וישב תשפ״ב

00:00 Speaker 1 A good start. Go straight into the, uh, questions which we have. And the first one is, it's a bit of a perhaps maybe a strange question. Who lights the electric lights, the husband or the wife for Shabbos? So what triggered my, um, triggered this question is I found here the Sicha. Every week, there's-- for the last f- twenty-five years, they've been publishing a Sicha from previous years. There's a group called Vaad Hanochos Belahak, ƔHashanah Kodesh, and they publish, they publish the Sichas which, uh, from previous years. And so-

00:42 Speaker 2 Well-

00:42 Speaker 1 -this past Shabbos, th-this, this pa- this pa- this past Shabbos for, in honor of this Shabbos, they printed a Sicha from Tov Shilamad Hey. Um- -the Rebbe was talking about-

00:54 Speaker 2 So this is-

00:54 Speaker 1 -Zeres Shabbos. And I found an interesting reference to the woman lighting the-- switching on the electric lighting. So I, I, I'd lo- just like to go through the Sicha, there's just this piece. When the Rebbe launched this idea that Sh- that girls should light Shabbos candles, so there were various questions about this. So one of the questions was, if there's a justification for the d-daughter to be lighting a candle when there is already light in the room. Because-- or the mother is providing light in any case, so why should the daughter be se- making a separate, um, bracha on lighting? That was the question. So to this, the Rebbe responds, "The more light there is in the room, even if it's at the same, in the same room, at the same table, so long as it's not in the same candelabra. One doesn't have two women or two girls lighting on the same candelabra. So long as it's in, in, um... even if it's in the same room, the more light there is, there's more shalom bayis, there's more tr- harmony, more simcha, more joy." And he gives a reference to the Bier Heite, quoting from Achron Bier Heite, there's a commentary on the Shechinach. So the Rebbe here is, is, is attempting to justify that don't worry about the fact there's going to be already light when the girl is lighting her candle. So what? Every F-Friday, um, it's okay for another woman to light with a bracha, even though there is already light

02:38 Speaker 1 in the room. And he says, "This is evident from the Minig B'noes Yisroel Hak'sheiros." This is-- uh, married women also do this. Look. So this is how the Rebbe reads it and, and looks at the situation. Mitzad, m- the tafkidoh. It's the woman's function to prepare the needs of the house. As part of that function, she makes sure that the room should have enough light without relying on the husband, because it could be that he'll be confused. And so she first goes and switches on the electric light. So there's already light in the room. After that, when there's already light in the room, she goes and makes a bracha on the electric light. On the-- sorry, on the, on the, on the candles that she's lighting. And not that she first lights the Shabbos candles, and then she tells the husband to start switching on the electric lights. So so y- I found this very interesting. The Rebbe is not saying, as I may have said at previous occasions, uh, more than once, that the electric light is part of the mitzvah. Here, the Rebbe is saying almost the contrary. That the w-woman makes sure that there's electric lights, and that can be done a long while before. And still she's going to make a bracha on the Shabbos candles, and that's because additional light adds to the simcha. Says the Rebbe, "If that's the case, that you, uh, have got the lights on, the electric lights are on, and you're making a bracha because

04:11 Speaker 1 of extra light, bringing extra simcha, so then there's no problem for a girl to also light a candle, even though there is as light as it is, and she's making a bracha because of extra simcha." That's the point which the Rebbe is making. I don't think there's any, um, indication here whether the husband or the wife should switch on electric lights. I think it's n-no difference. Um, just like the, uh, could be, uh, either way, that one... Personally, I do make it my business to do some, switch on some lights because that's part of my joining in the mitzvah of, of Hanukah's neris. Obviously, I don't make a bracha on that. But, um, yeah. Okay. So the next one, the next point is gonna be a little bit perhaps entertaining. And that is, on, uh, on Thursday morning, I was learning Shemoneh Esreh, and I was thinking, "I don't have enough questions for tonight's shiur." And, um, the reason being was Baruch Hashem, very busy week with, due to Skver, and, uh, personally, I had traveled, um, to Europe and back. And so as I'm thinking this, the Shemoneh Esreh, um, then I thought, "Hey, that's an interesting question. If you have a thought during Shemoneh Esreh, are you allowed to make a shiur out of it?" Is it, is it-- in other words, when a thought falls into your mind during Shemoneh Esreh, is it from Sitra Achra perhaps? And therefore, uh, you shouldn't be making a shiur out of that. Now, um, those

05:40 Speaker 1 who engage in public speaking from time to time may have similar experience. So sometimes you're in a room where you are all alone, there's no mezuzah on the room, and, uh, so n- and a, and a thought, an idea falls into your mind. "Oh, that's a good idea for the, for the drash or for the bar mitzvah this evening." And, uh, then, of course, you try to c-control your machshava, but then you come out- And you have that thought. So when a thought comes into your mind in a makim tome, this is my question. Is it the fact that your thought that came into your mind in an inappropriate place, is that a reason to say, "Oh, it must be from Sitra Achra," and therefore you shouldn't be using that thought, or that's not an issue? So I, I did do, uh, research for this, and I did not find anything directly. So two things I did find. One personally, one someone else helped me, and that is there's a famous story in the Gemara Shabbos . And that's the upper, uh, right quote. There was a Hasid, and they say it was Reb Yehuda Ben Bilo. Uh, when it says Hasid Echad, usually it's referring to Reb Yehuda Ben Bilo. And he had a breach on the w-- he was walking on Shabbos, he noticed on Shabbos he has a breach in the wall of his field. He decided, "Well, we're gonna have to fix this fence." And then he remembered Shabbos. "Oh, it's

