יתרו תשפ״ב

00:00 Let's go through, through the-- some questions which have come through recently. And whilst I was here, I had some very nice regards from some of our listeners who listen to the recordings as they are aired in the States. So the first thing someone asked me at the beginning of the week, he asked about how does it work when it comes to saying when you're davening without a minyan and saying, "Hashem, Hashem, kel rachum v'chanun, yitgil mul midas harachamim." So we have here in the Tehillas Hashem siddur, it has a line over here, "Hamispalel beyachid ein omer zeh." Now, actually, I think I did discuss this a few weeks ago or perhaps a few months ago, but I, uh, couldn't trace it, and I guess it de-deserves a repetition. Okay. So the question which I was asked is, what-- how do you read that sentence? Um, "Taaznu shavuaseinu," listen to our cries. "Sak shiv menu ma'amar," hear what we have to say. "Kayom vayikra Hashem Hashem," as on the day where Hash- where Moshe Rabbeinu appeals and calls out to Hashem. "Veshom naamar," there it was said. Now, normally, "veshom naamar" is followed by a colon. What was said there, "Vayavor Hashem apano vayikra. Hashem, Hashem, kel rachum v'chanun." So it's a colon intro-- prompting to, to say, "Vayavor." Now, when it says, "Vay-- hamispalel beyachid" should not say it, so what's the sense of the next-- of those words? "Veshom naamar" what? There it was said and kind of left in midair. Now, first of

01:51 all, we've discussed this before, that the Tehillas Hashem siddur is a copy largely of a siddur published in Vilna hundred and eleven years ago called Seder Haavoda. If you see on the right, on the bottom of the page, there is in brackets, it's, "Has samech hey ayin, um, reish." Whatever. What the reish is, I'm not sure, but that's like a code for the cr- publisher. Sa-samech hey ayin stands for Seder Haavoda. So this is the Vilna print, Seder Haavoda. Now, here, as you can see, uh, it has that instruction, "Hamispalel beyachid ein omer zeh, v'lo yayud gimel midas." The one who's davening alone should not say, "Veshom naamar" and "vayavor," and should not be saying, "Hashem, Hashem." What is remarkable, though, is that in the Vilna print, "veshom naamar" is after the instruction of what to miss out. In other words, "ein omer," you don't say, "veshom naamar" either. In the Chagas print, which is, as I say, was co-largely copied from there, there, curiously, the "veshom naamar" is placed before the instruction to skip, and therefore you get the impression you should say those words, "veshom naamar," and stop short. So that in itself is, is, uh, a problem. Now, in the Vilna print, and if you have an older siddur which is Chabad siddur, Tehillas Hashem, forty years old, let's say, you're going to see that that instruction of "hamispalel beyachid ein omer zeh," that instruction appears only in, um, only in Shacharis. Sorry, only at Mincha and not in Shacharis. Someone writes

04:09 to the Rebbe, and that's in Igrot Kodesh Lamed Gimel. He asks, "What's the explanation of the difference between Shacharis and Mincha?" "Im yesh chiluk ba-miyas yitgil mul midas harachamim beyachid bein tfilas Shacharis, Mincha, u'Slichos. Is there a reason to differentiate whether a yachid should be saying yitgil midas? Does it matter whether it's Shacharis or Mincha or Slichos?" The Rebbe responds, "Lo raisi v'lo shamati m'odi shum chiluk." I haven't seen, I haven't heard any reason to differentiate. Far-- as far as saying yitgil midas on its o-o-on one's own, whether it's Shacharis, Mincha or Slichos. "V'nifsek ha-din stam b'Shulchan Aruch siman tof kuf samech hei sif hei." It's a clear halocho in Shulchan Aruch, which we'll read in a moment. Just as we're speaking, just to remind you that the idea of saying "rachman" and "Hashem, Hashem," when you give midas harachamim on a daily basis, twice a day, that's a Nusach Sfarad, Nusach Arizal, uh, practice. In Nusach Ashkenaz, it's not said at all. Yitgil midas harachamim is not said as part of the daily tahachna. So let's come back. So Rebbe's first point is, no reason to differentiate between Shacharis, Mincha or Slichos. S-s-second point, look in Shulchan Aruch. Then you're asking now a question, what happened in the Tehillas Hashem siddur? To which the Rebbe kind of offers some kind of apology. The siddur Tehillas Hashem Ashale. The, the term, the, the first Chabad siddur called the Tehillas Hashem was that-- was known as the Rostov siddur. That's a very thin siddur with very

