בלק תשפ״ה

00:10 Speaker 1 Evening. Welcome to tonight's Shiur. Thursday, Parshas Balak. So we have some interesting shailas here today. So we'll start off with the first one. What berakhah should be said on ice pops made of grape juice? So predictably, not everyone agrees what the answer is. But so you have here on the top of the screen, you have a, a contemporary work called Shaarei Ha-Berakhah by someone, a Rav Shtitzberg, and he brings that frozen wine, uh, or congealed wine, or if it's been boiled to become, to become like a, a, a mass, a jelly. Some say it doesn't have the din of wine and the berakhah is shehakol. So to go to explore this a little bit more, why does wine have a distinct berakhah? So this you have from in the Alt Rebbe Shulchan Aruch, which is an earlier source is also in Shulchan. Shehayayin hotzi'u hu mikhlal peiros ha'ilon. Wine is taking grapes and upgrading them. In the halakhah perspective, if you take an orange and make it into juice, that's a downgrade. And therefore it goes from ho'etz down to shehakol. But grapes made into wine is a, is actually an improvement. It's an upgrade. And therefore on that basis, wine should have been borei pri ho'etz. But it has a distinct berakhah all for itself. Shehayayin hotzi'u hu mikhlal peiros ha'ilon. It's been upgraded from the general category of fruit of a tree. Mevorakh alav behavi hagafen. Why? Epnei she-hashivuso shemesameakh es halev. Because wine has got a certain quality beyond other fruit and

02:22 Speaker 1 beyond grapes, that it has, I guess, the alcoholic content, which serves to loosen up a person and bring them to a more cheerful state. So that's the mahloh v'yaayin. So once you know that the reason why wine has got a berakhah on its own because of its ability to, to be mesameakh, well, then let's look back at the frozen ice pops, and it doesn't actually fit that bill. So we're past this, the berakhah should be shehakol. Of course, you're gonna say, what about grape juice? So grape juice, though, is in a form of yayin or it hasn't, uh, it was-- its, its, its devel- development has been aborted. Well, okay, that's another discussion. But that's my, my, uh... If there's a svara one way or the other, I'm more inclined to say safek berakhos lehakel. If you say shehakol, for sure you're yoetz. If you say hagafen, I'm not sure if you're yoetz. But meanwhile, as I was looking to this, I was thinking of something else in my mind that the mahloh of wine is that it's used for kiddush, et cetera. And so I'm, I'm, I'm going to show here three different halakhas where we have, um, a, a special quality of wine. So here we've said wine is special, that it has its own, uh, berakhah. This-- The second point which we have here, also quoting from the Alt Rebbe Shulchan Aruch, and that is that when you make a berakhah on wine, you don't need to make a berakhah on any

04:03 Speaker 1 other drink, which is very interesting. You had a-- You, you have here a glass of wine, and you have a glass of apple juice, and you said borei pri hagafen. You do not make a separate berakhah on the apple juice. Why? Because the wine is like the king, yeah. So let's read this inside. Berek al hayayin, ein tzorekh levorekh al shar mashkin divrei hakol. You don't make a berakhah on any other drinks when you have a hagafen in hand. Sheyayin poiter kol min ha-mashkin, that the, the berakhah on the wine covers all liquids, whether during a meal, whether not during a meal. Vefish shehayayin hu ikar mashkeh, hu rosh lekol min ha-mashkin. It's the main drink. Well, I don't know. It's not-- I'm not sure how you, uh, explain that. Vehu rosh lekol min ha-mashkin. It's like the leader. So I've used the word the king. It's so interesting because let's say you had-- You, you, you... Shoyneh. You're having here the apple juice. You didn't say a berakhah. It was hagafen, and you still don't have to make a berakhah on the apple juice. Same thing comes to bentching. You had however much you had of other drinks, and you say the berakhah al hagefen ve'al pri hagefen. You don't say boreh nefotos on the other drinks, which is so interesting. And that's somehow the wine becomes... I see that even, even more than the way that bread covers everything, because everything else is kind of, okay, bread is a gener-- a drink-- can

05:35 Speaker 1 be generally referring to the whole meal. Avad lechem rab. A meal is called lechem. But to say that wine covers all other drinks is a very interesting halakhah. And so here we-- the, the reason here is given the title, rosh lekol min ha-mashkin. I was, I was intrigued. I remember this loshon about wine being, uh, special because it's used, um- It's used for, for other... for, for, um, because it's used for kiddush or for... Et cetera. So that's a, a third halakha. On that... This is what we have in Berachos daf mem alef, amud beis. Going on to daf mem beis, amud alef. 'Dvarim hateonim haba'im machmas hasudah. Einom teonim brachah leipnen ve'achrei.' Foods which come during the meal don't require a separate brachah. 'Avel hem ho'il apas petrosah. Yeho chi yayin nami niftari pas.' When you have wine during your meal, why do you have to make a separate brachah? Why isn't it included in the brachah already read? And for the Gemara, 'Shani yayin degueir brachah le'atsmah.' Wine is distinct because it's called for its own brachah. And Rashi says here, 'Hageir brachah le'atsmah bekamah mekomeh mesuboh mvorchim alav.' Wine is called for and a brachah is said upon it. 'Afil pi shelo ho yaitzrichin ishto yasod,' even though you don't need it. So I'm gonna come back to this again, but I just-- I found this so interesting that there's three dinim of the prominence of wine. At least these three dinim. So we have again, why does wine have its own