07:04 Speaker 1 Shabbos." So some say he ha-had a thought to f-fix it there and then. Others say, "No, he just had a thought to fix it." And he said, "Shabbos, I should think about fixing fences." And he decided, "I have thought of m-fixing a fence on Shabbos. No way." And he penalized himself, "I'm not gonna fix the fence." And a miracle occurred to him in his be-benefit. And a caper tree grew in that breach. And that ensured his parnassa for himself and for his family. So here he had a, an inappropriate thought. He took a strong stance to, uh, not benefit from this thought, and he was rewarded for this. Incidentally, there are many meforshim bring from the Arizal that this slav-- sorry, this Hasid had a connection with Slav Chad, who had, um, violated Shabbos and was put to death in the times of, uh, when the-- in the desert. And he needed a tikkun in Shabbos, in Marshava. And so this was his opportunity. And that-- the, the fact that it's the tree which grew was a slav, slav chad. One, one, uh, slav is a, slav chad is, you know, a, a caper tree. One caper tree. So there's, that's a lot of meforshim bring this down. So anyway, so coming back to the main point, we see here that he had an inappropriate thought, and he took, uh, a strong stance to distance himself from carrying that out. Although, truthfully, there it's talking about he had the thought which was a forbidden-- to

08:49 Speaker 1 do a forbidden act. Here, we're talking the other way around. We're talking about a person who is, during Shemoneh Esreh, or Lehavdil, in a makim tome, and a thought of Torah comes to his mind. And is that okay? Is he allowed to use that or should he reject that thought? So, um, actually, I do a rehearsal now. On Friday night, we have, uh, after Maariv, I chazer over some of these points. And one of the pr-- those present, Reb Yudel Weiss, who lives down the road, um, so he, he, he mentioned to me there's actually a Gemara which subsequently I, I looked up. And this is a Gemara in Zevachim Daf kuf beis, amud beis. Um, said the Rav. This appear, probably just brought into the discussion, but Ra- says Rav, this din. Obviously, it'll get-- Rav, . This halakha which we're just discussing now, I heard it from Reb Elazar, the son of Reb Shimon. This is Reb Shimon Bar Yochai. And he had said this in the Beis HaKnesses. Towards the end of the Gemara, there was a Gemara whole discussion. And the Gemara asked, . Yeah, that's the lower quote. That's from the bottom of the page. How could he do so? That you're allowed to think Torah everywhere other than in the bathhouse and the, the toilet. Which he answers, the Gemara answers, . If it was beyond his control, his, his mind was... That's a person's thoughts. Uh, it's di-difficult to control your thoughts. So his, his thoughts, uh, came

10:29 Speaker 1 to this, and so, uh, he shouldn't be faulted for that. But what we're seeing, though, is the fact that the Gemara brings this as a halakha. So this is very interesting that, um, although the-- although it was in a ma-ma-makim tome, and yet the Gemara brings this as the halakha. So we can't really take a view that, uh, it's in Sitra Achra and you have to reject that thought. We see that it's, um, that it's okay. So how much more so if you have a foreign thought during Shemoneh Esreh. So then, uh, all right, it's not the right thing to be doing. You should be focusing on your davening. But y- to say that therefore that thought is from Sitra Achra and you should reject it, doesn't seem to have, uh, a solid basis. Okay. Next question. A woman asks, until when may she eat on Shabbos morning without Kiddush? So we have a halakha that before Kiddush, we're not allowed to eat, and that's both true both Kiddush by night and Kiddush in the day. And here we have, this is from Shulchan Aruch, as you can see, towards the bottom of the quote. Uh, that, that this Kiddush should be Kiddush Makim Suda, and you should not . You shouldn't eat before the day Kiddush like a night Kiddush. And then he says, . You are allowed to drink water before Shacharis. Before davening is not a ti-- you don't have the duty. It's not, it, it's not a time for Kiddush. Elsewhere,

12:12 Speaker 1 the Alter Rebbe says also a similar lotion, it's not as man seudah. Before davening is not a time for eating. So what happens if someone, a, a person for his health needs, he, he or she needs to eat? So according to the Alter Rebbe, uh, before davening is not as man seudah. You have to have something, but it's not a time for a meal. But what happens if there's a, a woman who's not going to be davening? For whatever her pressures are, um, she doesn't have the ability to stop, uh, caring for the children, and she's gonna get up in the morning, she has to say, "Birkat Shachar," she'll say Shema, and that's it. She's not gonna be davening anymore. That's not n- that's not the plan for today. So then it looks like she should actually, she before she sits down for breakfast, she should make Kiddush, um, a glass of grape juice or something. Yeah, that's what it looks like. And, um, I see this also in the Shmirat Shabbat KeHilchot. It says so quite clearly also that if a woman, uh, if she's, if she is planning to daven, then she can take the liberties. Before davening is not as man seudah, it's not a time for a meal. If she's already, um, if she's not going to daven, then there's nothing to wait for, then she should be making Kiddush. Um, and since I'm already talking about this, I'd like to clarify. Uh, uh, many times I explain in, in this