06:02 small writing, and you k-have to keep on turning the pages. That was published in Rostov In Tov, um, Reish, Ayin, Ches, that's nineteen eighteen, and, um, was published again in Leningrad about ten years later, and then it was published, uh, several times afterwards. Now you can hardly see them, but they, they were published again in America. The things that since that siddur was called, we call it the Rostov Siddur, but that was called Tilos Hashem. And when the Americans and Yonichino published this beautiful siddur, which we use regularly, um, copying from the Seder Avoda, that is called Tilos Hashem HaShalem. So that's why the Rebbe uses just the terms of reference to be clear. Tilos Hashem HaShalem means the full siddur rather than the Tilos Hashem, um, the Rostov print, which is, uh, you know, which is incomplete because you have to keep on turning the pages. So let's read again. The Rebbe's last sentence here is, "The Siddur Tilos Hashem HaShalem." The Siddur Tilos Hashem, which you're asking about, where you've seen a discrepancy, a change between Mincha and Shacharis. "Ufotografia shmi sidur shekadmai." It's merely a photocopy of the preceding, its, its predecessor. That is the Seder Avoda print. "Velo hispik hazman lahagiya kidaboi." And as we were working on it, we didn't have enough time to check it adequately. So let's go through these points which the Rebbe raises step by step. First of all, he's saying there's no difference between Shacharis and Mincha or Slichas. Second, number two, he says, "I've

07:46 got a source in Shulchan Aruch." Now, just to help us, we've got the sh- the, the, uh, text of the Shulchan Aruch here on top of the sh- of the page. And here is, as it is in Tov Kov Samache, that's the Dinim of Taanis. And so here is where it's Hilchas Slichas of the Taanis. And, and the Rebbe said there's no difference between them. So we're gonna use this as the basis also for Shacharis and Mincha as per Nusach Sefard, Arizal, where we say Yud Gimel Tzerachmim at Shacharis and Mincha. So let's read the Mechaber. "Ein haYochid Rashayi loimar shloish esre midis." An individual without a minyan isn't, uh, authorized to say the Yud Gimel, the thirteen attributes of mercy. "Derech tfilah bakoshes rachamim" in the form of prayer and supplication. "Dedovoshe bikdushosheim." They have the status like Kdushe and Kaddish and Borchu. It's got that level of, of, of sanctity that it's not correct to, um, to say it without a minyan. Fine. "Avel im bo lo imram derech kriah be'alma." But if you want to recite it just as a recital, not as form of supplication and arousing, uh, heavenly mercy, "o imram," you are to say it. And on the margin here in the Tov Kov Samache, he says, talk, say it, you can say it with, if you can, you say it with the taamim, with the trop. Okay. And here the Maraimos says, "Ein haYochid loimar Slichos veyaaver." So it's, it's... Okay. So this is wh-where we, we, so

09:26 this is what the Rebbe's, um, referring us to, that you can, there's no problem to say Yud Gimel Tzerachmim, but, but, but just as derech kriah be'alma, just as a recital rather than for the purpose of bakoshes rachamim. So now, coming back. So, and the correct thing, well, according to the Shulchan Aruch is, you don't have to skip it. You just say it bederich, bederich, uh, uh, koireh b'torah, as, as, as just as a recital, not as a... So that should be, uh, that, that is certainly acceptable. Now, then the Rebbe said, "Lo hispik hazman lahagiya kidaboi," that they didn't have the opportunity to check. Uh, I suspect, see, and just to clarify, these instructions, "hamspal beyochid," which has appear in the Vilna print in that Tov Reish Ayin Alef, do not appear in the original siddurim of the Alter Rebbe, the ones in Samach Gimel and Ayin Vav, Tov Kov Samach Gimel from two hundred and, uh, twenty years ago, et cetera. And all of those siddurim for the first hundred years, approximately, you don't have this instruction. It was intru- it was introduced by the printer in Vilna just, uh, a hundred and twelve, eleven years ago, approximately. Fine. So, um, but what's, what, I suspect what happened is that Rebbe told them to take away this comment altogether. And instead, the publisher, whoever was, was doing the, the, the, the work on it, he left, uh, he, j- he, in other words, it's a little bit of an interesting lotion in the

