חוקת–בלק תשפ״ו

00:02 Speaker 1 Good evening, and welcome to tonight's Shiur. I'm trying to project my voice a bit better because of the air condition in the background. If it's a problem, so please alert me. Thank you. So Parashat Chukas-Balak. And I'm gonna say the first question is actually my own question. Having traveled and then trying to recover, you feel a few days after travel that you've traveled, especially, uh, a lot of different time zones. So there is a Halakha that, that you're... For the f- three days after you've traveled, you, you're patur from davening. I know we don't follow that. There is such a Halakha in Ra-- It's brought in Rambam also. On the ma-- On the s-- On the sefer, on the screen, you can see here, Gemara in Eruvin, uh, mem samech hei. , because the Rashi says from the , from the effort of the j-journey, you won't be able to concentrate. Now, nowadays, we're not so into... No, we don't concentrate so well anyway, so therefore we don't take liberty of this. But meanwhile, I'm sure some of you will agree that after a long journey, it takes you a couple of days to recover. So now when it comes to Birkat Hagomel, it says that you should only say Birkat Hagomel when you recover totally from your con-- uh, what, what, what you went through. And you have here the Lashon from the Alter Rebbe, "Ein levorach sheyetze " , therefore a person who had a medic-a medical experience, uh, well, it takes time

01:57 Speaker 1 till you are really back, back to yourself. But then if that's the case, why is there an emphasis to say Birkat Hagomel within three days when actually within three days you're still, uh, within the trauma of your journey? The Chareidi should dafka wait after three days, and then once you've recovered from the trauma of your journey, that's . And yet that's not the case. So I thought there was like a totally random shidduch over here. But actually, look, surprise, surprise. Let's go now to the Beit Yosef in Siman reish yod tes where the Tur had said that if you didn't say Birkat Hagomel on time, you can make up for it later. However, the Orach Chayim quotes the Ramban that you have only three days to say Birkat Hagomel. And says the Beit Yosef, or perhaps the Orach Chayim, I'm not sure, The reason for where does the three days come from, it says in Eruvin that if you travel, which means that until three days, you're still called bomi hadelech. So that's actually the whole three-day business is actually coming from the Halakha in, uh, about bomi hadelech al yaspal. So it's very interesting. So it seem-- What he seems to be saying is until the e-- until three days are over, you're still in the trauma of your journey, and that's why you should say Birkat Hagomel whilst you're still kind of, uh, in the trauma of your journey. So that I don't have an answer. How does that fit with the guidance

03:49 Speaker 1 of ? It seems to the other-- the opposite to say dafka whilst you're still feeling a little bit groggy from your journey. Okay. That's the first observation. The second observation is... Now, take a look how the Alter Rebbe presents this. He says, "Don't say Birkat Hagomel until you recovered from your j-- u-until you recovered mehasakona. And if you delayed, you've got... It's open, open-ended. Not to delay three days. Now, he doesn't talk about a journey here. You were in a-- some kind of j-- danger, and you were relieved from that danger on a Monday, and it was after Krias Hatorah. Then you should say Birkat Hagomel before Sorah without a Sefer Torah and don't wait till Thursday. So he words it yotzam mehasakona. Now let's go, go through this carefully. The Shulchan Aruch, if you have one pointed to in Siman reish tes says, . He says idea of three days. It doesn't differen-- It doesn't go into detail. From hasakona, from a journey, it doesn't go into detail. The Magen Avraham writes, , he means-- The Chareidi means you arrive back from a journey. So why yotzo? So it was... He's saying yotzo mehasakona. So if you were... That's where the Alter Rebbe gets his wording from. The-- It's, it's, uh, you... It, it was within three day. You should say Birkat Hagomel within three days of yotzo mehasakona. But where did it come from? It comes from the Knesses Hagedolah. So let's now go to the Knesses Hagedolah. In other words, this detail.