13:33 Speaker 1 class in school the difference between a meal and a snack. Uh, the snack is just to give you a boost of energy till you get over the next, uh, few, uh, uh, let's say, the, the next, uh, half an hour or hour, whatever it may be. A meal is to give you a fill for several hours. So although in Chabad it's quite, uh, common that people do eat before davening, and that's in order to give you the energy for davening, it's not a time for a meal. And that, that's something to be, uh, should be, uh, communicated. It's not that we allow eating a meal before Shacharit. It means we allow having enough food to be able to give you the energy to be able to daven. But it's not, um, not a time for having a meal with all the indulgence. That's, that, that you have to leave for later or earlier, whatever, you know, before, last, the previous night. Let's move on. Okay. So here's a question I received this week that someone ha- has been a regular donor to a particular institution, and now he wishes to switch and, uh, contribute, to give his contributions to a different institution instead. Is that permitted? So, here we have one of the specialists for him on Hilchot Tzedakah. It's a Sefer Tzedakah Mishpat. You see the title there. And, uh, I'm just gonna read Seif Vav. "Mi Sherogel Losis Tzedakah LeOni Mesuyam." If you are accustomed to be giving your Tzedakah, giving Tzedakah to

15:15 Speaker 1 a particular pauper. "Lo Yeshanah Miminhago Losis LeOni Acher." You should not switch to start giving to a different person instead. "Yesh Omrim." There are those who say that if the second pauper is a relative of yours or is a Talmud Chacham, that is grounds to just- to justify the changing. So to explain something. There is a concept in Halakha called Makiri KeHuna. In the good old days, Bezrat Hashem, when Mashiach comes, we'll be giving Matnot KeHuna and Leviya. So if you have your regular Kohen, there becomes a kind of contract that you have got with this person that you give them your Matnot KeHuna, and you wouldn't, you wouldn't switch that unless there's a very good reason. And so this is a similar idea. There's no contract here, obviously, but there is a relationship. And to break that relationship wouldn't be justified unless there's a very good reason. What this Sefer is suggesting, if, let's say, and this is... Let's say you've been giving to a particular Mosad, and now your son or your nephew or whatever, someone who's close to you, opens up a similar, a similar institution. That's what he's suggesting, that that would be already a, a moral, um, justification to switch to be giving to this, uh, to this, an other institution. That's what he's suggesting. But, uh, overall, just to s- switch, to stop giving and giving to another place is n- not, not really advised. And now we're going to read a letter of the Rebbe addressing this very,

16:54 Speaker 1 very point. So this is a letter of the Rebbe. In Igrot Kodesh, you have the reference. It's Chelei Yites, page Kuf Samech Gimel. So while someone writes to the Rebbe that he's been giving Tzedakah regularly according to his, uh, capability to various, um, sources, various institutions, et cetera. Now, he has a doubt because there are places which are more authentic, so to speak, in their Yirat Shamayim. And there are those, although they are basically, uh, K- Kosher institutions, but they're not Behudar. They're not so, um, they're Yirat Shamayim, et cetera. Uh, their Kashrut is a little bit less than the best. It's okay, but not the best. So perhaps he should switch instead to give to the more Mehudar, uh, institution and to stop giving his contribution to the one which is not so Mehudar. That's-- So he's been giving till now to level B, and now he wants to switch and start giving to institution which is level A. That's the question. Says the Rebbe, "Machshavot Koheinu," such thoughts always raise a suspicion- Where, ""Where does-- who is arousing them?" Now before talking about where-- how do I know the thought is from Sitra Achra. So this seems to be a similar question. Who is encouraging you to, to switch? Is it ""Is it pure, is it pure, um, goodness or is it ""perhaps a thought comes in from the other side." Now, the Rabbi explains what's going on here possibly. It could be that the, the , the Sitra Achra comes with all

18:47 Speaker 1 various schemes to discourage a Jew to-- from doing Torah mitzvahs. Now, if it's gonna come with a frontal attack and say, "Don't give Tzedakah," well, you, you, you're not gonna listen to him. So therefore, he uses the word ""he looks for." It's interesting how the Rabbi plays on the words. "" means to dress up, to, to, uh, disguise. So the, the, the Yetzer Hara, he seeks and he disguises himself, ". You've got this cloak of, um... I don't know how you translate. The word savua means a person who's in, in, uh, not genuine. So he comes up with a, uh, this, this thing and it comes along, like, and he comes along and he suggests, "You know what? You've been giving to this place. You're gonna be-- to B, give to A." "Later he'll come, says, "You're giving so much to one institution. Give them as much as you've been giving till now." And then what's gonna happen is the, to the A you'll give as much as you're giving till now. B, you've decided you're not gonna give them. So you're not gonna give the A again. So, so there's the, uh, your number, your amount of contributions will be cut down. Uh, and B will, will be out of the picture. Uh, and, and you're not gonna give more to the Moises which are more muhadu. And the Rabbi continues,". "Generally when it comes to Tzedakah,". "Not to be overly-- not to be so-- not to be, um, not to be scrut-scrutinizing excessively."