11:10 o- old print. "Hamspal beyochid en omer ze velo yagomer midis." Don't say this and then not, not to yagomer midis. So not to say this is what? Vashom ne'emar, not to say vayavar Hashem apanov. Um, so possibly the Rebbe's instruction was take out the whole comment. But the one who did the actual work understood that vashom ne'emar should be left, and it should be said, and vayavar Hashem apanov should be l- missed, should be skipped. And so they made tho-those modifications, and I think that's part of what the Rebbe is lamenting. "Lo hispik hazman lahagiya kidaboi," because what was done here is really, um, it doesn't-- to, to say vashom ne'emar without finishing the sentence doesn't really have, uh, an, a logical explanation at all. Just before we go on, um, finish off this point, Reb Hishke Gansburg apparently asked the Rebbe about this in Yechidas. And the Rebbe's respond was, "Lo shamati boze," whether you should say, you shouldn't say. Now, very, very strange answer. There's a Shulchan Aruch. It says is that a yachid shouldn't say it bedericht tefillah, but you can say it derich kriat shema. So what is this conversation which Gansburg is saying that he asked the Rebbe, and the Rebbe said, "Should you say it or you shouldn't say it?" And it... And the Rebbe says, "Lo shamati boze." In general, we have to be very careful how much we rely on someone, uh, who says, "I heard this in yechidus." It's a very fine chasidus shiur, but perhaps

12:55 there was a misunderstanding there. Um, the only thing I could suggest is that you're asking whether it's better to say it derich niggun, derich kriat shema, or just better to skip it. And we know that the Munkatcher holds that you shouldn't say it, even with derich kriah. Says that, "Lo shamati boze." But that's, that's, uh, there was the conversation in yechidus. But, um, what we have here letter of the Rebbe, he says, "Look in Shulchan Aruch." And so the Shulchan Aruch says you can say it bederich kriat shema, and, uh, so that's fine. Let's move on. Someone asked me, hmm, about there's a busi- there's, uh, a business of not putting out the match when you light the candles just before Shabbos. And so now you've got a, a kind of gas, um, a gas lighter, and you, you press on a button, and that makes the-- holds the flame. You release the button, so then the gas flow stops and the, and the flame, flame goes out. So he's asking. It's, it's... I'd written about this in, in Sivim B'sei HaShlichos, Chelek Gimel. I had written about the minhag not to put out the, uh, match, as we'll read it, this inside, and leave the match to go out by itself. So he's asking, when you're using this gas lighter, isn't-- and you release the button, isn't by the fact that you're releasing, isn't that the same as putting out the match? And once you've made Mekabel Shabbos, um, you shouldn't be putting out

14:39 the flame. We'll read the thing inside, but wh- as, as we were saying, you know, I, I, my, um, response to him was very simple. There's a difference between putting out a match. That's you, you are m-making it go out. When you are holding-- When you're pressing a button, and you now take away your pressure, and the button jumps back, you haven't put out the flame. You have stopped providing fuel to the flame. The flame go, went out by itself. Your energy was maintaining the, the fuel flow, and now you've stopped giving that energy, and therefore it, it stopped by itself. Therefore, I don't think that's a problem at all. But s-since this has come up, uh, let's read this inside, the tof-- in, in Siman Res Samoch Gimel. So, "Yesh oimrim, there is a shihtah, it's a shihtah going back to one of the Geonim, perhaps more than one. Shekim shehidlik ner Shabbos chal alav haShabbos veneseh ba'asiyatano. There are those who maintain that once a, a one has lit all the candles which you intend to light for Shabbos, that moment becomes Shabbos. Ela im kein hisnasheinu mekabel al Shabbos, by the way. Unless you stipulated that you're not doing, you're not come Kabbalah Shabbos. So, but by default, the last-- Once you've finished the last candle, then it's Shabbos for you. Now, V'al pi zen noigeg is... Now, the, the, the next thing is actually sorry. Um, many-- If, if you light many candles, more than two, then the likelihood is that