06:00 Speaker 1 The Shulchan Aruch says to say Birkat Hagomel within three days. This emphasis that if you have Um, if you came out to your, your, uh, you kind of re- out of your situation, your problem situation on a Monday, don't wait till Thursday. So that comes from the Knesses HaGedolah. Yeah. So the three days is mentioned in Orach Chayim, e-et cetera. But this detail, if it's on... If it's one day, M-Monday, don't wait till Krias HaTorah on Thursday, is from Knesses HaGedolah. Now let's read it over here. "Va'ni noheg k'she'ani bo min ha'derech o yom sheini." So when I'm, I'm traveling and I arrived at my destination on Monday, and there's not gonna be a Krias HaTorah until when? Till Thursday. And by then it'll be three days. Then I do Bircas HaGomel with three, uh, within three days without waiting, uh, until yom, Yom Chamish. So what I'm seeing here is very, very strange. First of all, since the idea of Shelishi Yom is based upon derech, the trauma of, of, of journey, so who says that the concept of three days applies by other forms of relief, of chole, yeshurim, whatever. What's three days got to do with it? There's... Clearly, if the basis o- is this Gemara of Al Yispa Bo Min HaDerech Shelishi Yom, that's where it's coming from. So then it should be limited to bo min ha'derech. And yet, the Magen Avraham and the Alter Rebbe, they presented yotzer min ha'sakanah, number one. And number two, the Magen Avraham is

07:43 Speaker 1 based upon the, the, uh, Knesses HaGedolah. And there is clearly this business of three days and not to wait till the Thursday. If it's, if you became safe on Monday, you're clearly talking to Afka about bo min ha'derech, and the Magen Avraham changes it to yotzer min, yotzer, yotzer min ha'sakanah, and that's why the Alter Rebbe quotes it. All I can say, I mean, I'm, I'm... I don't have an answer. I once heard from, um... I think I, I, I heard this from Reb Shalom Edelman, alav ha-shalom. The Alter Rebbe is said to have said in his later years that he has charata, he regrets having given un-um, so much, uh, un- so much reliance on the Magen Avraham. That's a well-known thing. But I heard from Rabbi Edelman that what he meant was, in this, that the Magen Avraham often quotes from o-other Sefarim, and the quote is not necessarily a full quote. And if you look up in the quote, in this source, you'll see things different. And the Magen Avr-- The Alter Rebbe relied on the quotes of the Knesses HaGedolah in the Magen Avraham, which are very, very many, and without having access to the actual Knesses HaGedolah. Later, if you see the actual Knesses HaGedolah, you'll see him. It's not Afka the same. But meanwhile, I'm gonna leave this with a question. So, um, two points have come up over here. Number one, that it's very interesting that the Cheshbon of three days has got to do with that you're

09:17 Speaker 1 still feeling that you're bo min ha'derech. That's why it should be within three days. And then the second point, which I'm also left with a question, is that the three days seems to be limited to, in Seforim, only to bo min ha'derech, and yet it's, uh, applied to all, all forms of, of relief from trauma. Okay. Next question I do not have a, a slide for, and that is someone designs websites, and I guess they do a good job. And a church wanted to... Or it's a group of churches, they wanted to create a website which will be used for promoting their ideology, but also for fundraising, et cetera. And so now the question is, is our-- He's asking, "Am I allowed to take on the job, which is a well-paid job?" Can you take on that project? Of course, the, the hesitation is that you are facilitating a spread of an ideology which we don't identify with at all. It's in Ved, Ved Isare. So by, uh, taking the job, you're, you're ad- you're, you're, uh, supporting something. Now, so there's something similar in Igros Moish, and that's talking about having a, a, an ar- an architect, whether a Jewish architect could draw up plans for a church. So the, the rule is the following. There is an expression in English, aiding and abetting. Assi-assisting someone to do something against Torah. Now, we have in Halakha two levels. One is when they could not have done it without you, and one is when they

11:12 Speaker 1 could have done it without you. The classic example in the Gemara is there's a Nozir on one side of the river, and there's a glass of wine on the other side of the river, and you are, I guess, uh, when, uh, you're paddling in the middle of the river. And the Nozir asks you, "Can you pass the glass of wine?" So he could not... The term is trei ivri de'nadar, two sides of the river. He can't reach it himself. So when you pass the glass of wine to the Nozir, which is he's not allowed to drink, you are facilitating something which he could not manage without you. That kind of facilitating is defined as lifnei iver leshiten michshol. You are creating a stumbling block for the blind. The person doesn't realize the severity of the issue. Okay. That's also min haTorah. Then you have, it's not trei ivri de'nadar. He could reach over to the glass of wine himself, but it's just to make his life easier. He says, "Could you pass it to me?" And that can be applied. The, the, the, uh, resources for his wrongdoing can be gotten elsewhere. But he, he-- you, you are providing him those resources. Now, you're not over of Lifnei Iveir because h-he's-- he can manage on his own. But there's a lesser of a level, and that's called Mesayeh Abideh Lifnei Iveir. Assisting, facilitate, helping, um... I don't know exactly what the term in English. Aiding and abetting. But if it-- if the, uh, Aveira could

