פנורמה של הלכה 24

00:10 Good evening, everyone. Hope you can hear me. I'd like to dedicate this shiur, at least my part of it. I can't dedicate your time, but I can dedicate my time to, uh, a young lady who is, uh, having very serious, um, health challenges. Her name is Chana Yenta Rivka bas Sheindl. Actually, her name was Chana Rivka till yesterday. They added a name. So that's Chana Yenta Rivka bas Sheindl. If you don't mind, I'd like to say a Kapitel Tehillim. I'll say a Kapitel Chof, if you don't mind joining me with that, and I'll give tzedakah. And if you give tzedakah in her zechus, she should have a refua shleima. So let's start with the first quest which a lot of people are asking about. The inyan of birkas ha'ilonos, making a bracha on the blossoms, um, which it says... This is the lashon of the, of the Gemara. And Alter Rebbe brings it in the Sefer HaBerachos. One who goes out, goes for a walk in the, in the country. . And he sees trees which have produced blossoms. He should say the bracha. That Hashem did not leave anything missing in his world. He created fine creatures. And fine trees. That people should have benefit from them. You say the bracha only the first time each year. So, so meanwhile it says, . So here we have the first quote, which you have over here is from the Birkei Yosef, from the Chida. And this is in, in the Shulchan Aruch, in, in Orach

03:15 Chaim 225. That I heard that according to Kabbalah, that the bracha belongs only in the month of Nissan. And these people are asking because especially I think this year, the, perhaps the, uh, season's a bit still cold and a lot of blossoms haven't started coming out. And so people are asking, "Can we still make the bracha in-- when we see the blossoms in Iyar?" So meanwhile, we have the Chida who says it belongs to Nissan. Then the other quote is also from the Chida, and this is from a different sefer called, it's called Moreh B'Etzbah. It's, um, inside a sefer called Avodas Hakodesh, which has got several sections. Moreh B'Etzbah. So, um, says you should be mishtadel. You should try to say the bracha on the trees during the month of Nissan. You should be davka in Nissan. You should also make a point it should be two trees, because it's-- you say ilanos. One would go out to the s- to the fields to make the bracha. Point kuf, kuf tzadik tes. It says you, you should be, , you should have extreme attention in this bracha because it's netikun haneshamos. This is to rectify the neshamas which are b'gulgolos beytzel hasod vasav. You have neshamas which have been reincarnated in trees and in herbs. And you should plead for them that they should be given relief, et cetera. So this is the, um, these are the two points from the Chida. So we're seeing here, not just on plain blo-- it's not just

05:02 a bracha on blossoms, it's something to do with, with neshamas, et cetera. Now, I have seen, or somehow perhaps in my mind I'm confusing, that there is in the Sefer Kabbalah HaYashar, talks about why we say the Nosi in the month of Nissan. And he says, in the month of-- There's a, there's a special time for the neshamas. Uh, aliyas haneshamas of some sort. Tishri time and Nissan time. And Tishri time, we go out to, you know, Elul, we go to Kivrei Ovos. So people go out to the, to the Beis Elok, and that's one way of helping the neshamas. Comes Nissan, we don't go out to the Beis Elok on, on Nissan. But on the other hand, we say, uh, the Nosi. And if you think about the Yeridat, the Misochachin, Ketziporim, Metazim, it's somehow got to do with nishmosin, of re-rejuvenation of the neshamas. And that seems to be, in my mind, perhaps I'm confusing, but this thing which the Chida is saying about relating to the neshamas, it seems to be, in my mind, connected Let's now go on to a letter of the Rebbe, um, where he talks-- It's, it's in Michot Avchroli. He talks about Chodesh HaAviv, the month of spring, where we ta- um, Hashem takes us out from Mitzrayim. And he then, towards the end of the paragraph, he says, "In the lustich von unzere chachomim zam, zichronam levracha. Hashem Eleicheinu is melech ha-olam, the kenich van velt," the Ebesht is the king of the world. "Shelo chisar

06:35 ba-olam moi klum. Az er hot gemacht, az zol nit in ir gar nit feln." How do you translate the word lo chisar? That the Ebesht engineered there's nothing missing in the world. Okay. So the beracha, the beracha, as we know, is in the Gemara, and he s- says the beracha is in Berachos Daf Beis Gimel. And then the Rebbe addresses this. "Ve'hineh lekama achronim," some achronim say, "Nisan lav davka. Ava yesh oymim de davkah hu." Some say it's davka in the month of Nisan. Now, um, I apologize, I did not look up the Stei Chemed, which the Rebbe refers to. So in my Stei Chemed, in that encyclopedia, you'll see the various opinions whether it's davka Nisan or not. What is our opinion? In other words, what did the Alter Rebbe hold? So the Alter Rebbe, as we know, with-- in addition to the Shulchan Aruch, he wrote a siddur, and he also wrote an earlier kind of interim edition on berachos called, it's called, um, Luach Birchas HaNe'enin. The later edition was called Sefer Birchas HaNe'enin. Now, so the Luach Birchas HaNe'enin HaRishon, which is the first of the two editions, he says that after Lamed, "Yevorek be lo shem u'malchus." So he says after Lamed, in other words, if it's after thirty days. S-so then you should say the beracha without shem u'malchus. If you see again, we'll see in a moment. Um, obviously, if he's saying after thirty days, that means Nisan lav davka, because how does it mean after thirty days?

