshuvah

2:16:04 Speaker 24 becomes doubled and redoubled here—an enduring bond. According to this, it turns out that the correction of this matter, too, is essentially lower-level teshuvah. Besides the first point we made—that from now on, it helps with everything, regardless of what he went through—even the correction itself is lower-level teshuvah. But for lower-level teshuvah to endure, it needs an enduring bond. That is “doubled and redoubled”: higher-level teshuvah on top of lower-level teshuvah. So he studies both Scripture and Mishnah, not just Scripture alone or Mishnah alone; that, too, is doubled and redoubled. The Written Torah is speech; its meaning is concealed. The Oral Torah is understanding and comprehension. But without the Oral Torah, you cannot understand anything in the Written Torah. It remains hidden. The Oral Torah strengthens the Written Torah. With every mitzvah, knowing how to fulfill it comes only through the Oral Torah. So the point here is that the study itself is also doubled and redoubled. For higher-level teshuvah to affect lower-level teshuvah, Torah study—which is higher-level teshuvah involving the mind—must also be doubled and redoubled: both the Written Torah and the Oral Torah. The Rebbe also explains that, in fact, with every sin, the completion of teshuvah is higher-level teshuvah. Because of the underlying cause. Every Jew has the essential point of the yechidah in his soul. We discussed this at length earlier. The yechidah is united with Hakadosh Boruch Hu in absolute unity, just as it was before the soul descended. This is the point of the Jewish people’s bond with Hakadosh Boruch Hu, beyond reason and understanding. It has no defined form, either. How does it find expression in all the faculties of the soul? Through Torah and mitzvos. If a person committed a transgression, if his acceptance of the yoke was lacking when it came to action, then

2:19:14 Speaker 24 the inner cause is that the point of his bond with G-dliness was lacking here. This is essentially what is written in the first part of Tanya, too: the short way is for him to remember the idea of mesirus nefesh. That will affect him in every aspect of turning away from evil and doing good. If the self-nullification that comes from the inner dimension of his soul had shone within him, his outward acceptance of the yoke would not have been lacking. So for his teshuvah to last, to endure—as we said earlier, with a bond doubled and redoubled, so that his acceptance of the yoke of the mitzvos and of the kingdom of Heaven, on every level, will endure—he must have higher-level teshuvah, revealing the inner dimension of the soul. Then his teshuvah has that same lasting permanence. That is really why Chassidus was revealed: so that a person could attain teshuvah that endures forever. In other words, higher-level teshuvah is not merely a stage that comes after teshuvah. Seemingly, higher-level teshuvah applies even to tzaddikim: the soul’s attachment to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Why connect that with teshuvah, to the extent of calling it higher-level teshuvah? Because correcting everything is possible only when a person reveals the point of his bond with Hakadosh Boruch Hu; that is also the cause. We will be brief; he is almost finished here. Reb Levi Yitzchak makes another precise observation. In an earlier note, when speaking about attachment, he says that the character traits are attached to His attributes. He mentions all the faculties of the soul. First he says that all the character traits and the garments of thought, speech, and action are attached to Hashem, blessed be He. Then he begins to specify: “That is, the character traits to His attributes”—“just as He is merciful”—“and the intellect to His intellect.” Why does he put the character traits before the intellect here? Seemingly, the order should be intellect first, then character traits. He says this reflects the advantage of a baal teshuvah over a tzaddik. Here, the character traits must be aroused. Here, the character traits come from beyond reason and understanding. That is

2:22:03 Speaker 24 the emphasis here. The service of tzaddikim follows reason and understanding, so it begins with the intellect and then proceeds to the character traits. By contrast, the service of a baal teshuvah comes from the essence of the soul, with greater vigor—a service beyond reason and understanding. In practice, that is a higher level of higher-level teshuvah. Earlier we mentioned that form of service, but here there is another point: it touches the innermost life of his soul. Of course, everything must also be connected to Moshiach and Geulah. It is known that Moshiach relates to the yechidah of the soul, the collective yechidah. That will be Moshiach’s innovation. Moshiach will “bring the tzaddikim to teshuvah,” so that even tzaddikim, whose service is primarily based on reason and understanding, will have the teshuvah that comes from the essence of the yechidah. And “when the Jewish people do teshuvah, they will immediately be redeemed.” May we merit the revelation of the Rebbe, Melech HaMoshiach, who will bring us the true and complete Geulah.

2:23:40 Speaker 25 Thank you to Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Kopen[?]. It is very, very hard to stop, because every talk and every Torah thought could go on without end. But because of the limits of the clock, we need to move on—to something “doubled and redoubled,” as was mentioned in the sicha. There, the Rebbe says that it means both the revealed dimension of Torah and the inner dimension of Torah. Until now, we have heard about matters in the inner dimension of Torah. We now need to move to the halachic part, the study of halachah in Torah. I would like to ask a rabbi who himself serves as a community rabbi, the rabbi of Karmei Yosef, Rabbi Eliezer Halevi Brod, to chair this session on the revealed and halachic dimension of Torah. Rabbi Brod.

2:24:34 Speaker 26 Good afternoon. First of all, I am sure I speak for those here now, as well as those who will come and join us later, in offering heartfelt thanks to everyone who worked so hard to prepare this day—a day of Yarchei Kallah, a day entirely devoted to Torah. I especially want to mention those leading the organization: my brother, Rabbi Nachman Halevi Brod, and Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Zilberstein. They truly have worked, and continue to work, with their bodies, their hearts, and their money. It would not hurt if others joined in and helped them financially, too, because there are expenses involved. So again, many thanks to them. I am sure I represent the entire audience in saying that. As Rabbi Zilberstein mentioned earlier, we are now moving to the part of the session that deals more with the revealed dimension of Torah. Incidentally, it is known that when Reb Yisroel Leibov, the former head of Tzach, was in yechidus with the Rebbe, the Rebbe asked him to pass on a message. The Rebbe told him that he had heard that at bar mitzvah celebrations, the bar mitzvah boy recites a maamar of Chassidus, but does not speak at all about the revealed dimension of Torah—no one speaks about those subjects. The Rebbe asked him to convey, in the Rebbe’s name, that at every bar mitzvah celebration, the bar mitzvah boy should present a point from the revealed dimension of Torah in addition to reciting a maamar of Chassidus. So even at a bar mitzvah celebration, where the usual practice was to recite a maamar of Chassidus, the Rebbe asked that they also say something from the revealed dimension of Torah. Perhaps we can say something similar here. We were accustomed to Yarchei Kallah sessions or Torah gatherings dealing more with topics in the revealed dimension of Torah. But since we are Chabad chassidim, of course we need to combine the two: to address both topics in the revealed dimension of Torah and topics in Chassidus. And now, of course, topics concerning Geulah and Moshiach as well. So after hearing Torah talks on Geulah and Moshiach and topics in Chassidus, we now

2:26:37 Speaker 26 We are now opening the session devoted to the revealed part of Torah. The first topic is the construction of mikvaos according to the Chabad approach. As is well known, there are several ways to build a mikveh. Some rely more on zeriya, drawing water through a pool of rainwater; others on hashakah, connecting two bodies of water, and each of these has a number of variations. Then there is the mikveh as instituted by the Rebbe Rashab, with one pool above another. From time to time, in certain places, there are disputes about this: how should a mikveh be built? I would like to invite the distinguished chossid Rabbi Mordechai Shmuel Ashkenazi shlita, the rabbi and mara d’asra of Kfar Chabad, who has extensive experience building mikvaos—dozens in Israel and around the world, if not more—to come and explain to the audience how mikvaos are built in general, and especially the approach established by the Rebbe Rashab. Rabbi Ashkenazi, please.

2:27:45 Speaker 27 It is precisely when the whole world is on vacation that we rabbis are required to work. We have barely had a chance to rest after the Yarchei Kallah in New York, and already there is a Yarchei Kallah in Israel. When I stood at the Ohel last week, I said, “May you go from one gathering to the next.” I also meant from one Yarchei Kallah to the next. May it all be crowned with tremendous success. Once again, we must give thanks and praise Your great name for this gathering. For the Rebbe, the most important thing was Torah study and engagement in Torah, particularly matters of halachah—and especially practical halachah. The Rebbe spoke so many times about the importance of studying the halachic part of Torah. In particular, when it comes to mikvaos—Geulah and Moshiach have already been mentioned here several times. And once we are discussing Geulah and Moshiach, it is hard to turn afterward to such involved matters. I ought to be studying the Torah of Moshiach, but since the subject of mikvaos is connected with the enactments of our Rebbeim, it is a continuation of that discussion. Since there are also young men here, it is difficult to speak openly, especially about the stringencies of mikvaos. So I will speak somewhat indirectly. And since... since I have to mention here the mikveh whose approach was opposed to Chabad Chassidus, I do not want to name the person who established that practice. I will call it the mikveh—not of Bnei Brak, because Bnei Brak, thank G-d, is a chassidic city with a chassidic rabbi. Let us call it the Zichron Meir mikveh. That way everyone will understand whom I mean. I am speaking indirectly about this matter of mikvaos. Last week, when I was at the Ohel, I went into the mikveh there beforehand. It was already getting late for my flight, and I was alone. It was before dawn, and when I entered the mikveh I noticed that a filter was running.

2:30:05 Speaker 27 I know there is a box there that you have to press so the light changes from red to green, and then the filter stops running. I got out of the mikveh, went back and tried pressing it, but it would not budge. The room was dark, and the mikveh was running. I did not know what to do, but I was already late for my flight. If I got dressed and went to the other mikveh on the other side, I simply would not make my flight or get to the city in time. So I decided to immerse as it was, and I did. But I had misgivings: perhaps I had not done the right thing. Better to miss the flight, as long as I immersed in a proper mikveh. When I came out, two young men came in. I told them, “The mikveh here is not all right; the filter is running.” They showed me a sign in English. I cannot read English, but it said that anyone entering should know that it is not a filter; it is some internal device that cleans the water. So I was relieved that, thank G-d, I had immersed in a proper mikveh. On the other hand, while immersing I had thought that it was not a valid mikveh, that something was wrong with it. So again I wondered: was it a mikveh or not? In any event, I will not speak now about women’s mikvaos, as they are called, or about the mikveh at... near the... which I had thought was not all right. In practice, as was mentioned earlier, there are three, there are seven, there are eight variations of mikvaos, but they are based on three approaches. The mikveh that differs from our approach, the Zichron Meir mikveh, is built on the principle of zeriya. What does zeriya mean? In practice, in the Mishnah and then among the early authorities, most mikvaos were based on immersion in a spring. Here in Israel and around the world, our mikvaos are primarily made valid through rainwater. The difference between a spring and rainwater... Both purify a person who needs to immerse.

2:32:17 Speaker 27 But there is a difference between them. A spring—one difference is that a spring purifies even when its water is flowing. Even if the spring is moving, flowing, a person who immerses in it has immersed validly and is purified. Rainwater purifies only when collected in one place, when the water is still. If the water is flowing, the mikveh is not valid. That is what the term “flowing water” means: the water moves rather than remaining in one place. When we build a mikveh, we collect water in a pool, which is called the rainwater pool. We make sure it contains forty se’ah—perhaps later we will discuss why it may need more than that—but the main thing is that the water remains still and does not leak. Now, we do not immerse in the rainwater itself. Why? For several reasons. First, rainwater is cold. Besides, if people immersed in the rainwater all the time, it would get dirty, and not many people would want to use that mikveh. So another pool is installed alongside the rainwater pool, right next to it. This second pool holds municipal water, drawn water. But one cannot immerse in that pool as it is, because drawn water is invalid for a mikveh. What do we do? We make the pool of municipal, drawn water valid by means of the rainwater. How? The Gemara or Mishnah describes a method called hashakah, connecting the waters. The rainwater does not have to mix into the other pool; the two bodies of water touch. Hashakah is related to the word for a kiss: the waters touch one another. The municipal water, the drawn water, then becomes water that is pure and can purify. How is the connection made? As stated in the Mishnah and in Shulchan Aruch, Yoreh De’ah, section 201, it is through an opening the size of a shfoferes hanod. The entire bodies of water need not meet. If you make an opening as wide as a shfoferes hanod—that is three, four, five, five centimeters,

2:34:39 Speaker 27 say a two-inch... a two-inch pipe, two and a half inches. We will not get into the details now; there are several differing opinions about the required size of a shfoferes hanod. The waters connect through that opening, and the rainwater makes the drawn water valid. That is what hashakah means. There is another way to make a mikveh valid: not through hashakah, but through zeriya. Rashi in Pesachim, for example, also refers to hashakah using the term zeriya. Zeriya means that we do not stop at connecting the rainwater to the municipal water through an opening the size of a shfoferes hanod. Instead, we pour the municipal water into the rainwater pool, and there is an opening from the rainwater pool into the mikveh. Previously, let us say, the rainwater pool was filled up to the opening. When I add more water, that water pushes the water already inside; the waters mix and spill out through the opening. In other words, I did not connect one pool to another through hashakah; I did zeriya. I put the rainwater into the drawn water—sorry, the drawn water into the rainwater. It then flowed through the opening into the mikveh where I want to immerse. That is, I made the mikveh valid not by connecting it to the rainwater through hashakah, but through zeriya. So we have two approaches to making a mikveh valid. One is through hashakah. In other words, I build... I had two cups here, but they fell over. Thank you very much. So this is the rainwater pool, and this is the pool of municipal water. I made an opening here, and the water in each pool is at the same level. The waters touch one another through the opening. That is called hashakah. There is another way: I build the mikveh like this, in this arrangement,

2:36:54 Speaker 27 Here is the rainwater. I pour the municipal water into the rainwater. Once it fills up, it flows out through this hole into the mikveh—the immersion pool, which is meant to contain municipal water. So these are the two ways to make a mikveh kosher: through zeri’ah, passing the water through a rainwater reservoir, or through hashakah, connecting it to one. People often call and ask whether they, or their wives, can immerse in a particular mikveh. I ask, “What kind of mikveh is it?” They say, “I don’t know—is it hashakah or zeri’ah?” So I tell them, “Take a look.” “I don’t know what to look for.” But even someone who isn’t very familiar with the subject can easily tell what kind of mikveh he has entered. I’m not speaking right now about a Chabad mikveh, but about ordinary mikvaos. There may be a difference here too, according to our custom, depending on whether it uses zeri’ah or hashakah. In a hashakah mikveh, the hole must be below the water level, because the two bodies of water have to touch. If the hole is a little higher, and the municipal water I put in does not reach the hole connecting it to the rainwater, there will be no hashakah. That is not the case with a zeri’ah reservoir. Usually, in a zeri’ah reservoir, the hole through which the water comes out is twenty or thirty centimeters above the water level of the immersion pool. So when he looks at the hole that makes the mikveh kosher, if it is high up, that indicates that the mikveh is made kosher through zeri’ah. If the hole is at water level, then

2:38:48 Speaker 27 or a little below water level, it is a hashakah mikveh. But even if he sees a zeri’ah hole, he should not conclude that the mikveh uses only zeri’ah. He should also check whether there is a hole below the water’s surface. Why? Because most mikvaos in Israel are built to satisfy both opinions as a stringency: they have both a zeri’ah reservoir and a hashakah reservoir. In any event, if he wants to know whether there is also a hashakah reservoir, he should look for a hole at water level the size of a shfoferes hanod—roughly two or two and a half inches. Then he will know that the mikveh is made kosher through hashakah, and not through zeri’ah alone. Those are generally the two accepted, common methods in Israel. For many years, in Jerusalem and in many other long-established communities, mikvaos were made kosher through both hashakah and zeri’ah. But... I also want to mention that they said this gathering is in memory of Rabbi Chanzin, a”h. He was the first to wage a battle against the Zichron Meir mikveh. I was still quite young then, but I remember the commotion he made. There was a mikveh in Petach Tikvah built according to our custom, and the people in Zichron Meir wanted to close it. There was a great uproar. The Rebbe even once wrote to Rabbi Chanzin, a”h, “Vu iz di chassidishe tekifus?”—“Where is the chassidic determination?” It was as though the Rebbe was demanding that he stand up with all his strength and resolve for this matter, for our custom, as we will explain later. In that Zichron Meir mikveh in Bnei Brak, there are several major problems—bear in mind, if it is built according to the Zichron Meir design. They do not make a hashakah connection from the side. Under that approach, it is called the chassidic mikveh.

2:41:09 Speaker 27 What is the problem? The biggest problem is the Mishnah. Halachah says—we learn this in the Mishnah about three log—that three log of drawn water invalidate a mikveh. What does that mean? Suppose someone pours three log of drawn water into an immersion pool. He takes a bucket holding three log—according to the stringent measure commonly used, that is about a liter of water. He takes a liter of water and pours it into the mikveh from a container, from a bottle. He pours a one-liter bottle into the mikveh, and afterward fills it with rainwater, entirely with rainwater. The mikveh is invalid. The Sages decreed that three log of drawn water entering first invalidate the mikveh; even if he later brings in all the water in the world, it remains invalid. When would it be kosher? If twenty-one se’ah enter the mikveh—[unclear]—which is a majority of the required quantity of rainwater, and three log enter afterward, then there are differing opinions. In any event, if forty se’ah of water—rainwater—entered first, he could afterward pour in all the drawn water in the world and the mikveh would remain kosher, because forty se’ah of rainwater, or water made kosher through rainwater, had already collected in it. The three log do not invalidate it afterward. Now, with a mikveh built for zeri’ah, when it is emptied, it is emptied. After all, the mikveh has to be cleaned first. You cannot keep the same water in it all the time. If it is cleaned and new water must then be put in, halachah requires that it be dried until it is bone-dry. Otherwise, three log might remain there—and that is very common, because a mikveh is cleaned with a rag and a bucket. A pump removes the water, but it sends the last of the water back into the mikveh. So, to make it possible to make

2:43:27 Speaker 27 the mikveh kosher again, it must be wiped thoroughly dry, because of the concern that three log present at the outset would invalidate it. If even enough water to make something else wet remains in the mikveh—a liter of water—then this great, holy mikveh will be of no use. So imagine: perhaps they can maintain that stringency in Zichron Meir in Bnei Brak. But imagine mikvaos scattered throughout the country, in all sorts of moshavim and communities, with no supervision. There is some mikveh attendant—who knows?—who knows nothing about it. Put this in her hands and expect her always to dry the mikveh properly. When we dry the mikveh reservoir, as perhaps we will explain later, we call a rabbi to stand there and check whether the water reservoir has been properly dried. Why? Because of the concern about three log. And here we would place all the mikvaos in the hands of attendants who know nothing about it. Every rabbi knows from the questions they ask how little they know. Suddenly we would entrust the entire kosher status of the mikveh to her—to whether she cleaned and dried it properly before the water was brought in. That is something that could, G-d forbid, lead to serious problems. So what was their initial solution? Not to empty the entire mikveh. One could empty, say, two-thirds of it, leave one-third—twenty-one se’ah—then bring in more water. Each time, take out, say, three-quarters of the water. How much does the pool itself hold? Three times that amount, perhaps eighty or ninety se’ah. Always take out seventy-one se’ah, seventy-nine se’ah, leave twenty-one, and then there is no need to dry the mikveh. But, gentlemen, anyone who knows how necessary it is today—not only... And the Rebbe spoke about this so many times, about

2:45:25 Speaker 27 It’s not just about whether the mikveh is kosher; it’s about how clean it is. I can tell you, I was in Mexico last week, and I saw a mikveh that a rabbi had built. He showed it to me. He had invested in beautiful marble and the most modern fittings. And he said, “Because of this—the elegance I put into it—I’ve now had the merit of seeing ten women from very wealthy families begin observing family purity. They wouldn’t go to mikvehs where things have been done halfway for years, where the walls are dirty, the floor is dirty, the water is dirty, and it’s impossible to keep the place clean.” That’s one problem. By contrast, when we make the mikveh kosher through hashakah, contact with the rainwater, it doesn’t matter to us. We bring in the water like any drawn water. All the water is drawn. Then we connect it to the rainwater, and it becomes kosher. I don’t mind if three log of water are involved. I can clean the mikveh properly, thoroughly, with soap and a sponge and paper and steel wool and so on, and the mikveh will be clean and pure. That is one of the most important things. The second issue, apart from the aesthetic one, is a halachic problem with this mikveh. Can the hashakah work? The Rambam writes in Hilchos Mikvaos, and the Mechaber brings it in section 201 of the laws of mikvaos, paragraph 61, that if there are two mikvehs, one invalid and the other kosher, but the kosher mikveh’s water is flowing—it isn’t staying in one place, but is flowing—and he wants to make the invalid mikveh kosher by connecting it to the kosher one, they do not join. The Rambam adds: Why? Because flowing waters do not join together unless they come to rest. Flowing water—that is, flowing rainwater—not only can’t be used for immersion; it also cannot join with another body of water. It cannot combine to form a kosher mikveh. The Rishonim and Acharonim debated what the Rambam’s words mean. We don’t know, but

2:48:13 Speaker 27 in practice, we are dealing here with cases involving possible kareis, so we have to take all opinions into account. Granted, the Rambam is not discussing the connection of a rainwater mikveh to drawn water. The Rambam is discussing two mikvehs, neither of which had the required amount of water, and someone wants to connect them so that together they will have the required amount. So the Rambam says that flowing waters do not join together. But many Acharonim, including the Tzemach Tzedek, understood that according to the Rambam, this also applies when the issue is making flowing water kosher—not because of the required amount, but because the water was drawn. According to the Rambam, drawn water can be made kosher by a mikveh whose water is stationary, when the rainwater pit is stationary. But if its water is flowing, it cannot make the drawn water kosher. So they came to the person who had designed that mikveh and asked: What did you do? You brought the municipal water, the drawn water, into the rainwater. But that water is flowing, since it is constantly circulating and leaving. How can that water make the drawn water kosher? So perhaps, with your permission, we’ll study this. As long as Rabbi Zilberstrom isn’t standing next to me, I understand that there’s still time. There’s another paragraph in the Shulchan Aruch through which we can understand and study what the Rebbe Rashab instituted regarding this whole matter. And especially with a few small additions, apparently in parentheses and in the Rebbe’s characteristic way, we’ll understand what was accomplished by the Rebbe Rashab’s enactments together with the Rebbe’s enactments. Then, in my humble opinion, the result is a kosher mikveh that meets the highest standards according to all opinions. But what can you do? As the Rebbe once told me in yechidus about a mikveh, [unclear]. Still, we have to do our part. In the Mechaber, section 201, paragraph 50, there is a case of a rainwater mikveh where one

2:50:33 Speaker 27 of its walls was breached and the water flows out through the crack. A rainwater mikveh where one of its walls was breached and the water flows through the crack: if forty se’ah remain in it—in other words, the crack is above the level of forty se’ah. Usually a mikveh contains several times the required amount, because we don’t immerse in cramped conditions. They put in, let’s say—the required amount for a mikveh according to the strictest view is 750 liters. A mikveh contains two, two or three cubic meters. If the hole is above the forty-se’ah level, the Mechaber writes: “If forty se’ah remain in it after some of the water has flowed out”—because by the time it flows down to the crack, the water above the crack has flowed out—“it is kosher. If not, it is invalid, because the water is flowing, and a mikveh does not purify with flowing water.” What is the Mechaber saying? Say the mikveh was 1.6 or 1.8 meters deep, and the forty-se’ah mark was at fifty—let’s say fifty. It depends on the square area—at fifty or sixty centimeters. The hole was at a height of sixty centimeters. So the water between sixty centimeters and 1.6 meters will eventually flow out through the crack. The Mechaber says that if someone immersed in this mikveh, the immersion is valid; he is purified. If not—if all the water would flow out, meaning that the crack is lower down and forty se’ah would not remain—it is invalid, because the water is flowing, and a mikveh does not purify with flowing water. There is a major dispute here about how to understand the Mechaber’s words: What did he rule valid, and what did he rule invalid? What exactly is the case? Where did this person immerse? The Mechaber says that if forty se’ah will remain below the hole, the immersion is valid. Where did this person immerse? Did the Mechaber rule it valid even if he immersed in the upper water? He didn’t squeeze his body down to the bottom and immerse in the lower water; he immersed in the upper water, and that is valid too. Why? Because the mikveh is not considered to be flowing. Or does the Mechaber mean that he immersed in the

2:53:06 Speaker 27 lower water, and that is why it is valid? But if he immersed with even, let’s say, just some of his hair in the upper water, then his whole body was not within stationary mikveh water. That is one dispute. Now let’s study the Rema’s words. The Rema says: “Some are stringent even if forty se’ah remain below the crack.” The Rema says that there are poskim, major authorities—the Tur in the name of “some say,” and the Rash—who are stringent and say that even if forty se’ah remain below the crack, that is not good. In general, this is called the Rash’s position. So let’s understand the Rema’s words properly: if forty se’ah remain, even if forty se’ah remain below the crack, the mikveh is not good. What is not good? The Rema did not specify. What is not good? Where did the person immerse? Did he immerse in the upper water or in the lower water? Does the Rema invalidate it even if he immersed in the lower water? Or does he mean that he immersed—Actually, in the Tzemach Tzedek itself there are two responsa. In one he writes that the Rema invalidates it in this way, and in the other he writes that the Rema invalidates it in that way, and the same applies to the Mechaber. If we put all the opinions together, there is a dispute here between the Rema and the Mechaber from one extreme to the other. According to the Mechaber, even if he immersed in the upper water, it is valid; he is purified. According to the Rema, even if he immersed in the lower water, he is not purified. Eh? Eh? Does someone disagree with that? Well, in any case, if we take all the interpretations into account—many poskim say that with a mikveh, unlike the laws of niddah, where one follows the lenient opinions, we generally try to build the mikveh to satisfy all opinions. If we adopt all the stringencies and follow the leniencies, then according to the Mechaber, even if he immersed in the upper water, it will also be invalid; he will not be purified. But according to the Rema, even if he immersed in the lower water, then it is

2:55:21 Speaker 27 That is also kosher. In any case... Huh? Huh? Sorry, sorry, that is also no good. Right. Earlier we spoke about this issue of flowing water, which does not make the rainwater kosher and does not purify it. When we mentioned the mikveh in Zichron Meir, not all the water drains out there. Forty se’ah will always remain. The water pushes—one part pushes the other—but forty se’ah always remains. So according to the Mechaber it is kosher, but according to the Rema it is no good. How was the mikveh in Bnei Brak constructed? Not according to the Rema. There is a dispute about what the person who constructed that mikveh said, [unclear]. He came and asked: Where should the water be brought in? And everyone said in his name that the water should be brought in from below. I don’t remember right now why he said to bring it in from below, but in the end, in his final opinion, he said to bring it in from above. He brought the water in from above. So at least, as we said, the upper water would be purified. It would not mix completely throughout the mikveh, and consequently it would be made kosher. In any case, that was the whole discussion in his case. For now I just want to... We have the second type of mikveh, with hashakah from the side. Seemingly, that works well. There is no concern about cleaning the mikveh. The mikveh is made kosher through hashakah, even if three log of drawn water remain in it. But there is a concern about flowing water, because they put the water of the mikveh into a pool where the water is still, and it is connected by hashakah to rainwater that is standing still. There is another problem, though, and it is very common. I experienced it myself, because for a long time I lived in Tel Aviv, where the mikveh on Yavneh Street used hashakah. A person stands in the mikveh and suddenly feels on