12:43 Speaker 1 be done without you and you are helping them, that's Issur Derabon. The general pr-principle is, general psak is that Issur Mesayeh, the lesser form of fa-facilitating, is not also not-- it does not apply to Goyim. To Goyim, there's Issur of Lifnei Iveir. There's no Issur of Mesayeh. So on that basis, Moshe says that the architect would be allowed to design this church, et cetera. And actually, it's even in Gemara, in, in Aveh D'Zarah, it talks about building with them just when it comes to the one particular part, just to say, "This, this part I can't build." So overall, it is permitted La'aloch. At the same time, it's certain-certainly something which should be discouraged. It's not a, a nice... It's not a p-- Uh, it's not-- You don't get, um, you know... It's, it's not a-- something to be encouraged. Yeah. Thank you, Gershon, for the, um, term accessory. Thank you. Okay. So that would be the same thing here with the website. You can't say it's asur for him to build the website, but it is a Dvar Megune. It's something which, um, we should discourage not being a Keili for Bracha. Okay. Now, this third question, I'm not gonna give you a clear answer, but here was the quest. There's some unmarried girls at a wedding. There's a bottle of wine at the table. And they want to have a little bit of wine. Is there any guidance to say yes or no? So I did search, and I didn't find anything clear, but

14:27 Speaker 1 I'm gonna share with you what I did find clear. So this is in the Magen Avraham and then later in Mishnah Berurah in Siman Kuf Ayin. Siman Kuf Ayin of, uh, of Arachaim is Hilchas Derach Eretz Visudah. So here, the Magen Avraham quotes Shulchan Aruch. Issur, a woman, a m-- a wife whose husband n-- is not with her, Ein Lo Lishtot Yayin. She should not be imbibing wine. Ach Sanoy, if she's a guest in someone else's house, even if husband is with her, also. V'im Hi Regila Lishtot Yayin Bifnei Ba'alah. But if she is used to drinking wine in the presence of her husband, Moteres Lishtot Sme'at Shelo Bifnei Ba'alah. She's allowed to drink a little bit, not in the presence of her husband. So there's obviously some concern here. And, uh, needless to emphasize that if, if, if a person l-- is, is drunk, a Dvar Megune. For a woman and for a girl to be so is, is, um, uh, you know, totally unsneezed to the extreme. So here's a question, though, a little bit of wine. And so it's... Here, it's talking about a married woman. And you could argue a married woman is perhaps more Chomer, and therefore, Ein Lo Lishtot Yayin without, without her husband being present. Or the other way you can say, "No, well, there at least she has some kind of, uh, awareness she shouldn't go. Uh, she has a husband. A girl who doesn't have a husband is even more of a concern." Of course, we--

16:16 Speaker 1 By Kiddush, we give out and we have a little bit of wine. Talking about having, I guess, a little more. Otherwise, they wouldn't ask the question. Yeah. So it's, it's... I don't have a clear answer to that. What I could say is, is I, I share this sheer on, um, last night. And there is a Gemara in Sotah, that when the Sotah was brought to the Beis Hamikdash to go through the motions of, uh, drinking the water, et cetera, and they would say, "Biti Harbeh Yayin Oseh. Harbeh Chaverim Rom Osim." One of the causes for slipping, uh, g-going a slippery slo-slope is alcohol. And therefore, yes, it, it is a, a concern. Uh, Magen Avraham finishes off, certainly the same applies to other f- other forms of alcohol. He refers us to... On the other hand, he refers us to Aveynu Ezer. It talks about how much is the, uh, how much a husband would provide for his wi- his wife. And it talks about how much bread and, uh, um, bits to go with it. And Shemen, oil for eating and oil for, uh, lighting. Ume'at Yayin Lishtot. Im Ho Yah Min HaGamur SheYeshtu Yayin HaNoshim Yahim. If it was common that people, women would drink wine, so to provide a, um, me'at, um, me'at yayin. So that's just the cross-reference. Then if she's, uh, breastfeeding, Nos-Nosten Lo Yayin. Somehow it helps boost her milk prod-- uh, production. So coming back, I did not find a clear guidance about, uh, unmarried women. And certainly,