07:25 Speaker 1 brachah? So that's because it's mesameach et haleiv, because it gladdens the heart. Why... The second din is why does wine dominate all other drinks? Now, so wine is-- it has its own brachah. Good. Now the fact that it dominates all others, so there we have a second rationale, and that is rosh lechol mini mashkim. It's seen like the king of all drinks. Then we have a third thing. Why during a meal, if you have any other foods during a meal, you made hamotzi, you don't have to make a brachah. Why does wine call for a brachah during a meal? And here we have because yayin is so... It has got a certain prominence. And here the prominence is it's called for its own brachah. It's, it's... Sorry. It's called for even when you're not thirsty. So let's say you're making a chuppah or a kiddush, a havdalah, um, at the end of birkat hamazon. So we'll use a cup of wine, not because we're thirsty, and perhaps not because we want to have the fl- and not because we want to have wine at the moment. But since wine is called for in a certain, say, mitzvahs it's, it's called for, that makes it that it can't be a total subsidiary during the meal. And therefore, it warrants its own brachah, even though you've got hamotzi which is covering everything else. But because of this inyan that wine is called for, even when it's not really, uh, needed be-gaf your, for your appetite, et cetera,

09:06 Speaker 1 that gives it a certain distinction that you'd make a brachah on wine during the meal. So just see how interesting these three separate things. Why wine has its own, uh, brachah, why wine dominates other drinks, and why wine doesn't, um, why wine doesn't, uh, get covered during a meal. And each one has got a, a slightly different rationale. You may find s-similarities, but I found this interesting to point out. Since I'm mentioning this already, that, uh, you don't... You make a brachah on wine during a meal because 'geir brachah le'atsmo.' There's a question which is actually in Kitzur Shulchan Aruch, a discussion: Do you make a brachah on, on bramfin, on, on a, uh, drink of whiskey, uh, liqueur during a meal? That's such a common thing. You come to a bar mitzvah, uh, et cetera, and the baal, baal simcha comes over, "Would you like to say l'chaim?" So is the g- the drink of vodka part of the meal? So this is a bit of a cultural thing. And the way the Alter Rebbe presents it, be-din Eretz, in Russia, having vodka during a meal seems to be a perfectly normal thing, and therefore, you would not need to say a brachah separately on the, on the vodka. But, uh, I believe that in this, this part of the world, it's not such a common thing to have a, a drink of alcohol in middle of a meal. It's a special occasion. They say, "All right, you make a l'chaim." But not as

10:43 Speaker 1 it's a regular thing that you sit down for, uh, dinner, you have alcohol during the, during the, uh, meal. I don't think it's such a common thing. As, as a result, it becomes a sh'elah. So there, it's like you make a separate brachah on the ice cream or separate brachah on, on the fruit. So this, the, the l'chaim which is during a meal is not really part of the meal. It's because of celebration. I understand. But it's, it's, in a way, it's a standalone. Or do you say, "No, it's part of the meal." So that's become-- is esoteric. So Kitzur Shulchan Aruch addresses this, and he s-recommends one, one, one solution, that before you wash and made hamotzi, have a little sip of the, uh, alcohol, and this way you already made, uh, sh'akoli b'dvarim. If, uh... But you didn't have a shiur to make a brachah achronah. Therefore, if it's warranted, so then it's, you, you have a brachah in a, in place. Similar to the idea of having a small amount of charoset, which will then cover for the, uh, food. So for the maror, which is a k- similar question. You know, people don't eat maror because they're hungry. So do you need to make a brachah b'eri, um, b'pri ha'adama on the maror? So we have a little bit of charoset, not enough to make a, a brachah achronah. And then if maror requires a brachah, so then you've got the, the brachah, um, b'pri ha'adama on the charoset which will

12:07 Speaker 1 cover. Call from Yakov Roskit. Let's, um, let's move on. So last Friday, someone asked me a question about wearing a kind of bandage on their ankle. They have some kind of, uh... They're worried about things moving out of place. Mm. Call from Yakov Ruskin. Call from- So the question is, are they allowed to... The, the-- It's not a bandage to-- because of a wound. It's a bandage to hold things together. Sometimes people wear a, a, a, a crepe bandage perhaps to hold things in place rather than to protect a wound. So are you allowed to wear that on Shabbos? That was the question. So I said yes, but... And then I'm looking now more carefully. Let's read this insight. So this is in Siman Shin Alef. The dinim about carrying and wearing clothes, et cetera, the main, main address is Siman Shin Alef. Mutar lehu gitzmartut al ha'retiah. So the retiah is a kind of dressing, and you're allowed to put a shmatah, wrap it around. O gael sh- arba'am sh'elam makom. You can wrap a shmatah around something which is directly on the wound, and you can walk in the street, and y- if necessary, you can undo it in the street and re-re-re'im, secure it again. And we're not worried that you might forget, and you've undone it, you might come c-to carry it home, this shmatah. The reason is because a shmatah is not very, uh, valuable, and so you-you probably thrash if it's... If you don't need it anymore, you just