2:57:37 Speaker 27 his body a blast of cold water from—through the opening. Why? It’s very simple. The waters stand side by side, and of course they mix. The rainwater is cold; the water here is warm. A person comes in during the winter and wants to warm up a little in the mikveh. When he gets in, he raises the water level. The water flows into the rainwater reservoir. That is the nature of water: it flows into the reservoir, raises its level a little, and flows back to equalize. He has barely immersed his head in the mikveh when a blast of cold water hits his back. I can put up with it, but imagine a woman who needs to immerse. What is she supposed to do? It’s very uncomfortable. Another thing—and this is a practical reality. It isn’t written in Yoreh De’ah, but it comes from a little practical experience: the mikveh attendants. The religious council wants to conserve water and worries that the water will cool down. They will have to use more energy to heat it. They want the attendant to plug the opening. In other words, fill the mikveh, make the hashakah connection, and plug the opening. Why? Because when cold water keeps breaking into the mikveh, it cools the water. After all, they do not heat the water to forty or forty-five degrees. From the outset, they heat it to a temperature at which a woman can immerse immediately. When a little very cold water keeps coming in, it cools the water. And there is another thing: the Health Ministry is on their backs too. That water has been standing there for a year, two years, three years. It is not exactly clean, and the waters are constantly mixing. So the Health Ministry is not very happy about it either. In their view, there is a concern. So what do they instruct them to do? Make the hashakah connection, then take out and put in the

2:59:41 Speaker 27 plug. And that leaves us... Again, imagine entrusting some mikveh attendant somewhere with this: the entire kosher status of the mikveh depends on that hashakah connection, on that connection, and, G-d forbid, she forgets to make it. And it has happened. It has happened many times that people called and said, “The attendant forgot to make the hashakah connection.” So have it done with the mikveh attendant present. The attendant is always there. In any case, we are obviously not talking about a stringency here. G-d forbid, if they do not do it—if she forgets to make the hashakah connection—the mikveh is not... You have accomplished nothing. The mikveh is not kosher. You have not made the water kosher. You immersed in drawn water. Another thing: there is a well-known Tashbetz cited by the Shach, in which the Tashbetz says that making the hashakah connection once is not enough. The connection must be constant. At these mikvaos, they will never allow you to keep it connected constantly because of their concerns. They are concerned both that it is unpleasant to enter the mikveh and have cold water flow back onto your back, and about cleanliness, and so on and so forth. There is no need to go on; the issues are clear. Then came the Rebbe—the Rebbe Rashab. And again, I want to say this because people sometimes get confused: Is this the Alter Rebbe’s mikveh? It is not the Alter Rebbe’s mikveh. But try explaining to someone that we are not talking about the Alter Rebbe here. We are talking about the Rebbe Rashab’s mikveh. It is a Chabad mikveh—the Rebbe Rashab was Chabad too—but it is not the Alter Rebbe’s mikveh. The Alter Rebbe discusses a different mikveh, one involving a kasten, a chest. He is not talking about a mikveh using hashakah at all. That was an enactment of the Alter Rebbe for his time, setting out how to make a mikveh in his day. Today it is no longer customary to build mikvaos that way. Here we are talking about a mikveh with a reservoir beside it, and that is the Rebbe Rashab’s mikveh. It is

3:01:31 Speaker 27 not the Alter Rebbe’s mikveh. The Rebbe Rashab came and said—and I want to explain this—that the reservoir could be placed not at the side but underneath. Like this. Not like that, but like this. The rainwater reservoir would be below, and the pool of drawn water would be above. In fact, I want to focus here on a point that has come up particularly in recent publications, and that I learned from the Rebbe’s teachings. What was the Rebbe Rashab’s innovation? People used to say—people used to say that the Rebbe Rashab’s innovation... In fact, this existed before the Rebbe Rashab. We find it discussed by the Steipler. What was his name? The... well, huh? [unclear]. In his responsa, he had already asked the Divrei Chaim about such a mikveh, one built not with one mikveh beside the other. No. And again, I want to be precise, because I have already heard people here confuse the terminology for the sake of a neat phrase. The Rebbe Rashab’s mikveh is not called “a reservoir above a reservoir.” It is called “a mikveh above a reservoir.” A reservoir above a reservoir is another subject that perhaps we will have time to address. This is not called a mikveh of “a reservoir above a reservoir,” but “a mikveh above a reservoir.” So this arrangement of a mikveh above a reservoir already existed, already existed, already existed in the Steipler’s time. But apparently what the Rebbe Rashab added in his construction of this mikveh was this: We know, as we learned in Yoreh De’ah, section 201, that the opening connecting mikvaos need only be the size of the mouth of a wineskin. According to the instructions conveyed by Rabbi Landau, a"h, the Rebbe Rashab required the opening between the upper and lower pools to be not merely the size of the mouth of a wineskin, but a tefach by a tefach. We do not find a requirement of a tefach by a tefach for connecting mikvaos. There is a requirement of a tefach by a tefach, [unclear], to negate the status of a vessel so that it is kosher and the water is not considered drawn water. But for a connection that makes mikvaos kosher, a tefach—an opening of a tefach by

3:04:12 Speaker 27 We did not find a tefach. It would seem—and I believe I have written about this before—that in the Rebbe Rashab’s view, this is not merely a matter of making a mikveh kosher through an opening the size of a shfoferes hanod, by means of hashakah, but of making it one mikveh. In his view, we regard the upper mikveh and the lower mikveh as a single unit. As I saw in an article here by Rabbi Gopin, he explained that the upper waters and the lower waters are connected to each other. It is not that I am making the mikveh water—the drawn water—kosher by connecting it to the rainwater. Rather, it is one unit. I found that in the laws of tumah and taharah, there is a halachah, brought by the Shulchan Aruch in section 371, that if there is a house with an upper story and an opening of a tefach in the floor between them, the whole thing is considered one house with respect to tumah. Even someone who is not standing beneath the opening becomes tamei, because once there is a tefach-by-tefach opening in the floor, it is all considered one space. We regard the floor as though it were not there. So what is the floor needed for? To give you somewhere to stand; otherwise you would fall through. But in practice, it is one mikveh divided into two: the lower level contains rainwater, and the upper level contains city water. So, first of all, what have we gained? When the rainwater is below and the upper water is above, there is much less concern that the waters will exchange places over time. Water passes from one side to the other through hashakah, as we said earlier, but the lower water remains below and the upper water remains above. Here I want to add that many have questioned this. They measured and found that it is not quite so precise, because over time the waters do exchange places. There is also the argument that rainwater is lighter than city water. But if we can avoid that concern, that is a significant thing.

3:06:52 Speaker 27 Because of that concern, we should try to ensure that the upper water is always warm—or at least warmer than the lower water. Once the upper water is even three or four degrees warmer, there is no concern about circulation. It is a well-known rule: warm water always stays on top, and the colder water stays below. I often go to the mikveh early in the morning, and there is a radiator there. I can feel it: when you first enter the mikveh, your feet are freezing. Later, when people immerse, they mix the water. But for the first person to enter, the lower half of his body is always cold and the upper half can be warm, right? Why? Because warm water always rises and cold water stays below. In any case, this is a way to solve that problem. But the main point—we said earlier... Let’s look at it now. We asked—I told you earlier about my own case, when I immersed in a mikveh while its filter was running. This kind of filter is common today in most mikvaos in Israel. It is hard to stand against this practice; it also cleans the water. The later authorities have disagreed considerably about it. What is everyone’s concern with this filter? The filter is set up to draw out all the water. It will take half an hour. Over half an hour or an hour, it will draw out all the water and return it. Why should I care if it draws the water out? It puts it back, and then the water becomes kosher again. No. We said that the Rambam rules that flowing water does not purify. According to the Rambam, the entire mikveh is subject to flow. It is not all flowing at once, but it is in a state of flow. So what do I gain by putting that water back into the mikveh? Where is it returning? To water that is flowing, or is going to flow. Flowing water does not purify. So according to most of the later authorities,

3:09:24 Speaker 27 they say—and Rabbi Dvorkin ruled this way too—that there is no question that it is not good to immerse while this filter is running. But when the filter is stopped, it does not matter. Even if the filter has already run for a full hour, why should I care? All right, it has passed all the water through the filter. All the water became drawn water, but afterward I connected it to the mikveh at the side through hashakah, so it becomes kosher again. I have no problem. Imagine that they now install a filter in this mikveh in Zichron Meir. What would make it kosher? The mikveh would be completely invalid. If it has only a reservoir for zeri’ah, we now have no way to make it kosher. So they came and said: Then let’s also make a mikveh at the side. So what follows? A side mikveh is good; rely entirely on the side mikveh. But then why isn’t a side mikveh enough? True, there are early halachic authorities who say—and many great authorities did not want to rely on hashakah alone—that they wanted zeri’ah as well. They combined hashakah with a zeri’ah mikveh. I have an excellent solution for you: the Rebbe Rashab’s mikveh, as the Rebbe himself explained. And I will explain it. But first, let us understand that if a mikveh has only zeri’ah and we put a filter in it, the filter will invalidate the mikveh and it will not be made kosher again. But imagine, before we turn to the next subject: I immersed in a mikveh while the filter was running. The filter was there, it was running, and I immersed there. But the mikveh was built according to the Rebbe Rashab’s design. So according to the Beis Yosef, I fulfilled my obligation. I did not, admittedly, observe the Rema’s recommendation to be stringent. But imagine a woman calls after several people have already immersed, and no one even knows who they were, because they forgot to turn off the filter—and this happens. If

3:12:04 Speaker 27 it is a mikveh with only zeri’ah, G-d forbid, we have caused her to transgress a prohibition punishable by kares. But if it is a mikveh with hashakah, according to the Beis Yosef she has fulfilled her obligation of immersion—and especially in light of the Rema’s view. Perhaps according to the Beis Yosef, all the water is leaving and entering... But in any event, it is clear that according to the Beis Yosef it is kosher. The Rema also writes about the preferred practice. Of course, ideally we will be stringent in every respect, but after the fact, G-d forbid, she has not transgressed a prohibition punishable by kares. The Rebbe added something in a letter to Rabbi Gurevitch, a”h, back when Kfar Chabad was first being built and they were building the first mikveh. He asked the Rebbe whether they should also make a zeri’ah mikveh in Kfar Chabad. The Rebbe told him—because apparently there was a problem with the Ministry of Religious Affairs at the time. I even knew the official at the ministry who dug in his heels so firmly and insisted specifically on following the Chazon Ish. We had arguments with him almost forty years ago, but eventually we succeeded. His name was Shag [unclear]. He was in charge of budgets at the Ministry of the Interior and had to approve the mikvaos. The Rebbe—I will explain our arguments with him in a moment—the Rebbe said: “You have a problem concerning zeri’ah? You can have zeri’ah in our mikveh. How? Direct the pipe bringing in the city water toward the opening specified by the Rebbe Rashab. The first water will enter through the opening into the rainwater. That is zeri’ah. After that, everything that enters is sown into the water already there.” What did the Rebbe accomplish with this? What did the Rebbe accomplish? It was not merely that the Rebbe wanted to save Kfar Chabad money so they would not need another mikveh. If the Rebbe favored zeri’ah, he could have said to make

3:14:24 Speaker 27 a zeri’ah mikveh. This was my argument with him, with Sh. K. He told me, “I saw the Rebbe’s letter, and the Rebbe wants zeri’ah!” I said to him: If the Rebbe wanted zeri’ah, he would have told the Rabbi of Kfar Chabad, “Build another zeri’ah pit.” The Rebbe does not write that they should build another zeri’ah pit. The Rebbe wants this mikveh of his—the Rebbe Rashab’s mikveh—to have zeri’ah as well. Why? In your mikveh, when you do zeri’ah, you are connecting the water to flowing water, which, according to the Rambam, does not make it kosher. But when I sow the water into this lower mikveh, the water stays there; it does not flow. That is genuine zeri’ah. It is zeri’ah according to all opinions. Why should I get into all the convoluted arguments and [unclear]—bringing the water in from above and below, and below and above, with all these “poperovs” and “shmoperovs” and everything else? Sow the water into the lower mikveh; the water stays there, and it is kosher according to all opinions. No! Because Chabad wants it this way, even if, G-d forbid, it leads to people stumbling, as long as they do not do what the Rebbe wants. But what was the solution? This was the solution the Rebbe proposed. And it would seem to answer all the questions. No, it does not mean that the Rebbe wants a zeri’ah reservoir. He wants the water in his mikveh to be connected in two ways: through both hashakah and zeri’ah—but zeri’ah about which there are no questions and no concerns. And therefore, [unclear]—all right, I will leave that for later. We have ended on a good note.

3:16:31 Speaker 3 Yasher koach and many thanks to the mara d’asra of Kfar Chabad, the distinguished chossid Rabbi Mordechai Shmuel Ashkenazi, for his illuminating words on the different methods of building a mikveh, particularly his explanation of the Rebbe Rashab’s method of a mikveh over a reservoir. I would now like to invite the distinguished chossid Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Belinov, rabbi of central Bnei Brak and head of the Paamei Yaakov kollel. He will speak about a subject that has become very common lately and has also been the subject of heated halachic debate. People sometimes don’t—are reluctant to wash their hands, to wash their hands and say Birkat Hamazon. People are in a hurry, and then there are mezonos rolls, different kinds of bagels and the like, and the question is what blessing to say over them. Is it borei minei mezonos or hamotzi? In fact, the subject is under halachic debate. Recently, it has also stirred up the Charedi community, and there are several opinions on the matter. Let us welcome Rabbi Belinov, who will come and explain it to us, and in particular expand on the Alter Rebbe’s approach to mezonos rolls, bagels and similar foods. Rabbi Belinov, please.

3:18:20 Speaker 4 Following the words of the mara d’asra, I want to tell you about something that happened roughly six months ago. The shliach in Ganei Tikva—I don’t remember his name—finally got the religious council there to agree to build a mikveh. And most of those who go to the mikveh—four or five or six of them—specifically want a mikveh with a reservoir underneath. Sorry, a mikveh over a reservoir. It isn’t one above the other; it is one mikveh, so it is a mikveh. But they would not agree. They would not agree, so he asked whether perhaps they could do this: they had agreed to make a mikveh with hashakah and zeri’ah, and in addition, to put a reservoir beneath the mikveh. Besides a reservoir at the side, there would also be a reservoir beneath the place where people immerse, as well as a side opening for hashakah and zeri’ah together, [unclear], and one underneath. Then the religious council made inquiries—I don’t know exactly who or how—and concluded that this would interfere. Not only could they not build it underneath, but the hashakah and zeri’ah would also be invalidated. So he could not build a mikveh that way in Ganei Tikva. Somehow he reached me—I don’t know how—and asked what to do. I spoke to someone there. He specifically said he was not an expert in mikvaos, and told me who had said to him that it was no good, and that he could not go against him. He told him: Take this [unclear]; I have no idea. So he could not do otherwise. I decided to go to the rabbi of Zichron Meir, Rabbi Wosner. And I decided that if I got a letter from him saying it was all right, then I assumed they would agree. It’s a pity I didn’t bring it here. He wrote it. After some effort, of course, but in any case there is a letter in his handwriting—not just something written down that could later be questioned. I wasn’t sure whether to tell this story, but I have

3:21:04 Speaker 4 it, written in his own hand; it has already been distributed as well. It says that even if a mikveh already has hashakah, a reservoir, zeri’ah and everything else, if they also make a reservoir beneath the mikveh, it will be acceptable according to all opinions. Above all, he wanted to add that it does not detract from the existing arrangement at all, and he gave it his full blessing. So even in places where there are mikvaos with such reservoirs and there have been objections, even where there are objections, this is a solution. The Gemara relates in Berachos, page 42: Rav Yehudah was arranging a marriage for his son in the home of Rav Yehudah bar Chaviva. They brought out pas haba’ah b’kisnin, and he heard them saying hamotzi lechem min ha’aretz. When he arrived, he was surprised: “What sound am I hearing? Are they saying hamotzi lechem min ha’aretz?” They said, “Yes.” Why? Because Rabbi Muna said in the name of Rabbi Yehudah that one says hamotzi lechem min ha’aretz over pas haba’ah b’kisnin, and Shmuel said that the halachah follows Rabbi Muna. Rav Yehudah then said: The halachah does not follow Rabbi Muna; rather, one says borei minei mezonos over pas haba’ah b’kisnin. And that is the ruling in Shulchan Aruch, section 168, paragraph 7: one says borei minei mezonos over pas haba’ah b’kisnin. What defines pas haba’ah b’kisnin? Not which food it is—what does pas haba’ah b’kisnin mean in the first place? The early authorities explain—the Rashba there, Rabbeinu Yonah, and the Shiltei Hagiborim citing the Riaz—all give the same definition. Pas haba’ah b’kisnin is a kind of bread baked from flour, but its defining feature is that people do not eat it to satisfy their hunger. When someone is hungry and wants to feel full, this is not what he eats. Rather, he eats it for pleasure, as a sweet, for dessert after a meal, and the like. That is the definition of pas haba’ah b’kisnin. It is not made to satisfy hunger, but to be eaten when someone wants a treat or something sweet. All the early authorities define it in one way or another. So why, because it is eaten for pleasure or as a sweet, is the blessing borei minei mezonos rather than hamotzi? This is explained

3:23:53 Speaker 4 at length by the Levush in section 168, and also, much more briefly, by the Alter Rebbe. At the beginning of section 168, the Alter Rebbe explains that the Gemara—the Mishnah in Berachos—says that a special blessing was instituted for bread: hamotzi lechem min ha’aretz. Why? Because “bread sustains the heart of man,” and “you shall eat and be satisfied and bless.” That is what bread is about, so it has a special blessing because of its importance. But when this kind of bread, though it too is made with flour, does not have that quality of being made to satisfy hunger—even though one could become full from it—its importance is diminished. Therefore, the blessing of hamotzi was not instituted for it; instead, its blessing is borei minei mezonos. It too provides sustenance—pas haba’ah b’kisnin provides sustenance—so the blessing is borei minei mezonos. But that special, important blessing, hamotzi lechem min ha’aretz, does not apply to a kind of bread that, although called bread, is deliberately made as a treat or a sweet and the like. That is the definition of pas haba’ah b’kisnin. What is pas haba’ah b’kisnin? There are three approaches: that of Rabbeinu Chananel, that of the Rambam, and that of Rav Hai Gaon. According to Rabbeinu Chananel, the bread itself, the dough itself, is like any other bread, but it has a pocket—something like what we today call pita. They fill this pocket with things like roasted grains, raisins, sugar, honey and spices. They put the filling in before baking and bake it that way. It is something like pita, but not our pita, which is baked first and filled afterward. They put it in the oven and bake it together with the roasted grains and raisins. That kind of bread is pas haba’ah b’kisnin, and it is not made to be eaten as part of an ordinary meal. People eat it, as Rabbeinu Chananel says, after the meal, as dessert, for pleasure. Or, because Rabbeinu Chananel

3:26:04 Speaker 4 also says that kisnin comes from a word meaning roasted grains. The Gemara says in Eruvin: “These kisnei are good for the heart.” Kisnin means roasted grains. People eat it because it is good for the heart and so on, but it is not a meal meant to satisfy hunger. So that is one kind of pas haba’ah b’kisnin. Essentially, its dough is like any other dough, except that from the outset it is baked with fillings intended as a treat, and the whole thing becomes a food eaten for pleasure. That is one kind. According to the Rambam, what is pas haba’ah b’kisnin? Dough kneaded with honey, milk and so on, with various spices and fruits—that is what is called pas haba’ah b’kisnin. Although it is bread, one says hamotzi over it—one says borei minei mezonos over it. The dough itself is different from ordinary bread dough. Bread dough does not contain honey. We will see later how much, and where. Here the dough itself is filled—or rather, kneaded. The dough, the flour, is kneaded with honey, spices, fruits and so on. This is a different kind of dough, and its blessing is borei minei mezonos. According to Rav Hai Gaon, it refers to ka’akin, a kind of dough that becomes very hard after baking. It is [unclear]. The Alter Rebbe says, in parentheses, that these are what are called kichlach. They are thin and hard, and people eat them by nibbling on them, not as part of a meal. These, too, are types—or interpretations—of pas haba’ah b’kisnin: either ordinary bread filled with sweet things, or a different kind of bread because it was kneaded with honey and fruits, or something thin and made to be nibbled on—thin and hard, made for nibbling rather than for eating as a meal. So even if it has no honey—it has honey—but it is this thinner, harder kind. Today we have mezonos rolls. That is the name given to them, “mezonos rolls.” They are bread, but as for their blessings, one says

3:28:24 Speaker 4 Borei minei mezonos. This type of bread, this roll called a “mezonos roll,” now has to fit one of the three approaches. Why do I say one of the approaches? Because these three approaches can actually be understood in two ways. One could understand that Rav Hai Gaon, the Rambam, and Rabbeinu Chananel are not disagreeing about pas haba’ah b’kisnin. That is possible. Each one explains it. The Gemara speaks of pas haba’ah b’kisnin, a kind of bread made for enjoyment. Each one explains, based on what existed in his time, how he understood it, what he had seen, or what he had received by tradition: What is pas haba’ah b’kisnin? One explained it this way, another that way, and a third another way. In practice, what they all have in common is that these are made for enjoyment, for sweetness, and so on. So they all agree that they are pas haba’ah b’kisnin and that the blessing is mezonos. Or do they? Rav Hai Gaon holds that the foods whose blessing is mezonos are crisp, hard baked goods. So what would he say about the Rambam’s example, a sweet roll? A roll is not crisp or hard, so its blessing would be hamotzi. And would the Rambam say that the breads Rabbeinu Chananel describes—essentially ordinary bread dough filled with sweet things and baked that way—have the blessing mezonos? No, that is ordinary dough. So the Beis Yosef holds that they are actually disagreeing. That is why, when the Beis Yosef brings all three opinions in his commentary on the Tur, he says, after presenting all three approaches, that since there is a dispute, the blessing is in doubt. And because the blessing is in doubt for each type, we say borei minei mezonos over all of them. And people ask: What does that tell us? What has that added? Why is the blessing in doubt? Surely everyone agrees that it is mezonos. What difference does it make if one gave this example and another described that shape? Where is the disagreement? From here we see that the Beis Yosef understood that Rabbeinu Chananel

3:30:33 Speaker 4 does not agree with Rav Hai Gaon’s type of pas haba’ah b’kisnin, and likewise with the others. So each holds that the blessing over his own example is borei minei mezonos, while over the other examples it is hamotzi. That is also how the Alter Rebbe understood it and ruled when he brought the last opinion as the halachah—the basic halachah, though he says that a conscientious person should be more stringent. He says that because of the doubt, we are lenient where blessings are in doubt, and so on. Otherwise, what is the doubt? If they all hold the same view and have merely given different examples? He understands the Beis Yosef’s Shulchan Aruch this way too. It does not say there why we consequently say borei minei mezonos over all of them, but the source shows that it is because of the doubt: each holds that his own example is borei minei mezonos and the other example is hamotzi. Accordingly, our rolls have to fit one of the three approaches, either Rabbeinu Chananel’s or the Rambam’s. We do not create new approaches in the Shulchan Aruch. Which type of pas haba’ah b’kisnin is this? It has to fit one of them for there to be a ruling to say borei minei mezonos. Clearly, it is not Rabbeinu Chananel’s type of pas haba’ah b’kisnin: it is not filled with sweet fillings. And clearly, it is not a crisp, hard baked good. So everyone immediately understands that, if it is to fit an approach, it must fit the Rambam’s type of pas haba’ah b’kisnin. Let us therefore study the Rambam’s approach and see whether, according to the Rambam, these rolls are mezonos rolls—or whether even according to him they are not. The Rambam speaks of dough kneaded with honey, milk, and so on. The Beis Yosef says in Kesef Mishneh that the Rambam’s wording is incomplete. The Beis Yosef, in his commentary on the Tur, explains that the expression “dough kneaded with honey” would seem to mean there is no water in it, or perhaps a little water, but it is mostly honey. “Kneading” refers to the liquid that takes the flour and turns it into dough. So it is dough kneaded with honey. Thus he

3:32:43 Speaker 4 understood it to mean that the honey is what makes the kneading possible. Without the honey, it would remain dry flour; and if there is water, there is only a little, so it is secondary to the honey. That, according to the Rambam, is what is called pas haba’ah b’kisnin—on the Beis Yosef’s first interpretation. “Dough kneaded with honey” means it is mostly honey, mostly fruit juice. But if it is mostly water and only a minority is fruit juice or honey, even if you can taste it, that is not called dough kneaded with honey. It is called dough kneaded with water that contains honey, and its blessing is hamotzi. That is the first approach. He brings textual arguments concerning the wording about spices, the Mishnah, and so on. Or one could say no: the amount does not matter. “Dough kneaded with honey” does not necessarily mean that it could not be kneaded without the honey. No. Even if it contains a lot of water—even if it is mostly water—since honey also took part in the kneading, it was kneaded with honey. If it contains honey and the honey’s taste is discernible in the mixture—meaning you can taste it—that is enough for it to be called pas haba’ah b’kisnin. So according to the second approach, its blessing is mezonos. The main thing is that you can taste it; the amount of fruit juice does not matter, even if there is only a little. “And this appears to be the primary view.” That is the Beis Yosef’s conclusion in his commentary on the Tur: according to the Rambam, it is pas haba’ah b’kisnin even if it contains only a little fruit juice, a little honey, and so on. Of course, that is provided you can taste it—the sweetness, though it need not specifically be sweetness. There may also be milk or eggs, giving it a delicate quality, and so on, unlike bread. He explains this, and the Levush explains it at greater length. But the Beis Yosef also explains the underlying principle: bread is made with water alone, because that is when it satisfies. Of that it is said, “You shall eat, be satisfied, and bless.” That is what truly satisfies. When it contains

3:34:53 Speaker 4 sweet ingredients or ingredients that give it a delicate quality, and so on, that reduces how satisfying it is and lowers its standing as bread, so its blessing becomes mezonos. That is why, in presenting the Rambam’s view in the Shulchan Aruch, the Beis Yosef omitted the words “dough kneaded with honey.” He adopted the second interpretation of the Rambam and wrote: “And some say it is dough into which honey has been mixed.” That is the Rambam’s approach. But instead of saying “kneaded,” he says that honey was “mixed” into it. He does not specify how much honey. He only stipulates that the taste of the mixture be discernible in the dough. That is the Mechaber’s ruling. Accordingly, for those who follow the Mechaber, the Sefardim, the Shulchan Aruch, this is one of the approaches under which the blessing is mezonos. The Rema says: “And some say that this is called full-fledged bread.” Fine. Some say that dough with honey mixed into it is full-fledged bread, “unless it contains a great deal of spices, honey, and sweet ingredients, such as what is called lekach.” Lekach. Up to here, everyone would understand the Rema simply: you say that even a minority of honey is enough to say mezonos; it does not have to be the majority. But he says, “unless it contains a great deal of spices”—not just a little. Here the Rema adds a few more words: “so that the honey and spices are almost the main ingredients.” Where does that leave the flour? What does it mean for the honey and spices to be almost the main ingredients? Where does that leave the flour? Are they the main ingredients? There is certainly much more of them than there is water. So the Bach says—he brings different approaches—the Bach cites the Geonim and also Issur Veheter, who say that some were stringent about what qualifies as pas haba’ah b’kisnin for the blessing of mezonos: only a bread in which there is more honey than flour. That stringent. More honey than flour. They were stringent. He says it is only in that case. The author of the Tanya also cites this as a practice for a conscientious person.