17:58 Speaker 1 having a lot of wine is something to be, uh, discouraged. Little bit of wine, I don't have grounds to say no. Let's move on. So now we have a question. There's a particular Chabad house- Where one of their sponsors wants to make a birthday party on Shabbos afternoon. This Chabad House is within an eruv, and the sponsor, by the way, said whatever he spends on the party, he will also give-- he'll match as a donation to the Chabad House. So they want to accommodate. Um, perhaps the more he spends on the party, the more he'll give to Chabad House. So he wants to give out a souvenir. That each child should, uh, have a take-home gift and not food. It should be something which will endure and, um... So now they're asking, is there a way they could give gifts, a take-home gift to the children at this party? So we do have Halakha in Shulchan Aruch about not giving gifts on Shabbos because of the problem of mekan chometz, of kinyan, of acquiring. And this you have from Siman shin vav. That those who are accustomed to give g- a kalim to-- as a gift to a chosan, gave a good drasha. To give on Shabbos, to give a gift, again, probably with an eruv. Lo yofa heim oysim. That's not, not right. Interesting, he doesn't use a stronger language, that it's asur. Lo yofa heim oysim. I saw as I was researching that although the Magen Avraham objects to this, there are poskim

19:40 Speaker 1 who are, um, a bit lenient on this, so perhaps that's why it's a milder expression. Lo yofa heim oysim. That it's not appropriate to give gifts on Shabbos or Yom Tov other than food. So we have the classic situation where a Bar Mitzvah boy is gonna be presented in a synagogue, and he's been presented a siddur or a beggar, an inscribed, et cetera. And this, the way around it is that before Shabbos that one, the rabbi or the shul president, whoever, gives the intended gift to another person to-- who makes a kinyan, lifts it to be koinen on behalf of the, uh, Bar Mitzvah boy. In this way, it's already-- it belongs to the Bar Mitzvah boy before Shabbos. And then you, you present it on Shabbos, but it was theirs already. So I suggested this, that they get these toys, and if they can, personalize the toys for the names of the kids who are gonna be participating. And then on Erev Shabbos, someone will give to someone else who's not husband and wife, give to someone else, a secretary, whoever, to be lift up each of these gifts on behalf of each of the children to part-- who will participate in the party on a Shabbos. So this way, there's no problem of giving a matana on Shabbos. It's theirs before Shabbos. After I said that, and that's the benefit of giving a shiur or this, this, this shiur, I had a reason to reflect on this. But perhaps i-if, if the idea

21:18 Speaker 1 of the person picking it up is a form of shlichus. Well, child is not capable of making a shliach. Therefore, what's the point of the secretary pi-pi-picking up these toys on behalf of all of those little kids? The four-year-old can't make him a shliach anyways. So that's where I was, um, questioning myself. So I, I did look up. There is the term of zochein le'adam shelo befono. You can be zocheit. You can acquire a merit for someone, even if they didn't, uh, ask you to do so. So here, this is off of Gemara Kidushin. On the left of the screen is from the Gemara Kidushin daf mem beis. And that Gemara discusses the concept of shlichus. Where do we know-- From where do we learn in Torah that shlichus works? That you can delegate, and someone else doesn't act, and it counts as if you did it. So, as we know, we have learned it from Terumah, and then kein torimu gam atem, um, the Rabbi Shlachchem, or from Korban Pesach. Uh, where it says, "Every... ," so there are various, uh, uh, sources where we see the concept of shlichus. Asked the Gemara, "Ve'lehodi amar Rav Gidel." Rav Gidel of Rav says, "From where do we know that shlach shalom kemoisi?" Well, in Sefer Bamidbar, when it comes to the casting lots for the distribution of Eretz Israel for the various tribes, and it says, "Ve'nosi echad. Ve'nosi echad lashovet." They, they would, they would each, uh, each Nosi of each tribe, mimata, will

