מטות–מסעי תשפ״ד

00:10 Good evening. Welcome to tonight's shiur. Today is Thursday, Parashat Matot-Mas'ei. And today's shiur is sponsored by Rav Mendel and Mrs. Freda Kahati nee, um, Davidoff. And this is in honor of their newborn baby boy. The bris should be Monday, BeShalot Hav Dalat Mesachas. And, uh, so we wish them mazal tov and sahmach nas. It's still daytime, so we can say together Pesukim Tehillah and Tzedakah. So we can say El Chaf for the welfare of the hostages and for Idan Eretz Yisroel, Vcham Lochim Sh'heim. So say El Chaf, we'll put in Tzedakah, and then we'll start the shiur. So let's go to our first question. Someone was asking me at last week's sedra. We have in the beginning of the sedra, we have where Hashem says to Pinchas, "Hineini noten lo es bris shalom." The word shalom is spelled, is spelled with shin, nun, vav, mem, but the vav is split. So not necessarily in all the Chumashim. I was looking around. But in a Sefer Torah, so the, the letter vav here is split. As I mentioned earlier, I, uh, as a bachur in, in Melbourne, we once Mincha, and we took out the Sefer Torah, and we saw there's a split vav. So we rolled up the Sefer Torah, put it back in the Aron Kodesh, took out another one. The next one also had a split vav. And so then, uh, we realized that's, that's by design rather than by mistake. Okay, so we've got here this, this, a split vav. The person

03:05 was asking me that, that seemingly he's seen in different Sefer Torah, different forms, whether the split is halfway, as you can see on the screen here, or the split is lower down, as you might see, um, in some Sifrei Torah. He's asking, is there any Mesorah in Chabad about that? Um, and also he's asking, well, if you take the, the vav of Shalom and split it in half, so the top half seems to be like a yud. Then that leaves you with a word like Shalim. Is there something significance in that? So let's explore this a little bit. So first of all, we have a Gemara in Kiddushin, which says, "Hineini noten lo es bris shalom, keshu shalem v'lo keshu chaser." The kehuna is given to a Kohen who is intact, who is, uh, um, got all the faculties, et cetera. No dama- no, no blemishes. So then the Gemara asks, "V'ha shalom kasear?" The word shalem means complete, but sh- it's written shalom. Omar Rav Nahman, "Vav d'shalom ketiya hi." The vav of the letter sha-shalem, the, the vav of the word shalom is a incomplete letter. And therefore, it, uh, lends to the pshat of reading it shalem, which means or, uh, complete. And therefore, that's a remez to the Kohen having to be, uh, i-intact without any mumin. So that's, that's one, uh, where we see already this vav ketiya, which means a split vav, a cut short vav, is mentioned in the Gemara. Then go to other sources. So here we

04:52 have in the Torah Shelomo, "Shalom vav katano." So, "Bishvil hi hineini noten lo v'lo la'achei. Es bris shalem matanos shelem." Also, he's being given the word shalom with a, uh, with a vav as if it were missing. I'm giving him a full gift. That's a Midrash. And then we have in another source, also in the Torah Shelomo, the vav of-- from Rabbeinu Yoyel, "The vav of shalom is split in half. She nola d'mohu k'mo..." Uh, uh, that to say that Pinchas was born already circumcised, like we have in the word Melchi Tzedek Melech Shalem. And he's alluding to a Midrash which says about Melchi Tzedek Melech Shalem, "Rabiu chabab l'ohem sh'no yald moho." So we have here Derushim on the word shalom, as if it were shalem, in fact. Then we have the Roqech, who takes it even with a yud, Shalim. The Gematria, Pinchas no yald moho. So the Reikeh who was brilliant in Gematrias. He was one of the Baale HaTosfos, the late Baale HaTosfos, I believe. Um, so he shows how the word shalim, which is three hundred and eighty, equals the Gematria of Pinchas no yled mol. I didn't work it out. I trust him. So we have here remez to the shalim, which, which also means intact. Having said all that, then he's asking a bit more detail about how the vav is split. So there is a sefer, I've mentioned this in the past, and it's a sefer which is a Talmud of the Semach Zedek. Um, and he

06:42 mentions, uh, uh, it's mentioned in Hayom Yom a couple of times. It's a safer dedicated to concept of sofras, so it's called Mishnah Saverahem. And in chapter thirty-one, he calls it Shaar HaShalem. And it's focusing on the word shalem, the split vav in shalem. And he says there are various opinions how the letter is split. Is it that it's a small vav? Is it that the vav is come-- it becomes managed like a yud? Is it that the vav is, um, a regular vav, but, uh, it's got the, the foot is a bit shorter? Is it that the vav is split in half, but the upper part looks like a yud, and together with the lower part, it looks like a vav? And, um, then he gives other opinions. So we have here an, a variety of opinions. So we have this, Gemara says, it's a vav ktio, exactly how it is done. So we have actually several shitas. And, uh, what my recollection from, you know, by seeing the Sifrei Torah is that it's, it's, uh, like a sh-shortened vav, not split in half, but split lower down. It is bedoecha, it's counted as a vav. Um, but there are, as you see, there's, um, the various different masores. Is there a masore in Chabad? Um, I'm not sure. Uh, that you'd have to ask Chabad Sofer. It's, uh, right. So Rabbi Safran is pointing out that, um, that Gematria, he's worked it out. So again, let's go back to that Gematria from the