14:12 Speaker 1 drop it there. Abbad al sa lichrech chut a meshicho, or to wrap a thread, a ribbon on a bandage, that's not allowed. Because this ribbon or this, this kind of thread, they are more choshev. And the worry is that you may come to untie it, and you, uh, and, and you see that you don't need the bandage anymore. You don't need the dressing anymore. So you'll throw away the bandage, and you'll carry home the, uh, the... You'll carry the, the, uh, ribbon in your pocket. So now it's not so poshut to say that a... You're allowed to wear a bandage in the street on Shabbos. 'Cause you see if it's a ban-bandage which is more choshev, which you wouldn't throw away, and I think that may be true. People would possibly... A crepe bandage doesn't get necessarily soiled, so people may use it a second time. Uh, I don't know how much they cost. They may be choshev. Therefore, you might ask, according to this, what's being said here, perhaps you shouldn't be wearing it in the street. Um, but I don't think that is true. I don't think you have to go that way. See, the way it's discussed in Shulchan Aruch here, we've got a dressing, and the dressing is being secured onto the body with either with a shmatah or with a ribbon, and that's where we have the, the two apart things. In our case, there's no, there's no dressing at all. There's just the bandage. The bandage is to keep,

15:51 Speaker 1 as I said, so something shouldn't slip out of place, whatever. Which... But it's, it's not a bandage to secure a dressing. It's a bandage on its own for just... for itself. And therefore, I-um, just to explain a little bit my, my thinking. When you have a dressing, you'll take off the, the, uh, the ribbon, and you'll see the dress... the, the wound is healed. And so you'll throw away the dressing, and you'll put the sh- the, the ribbon in your pocket because it's a, it's a valuable thing. Here, we're not talking about there's no wound. So you, you... Even if you take off the bandage, why would you want to take it off? But even you would take it off, it's not as if there'll be a healing and then, "Oh, well, I don't need it anymore." I don't, I don't see the, the... that kind of development happening. Therefore, this is a chidush, and we don't have to ex-uh, export that chidush to the case which we have at hand, which is, uh, a bandage wrapped around just to keep things in place. And even though it's a reusable bandage, I think it's okay. Okay. I had a little bit of a nahas, uh, message this week, and that is I, as I've told you before, I, I, I do the same shiur, or part of it I do in Hebrew. That's why I do the rehearsals on, on, uh, Wednesday evening. So I have a friend in-- who's lives in Ukraine. I actually

17:23 Speaker 1 got to know him. I was... It's actually just now, it's forty years since I went to Russia the first time, and I got to know this young man. He was, he was, uh, he was, uh, in his twenties or a teenager. We, we got to know one another. He lives in Ukraine today, and he visits small communities or single families. He goes around Ukraine. Well, he's got, he's got, uh, contact with at least a hundred and twenty families. O-o-of them, ninety-five percent of them, if not or more than that, do not have two Jewish parents. And so he's asking... He asked, he sent me a message. Could I please address in the shiur, could he address, um, what should be the attitude of a Jewish boy whose father isn't Jewish? Not... We're talking about if it's a more serious boy. He's asking, what does Torah say? How, how should he look at it, or how should he advise? So this is, this is his question. So as you remember, a couple of weeks ago, we had this whole thing about a non-Jewish father of a Jewish child who wants to be Sandek. And quoting Rav Elyashiv, who says that there is a, there is a, a, a duty of hakoras hatov, of appreciation, of, of, uh, gratitude to the father. And taking, uh, taking that, uh, that cue, that would be m-my advice to this boy. Your father is not, not your... is, is, is, not, not, not Jewish. The halacha, he's not counted as

19:06 Speaker 1 your father. Having said that, he has spent so much effort and time, et cetera, i-in, in your upbringing under normal circumstances. Therefore, there is an inyun of hakoras hatov. What would happen if it was... there's no contact, he's out, he's out of the picture, that's a different story. I don't think we need even ask the question. But if there is a father figure there, a non-Jewish father, uh, especially who is supportive, and Baruch Hashem, in many cases, they are very supportive of their Jewish children. So then there is a duty of hakoras hatov and, and, and respect them and, and be gra-grateful for all they've done for you. So that's the-- that was my general response to that. The challenge in which we have in the other way around is if you have a Jewish father and a non-Jewish wife and children. Here we have to be starting-- to be mekarev. In the ca- the first case, to be mekarev, for us to be m- invite the father to events, there's no harm there. But in the other way around, if there's a Jewish man who's got a non-Jewish family to invite him and his family, well, that's gonna be kind of undermining a lot of our work because we're trying to, uh, support the inyan of maavdil ben Yisroel lo amim. And by here bringing non-Jewish children, and they're gonna be part of, part of a social circle with Jewish children. So in the long term, we've actually caused, uh, possible serious damage. So

20:39 Speaker 1 there you'd have to be mekarev the father, but you wouldn't be able to be mekarev the whole family on a-- certainly not on a regular ba-basis. Be nice to them, reply to them, but to invite the family of a non-Jewish man-- Sorry, a Jewish man, non-Jewish family, to invite them to events is something which I think is not a wise, um, move. Let's move on. So here I had the following. This week, perhaps it happened last week, a shliach had a case of a, a Kohen who had married a divorcee. Where he married, who married them, that's, that's another issue. But lepo'el he's living with a divorcee. This is thirty years ago, let's say. They got married, and they had a son, a Bechor. Now, twenty-five, thirty years later, this son has now gotten married, and he has, uh, a-and his wife gave birth to a Bechor. So if now there's a pidyon haben of what we would say a chalal ben chalal. So does a chalal who is, uh, of Kohen lineage, but he is disqualified from kehunah, does need he, does he need to have a pidyon haben? Number one. What happened at this pidyon haben that-- is that the father, the middle one, yeah, the father of the baby, turns to the Kohen and he says, "I'm giving you the five selaim in case... I'm not sure whether I ever had a pidyon haben. In case I never had a pidyon haben, so have in mind that the money I'm giving you