3:37:35 Speaker 4 They were stringent about the blessing. The Bach says—and this is what the gloss to the Shulchan Aruch says—that the honey is almost the main ingredient. For the Rema, too, holds that for something to be pas haba’ah b’kisnin, like lekach, there must be so much honey that there is even more of it than flour. That is the Rema’s wording: the honey is almost the main ingredient. And the Rema adds, “And so is the practice.” Otherwise, according to the Rema, if there is not that much honey or fruit juice in relation to the flour, some say it is considered ordinary bread. And the Rema concludes, “And so is the practice.” The Rema gives lekach as an example. When the Alter Rebbe, in Birchas Hanehenin, explains what lekach is, he explicitly gives the example of lekach with much more honey than flour. So the Rema’s example of lekach is understood the same way. That is what emerges. We’ll look at the Alter Rebbe in a moment; we’ll get there. Strictly speaking, I am not invoking a stringency. There is the Bach’s position, which is stringent in this way. Let’s set aside the Bach’s stringency. The Rema. The Jewish people do not need to examine the Rema; we’ll look at the Alter Rebbe shortly. The Magen Avraham says the Rema’s words are the main ruling. So we have the Rema, and according to the Bach’s understanding of the Rema, the Rema holds that this does not fall into the category of pas haba’ah b’kisnin at all. Bread in which the fruit juice does not exceed the flour is bread. So, back to the rolls. We’ll get to the Alter Rebbe shortly. As for calling the rolls pas haba’ah b’kisnin and saying borei minei mezonos over them, we already said that the views of Rabbeinu Chananel and Rav Hai Gaon do not apply here. Only the Rambam’s view remains. And regarding that very view, the Rema concludes—whether he holds that this is the Rambam’s position or is unsure if it is—that, as he says in Darkei Moshe, “And so is the practice”: it is ordinary bread. So rolls are not like lekach. With lekach, you could ask: at home, with honey mixed into the other ingredients, might there be more honey than flour? There are cakes like that. Cakes, not cookies. But a roll—however much fruit juice we put into it, even if there is more fruit juice than water, even if all the liquid is fruit juice—the flour is still far more. So how could the blessing be mezonos? I’m not even talking about eating a certain amount. I’m not talking now about quantities or making a meal of it, or any of that. Now let’s look at the Alter Rebbe.

3:40:02 Speaker 4 One could simply say: we study the Alter Rebbe’s Shulchan Aruch, both the ruling in section 168 and Birchas Hanehenin, chapter 2. The Alter Rebbe gives one of the criteria: if the majority of the liquid is fruit juice, the blessing is borei minei mezonos—a majority in relation to the water. The Alter Rebbe says this both at length in the Shulchan Aruch and in Birchas Hanehenin. It is quite clear. So what more do we need? Here, in chapter 2, section 7, of Birchas Hanehenin: “Pas haba’ah b’kisnin—some explain it as dough kneaded with milk and honey,” etc., etc., etc. It is called kisnin, but it is ordinary bread. “A conscientious person should be stringent.” I think that comes later. That is the reasoning. A conscientious person—we are conscientious people too. All right, in Shulchan Aruch, section 168, subsection 11, he says: “Even if a little water was mixed in, if the majority is other liquids,” the blessing is borei minei mezonos. Subsection 11. So we go by the majority. Accordingly, for the rolls, the blessing is mezonos according to the basic law. And that is how the Alter Rebbe rules in practice, apart from the instruction for a conscientious person. Apparently, as a matter of practical halachah, the ruling there for all these types is borei minei mezonos according to the basic law. “A conscientious person should be stringent” is an instruction for such a person. So according to the basic law, the blessing is borei minei mezonos: with the rolls, the fruit juice must exceed the water—that is how they should be made—and accordingly the blessing is borei minei mezonos. But that itself raises a question. Or rather, we need to understand: did the Alter Rebbe rule here contrary to the Rema? That happens. There are times when he does. But the Rema rules,

3:42:43 Speaker 4 the Rema rules, “And so is the practice.” The Taz explains the Rema. The Magen Avraham says of the Rema’s ruling, “And this is the main ruling.” And according to the Rema, this is the actual practice: it is ordinary bread. Or, or you could say—very good. Wow, what an explanation. Good. We have to say, so that we do not conclude that the Alter Rebbe disagrees with the Rema here, that although the Bach explained the Rema that way, the Alter Rebbe did not. He understood the Rema’s plain meaning to be that what matters is whether the fruit juice exceeds the water. How so? How did he arrive at that? And there is the word “almost.” So, very briefly: the Rema’s wording here is short. The source is Darkei Moshe, as it often is with the Rema, and there he writes at greater length. Let’s read the Rema’s words in Darkei Moshe and understand what he means here. After the Beis Yosef examines whether the requirement is a little fruit juice or a majority of fruit juice, and concludes as a matter of halachah that even a little fruit juice makes the blessing borei minei mezonos, the Rema says in his Darkei Moshe, subsection 48: “The practice does not follow his words.” The practice is the opposite of the Beis Yosef’s ruling that a little fruit juice makes it mezonos. “For on Shabbos, Yom Tov, and at weddings, people say hamotzi over types of bread that are heavily seasoned, with the seasoning noticeable in their appearance and taste.” He describes the actual practice of saying hamotzi over these breads. That is the view of those who say hamotzi over bread on Shabbos, Yom Tov, and at weddings, even when it contains spices. It remains bread when a small amount of spices or other liquids is mixed in, even if it is noticeable, because it is only a small amount. “Unless”—here the Rema states the basic principle—“unless the main part of the dough was kneaded with” those ingredients. The question is: with what was the main part of the dough kneaded? Was it kneaded with fruit juice, or was it kneaded with water? In other words, this is precisely the question the Beis Yosef considers. So the Rema says here: In my view, the main

3:45:20 Speaker 4 halachah follows the view of the Rishonim that it is when the main part of the dough is kneaded with fruit juice that the blessing is mezonos. “And perhaps this is also the Rambam’s view. In any case, it seems to me that certain sweet baked goods called lekach have the status of pas haba’ah b’kisnin, for they contain a great deal of honey and spices, and the main part of the dough is kneaded with them.” So the Rema does not mention here that there has to be so much that perhaps the flour is outweighed. No, there is not even a hint of that here. That wording appears only in the Rema’s gloss to the Shulchan Aruch. Here the Rema explains the basic principle: the main part of the dough is kneaded with them. What does “the majority” mean, and what is the “main part”? There is flour, and the question is what it is kneaded with. And so the Kaf Hachayim says there, in subsection 8, that there is a distinction in the Beis Yosef, and he briefly sets out whether we go by a majority or not. The Beis Yosef rules the other way, that even a little fruit juice suffices, while the Rema, in Darkei Moshe, inclines toward the Rif’s view that we go by the majority. And that is what we must say according to everyone. Because anyone who opens the Kitzur Shulchan Aruch to section 48, where these laws appear and the different views are presented, will see that it does not mention any view requiring the fruit juice to exceed the flour. It does not mention it at all. It cites Rav Hai Gaon, Rabbeinu Chananel, and the view that we go by whether the fruit juice is the majority. Where is the Rema? You don’t mention him? That means the author understood that the Rema held no such view. And beyond that, we’ll shortly see the Chofetz Chaim in Derech HaChayim, klal 219. He presents this view plainly and also cites the Rif, explaining there that if fruit juice makes up the majority, the ruling is one way, and if water makes up the majority, it is the other way. He does not require the fruit juice to exceed the flour at all. It cannot be that all these authorities would fail to mention the Rema’s view altogether. They may not have been concerned about the Bach, but they would still have cited a view. From this,

3:47:20 Speaker 4 They must have understood that the Rema does not permit it because the other ingredients outweigh the flour. True, in practice, with lekach they do outweigh the flour. That is the reality, but that is not the basis for the ruling. Rather, it is because they outweigh the water. You find lekach of different kinds; lekach was a common thing. A sweet cake—that was what they had in those days. They did not have all these kinds of cakes, other kinds of cookies and the like. So he uses lekach as the example, but the ruling is not limited specifically to lekach. The main point, then, is the majority. And so when the Alter Rebbe presents the opinions about pas haba’ah b’kisnin, and discusses the basic law regarding both the blessing before eating and the blessing afterward, it is clear: if fruit juice makes up the majority, the blessing is Borei Minei Mezonos according to the basic law. There is even a proof from a single word. In the middle of the paragraph—the Alter Rebbe brings [unclear], and in a footnote he cites the Rema, the Bach, the Maharshal, the Maharam and the Taz. Anyone who looks at the Taz, the Turei Zahav, will immediately see that he understands the Rema to be following the majority. He then quotes the Bach and says the Bach’s view is a lone opinion and need not be taken into account. I do not have the text here, but clearly this is not because of how he understands the Rema; it is because of that opinion. In practice, then, according to the basic law, these rolls are Mezonos. I mean without the stringency for a baal nefesh, a particularly conscientious person, because that is the ruling, and that is how the Alter Rebbe rules in practice. The Alter Rebbe does add, in his Shulchan Aruch, a stringency for a baal nefesh who wishes to be strict with himself. He adds that stringency regarding the blessing, though he phrases it a little differently in each place. In his Shulchan Aruch, at the end of section 168:12, after stating the ruling, he says: “And any baal nefesh who wishes to be strict with himself should not eat less than the amount that constitutes a meal.” We will discuss that briefly in a moment, because

3:49:34 Speaker 4 if he eats it as part of a meal, with other food, as... then it is clear. But if he eats it normally, for pleasure, not as part of a set meal, he enters the dispute over what constitutes pas haba’ah b’kisnin. In parentheses, the Alter Rebbe adds that the two opinions can be combined: the opinion concerning dough kneaded with liquids or fruit juice, and the opinions of the Rambam and Rabbeinu Chananel together. If it is dough that was kneaded with those liquids and filled with fruit, it meets both definitions, and one can combine them to say that its blessing is Mezonos. Why not? Whether Rav Hai Gaon’s opinion can also be combined with them is not the issue here. The Bach discusses that too. We will get to combining the opinions, but here we are discussing the Alter Rebbe in Seder Birchos Hanehenin, which is what we follow—the later edition, in the siddur. After stating the practical ruling, the Alter Rebbe says that one may rely on the second view and the other authorities. But a baal nefesh should be strict with himself and not eat it without washing his hands and saying Hamotzi over bread afterward. Only when the dough was kneaded with honey may one be lenient, if there is little flour and the honey makes up the majority. Here he brings the Bach’s view: a baal nefesh should be strict with himself and say Borei Minei Mezonos only in that case. But according to the basic law, someone who is not taking that extra stringency—say, when there is reason to be lenient, because he is traveling and it is difficult, and he has not undertaken to be a baal nefesh; there is a story about that, too. Incidentally, the Shulchan Aruch says, “And a baal nefesh, if he wishes to be strict,” whereas here it says, “A baal nefesh should be strict with himself.” So there are these two formulations. Yes. I have eaten those Mezonos rolls. I ate the rolls. That is regarding the rolls one eats: one says Mezonos over them if one wishes to rely on the lenient ruling because one needs to.

3:51:46 Speaker 4 Because he is in a hurry or traveling, and so on, and he is not in the category of a baal nefesh. But there is a very significant stringency of the Alter Rebbe here. Ah, wait, wait. There is a dispute between Rabbeinu Moshe and the Raavad. Say someone eats pas haba’ah b’kisnin. Right now we are not discussing its different types: according to Rav Hai Gaon, according to Rabbeinu Chananel, according to the various opinions, this is pas haba’ah b’kisnin. But he eats it and feels full from it. He feels full. He ate more than just a small taste; he ate a portion and it satisfied him. Rabbeinu Moshe says it depends on the individual person—whether that person is satisfied. The Raavad says no. If it satisfies him, then for him it constitutes a meal and the blessing is Hamotzi. And that is how we rule in practice. The Alter Rebbe, in Seder Birchos Hanehenin, chapter 2, law 2, rules explicitly that it does not matter how much he ate. Even less than four egg-volumes, even one egg-volume—it does not matter. The question, according to the law, is whether the amount he ate satisfies him. Some people are satisfied by a small amount. Needless to say, there are people who eat four egg-volumes and are satisfied. Everyone differs according to their size, their capacity and their appetite. So if it satisfies him, according to the Rebbe’s ruling, even if it is less than four egg-volumes, and certainly less than six, there is a question of whether Hamotzi is required. What should he do? He needs to wash his hands and eat a kezayis of other bread, and then eat it. He should also say Birchas Hamazon afterward. Otherwise there is a question concerning the Rebbe’s ruling. I am not saying that because of this, but the Rebbe rules that if someone is satisfied even by a small amount of pas haba’ah b’kisnin, he must say Hamotzi over other bread. That is when he eats less than six egg-volumes. Someone who eats six

3:54:05 Speaker 4 egg-volumes says Hamotzi. Yes, I said Mezonos—sorry. He needs to say Hamotzi over other bread, and then he can eat the pas haba’ah b’kisnin. So there is no need for much weighing. Everyone knows that with almost any kind of pizza, if a person eats two slices, and certainly a little more, there is no need to measure exactly how much it weighs: an ordinary person is satisfied by that. I am not talking about a person who [unclear]; that is different. But an ordinary person is satisfied by two slices of pizza. “Satisfied” does not mean that any further eating would be excessive. That is not what it means. It means he has eaten a normal amount that satisfies him. Here it happens to be pizza, but the same applies to something else. So the package may say “Borei Minei Mezonos” ten times, but he needs to wash his hands first if he knows he is going to eat it as his lunch today and will have nowhere else to eat until evening. He knows he will eat those two slices and be ready to learn afterward. So he needs to say Hamotzi over other bread, without weighing anything. That is when he eats less than the prescribed amount. There is another point on which the Alter Rebbe is stringent: How do we measure the amount of bread? Not by the bread alone, but by the bread together with the entire meal—the foods one normally eats with bread. They too are included in the measure. That is what the Alter Rebbe writes in paragraph 3. It is also in the Shulchan Aruch, and regarding pas haba’ah b’kisnin the Magen Avraham raises a question, and so on. That is how the Alter Rebbe rules. So someone who sits down to a meal and does not eat much bread, just one roll—a typical roll, unless it was deliberately made small, is generally 130 grams. That is more than two egg-volumes. An egg-volume is approximately 55 or 60 grams, and this is an ordinary roll. They make smaller ones now, 90 grams, and smaller still—

3:56:08 Speaker 4 80 grams if you specifically ask for them. But an ordinary roll is 130 grams, approximately. You have already passed two egg-volumes. If you eat it as part of a meal with fish, meat and salads, you have added more food. First, clearly it is satisfying. And since all the food is counted together, you simply need to wash your hands beforehand. So you have gained nothing by eating a Mezonos roll. That would have been the right thing to do. More than that: even if it does not satisfy him, since the foods are counted together and the total exceeds six egg-volumes, he needs to say Hamotzi over the Mezonos rolls. If it satisfies him, and I count the Mezonos rolls together with everything else—one roll or one and a half with a serving of meat or chicken and so on, with a little tahini in between and all the other foods he eats—it all counts. He exceeds six egg-volumes, so he should simply wash his hands and eat the roll the way one eats bread. So according to the Alter Rebbe, this is our conclusion—and we will finish here and then discuss the other matters: if someone eats rolls as part of a meal, there is simply no case in which he would say Mezonos. No such case. There may be a doubtful case, but in a meal it always satisfies him, and there is no question that either he needs to [unclear], or he needs to wash his hands and say Hamotzi over other bread. If he knows he will eat a little fish and a little meat, it is possible he will not reach 350 grams. But if he eats a normal meal, he generally goes well beyond that, and then he simply washes his hands for the roll. So there is no such case. There cannot be such a case. It does not go together. It does not go together. No. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. One more thing, also about rolls. Please let me finish. A roll

3:58:05 Speaker 4 What they fill them with, the additions, whatever they may be—some add eggs, some add tuna and all sorts of things—the filling weighs about thirty grams. Ordinary filling, nothing special, is about twenty to thirty grams. So if a roll weighs 130 grams, plus another thirty grams, that’s 160 grams. Someone who eats two such rolls has no chance of still being hungry. I’m not talking now about the prescribed amounts. So you have to know: if he eats one, it’s mezonos. He isn’t someone who is stringent as a “person of conscience.” Fine, but [unclear]. As I said, if someone eats a mezonos roll by itself, and he’s the sort of person who would be stringent—for example, if he isn’t traveling. What? Yes, yes, write that down too, write that down too: if someone is traveling, or is somewhere, or is at work, then that’s good, that’s good. So I’ll repeat it. They say, to emphasize it again, “a person of conscience should be stringent.” And we say there are five levels of the soul: nefesh, ruach, neshamah, chayah and yechidah. So who is this “person of conscience”? After all, it’s the nefesh that eats bread. So a person of conscience, according to the Alter Rebbe, does not eat mezonos rolls at all. If one does eat them, one must be very careful about the prescribed amounts and the other considerations. Eat them only in a way that doesn’t—I won’t explain. That’s regarding rolls. And what about crackers, and what about [unclear]? With Hashem’s help, we’ll continue another time. Much success. Rabbi Akiva, since we’re dealing with this subject and I see many people stumbling over it, and since all the opinions were mentioned here, I asked Rabbi Belush[unclear] to give his opinion. He didn’t give it, so I’ll give it in his place. This is very common, especially at celebrations, where they serve bourekas and many Jews don’t wash their hands, even though according to all the opinions in the Siddur they should. The bourekas are filled with potatoes, or there are

4:01:09 Speaker 4 bourekas filled with meat, but in any case they aren’t sweet pastries. So apparently, according to all the opinions, they are not mezonos. But what is it about bourekas? They aren’t made from ordinary dough but from puff pastry, puff pastry. Once again, that brings us into the whole dispute over whether puff pastry is considered dough for which one must wash one’s hands, or whether it is mezonos. That’s why I think it’s best to avoid eating it on the assumption that it is mezonos. And another thing: for someone who does want to eat, for example, I know a tip—not all rabbis will agree with me. Sometimes at a meal they serve not bourekas but blintzes, blintzes: a thin batter pancake filled with potatoes as well. A blintz like that, it seems, is mezonos even according to the Siddur, because the Siddur says that something made from a thin batter is mezonos. That has nothing to do with pas haba’ah b’kisnin. Someone once asked me—I was sitting at a meal, and the waiter brought over a tray with three things on it: bourekas, blintzes and a third thing—what was it called? Moussaka. He asked me which was preferable. So I asked him, “Which do you like more?” He said he liked the bourekas more. I told him, “According to halachah, you can’t have the bourekas if you haven’t washed your hands.” So he asked me which was preferable according to halachah. I said, “First of all, the moussaka. It has no grain in it at all, so you can make the blessing borei pri ha’adamah. But if you’re asking which is preferable according to halachah, blintzes or bourekas, it’s better to eat the blintzes than the bourekas, because blintzes are made from a thin batter, which is considered mezonos even according to the Siddur.” He asked me how many blintzes one could eat—two, three, four—as Rabbi Baninov[unclear] mentioned earlier. I think the Alter Rebbe rules there that with a thin batter, one may even eat

4:03:16 Speaker 4 more than the amount that constitutes a meal. In any case, there’s a great deal more to say about this, but since it’s a practical halachic question and it’s very, very common at celebrations, it’s worth... [unclear].

4:03:36 Speaker 5 Thank you to the distinguished chossid and scholar Rabbi Banino[unclear] shlita, and to Rabbi Ashkenazi, for their illuminating remarks. With Hashem’s help, people have asked here about crackers and pretzels, and there is presumably a long list besides. With Hashem’s help, over the course of several years of Yarchei Kallah, all these questions will be clarified: what blessing should be made on each item. In any case, it seems that this pleasure of skipping the washing of hands and eating a mezonos roll is not at all so simple, from any angle. Now we’ll move on to another subject, a session on kashrus. Before I introduce the next speaker, allow me to say a little in his praise in his presence. Today we see a phenomenon: there are many kashrus experts, some genuinely expert, some perhaps less so. But we chose to bring a speaker with extensive experience in both areas: the theoretical halachic side and the practical side—how things actually work in factories, hotels, guesthouses, manufacturing plants and the like. I have the honor of inviting the distinguished Rabbi Dov Landau shlita, one of the heads of Yeshivas Sfas Emes in Jerusalem and one of the heads of the Chug Chasam Sofer kashrus committee in Bnei Brak. He is well known for his extensive knowledge of halachah in general, and especially of all matters connected with kashrus. The subject he will discuss is, in today’s language, very, very popular. Today, it seems that almost every second religious family feels it must take a vacation; if they don’t, they feel they haven’t had a summer. I’ve already seen someone write that this year more people went on vacation than in other years. He said perhaps it was because child allowances had just been cut, so people wanted to grab something quickly. This year it was simply impossible to find a vacant room, because much of the chareidi public is flocking to vacation spots. There are many guesthouses

4:05:48 Speaker 5 and hotels that are specially prepared for these vacations and given mehadrin kashrus certification. The matter is not simple. It’s not that, G-d forbid, the issues cannot be resolved, but it is not simple. And naturally, this is a common situation that people encounter every day. So I have the honor of inviting the distinguished Rabbi Landau shlita to review the halachic and practical aspects for us. When a family goes on vacation to a guesthouse or hotel, what must they be careful about, and what must they check? Rabbi Landau, please.

4:06:46 Speaker 6 First of all, I’d like to begin. I noticed earlier that Rabbi Belinov began his remarks with what the local rabbi had ended with. I noticed earlier that Rabbi Belinov began with what the local rabbi had ended with. So I too would like to begin with what Rabbi Belinov ended with. We’re talking about mezonos rolls. I want to raise the technical side of the matter. To make mezonos rolls, they certainly have to be kneaded with fruit juice. Whether it has to make up the majority or not depends on the dispute between the Beis Yosef and the Rema. But what kind of fruit juice would we knead them with? Some people knead these rolls with raisin water. From what I’ve found when I checked, there is almost no raisin water that would allow you to make that blessing, because it does not have the halachic status of fruit juice. The process of drying grapes is that they take the grapes and put them in an oven for thirty-six hours at a low temperature to dry. They become almost as hard as stone. Before marketing them, they put the raisins into special machines, special drums, or leave them in water. They absorb about thirteen or fourteen percent water, and then they are marketed to the public. So if we take those raisins and cook them or soak them in water, that water is tap water and has none of the halachic status of fruit juice. Therefore, if rolls were kneaded with this raisin water, their blessing is clearly hamotzi lechem min ha’aretz, not borei minei mezonos. Only if we take raisins dried in the sun—and there are very few of those in Israel, the Arab raisins that are left with their stems so they dry without rotting—and take ones that have not dried completely, cook them and soak them, can the resulting water be used. If the dough was kneaded with that, one may make the blessing borei minei mezonos. Otherwise, clearly not. A second possibility is if they kneaded the

4:09:01 Speaker 6 Pizza with milk—because pizza is the only dough you can knead with milk. You may not knead other dough with milk, because dough kneaded with milk may not be eaten, unless you make it “in the shape of an ox,” which has several interpretations: either triangular or small. That is the basis for making pizza with milk and cutting it into triangles, “in the shape of an ox.” Then we get into the question and debate of whether its blessing is mezonos or hamotzi. A third option, which is more common and which bakers tend to use, is to add apple juice. What is the advantage of apple juice? When you bake it, because of a property Hakadosh Boruch Hu put into apples, all the apple flavor evaporates from dough kneaded with apple juice. What you get is a roll very similar to an ordinary bread roll. So we have to examine whether a roll kneaded with apple juice, which has lost its flavor, still gets the blessing borei minei mezonos because it was kneaded with fruit juice, or hamotzi lechem min ha’aretz. That concludes the—what I’m saying about this, the mara d’asra. What? I said more than that: even without following the Alter Rebbe, even according to the Rema and the Beis Yosef, we are at a loss on the question of these rolls—whether they are mezonos or hamotzi. Yes, so I explained, according to the Rema, the plain meaning of the dispute between the Mechaber and the Rema. If water was added to wine, how much of its essence remains? The same applies to raisins. That is all about raisins that were moist. But the raisins we get are as hard as stones, and water is added afterward. Clearly, that has no status whatsoever as fruit juice. The subject I was invited to speak about is not mezonos rolls, so we won’t go on about it. I just need to know when I’m supposed to finish. Forty minutes? Excellent. There is an improper phenomenon of

4:11:28 Speaker 6 kashrus activists overstepping their bounds. It gets worse from year to year: kashrus activists, and every junior supervisor somewhere, become certifying rabbis and give certifications to large hotels, where even great rabbis can barely keep on top of the issues. They gain the public’s trust by answering questions online or appearing on religious channels, of which there are now plenty, competing with one another to answer kashrus questions and disqualify people and certifications. The first, fundamental question is: Who is trusted in matters of kashrus, and who is trusted to certify an establishment? First of all, suppose we come to a Jew’s home. Can we eat there or not? Does a person who owns a restaurant need kashrus certification or not? We know a Jew is G-d-fearing: he comes to daven every day and keeps Shabbos. Is he trusted on kashrus, or does he lose that trustworthiness because he has a financial interest? Alternatively, suppose we know that a particular Jew is not especially G-d-fearing. Is he trusted on kashrus or not? Opinions differ on this. Shulchan Aruch, Yoreh De’ah, siman 119, discusses trustworthiness in matters of kashrus. In se’if one, the Beis Yosef says: “One suspected of eating forbidden foods, whether suspected of a Torah prohibition or a rabbinic prohibition, may not be relied upon regarding them.” You cannot rely on a person suspected of violating either a Torah or a rabbinic prohibition. And if you are a guest—“Even if one is a guest in his home, he may not eat his food”; you may not eat it. The Rema says: “Even someone who is not suspected, but who is not known to be established as trustworthy in matters of kashrus, may not be bought from—neither wine nor other things about which there is a concern of prohibition. However, if one is a guest in his home, one may eat with him.” So here we have a dispute between the Beis Yosef

4:13:53 Speaker 6 and the Rema. Is every Jew presumed trustworthy in matters of kashrus, losing that trustworthiness only if we see him fail? Or must we first know that a Jew is trustworthy—we have followed his conduct and know we can rely on him—and otherwise he is not? Now, if a Jew is trustworthy, we can eat in his home according to both the Rema and the Beis Yosef. The Taz says: In Darkei Moshe, he writes, “The custom, however, is not so; rather, everyone is presumed trustworthy in matters of kashrus.” But, the Taz says, “Since the Rav did not write that here,” it implies that one should not act that way. And it is right to be stringent, since we see a decline in the generations. In Darkei Teshuvah, siman 119, subsection seven, we find something interesting. Citing Beis Hillel and Beis Lechem Yehudah, he writes: “Since the Taz wrote that in our times we see a decline in the generations, the regulations of the lands stipulated that one should not buy any food or wine from any Jew, even one established as trustworthy in matters of kashrus, unless he has a written certification from a rabbi or beis din that it was produced under supervision.” Until the matter of the written certification, though, he says the person is trustworthy. In other words, the Darkei Teshuvah cites the Council of Four Lands. The Council of Four Lands was the spiritual authority in Poland and Lithuania, from 5280 to 5524. It was the council that enacted regulations, and its records were found in Lublin. It stipulated, he says, that no one’s kashrus certification should be accepted unless it was issued by a beis din or a rabbi. Today it is customary for city rabbis to issue certificates, and for batei din to issue kashrus certificates. That was how things stood until recently. Then activists began doing it too—activists in the literal sense—whose entire knowledge comes not from studying the Shulchan Aruch or delving into the words of the Talmud, the Rishonim and the Acharonim and drawing conclusions, but from picking up a bit here and a bit there. By giving lectures on the subject, they build a reputation and issue kashrus certifications.