08:24 Reikeh, Pinchas No yled Mol. So you're saying that it, it is actually three hundred and seventy-nine, but Im Hakol, it becomes, um... it's, it's three hundred and eighty. Thank you very much. Okay, let's move on. So now we have one of our regular participants in this year, somewhere in Europe. So he's asking about use of this swing for his children, I presume, and, uh, in relation to using it on Shabbos. So what's the question? On Shabbos, we're not allowed to climb a tree, and we're not allowed to lean on a tree. You wouldn't... ein mishtamshim b'geduley karecha. Let's say to a-- Let's say if you wanted to, in your, in your garden, and you wanted to take off your jacket and hang it on a branch of the tree, that wouldn't be allowed. If the children are playing with a ball and it landed on a bush, you'd have a problem of taking it off the bush because ein mishtamshim b'geduley karecha. So there is... But then the halakha is that sdodin are asur. Tsidodei sdodin are permitted. If it's, like, two steps removed, then it is permitted. So let's read that halakha in Shulchan Aruch in Siman shin lamed vav. Asur lishtamshim betsidotei ho'ilon. Not allowed to use the sides of the tree. Ava betsidotei sdodin, the sides of the sides. In other words, two steps removed, you would be allowed to. So a ladder leaning on the tree, you wouldn't be allowed to go up that ladder because you are using the sides

10:07 of the tree. In other words, the ladder leaning on the tree, the side, the side of the tree. If there were a peg fitted on the tree, screwed onto the tree, and then the ladder is leaning on that peg, then you would be allowed to go up that ladder because that's called sidotei sdodin. If you have a, a, a, a hook hanging from a tree, and on the tree, on that hook is hanging a basket, so then to put stuff-- to use that stuff from the basket, that would be okay. To hang the basket itself wouldn't be okay. Another important point, though, is when we're talking about two steps removed. So in Piskei Teshuvot, he points out a very logical thing, and that is, let's say you're not allowed to sit on a wagon which is hooked up, harnessed to an animal, because that's called sdodin of the animal. Now, the wagon is made of a seat, and the seat has got connected to the sides, and on the side there's gonna be a bar, and the bar has got a, a ring at the end, et cetera, and then there's gonna be a strap. So, so lchaim, there are various, various, um, stages between yourself and the, and the animal. And still you're not allowed to sit in the wa- in the carriage pulled by an animal. The explanation is because all the pieces of the carriage, the wagon, are all one, one, considered one entity. The nails and the, and the, and the

11:32 hooks, et cetera, they're all considered one entity. So that brings us back to the question here. Let's go back to our swing. So you can go to any garden center probably or toy, toy shop, you can buy these swings. And so you've got the round seat, and then you've got the, the, uh, blue rope. So the blue rope is not considered a step removed from the seat because it's all one unit. That's understood. Now- So the regular unit is, let's say, about two meters long. That, that rope, uh, and it hangs two meters from wherever it's, uh, it's suspended. But here, it was suspended from the tree. So what they did, they got separate rope and suspended it from the tree at a higher stage, a couple of meters. And then at a given level, they are connecting the... As you can see in the middle picture, connecting the indigenous rope of the swing with the, uh, extra rope, which is hanging straight from the tree. Now, are we gonna call this tsadadin or tzedeit tsadadin? Can we say that because the, the rope-- There's the, there's the rope of the swing, there's the other rope from the tree, and they are two things which are connected to one another. So is it one stage or two stages? I didn't really feel confident. So from Yingenman, he's asking me that it should be in a way there's no chashash. You could all-- You look at this and you'd say, "It's-- What are you talking about?

13:01 It's one swing which is hanging, suspended from the tree." So I wasn't comfortable to say it's not a problem at all. So what I suggested to him is that at the bottom of the orange and black s- rope should add a horizontal bar, like a trapeze. And then he will hang the, the, uh, hooks with the turquoise, whatever, string to hang it from that tra-- from that horizontal bar. And there'll be clearly two stages removed. There'll be the, the orange rope. There'll be the tzedeit tsadadin. And then the next one, uh, and the, and the trapeze. And then the, uh, the, uh, swing will be hanging from the trapeze. Therefore, it's considered tzedeit tsadadin, and he will be able to entertain his children on Shabbos afternoon without any chashash. Let's move on to the next question. So one of our regular listeners has a, has a problem of sometimes waking up in the middle of the night. I'm sure many of us do. And this person is saying that she would like to say a couple of chapters of Tehillim. Um, doesn't want to say berachahs and everything. She wants to go back to sleep. But well, there's a way to say a couple of... You know, that's one of the ways to fall asleep, is to learn something or to do something, uh, which the Yetzer, Yetzer Ha-- Yetzer Tov wants you to do. So then that helps the, the, you know, the other side wants you to fall asleep. Okay. So she wants

14:29 to say a couple of ca-- uh, chapters of Tehillim, but then to start saying Birkat HaTorah and everything is going to be a bit of, uh, too much. Uh, and so she said, you know, she can-- she'll just read a book rather than reading, saying Tehillim. But, you know. So there's a famous story, I think it was Rav Shel Baruch, who used to... When he would get up in the middle of the night, he would make a point of learning something and then going back to sleep. And he explained that when his neshama goes back after his short excursion in the middle of the night, they're gonna-- they, in, in, in the milo, they're gonna ask, "What did you do?" You know. And she, she'll just say he said, "Ashir yotzer." He wanted to, uh, learn something. But most of us are not on that madrega. You want to go back and fall asleep and to be able to be alert for the following day, uh, in good health. So this is the question: Can she say the Tehillim in the middle of the night without saying Birkat HaTorah? So let's read in Shechinah, "Urechit Birkat HaTorah," Siman Mem Zayin, that he writes the following. The author writes the following: There are places, this is Nusach Ashkenaz, where they would say Birkat HaTorah, not where we say it right after the berachahs, you know, um, uh, the eighteen berachahs, whatever. They say later, just by, by Parashat HaTomid. I, earlier, you've said various pesukim. You've