22:30 Speaker 1 is for both of us, for fa- for, for my ba- my baby boy and for myself." So when I heard this, I, uh, I was, uh, very, um, concerned that if you're meant to be- give five selaim, and you say, "Well, I want two for the price of one," so then possibly neither of them got a pidyon because it's two-and-a-half selah for the father, two-and-a-half selah for the son. Neither have done the mitzvah properly. So that was the dilemma. So let's take a look here in Shulchan Aruch. So the, the dinim of pidyon haben go along together with the matnus kehunah. So near the day at siman shin he. Near the din of Terumah and Maaser. So a Kohen who has a son who is born to him, and the son is a chalal. Now, this is the following: If the father died within thirty days before the b- child was, um, in other words, before the chi-child is thirty days old, then the child, when he matures, will have to do an own-- his own pidyon haben. But if the father died after the chi-- when the child was more than thirty days old, so what happened here? It comes on the thirty-- day thirty-one, the father has a chiyuv of pidyon haben. But you have to-- And relate to this. The, the Kohen who's married to a gerushah, to a divorcee, he is still a Kohen. He, he's lost the privileges of kehunah because he's violated the pr-- the, the, the kedushas kehunah.

24:17 Speaker 1 But as far as in-- As far as I remember, he's not allowed to, let's say, enter, uh, a, a Beis HaKoheles, et cetera. He's still got kedushas kehunah. He's suspended from duchaning because he is in violation. But he-- if he walks away from this gerushah, uh, so he's back to his full kehunah. So here we have this interesting situation. There's a father who essentially is a Kohen. He has a child who needs to have pidyon haben. So very nice. So very good. So he says, "You know, I have pidyon haben. Yafrish ha-pidyon." So in a way-- So then the father can say, "Well, very good. I'll, I'll, I'll put it in my pocket. I don't have to give to another Kohen. I myself am a Kohen." Now, the child who inherited his father can also say, "My father owed pidyon haben five selaim, but he was also entitled to keep that money for himself. Therefore, very good, I'll take from one pocket and put in the other pocket, and I'm, um, I-I-I've done the Pidyon for himse- for myself." So it's interesting situation. So the, the cholol definitely needs to have Pidyon Haben, but the father who's, who is a Kohen doesn't have to fork it out. Um, so now we have here, and this is from the Aruch HaShulchan. Also in Sefer Shin He'e: "The father has a duty to go through the motions of Pidyon Haben. He keeps the money for himself." So now, coming back to our story. Thirty years ago, this

26:05 Speaker 1 Kohen married a Russia, had a baby boy. We don't know whether he did a Pidyon Haben and put it from one pocket into the other. If he didn't, so does this, this boy still need to have a Pidyon Haben? Or do you say, "Who needs the whole, the whole, uh, how'd you say, performance? The Kohen has... The father Kohen has a duty to pay and he's allowed to keep it. So he did... So even-- Who says he has to take it from one pocket into the other? After he's heard, sir, that the Pidyon has been done." And so here we see... So this is on from the Sefer Pidyon Haben. There's no need to start putting aside money and, you know, take it out and put it back again. And in the SkyMap Pidyon meielo. I owe money, I'm entitled to keep the money. So ca-case closed. So assuming that, that even if this was the case, that there was never a Pidyon, um, probably that wasn't the case. But the, the father of this little baby does not need to do a Pidyon Haben for himself because Toisu says his father never had to go through the performance of, of taking money, putting it aside, putting it back in his pocket. And therefore, we can rely on this. So the father does not need to do Pidyon Haben. So when the father at the Pidyon Haben of this little boy gave it to the Kohen and he says, "Well, I'm not sure whether I

27:32 Speaker 1 need to have a Pidyon Haben or not. Therefore, uh, to have in mind both of them. So I'm gonna confirm now. No, you didn't need to be paid for yourself. And therefore, all the money, the five sloin which you gave, is all for the little boy. So the little boy's had a Pidyon, you don't need to have a Pidyon because of what we just discussed, and so everything's falling back into place. Um, bit of a runaround, but yeah. Okay, let's move on. So that was question... Those were questions five and six. And then somehow it's in the air. I-- At the same time this past week, I had a question from a Shaliah, someone in Eastern Europe. And just to explain the setting. In Eastern Europe, there's a, a huge success in Kohelet Hatorah, and that is that they offer local people to come to... They come to Shiurim, and they will... Oh, no, no. They, they, daily or a few times a week, and they'll pay them for coming. They'll keep-- How do they pay them? They'll pay with vouchers. These vouchers, the people can use to buy kosher food. They want... Or they can, they can use them for cash, but they, they can use it for kosher food. And you've got hundreds of people, which I saw myself whilst I was in Ukraine, um, in Haditch a few years ago. I saw a Shaliah come with a, a whole minion of people who inscried through these Kohelet Hatorah. Amazing stuff. That they've,