4:16:17 Speaker 6 Clearly, under the regulations of the Council of Four Lands, you cannot rely on kashrus activists, only on batei din and city rabbis that issue certifications. As for rabbis, there are also rabbis who are indeed Torah scholars but do not know the... the realities on the ground, the technological aspects, or how to translate the technology into practical terms. That is a problem. But clearly, someone who does not know these things... And I’ll give a few facts, a few examples. There is a question of whether bishul akum applies to eggs. With bishul akum, we have a basic rule: anything that is not eaten raw and is served at a king’s table as an accompaniment to bread is subject to bishul akum. If it does not meet those conditions, it is not. So the question is whether eggs are subject to bishul akum. In Shulchan Aruch, siman 113, which discusses bishul akum, it says: An egg, although it is fit to be swallowed raw—even though it can be eaten that way; cantors take an egg just as it is, raw—if it was cooked by a non-Jew, it is forbidden. Why? After all, it can be swallowed raw. The Taz says: Because that is eating it only under duress. An ordinary person at a meal does not eat an egg, does not swallow a raw egg; he cooks it. Therefore, an egg is subject to bishul akum. Especially nowadays, when people are very careful because of salmonella and flesh-eating bacteria not to eat uncooked eggs. Any liquid egg product leaving a factory is pasteurized, whether for ice cream or as pasteurized eggs, as we’ll see shortly. As was mentioned earlier, I work regularly in kashrus for the Chasam Sofer Beis Din of Bnei Brak, and there are activists who attack us too. One day I got a phone call telling me I should know

4:18:39 Speaker 6 At our factory, we would be violating the prohibition of bishul akum with the eggs. And all the cookies made for Pesach—on Pesach they make the cookies with just eggs, a little coconut and potato starch—would that mean all the cookies are forbidden? Eggs in their shells? No. No, no, we’ll get to that in a moment. What kind of eggs do bakeries and factories use? Today we buy cakes from Berman, from Angelo, from any number of factories. You no longer find someone standing there—the mashgiach—cracking eggs and checking whether they have blood. Today there are factories—I know of four in Israel—where a vacuum device picks up the egg, gives it a crack, breaks the shell open, and the eggs move along. You can buy egg whites and yolks mixed together, or whites and yolks separately, in large buckets. That’s what they buy, pour in and whip. That’s what they use to make the... the baked goods, the various baked goods. First of all, there’s the issue of blood. I wrote about this in the newspaper just this week. Do they check for blood or not? I mention it only in passing. The eggs are opened onto two plates: the yolk stays on top and the white falls below. The mashgiach sits and looks to see whether there’s blood. If it’s his first day on the job, he’ll look at every egg. On the second day, too. After a week of looking at eggs, I think a person needs to be hospitalized. Sitting for eight hours looking at eggs would drive anyone out of his mind. But let’s say he does look. How much can he see? In fifty percent of the eggs, he sees only the top. He can’t see the underside. So if the mashgiach is particularly good, he’ll see fifty percent. Usually the mashgichim aren’t watching so closely, and they see only ten percent. That’s what we get: eggs of which ten percent have been checked—say, twenty-five percent at the very most. Checked for blood. What do

4:20:38 Speaker 6 they actually rely on? They rely on the Rema, who says you don’t have to check every egg, since most eggs have no blood. One moment—because most have no blood, you don’t have to check. Nowadays they do check. Second, they rely on the possibility that the egg is safna me’ara—unfertilized. If it is, there are also opinions that [unclear], and that it can be eaten as it is. So again, they rely on leniencies. They rely on the majority and on all these considerations together. We see here, too, that they rely on the majority. But that’s not the point I want to make. These eggs must be pasteurized. What is pasteurization? Pasteurization is not cooking. There was a scientist in France named Louis Pasteur who was looking for a way to destroy bacteria without spoiling the product. Take wine, for example. We know the Mishnah in Shevi’is about putting wine on the fire. You may not cook wine. Why? Because it damages it or makes it unappealing. We know there’s a well-known dispute about whether cooked wine can become yayin nesech. It cannot. Why? Because the wine has been diminished. What did Louis Pasteur come up with? A way to heat a product, destroy the bacteria, and leave the product good, without spoiling it. What did he do? He took a vessel of water and heated the water, then placed inside it the vessel that needed treating—a vessel of wine or a vessel of milk. It reaches a very high temperature. It can reach... Today they don’t bring it to a boil. The bacteria are destroyed and the product isn’t spoiled. They do this with eggs, too, because they must be pasteurized. If they’re pasteurized, as anyone familiar with this knows, you can’t whip pasteurized eggs: they’ve undergone heating. You have to add an ingredient. That ingredient presents a problem on Pesach. But these eggs are pasteurized. They arrive at the factory

4:22:39 Speaker 6 pasteurized. So we need to determine the status of something pasteurized. Is cooking it afterward still considered cooking? Would there be a problem of bishul akum or not? And what about pasteurization itself? May a non-Jew pasteurize it, or may a non-Jew not pasteurize it? If we assume pasteurization counts as cooking, that means a non-Jew may not pasteurize the eggs. So someone who gives... Because, uh, if we hold that eggs are subject to bishul akum, then there’s pasteurization. But here’s something interesting in Darchei Teshuvah: we’ve never seen or heard of a rabbi questioning sugar and saying one must be particular about bishul akum. We’ve never seen “bishul Yisroel” written on a bag of sugar. And why is that? The Ben Ish Chai, in Parshas Chukas, says it’s because a Jew doesn’t put the sugar—the sugar beets—into the water. Rather, he puts them on a cart, which tips them into a vessel, and the vessel tips them onto a conveyor that moves along and drops them in. In other words, it isn’t done by his direct action, but by a secondary force, and is therefore permitted. That’s what the Ben Ish Chai says in Parshas Chukas. But Darchei Teshuvah cites a dispute over whether cooking with steam is subject to bishul akum. He brings one opinion that says it is and another that says it isn’t. The accepted practice is that pasteurization is not subject to bishul akum. That’s the reality. We see in factories that non-Jews pasteurize milk. And today milk isn’t left raw as it is, either, because of concern about bacteria. The Health Ministry doesn’t allow it, and nevertheless non-Jews do the pasteurization. In other words, that’s the accepted practice today. The Minchas Yitzchak wants to say that a Jew is required, but all the kashrus agencies accept that pasteurization is not subject to bishul akum. That is established. Halachically,

4:24:37 Speaker 6 there is an opinion to rely on. All the mehadrin kashrus agencies are particular about it. Yes. Why are they particular? Because Darchei Teshuvah cites a dispute. He quotes the Shem Aryeh. Yes, yes, of course, of course. The problem is with sardines and other things. The concern is that perhaps there was something else at the factory. Apart from that, there is an opinion to rely on. Everyone is stringent nowadays, too. All the mehadrin kashrus agencies are stringent about this as well, requiring bishul Yisroel. So what follows? Yes, but in a factory, if we’re concerned about bishul akum, Darchei Teshuvah quotes the Shem Aryeh, who says there is no problem, and he cites others who disagree. In other words, if we take the stringent view that it is subject to bishul akum, then we have the Mechaber, who says at the end of section 113 that if it was cooked by a non-Jew, it is permitted, though some prohibit it. And there’s the Kaf Hachaim there, in paragraph 81. The Kaf Hachaim consistently takes the position that when the Mechaber says, “It is permitted, though some prohibit it,” he means to prohibit it. Darchei Teshuvah also cites this in [unclear]. What? Regarding whey, there’s no need to kasher the utensils for [unclear]. Yes. No, no. There certainly are examples. Tuna, for example. There’s tuna that arrives in Israel partially cooked, and they fill it at [unclear] Canning. There are peas that arrive at Pri Hagalil, for example, from abroad, already blanched. What comes from abroad is generally processed there inside the can. Generally, yes. And that’s the dispute with the OU over whether bishul Yisroel is required. They argue that it isn’t, since it’s done with steam in a large factory, so there’s no need to be particular about it. What? According to that opinion—again, not everyone accepted it—according to the opinion that steam cooking is not subject to it, then that applies. But today, here, the agency... All

4:27:02 Speaker 6 The mehadrin authorities in Israel—that is the dispute between the mehadrin authorities in Israel and the OU abroad. The OU... The Darchei Teshuvah mentions this and argues that it is incorrect. There was a place where they were not particular about sardines, right? Sardines were not fit to be served at a king’s table either. No. Yes. They used to say that the Divrei Chaim ate sardines as long as he had them. So it turns out, again, that in these factories there is no problem with pasteurized eggs cooked by a non-Jew. Besides, I checked, and it wasn’t true. That is one example of kashrus activists. A second example: When we turn on the religious radio stations, we hear, “That certification is no good because there is no constant supervision. So-and-so is no good. We went to the factory and there was no mashgiach. We waited a whole hour. The mashgiach wasn’t there.” There is a Gemara in Tractate Avodah Zarah, page 34b: A ship carrying muries arrived at the port of Akko. It came with muries, a food made from fish brine. Rabbi Abba of Akko stationed a kashrus supervisor beside the ship. Someone said to him, “Rabbi, who watched it until now?” What about everything that happened before? Suddenly you’ve become frum. You arrived in Akko, in Eretz Yisroel, and became frum. What changed? He said, “Why? What did we have to worry about until now? If the concern is that they might have mixed in non-kosher wine, I’m not worried.” Why? Because a measure of muries costs one luma, while a measure of wine costs four lumas. Until now, we knew what they might add. They could add some sour ingredient that costs one shekel, while wine costs four. So common sense says—there is logic to everything—would he put in wine that costs four shekels instead of something cheap? It is unthinkable. There was no need to worry. Here in Akko, where wine is very cheap, there is

4:29:15 Speaker 6 reason to be concerned that they might add it. Tosafos says on page 12, in the passage beginning “Mai ta’ama,” that we have non-Jewish maidservants and are not concerned that they might bring something forbidden into the house while we are away. You see from this that there is logic to everything. We leave the maidservants at home, go to kollel, go to learn, and are not concerned that one of them might bring in something forbidden, because she has everything she needs here. In other words, halachah takes practical logic into account. If we come to a factory and there is no reason at all for this person to bring in something forbidden when he has a permitted alternative, we rely on that. Constant supervision is unnecessary. You need constant supervision when there is a concern that he might bring in something forbidden because the permitted alternative is more expensive. I’ll give you an example. We had a question before Pesach, and we disqualified the product because—honestly—because of pressure from people talking. We were making chips for Pesach in a chip factory, using cottonseed oil. We looked for oil with the best hechsher and constant supervision, so everything would be fine. There was a stock of it, and we told the mashgiach to mark where the oil level stood and check the gauges and all the details. Outside there was more cottonseed oil with a Rabbinate hechsher. We checked: same hechsher, same factory, same ship. One lot bore the kashrus seal and the other did not, and there was enough oil with the mehadrin hechsher. But then someone from outside came and said, “You should know, I checked the Rabbinate stock, and the gauge went down. You should know it went down, and they used that oil.” That raised the question of what to do. First of all, strictly speaking it was permitted, because the factory did not belong to him and he had an interest in using the oil he already had—taking all the grounds for leniency together. But again, because of those kashrus activists, we disqualified that portion

4:31:33 Speaker 6 of it. But it is clear: if there is a concern, there is a concern, and if there isn’t, there isn’t. Those are examples of why not to rely on kashrus activists, but let’s move on. What? There are raw ingredients about which there is no question at all. Take preservatives, for example potassium sorbate, which is found in many ingredients and many products. Today it is known that there is almost no difference between one supplier and another. It is just the stamp. And so on—all those issues aren’t there. Again, if there is a problem, and you say there is a problem, then there is reason for concern. If there is no problem, there is no reason for concern. Now, factories—don’t forget that factories with ISO 9000 certification cannot simply substitute one thing for another. They have to record it. ISO is an international standard under which everything brought into the factory and everything that leaves it must be recorded. There is no such thing as bringing something in without recording it. Granted, there are various loopholes, but generally it is organized. A person won’t just bring something into the factory, because he knows he can be caught. Now let’s turn more specifically to hotels. When an ordinary person who does not work in kashrus enters a hotel, he sees a hotel; he does not see the actual problems. If we go into the details, we find that a hotel that is not kosher all year is almost impossible to make kosher for part of the year, let alone for Pesach. Especially when the person granting the certification does not really know all the details of what is forbidden and permitted, but asks one rabbi one time and another rabbi the next. That is nothing. Take, for example, a well-known hotel in Caesarea. I once tried to provide kashrus certification for one of the hotels there. There are standards. You cannot just bring in any meat. For example, they do not want to bring in meat under Rabbi Landau’s supervision. Why? It does not have the approvals. As those familiar with the Ministry of Agriculture know, Rabbi Landau’s poultry from Bnei Brak is classified as cut-open poultry. He checks the tendons in the upper part of the leg, so he has to open it. A piece of chicken cut that way cannot be served in every hotel. There are all sorts of other paperwork requirements too. In other words, not every chicken can be brought into a hotel; the poultry has to meet certain conditions. And under those conditions, meat and poultry can be brought in that we would never eat, even if questions arose about it. Yet we are supposed to make such a hotel kosher. Hotels today have ovens called combi steamers. These are not ordinary baking ovens like the ones we have at home. A combi steamer bakes with both dry heat and steam. What do they bake in that oven? In special pans. The name has slipped my mind just now. Special stainless-steel pans. Pans. No, that is not what the pan is called. Gastronorm pans, yes. Those are the special pans they use in the oven. They are made of stainless steel and are very expensive. Now we need to kasher those pans.

4:34:08 Speaker 6 According to the Shulchan Aruch, in the laws of Pesach... What? I gave certification for half a day, for one meal. I certified one meal. What did we bring in there? We brought in only meat with Agudas Yisroel certification. They agreed to bring it in, under certain conditions, and we made the meal in the courtyard, as a barbecue. It wasn’t prepared in their utensils either. Those Gastronorm pans have the halachic status of baking pans. In the laws of Pesach, section 451, paragraph 11, the ruling is as follows: “A frying pan used for frying may be kashered by hagalah.” Say we have a frying pan in which eggs or blintzes were fried, and we want to kasher it for Pesach. The Beis Yosef says hagalah is permitted, and light libun—heating it until straw burns on it—is sufficient. “Some are stringent and require libun for the frying pan, but light libun, meaning heating it until straw burns on its outside, is sufficient, and the custom is to perform libun initially. Nevertheless, hagalah is sufficient if it has no crevices.” That is regarding Pesach. But for other forbidden foods, the matter is not at all simple. Yoreh De’ah, section 121, paragraph 4, says: “A frying pan used for frying—even though hagalah is sufficient for chametz on Pesach—requires libun for other forbidden foods.” In other words, if we want to kasher pans used for meat that we consider non-kosher—because if it is kosher, then, as it says in section 64, when the food is kosher and we are only being stringent about it, [unclear], there is no need to kasher the utensils. Today people are stringent and kasher everything. But there is certainly meat in Israel which, if cooked in certain pans, requires those pans to be kashered properly. I am not talking about that case. About... a utensil that has not been used within twenty-four hours. Yes, that too. Initially, one should not rely on its not having been used within twenty-four hours, though sometimes people do rely on it. Yes. Fleisch is the problem, Fleisch is the problem. Meat can be a problem. Meat can be a problem. Meat can be a problem. There are very good shechitos, and there are shechitos whose meat one must not eat.

4:35:43 Speaker 6 In the Shulchan Aruch, in the laws of Pesach. What? I gave a hechsher for half a day, for one meal. I gave a hechsher for one meal. What did we bring in there? We brought in only Agudas Yisroel meat. They agreed to let us bring it in. They agreed on condition that we do it in the courtyard, as a barbecue. It wasn’t even in their utensils. Those gastronorm pans have the status of baking trays. In the laws of Pesach, section 451, paragraph 11, the ruling is as follows: A frying pan may be kashered through hagalah. Say we have a pan in which eggs or blintzes were fried, and we want to kasher it for Pesach. The Beis Yosef says hagalah is permitted, and a light libun—heating it enough to burn straw placed on it—is sufficient. Some are stringent and require libun for the pan, but a light libun, meaning that straw burns against its outside, is sufficient, and the practice is to do libun from the outset. Still, hagalah is sufficient if the pan has no indentations. That is regarding Pesach. But regarding other prohibited foods, the matter is not at all simple. In Yoreh Deah, section 121, paragraph 4, it says: “A frying pan, although hagalah is sufficient for it with regard to chametz on Pesach, requires libun with regard to other prohibited foods.” In other words, if we want to kasher trays used for meat that we maintain is not kosher—because if it is kosher, then, as section 64 says, if the food itself is kosher and we are only stringent about it [unclear], the utensils do not need to be kashered. Nowadays people are stringent about kashering everything, but there certainly is meat in Israel that, if cooked in certain trays, would require those trays to be kashered properly. I’m not talking about that case. About... a utensil that hasn’t been used in the past 24 hours. About that, yes. But we don’t rely on that from the outset. Sometimes people do rely on it. Yes. Fleisch is the problem, fleisch is the problem. Meat can be a problem. Meat can be a problem. Meat can be a problem. There are very good shechitos, and there are shechitos whose meat may not be eaten.

4:38:35 Speaker 6 More dairy utensils—the utensils, I know, even porcelain utensils. We’ll get to that in a moment, all right? Yes, yes, yes. One moment. The concern about porcelain ovens. All right, we’ll be brief and discuss these things. So it turns out that baking trays cannot be kashered under any circumstances. Glass utensils. I’ll be very brief here about glass utensils for Pesach. Regarding Pesach, we find a major dispute over whether they can be kashered. In any event, glass utensils are generally used for cold things, not hot ones, so certainly, in practice, the utensils can be washed and used. Now, ovens. An oven needs to be kashered. Strictly speaking, it would seem that an oven cannot be kashered. Why? The Shulchan Aruch says in the laws of Pesach: “A kuvya, which is a vessel made of bricks and earth in which one bakes and fries, and likewise a small oven called padla or padla, which is heated from the outside—one may not bake in it on Pesach.” If we have an oven where the fire is not inside, as it is when baking matzos, but outside the chamber, outside the structure, and it heats the structure, which is how we bake, it cannot be kashered; one cannot bake in it on Pesach. Why? “Because the chametz in it is not expelled that way; but if one fills it with coals on the inside...” It would follow that our electric ovens—most of the ovens we have today at home or in bakeries, where the heat source is outside the metal chamber, not inside it—cannot be kashered. One moment. All right. In other words, if we read this paragraph of the Shulchan Aruch at face value, ovens cannot be kashered. But it is not quite that simple. Why? There it is talking about ovens in which the bread was placed on the bottom, on the oven’s surface. Today we put a baking tray inside the oven, in the oven’s airspace, so that changes things. [unclear] So we put the baking tray inside the oven, in its airspace. Yes,

4:41:18 Speaker 6 Since we put it in the oven’s airspace, there is already a dispute here over whether steam renders the oven forbidden or not. Some are stringent and some are lenient. We know from the Shach, siman 108, subsection 12—and this is brought in the Taz, siman 92—that one can be lenient regarding steam that enters an oven. Not everyone agrees with that. Beyond that, if we generally leave it unused for twenty-four hours, we again have the question of an impaired taste, because a taste that has deteriorated is permitted. The Maharshal does say, however, that this is not permissible as an initial practice. On Pesach we have an additional difficulty with the Rema. The Rema says not to do it. So if we want to kasher an oven in a hall or a hotel, the best approach is this: clean the oven very, very thoroughly, and leave it unused for a full twenty-four hours. After that, turn it on at its highest temperature for an hour, so that everything inside burns off, and then use dedicated baking trays. We can certainly rely on all these considerations together with confidence, even as an initial practice. But these steps must be taken; if they are not, there is a problem. It won’t be baked properly. Yes, it’s possible to—there is a possibility, but if we’re concerned about that, anyone who wipes the top of an oven with his hand will see that there is actual residue up there. So the top needs to be burned off with a blowtorch too. If you put things up top, then the top needs it as well. But it is clear that the baking trays must be new. Another issue is porcelain plates. Porcelain is clearly treated as earthenware. What? Porcelain. Porcelain is earthenware. It has no glass coating at all. And how do they make the glaze? They put it in an oven and it reaches a high temperature, so its upper surface becomes

4:43:38 Speaker 6 somewhat shiny, or they spread a certain substance on it. Regarding the immersion of utensils, the She’eilas Yaavetz says, as cited in Gilyon Maharsha in the laws of immersing utensils, that porcelain does not need to be immersed. That is what he writes there, because it is earthenware. All right, the rabbi says it is a glass coating. I give up.

4:44:17 Speaker 7 I checked. I checked. It isn’t.

4:44:32 Speaker 6 In any event, even if we were to assume that it is glass, part of it is certainly earthenware. So if it is glass, we can apply the leniencies for glass. But if it is earthenware, the question arises whether we can use it or not. The Shulchan Aruch rules, in siman 451, paragraph 1, that earthenware must be fired. In practice, earthenware cannot be kashered; it can only be broken. Earthenware has to be broken. The truth is that firing should work, but we are afraid it will crack. That is why it cannot be kashered. We might also have been able to rely on hagalah, immersion in boiling water, but hagalah too is only [unclear]. By the way, I saw a nice thought in Pardes Yosef: Why did they have to break earthenware utensils in the Beis Hamikdash every day? They could have relied on hagalah as well. But they never required [unclear] sacrificial meat in the Beis Hamikdash, so there was no need for that either. But I don’t want to go on at length, because my time is almost up. Another seven minutes. What we can do, though, is rely on the Ittur with regard to porcelain. There is an interesting Ittur in siman 121. The Ittur says: “If I were not afraid of my teachers, I would say that even an earthenware pot that absorbed only a rabbinically prohibited substance can be immersed in boiling water three times, and that is sufficient.” If I were not afraid, I would say that even earthenware—that is, it can be kashered three times. This is also mentioned in Shulchan Aruch, siman 113, paragraph 16: Utensils in which a non-Jew cooked food subject to the prohibition of bishul akum require kashering, while some say they do not. And even according to those who require kashering, if it is an earthenware utensil, one immerses it in boiling water three times, and that is sufficient. In other words, there is a dispute here over whether earthenware can be kashered. So if it is porcelain that was used

4:47:00 Speaker 6 with boiling-hot food, perhaps one should be stringent. But porcelain that was used for dairy—dairy utensils are generally not used with boiling-hot food, and if they were, it was in a second or third vessel. So I think we can rely on this: take the porcelain and kasher it three times, changing the water each time—not using the same water, but fresh water on each of the three occasions. Then we can rely on it. But again, all this applies only when it is actually done. From what I hear, though, the people in charge of kashrus who grant certifications are not particular about this.

4:47:36 Speaker 8 Can that be done with a dishwasher?

4:47:38 Speaker 6 What?

4:47:39 Speaker 8 A dishwasher.

4:47:41 Speaker 6 With a dishwasher. Some dishwashers can be used, because generally a dishwasher does not reach the necessary temperature. If it reaches a high temperature and has a water bath—some have a water bath and some have spray jets. If it has spray jets, that is only pouring, and pouring is not good enough. Granted, if that is how it was used most of the time, the question is what temperature it reached. But ideally, if we want to do this, there are dishwashers—these are specially ordered—that have a water bath. The utensils go inside and the water boils. That is certainly good. Another thing: of course, the tables need to be kashered, and that takes a great deal of work. Another thing is the microwave. Today there is a microwave everywhere. There are microwaves combined with ovens, and there are microwaves without an oven. But a microwave works through a special tube, a magnetron tube. It emits electromagnetic waves. The waves strike the food and interact with it, and that interaction heats it. Studies have shown that food heated in a microwave by these waves is not cooked. That is, scientifically speaking, scientifically speaking, it is not cooked. Halachically, though, a person who cooks with it might be liable for cooking on Shabbos; I don’t know. It is like the case we find with an egg. If someone cooks an egg in the sun, there is a dispute in the Gemara over whether that is considered cooking. And if it is cooked, the point is not that it hasn’t been cooked, but that this is not the usual way to cook it. The same applies here: it is not clear whether, halachically, this counts as cooked or not. In any event, if we put meat inside—clearly, if we put meat inside and turn on the microwave, the meat heats up and gives off steam. In other words, the microwave fills with steam from the meat and becomes fleishig. Whether it is scientifically considered cooked or

4:50:01 Speaker 6 It isn’t cooked, scientifically speaking. If we later put milk inside, or put in pizza to heat it, the microwave will absorb that too. That means the microwave will then be prohibited. And if we’re concerned about absorption inside an oven, that would also be prohibited. So before we get into any of that, we have to kasher the microwave thoroughly. You can do this with a microwave at home too: clean it thoroughly, wipe it down, leave it for a full twenty-four hours, and put a large container of water with bleach inside. Huh? One moment. A large container with bleach, so that the microwave fills with steam. Let it fill with condensation, and we can rely on that. Now, the glass plate inside should be kashered; and if we don’t want to rely on that method, put it into a vessel for hagalah and actually immerse it in boiling water. Yes. And if we don’t rely on that either, then from now on, after kashering the microwave, every food we put in should be wrapped in plastic, tied shut, and then wrapped in another layer of plastic and tied shut. Why two layers? Because if there’s condensation, we know from section 91—and it’s also brought in the Mishnah Berurah, section 451, subsection 1, regarding a stovetop grate—that a dry vessel does not transfer a prohibition to another dry vessel. So even if there is something there, the first layer won’t transfer it to the second, and then we’ll be able to use this microwave for either dairy or meat. What? If it’s wrapped in plastic, nothing will transfer from the door. First of all, the door is plastic, not glass, usually. But it won’t transfer. No, it won’t transfer, but even if there is something there—if the food is in plastic wrapping, it won’t transfer. Wrap the food, not the plastic. You can’t wrap the plate in plastic; it won’t turn. Wrap the food in plastic, and that covers all our obligations. So forget it.