08:10 But in Sefer Birchas HaNe'enin, the Alter Rebbe misses that out. "Ach sh'yesh l'omar," perhaps he means that you should only say the beracha the first time. "Adain yikshul omenu biydivei HaShulchan Aruch." W-the if, if that's the case that he says you can make the beracha in Iyar also, he should have said the word, "Be'mei Nisan," when it says, "Harah, Iyar is-- if you wanted to see his trees be'mei Nisan," he should have said it's lav davka. As he does explain many halachas in the Birchas HaNe'enin, it's translated in a very simple language. So if Nisan is lav davka, he should have said so. And then he's saying, "Yesh l'omar de hishmit." Perhaps he missed out this thing about after thirty days, if you saw it once and you saw again after thirty days, because he holds that it's only yemei Nisan kipshuto be'davka, and therefore, "I efshar achar Lamed," therefore it's not possible. So we have here-- So the, the Velt takes the view that so long as-- So you see there's different opinions. The general, uh, Vel-Velt opinion is that it's-- you can also say the beracha, uh, in Iyar also, so long as that's the blossoming season. And according to that, possibly Australia would be able to say the beracha. "Al pi medadecha ha-hafrim Nisan yonim." It's, uh, it's davka in Chodesh Nisan. Let's move on. Okay. So my next question, which is a totally different type of question, is a money matter. So here we have a story, a real story, that

09:52 there's, uh, someone who passed away, and grandma's flat now has to be sold or emptied, and there's lots of old furniture there. And what do you do with all that furniture? Well, one way is to, uh, bui-- uh, get a skip. But there's a, uh, perhaps a save the world attitude. Resell it, and then s-you put something on, on Gumtree or something, and people come along and see that furniture. As a famous expression, one man's trash is the other one's treasure. So fine. So they, um... One, one evening, a couple came, a non-Jewish couple came along, knocked on the door, and they said they want to see the furniture. They looked around, and they saw a couple of armchairs. And they said, "Well, how much do you want for those?" He says, "Well, twenty each." "Nah, twenty for the two." "Okay, take twenty for the two." Th-they took out twenty. The visitor took out twenty pounds in cash, gave it to him. He says, "I don't have a van here. Just with a little car. Well, come next week, we'll pick it up." In the interim, one of the grandchildren came, uh, to the, the emptying apartment and saw those armchairs. He said, "Those armchairs, wow, I remember how Bobby and Zadie would sit and relax, and I've got such good memories of their armchairs. I'm having them." "Oh, we sold them." "Nah, I'm having them. Forget it." And so, so now we have, uh, a goy has put down twenty pounds to buy those

11:22 armchairs. And now, can you cancel that sale? Is it, is it a sale? Right. So now, what do we have here? Um, let's read this, this loshon over here in the Shulchan Aruch. There, there, there's two ways of being koneh. There's one way of being koneh through kinyan kesef, and one way is kinyan m'shicha. Kinyan kesef means you hand over money, and m'shicha means you actually pick up the article, pull it if it's an animal, et cetera. M'shicha. Now, min ha'torah, we would be koneh with money. So if I would come to you, if you're a f- you're a farmer, and I want to buy grain, and I give you a hundred pounds, and so the grain in your attic belongs now to me. That's min ha'torah. What would happen if a fire would break out? So then- You've got the hundred pounds. I mean, uh, h-yeah. So, so you're not gonna start salvaging the grain from the attic because you know what? It might even be worse. It might be that they will... That you'll tell me that there was a fire in the attic and, uh, you know, and just keep the money. So the expression, Therefore, uh, canceled the power of Kinyan Kesef, and they said the only way you can be Matana, portable objects, is only with a, a more tangible Kinyan, not through giving money. That is true. Say, Yisroel, a Jew from a Jew would only Matana be the Meshiha or Hagbah, not with money. What about with a