20:30 Speaker 1 "How much more so don't be overly, uh, scrutinizing with a c- with, with a Moises which you yourself acknowledge that it's a kosher Moises, but it's not as muhadu. So the Rabbi says, "Don't, don't look badly at them." It's very, very interesting how the Rabbi is-- basically he's discouraging this idea of, of cutting down from one to give to the other. I just want to just throw in a fascinating story in Gemara Baba Batra which comes, comes to mind as I'm speaking. That the father sends the son to deliver, uh, an a- an amount of money to a poor family on the other side of town. The kid comes back and says, "Ta, they don't need the money. They were sprinkling wine in the house to give it a nice fragrance." Now, that was the wealthy people would do that. So the kid is saying to, to the father that they are quite comfortable. You don't need to give them, um, m-um, financial assistance. So the father says the following: "We have to be grateful for the imposters. Because if every, every need which came our way had been totally genuine, then the fact that we don't assist everyone all the way would be a terrible indictment on ourselves. The fact that there are imposters out there, that is a mitigating factor for ourselves for the fact that we do not e-extend ourselves fully for every needy person who comes our way." Okay. Um, someone's put here on the chat a couple of questions, so

22:14 Speaker 1 I'm gonna relate to that. Okay, let's go. "Is changing Tzedakah from a pauper the same gravity as from an institution?" I, I, I don't think there's any difference. The point is that you have a, a, a particular beneficiary on a da-- regular. I'm not talking about the person you just meet in the street one day and one day yes, one day not. If there's a particular beneficiary who you've been helping on a regular basis for a, over a period and now decide to stop that, that, that is an issue. "How to give an institution without crossing the threshold of commitment?" That's a good question. Correction. "Is changing Tzedakah institution the same gravity as from a pauper?" I, I think it's the same idea that, that you are, you are, you've, you've created a kind of relationship here and they, there is a reliance on your regular donation and then, then to break that relationship would be similar to the idea of Makir et Kehuna which you shouldn't be switching unless there's a very good reason. All right. Let's go on. And now here someone lay-- raised, brought to my attention that in some of the Hameish news sheets. So in this part of the world, you have Hameish news sheets. I know some of the listeners would love to have Hameish news sheets coming through your door. Uh, we have about five of them every week. It's ridiculous. But, um, so some of them come with advertisements which have got , Sofer writing and she

23:43 Speaker 1 was quite upset about this and, um, so actually she said about a story with someone who, uh, a story with the Rabbi about this. Now, I'm gonna tell the story first, then can come back to the Halacha. So this is a, a, a, uh... This is from Rabbi Danny Ashkenazi who lives in, he's a Shliach in, uh, Palo, in Ezbra-- in Brazil. And when he got engaged, so, uh, they're gonna print invitations. So they printed-- So he, he's a Sofer. He's trained as a Sofer. So he, um, he wrote his own wedding invitation and he wanted to give a first invitation he wanted to give to the Rabbi. So he was-- He went to New York and he went to the, you know, the Maskiras and he gave the Hebrew side of the invitation and, and to give it to the Rabbi Groiner. Although Shaul should give it to the Rabbi. Rabbi Groiner looks at it, he says, "Who wrote this?" You know, he likes, is like, uh, impressed with the beauty, beautiful Ksav. Um, he says, "I wrote it." So he says, "But do you know that the Rabbi's not happy about people making invitations with Ksav Ashuri, with the Sofer writing because afterwards it's then thrown into the bin. It's a disgrace." "But no, no." His Leivor says, "No, no." So Danny said, "No. If that upsets the Rabbi, I'm not gonna give it in. Give it back." And he had already, they had already printed seven hundred invitations. They sent 690 of

25:17 Speaker 1 them into Shamus and kept just 10 of them just so you know, for remembering, for remembrance, and they re- reprinted a new invitation with, with regular writing. So I'm telling you the story just-- I, I'm also impressed with the Hasida Sheherges of Engemann. Without going into lamdus, if the Rebbe's gonna be upset, I'm not, I'm not gonna do it. Okay, so now this is from Shulchan Aruch, the end of-- it's the last seif in Hilchos Sefer Torah, and this is from the Rama. As you can see, the underlined, uh, writing, the, uh, highlighted writing. There are those who say that you should not use the Sefer Torah writing, that script. You should not use it for mundane matters. It's, um, it's a, it's a disgrace. It's, it's because it's dedicated for Sefer Torah. They're on, you know, mezuzahs, tefillin. It shouldn't be used for mundane stuff. So now then we have-- Next to this, we have a letter from, uh, the Rebbe's letters, Chelek Yod Beis. After my apologizing to you, and although it seems to be after the fact, but I want to raise the issue. I see invitations which are printed with, uh, Ktav Ashuris, plus even the tag in, the little, um, crowns on the letters. We are due, it's well known how much the Rishonim and Achronim, how, how much effort they made to, to justify using block writing. Because block writing is like a very basic, um, writing, and the Sefardic, uh, um, script for Sefer Torah is like our