23:03 Speaker 1 pick up a piece of paper which will have the pl- the, the plan of the area of the part of Eretz Israel. And this way, this area of Eretz Israel will belong to that t- that tribe. Tei puklei shlichus mehocho. Well then, perhaps we can say, "Ah, see?" Say Rav Gidel says, "The fact that the Nosi is doing a kinyan on behalf of the-- his tribe. So you see that shlach shalom kemoisi." To which the Gemara rejects. V'tizmeru. How could you say such a thing? Dehol shlich-dehol shlichuso. You could think that this is called shlichus. V'hoktanim lav ni shlichus ninhu. But minors cannot appoint a shliach. And therefore, for those people who are going to enter Eretz Israel and going to receive a portion in the land, some of those were under bar mitzvah, and therefore, they are not capable of appointing a shliach. Therefore, you cannot say that the Nosi who's doing a kinyan of sorts on behalf of his tribe is doing so as the concept of, of shlichus because kin-children can't appoint a shliach. Eloki od harav barav. Hu nodav rav. Hu lo marav gidel amarav. We have to rephrase this. Minayin sh'zochin le'adam shelo befono. He didn't say shlach shalom kemoisi. Minayin sh'zochin le'adam shelo befono. From where do you know that you can do a k-kinyan on behalf of someone for their benefit, even in their absence, they don't know about it? Sh'namo nosiah kod nosiah. Okay. So what we're seeing here from this Gemara very clearly, that despite sh-children

24:44 Speaker 1 unable to appoint a shliach, but the concept of a zochin le'adam shelo befono, that someone can acquire something on behalf of someone else, applies even for a child. Now, as I said, I did look this up in, in Sikre Pedro Talmudis, and there there's a whole discussion that how does it work? If it doesn't work as shlichus, how-- what are the mechanisms that, um, this secretary will pick up this, uh, cuddly duck, whatever, on Friday, and it will belong to, whichever child's gonna be coming there, which his name is written on the, on the toy. How does it work? I don't know. There's a, there's discussion about it. Is it schlichas or not? But meanwhile, what we do see clearly from this Gemara, that zach and shelo adam, shelo gefanah works for children also. So I was relieved that that answer, that, that, um, that eitzah was legitimate la-la. Okay, let's move on to our fifth question for us this evening. And that is, someone is sitting at a Sheva Berachos, and th-there are narrow tables, and there's tall, narrow wine glasses. And as he's, he's sitting there, as he's-- across the table, there's a gentleman wearing a nice suit, and he had poured some wine into his tall goblet. And our, our, uh, sh'eil kind of moved his plate a little bit. And inadvertently, that knocked over the glass of wine, which in, in, in, in turn spilt some, let's say it was red wine, on his light-colored suit. And so now here's the

26:30 Speaker 1 question, does he have a, a, a chrayus? Does he have a duty to pay for the dry cleaning of the suit? Um, hopefully all that will work. But yeah, so this is the question. So looking into this carefully, there are-- we do know that there's a concept of adam mu'ad le'olam, a man is liable even if he's asleep. Which means that if he lay down next to something which is breakable, and in the middle of his sleep he rolled over, and he broke that breakable thing, he has to pay for it, even though he wasn't aware of he was, he-- what he was doing when he rolled over in his sleep. So that is the adam mu'ad le'olam, Ben Hi-- Ben Yoshin. That's when he broke things directly. Then we have something called gerama, which is indirect cause. And gerama ben izakin, sometimes you say it's patur, sometimes... What we're seeing over here is the following, that gerama ben izakin may be patur, but midda shmayim, he should be, uh, he should pay. But then he says, if it was beshoegeg be-on-ones, patur afilu bedina shmay. This is from the Sefer Pispe Choshin. He's saying that the concept of gerama ben izakin seems to be from the earlier sources which he quotes, that the, the liability of gerama ben izakin is at Rabonon, and when it's beshoegeg, that doesn't apply. So now, what happened over here? The-- he moved his plate, and that knocked over a glass and spilled wine on the fellow's trousers. The

28:16 Speaker 1 trousers, Baruch Hashem, are still working. It's just that they've got a stain. All right. So then the damage here is clearly a indirect cause, and has to be taken to the cleaners. Okay. That's all definitely on the level of gerama. What's the difference between beshoegeg and be-ones? Shoegeg means you didn't realize what you're doing. Be-ones means that you were out of control of the situation. Here, I wouldn't say it's a ones, but it is a shoegeg, that's for sure. And therefore, even midda shmayim is patur because it's gerama ben izakin. Now, actually, I had a very interesting experience. I was, I was in LA for a Shabbos. It was-- So two Fridays ago, I'm in LA. And by the same-- by our host, I come back after I've gone out for lunch. I come back, and I meet a, a friend of mine from forty years ago. His name is Mar-Mar-Marcus Solomon. He is very prominent in Perth, in his br-- in his hometown. He's a member of the, of the bar. He's a, he's a judge over there. And so we hadn't really had a conversation in many years. And we-- And, and he said he's got a particular interest in Choshin Mishbut. Wonder why. And, um, we were just talking about, just schmoozing about the difference between civil law and Halakha. He-- One observation he made, which I'll share with you, is that Halakha is much more in klalim, general rules. Doesn't go into every nitty-gritty. Whereas the, uh, civil law has got