15:52 said, uh, Ma Toivu. You've said, uh, perhaps Akedah, et cetera. They don't worry about that. "Ho'il ve'ein omrim oysom derech tachanunim." Sorry. "Ho'il ve'omrim oysom derech tachanunim, ve'lo derech limud uchriya baTorah." Since these pesukim are being said in a form of supplication rather than a form of l- study, of learning Torah, therefore, it's not necessary to say Birkat HaTorah. So according to this, to say Tehillim without Birkat HaTorah, if you're saying it as a prayer rather than as learning, would be legitimate. The Yochden is preferable, more correct, to say Birkat HaTorah earlier, right after the Birkat HaShachar, and which is indeed our minhag. But we're seeing here that there is room to be makeil on this, and that's what you see here in Piskei Teshuvas. He writes Rabbi Moshe's situation, that a person who, when they wake up in the middle of the night to say some tefillahs and Tehillim, they can be makeil as far as not having to say Birkat HaTorah, um, before doing so. It just struck me when I heard the reading of the Hayom Yom today after davening. So the Hayom Yom, Chof Chof Vav Tav, says that in learning, your devotion is to an object which you wish to understand, and you understand. When you're davening, your devotion is to something which is higher than understanding. When you learn Torah, you are like a pupil in front of a rebbe, in front of your teacher. In davening, you're like a child in front of your father. So it's a

17:32 different relationship. And I think that that would, you know, uh, sum up the person saying Tehillim. They want to think about Hashem, but it's not that they're against-- they, they're studying Tehillim as such. So there is room to be makeil just to say the Tehillim without having to say Birkat HaTorah. Let's move on to the next question. Very interesting. So seems to be a r- rather, sort of simple question. Someone's asking me, why do we have a V'lo Mimadorchu on a Friday evening and not on Yom Tov? To, uh, let-- To clarify a little bit more. In our Nusach, as in Nusach, uh, Chassidic Nusachos, we have a piece of Zohar, which we say on Friday night at the end of Kabbalah Shabbos before Borchu. So it starts off Kagavnu, then there's a passage, Rozin de Shabbos, and then that leads into Behirat Anpin, and then we have Kaddish and then Borchu. And it has in the siddur, this is right from the Alter Rebbe, the first print, that if you're davening on your own, you should say the end of that ma'amar, of that, uh, passage in the Zohar. After Behirat Anpin, you should say this passage of V'leime Boruch Hu. Okay, so this is something which is unique to the Alter Rebbe's siddur. Now, I saw someone who's quoted that he saw this in the Siddur Shalo. So with, um, with Mechilas Choidai, the-- he saw a later print of the Siddur Shalo. I have in possession, I was given this, uh, uh,

19:10 for Yursho of Mr. Teller, alav hashalom, a siddur from the year Tov Kuf Pey Vav. And there it does have exactly the same thing. But these are all after the Alter Rebbe. It's almost two hundred years ago, but it's after the Alter Rebbe. Before the Alter Rebbe, you don't have anywhere where it has to say this passage of V'leime Boruch Hu. So it's, it, it is interesting. Um, before going to a bit more detail, we have here a letter of the Rebbe. The Rebbe says about... See, this is, uh, added to a letter, Migtab Klali Prati, and the Rebbe says the following, that, "Oimim V'leime Boruch Hu Mispal BiYechidust." The passage of V'leime Boruch Hu, if you're davening V'leime BiYechidus, you add, add the passage of V'leime Boruch Hu. It doesn't matter whether you heard Boruch Hu before. And he refers us to the Zohar, which we're gonna look at in a moment. "V'leime Boruch Hu B'gin L'miftach L'gaboh B'bracha." In order to open with a bracha. So just to explain what's going on here. So you'd be-- could be forgiven to think that this is a consolation, consolation price. Someone who'd missed Boruch Hu, so then by V'leime Boruch Hu, it's making up what you missed. And therefore, begs the question, why is there the option of, how do you say, compensating for the missed Boruch Hu? Why is there that compensation available on Shabbos, not available on Yom Tov? Because they're the same thing for the weekday. And that's a misunderstanding of what's

20:43 going on here. It's not a compensation. As you can see, when what we just saw from the Rebbe's letter, that even if you did answer Boruch Hu, but you are somehow behind the minyan, and when it comes to the end of Rozin de Shabbos, you're davening alone. So then you should say V'leime Boruch Hu. Doesn't, doesn't matter whether you're a page before or five pages, it doesn't matter. It-- When you're reading Kagavnu and V'leime Boruch Hu, Rozin de Shabbos, you sh- If you're not finishing off with actually saying Boruch Hu, then you should say the passage of V'leime Boruch Hu. So what is it, what is it about? And you see how the Rebbe refers to this with the L'megin L'miftach L'gaboh B'bracha. So what's going on here is, you can look it up in the Zohar, Daf Kuf Lamed Heh, talking about the... During the week comes Ma'ariv time, we start off with V'hu Rachum, and that's corres-- V'hu Rachum has got to do with people getting malchus. It's Inyon of Dinim. The person would get malchus, they would say V'hu-- As we do indeed Erev Yom Kippur, we say V'hu Rachum three times with the thirty-nine malchus. Um, I don't know whether I've discussed this in the past. I think I have. That there are Shitas in Rosh Chaim which say, "Malchus Mardus," which is malchus for a violation of the Rabbonon is thirteen malchus. A third of, um, of the full malchus of thirty-nine. Look at this. Shelish L'fonov, Shelish L'achorov. And