27:04 Speaker 1 block writing, a little bit more, uh, you know, perhaps a bit more fancy, but it's basically very similar. And so really you can ask the same question. Even block writing, Hebrew block writing should-- uh, and that's actually one of the reasons why, uh, they developed. On the margin of the Shulchan Aruch, here in Resh Pey Vav, it's mentioned that's how they d-- why they developed the Rashi writing. Or you can see sometimes Sefardis as far-- they had another script. They developed other scripts because when it comes to a mundane stuff, they, they wanted to write, write in Hebrew, but they didn't want to use this, uh, the Ktav Ashuri. So they developed other scripts as an alternative. And so when it came to printing Seforim with, uh, block writing, that wasn't, uh, an easy ride. But there should be, um, that one should try to do that the writing, even if you're doing block writing, it should not resemble the Ktav Ashuris. And he says, for whoever, he says, "For you, I don't have to elaborate on this." And he gives reference to the Gilyon Maharshal, the Sefer of Shlomo Eiger. On the margin of Siman Resh Pey Daled, he quotes also another Sefer, Torat Yaakov. Earlier, the Rambam in his correspondence, in his Sefer, his response are called Pe'er Hador, quoted in the Responsa Yosef in Resh Pey Gimel Gan Yordeh, and the Radbaz in two places, which I d-- I, I didn't look up all of those sources. Um, but this is just

28:32 Speaker 1 bringing the, the point that the Rebbe is, he's saying here, and really it's Halacha in Shulchan Aruch, that one should not be using Ktav Ashuris for mundane stuff. So using them for advertisements, et cetera, uh, is not really the right thing. Let's see what, uh, Aria Freeman writes. "Today, we place tagin on Sefer Torah writing due to minhag. Um, tefillin, mezuzahs are achir. Even our print in the siddur is, is far divellish." Right. But the point is that we do have a dedicated Ktav. At least we do, um, which was clearly we call it Sefer Torah writing, and that shouldn't be used for, for mundane stuff. Okay, um, let's move on. Right. So I don't normally, um, talk about tznius issues in this shiur. It's, uh, but, uh, a teacher asked me to clarify this, and so that's why I'm dealing with it. Okay. There's something called leggings, apparently. And they are like, uh, for those who are not, not familiar what this is, it's like a, it's like, um, tracksuit kind of-- It's like, uh, hugs the-- It's, uh, uh, perhaps like made of cotton, but it's, it's a kind of, uh, trousers which hug the, uh, the leg, and they go down obviously from higher up in the body, go down till, till the ankles approximately. And also there is, uh, it's said that there is a problem with the issue or, or it's tznius with them to explain what the issue is. So I really want to first explain the lamdus a

30:13 Speaker 1 little bit. The Gemara, in this Gemara daf-- in Brochos daf chaf daled. That for a woman to expose her shayich, a part of the body called shayich, that would be considered erva. It would be embarrassing, et cetera. And he gives a reference to a pasuk in Shir Hashirim, "Gal ei shayich ki brit noharos," whatever the pasuk is. Okay. Now, what is the definition of shayich? Here's very, very interesting. Now, we have the word shayich comes up in Torah. Chazzeret shayich. It's mentioned about, um, uh, for the Korbanos. There's a shayich of the animal, and the shayich of the animal-- So the le-- This is, this is the hind leg of an animal. I guess this area, the top area, is called the pelvis. But this top piece, this up- the leg is basically in three sections. The top section, the top third is called the yereg. The middle third is called the shayach. And the bottom third is called the regel. Now, to explain. The human leg is also made of three parts. You've got the upper leg, the lower leg, and then you've got the foot. An animal doesn't have a foot. It doesn't have the f- the horizontal foot which, which humans have. At least most animals. And so what... when we say shayach in the animal, the shayach of the animal is, is, uh, is away from... it's above this first joint. It's the second piece, uh, of, um, of the leg. So what we're seeing here is a confusion, and where

32:05 Speaker 1 exactly is the shayach? Is the shayach the upper leg or is it the lower leg? So curiously, the Mishneh Berurah seems to take the view that the shayach is the upper leg. Most other Poskim don't agree with that, and most other Poskim understand that the shayach is the lower leg. And when the Torah, when the Gemara says, "Shayach be Ish Ha'Arevah," they're referring to the lower leg. You all know that one of the words for socks in Hebrew is, uh, is, is batei shayachayim. So that means the socks are pulled over the lower leg. That's called... That's, that's the shayach. But the Mishneh Berurah is a little bit, um... He takes the view that the, the shayach is the upper part. So according to Mishneh Berurah, the exposure of the lower leg would not be asur. Um, according to most other Poskim, it is asur. Then there's a difference in Dinim of Tznius of, about wearing something very tight. Wearing very clothes, very, uh, clinging kind of garments which are so exposing the, the, uh, the profile. So on, on the lower leg, the Minag, by and large, is that it's covered, but it doesn't matter that it's, that it's covered with something which is opaque and where the profile is obviously visible. The upper leg is, uh, that, that should be covered, and in a way that, that the profile should not be visible. So let's come back to this question about these leggings. The, um, th- one of the issues is where the,