13:01 Goy? So here there are different opinions about this and some say... Rambam says a Goy can be Matana with Meshiha or Kesef. Ram says a Goy is Matana only with, only with Kesef, not Meshiha. Rabbeinu Tam says with the Meshiha, not with Kesef. So it looks like the Halakha seems to follow Rabbeinu Tam that a Goy is not Matana with Kesef, only with Meshiha. Having said that, here we have a Teshuvot Harashba. He writes the following: Even according to the first Teshuvot that a Goy is not Matana, it should be, is not Matana with Kesef, only with Meshiha. See the note at the bottom. Even if you only say that a Goy is not Matana with Kesef, only with Meshiha, in other words, according to Rabbeinu Tam. Says Rabbeinu-- Says the Harashba, Because in Goyshe law con-currently, That a Goy is Matana from another Goy by with putting down money. That if you put down money, it's considered sold. So then also we vis-à-vis Goyim would also be, uh, have to recognize Kinyan Kesef. Even though you're gonna say it's just that's the custom. That should be recognized as something important, even Yisroel, Yisroel. And he quotes the gloss of Situmta. If this is the conventional approach of Kinyan Situmta, gloss, um, okay, the gloss in the Gemara is, is Kanyo. And therefore, what we're seeing here is that even if you'd say that there is Lamdus to say that a Goy is not Matana by Kesef. Says the Rashba. If that's the Min HaMedina,

14:52 that M-Kinyan Kesef is Matana, then that sale is final. So my, um, understanding is that actually the, uh, the furniture is sold to the Goy and they should actually, uh, give it back to the Goy when they, when they can. Let's move on. So here we have another money question. Now, here is though... Here, uh, it's a Ribis question. I-I'm, I'm, I'm alerted to that the Yahadus book. If you-- For the people of my age, Yahadus book is that, that the thing... You may have heard something called Chiddan, where you got children who are memorizing, uh, all about the Sefer HaMitzvot. And so one of those, uh, one of those members who went through the Chiddan tells me that the Yahadus book translates Situmta as a handshake. Okay. So no, we, we didn't, we didn't learn this kind of stuff when we were, uh, you know, 11 years old, huh? Right. So let's move on. So now, so here's a, here's a Ribis question. And it says in Gemara, one of the people said, "If Moshe Rabbeinu had been a businessman, he would never have taught this business about Ribis." How, I mean, this is how business works. You know, your money. What is Ribis? I'm, I'm giving you money for time, and I'm, I'm charging. I'm, I'm renting you my money. I'm, and that's... I mean, money is, money is energy, and you're using my energy over time, so I'm taking money for it. Tell you what, we're not allowed to. And the, and

16:31 the, uh, laws of Ribis are not in Choshen Mishpat. They are in Yehudah because even if both sides are agreeable, and the, the lender is agreeable, the borrower is agreeable, it's still, it's still not Kosher. It's not allowed. Okay. So the story is the following, that there's this distributor who distributes disposables around Europe. Now, he's been delivering a lot to Chabad houses, and some of them are not so prompt in payment. The consequences are that by the time they have paid, and because of the devaluation of the euro vis-à-vis the, the pound, he's actually being out, quite out of pocket. So he's trying to find a way of incentivizing these, uh, customers to pay more promptly. Now, what has to be made very clear is that you cannot advertise two prices. This is, you have in front of you, you have from the Alter Rebbe's It's, it's Alter Rebbe's, uh, made a different Seder from the Mechaber. You know, Mechaber is about 20 Simanim. Alter Rebbe condensed it into one Siman. He says... So let's read that first of all. First thing. In a sale, after you've sold, after the Kinyan has been effected, you're not allowed to say, "Oh, we've agreed a hundred pounds. If you pay me fi- a hundred and ten, ten pounds, you can pay me two weeks' time." Two. In other words, the person already owes you a hundred pounds. To say that, "If you will, uh, pay more, you'll be able to, uh, wait with the ma- payment," that's

18:14 Ribis G'murah Sh'Shoteh. It's basically once you've paid and you... Sorry, once you've made a Kinyan, you owed a hundred pounds, so then you have a debt. That debt mustn't grow. The word ribbis is loshon harbeh. It mustn't grow. Then it goes further. Even before the sale has been, uh, finalized, you're, you're not allowed to, um, increase the price midrabbonan. To say to the customer, "If you give me the money now, it'll be for ten. If you want to pay later, it'll be 12." So you're not allowed to give two prices. One for prompt payment and one for delayed payment. And it may be, he says further, even if it's actually worth 12 pounds, and you're saying, "If you give me now, I'll give you 10 pounds," it's still called avak ribbis. The word avak can be translated as dust. It can also mean loshon of entanglement. If you remember Rashi on the words, "Va'ye'aveik ish immo," that there's an entanglement. It's kind of pulling you towards ribbis. The fee... And he says that because payment for a sale is not like a rental. As soon as the co- the b-b-b- the buyer has bought it, um, it's his, and the fact that you start increasing the price because he's gonna pay you later, so it's basically you are, you are charging for waiting for your money, and that's ribbis. So really, um, he would have wanted to give them a price, a better price. Say, if you b- pay within a week, it's 100 pounds