22:13 that's, um... Whereas Malchus Rabbonon, according to some Poskim, is thirteen malchus. And it looks like, it used to be in Munich, people would sometimes, uh, volunteer to having malchus after a day's exposure to the Pilipus outside in the market, and that's the V'hu Rachum at the beginning of Ma'ariv. So it says in the Zohar not to say that on Friday night, because the-- here is a moment where we've gone away from Dinim, gone away from... And, and it's a moment of elevation. Therefore, not to indulge in talking V'hu Rachum and many Dinim, it's to go to, to, uh, go, take the approach of Bracha. And that's it. The Zohar goes into detail about that the Boruch Hu of Friday night is like going into Shabbos with the Inyon of Bracha. Something on, on those lines. As you see here, "Ve'os lamah kadishi L'miftach L'gaboh b'psuchid de dinim ke'em V'hu Rachum. B'kid hachoish pashtas m'rozin de sitra achra." We've only been disassociated from the Sitra Achra. So don't mention V'hu Rachum, we should got to the Sitra Achra. Right. And so we have here a bit more detail. Es de'ikor, Es is in relation to Ma'ad Shabbato. B'kitzer, it is here an Inyon of going into Shabbos with the Bracha, with the HaMav Aleph. So if you are davening with the Minyan, so you finish off Rozin de Shabbos, and then you go in straight into Boruch Hu. If you're davening without the Minyan, then we have the, to finish off the, the, how do you

23:52 say, the introduction to Ma'ariv. With the Bracha, we say V'leime Boruch Hashem HaMevorach. I'm just want to mull over this a little bit more and say the following, that the Mincha-- Nusach Ashkenaz does not necessarily ca-- say Kaddish before Ma'ariv because Nusach, original Nusach Ashkenaz would go straight from Mincha into Ma'ariv, and therefore, if you had a Kaddish after Mincha, and then go straight into Boruch Hashem HaMevorach, start Ma'ariv. The Nusach Sefard, Chassidishe Nusach, is a kind of, I th-- you know, kind of in between. And so they don't have necessarily Mincha-- M-Ma'ariv right after Mincha. So they say Shira Ma'alos, and then they say a Kaddish. Then they say V'hu Rachum, and then Boruch Hashem HaMevorach. So they don't have the Kaddish and the Boruch Hu coming together. The Alter Rebbe here follows Nusach Sefard, which just like Vayishtabach, is Kaddish and then Boruch Hu. So the same thing at Ma'ariv, it's Kaddish and then Boruch Hu. That's the Alter Rebbe's introduction here into the Ashkenazic world, which it wasn't, wasn't followed a-and isn't followed by other Ashkenazic communities. So in order to say Kaddish, you have to have either a Limud or, or a Tefillah. So what is the Limud which justifies the Kaddish? It's this Limud of this piece of Zohar, and it's also a focus on the Pasuk: "V'dai'ir v'razda es Hashem echad v'shmo echad." The whole discussion of the Zohar is the Echad L'maalah and the Echad L'mata. That's the introduction to... That's, that's the Zohar. That's the piece of--

25:46 That's a discussion of a Pasuk. It's Tosha v'Petacha, but that is justifying the saying of the Kaddish and then going straight from the Kaddish into the Borchu. I'm wondering whether that, I'm having to think of it a bit more, whether that is the explanation why the Alter Rebbe has this V'loima Borchu and not in other Nusachot. Think about this. The other Nusachot who don't have to have a Kaddish here, so then they can go finish off the "Hiru d'anpin v'loima Boruch Hashem hamevorach." Done. They can just say, "V'loima Boruch Hashem hamevorach." Whereas according to the Alter Rebbe, where we need to have a Kaddish here. So we start with... We don't say, we don't say, "V'loimar," as the Polish, uh, Nusach does. We have, we have a Kaddish. And then, and then, uh, and then Borchu. I'm just wondering whether the fact the Alter Rebbe therefore had to also introduce when you're davening V'yochid, um, to say this whole passage, whether that's also got to do with the different structure which he has in relation to the Amirah Sa'kaddish. To think about it a bit more. Uh, let's move on. So here's a question. A lady went to Bournemouth and, um, she is not so comfortable to go back on the train. So she called a taxi, a car service to pick her up, to come from London to Bournemouth, to pick her up and then drive her to, from Lon- from Bournemouth back to London. As for those who le- don't know where Bournemouth

27:33 is, it's about two and a half hours drive from London. She-- Part of her kind of, kind of Chezkah was that she, she, she's con-- One of the things she's concerned about Yichud, and as a result, therefore she ordered the car to arrive six o'clock, let's say, uh, something. So it will be daytime during the travel, and in that way she felt there's not a worry of Yichud, car's visible to the outside. The point of the driver arrived an hour, an hour and a half late, and by the time the driver, driver arrives, she feels that they're going to be driving into the night, and so she cancels the drive. So the driver has driven two hours, two and a half hours one way, going back empty-handed the, the return journey. And of course, the, the, the driver is furious and the, uh, the employer of the driver, uh, is insisting on payment. And, uh, here's the question: Is she obliged to pay for this driver, or is she, uh, able to say, "Well, you didn't come on time, and consequently I wasn't able to go with you because of my concerns, and therefore I do not have to pay"? So I looked around and I see that in Piskei Choshen he talks about this, um, that if a worker did not come on time, well, let's say a slightly different variation. He talks later also about taxis. But let's say he didn't come on time, so the employer went and hired a different worker.