33:45 Speaker 1 where the, uh, bottom of the leggings fee- feet meet the, uh, the ankle, the, the, the foot. So long as that, the area's covered with socks or something, then that, that would be okay on that, that part. The other part is apparently, and, um, just so you, I ha-- this is all secondhand information. Um, it's quite common that people who are wearing leggings wear, would wear a shorter skirt, and that again is a, a problem, as I'm just explaining. The upper part of the, uh, leg should be not only, should be opaque, covered in a opaque material, but also shouldn't be in a way that the profile should be emphasized. So this is what you have over here in, um, got it from this Sefer, Piskei Teshuvos again. This is, um, in Siman Ayin Hey. And he quotes the Mishneh Berurah, and then he says that, uh, all the other sources, Chayyei Odom, et cetera, they say, um, have Achronim that from the Karсуl ad HaBerech, from the ankle until the knee, that's the shayach. And therefore, Midyon Batei, Batei Shoel Achshavim, that women are careful to wear, um, socks of sorts, stockings of sorts, which would cover the lower leg, uh, even at home, not to be Machshil, uh, other people to be able to say a Bracha or something if they... that's exposed. So I hope that's added a little bit clarity to the issue. Um, so what we'd, so what we... To summarize that, so long as there is a skirt which

35:13 Speaker 1 is, uh, well over past the knee and the, uh, where the foot meets the, uh, leg, right, the ankle area. And if that is covered also, that shouldn't be a problem. Right. Um, one of our questions, Rabbi Moshe Pulat is asking, "Since we've been talking about not using, um, Sab Ashuri for, uh, mundane stuff, can you use a Kiddush cup for drinking water?" And the answer is yes. It's not the same. Here, it's, uh, a Kiddush cup. It's, it's, it's a keli. It's, uh, for, for yourself to drink. Um, Sab Ashuri is, is, is dedicated for something which is holy, not just... You've got a difference between Tashmishu Kedusha, Tashmishu Mitzvah. So, you know, so even if you want to have a drink from your Kiddush cup, y- you can continue doing so. Okay. Here's a Mamish, a standard, um, well, Rabbi Levi, uh, Yisrael Micha Gronoh, alav hashalom, he used to, he'd say this, "A tepel lefel shailah." A really regular y- yodeah question. So a milchig knife with dried cheese resid- residue was put into a fleishig mug. Boiling water was poured into the mug. The hot water from, uh, the mug was then poured into the empty fleishig sink. What's the status or Halacha status of the knife, the mug, and the sink? All right. So let's say the fleishig, the mu- Even if the mug was a Ben Yomo of, of, uh, hot, um, you know, of hot fleishig soup. Um, all right. Um, but it probably, that wasn't the case

37:06 Speaker 1 in any case. But so the, the knife is not a problem I'm assuming that certain, um, changing, changing the, the, uh, goalposts. The, but the mug wasn't used in the last 24 hours for hot fleishig, um, soup, and therefore the knife is not a problem. Uh, it doesn't become treif because of the mug, because the mug is enay ben yomo. The, um, the question is, what, what, what about the sink? Well, once the water came into the mug and then was poured into the sink, so the water is already at least kli sheini or, or, or if, or less than kli sheini, so they're not a problem for the, for the sink. What about the mug? So, if there had been a lot of water poured into the mug, then you could possibly use the concept of brit lo besishim. If there had been, if you could assess there was 60 times water over the cheese on the, on the, uh, the knife. Um, other than that, if that, not, not, if there wasn't so much water. So, there we have a worry, that you have a b'liya of, um, absorbing of a taste of cheese into a fleishig mug. That's the concern. Now, what my answer was, that if it is a, uh... I asked if it's part of a set or is it one of those, uh, uh, a standalone. If it's part of a set, then there's a question of a loss involved, and we would certainly be able to rely on,

38:27 Speaker 1 uh, here you have a quote from the, uh, Shulchan Aruch and Chayei Adam, Siman Ches. Kli sheini einim avashil, afilu yatz le'des bo, bediavad shari. So, with a, uh, this is a, a... You can't kasher a mug usually, and so it's a bediavad. And if it were part of a set, I would certainly say that you don't have to throw it away because, um, it's on the level of kli sheini. If, uh, if it was just, as I say, a standalone, not part of a set, then there would be room to be machmir, and, um, give it to your cleaning lady and she'll be happy to use it. Okay, let's go on. So, here I got a shailah from a shliach somewhere in, in Ukraine, and he had, uh, he came up with this discussion with his local people about lifting a child, a toddler, who is, uh, on walking, walking on Shabbos, the toddler, and then the toddler refuses to cooperate. What are you allowed to do now? And, uh, he had understood that you're not allowed to do anything, and his people had picked up information from elsewhere that they could, and so he asked me. I said, "Listen, let's, let's get a, a clear picture." So here's the, here's the story. So, um, we have a general principle of chai noseh et atzmo, that a living being bears its own weight. Now, for that, however, this hetter of chai noseh et atzmo, for it means you're not punishable for carrying a living