19:53 per box, and if you pay, um, delayed, it's gonna be, uh, 150, 110 pounds per box. You're not allowed to do that. What can you do then? So we got back-- we're back to this problem. How can you encourage your customers to pay on time, and which is, which is actually more efficient for the entire, entire industry? So one-- What, what I say, um, I, I contacted a ribbis expert who said, what you can do is once they've taken delivery and they owe the money, you can say, "If you pay me within the week, I'm gonna drop five percent." That you can do. But because they, they, they are-- You're, you're giving a discount. They owe the, the 100 pounds, but if you pay within the week, it's gonna be 95 pounds. That would be acceptable. Okay, let's move on. So here we have a different question altogether. We've got a story of two boys who are twins, and they are turning Bar Mitzvah. They are Kohenim. So normally, when you've got twins Bar Mitzvah, you can ask, kindly ask the Kohenim to leave the room if you have a minyan without them. And you can give one because it is also important to point out, you don't give two brothers an aliyah right one a-after the other. Oh, but I'm ein hor, I'm, I'm, because ein hor, et cetera. So now... But they're Kohenim. So what, what do you do? So let's go to the next slide. So here we have the Shulchan Aruch

21:30 in, I think it's kuf lamed he. Yeah. And he says that you can call a Kohen after a Kohen with a Yisrael in between. And when you... So in other words, you call Rishon, you call a Kohen. The Sheini, you call a Yisrael. And then, or whatever, then you can then, when you call your Kohen again, you'll say, "Af al pi shehu Kohen." So as not to give him... Not, not, you know, to be, be confused people about his status, whether he's a Kohen or not. Af al pi shehu Kohen. Then the, the Rama is not so keen about that. V'yesh omerim, I'm pointing down the third line from the bottom. V'yesh omerim, de'ein likros Kohen or Levi leminyan shivah. That you shouldn't call a Kohen or Levi for the basic three aliyas or the seven aliyas on Shabbos. Once you've m- finished the seven aliyas, the people of whom the most, the world makes hafsufas. Yeheiu chol likros Kohen or Levi. Vechein noigim bemdinos eilu. That the minhag Ashkenaz is that you don't call a Kohen after a Levi or after Yisrael in the basic number of aliyas. Umi hum bamakom tzorich udchak, yesh lismocha svara rishonah. When you're stuck, you are able to... Where there's a pressure, you need to give two aliyas to Kohenim, then you can rely on the first, uh, um, pase- pasek for the Maharik or the Mechaber, who says that you can do a Kohen achar Kohen with a Levi or Yisrael beem Tza. And although there's some

23:04 further apprehension about that, so we've got here this sefer, because he, he, he says so. Also, Halacha Lamai says, very much a contemporary, that you can do that. You call up the, um, mamash is, "Shnei HaKohanim vehehem chasani Bar Mitzvah." So he d- he does that on a Monday and a Thursday. And the reason why they're doing this on a Monday or Thursday is probably to avoid hilul Shabbos. It's in a place where very spre-spread out. Therefore, they're doing it dafka in a weekday. And so you'll give the first aliyah to one boy and the, the, s-- then a Yisrael, and then the third aliyah to the other boy, and mazal tov. Um, I had first suggested perhaps one boy would lain and the other boy would have the aliyah. But, uh, you know, I was, um, informed that the, neither of them are, are capable of lainying. They'll make the brachos, but, uh, right. Okay. I see here someone on the chat puts up a question. Ma boneh geir lekampim. Shem, that, about the camps, et cetera. That they say that if you, um, pay by this and this date, you'll pay so much, you're getting a little early bird discount. That is a problem. The, um, in Nesivim B'sei HaShlichus, chelek alef, I've written about this. There you have also, however, Reb Meir Aharon from Rechovot, who disagreed with me, and he says it's not a problem. There's a couple of poi-- there's a couple of chilkimas there. So it is a t-