29:08 So if someone s- lays off a worker, um, at very short notice, says the Mishnah, "Ein ha'elok..." Says, "Ein ha'elok..." Whatever. Says the Mishnah, you can hire... The, the worker has reason to be upset. That's as much as he can do. But if he, the worker came late and therefore the, the employer had to employ someone else, so you can't even... You have no, no... You ar-aren't even entitled to a wage. What do you want from the employer? How does he know? He doesn't know, uh, whether you're gonna come or, or at all. And therefore, his commitment to you, to you as an employer to employee is V'tor, V'tor. Because coming on time is part of the, part of their contract. And so therefore, by turning up late, so there's a violation of contract. And therefore, you can't have any complaints. If he was already in, already kind of, um, in middle of the work and then for some reason there was a delay, that's a different story. That may be, may be more, uh, more, more, uh, sway in favor of the worker. But what I'm seeing here is that even without the whole Chezkah of Yichud being, et cetera, et cetera, but if you call a, a, a, a driver to arrive at a particular time and he arrives, I don't know what the story was, yeah. I told the-- Actually, I told the woman, um, "I'm not gonna pasken for you. Speak to someone who's more Rabbe Mumche in yoni, uh, in

30:40 yoni Momnus, and you should hear both sides." But then afterwards, I was looking into it, the interesting situation that you see here that, uh, keeping time, uh, especially to such a degree, is, uh, if, if it's with a couple of minutes would be reasonable. But if it's an hour and a half, especially when it was making all the difference for her, for her going home during day or, or night, then she has grounds to have canceled him. And, uh, yes, it's, it's, uh- Sorry for the driver, but, uh, yeah, she's, she, she's in her rights to cancel him. Let's move on. Very, very interesting question. Now, there is a website called chabad.org, and one of the features of chabad.org is you have a section of Halacha times. So you can select any place in the world kind of thing, and they're gonna tell you what time is Alos Hashachar and, uh, Minchat Sot, et cetera. So came up the discussion about a place called Samoa and American Samoa. Then these are two separate islands which are near one another, and the question was about where to-- how to define when is Shabbos. So to explain, we have, we have what's called the international date line. And on, on either side of a national da-- international date line, it's going to be one day. One side's gonna be Mon-Monday, next day, the other side's gonna be Tuesday. Um, so if you look in this map over here, um, so you can see in the green circled

32:22 area. So the dotted line is the international date line, which it-- where it goes between Alaska and, uh, Vladivostok, Bering Straits. It kind of does a bit of a swerve to, uh, to the west, and then to avoid-- to, to include some islands on the American side. Then it goes straight down, and then lower down and parallel to, is it Fiji or somewhere around there, there's a bit of a movement around there of this line. And just around there is the-- are the islands of Samoa. And what's very interesting is that Samoa, as you can see on the map, is not that far from Australia. And these are-- there's the, uh, Samoa and the American Samoa. The American Samoa is a little bit more to the east, and the other Samoa is a little bit to the west. But I, no, I don't know how many miles they are apart. And for many a, years, they would keep their days the same as Australia. So it'd be a few hours before, but it would be the same. When it's Thursday in Australia, it's gonna be Thursday in Samoa also. And about fifteen years ago, American Samoa decided that they're gonna follow, uh, American time. So therefore, whereas in the other Samoa it's gonna be Thursday, in American Samoa, it's gonna be Wednesday because they're connected with America, and they following, um, the timing of America. So here's a question. If someone happens to go, um, someone goes on a-- for a visit to Samoa and

34:11 spending a Shabbos there, and, and do you follow... You know, what do you do about, uh, Shabbos? Do you follow the local Saturday being Shabbos, or, uh, or, or is it a day out, a day out? Obviously a difficult situation. So let's go back to the previous map. So this is at the back of the volume of Piskei Teshuves on the volume, uh, of Shabbos, Chedet Beis, whatever, um, on Siman Shin Daled Bet. So the, the story is that there's a general view that, that the center of the world is Yerushalayim, and therefore it follows that the, the day should be like from, uh, spreading from Yerushalayim ninety degrees ei-either way. That's one opinion. That was the opinion of the Chazon Ish. So he draws the line of, of the date line, l'Halacha, ninety degrees away from Yerushalayim. As you can see on the map, that cuts through a large part of Asia, cuts through Australia. But he took the way-- he took the, well, the, the, the policy decision that if it's the middle of a land mass, so that whole land mass is going to be kind of drawn to the Eretz Yisrael, the one closer to Eretz Yisrael. And therefore, in the land mass of, of, uh, far east of Russia and majority of Australia, they are still drawn to, uh, the timing of Eretz Yisrael. But according to that view, New Zealand would have the times like, like America. Japan would have the times like America. And this came to a