29:05 Speaker 1 they, they come to learn, and they get paid for coming, but they have the sense to use this money to, to, to kosher, to maybe a mezuzah, whatever it may be. So you have this situation where they are, they are poor people. That's the incentive for them to, to, for the Kohelet Hatorah. Okay. So now, whilst we don't have a mivtza of running around to doing Pidyon Habens, we join a bonim. Um, but it comes to a point where you've, these people know about Pidyon Haben, and the Kohen comes to town, and let's make a, an event of several Kohen, of several of the elderly, these, these people who are, uh, short of, of means, to make a collective Pidyon Haben, one after the other, do a Pidyon Haben. How much is Pidyon Haben today? Anyone, uh, out there suggest how, what, how much you're talking about? Okay. I'm gonna venture something in the region of ninety dollars. For a needy person, that's a lot of money. It's a hundred grams of silver. Now, price of silver keeps on changing, but it's, it goes more up than down. So let's say, so now the question is the Kohen comes along wh-- And he has a special kit of five silver coins. Doesn't need to be silver coins. I remember I was in Yeshiva. There was a, a boy who has a, who was from a non-Jewish father, a Jewish mother, and, uh, he was from Holland. He came to Yeshiva in Brunoy, and we realized

30:44 Speaker 1 that he's a Ko-- He's a Bachur. And Rabbi Hillel Pevzner, um, told him, "Oh, you know what? You have a tape recorder." Because he had an expensive tape recorder, and he gave that to the Kohen, and that was his Pidyon Haben. Afterwards, the Kohen gave it back to him, but he didn't have to. It doesn't have to be coins. It doesn't have to be silver, but, uh, it's nicer. It's, uh... So the Kohen's got this kit of five silver coins, and the question is, can he just give it to these gentlemen and they'll give it back, make a berakhah and give it back? Whatever the nusach is, slightly different to the Pidyon haben for a little child. Or do they have to buy it? And do they have to buy it at full value, or can they just buy it as at, at a nominal, uh, amount? So here again, what I've got here from the Sefer Pidyon Haben, um, Kil Chaso. So he has-- he addresses this story. The Kohen who has these coins, and he's ready to sell them. Whoever wants to be a customer, part-to be part of it with him, he's ready to sell them. Obviously, he'll get them back. So that's okay. So I, I-- as a Kohen, I can sell my coins to the father, et cetera, of a baby, and he'll then give them back for the Pidyon. But then he says, "You should not sell the coins for less than their, their true value." Why not? Because

32:09 Speaker 1 there's a concept called Kohen Hamasaia BeBeis HaGroz. A Kohen is entitled to trumah, and he's allowed to go around to the houses, and the farmers will give him trumah. But imagine if you have a Kohen comes along, you know, he says, "You know, I'll help you with the pitchfork. I'll help you to move stuff around." He comes to the farmer and does him, does lots of favors. And oh, of course, the other, the, the farmer is indebted to him, says, "Oh, here's my trumah." That would be... Well, first of all, uh, it's-- the main, main objection is it's a disgrace for the privilege of Kohanim. Another thing, it's gonna be unfair competition because you're going to be currying favor with the farmers by offering them favors, and that's not the way Ko-Ko-Ko, um, the, that Kohanim should be. It should be given as a privilege of Kohanim. So for a Kohen to be, uh, doing efforts to c- to attract cl- um, clients to give him trumah, that's not... That's seen as inappropriate. So these Seforim are suggesting that the Kohen who's saying, "Oh, I'll offer you five Sela'im for, at a, at a, at a, a reduced rate," it's like he's offering his services to get to attract clients. I feel that's a little bit of a stretch in, in the, in the, uh, this situation. It's-- we're talking about, uh, Yidden, as I say, who are n-not, not able to afford and, and, uh, to say that it's a problem of Bizoyon of

33:48 Speaker 1 Kohanim, I, I, I see it's i-in our situation. I see it a little bit stretched. So on the other hand, um, so all right, so I, I did suggest that he should... that they, they should pay for the Matbe'es, for the Kohen Chamisha Sela'im, according to what they can afford, a reasonable amount. So now let's read, what about just giving it to them, uh, I'm giving you these coins, and you'll give them back to me to do the Mitzvah Pidyon Haben. So that, I think, is what he's addressing in the next, in the next paragraph, in Lambertville. A Kohen who's ready says, "Um, I'll lend you, I'll lend you the ninety dollars. I'll lend you this money, and then you can pay me back." And so then he'll give it back in the form of Pidyon Haben. So some say that's okay. V'yesh oimrim. That's us. Yeah. Because he's, he's gonna give this back in, in Pidyon. That's a Hadar... Nidur Kehadar Avah Bealma. It seems, it seems to be a sham. And I, I, I, I can relate to that. This, these, these fine Poshei Teuidah, they've gone, th-there's party, and there was money going there and back, and they, they, they probably that's will be their, be their impression. Now, they don't realize that they've actually done some kind of transaction. It didn't cost them anything. So I don't think that's appropriate. I think it would be correct. They should give something to buy the coins. Uh, you want to find another way