24:33 I, I do see it as a problem. There's, um, I'm now going to confess to you, who is my expert on ribbis. His name is Rav Shabsi Tayar. And whenever there's a, a mivtza of a sale of, uh, a set of hanukias, this, that, and you get an early bird sale, he is right on the case. It's a problem on, in his ribbis. Uh, y- one, one eitzah is a simple eitzah. There's a solution that you do it with a, uh, with a chet ha'isk. That you are investing in the business. That's, that's, that's one eitzah which, which, which I would recommend. You know what, Reb Levi? The question is equally, um, when you buy, I buy the Kfar Chabad, and I don't pay a weekly, uh, whatever the weekly price. I give them $100 for a few, for a, for a few months, and because of this, I get it cheaper. And how does that work? So also one of the ways is it works through heter iska. Well, this, this business is, this is in, uh, law and meant for... Already, you know, 100 years ago, they've already been worrying about this. All right, let's move on. So here we have a question, and interesting, I got this question from two different people, um, different countries, asking about the meaning of, of doing a Borchu at the end of davening. So here we have, uh, this is from the Alter Rebbe's Shulchan Aruch that this, it's, this is Siman Samech Tes, and this

25:58 call is all about Pru U'Restu El Shema. So he has here that some places they have a minhag that the chazan says Borchu every day after the last Kaddish. Now, the last Kaddish is different between Ashkenazim and Sephardim. By the Sephardim, they don't say a, a Kaddish after Aleinu necessarily, so the last Kaddish is the Kaddish after Kaveh El Hashem. By Ashkenazim, the last Kaddish, sorry, is after, is after Aleinu. It doesn't matter. So the... This is from the Chabad, um, from the Rivosh, who says that they have a minhag to say Borchu every day after davening in case someone has come late to davening. And even if they don't, they still, they still do this. They-- If there's no late-comers, they still do this. But the Alter Rebbe says, "Beis HaMedrash Ein Nochshin LeMachlokes." If there is no, um, worry about... He says about there's a difference between the Beis Haknesses and Beis HaMedrash. If it's not an established thing, and y- especially when you've got just Talmidie Chachamim, "Yesh Linoy Shelo Yomar SheYachitzu Borchu El Im Ken Bo Achi Echad Acher Borchu." So one shouldn't do a Borchu after davening unless there's a late-comer. So that's the Alter Rebbe's Shulchan Aruch, and here we have a letter of the Rebbe where, about saying Borchu every day after davening, and obviously referring to the Tour in Kuf Lamed Gimel, the Alter Rebbe, we see that he doesn't bring this late Borchu, uh, in the siddur, although he has it for Friday night. And furthermore,

27:28 we have Minuch Beis Harav. We've never seen that we should be making this kind of Borchu. And so, um, basically, the Rebbe seems to be discouraging it. So in Chabad, it isn't encouraged. Now, the question, the way it was put to me from one of the quest- one of the, one of them, was that they struggle to get a minyan on time. Very often for Borchu, they still don't have a minyan because people, you know, straggle in la-later. And finally, it could be sometimes even they don't manage to do Chazarat Hashatz because people are, haven't come. But by eight clock, they will have, uh, 10 people. So I feel that then, yes, for sure you can, you, you, I think you should do a Borchu. Although-- So the Shulchan Aruch seems to be saying, "I came in late. I will make a Borchu after davening." And possibly in Chabad, that's discouraged. You came late, you know, so, you know, just be, be, be embarrassed and sit at the back and be quiet. Un-un-and next time, you come on time. But, you know, to come announce, "I came late, and therefore I'm gonna make a, a Borchu," so perhaps that's why it's an, an, some attitude which in Chabad it's not, not seen. But if someone does want to make a Borchu, you see, for sure, they came late, they want to make a Borchu, gezunteheit, and especially if there wasn't a minyan earlier. So to make a Borchu later, and I think it should be,

28:52 uh, as you see, after the last Kaddish, I think that, that would be okay. Let's move on. The fact that it says by the Rebbe, you never saw it because there was a minyan on time. They, they did never have such a thing that, uh, they didn't have a minyan for Borchu, I presume. Okay. Then we have here, someone asked me about saying Kaddish. He happened to turn up late for schul, and he says Kaddish for various Niftarim. Can you say Kaddish in middle of Psukei D'Zimra? So the Cha-- the, in other words, the tzibbur, the, the congregation already on for Shir Shel Yom, and you are holding in middle of Psukei D'Zimra. So you're about 20 minutes behind the minyan. Can you say your Kaddishim then? So here he says, "The Chiddush says you are allowed to say Kaddish." Achronim disagree, uh, but they say you shouldn't, but a yosem, an orphan within the tw- 11 months after a passing of a father or mother, um, and if he was late and he's at, has, um, it's for sure and is now in middle of Psukei D'Zimra, he could say the Kaddishim, um, at the appropriate places. So there is also, I f-- I didn't look it up now, there's a letter of the Rebbe which says also about saying, um, the letter I think was to Rabbi Dubov about saying Kaddish D'Rabonon. I think it was Rabbi Dubov. There's a letter of the Friediker Rebbe, how it's important to say the Kaddish D'Rabonon