4:51:59 Speaker 9 Fish and meat.

4:52:01 Speaker 6 Fish and meat—there’s a Shach that says a vessel doesn’t absorb it.

4:52:05 Speaker 9 Not together.

4:52:05 Speaker 6 Not together. One after the other is certainly permitted. Yes.

4:52:10 Speaker 9 One moment, one moment.

4:52:11 Speaker 6 One moment, one moment, Rabbi Loib Manah[?], one moment. Here’s how the schedule will go now. We’ll hear one more lecture in a moment; I’ll introduce the speaker shortly. After that, those who haven’t yet davened Minchah will daven. Then there will be a kashrus panel, followed by questions and answers. Rabbi Landau will also take part in the panel, so the questions already asked, and any questions people still want to ask, can be put to him shortly during the panel. Well, the day is short and the work is plentiful. I’d like to invite a friend and colleague to give the next lecture. He may be young in years, but he is one of the foremost experts in kashrus generally, and especially in matters relating to the mitzvos that depend on the Land of Israel. Among other things, he specializes in insects in animal and plant foods. He truly is one of the leading experts in this field today, and he devotes himself to it with great self-sacrifice. He’s also an engaging speaker. So if the audience listens—and I see that you still have the patience—you’ll certainly enjoy it. I have the honor of inviting my friend and colleague, the distinguished Rabbi Schneur Zalman Revach. Why is he called Schneur Zalman? That’s a story in itself. He’ll come and speak to us about problems involving insects in animal and plant foods. Rabbi Revach, please. What? His father, yes; he didn’t come. He lives in Tel Aviv. We don’t know that. He’s from Tel Aviv. I think you want to... Thank you very much to the moderator. To resolve the disagreement between Rabbi Landau and the local rabbi: there are two kinds of porcelain. Even at the Naaman factory in Israel, there’s the well-known porcelain. It’s an old, familiar dispute, and it does have a glaze coating. The rabbi is right that it’s made at a very high temperature. Still, still, still, most later authorities hold that it has the status of an earthenware vessel in every respect, and that is the practical halachah. Rabbi Landau is right, though, that there are special products made with two coats, applied twice, whose glass coating is of a much higher quality. There is room to be lenient in that case.

4:54:36 Speaker 6 As a practical matter. I want to tell Rabbi Landau that in Tel Aviv, Rabbi Amar required the large Hilton Hotel to spend seventy thousand shekels and did not allow them to kasher their vessels three times with fresh water each time for the changeover from chametz to Pesach. This has nothing to do with dairy and meat, because Rabbi Amar firmly held that porcelain has the status of earthenware, both after the fact and from the outset, and that was his practical ruling. And it’s true that there are two kinds of porcelain; you’re right about that. Ladies and gentlemen, there is what’s available and there is what’s ideal. Rabbi, I’ll move to another topic, or we’ll never finish. Naaman makes two lines of products. The normal, standard Naaman porcelain is earthenware. Their standard product is earthenware. If there’s a special order—what do I mean by earthenware? It has the basic, standard coating, about which all the early authorities and all the later authorities still hold, for the most part, that porcelain is like earthenware. That’s also how we rule in practice. Naaman has a special product made to order for hotels. For example, the Hilton paid—I saw the invoice—tens of thousands of shekels more to the Naaman company, on the instructions of rabbis from Bnei Brak, to have it given two coats, a double coating, so that it would be considered glassware. That would mean, incidentally, that it could be used on Pesach without any kashering at all, like actual glassware. Rabbi Amar did not agree to that. The Hilton did not receive a Pesach kashrus certificate until the actual eve of Pesach, when it replaced all its Naaman vessels. Well, ladies and gentlemen. Insects, animal foods, plant foods. Time is so short. It’s not my fault. I tried to arrive on time, but I understand things have run long, and our deadline is Minchah. So we’ll do what we can in the time we have. I’ll focus more on animal foods than on plant foods. There are slides too, arranged and organized according to the—Rabbi Yossi, it’s all properly organized. If we have time and manage to show them, I think the audience will understand the points better. I’ll tell you

4:57:03 Speaker 6 why the discussion I want to address begins here. The world of insects is a world unto itself. The insect system, the arthropod system, includes the class of insects, which contains about a million distinct kinds of insects. On the order of a million. It’s an enormous population found everywhere in the world. I have yet to see a country with no insects. I haven’t seen one. And I’ve been to places of bitter cold. To this day, I can’t forget my impressions of Russia. The rabbis’ wives tell me, “There’s no such thing here,” and I look and tell them, “If there’s no such thing, then you don’t have vegetables either.” Wherever there are vegetables, there are insects. There’s no other practical possibility. The produce may be grown in greenhouses, but insects are found in greenhouses too. I’m in Iceland—no one disputes how cold that country is—and there are insects there too. They’re everywhere. We’re familiar with insects in plant foods. We’ve heard about them, thank Hashem; we’re speaking to Torah scholars, people who fear Heaven. People hear, listen, pay attention, see for themselves, go into a vegetable store and see the special produce labeled “insect-free.” They know about it; there’s discipline. Though I always say we need to improve, I still see Torah scholars buying corn and eating it right off the cob, and that’s a real shame, because with this crop you can’t clean the corn while it’s still on the cob. It can’t be done. They subjected it to blood and fire and pillars of smoke, and all the plagues of Egypt, and the thrips remained inside. If time permits, we’ll see that in the slides too. But there certainly is awareness and discipline, and that’s how we act in practice. Rabbi Landau spoke about kashrus in hotels, about mashgichim. I came back early this morning from a country very close to us. How fortunate we are, Rabbi Landau, that we’re talking about a mashgiach who checks fifteen percent. I dealt with a country, honored Rabbi, where the

5:00:00 Speaker 6 All the kashrus supervisors I met put on their kippahs when they entered the room. What? That’s an achievement. In any case, when it comes to insects, unfortunately the supervisors themselves are still far from truly knowing what needs to be checked and what to watch out for. I see a supervisor checking rice and throwing away every grain with a black spot, even though 99.9 percent of those black spots are nothing at all. They’re a natural part of how it grows. Cashews: most of the bits of shell that turn brown when the nut is processed become insects in the eyes of supervisors. On the other hand, I see supervisors who don’t clean leafy vegetables properly or—and I hope I’m not being recorded—use “bug-free” vegetables as though they’re 100 percent clean. That isn’t good either. Since I see that I’m not only being recorded but filmed, I’ll say it straight to the camera: even bug-free vegetables from these companies can have problems, and supervisors need to know how to deal with them. True, they’re much cleaner; they’re presumed clean. There’s a discussion about whether they need to be checked at all, whether the incidence is still halachically significant or not. But again, that isn’t the main point. This is a comment on what Rabbi Landau said about the standard of supervisors, and I think it’s very important: every kashrus organization that employs supervisors should refresh their knowledge and teach them what to watch out for, what to check, and how to check it. They need to recognize the insects. Know your enemy. If you don’t know the enemy facing you, how will you deal with it? How do you get rid of it? I still hear people who are certain that soaking in salt water or vinegar helps remove insects. That’s childish. It’s not correct professionally, it’s not true, and it has no basis in reality. In salt water, the insects just become tastier because they’re salty—nothing more. Soaking does not loosen the grip of an insect that secretes wax, such as an aphid

5:03:00 Speaker 6 on a leaf. True, a certain percentage come loose. But it has never brought the produce to an acceptable level of cleanliness. Again, it’s a lack of knowledge, and it isn’t their fault. It was passed down from father to grandmother to grandfather, but we really do need to put these ideas aside. The answer is simple, Rabbi. The western flower thrips arrived in Israel in 1983. The western flower thrips. The Mediterranean fruit fly arrived in Israel in 1948, or 1946. The leaf miner has been here only in the last ten to fifteen years. Now the Rabbi asks: what happened? GATT agreements, import agreements, produce being smuggled, movement from one country to another—things that didn’t happen in the past. And above all, the words of Rabbeinu the holy Or Hachayim, who says: “As deeds become corrupted, so does creation become corrupted.” That’s already a Chassidic vort. But that is what the holy Or Hachayim says. He says that when the world and creation become corrupted by people’s deeds, we can see it with our own eyes in the insects that spread and take over. Why do I want to speak more about living creatures than about plants? Two months ago I encountered something that troubled me very, very much. I wrote an article about it, and I want to tell you the main points of the halachah. Fish. Everyone sitting here eats fish in one form or another, one kind of fish or another. Among the creeping creatures, as the holy Torah calls them, there are water-dwelling creatures, and someone who eats one transgresses four prohibitions. I’m counting according to Rabbeinu the Pri Chadash. A water-dwelling creature is any insect found in water, whether drinking water or another liquid. A person takes some water, filters it, and seals the bottle so that nothing from outside is in it or can get in. After some time he opens it, and there are insects inside. Those insects are called water-dwelling creatures.

5:05:38 Speaker 6 Whether they are permitted or forbidden depends on whether they moved onto the outside of the container. It’s a long discussion. I’m sorry I’m not going into it. In principle, by the way, one may drink the wine directly without any problem, as it says regarding a water well: one may lie down and drink, but should not fill a cup, lest the creatures move out of the water. Someone who eats a water-dwelling creature transgresses four prohibitions. Land-dwelling creatures are those ants, thrips, aphids, and mites—all those types of insects, from two-tenths of a millimeter upward, all the way to Prodenia and Plusia caterpillars, which can be around five centimeters long. Someone who eats a land-dwelling creature transgresses five prohibitions. Not now. He transgresses five prohibitions. A flying creature: someone who eats one transgresses six prohibitions. And what is a flying creature? Those creatures that fly are called flying creatures—flies, mosquitoes, and the like. We most often encounter land-dwelling creatures on plants, in the various kinds of vegetables and fruits. We are now in summer, when we need to be very careful with soft fruits. You know the Mediterranean fruit fly, or the fruit fly in professional terminology? The female has an egg-laying tube at the end of her body. She lands on the fruit and lays her eggs; the larva enters, grows near the pit, and begins to eat. If you catch it at that stage, the fruit is still firm, but it has a puncture mark. At a later stage it begins to soften. When it gets too soft, it becomes obvious, because by then it is also beginning to rot, attracting the vinegar fly, which makes the fruit completely soft. This is a time to be very careful with summer fruits, where this is very common. Incidentally, it is also found in citrus fruit. We encounter flying creatures too. We find mosquitoes and flies getting into food, and we need to be very careful about them. You’re eating at the table on Shabbos, a light is on, and flying creatures are circling

5:08:31 Speaker 6 the light. Usually that flight ends with a few dives into the salads, and these things call for the utmost care. We encounter water-dwelling creatures less often, but there are a great many aquatic parasites in fish. The fish serves as a host for many parasites that attach themselves to it and draw nourishment from it—essentially taking the food the fish eats for itself. What happens next is that after the parasite settles on the fish... I’m speaking about the female parasite, because the male actually shrinks and dies off. The males of these aquatic parasites are inactive. The female develops organs on the part of her body that remains outside in the water, rather than in the head embedded in the fish. From there a new generation emerges, attaches itself to new fish, new hosts, and the cycle repeats. A small, average number on a fish does not affect it at all. A catastrophic number causes anemia and death, and that is very rare. Why am I telling you this? Health authorities around the world do not prohibit the sale of fish with parasites embedded in them. A dead aquatic parasite is generally not harmful to health. There is Sphyrion lumpi. Incidentally, even when it’s alive it isn’t harmful, as is true of a very large proportion of them. There are several types of parasitic creatures that health ministries around the world classify as harmful to health, but even with those, the concern is when they are alive, not dead. So in practice, we receive a great many fish infested with aquatic parasites. Now note the following detail: some fish are sea fish. We know sea fish. Some are pond fish; we encounter those too. Some can live both in ponds and in the sea, like carp. You can find it in the Kinneret, and you can find it in private ponds. Each has different kinds of parasites. True, nematodes—that is, worms in the intestinal cavity—are found in sea fish, not pond fish. By contrast, types of

5:11:34 Speaker 6 Aquatic insects are found in ponds and in the sea. But while I can’t do anything about them in the sea, a pond is, after all, an enclosed place, and I can deal with them there. So what the kibbutzim do is treat the ponds by spraying. Just as you’re familiar with spraying vegetables and fruit, they spray inside the ponds with a substance called Bronx. I don’t want to say here what its effects are. I’d rather you didn’t know and kept eating. Right now, we are in the midst of major efforts to use a new substance and require pond owners to use it, because the health risks are not small. The Ministry of Health does regulate how long they may spray with this substance and when they must stop, to avoid harming the public. When they use it, most types of parasites disappear. Now I want to focus, from a halachic standpoint, on two types of parasites that pose a very serious problem in carp, and address a practical halachic point concerning them. Carp have two types of parasites: one is argulus, and the other is lernaea. Argulus is a transparent parasite. It has two black eyes and two round suction cups. It doesn’t burrow its head into the fish; it simply settles entirely on the fish and draws nourishment from it through its suction cups. This parasite comes off when the fish is scraped. That means the fish should reach the kosher wholesalers without it. But if it arrives with the parasite, the mashgiach doesn’t rush to send it back. The mashgiach commits a minor violation of health regulations and puts a substance called DVP into the fish tank for two hours. Of course, the veterinarian isn’t around. After two hours, he takes another sample and checks whether it worked. Why do I say “without a veterinarian”? Because the matter isn’t clear-cut. Some say it’s fine; others say it isn’t. The Ministry

5:14:22 Speaker 6 of Health decided to sidestep the issue. We are now engaged in a major research project with the Sterili company to find a substance that will be approved both by the FDA in the United States and by the Ministry of Health authorities here in Israel, so that it can be used. But there is a more problematic parasite. Over this one, I had a very difficult halachic disagreement with one of the most prominent kashrus boards in Israel, one of the country’s longest-established kashrus boards. The second parasite is called lernaea. We don’t—no, no. First of all, you can peel off the skin, but we can also deal with it easily. That is, we soak it, take it out, take it out—or don’t take it out. It’s easy for us to deal with. I can’t hear. When you scrape off the scales, the argulus parasite comes off. The problem is, as I’m about to tell the rabbi—if we manage to see it in the slides, too; I no longer know how much time I have, because I’ve completely lost track—argulus also sits in places the scaling doesn’t always reach. Therefore, in practice, we do not permit it or rely on scaling. No, no, no—argulus. Everything I’ve discussed so far has been about argulus. In practice, I do not rely on scaling, because argulus sits in places we don’t scale either. The more serious problem is the lernaea parasite. Lernaea burrows its head into the fish, while the outer part remains exposed. When the fish reaches a wholesaler with kashrus supervision—and, gentlemen, I want to tell you clearly: not all the fish sold in Israel pass through a kashrus supervision system. Period. It’s important that you know this. They do not pass through kashrus supervision. It’s important to buy fish from places that are under kashrus supervision. When the fish reaches a place where a mashgiach is present—and not a mashgiach whose job is to come once a week to collect five kilos of fish to take home, but a mashgiach who does his job faithfully—

5:16:47 Speaker 6 Sadly, that’s the situation I encountered when I took over in Tel Aviv: there was a mashgiach whom I waited so long to see, but never managed to. I’ll never forget the embarrassment on the owners’ faces when I asked what the mashgiach was paid. Eventually, one of them told me that every Friday he came to pick up a box of fish, and that was the beginning and end of his work. Rather, thank G-d, in a properly run place, a mashgiach arrives every morning at four o’clock, receives the shipment and checks a sample of it. He learned about the parasites at my institute, was thoroughly tested, and knows the subject well. Today, almost all the mehadrin kashrus boards rely on his work and no longer send their own mashgichim into the wholesale facilities. When he sees lernaea on a fish, he simply rejects the entire shipment. But then something astonishing came to my attention. A fish dealer from Bnei Brak came and said, “The kashrus board lets me take the shipment even if it has lernaea in it.” Why? What is the basis for permitting it? “Ask the rabbi.” With Hashem’s help, we have a good relationship with that great rabbi, so I called him. He told me, “The fish is scaled.” I said, “With respect, Rabbi, what follows from that?” He said, “In that case, it isn’t a whole creature, and if it isn’t a whole creature, it is nullified.” I said, “With respect, Rabbi, I have two answers to that. First, have you encountered lernaea somewhere other than among the scales, such as on the underside of the fish? And second—and this is the harder point—it’s true that insects have the halachic status of a whole creature when they are intact.” That was supposed to be the subject of the class. I see the introduction has taken up the whole class, so I’ll at least cover the main points. When do I need to finish? Where are the organizers? I’ll pace the class accordingly. When is Minchah, Rabbi? Seven-oh-five. So I have ten minutes. I’ll try, in these ten minutes—

5:19:00 Speaker 6 because I really do need to finish in these ten minutes. Very, very briefly, why do I hold—and this is also the halachic ruling, which, thank G-d, the leading rabbis of the generation agreed with; I hope that board has stopped doing this too, and I understand that it has—but I’ll explain it in a word. The law concerning a whole creature is rabbinic law. It is not a Torah-level law, although there is some indication otherwise in Tosafos in tractate Chullin. In practice, the law concerning a whole creature is rabbinic. Here is what that means: although forbidden substances mixed into permitted food are nullified, whether in sixty times their volume or in a majority, as the case may be, a whole creature is never nullified, even in a thousand times its volume. Why? Because a whole creature is significant—not significant in the ordinary sense, like a piece worthy of being served to a guest, but significant because one receives lashes for eating it even though it is smaller than a kezayis. Yes, that is the view of most of the Rishonim, unlike the Rosh Yosef on Chullin, who says its significance is like that of a piece worthy of being served to a guest. He stands alone against everyone else on this issue. Rather, in practice, as the other Rishonim say, the fact that one receives lashes even though it is smaller than a kezayis shows that it is significant. Incidentally, a scholarly aside: I’d be grateful if someone could point me to a source on this. You know there are insects—we discussed earlier ones that developed inside a bottle of water, inside a bottle of [unclear], or that developed while still attached to the ground. The latter are forbidden by Torah law even if they never left it. Insects that developed in something detached are permitted unless they leave it. That’s a well-known halachah. What if one left and returned? It’s a question left unresolved in the Gemara. In practice, we are stringent in a case of doubt involving Torah law. But if someone eats such an insect, does he receive lashes or not? He does not, because it is uncertain whether it has the status of a whole creature. If I say that status depends on liability for lashes, here he does not receive lashes. If he does not receive lashes

5:20:59 Speaker 6 The entire prohibition remains because of a doubt concerning Torah law. If one is not liable for lashes, they do not have the status of a whole creature. And if they do not have that status, we have very significant grounds for permitting their use in other things, but this is not the time. Rabbi Landau knows the sugya; he has dealt with it. I have not come across a responsum on this. Not because it is unimportant. Again, the Rosh Yosef is not the practical ruling. In practice, the ruling is that a whole creature is not nullified, because one is liable for lashes for eating it. No! I am saying if, if, if the definition of a whole creature depends on liability for lashes, then if there are no lashes, it is not considered a whole creature. And there is a great deal of evidence for that. The question is what we say here in practice. That is another discussion. Just a second—perhaps we will do that later. I don’t know; there is no time left. Okay, that was just for the scholars. If anyone has something in writing on this, it would help me very much. In any case, what are the conditions for something to be considered a whole creature? Rabbi, what are the conditions? We have well-known conditions. Rabbi, please be quiet for a moment. What are the conditions? They are as follows: we need—we need... I remember something from the Yiddish. Rabbi, you see, what are the conditions? They are as follows: it must be a living creature. It must be whole. And it must be something forbidden from the beginning of its existence. Straightforward halachah. Three things; the Ran presents them very clearly and systematically. What are the three definitions, the conditions for something to have the halachic status of a whole creature? Incidentally, again, this raises... If I say it must have been forbidden from the beginning of its existence, an insect that developed on detached produce and then left it becomes forbidden as an insect because it left. But people ask—and that is fine; there is the Pleisi and the Chavas Daas, everyone knows this—why is it so? At the beginning of its existence it was not forbidden, because an insect

5:22:54 Speaker 6 that developed on detached produce is still permitted. So if it was not forbidden then, it was not forbidden from the beginning of its existence. If it was not forbidden from the beginning of its existence, it lacks one of the conditions for being considered a whole creature. If so, it is not one. The rabbi shlita writes in Shema Shlomo, volume one—the Rishon LeZion, Rabbi Amar, writes about it in volume one. He brings a lengthy discussion in Yoreh De’ah, siman one, on all the general laws of a whole creature. There he reinforces some very wonderful points made by the Chida on this subject. Anyone interested can look there. Now, to the point: when we have these three criteria for a whole creature, clearly, if one of them is missing—if it is not whole, if it is missing a limb, even one on which its life does not depend—it is not called a whole creature. If so, ostensibly, that kashrus committee says: a condition is missing here, so it is not a whole creature. My teachers and friends, let us set that aside. The ruling in Shulchan Aruch, siman 104:1, is explicit. Maran says: “A mouse that fell into beer,” and so on. Maran says that even if it was cut into small pieces, if the liquid is thick and cannot be strained, it is all forbidden. Why? Because we are concerned that one might encounter the actual forbidden substance. Where—[unclear]. Granted, if it is a liquid you can strain, then you can separate the two. But here there is still that concern. Forget the question of a whole creature: one might encounter the actual forbidden substance. Now what might someone say? I want you just to look at this slide, and I very much want you to notice what I am talking about. When a carp has Lernaea, there are unmistakable blood marks and signs of injury on the fish. Clearly—that is one point. Second, run your hand over the fish and you will feel hard spots. What are those spots? The heads of the Lernaea that remained embedded in the fish. So under the rule that we are concerned one might encounter— And there is a book,

5:24:56 Speaker 6 Maadanei HaShulchan, by one of the sages of our generation. He discusses it there at length. There is [unclear], which is very interesting. The Aruch HaShulchan writes—I will tell you how the Aruch HaShul defines it. He writes in chapter four: what do the laws of nullification have to do with this? Nullification applies when the forbidden substance is not discernible, he says. But here, as soon as it is discernible, the entire question of nullification falls away. It is discernible in its own right. The rabbi is talking about gefilte fish. Everyone eats gefilte fish. The rabbi eats only gefilte fish, only gefilte fish. The rabbi does not eat [unclear]. Fine. The rabbi was still talking about carp. Rabbi, Rabbi shlita, you are talking about carp. What will we say about the other fish? What will we say about the other fish? Well, since there are three minutes left, I just want you to see what I mean. Is that possible? Rabbi Yeshaya? What? It is not possible anymore, it is not possible. Then take my word for it: it is plainly visible. So, in any case, I want to say this: I am sorry I addressed only the main points. Presumably there will be other opportunities. But there is one thing I want to emphasize. I think it is very important for everyone involved in kashrus to make every possible effort to ensure the standard of the supervisors. You should know that these matters are not out of reach. It can be done well and organized properly. When the public relies on a kashrus committee, it is important that they know it is headed by professionals who give proper guidance and are themselves properly guided. Then, G-d forbid, our pure table will not be compromised. May Hakadosh Boruch Hu help us neither to stumble nor to cause others to stumble, and may no forbidden food, G-d forbid, come into our hands. Be strong and resolute.

5:26:58 Speaker 10 I would like to invite the rabbis to the stage: Rabbi Landau, Rabbi Dov Landau, whom we heard; Rabbi Schneur Zalman Revach; and Rabbi Yossi Steinberger, who will moderate the panel. The audience will be able to ask questions, whether about matters discussed here or more general matters—whatever is weighing on their minds. Rabbi Yossi Steinberger, please.

5:27:31 Speaker 6 All right, the two of them switched places; I switched places with him.

5:27:40 Speaker 11 Rabbis Landau and Revach, please.

5:27:56 Speaker 6 Yossi, until exactly eight o’clock.

5:27:59 Speaker 11 Okay.

5:28:00 Speaker 6 Segev.

5:28:01 Speaker 11 All right, give me the announcement.

5:28:04 Speaker 6 Rabbi Steinberger. Until exactly eight o’clock. I’ll break my neck. What? What?

5:28:15 Speaker 11 Well, since our time is very, very short, we have only twenty minutes. We are at a Yarchei Kallah being held in connection with, or close to, 20 Menachem Av, the yahrzeit of the holy Rabbi Levi Yitzchak, the Rebbe’s father. There is a well-known sicha in which the Rebbe relates that once, when the Communists came to power, his father was asked to certify the matzos baked in his city and the surrounding district, from which all the Jews ate. They asked him to sign that they were kosher. They told him, “You should know that if you disqualify them, now that Communism has come to power, all the wheat and all the profits belong to the state, to the government. If you disqualify them, you will cause the state a loss, and you should know that you will be held responsible. You are going to war against the state, against the government.” He told them, “You should know that I will never certify the wheat, the flour or the matzos unless they are one hundred percent kosher.” And indeed, they did what he wanted. Some years later, the Russian government decided to open matzah bakeries and sell matzos on behalf of the government. Rabbi Levi Yitzchak publicized and declared that eating any of those matzos was eating actual chametz. It is well known that this was one of the reasons for his imprisonment and, ultimately, his passing in bitter exile. This teaches us how much care we must take. We know what Tanya says: that something not kosher dulls the mind and heart, and that this is not undone even if one uses the strength gained from eating it for a holy purpose—even if one ate with a holy purpose in mind. So we, as Chabad chassidim, need to be even more and more scrupulous about kashrus, down to the finest detail, to the point of mesirus nefesh. Something that made a deep impression on me as a child was what my teacher told us when I was just four or five years old. He said there are people with an illness who could die if they eat gluten.

5:30:25 Speaker 11 In a matter of seconds—really, a few hours, a few minutes—someone could die. And he tells us: When a mother has a child with an illness that means he cannot eat gluten, and she sees something in a store labeled “gluten-free,” she won’t be satisfied with those words on the package. She’ll want to know: Which expert checked that it contains no gluten? Who stands behind that expert, and can they really be relied upon? Otherwise, her child could die. It’s the same when we’re about to eat a product, or stay somewhere—a hotel or guesthouse. We need to check whether it’s kosher. It isn’t enough for “kosher l’mehadrin” to be printed on it in huge letters. We have to approach it like the mother of that child who cannot eat gluten. Food that isn’t reliably kosher harms the soul. Even if something is labeled kosher, but the person giving the certification cannot really be relied upon, eating it dulls the mind and heart and harms the soul. We’ll begin with a few questions and answers. If anyone in the audience has questions, I’d be glad to receive them on slips of paper, and if we have time, we’ll discuss them too. I want to start with something relevant to us as chassidim: at farbrengens, we drink and say l’chaim over alcoholic beverages. I want to ask the rabbis—Rabbi Landau and the distinguished Rabbi Revach—to answer very briefly, really a word or two on each point, because we don’t have time to go on at length. Rabbi Landau is an expert, one of the greatest experts—I’d say the greatest expert I know—in this subject, both in halachah and in practice. Usually, those who are brilliant in halachah aren’t brilliant in the practical side, and those who are brilliant in the practical side aren’t

5:32:06 Speaker 11 brilliant in halachah. And Rabbi Revach compiled the first list in Israel and in the world on alcoholic beverages, which may soon be released to the public by the Chief Rabbinate of Israel. So I want to ask the rabbis a question that many people surely ask: May we drink vodka? May we drink whisky? May we drink liqueur? May we drink brandy? And if people around me drank a particular liqueur or whisky, or a great chossid drank it, does that mean there really is no concern at all? Please, Rabbi Dov Landau, very briefly.