16:20 you're going to light one candle with a match and then light th-- with that candle, light the other candles. So this business of dropping the match and not dropping the match don't really apply practically for women who light lots of candles. Um, I'm talking about candles. I'm not talking about the neroni or other, other, you know, these paraffin ones, which is, you know, I guess they are a different story. Okay. V'al pi zen noigeg haNoshim. Because of this opinion in the Geona, that the mere finishing, the last lighting is Kabbalah Shabbos, therefore, there's a minhag of women to achar sheberchu v'hidliku hanerot, after they made the berakhah and lit the candles, mashlichis la'aretz hapsilot sh'bi-yadan shehidliku banerot. They, they, the wick which they had been using to light the candles, they will drop it onto the floor. V'einam mechabesh otho. They will not put it out manually, directly. They won't extinguish it directly. Shekfor chal alem Shabbos bikmar hadlok azrai. By the mere finishing touch, the last candle is lit, Shabbos. So they got-- Therefore, they, they don't extinguish the, the, uh, wick which they, they use for lighting. They just drop it. Obviously, there's a couple of, um, questions here. Here he says, achar sheberchu. And now that's following the minhag. This quote, the alterrebe usually quotes poskim in the language which they u-used to a, to a degree. And some poskim, and indeed, that's the minhag Sefardim up till today, they, they will light-- They make the berakhah, sheki'kodesh shabbatos v'zeman lehadlik ner

18:04 shel Shabbos, then they will light. Minhag Ashkenaz, we'll discuss later in Res Samoch Gimel is the-- not that sequence. Uh, women will light the candles, then cover their eyes and say the berakhah then. But the, this, this lashon, therefore, is a bit, maybe a little bit bothersome, but that's, that's, uh, I don't, don't think it really changes the picture. So, fine. Um, then he-- Let's finish off this paragraph. "Avel yechoeles lehadlik neiros harbeh," you can light many candles and don't have to worry about Kabbalat Shabbos then. "Shekulon mitzvah sadloka achat," this is all one mitzvah of lighting. "Ve'ein Kabbalat Shabbos cholo ad achar gmar hadlak." Once you've finished lighting all the candles, that's when it's Shabbos for you. And then the "yesh chochim." Then another opinion says, no, that you're not Mekabel Shabbos by lighting. Uh, I'm skipping, as you can see, towards the end of that paragraph. Resh samach yud, mesechta zayin. "Avel ha-minhag hu kisvoro harishonaim." Indeed, the minhag remains. Minhag Ashkenaz, not just minhag Sefard, but minhag Ashkenaz also, is that women are Mekabel Shabbos by the, uh, last lighting. "She'oso ishu mekabel hamadlicheis, mekabelet Shabbos alei badloka sei." The Kabbalat Shabbos, even though she hasn't said the beracha yet, is already by the mere fact that she's finished lighting. And then he goes in, therefore, she should have minhag earlier, as he said, and, um, that's another discussion. So, what we're seeing here is that the finishing of the lighting is considered Kabbalat Shabbos. Um, and so coming back to the

19:54 original question, is re-releasing the pressure on the gas lighter, is that called, um, putting out the flame, as they say? It's-- I think it's the same as dropping the, uh, the psila to the floor, and okay, uh, you know, it, nature will, uh, follow its course. It will go out, but that's not, it's not your doing. I think I once discussed this also when someone raised the point that, and this is the Alter Rebbe's wording, psila is very specific. A ph-- a wick, because it's porous, you leave it onto a, uh, a flat surface, it's going to continue burning. So dropping it onto a flat surface is not putting it out. A match, by contrast, if you put it onto a flat surface, it will go out. And therefore, this person was arguing with me that, um, which I'm, I'm ready to be Mekabel. If it's, if, if it's a match, instead of putting the match on a flat surface, put it in a diagonal, on a diagonal position, and it shouldn't go out automatically by the fact that you put it down. Okay, so that's, uh, question number two. I know this is a subject to a debate, uh, what we just discussed, um, behalal, whether we do follow this minhag or not. I did have a debate about this with Rabbi Rimler of, uh, Brighton Beach, and it was now Harav Tzvi Yurech. And, uh, in the Sefer Mesivim Ba'haloch Minhag, I've brought down his position, my position, et cetera. Anyone who wants