35:24 Speaker 1 of, of reimbursing them, the, the organizer can do that. But between the, them and the Kohen, they should be giving the Kohen something to buy those coins. So these were the Shailas which I had prepared. And then I had... And I'd already written these up on Wednesday. Then I got another Shaila, another Pidyon Haben Shaila from somewhere here in United Kingdom. When the baby was born on Chesh Tammuz. Chesh Tammuz, if you remember, was on a Friday. So Chesh Tammuz is a Friday. So four Fridays later is day twenty-nine, and then the thirtieth day is Shabbos, which is Chesh Ov, and then the thirty-first day is Tisha B'Av. So what do you do about a Pidyon Haben on a fast day? So the dilemma is that on the one hand, we don't want to delay a Pidyon Haben because there is a Halachah in some Poskim, every day you delay, you Mevatel a Mitzvah min HaTorah. On the other hand, there is an Inyan of having a Pidyon Haben with a Seudah to, to celebrate. On a fast day, you can't do that. So there are those who, you can see here, some say to do the, to do it after nightfall. Some say to do a Pidyon Haben by day and to do the S-Seudah after nightfall, because they want to have the... Because d-delaying the Pidyon to night is you, you've missed the, the, the right time. I mean, celebration is all beautiful, but the main thing is the Pidyon. That should be

37:03 Speaker 1 done on time. And then there are those who kind of find a way, uh- To reconcile, to do the pigeon late, uh, just before evening, just before night, uh, just before Shkiya. And then shortly afterwards, the people are gonna be there. They'll hang around for another t- uh, half an hour, and then there'll be a Sudde. And, uh, so we have had that in the past. It was, I think it was Shevos HaBetamos. Uh, it happens she says, "I'm not gonna get people to come for Sudde at eleven o'clock at night." Okay. Then it turns out that he's, this, this Shliach is asking for a woman who's married to a non-Jewish man. She's, uh... And she's agreed to make the Pidyon HaBen, but, uh, now she, she doesn't have to do a Pidyon HaBen. It's not her, her duty. In the case where there's no father, no Jewish father, who has a Chiyuv to do the Pidyon HaBen. So there's a way of saying that it's a Chiyuv on the Beis Din. But although when it comes to the father, we'll do, uh, we'll do whatever we can to do the Pidyon HaBen on time. Does it make sense that the same rigidity would apply to Beis Din? Or could you say Beis Din can do it when they get round to it? I don't have a clear, uh, clear Svara one way or the other. I felt it's a little bit, it is a little bit flexible. And therefore, he said, "If I do

38:26 Speaker 1 it on Monday, I'll be able to get a few more people to be around, and there will be a, make it a shtickel event out of it." So I felt that was, that was okay. And because it's not his personal Chiyuv, and therefore I didn't see that he has to do it ma'ales on time. He's, he's in violation if he doesn't do it on time. I didn't see that as, as strong. Right. Let's move on. So totally different type of question. Someone's asking, "Why if I have fillings am I allowed to have hot Fleishig food, meaty food, and hot, uh, milk, milky food? Is it not a problem that the fillings which are made of metal or whatever material, is it not a worry that they will be absorbing? It's like using the same cutlery for meat and for milk, for hot meat and for hot milk." So this question goes back already. You can see on the screen. This is from the Sefer Nishmas Avrohom, which is, uh, a contemporary, Dr. Avrohom, Sefer Avrohom, Talmid of Reb Shlomo Zalman and of Rav Neuwirth. He's a doctor in Yerushalayim. Uh, probably by now he's probably retired, but, uh, excellent series of Seforim. And so he quotes both of them extensively. So he first, he quotes the Kav HaChaim, who lived about, uh, let me say eighty, ninety years ago, perhaps more. Uh, so the Kav HaChaim writes the following, "Don't worry about using the same dentures for Fleishig and Milchig because the dentures are for

40:03 Speaker 1 sure made from hard material, smooth surface, which doesn't absorb. They're similar to glass," number one. That the material is hard and non-absorbent. Second point, he says, "The food is generally Fleishig. And Fleishig is not, according to many opinions, is not, does not Breleh. Third thing, uh, and then third thing he says, "Ein HaYad Soledes Bah. The food is not so hot that you would re- um, recoil if you touched it." And then he says, "I would recommend that your Shomayim should have two sets of dentures, one for Milchigs and one for Fleishigs." So this is about dentures. Then the further discussion, and then we've got Reb Shlomo Zalman. Reb Shlomo Zalman says that actually it's quite common to have food which is Yad Soledes. I mean, I have a cup of tea. I can't put my finger in the tea. It's too hot for m- for my finger to stay there, but I'm happy to drink it. Soup, same thing. Yeah. So it's common to have Yad Soledes food. Perhaps solids is less than, than, than, than liquids. But it's not, not, uh, far-fetched that you'll have food which is Yad Soledes. But then he says, actually, he's looking b- back at the dentures. He says, "Sometimes there may be silver or gold in the structure of a denture, and that's not glass." And then he says, "What about people who have got gold crowns on their teeth?" And then you say Fleishig, but sometimes you're eating a, a mass. There's a concept called Gush.

41:48 Speaker 1 A Dvar Gush, a mass rather than a liquid, retains the heat of Fleishig even when it's taken out of the Fleishig. Comes along Reb Shlomo Zalman has a very interesting explanation. Ikar HaTa'am, why we're not worried. And I'm, I'm using this for dentures and for, for, uh, fillings. Mipnei SheHaChayyim HaTivi B'Toch HaPe. Because there's a natural heat, natural warmth within the mouth, and that spoils the, the residue of taste. So when you eat food, there's a residue of taste which is left on the teeth, between the teeth, et cetera. But the warmth in the mouth will cause that to go off. And therefore, withi- within a short time, it's comparable to food, to, to te-- dishes which were last used for food twenty-four hours ago, where we say that the taste in the dishes has gone off. And although Chachomim did institute that we ca- avoid eating meat and milk, uh, within a certain amount of time of one another. But they did-- never worried about the taste which is absorbed inside the dentures or et cetera. So I found that a very interesting explanation, so I'm sharing that with you. Right. Um, there is a story of the Rebbe Rashab with the Erloyer Rov. The Rebbe Rashab was once in some kind of a, um, spa for his health, and the, there's the Erloyer Rov, who came from Erloyer, I guess it's somewhere in Hungary, that kind of region. And the Rebbetsin... This story was told by the Erloyer Rov to Reb Tzvi Grunwald.