39:59 Speaker 1 creature. If you would carry a cat or a dog, you would, you would, you would be liable for carrying. The reason why chai noseh et atzmo is, uh, an exemption for not being punished is because the, the passenger, so to speak, is cooperating and helping you carry the, i-i-i-it, to carry it. If the animal, let's say, is wriggling and not cooperating at all, then you can't say it's a party to your melacha. On the contrary, it's actually, uh, acting as a right old nuisance. So, you can't use the hetter of chai noseh et atzmo. What do we have here, um, what do we have other cheshbonis? We could say if it's a small town, you could say that we don't have two hun- 600,000, uh, users of this reshus harabim, and therefore, um, you could say, yisod rabonon, you could bring that in. So, what we're looking for is to make it into a shvus de shvus. Um, a shvus de shvus l'tzorech gadol. Obviously, it's a tzorech gadol. This toddler in the street, it is a tzorech gadol. So, if we can bring it down to rabonon on two counts, then we'd be able to allow it. So, let's read what Shmiras Shabbos K'Halacha writes. Um, "Yeled, a child who stops in middle of the street or in the karmelis, and you cannot motivate him to actually continue walking, you're allowed to carry him pochus, pochus mid'ahal damas. That you carry two steps, three steps, and you stop, and then you continue. That, to

41:32 Speaker 1 do that is a yisod rabonon. But in these circumstances, which is, you know, to do that, pochus, pochus mid'ahal damas, that's a carrying, um, a bouquet of flowers, would be yisod rabonon. Now, it's not a flowers, it's a, it's a, it's a child, so it's a chai noseh et atzmo. So, you've got two, two rabonons. It's the idea of going in sm- in, um, in, uh, spurts of less than ahal damas, one after the other. That's one a-aspect. The other aspect is chai noseh et atzmo. He doesn't bring in the idea of perhaps we don't have a reshus harabim d'oraysa. As I say, that's not, that won't help in a big city. What I lo- what would, also want to add is also that if the child is actually, um, uh, throwing a tantrum and, and, and, and not cooperating at all, so the hetter of chai noseh et atzmo also falls away. And therefore, if you are in a big city, um, and you wanted to do pochus, pochus mid'ahal damas, I think you'd have to first calm the child down till the child is, uh, cooperating and then happy to be carried, and then you go pochus, pochus mid'ahal damas. Obviously, we're not talking about middle of the road and the traffic is coming, et cetera, et cetera. Um, because we're not talking about pikuach nefesh. We're just talking about you have to get home, that's all. Right. Um, so here someone's asking, going, we're going back to the mug. Does it help

42:55 Speaker 1 leaving the mug for a year? So, that does help. If it was a loss involved, there is a Chacham Tzvi, and where there's a substantial loss or a sentimental, uh, issue about you want to hold on to that- Then we can rely on this. But normally for a simple mug, no, we wouldn't go for that. It's, it's only, uh... W- this idea of waiting a year, uh, is, is a heter where there's substantial, uh, loss or concern. Rabbi Singer is asking, "Isn't there a Kuntras Achron in Chag Pesach maybe about not making an Issur of Basar Bechalav if the Beliya is Pogem?" If I'm not mistaken, you're referring to Siman Taf Nun Alef, Sif Yud Gimel. Not a Kuntras Achron, but there's a very beautiful note there about, um, about, uh, Basar Bechalav, Yoreh Deah, Bola, et cetera. All right. But we, we... I guess we'll have to discuss later. Let's move on. Uh, here we go. All right. So next question, I'm not totally confident, but I... the question was raised, and the question is the following. So I bought a property for an investment. For investment. I... Let's say, I bought this property, it cost five hundred thousand. I had, I had a down payment of two hundred thousand. I borrowed three hundred thousand from a building society, from a bank, and I have a tenant there. The tenant pays rent, so now I'm getting an income. Do I have to give Maaser from the rental income? That was the question. So I

44:42 Speaker 1 thought about this for a while and, I mean, when... Well, let's say, let's try to... Well, where... come from a particular angle. Let's say I, I sell, I sell, um... I'm a grocery. I sell cheese. I sell a block of cheese for £5. How much did I pay for this? I paid, let's say, the wholesale price, I paid £2. I've got my markup, my, my, my, uh, uh, rental, my, my, um, you know, my... I have to run my bu- my overheads. So if I sell a block of cheese for £5, if I made £1 on it, I'm, I'm lucky. Yeah. So how much, uh... So I don't take Maaser from the £5. I take fi- my Maaser from the, from the £1. So in this case, with this investment, I, I bought this property and, and I, um, I've got this m- massive mortgage of three hundred thousand pounds, and I get rent. I'm, I'm not really, I'm not really making any profit as yet. Uh, uh, this is, this is like, uh, to pay my overheads. Obviously, after a while, there will be an equity. And from the equity, I should be giving Maaser. So I've never really learnt the details of accountancy. Is there a difference between, uh, income tax and, uh, a wealth tax? Uh, so the inc- I wouldn't see that the, the regular rent would be subject to giving Maaser. But after some time, when there is a, a, um, a, a realized, uh, equity, especially if you're going