21:29 to read it more carefully is welcome to find it over there, or I can-- they can send me an email, and I'll send them the conversation. One of our regular, uh, listeners asked about on Shabbos, using a, uh, a screw cap, um, bottle. Are you allowed to open these on Shabbos? And, um, so there's a con-- a, a substantial Mahloket Poskim about this, where you have-- And what you have in front of you is the Sefer Mishneh Halachot shin yud daled, sif zay, um, Sif Katan chaf. And this question is, is opening this screw cap, is it cr-creating a keli? This cap wasn't usable before as-- because it was depressed, and now it's gonna be-- By breaking off the, the... I think so. You're, you're creating something or you're fixing something. This is the opinion of, of, of some Poskim. The most significant one was Rav Shlomo Zalman, who was Machmir. If I'm not mistaken, there was someone called the Zuchcher Rebbe, and he was the one who stirred up this, this question, and he wrote to many different Poskim about this. Um, one of those, those he wrote to was the late, uh, Rav Padver, Penich, who actually is quite, um... He says, "I don't have strong enough evidence to make any isur on this, but, uh, mean, personally, I, I try to avoid it, but I don't, I don't have evidence enough to make an isur." Um, the Debreciner Rav, the Beher Moshe, he doesn't see any problem with it. And I'm particularly,

23:15 um, how do you say, not ready to make an isur on this because we saw this being done in front of the Rebbe. People would bring vo-vodka, and I know there are those who says they would open them before Shabbos. That wasn't always the case. So let's just go through, quickly through what he's, he writes over here in Pitchei Teshuva. He says, "These, um, kakim, these, these, uh, bottle, um, bottle tops, which by, uh, opening them, you're breaking off a ring or there's a, uh, or it gets torn open." Many, many opinions. L'maaseh, they are eminent Poskim who do allow the metal a-a cap, and therefore, he says, "We can't really object totally to those who do allow to use them, especially where there's lots of people." And he says, "Here's an interesting point. If there's a large crowd, then you open up a bottle, and then you're not gonna use the bottle top again because it's gonna go to-- it could get thrown out in any case." And so that makes, makes like... So, especially if there's a larger crowd, and so the bottles are not going to be kept. So you can't really have a tayna that you're creating something useful because it's gonna be thrown away in any case. So these are his arguments to mitigate, um, the opening of these bottles. But then he says, "Nevertheless, Yireh shama, yir-yir, um, yesh lirah, rech lachshosh. One should take heed of the other Poskim who say that there is, as, uh, particularly Rav

24:58 Shlomo Zalman, who's it apart, now it's gonna become usable. Um, so bottom line is that can we use... So in effect, there are, are simple questions. Can you open these on Shabbos? As I say, many, many poskim feel it's, it's okay. Some do have a problem with it. I would recommend, if you didn't open it before Shabbos and you need it on Shabbos, to open it kilachayad. Um, personally, I would take, like, for example, instead of twisting the cap off the bottle, if you twist the bottle away from the cap. And so that's not a normal way of doing it, and I think that's adequate. Bemoken, uh, when you, when you have a need for it, and you didn't prepare it before Shabbos. Okay. One of our regular listeners, um, a friend, he's involved with a, a Jewish man who unfortunately is married to, to a non-Jewish, uh, woman and was... When he passed away, was buried in a non-Jewish cemetery. And so he's asking, what can we do as far as, um, as far as saying Tehillim, as far as saying Kaddish? So, let's take a look. We have here Shevuot, Nuach, and Siman, Sanhedrin Dalet, talking about a person who's traveling, and you have a choice. Do you daven whilst you're traveling, or do you wait till you get into the hotel or your hostel, motel whilst you're traveling? So he says, it would actually... If you can find a quiet spot en route by the side of the road where you won't

26:57 be disturbed by passersby, actually better to daven over there than to da-daven in the, in the motel, where there's gonna be certainly, um, i-idols and other abominable things, and it's not appropriate to bring kedusha into such a place. Moshe Rabbeinu, when he prayed for the, uh, c-cessation of one of the plagues, he says, "K'tzei si es ha'ir," and I'll leave the town. He didn't want to daven in the city, the m-metropolis of Mi-in Mitzrayim, because it was malei hagilulim. It was full of, of idols. So that's the sentiment. Pref-preferably not to daven in a place where there are idols, et cetera. Avod im yi ef shala stalek min hadeirech bamoken shelo yapsiku. But if you cannot find a quiet spot on the roadside, then it's okay to daven. Is pal bemolein, be'ezek herin zotz. You'll find a quiet corner in the hotel, and you'll daven there. Shelo yevalehu bnei habayis, where the other people, uh, or, or, or who are living there in this ho-in, um, um, a motel shouldn't disturb you. Ve'in lo chash legilul. Don't be worried about the fact there are idols, symbols, et cetera. Charikot tuloseinu be'ayorot malei hagilulim. Wherever we're living, there are churches, and there are icons. Therefore, it's, i-it's not a really an avoidable situation, and it's okay. So coming back to the question over here. May you say Tehillim, um, say Kaddish in a non-Jewish cemetery? To say Tehillim, amach, in front of a cross seems to be, uh, you know, not, not, not very gishmak. Um,