43:42 Speaker 1 Reb Tzvi Grunwald lived in... In my time, he lived in Kfar Chabad. He was a, he was a Yerushalimer, probably also Hungarian origin, I don't know, but, uh, very Chassidishe Yid. Anyway, and he was working for some time in the Erloyer Moistes in Yerushalayim, and the Erloyer Rov told him this story. So he had been with the Rebbe Rashab at this spa, and the Rebbetsin saw how the Rebbe Rashab, her husband, is getting along very well with this Erloyer Rov. And so she asked him if she could speak to him privately, and she says, "My husband suffers terribly with his teeth, but he refuses to have, to have proper treatment." Worried, fleishig, milchig, I don't know. "I see that you've developed a good relationship with him, with my husband. Please try to explain to him or influence him that he should, uh, agree to have medical treatment." So he says, "Um, good. I'll try." He's not so comfortable, but... So before he leaves, the Erloyer Rov was leaving town. He went to bid gezegenzacht, to say l'chaim u'lsholom, to bid farewell to the Rebbe Rashab, and he brought this up. And he said, um, "I know that you're... The Rebbe might be worried about different tastes combining." He says, "It's a worry of a worry, a very remote worry." That was what he said to the Rebbe. "" So the Rebbe says to him, "Sometimes you have a shail, a shail on a chicken, whatever it be, and it's a one-off psak, and

45:28 Speaker 1 you pasken it's kosher or no. Gang of eight. But here you're saying I should have something in my, in, in, in my te- in my mouth, and every single day I will be living with a . I'll be living with this remote concern, but it's gonna be a day-in, day-out thing. That's too... I can't, I can't handle that." And so he said, uh, "Thank you, but no thank you." And so that's the story. So the Rebbe Rashab had this. Uh, I had the Rosh Yeshiva, Reb Gedalia Goldberg, who had special teeth, special dentures for Pesach. And he, I remember, it would cost him a lot of money. But then he, when he was our maggid shiur, he had had them for about ten years, and he explained to us how the mouth of a person changes over time. And so the same dentures, if you're wearing them day in, day out, so the den- dentures will also modify to the, uh, shape of the mouth as it, as it changes. But if you only use them o-o-one week a year, so the mouth changes, and the dentures stay where they are. And so after all this time, he could not wear those den- dentures. They were just, uh, very, very painful. And so he had to find a different way of coping with having his matzah, uh, on Pesach and without having teeth and without having dentures. Okay, separate story. Let's now move on. We have here a question which actually came to me today.

46:58 Speaker 1 Um, you can see on the bit... on the, uh, screen, a nice fancy oven. So this is a commercial oven. You can see all those trays. And it's owned by Moises. Got goyische workers, and the mashgiach will come in first thing in the morning, and he'll switch it on. This oven, apparently, when you open it up, so the oven switches off. When you close it, that's when it switches on again. So now, does the mashgiach have to keep on running into the o- the kitchen every time when they open and close the oven to switch it on, uh, again? Or the fact that he switched it on in the morning is enough? So I'm, I'll tell you what I said, and I'll... then I'll explain. I said that if, assuming that between one use and the next, between opening and closing, it stayed warm or hot, then you, you then it's, it's, uh, you can rely on the fact that it was switched on in the morning. If it cooled off in between, then that's a different story. So let's read this inside. We have here in the Siman Kuf Yod Beis, Yoreh Deah. If you have, he says, the Mechaber says, "If you baked in an oven, um, with a goy, a goy's, a goy's oven, but you put... threw in a piece of wood once, um, twice. The third time you didn't throw in a piece of wood, it's, uh, it's kmuta." Then the Ramah adds, "Uh, if you had put in

48:34 Speaker 1 some wood into the oven to make it k- kosher for a Bishul Yisrael or Pas Yisrael, and the oven then was not left twenty-four hours without heating, even if it goes over several days, that's kmuta because it started off, it... because it was made kosher the first time, even though it wasn't used in between, uh, but for less than twenty-four hours because it remains warm." So, so this is what I'm... the basis what I'm saying here, that since the oven remains warm, although it, it's opened for a little while, but between one use and the next, it's, it remains warm, then the fact that he switched it on in the morning is enough. I'd just like to add that if you read in the Acharonim, they'll say that this Ramah is only kind of, I'd like to say the following, that in the case of the Ramah, you had today, today is Thursday, and they use the oven. And tomorrow, Friday, within twenty-four hours, the goy puts in fresh wood in the oven. But it's a little bit warm from yesterday, and he says it's still kosher. The w- the, the, the heating of the wood tomorrow has got nothing to do with today. Little bit of the residue of warmth. Here, what's happening is you open the oven, the goy opens the oven and closes it. Why is it going on? Yeah, it's going on because he had switched on the oven in the morning. I know that technically it was switched off, and