36:02 head during the Second World War, where there were the refugees who were in Kiribi, in Japan, and there was a question, how do they keep Yom Kippur this day or that day? The majority of the Rabbonim Eretz Yisrael Pasken that they should follow local time, whereas the Chazon Ish told them to follow, uh, it should be a day, um, I think a day earlier. I don't remember the detail, but it was, it was a different day, yeah, based upon this Ma'adane Eretz Yisrael. That's, that's the opinion of Chazon Ish. Then we have the other opinion, which is a hundred and eighty degrees from Yerushalayim. Because the, the, uh, the international date line is a hundred and eighty degrees from Greenwich, but Greenwich is about thirty-five degrees away from Yerushalayim. So where, where should you... The, the, the, um, Greenwich has no bearing l'Halacha, and therefore they took the view of a hundred and eighty degrees from Yerushalayim. Now, if you look on the map over here, um, that puts, that puts a-- that makes a problem that Hawaii is actually On the other side of the, that line, instead of Hawaii being connected to America and keeping Shabbos the same time approximately as California, a couple of hours difference, okay. But instead, Hawaii is on the other side, and therefore Shabbos should be, uh, when it's Friday, uh, over there, it should be, it should be Shabbos. It should be I have to observe Shabbos. The point, that's not what's observed in Hawaii, and they

37:42 keep Shabbos when, uh, the same as America. That wasn't the question here. Here was the question, um, more about... And, and also, this also has to be addressed. How, how can you have, um... Why, why is Hawaii not have to keep Shabbos on a different day? So let's take a look. So about seventy years ago, you have a brilliant, um, chacham in Yerushalayim called Rabbi Dovid Shapira, and he comes up with a very novel way of working out the date line, and that is based upon a Midrash, which, um, Sefer Olam or something, which tells us exactly the time on Wednesday, what time of the day it was when Hashem placed the sun in position. And as a result, you can kind of work out from there ninety degrees to the east. That would be, um, well, kind of-- He works out something o-on those lines, and he therefore manages to work out that the date line is a hundred and thirty-five degrees from Yerushalayim. A hundred and thirty-five degrees from Yerushalayim is a hundred and seventy degrees from Greenwich. And happily, that makes all the difference that Hawaii is actually on the east side of the date line, and that Hawaii remains with America. So that is, as far as Hawaii is concerned, so they can fo-according to Rabbi Dovid Shapira, they're doing Shabbos at the right time. There's another chesbon here, and that is that there are those who say that the chesbon of Shabbos should be established by precedent. When the first

39:33 Jewish people came there and kept Shabbos, even depends where-- It could be even over the, the, the over the line. But if there were Yidden who came and, you know, were shomer Shabbos there, that becomes the Shabbos over there. In other words, this is Rav Nachum Karshe, he's taken the view it's not an objective date line mamash, it's go-- it's based upon precedent. So these are two chesbonos to justify how Hawaii is keeping Shabbos the way it is, like it is in, in America. And the, but the problem is going to be here with Samoa, where it's-- there's no kehillah there as such, no precedent as such. And it certainly doesn't feem-seem to be correct to say, "Oh, because fifteen years ago, America, Samoa switched the date line, their, their, their days, therefore Shabbos is affected." So it, it does become quite a tricky pe-- a tricky question. And, um, the, the, the good news about it is that there's very few Jews who need to go to Samoa for, to spend a Shabbos there. Um, it seems to be a nice place, but, uh, it's a bit far. There are plenty, plenty of nice places closer by. Um, but if someone would go there, there may be a chesbon of them keeping two days Shabbos, avoiding doing at least one day keeping Shabbos, one day avoiding melacha d'oraisa. It is a, it is a complicated one. Okay. That's as much as we're gonna deal with that for the moment. Let's move on to the

41:01 next question. So here, someone beginning of the week was asking me about hafrashat challah. So when it comes to hafrashat challah, there's a minimum amount of flour to, uh, be chayav b'challah. The shir is, by the way, it's a gematria of the word challah, which is samech forty-three. And you can see in Shulchan Aruch, samech shin chof daled. Now, the shir is, uh, a volume of forty-three eggs and one-fifth of an egg. This is based upon the Gemara, the volume of forty-three eggs. Now, when teaching in, in, in the, uh, in class, I've asked the talmidim, "Think of how much, how much the vo-- what's the volume of the food which you eat over a day." So imagine, let's say, you have a twenty-four-hour flight, and you have to take with-- of course, you have to take with food. So how much food are you going to have? You're gonna have a few slices of bread, let's say, and, uh, some fruit, whatever. The volume. Will it be the volume of one liter? Will it be the volume of two liters? How much food on average do you go through in a day? You have to... Don't, don't start tapping it. Don't worry. Um, the th-- And, and the thing is, why is this relevant? Because the shir challah is the shir of the man. Every person got a man. It's, "Oi mer'asiras zehu efo," and that's a shir challah, and that's the amount of, of man a person, each person had over a day.

42:43 And that therefore makes me wonder about some very big mechmadrim who talk about five pounds of flour or something. How many people go through that kind of amount of food? I'm talking about not after flour. I'm talking about, let's say, tomatoes and fish. Whatever. Maybe all your foods together. Go through five pounds of food. The, the volume of five pounds of food in a day, I think that's a mute. All right. Meanwhile, we have to translate these forty-three eggs. Volume into meas-, into contemporary measurements. Now, this is for sure that the sheer challah is a sheer in volume. It's not a sheer of weight. But it's easier for us to translate it into weight because it's more manageable to measure weight than to measure volume. So what we have here in the siddur, the Tillos Hashem siddur, the page before Birkat Hamazon has got a list of brachos, Shehakol and Hagafen and da, da, da, all, all the different, Netilat Yadayim, whatever it may be. And it also has a sh- the bracha for Hafrashat Challah. And there it says, "Halosh yiso," one who kneads a dough, "le'erech" approximately "mishkhol sholosh litreis," the weight of three liter of kemach amaim beflour and water, "chaiva firshmeinu chal." So this is what is written in the siddur now. This is not from the Alter Rebbe. This is from the printer in Vilna in the year taf reish ayin alef, and this seems to have been the minhag in Russia. When it came... Actually, I wanna share with