30:22 before Hodu. Rabbi Dubov was mashgiach in Manchester Yeshiva. Uh, perhaps it was there or perhaps it was in the schul in Das Ist Israel, but he would start davening early. Because he davened longer, so he started early. But he wanted to make sure that that Kaddish is said, so he asked the Rebbe could, if he sta-- he's now, let's say, on for Ashrei, Halelucha, and the tzibbur are starting Hodu, can he say the Kaddish there? And the Rebbe says, "Since it's not your personal chiyuv, you shouldn't say the Kaddish there." So here, there's, this is the, this is the balance here. If it's a personal chiyuv, and then you could say the Kaddish in middle of Psukei D'Zimra. If it's not a personal chiyuv, then you should try to delegate it to someone else. One more point about this is that if you pause between after Yishtabach, before Yoetz Et, then you could, you could say it there. One other thing I want to share with you, um, a, a One Shabbos morning, I was-- It was about ten thirty, and, uh, I was called to the door of the shul. There was a, a lady who has said that sh- her husband is, uh, had some kind of attack, and she wants to know whether she c- she should call an ambulance. Now, uh, so I was already middle of Psukim DeZimra. So I needed to answer, obviously. I s-said it written in Shulchan Aruch. If you need to, on emergency, interrupt the middle

31:49 of Psukim DeZimra, you can say, "Baruch Hashem L'Olam Amen V'amen." And that's like you have m-- had your final beracha. When you re-come back and you want to resume your Psukim DeZimra, say Baruch Hashem L'Olam Amen V'amen again. That would say I did that, um, and answered to her that, of course, she should call, uh, an ambulance or Hatzalah, whatever it was at the time. The next week, I t- I, I, uh, felt that I should make a fuss that don't ask me such questions. If you have a question of emergency, you shouldn't start asking shailas and you should, um, d-deal with it promptly. All right. So that's the story with the Kaddish. So, um, if it, if it is a personal fear, then you would say, um, the Kaddish in the Psukim DeZimra, otherwise try to delegate it. Let's move on. Um, I got this question this week from a lady who had bought some avocado salad from Russ & Sons, and in it, it had a sprinkling of croutons. Which beracha should be said on the croutons? So this, we've got here two issues. One is, what is the beracha on croutons per se? The other one is when the croutons are now in the salad. So let's first deal with the croutons in the salad, assuming, assuming that the croutons are mezonos, let's say. Which that's what this sefa is c- assuming. So, this first opinion is suggesting that the croutons will dominate and make the whole salad into mezonos. Am Nom

33:25 LeMeisa, he says, it's, "L'roi l'chol yirei shamayim," you should avoid this because you've got the Shulchan Aruch and the Chayyei Odom. Each one, for different reasons, holds that the salad will not become mezonos. And so here he quotes from the Alter Rebbe that which we say that the, um, that the grain element would dominate the whole thing is if they were cooked together or, or if it's clear that the, the other stuff is tofel to the, to the, uh, to the, um, to the grain. But here, that's not the case. Here, it's clear that the main thing is the avocado, and the croutons are there to give a bit of a crunch, a bit of a something or other, but it's not. So according to the Alter Rebbe, the, the croutons do not dominate. And therefore, what I would say is, uh, the br- the salad would be an avocado salad, and you make the beracha accordingly. What about the croutons? Now, you'd have to make a separate beracha. The problem which I have is, which I didn't look into more carefully, um, just, just now. You've got croutons which are, which are mezonos, the little yellow ones, but then you've got diced bread. They take bread, cut it, regular bread or some motzi, cut it into little cubes, and they add a bit of, of spice, uh, and fry it, deep fry it. That's-- It, it, for all intents and purposes, you look at it, you see it's a piece of bread. So according

35:02 to my understanding from the Alter Rebbe, even though it's less than a kezayis, it still remains hamotzi because it still looks like bread. And therefore, I think, and, um, this, this lady who asked me this question, she said she, she took the croutons and put them out, out to, to one side. And I said, "I would do exactly the same as you," because the croutons would not-- Uh, I, I wouldn't want... Well, if I'm, if I'm washing already, then, you know, more ha'iruch hanchan ve'takan osam. Yeah. The whole idea is having this as a snack of, of some sort, and I would just keep the croutons to one side. Right. Um, let's come to your, um... Someone's putting on the chat a question. If there was no minyan until after Borche Omer, should one be said in Psukim DeZimra? Do you mean should Kaddish D'Rabonna be said in Psukim DeZimra? I think not. No. The Kaddish, certainly al pi Kabbalah, the Kaddish is to distinguish between Olam Ha-Ha-Ha'asiyah and Olam Ha-Briyah. Uh, sorry. Olam Ha-Hoasi and Olam Ha-Yitzirah. And the same thing, the Kaddish between Yishtabach and Yoetz Et is between Yitzirah and Olam Ha-Briyah. So if you're looking for the Kabbalah reason, it should be said at the, at the junctures, not in middle. Um, I had a funny experience. I, um, I, I was in New York a couple of years ago. I was in one shul, and someone came along late on Shabbos morning. It was a Yom Tov morning. He comes