50:07 Speaker 1 therefore the goy switched it on. But this, when the goy closes the door, it's switching on thanks to the action of the mashgiach in the morning.So I see this as even, uh, lechatchila rather than the justabidia. Um, we have now a f- couple of minutes, and so I want to address something which a couple of people have asked me recently, and that's about the Inyan of, of, um, Tish- Tisha Kabi. So where there's no mikveh available, I'm talking about for a man, uh, he wants to, uh, to los esra, et cetera, and there's no mikveh, no men's mikveh available, so there is an alternative called Tisha Kabi. How much is Tisha Kabi? By pouring Tisha Kabi over the body. So, Tisha Kabi, you can see on the lower level, is, is approximately twelve and a half liters. In the Sefer from Rav Taluskin, Rav Nissan Taluskin, Toras Mayim, he says that, that, that amount, if an hou- a shower is running for three, four minutes, you'll have already, uh, the, the shir of, of Tisha Kabi. Personally, I, I worked out the shir of this. So I went to my shower, took a bucket. I wanted to see how long it will take to fill up that amount of water, and it took me about one and a half minutes. So the Toras Mayim was written about seventy years ago, and I, I suspect that the showers have become m- that much more efficient. So in one and a half minutes, you get your

51:42 Speaker 1 Tisha Kabi. Does a shower count for, for the, uh, Inyan of Tisha Kabi? Is not unanimous. There is a letter of the Rebbe where he says that there is a... He mentions Toras Mayim. And then there's another of his mentions, uh, Mishne Halachas, Mishne from Rav, uh, uh, Menashe HaKohen, Rav Klein on Boropark, and he doesn't see the shower as fulfilling the Inyan of Tish- of Tisha Kabi. And the Rebbe mentions both of them in a letter. He doesn't decide one way or the other, but I believe that's the general meaning. People rely on the, a shower. The problem would be on Shabbos, where you... it's not practical to use a cold shower, uh, if a person doesn't love, um, torturing themselves with freezing cold water. So then they want to do a Tisha Kabi perhaps in a more traditional way of using a bucket of, of water. And I said to them, you can add to the bucket of water, you can add a mug of hot water from the urn. A little bit of hot water into a large body of, of cold water, there's no kshila or pishul. If any- if anything, it'll take away the, it'll take away the chill. So now let's read this. This is from the Alter Rebbe Shuchan Aruch in Siman tof reish vad. I'm going through this because, as I say, there are people it's negeh to them, um, so I just want to go through this in a mesoratic way. So a person who cannot

53:10 Speaker 1 handle, for whatever reason, the, the mikveh is not available. But then there's a second best is the Tisha Kabi. And you can use up to three containers for Tisha Kabi. So assuming that it's twelve liters, so you could prepare a couple of bowls, each one... or three bowls, each one with just over four liters. And it sh- it cannot be in more than that. But it can be up to three containers of water. Ze achar ze. They can be in sequence. One can do one and then the other. U'vein kulam, and as long as between the three there is Tisha Kabi, that's okay for the purification of Tisha Kabi. This, it gets a little bit more complicated because like a tevilah, it has to be in one go. So here it has to be an uninterrupted sequence. And so, "Velv havi yaschil hasheni achshav lepos hakadishin." You'd have to begin pouring the second bowl or the second bucket before the first bucket has stopped pouring. And so too, the third one has to begin pouring before the second one is finished. Um, so it's... I can see this being quite an awkward thing to manage, especially if it's all on your own. But that's what we have here. This, these are the opt-- This is, this is an option of using Tisha Kabi. Um, as I said, we can prepare three buckets, each one with just over four liters, and then pour them, and, and you, you can use hot water to take away the

54:45 Speaker 1 chill. Um, and then, "Umefila umemarik..." Eh, then he goes into the chumrah. Even if you're using a single bucket, also it should be poured without interruption, um, then he goes into further detail. What-- That's, that's the end of what I have to share with you today. Just I want, like to share with you one, one feedback. We had a whole discussion last week about Shabbos Kodshecha, um, and Shabboses Kodshecha, and how the word Kodesh is an adjective describing the Shabbos, not the Shabbos of the holiness. So one of our listeners who listened on a recording sent me a fascinating article about this whole idea of indikduk of smichus and, uh, if anyone wants, I'm, I'm happy to forward the article. He wrote to me that, "If you read this article, you'll become wiser." And I wrote back to him, "Yes, the tachlis of the, of chacham is to realize that there's much more that you don't know." So I, I read the article, and I realized there's much more of that dikduk that I don't know. But, uh, I'm happy to share it with anyone who's got, uh, an interest in it. Um, which... But it, it did corroborate very much the, what I'd, uh, written. Um, he gave an example there of Beis Din HaTzedek, another, another where, uh... All right. Uh, okay. Whatever. Um, that's enough for now. And I'm just gonna wish you a Good Shabbos and Good Night. And, uh, should hear Besuras Tovos. And, uh... What's here on the chat?

56:22 Speaker 1 Anything? Something new. Message to everyone. That's it. How is it different to Al HaMinim? Sorry, that's me a long time ago. Okay, we'll stop here.

56:34 Speaker 2 Good Shabbos.

56:36 Speaker 3 Good Shabbos.

56:38 Speaker 1 And, uh, good-