30:05 Speaker 1 much more fine print, going to so many... What hit this and this and this. But, uh, my observation was that in civil law, there's always someone who's liable. It's either this one or the other one or the third one. Generally, they will find someone who's liable and, uh, and put the-- And then that, that person has to pick up the tab. The idea that something is... It's taka, someone caused it, but he is not a chayi. And it's, it's as if it were milmalo, it was-- and damage which, as they do have in, in, uh, insurance law, an act of God. That kind of thing, when it's ben adam l'chaverei, is not very, uh, common in, in, in Goish law. Much that I know much of, about Goish law. I just mentioned, uh, about thirty years ago, there was a major, uh, catastrophe in India. There was a factory- Which, which, um, burned down with all the workers in it. Uh, hundreds of people were killed. And it was a factory which belonged, let's say, to some, uh, a company from England. It had been built by a German company, and it was, uh, it like, like all different parties who were, uh, involved. And it was a major court case. Who has to be liable for obviously very serious damages? Is it the builder? Is it the designer? Is it the owner, et cetera? And what I'm... I was-- my observation was that in Halakha, probably all of them would not be equ-- uh,

31:43 Speaker 1 would not be liable because of all bad grammar. And, uh, it would be all right. It's, it's a Right. Um, now, last week I did address about this person who wanted to... needs to use the bathroom in middle of Shemoneh Esreh, and I did not answer the question, um, directly. I just said that the Alter Rebbe is very lenient in the id- the, um, that you can... If you can retain yourself, you may continue davening. But that didn't answer the question, what happens if the person is unable to, and they do have to make an interruption? So the bottom line of that is, they not speaking to anyone. There's no need for that, and that, that wasn't the question. Live alone, but they're, they're obviously taking a time out. So it depends how long that time out was. You have in, in numerous areas of Hefetz, She'ho kedai ligmor es kulam. If the time out was such, let's say, if they normally take eight minutes to davven Shemoneh Esreh, and the time out was nine minutes, so then such a long interruption, such a long pause would, uh, would warrant that she goes back to or he goes back to the beginning of Shemoneh Esreh. If it was a shorter pause, let's say seven minutes or less, so then that pause would not invalidate, it would not cut short the Shemoneh Esreh, and they're allowed to come back to the Shemoneh Esreh and start off from the bracha where they left off. If they were

33:45 Speaker 1 in the middle of a bracha, go to the beginning of that bracha. So that's the, the bottom line on that. Okay, let's go on to our next question. So this, uh, young woman asks a question. She had an, um... She puts money in a particular place, and that money is either she owes it to someone or she's saving for a particular purpose, and she can't remember whether this money is money she... So I guess she knows whom she owes, and she's thinking perhaps this money is owing to someone part- in- specifically. On the other hand, she's concerned if she borrowed, let's say, five hundred dollars, and she pays off fifty pound-- fifty dollars a, a month. And she sees fifty dollars, and she doesn't know whether she's still owing fifty dollars, and that's why she put it aside, or she's paid it in full. And if so, she's given another fifty dollars, there's a problem of ribbis. This is her question. She doesn't want to remain owing someone. On the other hand, if she doesn't owe this lender and she gives more money, then she would be violating ribbis. This is her question. Which I looked around, and I found this in the Sefer Bris Yehuda. Bris Yehuda is, shall we say, one of the, uh, earliest contemporary pioneers on hilchas rib- um, uh, ribbis. Um, nowadays there's dozens of seforim on ribbis, but this was printed, written forty years ago approximately. So he writes the following. Um, if the loiver, if the borrower is