44:24 you, when it came about twenty years ago, when Kol Ha'As published the annotated siddur. It says all the instructions, and I was asked to review those instructions. I was very uncomfortable with this piece. And I'll tell you one glaring problem. What's the mayim got to do with it? The weight has got to do with-- We're talking about flour. Why is it mixing in the water should be also part of the sholosh litreis? But okay, the point that we l-- And this, this, you see it's a little bit kind of controversial, and it was left like rather vague over there. You have a sheer, it doesn't say how much the sheer is. Uh, you get guidance on that. Now, that is... But meanwhile, we have here a sheer of sholosh litreis. Rav Chaim Noah, by contrast, he comes along with a sheer of not, uh... Well, he comes along with a sheer of sixteen sixty-six. One li- one kilo and six six six, uh, grams. How much is sholosh litreis? You'll see in a moment. That's about twelve hundred grams. So we've got a huge discrepancy between minhag, which is least prevalent in Russia, of twelve hundred grams, and Rav Chaim Noah's recommendation of sixteen hundred grams. Now, there's gonna be the view and say, "It's written in Tillos Hashem siddur, published by Kol Ha'As. That m- that must be, that must be good to go." So in taf shin gimel, there's the publication of the Hayom Yom, and I'm sure some of our listeners have

46:03 a luach which was published in English, Young Scholars Calendar or something. Young sch- And, and in that Young Scholars Calendar, which was published in English, as I say, by, by Merkaz LeInyani Achrin. On twenty-fifth of Sivan, it has an entry about the mitzvah of challah. And it says the weight of the flour being at least sixteen hundred grams or three and a half pounds. So whereas in the siddur it said three pounds, three litreis, which is about three pounds, you'll see in a moment. In, uh, this Young Scholars Calendar, calendar published by Kol Ha'As, they're following the sheer of Rav Chaim Noah, which is ar- ar- around sixteen hundred grams. So there's a discrepancy right then. Okay. Uh, so the sheer of three liter. So here is from the Tzemach Tzedek in Yoreh Deah, Siman reish tov gimel, a whole shulchan about various measurements. And he says there that the shi- "Ya'adu ra'ashir challah erech gimel litreis etzlain." What does Rav Chaim Noah do with this? Well, actually, he questions whether this is actually from the Tzemach Tzedek. Although it's published in the volume of Tzemach Tzedek, the style is a little bit unusual. And also in that shulchan, there's a mention of "my Rebbe," and it's unknown who that is referring to. See, there is reason to, uh, doubt whether that shulchan is indeed from the Tzemach Tzedek. Okay. But so therefore, he doesn't see that as binding, that gimel litrei. Now, here is a Sefer, a contemporary Sefer, and that is, um... Well,

47:48 he writes the following. And I... Let's, like, explain a little bit what's going on here. Fifty-seven, you can see on my, my, my, my sums on the side. An egg is fifty-si-seven point six grams or milliliters. Forty-three time, forty-three point two times fifty-seven point six is going to bring you to two four eight eight, which basically is two and a half, two and a half, uh, liter. The thing is that the Rambam says that flour weighs one-third less than the same volume of water. So that's where he gets his... Take two, two and a half kilo, two and a... Yeah, two and a half liter, and take off a third. You take off a third, so you're going to be left with one six six six. So again, starting off with a volume of two and a half liter, but in weight, that two and a half liter, for the Americans don't know, so two and a half liter would weigh two and a half kilo. But that's in water. But two and a half kilo of flour would weigh one-third less, and therefore you've got the sheer of one six six six. That's two-thirds of two thou- two, two and a, two, uh, two five hundred. That's where Rav Chaim Noah gets his sheer based upon the Rambam who says that flour weighs two-thirds, uh, volume per volume as water. But then in the lower down, he comments that, uh, that may be by intense packing the flour in. But bemili harogil, he says,

49:26 actually, uh, the volume of flour will be half the weight of the same volume of water. And therefore, that's the background to the Russian minhag. He says, "Zehu ha-sheer shall Challah Berusia." Yeah. So he's talking about twelve hundred grams. Well, twelve hundred grams, twelve hundr- is approximately half of the two and a half, two, two, um, two and a half kilo, uh, which was the sh- the weight in water, of, of water of the same volume. So that's what he's saying. That's the, where the background of the th- th- the three kunt Russia. And he quotes from the Rosh Hashanah that they would say three liter of flour. Well, that's what you just saw, um, on the, in the siddur,which was printed in Vilna, um, a hundred and ten years ago. A olem no again, three pounds, and the, the Rosh Hashanah and the Torah, we weren't so confident about this. Meanwhile, he tells you that the Russian pound, which is a litro, is four hundred and nine grams, and therefore three times that is one two two eight. So, well, well, yeah, it's about one two thirty. So that's where the lower shir comes from. So bottom line, what do-- how, how do we deal with this? I don't have to say, "Oh, uh, because the siddur mentions sholosh litreis, therefore you can follow that." But at the same time, we've got the, uh, the Hayom Yom in English, which follows Rabbeinu Yonah. Rabbeinu... In Skobers Razash, there is a-- someone's quoting Rabbeinu