28:46 there are types of crosses. There's Christian, there's, how do you say, um, Protestant, um, Catholic, different types. But, um, if, if you go away a, a little distance, you're looking, you know, you're not looking directly at them, more than, more than dalet amos away, that would be okay. Kaddish, if there are ten people there, to say again, to say Kaddish right near a tselem seems to be out, out of order. But if you can get it a-away, if there's a path a little bit further where there's more than dalet amos from, from a grave, I think that would be okay. Which brings me to the next question on our list, which was one of the shluchis sent me. She's on the way to the Ohel in an Uber, and the, uh, driver has a tselem suspended from the rearview mirror, mirror. And she told me also there's prayer beads, which I don't know what that means exactly. Um, and she, she's allowed to say Tehillim. Now, what we're seeing here is that if you can look away, so to speak, uh, then that shouldn't, in itself, not be a problem. In addition, sh-there happens to be that this, uh, car had a, a screen, uh, between the front and the back of the car, as is common in the taxis here in New York. And I certainly felt it was okay to, for her to continue to saying her, to say her Tehillim and leave the driver do his own thing. Okay. Then we have

30:09 a question, which I got asked by one of our regular listeners, and he's in a, um, faraway location. He's a lawyer, and he was appointed by a non-Jewish client as executor of his estate. Um, and he then... This client passed away. In the instructions to his executor, he has gi-given instructions that he should be cremated. He's a goy, so the question is: Is it okay for a Yid to be involved in the cremation of a goy? Is a goy allowed to be cremated? So is it a, on the Sheva Mitzvot of Bnei Noach for a goy not to have himself cremated? You know, is there such a thing? Um, a bit more complicated is the fact that the, uh, A place where this is, cremations are done by, it's a religious service done by the priests of the local Aveh Dezara. So to my knowledge, I've done, I've researched for this a few times. Although we understand that a goy also has a form of Tzelem Elokim, but the emphasis of how, how, you know, how we stro- so object, so, um, uh, strongly object to the concept of cremation is very much a Jewish thing. And for a goy to be cremated is not something which we have to make a fight about. We wouldn't advise it, but we wouldn't, we don't have to make a fight about this. Now, what's a little bit more complicated was about giving this, uh, delegating, you know, making a phone call to the local, local temple and

31:55 asking them to, to do this job, which I felt was a little uncomfortable. The reason being that they're gonna, uh, they, they, then they're gonna, uh, it'll be a conversation also involving something about their rights or, or their relig- their religious right. So I felt it would be, um, simpler that this Jewish lawyer appoints a, either, either a worker of his or another colleague who's a non-Jewish lawyer who should be carrying out the, uh, the instruction. Now, we have a, a rule in Hilchot Shabbos that if you employ a goy to do a permitted act, and they choose to do it, uh, in a way that's also doing an Avera, that's not a problem because you've been, you've been commissioned them. Let's say you ask a goy to open the door of your fridge, and by the way, the light goes on. That is acceptable because your instruction to him was not about the, the, the switching on the light. Your instruction was to open the fridge. So, and you have a, a few different variations of the same idea. So if I give instructions to sort out a cremation, that is being done on my behalf. The fact that the cremation will be involving a certain form of Avedah Zarah, I didn't feel that that is such a big concern because that wasn't what you asked them to do. In fact, they, they, that's the way they do that, but that's not my instructions, and therefore, that they're doing by their own volition, and

33:30 you're, all you're, uh, doing, uh, asking them to do is do the act of cremation, which, as I said, with a goy, that would be, uh, would be something you, you are allowed to let through. It would obviously be a, a much more difficult question if the client was Jewish. Then you as a pro- a professional, um, you're being in conflict between your professional, uh, uh, duty to carry out the client's instructions and your, your, as a form of Eid, you wouldn't, well, I guess you'd never ac- ac- accept such an instruction because you wouldn't be able to do it. This is similar to the question about if you are a travel agent and, uh, a, a client wants you, wants you to book them a ticket to be able to travel on Shabbos. Uh, there are so many variations of this idea which do become quite complicated. But in here, in this case, I felt it was, uh, something which we could let through. Uh, which brings me to the next, um, question, which also happened this past week, that a Jewish man had died without having made any, uh, arrangements for burial and looks like didn't have any money, um, and the body was just in a morgue somewhere. And a non-frum friend of Chabad gave the Shliach, was it five thousand dollars or ten thousand dollars, to cover the cost of the burial, which is really, uh, very generous. Then all of a sudden, there's a next of kin. There's a next