35:30 Speaker 1 mesupak, is not sure, and obviously here the, the lender doesn't know, doesn't remember. Otherwise, that would be resolved one way or the other. If the borrower is not sure whether he owes the money or not, he is permitted to pay that money, um, and that's not a problem. He quotes this, that is not a problem of ribbis because is... But then he says that the loiver should consciously say, "If I don't owe this money and I'm giving this money, um, there should be no liability on the malveh, on the lender, for taking money which they're not entitled to." But he, he brings, he bring-- he, he brings, um, sources that it's not a problem of ribbis. Possibly is the following. You have ribbis whilst the loan is, is, is current. First of all, there's ribbis katzutsa. Ribbis min hatorah is only when, at the outset, when you'd taken the loan, you had committed to a set amount of, of bonus called interest. If that wasn't agreed at the outset, if it's come later, that's a ribbis, uh, is d'rabonan, what's called a, something called Avak ribbis, and less than that is ribbis, um, mikdemes ribbis mucheres. If you've already paid off the loan and then you give a gift or you give a bonus afterwards, that is an issue d'rabonan. And possibly that's why they are saying here that a It's a sofer, and it's a sofer of, he's a rabonim, and therefore you can be mekel on, on the Sofer rabonim's lekula. And y-

37:19 Speaker 1 on the other hand, you might be owing the money. Therefore, um, that, that seems to prevail. That you should... That y- you are advised. You're not mechuyav to, because you're not mechuyav to pay something which the... He's not sure that you owe, but if you are conscious, uh, your conscience says that you do, you should give, you're allowed to, and it's not a problem as far as ribbis, as ribbis muchel is. Let's go on to our next question. And that's, I think, the last thing which we have for today. Um, finishing a bit early. Perhaps I'll share with you something else, but yeah. So a young man who is a shochet, he trained as a shochet, but he's, uh, you're not active in shechita. So from time to time, he goes to the goyishe, uh, chicken market, and he'll, uh, shech some birds just to keep up his, his, uh, his movement, his, his, his skill. So he asks this, this. He's gonna shech there. He's gonna go to goyim. He's gonna go straight into a hot water tank, and it's gonna be inedible for a kosher. So is he... Should he make a bracha when he shechs for this or not? So here we have in the Shulchan Aruch on, in the siman in yore-- In, uh, shechita in Shulchan Aruch is Yoreh Deah from siman alef till around kof tes, around there, where you have kisui adam. Meanwhile, we have at the margin of the Shulchan Aruch, we have the following note. One

38:52 Speaker 1 who's shechting for the army, ve'eino bo dek. Is he is talking about animals. He's shechting cattle for providing for the army, military and, and whatever, somewhere in Europe. So, and he's not shechting the lungs of these animals or anything, kishkas. He's not checking anything because he's not gonna eat from it. Eino mevorech. He should not say a bracha. And this he says because it's... He compares it to something else, where if you have an animal, let's say an animal had been, um, attacked by a, an, an animal of prey, then you could shecht it, and then you're gonna have to check, check inside to see whether there was damage done. So that's ishu l'debore yoso. An animal which there is a known problem, then you cannot make a bracha when you shecht it because it may very, it's very likely that it's not edible. So he says similarly, compare this, Shaar Efraim is quoting, says similar, that you sh- the shochet should not make a bracha when he's shechting aware that no one's gonna be bo dek, the animals, whether they're gonna be, uh, kosher or not. So that's the Shaar Efraim quoted in Biryei Ma'aseh on the margin of Shulchan Aruch. Now, the classic sefer on shichita is the T'vu'at Shor, or sometimes known as the Simla Chadasha. Simla Chadasha is more the simple halachas, and the T'vu'at Shor is the, the com-commentary around it. I have actually my father's T'vu'at Shor, uh, which he used when he lived, uh, going back sixty years

40:30 Speaker 1 ago. No, it's seventy years ago, yeah. Ve'yei sh'bo dek. Uh, yeah. So he says like this. Now, here when she... Now, he, he talks about shechting, this T'vu'at Shor. Simla Chadasha says, um, if there is someone who can check it, since it's possible it will be bro-- it will be edible, eaten, even though you're shechting it for goyim or for dog, for klavim, uh, you should make a bracha because you could change your mind. You can eat from it. And he's quoting here, um, Pikkah Chadash. He's talking about that there should be someone here at hand to be able to check it. After eloi bo bedika. Uh, now he says, kitsa, we have here, it's not such a clear story. Um, and there's nothing stopping this young man to take that chicken home and kasher it. And, uh, so according to the... It looks like according to the T'vu'at Shor, he should be making a bracha. Uh, whereas according to this other posek, the Shaar Efraim, he shouldn't. I told him not to because we have a klal of soferek brachas leha'okhel, and therefore I told him not to make a bracha. I'm just gonna finish off and just share with you, uh, something which I, uh, picked up when I was in New York now. Very excited. This, uh, I don't know whether you can see it on the screen. Um, not very good, yeah. So what it is, is a, a, a kundrus called Toras Shalom Hago'as on Kaf HaChaim. So not to