51:12 Zalman Shimon who said that when three American pounds, which is a little bit more than three Russian pounds, you can make a bracha. So what's, what's the bottom line? What I did say to the one who asked me this question, the women who have been till now being particular with the shir of one six six six should continue doing so. Uh, when it comes to the public challah bakes, where you want each woman to be able to make a bracha, but she has to be able to g-go home with a shir challah. So then it would go down to the minimum shir of, uh, approximately three, three pounds or t-twelve hundred grams approximately. That would be, if necessary, you can rely on that shir. But, uh, the general Rabbeinu Yonah's shir of one six six six is certainly the more popularly followed shir. And that's... Separately, you've got the shir, the Litvishe world are going Chazon Ish's shir, which is much more, as I said, um, five pounds or something, which is much, much more. Okay. That's, that's a little bit of the discussion of the... But I found interesting to understand where these three shirim are coming from. And it's not because they are disputing the size of a reviis or the size of an egg. It's just the question is, is the flour, uh, uh, two-thirds of the weight of water, or is flour half the weight of water? And that makes all the difference in the, uh, shir. Okay. Someone asked me

52:49 this morning, this is the question number eight, and how are we doing for time? Okay, we've got another couple minutes. Okay. That the Rebbe, I was, I was, uh, as I often do, I, I was d-davening the Amidah. Not out of passion, uh, for davening the Amidah, but out of passion that, uh, things should run on-- reasonably on time, uh, and for the efficiency of the minyanim. Anyway, I davened the Amidah, and someone pointed out that the Rebbe, when it came to Kedusha, when he was part of the congregation, he would lift himself. You know, you lift yourself on your, uh... You lift your heels by Kedusha. The Rebbe would do that. But when he was chazan, he would not do so. And, uh, so this is from-- What you have on the screen is from a volume which was published last year or two years ago called Halichos Menachem, which is, uh, recording the Rebbe's hagahos and adding explanation where possible. And so you have here the, uh, wherever it says about lifting yourself for Kedusha, it says, "When the chazan says kadosh," so then the tzibur kind of say also, and they, and they lift themselves. So possi-- That's then, but then he says, "But in the Alter Rebbe's Shulchan Aruch, it says, 'Ashir sh'omrim kadosh.' It doesn't differentiate between the cha-chazan and the tzibur." My-- I just want to suggest that possibly if you're standing shem ve'esre, you're only lifting your feet, you shouldn't be moving at all. So for the tzibur

54:21 who are not standing shem ve'esre, okay. So they lift themselves, uh, in, in, in-- when, when saying Kedusha. Whereas if you're the chazan, so you're omed lifnei HaMelech, you've got no reason to move anywhere. So possibly the moving up and down is also a re-- um, a question of whether it's appropriate because you're omed lifnei HaMelech. Just a thought which I wanted to share. And then finally, um, the last thing which I have on my list is about going back to, if you remember our whole discussion about the l'chaim and the fellow who had eaten bread and then had l'chaim and forgot about having eaten bread and said, "Al hamichyah." And is he yotzer for his, uh, for his-- by saying Al hamichyah, he yotzer for the, for the, um, bread. And so someone had pointed out to me a diyuk that, that it's all very well, the discussion, if you-- when you said Al hamichyah, you had in mind that bread. But here, he had forgotten about the bread. And in Al hamichyah, it's-- and not only in a bracha rishona, but even a bracha achrona, it, it's relevant the kavana. It's important to have had kavana for which foods you're saying the bracha achrona, which was for me was a big chiddush. And so someone this week was, was not impressed with the way I was so ready to accept that savara. He found it, um, questionable. So I did a little bit more research. And just to rephrase the question, if I

55:50 had some fruit, and I had, had a drink of, uh, orange juice, and I made a bracha achrona on the orange juice, and I forgot to say a bracha achrona on the fruit, not shevas amim. Do I have to now say again boreh nefoshes on the fruit because I-- when I made the boreh nefoshes on the drink, I wasn't thinking about the fruit? So this is addressed in detail by the Ben Ish Chai. The Ben Ish Chai published, uh, four volumes of tshuvos under the name Rav Pe'alim. And what his story was that someone had, had, um... forgot what it was. But someone had, had a drink and had, had rice. And the person was under the impression that the ha-brocha achronah for rice is al ha-michya. And so now he made a bo-boreh nefoshes for the drink, and he was now saying al ha-michya for the rice. And someone notices they're doing the wrong thing. He's thinking, "Should I interrupt him? Should I not interrupt him?" So he goes into a detail. When the person said boreh nefoshes for the drink, he didn't have in mind the rice because he was intending to make a bo-al ha-michya on the rice. You know, in error, but he-- that was, that was-- he didn't have in mind. So he goes to the-- for this, this, this, this question. If you made a brocha achronah and you didn't have in mind a particular food, are you yotzer or not? His end, um, hasrona, you can see it's

57:16 on the screen, um, that you're not yotzer. And it is imperative you have to-- and you had-- So in case of having had a drink and had fruit, and you forgot about one of the two foods, and you're only thinking of the other, and if you made a brocha achronah, you didn't have kavana on the other food, then he says you would have to say brocha achronah again. So the sevarah which this Yingerman was mechadesh indeed has got good grounds in the Ben Ish Chai, and so I'm happy to go along with that. Um, with this, I'm going to finish off for tonight. Wish you all, uh, good night. A good Shabbos. And Shabbos Mevorchim, and Shabbos Chazak. Tzvah doyos, pe'ilos. And mi sheberucha, veshuva Hashem veshibas Tzion. Um, and mi she... Oy, oy, oy. Efen in di oygon. Mayinuk a choylm, mi she efen in di oygon. Iz sidur geulah, amitas, v'hashleimus, Moshiach tziddkeinu. Mamash now. Amen. Amen. Yeah. Shaboyach.