5:32:44 Speaker 12 I can tell you what the problems are, not the names of the rabbis or the products. One potential problem with alcoholic beverages is the distilled spirit added to them. If it is made from yayin nesech, it is a problem, because the Shulchan Aruch rules that a spirit made from wine retains the wine’s status. If it was made from wine that a non-Jew touched, it remains yayin nesech. Of course, if a non-Jew touched it after it had become a distilled spirit, it cannot become yayin nesech, because it has been cooked. We find that a spirit made from chametz has the status of chametz. If it is made from milk, responsa in Nefesh Chayah and Minchas Yitzchak say it has the status of milk. So the spirit must be made from a kosher product. Generally, around the world, distilled spirits are made from molasses rather than wine. Not in—France. There are a few places in the world where they are made from wine, and a few where they are made from wheat. The problem is the ingredients added to alcoholic beverages and the way they are stored. In some places they are stored in wine barrels, which have absorbed wine.

5:33:50 Speaker 11 Whisky. Sorry to interrupt you, Rabbi Landau. May one drink Scotch whisky?

5:33:54 Speaker 12 Scotch whisky—generally, whisky is made from barley, from fermented barley, and the alcohol comes from the barley itself. But you have to know that yeast is added to make whisky. What is the source of that yeast? That needs to be investigated.

5:34:05 Speaker 11 And may one drink Chivas Regal?

5:34:06 Speaker 12 Chivas Regal is the same thing. It’s whisky too, though it’s made differently.

5:34:11 Speaker 11 So may one drink it or not?

5:34:13 Speaker 12 Rabbi Revach will clarify that in a moment. And there may be additives. You need to know where the yeast came from and what the barrels had held.

5:34:20 Speaker 11 Okay, thank you very much.

5:34:21 Speaker 12 So my personal recommendation is to drink only alcoholic beverages with kosher certification.

5:34:27 Speaker 11 Even plain vodka? Even plain vodka?

5:34:31 Speaker 14 I can add just two further, new points to what the rabbi said. Smirnoff Ice, for example, was something many respected people drank. It turned out to be non-kosher for one reason alone: it passed through pipes previously used for yayin nesech. Smirnoff had decided it wasn’t earning enough and wanted to add other products to its production lines. Some of those lines began producing products containing alcohol derived from wine, and that caused many problems. Today, baruch Hashem, Smirnoff Ice is available with kosher certification. As for Chivas Regal and whisky, people in the Torah-observant world customarily drink them, and they have grounds to rely on. We investigated it as far as we were able, and I hope that, with Hashem’s help, this year the doors will be opened for us to enter the facilities and examine them in practice, beyond what was checked in the past.

5:35:28 Speaker 11 Thank you very much. Even though everyone agrees that whisky is aged in oak barrels that previously held wine—everyone agrees on that.

5:35:36 Speaker 14 That’s not right. It’s not accurate.

5:35:37 Speaker 11 By the way, I also heard in Rabbi Landau’s name that one of the Smirnoff products from England either had its alcohol made from milk, or milk was added to the water to make it clear. So the issue isn’t necessarily connected to that at all.

5:35:48 Speaker 14 When we checked Smirnoff, there was no such thing.

5:35:50 Speaker 11 We’ll move very briefly to the next subject, which does relate to Rabbi Revach. We know that vegetables can be bought anywhere, because anyone can separate terumos and maasros—provided, of course, that they know how. There is an opinion that if someone doesn’t understand the wording of the declaration, it is as though they haven’t separated terumos and maasros. Unfortunately, many people don’t understand it. Some separate too small an amount and don’t... But those who know how to separate terumos and maasros can buy the vegetables. Fruit, on the other hand, we make a point of buying only where there is kosher certification, because fruit that is orlah cannot be remedied. Fruit grown during the tree’s first three years cannot be remedied. Rabbi Revach’s Institute for the Mitzvos Dependent on the Land, Rabbi Efrati’s institute, and Dr. Sachs publish annual figures showing the percentage of orlah for each kind of fruit. There are opinions that, below certain percentages—whether ninety percent or seventy percent of the fruit is not orlah, depending on the opinion—it is permissible to use that fruit. I heard that Rabbi Landau published notices on the subject. He didn’t say it explicitly, but I heard that he meant that the percentages cannot be relied on at all, because the grapes might— I mean Rabbi Landau of Bnei Brak. I heard in his name that one cannot rely on this, though I can’t vouch for the report. I’d like to ask the distinguished rabbis—perhaps we’ll start with Rabbi Landau, since Rabbi Revach does publish a chart of percentages. Rabbi Landau, very briefly: What is your view of these percentages? Can they be relied on? Is it even possible to track whether only a given percentage of grapes are orlah? Who can keep track of that?

5:37:21 Speaker 15 If we look at what the halachah says, as brought in the Shulchan Aruch, siman 294, in the Mishnah and in the author’s ruling, one may rely on the majority. There it discusses grapes bought in a non-Jew’s field, but the Radbaz also permits relying on— The whole question arises if we consider the source to be fixed in place; otherwise, one can simply rely on the majority. The question is whether the rule that something fixed in place is treated as half-and-half applies here. But the Radbaz explains there that one may rely on the majority, even in relation to something fixed in place, because the fruit separated from the place where it was fixed. The Chazon Ish discusses this in the laws of mixtures: if it was in the possession of someone who is not at all reliable about kashrus, it does not acquire the status of something fixed in place, especially since it left that place and passed through several places before reaching the greengrocer. So halachically, there is no doubt that one may rely on this. This is also brought in the responsa Minchas Yitzchak and in Yabia Omer, volume 6, siman 24. They, too, say one may rely on the majority. There is a difficulty: Mishkenos Yaakov, siman 17, if I’m not mistaken, argues that ten percent is a commonly occurring minority and therefore one cannot rely on the majority. But it’s clear that ordinary fruit we buy also does not reach ten percent. So halachically, there is no doubt that one may buy from any store and rely on the majority.

5:38:34 Speaker 16 Thank you. Rabbi Revach, who is the expert on the mitzvos dependent on the Land of Israel, please.

5:38:39 Speaker 17 Well, we really need to distinguish between several things. It’s true that some hold that this is a case of kol deparish, so it follows the majority. Others say it falls under the law of kol kavua. That dispute has continued among the halachic authorities of our generation: some say one thing, some say the other. A note for Rabbi Landau: there are many kinds of fruit that exceed ten percent every year, and even fifteen percent and twenty percent. There are two particular kinds that consistently top fifty percent each year: blueberries and some varieties of blackberries. I’m speaking about the varieties that are definitely classified as trees, because some blackberries are classified as trees and others as vegetables. Those are always above fifty percent. But let me give you a simple example: the earliest and latest varieties of peaches, as well as the newer varieties, exceed ten percent. Now, saying that a commonly found minority means ten percent is itself not straightforward. As you know, some say it is even five percent, and some say it is not defined by percentages at all, as stated in Shevet Halevi. So these matters are not clear. I would like to explain what Rabbi Landau meant by what he said this year, because I hear a lot of elaborate analysis around it. He said something very simple: This year, ladies and gentlemen, is the third year of the Shemitah cycle. During Shemitah there was no planting. Why wasn’t there planting? Because planting is forbidden. Why is it forbidden? That is what the Torah commands. And a farmer wants to comply—if not because of the Torah, then because the Chief Rabbinate will not give him approval otherwise. So he does not plant during Shemitah. Since he does not plant during Shemitah, there were no new plantings that year. What does that leave us with this year? Almost all the fruit is past the years of orlah, so in practice, this year there is almost no orlah among deciduous fruit.

5:40:19 Speaker 17 But Rabbi Landau has a very large network of stores under his kashrus supervision. It cannot be right to come along and say there is no need for any kashrus supervision. So the knowledgeable people working in this field on Rabbi Landau’s behalf—with whom we have a very close friendship—tell me: “After all, we did find some in these fields, because they planted bare-root trees.” We did find some there. They are right: a very, very small amount was found, but it was found. In practice, halachically, the fruit is kosher even lechatchilah. But lechatchilah, one should buy from the stores under kashrus supervision: first, to support those who are careful about this every year, and second, to avoid any doubt as far as possible.

5:40:53 Speaker 18 Yes, Rabbi Ravad[?], thank you very much. There’s an issue I would raise, perhaps without involving the rabbis: for some reason, eating corn on the cob is common even among anash. I was with Rabbi Rabach[?] at the Carmel Market for a tour of a bakery, and he said to me, “Come, let’s get an ear of corn.” We opened the husk and saw the thrips simply running away from us and hiding. We peeled back another layer, and they hid and went farther into the ear of corn. The Chief Rabbinate of Israel has also published a warning that eating corn on the cob is a problem. So it certainly isn’t appropriate to sell it—or at least, when selling it, it should come with a warning that one may only cut off the kernels and wash them, and then eat them. I want to ask a question: These days, each of us generally has one stovetop, apart from the wealthy, who have separate stovetops for dairy, pareve and meat, and a Pesach kitchen. Everyone has one stovetop on which they cook soup, meat, chicken and tuna. But when they want to heat milk for coffee or porridge for the children, they don’t designate a separate burner. They use one of the burners for milk, and everyone permits it. Why? Because even if milk boils over, it spills onto the flame, which burns it away immediately. But I ask: Wouldn’t it be worthwhile to buy a small burner that costs next to nothing and put it on the dairy counter? After all, milk could splash onto a meat pot, and with both surfaces wet, that could be a problem. Milk could boil over between the burners, and later soup could spill there, or a piece of schnitzel could fall there, and they would have to throw it away. So why keep something treif in the house? Why not put

5:42:27 Speaker 18 it to the side? Rabbi Landau, please.

5:42:32 Speaker 19 Those who don’t keep separate dairy and meat stovetops rely on what I mentioned earlier: Yoreh De’ah, section 91, says that one dry item does not transfer taste to another dry item. In other words, if a dry meat pot stands beside a dry dairy pot, taste does not transfer from one to the other. The Mishnah Berurah, section 451, says the same about a stovetop when discussing a pot stand. It says that, strictly speaking, a pot stand does not need to be kashered; we are stringent only for Pesach. Why? Because the pot resting on the stand is dry where it touches the stand. Even if the stand absorbed taste from meat or dairy, or from both meat and dairy, it does not transfer it to the pot. That is what people rely on. A problem would begin only if something spilled from the pot, ran down to its bottom and touched the stand. Even then, the taste it imparts is detrimental, so there is no reason and no need to be stringent. That is the basis for permitting it.

5:43:24 Speaker 18 But would it be worth recommending from the outset that people buy a small burner that costs next to nothing and put it on the dairy counter?

5:43:29 Speaker 19 No, no. It’s fine, because if a drop spills onto it, it is immediately heated until it glows. The flame is burning there, and the drop burns away at once.

5:43:35 Speaker 18 Thank you very much. Let’s move to the subject of chalav akum. We know that although Rabbi Moshe Feinstein permitted it outside Israel, butter made from non-Jewish milk is different. The Gemara says that it is certainly made from the milk of a kosher animal, such as a cow, because the milk of a non-kosher animal does not set and cannot be made into butter. So why, today, do observant Jews, thank G-d, also insist on butter made from chalav Yisroel?

5:44:11 Speaker 19 There is a responsum about this by Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu in Rabbi Amram Hendry’s[?] encyclopedia. Today we know that it is possible to make margarine and butter-like products even largely from water. I have been to a factory where they make a product with eighty percent water and twenty percent oil. Today, sophisticated ingredients can be added, including emulsifiers that bind the oil and water, and the result tastes like margarine or butter. So because all sorts of ingredients might be added, people are careful that butter, too, be made from chalav Yisroel.

5:44:41 Speaker 18 Beyond that, I have been to several butter factories that add coloring. Notice that many kinds of butter no longer have a uniform color. You see white and yellow, lighter yellow and darker yellow. These are all additives, some of which are not kosher. Well, we have a question here from someone in the audience: Must a mashgiach be present at all times, or is it enough that he comes and goes? The answer, of course, is that sometimes coming and going is enough. There are factories abroad that we know of where a mashgiach comes in once a year—or once every two years. For some factories, that annual visit is enough. There is another question I wanted to ask.

5:45:16 Speaker 19 He wasn’t at my lecture, and that is why he is asking this question. It’s the same issue that was under discussion. I tried to answer it there.

5:45:26 Speaker 18 Everyone knows that I’m somewhat—more than somewhat—forceful on the issue of insects in bakeries. I maintain that there is no bakery without insects. There may be no insects in the dough or inside the machines, but if you tap a fluorescent light fixture or the electrical conduits, you will find insects there. There is no such thing as a bakery without cockroaches. And I want to ask a halachic question: If there are cockroaches in the electrical conduits, Rabbi Landau, or in the acoustic ceiling, and there is some chance they could fall into the dough, on what basis is it permitted to eat that bread?

5:46:01 Speaker 19 Rabbi Yossi, I know your concerns about bakeries as well as anyone, so I’ll answer you. Look, you are right about [unclear], but we need to make several distinctions in halachah. We are all familiar with the Taz’s discussion of bread containing worms—whether they have disintegrated or not, the question of a double doubt, and all the rest. I want to tell the public one thing clearly: everyone who eats bread today relies on halachic grounds for leniency when eating it, because it is impossible to get flour completely clean. Plain and simple.

5:46:31 Speaker 18 Even with sifting?

5:46:31 Speaker 19 Wait, wait, wait, wait. You can’t get it completely clean, because to get the flour clean you’d have to sift it through an 80-mesh screen, as people call it, and even flour won’t pass through 80 mesh. So what do you do? Rabbi Landau was more lenient about the mesh count. He says that if that’s the case, 40 is enough. Some require 50, and some want to be stringent and use 60. Bottom line, with all three, insect eggs pass through. As for the insects found in the fluorescent light fixtures, that’s true, it’s very bad. And you know that at the place where you are, you didn’t issue certificates for a year, with the rabbinate’s full backing, because you found worms in the fluorescent fixtures. So in practice, you didn’t issue them until the place had been cleaned completely.

5:47:13 Speaker 18 Yes.

5:47:13 Speaker 19 But, after all is said and done, there are still many doubts about whether they get into the food-preparation area. Of course, when you see the mixer beneath the silo, there’s no chance in the world that they aren’t inside it. But once you’ve made the separations and you still find them in the fluorescent fixtures, there are so many grounds for saying otherwise, and that’s essentially what they rely on.

5:47:31 Speaker 18 Maybe we’ll finish with the subject of shechitah. Someone told me he looked in the Ben Ish Chai, and it says there that if the shochet hadn’t been to the mikveh, there’s some problem with his shechitah. What? So...

5:47:43 Speaker 20 The Mordechai cites this in the name of [unclear], that if someone needs to...

5:47:47 Speaker 18 That...?

5:47:48 Speaker 20 So it says there that someone who needed to immerse and didn’t, his shechitah is pigul. There’s a responsum, [unclear], that says this isn’t a matter of Chassidus; it’s a matter of halachah. He goes into a lengthy discussion there. And it says in the Kuzari that someone who needs to go to daven and doesn’t, because his feet feel heavy, lacks sensitivity. That’s what he says.

00:01 Speaker 1 Regarding hotels, Rabbi Landau spoke here about rabbis who aren’t professionals giving a hotel a hechsher, so there’s reason to be concerned about eating there. I’ll go further: even professional rabbis. I was approached to give a hotel a hechsher this summer for... we’re talking about very large sums. Just so you know, they offered 10,000 shekels for only a week and a half, in addition to three mashgichim. I told him, “Listen, I won’t work for free. Why should I lend my name for free, without payment? What would I gain from it? [unclear]” But I can’t take money either, because if I do, and tomorrow I need to bang on the table and tell the guests they mustn’t eat here because I was misled and something has gone wrong, I won’t do it, because I’ll know I’m going to lose the money. You have to be very, very G-d-fearing for that. I don’t think I’ve reached that level. So even someone who is a professional needs to know whether he has a personal stake in the matter or not. Another issue, related to what Rabbi Revach said about insects in leafy greens: I’m no great expert on insects, but I do have some practical experience in hotels and restaurants. I maintain that even the greens... First of all, there are companies that the regular Rabbinate does not approve because insects were found in their produce. I maintain that lettuce, scallions, dill, parsley, and cabbage must also be washed.

01:18 Speaker 2 Rabbi Yosef.

01:19 Speaker 1 Wait, wait, wait.

01:19 Speaker 2 Do you know who is claiming what? Do you have backing for that? You have full backing from [unclear].

01:23 Speaker 1 Even greens sold as insect-free must be soaked in water and washed. Anyone who took lettuce and made a salad without washing it is simply eating insects, even with insect-free greens, because there are black flies found even on vegetables—lettuce from Alei Katif, Gush Katif, and so on. They must be washed, and I intend to keep fighting for this, because people think lettuce doesn’t need washing.

01:46 Speaker 2 Explain.

01:47 Speaker 1 Then you explain.

01:48 Speaker 2 Explain to the public why you’re being stringent. It’s important; I want to tell the public something.

01:51 Speaker 1 Why? Because there are insects. Even after a light wash, insects remain if the greens haven’t been soaked properly. And if the mashgiach wasn’t the one who washed them, that’s even more serious.

01:59 Speaker 2 I want to tell you one thing, and it’s important. Look, Rabbi Yosef Steinberger is so careful about sin that it’s very hard to find people working in kashrus who are like him. I’ve known him for many years, and I know how G-d-fearing he is. I generally don’t send him to complicated projects, because he comes back just as he went. All I can tell you is that, from a halachic standpoint, this whole matter of insect-free vegetables has not brought about any revolution. After all, they aren’t grown in heaven or beneath the sea. They’re grown in a straightforward way that protects them from most... You know, insects don’t come from the soil, as people imagine. Ninety-five percent of insects come through the air, and each insect has more or less its own flying range. One flies up to a height of eighty centimeters; another flies lower, another higher. It depends on the wind as well. They’re kept out with netting. What happens is that while ordinary greens have very large numbers of insects, these methods bring the incidence down below the level of a mi’ut hamatzui—the commonly occurring minority that Rabbi Landau mentioned earlier—to below five percent, below ten percent. Once it’s below a mi’ut hamatzui, there is no longer an obligation to inspect it. There is no obligation to check it, and that is the entire basis of insect-free vegetables. There is no such thing as one hundred percent insect-free vegetables. I’ve worked with insect-free vegetables from all the companies for eleven years; technically, there is no one hundred percent.

03:22 Speaker 8 And so it’s good for everyone.

03:23 Speaker 2 But here’s the thing: on an institutional level, there’s no way to require more. It was hard enough to get them to bring the incidence down below a mi’ut hamatzui; requiring them to go further is difficult. But in every Jewish home, it’s certainly appropriate to do something simple: soak the greens in water with Ama dish soap. No other substances, nothing else. Soaking them in water with Ama irritates the insects and causes them to come off. Then rinse them under running water. That brings you close to one hundred percent.

03:52 Speaker 8 Thank you very much. I just want to say that in the mehadrin kashrus I’m responsible for...

03:54 Speaker 2 That’s your practice.

03:55 Speaker 8 Just a moment. If a mashgiach sees that Chasalat lettuce was used and he wasn’t the one who washed it, the instruction is to throw it in the trash. I want to thank Rabbi Shneur Zalman Revach, head of the Institute for Mitzvos Dependent on the Land, and the distinguished Rabbi Dov Landau, shlita. Thank you very much.

04:12 Speaker 2 Yasher koach to the moderator.

04:48 Speaker 9 Everyone has been left wanting more. They want to hear more and ask more questions, but time is short and there is much to do, and we still have several important speakers. Now we want to devote the coming hour to a discussion of the laws of Shabbos. I’d like to invite my friend, Rabbi Chaim Porush, a teacher at the Achi Temimim yeshiva in Rishon LeZion, to moderate this session.

05:32 Speaker 8 We have the honor of inviting the distinguished Rabbi Levi Yitzchak Halperin, head of the Scientific-Technological Institute for Halacha in Jerusalem. At the outset, we want to thank him for the great effort he made to come and join us here at this important gathering. We fondly remember the previous times he was here in Kfar Chabad, when the audience very much enjoyed what it heard from him. Please, Rabbi Halperin.

06:48 Speaker 10 First of all, I must apologize for sitting rather than standing. According to halacha, respect for the congregation requires a person to stand in many circumstances, solely out of respect for the congregation. But I’m in a condition that made it very difficult for me to get here. Standing is even harder, and sitting is difficult for me too. So don’t worry that I’ll go overtime and take up your time. Because of my health, I have to keep it short. Especially since I find myself in a situation where, as our Sages say, “Where they said to be brief, one may not speak at length.” That’s all when it’s at the proper time; when it isn’t the proper time, one isn’t even allowed to be brief. And I find myself as though it’s not the proper time, so I’m not even allowed to be brief. I don’t know what to do. I already told Rabbi Boroda [unclear] that I feel like the prince without [unclear]—born without a time. Looking at the program, I’m genuinely unsure whether to give the talk I had planned, because I won’t have time to give it all. Should I shorten it? Sometimes, when you shorten something, you lose the point. Or I could make a suggestion: I’m here, and, thank G-d, there are many questions on technology and halacha. If people want to ask, I’ll answer as time allows, and then I can stop whenever I need to. Or you can settle for a shortened talk. One of those options. Before I start, before I have the floor, I’m giving you the choice. Actually, looking at the topic here, something may be missing, but anyone who studies the source references can probably understand what it’s about. Yes. Well? I can’t hear.

09:21 Speaker 11 A baby born through in vitro fertilization whose father is a kohen—does he require a pidyon haben? A baby born through in vitro fertilization whose father is a kohen.

09:32 Speaker 10 The father?

09:32 Speaker 11 A kohen.

09:33 Speaker 10 A kohen.

09:34 Speaker 11 Does he require a pidyon haben? And the same question if the father is a Yisroel, I mean. Does he require a pidyon haben? And regarding being called up to the Torah and so on, is he considered the son of a kohen in terms of lineage?

09:49 Speaker 10 Let’s look at it this way. It’s a weighty and difficult question, and I’ll state my position in principle: I have reservations about the entire subject of in vitro fertilization.

10:01 Speaker 11 But I’m asking.

10:02 Speaker 10 Let me explain why I have reservations, and that will lead us to the answer. My reservations, in practice—

10:11 Speaker 11 That’s what you meant when you said people should ask questions.

10:13 Speaker 10 Because in practice, if we find a definition of a mother without a father, we do find that definition, and the child is Jewish under all the laws concerning a non-Jew who has relations with a Jewish woman, and so on. But even though... the offspring. Still, the child is a Jew, clearly. He will not be a Kohen or a Levi—a non-Jew who has relations with... But when there is... In practice, let’s understand it this way: we need to understand this issue, though we won’t go into the whole subject now. The very relationship of a father to his child is something the Torah establishes. That is why the verse says, “Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and cleave to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.” The Ramban raises a question about Rashi concerning why “they shall become one flesh” appears there too, but the plain meaning is that “they shall become one flesh”—there is a relationship. The child is related to the father or the mother, but here, I think, a condition is stated: “Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother.” As I say, for example, the Torah says, “And Adam knew Chavah,” and the child is his son. What is the first part there for? In the account of Chavah’s descendants. The relationship applies only when it happens in the usual way, and so on. Once we take it outside that framework, there is room to say—I don’t want to make sweeping statements—there is room to say that it becomes a matter of interpretation and [unclear]. And I am sure that any rabbi will have to rule if, tomorrow, they find a way—and perhaps they are already almost there—to produce another person from a human cell. Would we say the same thing in that case too? I don’t want to.

14:56 Speaker 12 How good and how pleasant it is for brothers to sit together. How good and how pleasant it is for brothers to sit together. Ay ay ay ay ay, na na na. Ay ay ay ay ay, na na na. Ay ay ay ay ay, na na na. Ay ay ay ay ay, na na na. Ay ay ay ay ay, na na na na. Ay ay ay ay ay, na na na na. Ay ay ay ay ay, na na na na. Ay ay ay ay ay, na na na na. If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if I am only for myself, what am I? If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when? If not now, when? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if I am only for myself, what am I? If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when? If not now, when? If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when? If not now, when? If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And if I am

19:21 Speaker 12 only for myself, what am I? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when? And if not now, when? If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when? And if not now, when? If I am only for myself, what am I? If I am only for myself, what am I? And if I am only for myself, what am I? If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when? And if not now, when? If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when? And if not now, when? If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when? And if not now, when? If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when? And if not now, when? If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when? And if not now, when?