35:05 of kin of this, of the deceased, and they are insisting on a cremation. And they're saying that's what the nifter would have wanted, and, and i- i- next of kin, you, you generally, one, once the next of kin stands in court against you, it's a, it's a lost case. That's, but that's, that's, now the, the chutzpah is, though, that now that this next of kin is in, telling the Shliach, "Well, you have the money to deal with this person, to, to, to deal with the, um, end-of-life, uh, costs, and I want you, Rabbi, to pay the cremation parlor. They should, um, do, do, do the, uh, cremation." I felt that was, um, totally unacceptable, um, for Shliach to be actually paying for the cremation. I, I felt that was, um, beyond what, what, what one, one should allow. I said, "Next to him, what you should do is give it, the whole, the whole lot, send it back to this donor." And the, the donor who gave the money, he's, doesn't, uh, doesn't care. Yeah, cre- does, uh, if it were a cremation, he's, he just gave it as a generous gesture, but he's not, not because he's dafke, one, uh, religious or not so religious. Uh, it's not, doesn't bother him either way. I said that you, you, uh, you'd have to give back the money. To hold onto the money, you, you can get yourself into trouble. Give back the money and tell them, "Listen, I can't deal with it," and you do

36:30 what you want to do. Okay. Now let's get to something more friller. And this is, again, one of our regular c- listeners asked a question about if you have a, a door knocker installed at the front of your door, are you allowed to use it on Shabbos? So, what's the issue here? There's the issue of not creating music, et cetera. Midrabona, we're not allowed to create music on Shabbos. So let's read this. This is from, uh- Sorry, the, the ref-- the number, the, uh, reference in sub number six are from, from last week. They're nothing to do with the reference over here. Um, it's just a little bit of the Rosh HaShanah of Shabbos. We managed to get everything together properly. All right. So he says here in the Shulchan Aruch, I think it's Shin Lamed Ches, that he says about to, to, um, ""To knock on the door,"" "," that people should let you in. That is, uh, he says that since it's not Derech Shir, it's not a form of, of a tune, it's a song, . You are allowed to make, um, knock on a door to, to... because it's not creating music. But then he continues, "."" There are those who maintain that even though knocking on a door is permitted, but you wouldn't be allowed to use a specially designed knocker. Because then once you've got an instrument, then there's-- we're back to the whole thing, why don't we play music on Shabbos? In case you come to

38:17 adjust the ins-ins- fix up the instrument. """ To knock on the door with a ring which is fixed there as a knocker. """ Even though you're not creating music, you're just using a knocker. But since it's a made as a knocker, then you shouldn't be opening... You shouldn't be using it on Shabbos to knock on the door. Um, therefore, in the olden days, in the ghettos, et cetera, the shamas was the one who would go on around the ghetto, and he had a, a knocker, which he would knock on the shutters on, on, of people's houses to wake them up to come to Shaharis. Now, I've seen pictures of those. They look like a shofar, like a long handle and a big, um, bigger piece at the end. Um, so he says that they-- he would not, on Shabbos, the shamas would not be using his regular knocker because it's "," made for creating no-a noise. Instead, he would have to, on Shabbos, knock on the, on the doors with his ha-with, with his hat. "" And he says, uh, in some places on Shabbos, they would use something else, another instrument. "Allen," his hands very sore of knocking all those doors on a Shabbos morning. So they would allow him to knock with something else, another kind of stick or something which was not made as a knocker. Um, Rav Moshe Katznelboyg, in "Ahavat Shalom," m-maintained that, you know, you know, the post, the post slot where the mai-mail