46:18 Speaker 1 to sell the property, and then you say, "Well, I bought this property two hundred thousand. Now I, I was able to sell it and I have an equity of another hundred thousand," well, then, at that point, you should be putting aside Maaser of the, uh, of the equity. That's the best I could do with, uh... I tr- I tried to find a bit more sources on that, and I didn't find, uh, it be addressed so clearly. Okay. Here, I, I had this question. A non-Jew asked me why Yidden... Two, two, two questions. Why Yidden Schachle, and why Yidden wear ta- a Tallis when praying? May I give them, give the Goy a Torah explanation? So really this question is, um, teaching Torah to Goyim. Torah is given to us. Are we allowed to teach a Goy Torah? So generally, we shouldn't be teaching Goyim Torah. Some say that, um, that only Torah SheBe'al Peh. Torah SheBichsav, you are allowed to teach them. Also, if they come along with, uh, a... This is from a Sefer called Piskei Teshuves, uh, on Halachot of Torah, and he's talking about this, this detail about teaching Goyim Torah. If the, um, the Goy knows... He comes along and he seems to know Halacha, uh, but he's got-- He's misunderstood it. So you're allowed to... And he thinks, "Well, you're not doing the, the right thing," and therefore, uh, you're allowed to just explain. I remember when I was, uh, learning to drive, that's going back a few years, and

47:51 Speaker 1 actually, my, uh, driving instructor was actually Jewish. But he asked a question, "How come you have photographs? It says in the Ten Commandments you mustn't have a graven image." Um, so I explained to him that that means, uh, a sculpture and not, not a, not a, a flat picture. So I'm just, just giving an example. If Lehavdil, a Goy would ask that question, and I say, "Well, you, you are violating your own To- the Ten Commandments by having photographs in your house." And you explain to him, "No, that, that... the Halacha is referring to, uh, to sculptures, not, not to pictures." So that seems to be okay. But coming back to the immediate question, a Goy asked why Yidden Schachle or why Yidden wear, wear a Tallis. I did say, um, about the Tallis, I, I re- tell-- told him, told the person asking, refer the Goy to read the Psalm a hundred and two. «תפילה לעני כי אתך ובלפני השם ישפך שיחיי». So there you have in Torah SheBichsav, you have talks about a person wrapping himself in prayer. Um, the idea of why we Schachle, we know that there is a mention in the, uh, I think, the Kuzari that, uh, is, uh, re- reminiscent of Har Sinai, of Urah Am Vayanu. But I didn't think that there's, uh, uh, reason to tell the Goy, um, explanation to Za'anid Torah and no, no need to be Matir to tell the Goy the reason for it. Um, finally, what we have on the list

49:19 Speaker 1 is that, um, someone's asking the question that they're going to be spending Shabbos Hanukkah at their... They, they live in one area, they're moving and coming for Shabbos to another area, to their, to their pa- to their children's home, going to spend their Shabbos. So Friday evening, befo- before Shabbos, their son will light Menorah and the mother will be Yoitze from her son. This is a woman's asking the question. She asked the question, on Motzaei Shabbos, should she, can she be Yoitze from her son before she goes back home? Or does she have to light when she gets back to her own house? So generally, one should be lighting Menorah in one's own house. But here, actually, w- if necessary, one could be Mekil and say, "Listen, this is-- it's still her house until she's left." So sh- because she came there and she spent the night, um, um, Friday night, so this has become her home for this, for this period. Until she leaves their home, it's still her, her home. It's an interesting question which comes up when a chassan during-- if a person gets married during Hanukkah, where does the chassan light menorah? Because in the morning, he lived in one house, in the evening, he lives in another house. Where exactly should the chassan be lighting the menorah? Especially you don't want to leave menorah till after he comes home after the whole, uh, chassanah, um, likely forget. And also they are eating a whole meal, uh, with other moises before

50:39 Speaker 1 Ha- before a mitzvah is also questionable. Uh, sometimes the chassanim will, depending on the timing of the chuppah, et cetera. One solution would be actually to light the menorah in the yichud room. Uh, chassan pays rental for the yichud room, and they eat something there, and that's, that's their home for that time. That would be one, uh, solution. Now, I just want to finish off. I'm gonna finish a little bit early. And I had some very nice feedback about the, um, discussion we had a few weeks ago about mantzepach and how the division of mantzepach allows it to be divided to ninety and ninety and a, and a hundred, and that being the gematria of melech, moloch, and yimlech. So I had, um... Then there's a Zohar which connects it with the yaboik. And I was thinking today, should I share it tonight? It's a nice thing. And then the So, yeah. So, yeah, that's-- I guess that would be the better one than instead of being nervous and, or waiting to put them out, to just get in the car, go home, and light them at home. All right. So I wish you all a Hanukkah and, uh, .