42:05 Speaker 1 be confused with the Kaf HaChaim of Yosef Chaim Sofer, uh, who lived, let's say, a hundred years ago. But let's say a hundred and fifty years ago, there was Rabbi Chaim Falaji who lived in Turkey, I think in Salonika, and he wrote many sefarim. One of them was a se-sefer called Kaf HaChaim, a fairly small sefer, and lots of collated, uh, halachas and minhagim, tovim were many, many, many sources. Ashkenazi sources, Sephardi sources. Very interesting. And then a bocher was browsing through the Rabbeim's collection of sefarim, which are in Galus in Moscow. And he s-- He came across this, this sefer, which belonged to the Rebbe Rashab, and he saw that there's lots of notes on it. And so that was a very exciting discovery. And so he ma-- Th-this, all of it's available online. And so someone took to deciphering those notes of the Rebbe Rashab on the margin of the Kaf HaChaim. Of the, of Rav Palagi. And lots of very, very interesting, um, halachas and, um, and hopefully in the, in due course to be able to share with you some of these things. Um, let me just perhaps share with you one at kind of at random. Um, I did see here. Let's take here. Um, complicated. Right. Um, I'm gonna read... He has a, a, a section about de-dem-- separating the tzitzit. When you, when you check the tzitzit before making a bracha, if they are entangled. So, you know, on Shabbos, is it, uh, are you allowed to disentangle

44:13 Speaker 1 them? Tzitzit has a Rosh HaTevet, says the Rav Palagi. Tzadik yafrid tzitziyos of tamid. That a tzadik will separate his tzitzit regularly. So now he says, "If you're argued out to de-separate them on Shabbos," he gives some references. To which the Rebbe Rashab comments, "If they're not entangled, for sure you are allowed to check the tzitzit on Shabbos. And in our tallisim, they are not entangled." In other words, the tallis, the tallis gadol. No reason why the tzitzit on a tallis gadol should get entangled. The tallis cotton, well, that's, you may know. You're wearing them and you're sleeping, you're rolling over. Sometimes they do get entangled. He says, "Because they're kind of einon musabach." They're not so entangled. You get a little bit, um, curled. He says, "Masham miskarchim kol hatzitzit yes biachad." Becomes like a chevel mechayich. It becomes like a rope. Instead of being th-loose strands, it becomes like a rope. Niro de'ein zer sibuch. He doesn't see that as an entanglement, and therefore you are allowed to separate them from one another. But if they are indeed entangled, uh, like, like knotted. He uses the word in Yiddish, verplantet. And this is where there's a issue on, on dividing them or separating them on Shabbos. And therefore, in that case, Sacha, you should be, um, you should be just making sure that there's nothing missing, but you shouldn't be disentangling them. One more comment, and that is about the tzitzit should be hanging on all four sides of your body. Al arba

45:53 Speaker 1 kanfos. So he's dealing with, in this note, about people who take the back tzitzit and they bring them forward, and they tuck them into their girdle in the front of their body. So they got the front tzitzit hanging down from the shoulder, and the back tzitzit brought to the front. And that they have an objection because the tzitzit should be on all four corners. The arba kanfos ha'aretz. Um, and so the, the Rebbe Rashab comments on that. But I'm gonna stop there because I didn't prepare this for our lesson. I'm just tempting you to get hold of this. I no-- get no commission for it. But, uh, it's very gishmeke zachen. And, um, as I say, in due course, I hope to share with you some in, um, points over here. Meanwhile, I wish you all a good Shabbos and a inspiring Chag Hageulah Yebis Tammuz, Yebis Gimel Tammuz, and yehofch l'simcha, the other e-element of Tammuz. Um, we should have the geulah shlemah simchas olam al roshon, malcheinu b'reshonah. All too.

47:07 Speaker 2 Amen.