39:54 comes in, sometimes there's, like, a handle which is, uh, part of that piece. That handle is on a hinge, and you can leave it, and it can, it can drop and be, act as a knocker. So it acts also as a handle to pull the door. Also, it can hand-- it work as a knocker. So Rav Moshe was inclined to allow to use those knockers on Shabbos because it's not made as a knocker. It's made as a handle. Um, I'm not so sure because it also is made as a knocker. There's a special little piece there. So better to avoid. But certainly, if it's a knocker just as a knocker, so here you have a clear din Shulchan Aruch that it's not okay for Shabbos. Finally, what got with this, and that is that someone asked me, we have the lotion of Perech Echad Shaharis, Perech Echad Arvis. Um, is asking, what exactly does it mean, Perech? It's like, it's seen as a, kind of a minimum, a minimum, kind of, uh, amount of learning Torah per day. One chapter in the evening and a ch-- in the morning, one chapter in the evening. What do you mean a chapter? A chapter of what? So why I, um, I discovered as I was looking around that there is the lotion of Perech Echad Shaharis, Perech, uh, Echad Arvis is in Menachos Daf Zadik Tes on the base. It's mentioned several times in Tanya, um, in passing and-- But then there is a piece which was

41:25 found in the last fifty years, a piece of the Alter Rebe's, like a, like a Kuntras HaAchron kind of piece, and it's published at the back of the Alter Rebe's Shulchan Aruch. Volume Heh, Taf Kof Yod Daled. It's probably, it was, it was, um, it said, he, he talks about this business of Perech Echad Shaharis, Be-Perech Echad Arvis. Basically, he says the following. There's a level of learning of Torah, really understanding and, and delving, et cetera. That's what we call Limud HaGemara. That's really to understand. And then there is Mishnah, which is Halakha, which means you know the facts, what you're allowed to do or you're not allowed to do, but not necessarily the reasoning behind. And so if a person-- This is his discussion, Alter Rebe's discussion over here. If a person is not capable of delving into the discussion aspect of, of Torah, not able to, uh, it's not, not, not really, it doesn't work with him, this whole Gemara and, and probing, et cetera. So for such a person, so we have the idea of Perech Echad Shaharis, Be-Perech Echad, uh, Arvis. And if you look at the last words on this, uh, slide, which you can see, that the piece says, "Let the person have a, have a job and earn a, earn a living, and he'll be "." Interesting. It-- Basically, the word Perech here means to learn something of Halakha rather than to be learning something more of Shakla V'Tarya discussion as in the Gemara. Instead, learn something

43:11 of Halakha, and he says, Mishnah, Braisa. I'm sure that's the same thing would apply to Limud HaRambam. It's, in other words, getting the factual information rather than the, the, the lamdis which, which behind it. So Perekh Echad Shachar is Perekh Echad Arvis would mean, I don't know whether it means-- My, my impression is it doesn't mean a full chapter. What it means, a, a section. A se-- The word perekh means a section and a section of, of, of halakha on a daily basis. And how much, how big that section is, is up to the person's, uh, you know, the resources, what's available to him, et cetera. Um, I mentioned this, the word perekh. Um, some pe- some of our listeners like a bit of dikduk. You've got the same shoresh, prat, which means a detail, same as the English word part. We have the word perekh, as in backbreaking labor. We have the word pirul, which means, uh, a crumb, and now we have the word perekh, which means a part. They're all the same shoresh. They all mean of taking things apart. Um, different forms, whether it's a crumb or it's a part or whether it's a, a, uh, breaking, it's all the same, the same shoresh with pey-resh. Um, in Kabbalah, there is a, a significance to this. If I'm not mistaken, the word, the five letters of Mansaph equal two hund- two hundred and eighty. And there is a, a drush on the words in Pasuk, Kefoyr is, um, pey-rei, pey-resh and

44:53 kof-vav, which is Yud Kei Vav Kei. Koeffer is pey-resh and kof-alef, which is . Yefazeel is, um, pey-resh and Yud-zayin, which is, I think, the of Yud Kei Vav Kei. Whatever it may be, there is-- So you have this idea of gvurus. Pey-resh is the meaning of gvurus, and that fits with the meaning of it, breaking things down, whether it's perekh or pra-prat or perekh, et cetera. Um, the rich here, we should, um, be past this stage of breaking down the gvurus, and we should see b'yis moshiach tzidkeinu b'heiv yameinu mamash. Uh, and since you're listening to this, it should be, be on Motzei Shabbos, so we should be told about this with Eliyahu, through Eliyahu Hanavi m'vassa hag'ulaim b'heiv yameinu mamash. Have a good Shabbos and a good HaAvodah, whichever way you want. All the best.