36:32 late, and i-it was after, after... He, he was in Shnas Ha'aveilim or whatever. So he, after Hadar Svemuno, he did his Kaddish at, at, um, over there. And then someone says, "Where does your head give birth? Where do you see a shul in the middle of, uh, Psukim DeZimra, they come along and say Kaddish?" That was the beginning of, of Succos. The end of Succos, I was in the Chabad house, and typically every morning over Yom Tov, they didn't have a minyan first thing, you know, by Chaydu. And each day of Yom Tov- It was the same story. After ad aslemuna, then v'alav v'yadah it gathers. So, yeah, you know, um, as they say, vive la difference. Okay. Um, so now back to, so back to the question about the avocado salad. Do you say a separate bracha? The answer is you'd say, um, you-- if you wanted to have the croutons and then the mezonos croutons, I would take one out as, uh, uh, apart, say a bracha mezonos, and then, um, and then say a bracha on the, on the salad separately. Um, similarly, if you are one of those people who pick cherries off birthday cakes, I don't even know what the bracha on, on a cherry and on, of a birthday ca- now, those cherries have gone through such a transition from a, from a natural cherry. Perhaps they're pure shehakol in any case. But, uh, if you pick those... If you pick a fruit off a ca- um, a cream

38:04 cake, you would make a bracha separately. If you have the ca-cake together with the fruit and that, in that position, it's tafal. You wouldn't make a separate bracha. Okay. The next-- Since we're talking about brachas on foods, we have the next question, and that is about a salad of tomatoes and cucumbers and avocado. Now, in place-- in case I'm sure everyone is f-aw-aware that avocado is a bore pri ha'etz. Um, what was Yaakov's quote? "If you are clever, you know that tomato is a fruit. If you are intelligent, you don't put it in the fruit basket." Um, so now but avocados are bore pri ha'etz. They are however, because of their taste, they, they have quite a common combination with salads. So now, but so now you've got a salad which is predominantly bore pri ha'adama, and it's got cubes of avocado also. So what is the bracha? The, so now this is again, it's the same, same, um, apprehension of the Alter Rebbe where we have a combination, but they haven't been cooked together. So let's read the underlined part. Actually, this seif is about soups, but it's, it's the same halacha. Let's say if you have a lokshen in a soup. You have m-made soup separately, and then you, then you'd cook lokshen separately, and you put in the soup. It does not make the soup mezonos because they were cooked separately, so the lokshen is mezonos, and the soup is shehakol. So here we have a similar situation. "Ve'im kavanos li al

39:46 shnehem. Ein-" If you want both of them. "Ein hulchin voi achar harov." We wouldn't decide, oh, the majority wins. "Ela m'vorach al shnehem." You'd make a bracha on both of them. First, al ha'maichel. They're talking about the f- the, there, the food and the soup. Um, and so in avocado in, in a, uh, salad, I don't think it's there just to flavor the rest of the salad. I think it's you want to have the avocado as well as the others. I think it's on equal footing to the others. And therefore, I think one would, should first take a cube of avocado, put it to one side, and make a bracha ho'etz, and then have the other, uh, the other components of the salad. Right. Let's go on. Um, here I have a question from a Chabad house somewhere in the United States, and he's struggling to keep people from Mincha through to Ma'ariv with a large, uh, interruption in between. So he was think- he was grappling with the idea perhaps he should do Mincha after sunset and by the... a-as a result, he will have Ma'ariv will be on time. Or should he do Mincha before sunset, but as a result, Ma'ariv will compro- he has to compromise one side. Should he compromise on Ma'ariv bi-um, bizmanom or should he compro- on Mincha bizmanom? So we've got the famous idea that we've got Rabbi Yehuda allows us to daven Ma'ariv from Plag Mincha, and in this part of the world, probably most shuls, um,