21:50 Speaker 13 That he should not say it is because of his arrows—the whole chapter. And that is what Rashi says at the end of the discussion of “fire is considered his arrows” in Bava Kamma. But that is how Rashi presents it, though it does not seem to me that Rashi is saying we apply it back only to speech and to going out. But we won’t go into that now at all; it doesn’t follow. Now, let’s picture this. Would anyone have thought of it? Let’s picture the action. Let’s picture the action. A person takes an animal, ties it up, brings it beside a wheel, fastens a knife to the wheel close to the animal’s neck, goes over and releases a waterfall, and the wheel turns and slaughters it. Is that realistic? Did this question ever arise? Would you have said it should be mentioned in the Shulchan Aruch? But anyone who understands what an electric motor is today will see that this is an exact analogy and example of an electric motor. When I turn on the electricity, the alternating current creates magnetism in the motor, and the magnet begins—the motor begins to run. And if I want to slaughter with an electric motor today, I have a Talmudic discussion from which to learn; I simply look in the Gemara. So if not—we may see this even more clearly later. But if we go back to his time, it was not a practical question, at any rate in the first case. Someone who released the water and then came back—that, too, might not have been simple. But here we are talking about slaughtering. When we discuss how an electric motor relates to a person and carries out actions, this is the living example. I’ll give another interesting issue in this area. With electricity, a problem arose. Clearly, with neon and fluorescent lights, the starters were red-hot metal, a metal ember. But the light itself is not fire. It is merely electrons passing through gas and flashing. The first bulbs, though, had filaments. The current passed through a thin wire, which offered resistance. The current passed through it, creating intense friction, and the friction

24:34 Speaker 13 heated the wire. The wire became so hot that it began to glow and give off light. Is a metal ember also fire, or is it not fire? And what, really, was the question? It concerns the fire the Torah speaks about. As I say, we are constantly reminded that life has changed. No, no—the day is not far off when, if people want to know what natural fire looked like, rather than a microwave or electricity and so on, they will have to travel far to see what natural fire looked like in some museum. So what makes it fire? Fire has heat; thermal energy produces light. That is the definition of fire. The definition is not that the light of a fire produces heat; it is the other way around. I take something and heat it, and heat it so intensely that some of the thermal energy turns into light energy. But every ordinary fire consumes its surroundings, burns them, and lives off that energy. It burns wood, coal or oil; it consumes it, draws its energy from it, and then there is heat and so on. A metal ember does not work that way. It needs energy from outside. I can make a metal ember in two ways: either by taking metal and placing it over a fire, as people once did, or through friction, as we said—rubbing it until it begins to glow. Electricity, too, works through a kind of friction, but in a more sophisticated form. Does that also fall under the definition of fire, or not? What? What is the proof? Excellent. What is the proof? Good. Good. You made an excellent point. An excellent point. That is what I wanted to get to. All right, let’s see. Let’s see which is more relevant. Go on—who said “go on”? Perhaps there was another kind of fire, and so on. Perhaps it was a different fire. That doesn’t prove it, but you have touched on something. Very good. I’ll finish, and then we’ll talk about

27:12 Speaker 13 that. There is a dispute between the Rambam and the Raavad. The Rambam says, in chapter 12, that one who heats a metal ember is liable for kindling. The Raavad comes along and says: Why not for cooking? The Maggid Mishneh comes along and says, [unclear] heating it constitutes kindling, not cooking. Everyone then raised a question about the Maggid Mishneh and the Rambam from chapter 9, where the Rambam says that one who heats metal until it becomes an ember is liable for cooking. So why did you say here that he is liable for kindling? Some say he is liable for both. To me, an entirely different answer to the Rambam seemed right. We will get to what we wanted to discuss afterward. If you look closely at the Rambam’s wording, in chapter 9 he says “metal,” while in chapter 12 he says “iron”—one who heats iron. And anyone who knows metals knows that the other types of metal—we won’t discuss copper, gold, silver or [unclear]—will melt before they reach the point of glowing and becoming incandescent. Iron does not, because those metals already melt at three or four hundred degrees. Iron begins to glow and shine, to become fire, at four hundred and fifty to five hundred degrees Celsius, and melts at a thousand or eleven hundred. So when he speaks about iron, it certainly has not melted. It reaches the point of kindling first. Since it reaches the point of kindling first, the Rambam says “kindling.” When he speaks of metal, there are various metals. Could it melt before it glows? Then cooking is involved too. But the question is whether there is a basis for bringing proof. That is all I want to say. That is why I brought this. That is why I brought this. There is a Gemara in Yoma 21. I only want to show that we can learn from things the Sages passed over and did not say, not only from what they said. Incidentally, we can also learn practical halachah for our times from things they passed over. The Gemara says there are six fires, six types of fire: one that consumes but does not drink,

30:00 Speaker 13 That’s our ordinary fire. Pour water on it and it goes out. “It drinks but does not eat”—that’s like a sick person. It’s a figurative way of speaking about fire: it wants to drink but doesn’t want to eat. “It eats and drinks”—that’s the fire of Eliyahu. Fire that drinks and licks up everything. That was the fire with Eliyahu Hanavi, which licked up all the water. “Fire repels fire”—that was with Chananya, Mishael and Azarya, when Gavriel entered and pushed the fire outward. And a third fire, a fourth, so to speak: “fire eats fire.” So I ask him a question, and you ask: Why didn’t the Gemara bring another fire? Another miracle involving fire: “The bush was burning with fire, but the bush was not consumed.” Why did it bring only those six? You say there was a miracle—there was a miracle there too. And with Eliyahu, and with the altar pyre, and with Gavriel, there was a miracle too. So why didn’t the Gemara bring it? We must conclude that our Sages understood the fire to be ordinary fire, and the miracle was not in the fire. The miracle was in the bush: the bush remained standing and did not burn up. So if the fire was ordinary fire, there’s no other fire here, no different kind of fire. And from this we can also understand why a metal ember does not turn to ash. The fire doesn’t consume it because the metal is strong and this fire cannot do so. As we said, it takes twelve hundred degrees for metal to melt or burn, and so on. So we see from the fact that our Sages did not include it—even for the practical law today, and so on.

32:09 Speaker 14 Nadav and Avihu.

32:10 Speaker 13 What?

32:11 Speaker 14 What kind of fire was it with Nadav and Avihu?

32:13 Speaker 13 With Nadav and Avihu, it seems, it was ordinary fire.

32:16 Speaker 14 Ordinary fire.

32:17 Speaker 13 It burned them. What about those who say it was only the soul? The soul was burned—the soul was burned, meaning the body remained intact. So was the soul simply [unclear]? Is that what [unclear]?

32:28 Speaker 14 It seems it was an electric current.

32:30 Speaker 13 What?

32:31 Speaker 14 An electric current.

32:32 Speaker 13 Could be. But the question is, when an electric current catches on something, it turns into fire. Could be. All right, but in any case, it says “fire” there, and there was no... It doesn’t say there was anything unnatural about it. Fire burns, and it burned them. But if we say that only the soul was burned here and not the body, then we need to explain what it means for a soul to burn. It happened in places where it separated the soul from the body. Fire burns a body, but in those places it could be interpreted that way. The Gemara, though, cannot bring proof from here that there are other kinds of fire, and so on.

33:13 Speaker 14 What, was the fire below ground level?

33:15 Speaker 13 What?

33:16 Speaker 14 The fire was below ground level.

33:18 Speaker 13 I can’t hear.

33:19 Speaker 14 The fire was below ground level.

33:22 Speaker 13 What fire? It was fire. It was fire. It didn’t do anything. That one didn’t extinguish it. All right, because Hakadosh Boruch Hu separated them. I want to give two more examples, and then I’ll finish. I’ve already gone beyond the time allotted to others. I hope the Rabbi doesn’t mind, because I was prepared to speak about this whole subject. I want to tell you something interesting—something very interesting. I’ll give two examples from the physical world: one from chemistry and one from medicine, briefly. A question once came to me, and I wrote an extensive study about it. Never mind. At a certain factory in Haifa they were making gluten and citric acid from wheat flour, and there was a major problem, and so on. I wrote a study and offered advice, but in the course of that study I came upon something extremely interesting. Extremely interesting. A question arose for me: What causes dough to become chametz, the gluten or the starch? Because wheat has two components, gluten and starch. Which causes it to become chametz? It seemed to me that it was the gluten. If both become chametz, then of course that wouldn’t be surprising. I’m talking about when it doesn’t become chametz, and so on. It seemed to me that gluten was the cause. The actual cause is the starch, but the difference between the grain species and other legumes is due to the gluten, not the starch, because their starches are alike. I wasn’t sure, so I studied the Gemara in Pesachim 35. The Gemara in Pesachim 35 says—the Mishnah says—that the five grain species become chametz. Rabbi Yochanan ben Nuri says rice does too. The Sages say it does not become chametz, because it spoils. So I went to the chemist there and said: “Come, do an experiment for me.” What did the experiment need to be? Take wheat flour and rice flour, make doughs and let them rise. Separate them for me. Separate the gluten from the wheat flour and the gluten

35:57 Speaker 13 from the rice flour, and the starch. Combine wheat gluten with rice starch, and rice gluten with wheat starch. Make doughs from those too, and we’ll see how they behave. And according to our Sages, as well as chemistry—whether it develops cracks, and so on—sorry, one mixed into the other, with all the signs. After that experiment, after twenty minutes, twenty-something minutes, the wheat dough rose and developed cracks, and so on—everything our Sages describe. The rice stayed down. Wheat gluten with rice starch behaved like wheat; rice gluten with wheat starch behaved like rice. In other words, my thinking was confirmed. From that Mishnah I went on to the Mishnah in Challah. The Mishnah says in chapter 3 of Challah: “One who makes dough from wheat and rice: if it has the taste of grain, it is obligated in challah,” and also subject to the prohibition of chametz on Pesach. So chametz too—three things go together. Then I asked myself: Does it specifically say wheat with rice, or can it be any of the grain species with rice, or with any of the legumes? There is a dispute in the Yerushalmi. The Yerushalmi’s conclusion, as the Rambam brings it, is that with wheat and rice, rice can even be the majority and wheat less than the majority. I asked another question: If you were to say it means specifically rice and specifically wheat, why does it say “if it has the taste of grain”? It should say “if it has the taste of wheat.” Why does the Mishnah say “the taste of grain”? It should say “the taste of wheat” if it means wheat specifically. So the Yerushalmi says that with wheat, there might not even be a majority of wheat compared to the rice, yet if it has the taste of grain, it can become chametz, and so on. With other grain species mixed with rice, or wheat mixed with other legumes, there has to be a majority and the taste of grain. So that’s the distinction. What, then, was my assumption?

38:29 Speaker 13 That the five grain species do indeed have high gluten levels, but they aren’t all at the same level. Some are at the very top and some are lower, and below them is rice. So the minimum amount of gluten in a grain species is not enough on its own when you mix it with rice. But if you take rice and wheat and combine them, even if it’s, say, sixty percent rice and forty percent wheat, you reach the minimum gluten level of the five grain species. With other kinds, though, you can’t reach it unless there is a majority of wheat or a majority of grain. If it’s wheat with other legumes, there has to be a majority of wheat or a majority of grain. So I reached that conclusion and passed it on. I brought in the experts, chemists and so on, and told them: “I learned chemical values concerning gluten, the five grain species and legumes from the Gemara. The five grain species are higher than all the others, but there’s a scale among them, and I don’t know where each falls on that scale. Wheat, though, is at the high end. Rice is close to them. Other legumes are lower. And if you take sixty percent rice with forty percent wheat, you’ll reach the minimum. That won’t happen with the others.” They sat for half an hour and produced figures for me, and it was remarkably precise. Wheat has 12.2 percent gluten, so it certainly counts as grain. Eleven minus, eleven plus. Barley, the lowest, is ten percent. Indeed, that’s how it was. And rice has 8.4 percent—it has 8.4 percent. So if I take sixty percent rice with forty percent wheat, I’ll reach ten percent. And the taste really won’t be the taste of wheat; it will be the taste of grain, because the gluten gives it its taste. With the others, you need a majority. They were very, very excited. But then something extremely interesting occurred to me. A problem arose: What about millet? After all, it really does say millet, our teacher. So, in fact, regarding millet there is a dispute in the Rosh. Apparently, he holds that millet does not, does not adversely affect even

41:13 Speaker 13 Rabbi Chana ben Dora, and so on. I open the Tzlach, and he says: Millet is inferior chametz; it is chametz nuksheh, because it is not really fit to eat. Anyone who knows what millet is—it is sorghum and the like, which they feed to chickens. I was beside myself. I was astonished. I opened the Pnei Yehoshua and asked: What about millet? Because I found that millet has 9.2 percent more than rice. The Pnei Yehoshua says: Millet becomes chametz more readily than rice. How does the Pnei Yehoshua know that secret? He says it is simple: In Yechezkel, when Hakadosh Boruch Hu commands him concerning the famine, He lists millet alongside the five species of grain. The word of Hashem spoke through him, and with that I finished the subject. It is a subject I found in Chazal, and we are working on it, and so on. Let me add something more. One of the chemists responded: We know what starch is. Now we can understand exactly what it is, how fermentation actually happens. When water comes into contact with starch, within eighteen to twenty minutes, bacteria begin to release substances that ferment the carbohydrate, and consequently it starts to rise. If the gluten is strong, it holds it in and gives it a good taste. If the gluten is not strong, it comes out, or, as Chazal say, [unclear]. That is the second point. To conclude with a third point, briefly, on medical matters: I was once invited to an international conference at Tel Aviv University on medical ethics and so on, and there were debates there. We will not go into that subject. Some people attacked certain rabbis over their position on transplants. My answer was—and I want to tell you this—do you think... Let me present it to you, the doctors. There were doctors from all over the world, as well as religious figures from all over the world. I ask you a question: A doctor enters a hospital,

43:40 Speaker 13 and there are two people lying there. On one side is a patient whose vital organs—the lungs, heart, liver, pancreas, intestines—are destroyed, but whose head is one hundred percent intact. On the other side is a person whose head is completely destroyed, and so on, but whose bodily organs are sound. Suppose I can sever heads or attach them—and the day when that happens is not far off. How do you approach a question like that? Everyone went pale. Have you killed two people? Saved them? Created two people? Killed one and saved two? What have you done here? How would you approach it? Then they turned to me, which was what I wanted: How would you approach it? I will tell you what I said there. I said it at greater length. I told them: My approach to this whole subject and to every technological development is based on what Chazal say: “And he shall surely heal”—from here we learn that a doctor has been given permission to heal. As Tosafos say, what right do you have to interfere in Hakadosh Boruch Hu’s reckoning at all? You were given permission—permission to heal. Transplants still constitute healing, all kinds of transplants, in most cases. We see this in the verse in Haazinu, “I have wounded, and I will heal.” Chazal say, “I put to death, and I give life”; earlier in the verse, before “I have wounded,” it says, “I put to death, and I give life.” And someone who is missing organs—I will restore them. So that is called healing. But all this applies only as long as you are not attaching a head. I once asked a doctor about this—a medical writer. When someone receives a transplanted heart, liver, and so on, who is the recipient? I told him: It is the person who receives the transplant, because in practice the organs all become subordinate to his body. I also have several proofs for that. As I mentioned regarding eggs, they become subordinate to the body. And here is my proof. Go and check: If a heart from a bad person was transplanted into a person who had been good, how would he behave? Today you can check that. Or the reverse:

46:02 Speaker 13 A heart from a good person was transplanted into a bad person. How would he behave? Clearly, he would behave as he did before. That is what I told him, and he went and did research. “You were right,” he said. “He behaves as he did before.” Although the heart is not his own heart, it becomes subordinate to the body, and so on. But with the head, if you replace someone’s head, he will be a different person. In halachah we have—and this is the Mishnah in several places, including Ohalos, chapter 7—“Once his head or the greater part of his body has emerged,” it says, either one means he has been born. He is already a person: either his head or the greater part of his body. And if you take a head along with the greater part of someone else’s body, neither becomes subordinate to the other. Each is an entity in its own right. So here you have created a human being through his head. You have made a new being. Clearly, that is not healing, and it is forbidden to do it. I have been brief where I should have spoken at length. What is the halachic status of a cold-water dispenser? There are so many kinds that it is hard for me to answer. Some pose no problem; with others, the problems are quite serious. But overall, some do have a halachic solution. If there is no halachic solution, and it dispenses only cold water, not hot water—which, G-d forbid, it heats, raising the issue of cooking—then it is best to draw one cup at a time, so that activating it is not an inevitable result. If you fill a bottle, in some cases that could activate it. And someone who wishes to be stringent should also do it in an unusual manner. A place that is constantly filmed by closed-circuit cameras: the question is whether to go there or pass by. So what is the situation? If it is only a live image on a screen, with no recording, the problem is less serious, because in practice it is like seeing. But if there is recording, the problem is more serious. What should one do? I would say that there should be times when it does not record, making one’s presence an unintended act whose effect is not inevitable, and then there is no

48:09 Speaker 13 problem. Is it permissible to enter such a place on Shabbos? If it is known that there is only a live image on a screen and no recording, then if a person has no choice and there is no other way, and [unclear], there is room to be lenient. Thank you very much.

48:39 Speaker 15 Thank you very much to the distinguished Rabbi Levi Halperin. We could spend an entire day of Yarchei Kallah on these matters concerning the institute. But keeping to our schedule, we will now invite the distinguished Rabbi Eliyahu Landau, who will also address a related subject: asking a non-Jew to perform work on Shabbos according to the Alter Rebbe’s approach. Rabbi Landau, please.

49:41 Speaker 13 No, no, that is the Alter Rebbe’s legacy. May it happen more often, without the evil eye. I wish it happened more often. I will arrange—

50:54 Speaker 3 Wait for the Shulchan Aruch. What should I begin with? No. In the meantime, before they bring a Shulchan Aruch, let us discuss section 243. The Alter Rebbe opens with wording distinctly his own, unlike the Tur or the Shulchan Aruch. The Alter Rebbe says there: “The Sages forbade telling a non-Jew to perform work for us on Shabbos. The Sages forbade telling a non-Jew to perform work for us on Shabbos, whether for free or for pay. Even if one tells him before Shabbos to do it on Shabbos, so that the instruction itself is not given on Shabbos”—even if he tells him before Shabbos, it is forbidden. Why? Because when the non-Jew performs the work on Shabbos, he does it as the Jew’s agent. He acts on his behalf. Although the Torah principle that “a person’s agent is considered like himself” applies only to a Jew—we learn agency from the law of terumah: “So shall you, too, set aside a contribution.” Just as you are members of the covenant, so must your agents be members of the covenant. A non-Jew cannot be an agent under Torah law. Nevertheless, by rabbinic law, agency does apply to a non-Jew as a stringency. Consequently, it is forbidden to tell a non-Jew to do it, because in performing the work, the non-Jew becomes the Jew’s agent. The Alter Rebbe concludes: Nevertheless, this is only an asmachta, a supporting allusion—the Alter Rebbe cites a hint to it from a verse. The primary prohibition against telling a non-Jew to do work, whether on Shabbos or Yom Tov, is rabbinic and rests on a different reason, not on agency: so that Shabbos should not be taken lightly by people, leading them to perform the work themselves. The Alter Rebbe begins by asking why it is forbidden to tell a non-Jew to perform work: because he becomes your agent. Not under Torah law, but under rabbinic law. The Alter Rebbe concludes, however, that the primary reason it is forbidden is to prevent people from treating Shabbos lightly and coming to do the work themselves. That does not mean—do not think—that the Alter Rebbe retracted the first reason. Elsewhere, the Alter Rebbe even says that this reason of agency is more stringent than the prohibition against giving the instruction. How do these two ideas fit together here?

54:56 Speaker 3 On the one hand, the Alter Rebbe begins by saying that it is forbidden because the gentile becomes your agent. On the other hand, the main reason is so that people will not treat Shabbos lightly and come to do the work themselves—that is the Rambam’s wording. True, whether agency applies to a gentile is itself a dispute among the Rishonim. What? They spoke about that. Yes, yes. There is a dispute among the Rishonim over whether agency applies to a gentile even as a stringency, because that question is not limited to the laws of Shabbos; it applies throughout halachah, beginning with the laws of interest. It is a dispute between Rashi and Rabbeinu Tam, and the Rambam rules that agency does apply. More than that, there is also a dispute among the later authorities over whether agency can apply to work done on Shabbos. The Chasam Sofer, for example, and other later authorities say that when it comes to work on Shabbos, the principle that “a person’s agent is like himself” cannot apply at all. Why? Just as a mitzvah that must be performed with one’s own body cannot be fulfilled through an agent, because the mitzvah is for the tefillin to be placed on my body. If an agent puts on tefillin, the act of putting them on can be attributed to me, but that does not make his body my body—it does not mean the tefillin were placed on my body. So I cannot fulfill the mitzvah that way, as the Rishonim also famously discuss. Therefore, one cannot fulfill the mitzvah of putting on tefillin through an agent. The Chasam Sofer and other later authorities, including [unclear], say the same applies to Shabbos. Why? On Shabbos, the mitzvah is for me to rest and cease from work. So even if I instruct my agent to do work, even in a case where there can be an agent for a transgression—such as when the agent is not himself subject to the prohibition—it makes no sense for me to become liable for work on Shabbos, because I am resting. The mitzvah is one that must be fulfilled with my own body: to rest. So how can I become liable when the work is done through an agent? But the Alter Rebbe explicitly rules otherwise. In section 263, there is a law in subsection 25. By the letter of the law, a Jew can accept Shabbos upon himself

58:36 Speaker 3 before Shabbos begins. He can accept the sanctity of Shabbos early. And the question arises: A Jew prayed the Shabbos Maariv early, before the rest of the congregation prayed Maariv and accepted Shabbos. For him, it is already Shabbos; for everyone else, it is not yet Shabbos. He forgot to do some work he needs done, and he wants to ask another Jew, for whom it is not yet Shabbos, to do it for him. The Shulchan Aruch rules that this is permitted. Someone who prayed the Shabbos Maariv before the congregation did, even though his acceptance of Shabbos has already taken effect—thank you—may tell another Jew who has not yet accepted Shabbos to do work for him. He may ask another Jew to light a candle, and he may benefit from that work on Shabbos. Why? Because his fellow Jew is permitted to do it. There is no prohibition at all in telling him to do so. This does not fall under the prohibition against asking someone else to do work. When does that prohibition apply? When he asks at a time when the work is forbidden to all Jews. But if it is a time when his fellow Jew is permitted to do it, there is no prohibition against asking. The Alter Rebbe asks in Kuntres Acharon: True, there is no prohibition against asking here, but “a person’s agent is like himself.” So it is considered as though I did the work and lit the candle on Shabbos. And the Alter Rebbe develops the question further: “A person’s agent is like himself.” The Alter Rebbe adds: “We find that when a man told a woman, ‘Go and round off a minor’s sidelocks for me; cut off his peyos as my agent’”—the rule is that, generally, there is no agency for a transgression, but if the agent is not subject to the prohibition, there is agency for a transgression. The person who sent her receives lashes. The Alter Rebbe says: The same should apply here. I told another Jew to do work for me. That Jew is not subject to the prohibition: for him it is not Shabbos, and he is permitted to do it. So there is agency for a transgression. Please. Please. She is not mentally competent? He told a woman. She is not mentally competent? I simply did not understand the question.

1:02:39 Speaker 3 I am telling another Jew who is mentally competent, “Light a candle for me.” Who is talking about someone who is mentally incompetent? I did not understand. Such a person cannot be an agent. Who is talking about someone who is mentally incompetent? The law of agency does not apply to someone who is mentally incompetent. That is the category of a person who is mentally incompetent, a deaf-mute, and a minor. [unclear] The law is that if a man told a woman, “Go and round off a minor’s sidelocks; cut off the minor’s peyos for me,” the person who sent her receives lashes for violating “You shall not round off.” He did nothing with his own hands, but the woman is not subject to that prohibition; she is not commanded against rounding off the sidelocks. And because she is not commanded, she is not subject to the prohibition, so there is agency for a transgression. What? The act itself is not a transgression for her; if she is not commanded, she is permitted to do it. The point is not merely that she does not become liable. It is a minor—we are talking about a minor. That is the Alter Rebbe’s question. One moment. Yes, but that is a different point. No, he is asking about a Jew who lit a candle before Shabbos. That is not a prohibited act at all. That is his question. A prohibited act—lighting a candle on Friday. In Hebrew, in Hebrew, all right. That is how the Alter Rebbe asks the question. Actually, I think this comes from the Maggid. [unclear] At first glance, it is somewhat surprising that the Alter Rebbe wants to raise this question. We know the rule: “A person’s agent is like himself.” Why does he need to bring in the example of someone who told a woman, “Go and round off a minor’s sidelocks for me”? The Gemara says that where the other person is not subject to the prohibition, there is agency for a transgression. That is understood. Why do I need the example of “Go and round off a minor’s sidelocks for me”? The Alter Rebbe is asking a question: A person’s agent is like himself; ordinarily there is no agency for a transgression, but this agent is not subject to the prohibition. Here, surely everyone understands that the agent is not subject to the prohibition: for him, it is not yet Shabbos. Why do I need the example of “Go and round off a minor’s sidelocks for me”?

1:07:29 Speaker 3 Rather, the Alter Rebbe derives a remarkable new point here from a difficulty with the case of “Go and round off a minor’s sidelocks for me.” At first glance, there is a problem. The Chasam Sofer, for example, gives this case: What if I tell a kohen, “Eat terumah as my agent”? Would I be violating a prohibition? Certainly not. So at first glance, the question is: What happened here when the man told a woman, “Go and round off a minor’s sidelocks for me”? True, I am instructing you to round off a minor’s sidelocks. I told a woman to do something she is permitted to do. How is that different from telling a kohen to eat terumah? Why is the person who sent her liable? I told a kohen to eat something he is permitted to eat. I am forbidden to eat it, but I did not eat it. When I told a woman, “Go and round off a minor’s sidelocks,” the woman, says the Alter Rebbe—he emphasizes this twice—is not commanded against rounding off sidelocks at all. One moment. So what is the answer? That is what he asked earlier. Rather, the Alter Rebbe derives from this a new principle of agency. The Alter Rebbe says: Agency means that it is as though I am holding the other person’s hand and acting with it. That is the Alter Rebbe’s wording in Kuntres Acharon in explaining the Gemara’s point. What does this mean? When I tell a kohen to eat terumah, suppose I put the terumah into his mouth with my own hand. What have I done? A mitzvah. I fed terumah to a kohen. But if I take the woman’s hand and use it to round off the minor’s sidelocks, I am the one doing the rounding. I performed a prohibited act. The Alter Rebbe derives this from the law of “Go and round off a minor’s sidelocks for me.” That is why the Alter Rebbe brings it—not merely to say that where the agent is not subject to the prohibition, there is agency for a transgression. If a man told a woman, “Go and round off a minor’s sidelocks for me,” he is liable. You are forced to conclude that agency means it is as though I am directing the action, holding the agent’s hand and acting with it. And, in effect, the Alter Rebbe is giving what seems to be a new definition of agency here. I will not get into the scholarly analysis, Rabbi Yosef Engel’s inquiry into what agency is, but according to all the definitions, it emerges that agency is something

1:10:26 Speaker 3 Something so abstract. The Torah says, “A person’s agent is like himself.” So it’s as though there’s this kind of level of shlichus, this kind of level of shlichus, but that’s abstract. Here the Alter Rebbe gives such a simple definition: What makes the other person act? What causes him to act? My instruction. As the Alter Rebbe explains there at length—and he cites a formulation of the Rosh—the other person acts at his word. In other words, my instruction sets him in motion. The Alter Rebbe says: When I set him in motion with an instruction, it’s like setting him in motion with my hand. True, that doesn’t apply to a non-Jew. We need to derive the law of agency from the Torah. I can’t arrive at it through reasoning alone. But where the Torah... On the contrary, now I understand even better why I need a Torah exclusion to establish that a non-Jew cannot serve as an agent, because the act of setting him in motion is still there. I tell him to do it, and he does it because of my instruction. So the Alter Rebbe asks: Once Shabbos has begun for me, if I tell another Jew, “Light a candle,” I’m setting him in motion. It follows that I’m the one lighting it, as though I were holding his hand and lighting it. How is that permitted? Now, it’s true that the Chasam Sofer, as we said earlier, held that the concept of agency does not apply to Shabbos, because he understood its definition differently. There is evidence from the Rishonim supporting the Alter Rebbe’s view that agency does apply to Shabbos. We won’t go into that now. The Alter Rebbe answers: Since everything that... What, is it late? The problem really is that I don’t have a watch. Could someone... The Alter Rebbe answers: Since... But it would be good for me to have a clock. They covered it, though. They covered it so people wouldn’t think it was too early, because it isn’t working. All right. It’s like the button instead of the candy. Thank you. So that works. Good, fine, fine. The Alter Rebbe answers: Since the entire sanctity of Shabbos for me—the sanctity that came when I accepted Shabbos—is

1:13:30 Speaker 3 because I accepted it, the Alter Rebbe says, it follows that something done by another person was not included in what I initially took upon myself. And here, while explaining these points, the Alter Rebbe says there are two distinct aspects to the prohibition against telling someone else to do something: the prohibition of agency and the prohibition of telling him. The Alter Rebbe explains the difference at length at the beginning of section 243, in Kuntres Acharon, paragraph 8. The prohibition against telling him applies at the moment you speak. The prohibition on grounds of agency applies when that person performs the act as my agent, because if I instructed him or sent him to do something but he hasn’t done it, nothing has happened. In other words, if I instruct someone to do melachah when he is not bound by my Shabbos restrictions and he doesn’t do it, there has been no violation on grounds of agency. But I have violated the prohibition against telling him. You were forbidden to tell someone else to do melachah on Shabbos. That is a separate prohibition against speaking. One prohibition applies when you speak, and the other applies when the act is done, on grounds of agency. So we can understand what the Alter Rebbe says at the beginning of section 243. First he begins: It is forbidden to tell a non-Jew to do melachah. Why? Because when he does the melachah, there is an issue of agency. The Sages ruled that a non-Jew can be considered an agent where this leads to a stringency, so it is considered as though you were holding his hand and doing it. Agency for a non-Jew as a stringency. In a moment we’ll see where that applies and where it doesn’t, if we have time. The Alter Rebbe continues: But that is not the main prohibition against telling him. The prohibition against telling him is one you violate when you say it. Whether the non-Jew does what you told him or not, you have violated a prohibition by the very act of telling him. That is not on grounds of agency. About this the Alter Rebbe says: But the main prohibition against telling him, in its own right, was decreed by the Sages so that Shabbos should not be treated lightly. They forbade telling him so that people would not come to regard Shabbos lightly and do the melachah themselves.