41:27 synagogues for sure, during the summer, they will do Ma'ariv whilst it's... Well, funny people are. It comes in the winter, it's 6:30, it's pitch black, and we're davening Shacharit. And it comes the summer, it's 7:30, 7:35, the sun is shining, and we're davening Ma'ariv. We just say it's night. But okay, so we're flexible. Okay. So now, um, so we're following Rabbi Yehuda. So now davening Mincha after Shkiya, the Alter Rebbe takes the view that one should daven Mincha before Shkiya, and so does the Mishnah Berurah, the Gra, et cetera, are quite strict about that. The Alter Rebbe is a little bit more tolerant. It says, "Elim chei zvi ad hamkilen." So here I've got a quote from Mishnah Berurah, actually. "V'yesh omrim," this is saying in the Resh Hamzav. "Yesh omrim b'tzibur yesh lo hokhel l'hispalel Ma'ariv mib'ed yom af himispalel Mincha achar plag Mincha. V'nira li she'eli smichah zeh ra k'sheh mispalel Ma'ariv al kol ponim b'ben ha'shmashot b'shas ha'tzachak." So what the Mishnah Berurah is s-recommending here, if you could do Mincha before sunset and Ma'ariv at least it's ben ha'shmashot, so this is sof hakailah, that would be recommended. Ha'lo k'shuva dai. So he's pre-- he's, he's recommending this. What this fellow is asking, Mishnah Berurah is actually recommending do Mincha before Shkiya and Ma'ariv right after Shkiya during what we call ben ha'shmashot. So that's at least to do Ma'ariv sof hakailah. So that, that, that would be, uh, rather than compromising on Mincha, um, you know what? If you do--

43:04 If you're gonna compromise on Mincha, they may come late, and you're gonna be, gonna be even later. If you make Mincha on time, so if they do come late, at least, you know, you're gonna get your Mincha, um, sameach l'shkiya. One side or the other. Okay. Finally, I'm, I'm gonna finish a little earlier because we have min-- ma'ariv at ten o'clock. Uh, sorry, at nine o'clock, so I want to go, uh, go out a couple of minutes early. So I, I put it for nine fifteen. So we'll finish in two minutes. So someone asked me the question: What's the story of when we have, uh, in Amen Selah, in Pesukei DeZimrah Amen Selah or Amen Veamen? What's, what does it mean, this double amen? So I looked in the Sefer from Rabbi Heber, uh, Rabbi Shmuel Heber on... So he brings actually, like you're not meant to say Shema Shema, and you're not meant to say Modim Modim. So there are, there's a Yerushalmi which says shouldn't say Amen Amen. I sometimes, we do find Amen, we say in Parshat Srot. That's not talking about HaShem. That's talking about the Shevua. Amen Ish Zeh, Amen Ish Acher. Um, so that, that, then, so we do find Amen, but, but we s- Here we see Amen Veamen. What, what's, what is the meaning? Um, he does bring some Perushim over there. Here we have a nice, uh, shtickel from... This is a quote from the, s- one of the Jichve Rebbes who says, "Amen Selah." Amen

44:28 Selah is like this. Amen is gematria ninety-one, and Selah is gematria ninety-five. Now we say Yud Kei Vav Kei. BaYom HaHu Yihye Hashem Echad U'Shem Echad. La'asos Lo Vay will be Yihye. Instead of Yud Kei Vav Kei will be Yihye, and somehow, uh, somehow that's gonna increase. So, ah, so Amen is, um, Havayah and Adoni, twenty-six. And twenty-- Amen is twenty-six and, um, and sixty-five. So that brings you to ninety-one. If instead of Yud Kei Vav Kei, it's going to be, um, it's going to be Yud Kei, Yud Kei, that's thirty. So then Yud Kei, Yud-- Yihye and Adoni will become up to, uh, will come up to ninety-five. That's what he says. Amen Selah. That it should come, La'asos Lo Vay, we should come from the Amen, should come to Selah which is increase to the gematria of ninety-five. That's how it's gonna be La'asos Lo Vay. And so, Ni- Nishtchidot SheNishtakel Zeh BeMehera U'beAmen U'amen. We'll stop with that, and Bezrat Hashem, we should meet in good health. Amen. Sh'oyach. What did you say the Alter Rebbe says about the Mincha Ma'ariv? Um, I, I said the Alter Rebbe is quite, um, strong about davening Ma'ariv, um, before Shkiya. That's what I said. He doesn't agree with it. He, he's-- Again, again, the Alter Rebbe says you should daven Ma'ariv before Shkiya rather than leaving it for later. Um, davening Ma'ariv early, the Alter Rebbe says the meaning is Bizman HaAcherim, we're machmir to daven Ma'ariv, um, uh, bizmanoy. But, uh, whole of

46:14 Ashkenaz would daven Ma'ariv early. It was always- Yeah ... accepted. Ad SheYikach, they didn't even say Aleinu. And the reason why they say, um, Borchu without a Kaddish, because they would have a Kaddish at the end of Mincha. Ah, that's why. They don't need a Kaddish before Borchu. All right. I'm gonna have to stop here. Thank you. Wish you all a good Shabbes. Shabbes. Good Shabbes. Good Shabbes. Shabbes. Shabbes. Shabbes. It's been swelling. Hmm? This. To switch it off. It plays around with you. Like so.