1:16:43 Speaker 3 So there are two distinct aspects. Hm? It says explicitly, even if he tells him before Shabbos. No, no, no. The Alter Rebbe says explicitly in section 263 that the prohibition against telling him applies only at a time when the act is forbidden to all Jews. That’s what the Alter Rebbe says in section 263. Just a moment. “And it is not comparable to telling a non-Jew, even though he is not commanded to observe Shabbos, unless one tells him at a time when it is forbidden to all Jews.” He said that on grounds of agency. That itself is the distinction. When you may not tell a non-Jew to do melachah on Shabbos, you may not tell him even before Shabbos. Why? Because when he does the melachah, you are doing it. Agency. So he says explicitly in section 263: only at a time when it is forbidden to all Jews. I’m saying, look, it’s right here in the text. So that concerns speech. That’s the prohibition against telling him on Shabbos. Right, it says so explicitly, right. So there are two distinct aspects. There is the prohibition against telling him, and that prohibition applies at a time when it is forbidden to all Jews. What? That’s a separate question. It really is a separate question. What? Why are there these two distinct aspects? It’s simple. There is a prohibition against the act of telling him, even if the agency is ultimately never carried out. The very act of telling a non-Jew. Hm? Here it gives the Rambam’s reason: so that people won’t come to treat Shabbos lightly. The Sages forbade telling a non-Jew. What? I didn’t understand. The prohibition on grounds of agency applies not only to Shabbos but to other prohibitions as well. Correct. Yes. We learn that at the beginning of section 243: “And likewise all other prohibitions in the Torah.” This is the act of telling him itself, so that a person won’t come to treat Shabbos lightly. Does “speaking of weekday matters” apply here? No, it doesn’t. He mentioned agency at the beginning, and that applies specifically if the non-Jew actually does it. So the prohibition against telling him itself applies even if the agency is ultimately not carried out. As for telling a non-Jew, if the agency will be carried out, then you may not tell him even before Shabbos, when the prohibition against the very act of telling him

1:21:00 Speaker 3 does not yet apply. But when you instruct him to do it and he later performs the melachah on Shabbos, it is as though you did it. Right. Yes. The very act of telling him to do melachah is forbidden so that a person won’t come to treat Shabbos lightly. All right, if we want something practical, perhaps I’ll first address a point that has practical relevance. A question arises about this same law, although I had intended to discuss another point, but never mind. The question concerns the situation the Alter Rebbe sets out in section 263 on grounds of agency. And given the Alter Rebbe’s definition of agency—that it is as though I am doing the act—a question arises. It’s a valid question, not a new one; I’ve already written about it: What is the law if I’m here and I ask a Jew in the United States to do melachah for me when it is already Shabbos here but not yet Shabbos there? At first glance, there’s something like an example of this at the beginning of section 243, in the question the Alter Rebbe raises: How am I permitted to tell a Jew who has not yet accepted Shabbos to do melachah for me? Isn’t it as though I were holding his hand and doing it? The Alter Rebbe says: It is not comparable to guarding fruit. If I tell a person who is beyond my techum, “Go there and guard my field, and I’ll guard your field here”—I may not go there because it is beyond my techum, yet this is permitted. The Alter Rebbe says: That is not comparable. Why? I’m not walking there; I’m directing him within his own techum. No, I am walking there—I’m directing him with my words. He says: Look, if I were there, I could lead him there by the hand. So now I’m leading him there through my instruction. I’m telling him to do something that is inherently permitted. Not only is it permitted for you; it would be permitted for me to lead you there. But if I tell him, “Light a candle for me”

1:24:23 Speaker 3 Or you send me a fax on Friday afternoon where you are, when it is already Shabbos where I am. According to the Alter Rebbe, that is expressly forbidden, without any doubt. Why does the Alter Rebbe say that? Let’s picture it this way. We know there is such a thing as the International Date Line. Imagine two people standing on opposite sides of the Date Line, or two ships at sea right next to each other. For me it is Shabbos; for the other person it is Friday. I reach over with a stick to the other ship and light a candle there. There it is Friday, so perhaps it is permitted? But for me it is Shabbos, and I lit a candle. It is forbidden. It is exactly the same thing. The Alter Rebbe says that if I tell someone in America to do something, it is as though I am holding his hand. So my hand reaches all the way over there. As though I am there. No, that is what agency means. No, that is what agency means—that I am there. Why would I be there? My body is here. For me, it is not Shabbos. The Alter Rebbe says, wait a moment, that it is like holding the other person’s hand and moving it. Why would I be there? If I tell you to do something there, am I there? You are saying that the one who sends is like his agent. That is not what we learned. “A person’s agent is like himself,” not “the sender is like his agent,” so that I would be considered as though I were in my agent’s place. This has practical halachic implications. Yes, it is a problem. It can sometimes be a problem for residents of Eretz Yisroel too. If a Jew has a share in a factory there, or an American Jew has a share in a factory here, and the factory operates for his benefit. The question is—just a moment—the question is what happens when I do not actually instruct him to do it, but he does it for me. The Tzemach Tzedek is even more stringent and says that if someone does something for me, for my benefit, he becomes my agent under the principle that one may act on a person’s behalf without his knowledge.

1:27:21 Speaker 3 So again, it is the same thing: as though I told him to do it. Again, as though I am holding his hand. In this case, I do not know whether it is the same, because given the Shabbos prohibition, I certainly do not want him to do it for me. It is different. Why? That is exactly how agency works. No. On what basis am I there? That is a—wait, wait, wait. That is not such an easy question to answer offhand. If, during Shabbos, I cross from a place where it is Shabbos to a place where it is Friday, does Shabbos cease to apply to me after it has already begun for me? We will not address that question. It is not so simple. But—wait a moment, wait a moment. Yes, I know; I am familiar with this argument. You are not the first to ask it. There is no basis for saying that I am considered to be there. I am here, and all the laws of Shabbos apply to me. I cannot be both here and there. There is no such thing. I cannot be both on Shabbos and outside Shabbos. One moment, I heard the question. The Alter Rebbe says that it is not comparable to telling someone to guard fruit, because it is as though I am leading him there, and leading him there is permitted for me. Walking there would be forbidden for me. If I were there, I would not be allowed to walk there. Only—yes? [unclear] But the Alter Rebbe says that if I were there, I would be permitted to lead him, because that would be walking within the Shabbos boundary there. When I do it from here, it is not as though I walked over there. Rather, I am leading him there from here, and there is no prohibition in that. Ah, ah, ah. Just a moment, just a moment, I understand. No, please. Please. May I throw something from here to there on Friday afternoon? So, when I heard—

1:30:26 Speaker 3 That is not comparable at all. Why? Because for that we have the Nimukei Yosef. But wait. Good. The Nimukei Yosef says that the entire act is already done here. Without the Nimukei Yosef, I do not know. I know what the Nimukei Yosef says. What can I do? I do not have to know the answer without the Nimukei Yosef. Regarding shooting an arrow, the Nimukei Yosef says that the entire act is done at the moment it is shot. In practice, the shot is made here. Time and place have the same halachic definition. The Nimukei Yosef says this about shooting it on Friday and its continuing to travel on Shabbos. What difference does it make if it travels somewhere else? But if the Alter Rebbe says it is like holding his hand, that means I am extending a stick from here to there and lighting the candle. But to leave no room for doubt: recently I actually found this question discussed both in Minchas Yitzchak and by the Tchebiner Rav in Dovav Meisharim. As a matter of halachah, we do not rule that it is forbidden for everyone, because many halachic authorities disagree with the Alter Rebbe and say that the laws of agency do not apply on Shabbos. If I say that agency does not apply on Shabbos, then there is no definition of it as though I am holding his hand. But both of them rule explicitly that according to the Alter Rebbe it is forbidden. It is not that—I am not—these are authorities who support the point. This is a subject that was discussed recently in the yeshivah and was written about as well. If I lead someone beyond my Shabbos boundary while he remains within his own, I have done nothing prohibited, because I am leading him from here and doing something permitted. If I guide him by remote control within his boundary, no forbidden labor has been performed. But if I tell him to light a candle there, I am lighting the candle at that moment, and lighting a candle at that moment, when it is Shabbos for me, is forbidden. So someone wanted to suggest a basis for permitting it, and the Tchebiner Rav answers him. I obtained a responsum—I actually found it recently, after I was asked the same questions you are asking.

1:33:13 Speaker 3 But the Tchebiner Rav says that according to the Alter Rebbe it is forbidden. So this is clearly a practical matter, because it is something that can happen. Neither the Tchebiner Rav nor the [unclear] Rebbe forbids it because of the other halachic authorities, but both agree that according to the Alter Rebbe it is forbidden. Not “agree”—both rule that it is forbidden. Excuse my wording. And this has practical implications. There are, of course, ways to deal with it. Each person should ask a rav how to arrange things using those solutions, because time does not allow us to go into them now.

1:34:00 Speaker 4 Thank you very much, Rabbi. We apologize for having to cut you short. At least this subject will stay with me and continue to resonate. We invite Rabbi Yaroslavsky, secretary of the Beis Din of Chabad Rabbanim, who has been here since the afternoon and has participated in the entire conference as a representative of the Beis Din. We hope others will learn from him and do likewise. His subject is also very interesting: copyright, copying tapes, copying books, copying software. Rabbi Yaroslavsky, please.

1:35:19 Speaker 5 I’ll keep it brief myself. Well, since it is already very late and I do not want to hold things up, I want to speak about issues that have become especially common recently. In the time of the Gemara, these things were not common at all; they did not exist. But they do have sources. In brief, there is a mishnah in Bava Metzia, page 78: “One who rents a donkey to take it through the mountains and takes it through a valley, or to take it through a valley and takes it through the mountains—even if each route is ten miles long—and it dies, is liable.” If he rented the donkey, he is liable if damage results. The mishnah then continues: “If he rented it for the mountains and took it through a valley, and it slipped, he is exempt.” In any case, we will not go into that at length. The Gemara asks: Why is the first part different from the latter part? In the first part, the mishnah makes no distinction, while in the latter part it does. The Gemara tries to resolve this and concludes that the ruling in the first part follows Rabbi Meir, who says: “Anyone who deviates from the owner’s instructions is considered a robber.” The Gemara cites a basis for this in Rabbi Meir’s words: if someone gave a dinar to a poor person to buy a shirt or a tallis, and he bought a shirt with money meant for a tallis—or the reverse—he may not change the purpose for which the charity was given. The Gemara therefore concludes that he is considered a robber. But the question is: Where do we see that ruling here? In the case of the shirt, we do not find that he is called a robber. So what is the Gemara basing its conclusion on? And as for the Sages, the halachah does not follow Rabbi Meir on this point, as we later see in the Rif, who also cites the ruling at the beginning of [unclear]. The Rif says that the halachah does not follow Rabbi Meir, who said that anyone who deviates from the owner’s instructions is considered a robber.

1:38:02 Speaker 5 So, seemingly, we can resolve this by saying that when Rabbi Meir says, “Anyone who acts contrary to the owner’s instructions is considered a robber,” and the Sages disagree, that is specifically in a case where there could be another explanation for what happened, as with the animal slipping, and so on. But if someone changed the instructions and directly caused the damage, then even the Sages agree with Rabbi Meir that he is considered a robber. The proof is an explicit ruling in the Shulchan Aruch, in the laws of tzedakah: if someone gave a poor person money to provide for his family, a creditor may not come and take that money. The Rema adds that if the letter of recommendation for that poor person also mentioned his debts, then creditors may take the money too. But if it said that the poor person needed money to support his family, a creditor may not take those funds from him. Now, regarding the principle we mentioned earlier, that anyone who acts contrary to the owner’s instructions is considered a robber, we also find the Ritva explaining Rabbi Meir’s words. He says that according to Rabbi Meir, even where there is no absolute insistence on the owner’s part and no outright negligence, the person is still considered a robber. That implies that according to the Sages, where there is absolute insistence or outright negligence, they too agree that he is considered a robber. And regarding that second ruling in the laws of tzedakah, whose source is the Mordechai, he cites most of the Rishonim as holding that the person is considered a robber, apart from [unclear]. But he cites the Avi HaEzri, the Rif, and other Rishonim there, all of whom hold that he is considered a robber. Now, in this connection, let’s move briefly to the subject we want to discuss, which is copyright. If we say that even in a case where someone

1:40:52 Speaker 5 acts negligently and causes another person a loss, he is considered a robber. We also find in the responsa of the Rif that if someone took another person’s book and swore that he would not return it until he had copied it, the Rif rules that he is both a robber and a thief, and that by swearing in Hashem’s name he also desecrated His name. In other words, we see that when a person sets out to cause someone else a loss, he is certainly considered a robber. When someone invests days and nights in creating something—writing a book of his own Torah insights—and writes “All rights reserved,” and another person comes along wanting to copy from it and sell parts of what the first person wrote, created, and worked on, that is certainly forbidden. There is a responsum of the Tzemach Tzedek. The Tzemach Tzedek discusses someone who printed the Shas and was granted fifteen years after its printing. This concerned the Slavuta printing house, while people in Vilna wanted to print the Shas. So the Tzemach Tzedek discusses whether, since the full fifteen years had not yet passed, they could do so, even though the first printer had already sold copies and made an enormous fortune, as he writes. In the end, he concludes—I won’t go into every subsection of that very long responsum, in section 195 of Yoreh Deah—that since the printer had already recouped all his expenses, and since the Shas was not his own creation, even if he still had a few dozen sets left, that would not prevent someone else from printing the Shas too. But when a person creates something of his own, his own book, that is different. There are, of course, those who argue that once he has sold it, anyone who bought a copy of the book can

1:43:07 Speaker 5 copy it. But others hold that the rights are also an inheritance, passing on to the generations after him. I also wanted to quote the Rema. The Rema writes about a case in the time of Maharam Padua: he had printed the Rambam and corrected its text, and someone else with a printing press wanted to take that edition of the Rambam and print it. The Rema discusses the ruling of Rav Huna in Bava Basra concerning someone who has set up a mill in an alleyway and can prevent another person from setting one up there. On the other hand, we see that where someone in an alleyway teaches children, anyone else may also come and teach children. Since this concerns Torah study, another teacher cannot be barred. The Rema gives four reasons why, in this case, Maharam Padua could prevent the other person from printing the Rambam. First, the Rema writes that the ruling here follows Rav Huna: the other printer would be cutting off his livelihood. Second, there is the ruling concerning a Torah scholar’s merchandise. The Gemara says, “Clear the market for him,” and the Rema cites Rashi’s explanation that one may announce in the marketplace that, as long as the Torah scholar still has merchandise to sell, people may not buy from others until he has sold his. Third, he writes that there is the obligation to buy from a fellow Jew, because the person who wanted to take Maharam Padua’s rights was a non-Jew. So even if the non-Jew sells it more cheaply, the obligation to buy from a fellow Jew still applies. We see that even when someone wants to buy from a non-Jew who sells cheaply, [unclear]. Even at a higher price, one should buy from the Jew. And the fourth point, which he says is the main one, is that the text must be proofread.

1:45:22 Speaker 5 When selling a book, it has to be properly proofread. If it has not been proofread as it should be, then it is forbidden to buy it. The Chasam Sofer also writes about this. Someone wanted to do away with the practice of giving haskamos and imposing bans against reprinting books for a period of ten or fifteen years after publication. The Chasam Sofer writes that haskamos are necessary for two reasons: first, to prevent people from encroaching on another’s business; and second, because a haskamah lets people know that the book has been proofread and can be bought. Otherwise, someone might write things that should not be written, with no one checking them. What? We don’t need to [unclear] now. Actually, I have seen this discussed. Since those books are old and well established, today there may be no one who can claim the rights to them as an heir. But if there were, perhaps he could claim that the rights belong to him. And since we have reached this point and have spoken about it, we see how particular the Rebbe was about the Tanya when certain people wanted to publish editions of it. The Rebbe was very particular about the editions of the Tanya, including editions printed without permission. There is also the issue that, in particular, they had not properly proofread them and printed them with [unclear], and so on. In any case, we see clearly that the Rebbe wanted all the books belonging to our Rebbeim to be published specifically by Kehot. We won’t go into that now. In any event, that applies only

1:47:34 Speaker 5 to sefarim and sacred writings. But of course, as the Chasam Sofer writes, and as is also stated in the Chofetz Chaim, one of the reasons they were so particular about this was to keep incorrect material from being published. Obviously, when it comes to singers’ recordings and the like, that argument cannot be made. You cannot say, G-d forbid, that otherwise the tradition of Chassidic song will be forgotten. That is nonsense; you cannot make such an argument. In any case, there are two issues here. Some want to argue from the laws of robbery, as we said. Others argue on the basis of what the Gemara says in Bava Basra about craftsmen making rules among themselves. The Gemara tells of two butchers who agreed that if either entered the other’s territory, the other would tear his hide. One of them did so, but Rava held him liable because they had made the agreement without Rava’s authorization. The Tzemach Tzedek, in his chiddushim on [unclear], says that this is not limited to [unclear]: in each generation, people in a given place can establish rules to prevent one person from encroaching on another’s business. And since such rules have become accepted, when a person invests in something—whether various kinds of cassettes, calculators, or, in practice, certain computer programs—it certainly costs him a great deal of money. So the issue of robbery is very relevant here, particularly because he retains part of the rights for himself. He sold the other person only the item itself, while reserving the right to prevent that person from copying it. We find, uh... So that is why some halachic authorities say that if he copies it only to teach it to a particular class, or for his own use, it is permitted.

1:50:00 Speaker 5 For himself, it’s permitted. But to copy it, sell it, or publish it—even to publish excerpts—is certainly forbidden. Why? Because the publisher’s expectation is that people will buy the book from him; otherwise they won’t buy it, and he’ll be left with all his expenses. What? There is also discussion about software made by non-Jews, and some say there is an issue of chillul Hashem as well. Some say it is forbidden to steal even from a non-Jew, if we classify this as theft. No. For himself, if he needs it so a child can study with his chavrusa, he may do that, yes. Software, no. Software is explicitly excluded. Software, no. All right. Look, as for making a copy for himself, if he bought it—something that isn’t... For himself; he mustn’t give it to anyone else. It would seem that he may do that, because this isn’t the sort of commercial activity that would make it forbidden. But software isn’t something that wears out. A record, for example—perhaps he may make a copy of a record. Since he bought it and it will wear out, that’s different. But copying it for someone else, even to give it as a gift, is forbidden once he makes that copy. Why? Because the owner retained that right. We see something further in what the Alter Rebbe writes in the laws of Pesach, in the... It’s interesting that he... Some disagree: when he sells the chametz, it says he must give it over. He can give it to his friend—why? Because after Pesach his friend will return it to him. But if, for example... So he says the seller has retained some interest in it, in that he can get it back. Others say: What do you mean he retained an interest? That would mean the chametz is his during Pesach. But it turns out that the Alter Rebbe does not agree with that. There is also a sicha of the Rebbe on this in volume seven,

1:52:01 Speaker 5 where the Rebbe writes about the story with the Tzemach Tzedek and the Rebbe Maharash—that is, when he found his candies. He writes that since in that case he was particularly strict about it, the subsequent sale was indeed a complete sale. There was a greater element of legal artifice there, as he explains. But ordinarily, the practical conclusion is that anyone who invested money and printed a book or a CD, or developed software into which he put his whole heart, may not have it taken and copied. It is as though he retained the right that no one else could make copies. And since he retains that right, copying it is more akin to theft. With a book he sells, you could say he sold it completely. But here he retains a right: if copies are to be made, they must be made by him. Therefore, transferring a copy is forbidden. Some want to say that if something has already been widely copied and taken, it is as though he has given up hope of preventing it, so the prohibition is not as severe. But certainly with CDs and things like that, one must be very careful. That follows from this. Yes, it says explicitly that if the rabbi informed you beforehand that he does not permit you to copy or record it, then you may not record him. But if... Then he told you: Well, you have to know whether you will convey it accurately or distort it. You know, someone... So he has to... No, that is explicitly forbidden. Torah insights heard from others may not be passed off as one’s own. You must say them specifically in the speaker’s name. And even if someone saw something in Piskei Teshuvos, which cites various responsa from the great Torah authorities of the generation, he should say that he saw it

1:54:08 Speaker 5 in Piskei Teshuvos, which cites them—the Noda BiYehudah or someone else. Some permit him to mention only the name of the original authority; he doesn’t have to say that he saw it in a particular book. But presenting it in his own name is certainly forbidden. So he said it wasn’t his. Well. Yes. Yes.

1:55:03 Speaker 6 On this subject, is there... Can Torah insights be inherited? Can one own Torah insights? Did the Mahari”l acquire the...?

1:55:13 Speaker 5 All right.

1:55:14 Speaker 6 Whether he has proprietary rights to this Torah material, yes. It’s a long responsum extending over eight pages, but the end of the responsum is missing. There the Tzemach Tzedek discusses this question concerning Torah. I’m not talking about software and all those things. I’m talking about Torah: can one have proprietary rights to Torah insights or not? That seems to be the direction of the discussion there. The ending is missing.

1:55:38 Speaker 5 There is the Chafetz Bar[?], who wrote in the introduction to his book that as long as it hasn’t been sold, no one else may sell it. What is that? How is that relevant?

1:55:49 Speaker 6 There is the financial investment a person made in printing it, but that isn’t what we’re discussing. Right now we’re discussing who is permitted to print it.

1:55:58 Speaker 5 So if...

1:55:58 Speaker 6 When there was a dispute here.

1:55:59 Speaker 5 On this subject specifically: if a person shares Torah insights and many people hear him, anyone can go and disseminate them in the name of the person from whom he heard them. If he invested money in them, that’s another matter. He didn’t invest money.

1:56:12 Speaker 6 Before that, it didn’t exist. Does he own it? He passes it on to his children.

1:56:17 Speaker 5 No.

1:56:18 Speaker 6 It belongs to everyone.

1:56:20 Speaker 5 Look, it belongs to everyone.

1:56:21 Speaker 6 In the case we have at hand, it seems he has only one child. There is no second child.

1:56:26 Speaker 5 Ah, so the law of... doesn’t apply.

1:56:28 Speaker 6 There’s no need to go over it again, but that is the spirit of it.

1:56:37 Speaker 5 There’s another matter that may touch on this subject as well, though it’s a separate topic: in general, the law of encroaching on another’s livelihood when something is given as a gift. As we see, the Rebbe explains in one of the sichos the principle of a neighboring landowner’s right of first refusal. There are two ways to understand it, or two opinions: either that the right applies only to the buyer—meaning the owner may sell the property to a non-Jew as well, but if a Jew buys it, the neighboring Jewish owner can compel him to hand it over to him—or that it is also part of the sale itself, with a certain right retained, so that he cannot give it away or sell it to that person. In other words, a certain restriction remains on it. We see that the Rebbe also addresses this latter view, at any rate. As for encroaching on another’s livelihood, we see that the Rebbe Rashab treated it very seriously. Even in cases where, strictly speaking, there is no financial payment involved and the laws of encroachment do not apply to institutions, we saw that the Rebbe was very careful that one should not, G-d forbid, intrude on another’s domain. If one publisher puts out something under an established name and reputation, and someone else also puts it out, that isn’t quite... One must know that there is a great deal involved here, beyond the basic matter of ethical fairness, particularly in such a case. We see that the Alter Rebbe also discusses a shop opening next to another shop, which is permitted. If the new shop doesn’t cut off the first owner’s livelihood—he can continue selling and cover the shop’s expenses—then there is no... But if someone does it in a way that causes the other person to close his shop, well, that is certainly forbidden.

1:58:35 Speaker 5 To do that is intolerable. But we see that the Alter Rebbe also discusses cases where something is permitted according to Torah law. Even then, as we know, a chossid in particular must conduct himself according to “You shall do what is right and good,” going beyond the letter of the law. So these are things one must not do. Certainly one must not do this with things being published. It is like the Rema writes: when things are published without approval, they can be garbled and mislead people, and so on. This is not the place to elaborate on such matters. One must certainly be careful not to lend a hand to such things. Those who print such material certainly need to make a serious accounting of themselves and what they are doing. A chossid must always consider whether what he is doing brings the Rebbe satisfaction, or, G-d forbid, the opposite. So one must think about how the Rebbe would view it if he were here with us. He is with us in spirit and soul. How would he view it if we had to give an accounting for the things we publish? Do they bring honor to the Rebbe, honor to Chabad, and so on? One must give careful thought to everything one publishes.

2:00:00 Speaker 7 Thank you to all the participants, and thank you to Rabbi Yaroslavsky. We also want to thank all the organizers: Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Zilberstrom, Rabbi Menachem Brod, Rabbi Yoel Hertzvi[?], Rabbi Shashi Segal, and all those who came and took part in this day of study. We think the conclusion is that this should be held twice a year. To the organizers, Rabbi Brod and Rabbi Zilberstrom: there is a request from the audience—Maariv prayers.