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TU BISHVAT: TREE AND THOU

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TU BISHVAT: TREE AND THOU
by Alan Zelenetz

Rabbi Alan Zelenetz, M.Phil. has been professionally involved in Jewish education, academia, and independent scholarship for more than twenty-five years, including leadership positions as principal of Torah and General Studies of Yeshivah of Flatbush Middle Division and Director of Curriculum Development of Teachers College Innovations, Columbia University.

DYNAMIC GREEN
From their cosmic vantage point in outer space, NASA satellites orbiting our planet beam down real-time streaming video of Earth’s surface. They reveal that 75% of our world is “a relatively unchanging ocean of blue,” the remaining 25% “a dynamic green” terra
firma, confirming the dominance of vegetation and the fecundity of plant life on dry land. It’s not difficult for us to re-imagine NASA’s spectacular photographs as screenshots capturing the magnificence of the third day of Creation described in Sefer Bereishit, the Book of Genesis – a gathering of waters followed by growing grass and the flourishing of flowers and trees.
NASA’s cutting edge science and technology provide a God’s-eye view of the plant world unique to our modern day and age, but the variety and beauty of Earth’s species of flora has been the subject of literary poets for millennia. From Ovid of Ancient Rome, who sings of elms and oaks and laurel trees transformed, to the 18th century Scottish lyricist Robert Burns, whose “O my Love’s like a red, red rose” remains, perhaps, the best known simile in verse, the botanical side of nature has forever held fascination for us humans who share our globe and gardens with the kingdom of plants. In his fantasy epic, Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien goes so far as to envision the Ents, a noble race of
walking, talking trees, while contemporary American poet Louise Glück personifies a real flower, “The Red Poppy,” which speaks to us in a floral first person, “I have / a lord in heaven/ called the sun, and open / for him, showing him / the fire of my own heart…” Though talking trees are nothing if not a prime example of poetic license, there are many scientists today who embrace the metaphor in their practice. In a recent New Yorker essay, “The Intelligent Plant,” journalist Michael Pollan reports the latest research in plant biology. He describes attempts to prove (not without controversy and critics) that plants are capable of cognition and communication, and he includes as an example a leaf’s ability “to signal other leaves to mount a defense” against impending infestation by insects. Astonishing as is the scientific hypothesis of “thinking” plants, emotionally stirring as is the imagery of poets, they ought to be comfortably familiar to us as Jews, who have been sensitive to our seed-bearing cohabitants on earth literally since the beginning of traditional Jewish time.
FIRST PLANT YOUR SAPLING
Had there been an ancient Green Party, the Torah would have been its platform. The very first pages of the Jewish Bible introduce humankind at its origin, woman and man implanted with divine purpose in the Garden of Eden. Commenting on this edenic scene, Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch intuits God’s purpose: the destiny of humankind and the earth is Paradise. By working the earth, human beings raise “its purely physical nature into playing a part in the…moral purposes of the world…we are shown what we should be, how we should live, how this world of ours would form a paradise…”
Several Books later, Sefer Devarim offers one of the most celebrated examples of the Written Law’s ethical and ecological sensitivity, “Lo tashchit…do not destroy [fruit-bearing] trees by wielding an ax against them, for from them you will eat, do not cut them down.” Based on this proscription, Judaism derives an overriding moral principle known as bal tashchit, prohibiting any random destruction or wanton waste in all walks of life.
An Aggadic passage in the Oral Law carries Judaism’s recognition of the sanctity of plant life on Earth to an extraordinary extreme: Rabbi Yochanan used to say, “If you are about to plant a sapling and a cry goes out, ‘Come, hurry, the Moshiach is here!’, be certain first to plant your sapling, then go and greet the Messiah.”
Yes, our Jewish love affair with fruit, flower, and foliage has, indeed, been an eternal one. We can already discern the strains of a love song in Talmudic times when the Sages teach us how to bless the trees “who” share our lives, “Tree, O tree, with what should I bless you? Your fruit is already sweet…Your shade is plentiful… May it be G‑d’s will that all the trees planted from your seeds should be like you . . .” And it continues in our own day and age, when Yossi Klein Halevi reminds us – in describing a young Israeli kibbutznik’s attempt to preserve a tactile encounter with the fruit he harvests by machine –  “If you don’t say good morning to the tree, he had learned from the old-timers, the tree won’t say happy new year to you.”
WE HAVE TO TALK ABOUT TU BISHVAT
To speak of plant life and Judaism is to speak, of course, of Tu Bishvat, the day marked in the Mishnah and on the Jewish calendar as our New Year of Trees. This designation carries specific halachic obligations regarding agricultural tithes, both in the ancient and contemporary lands of Israel. But, true to our theme, we keep here to the celebratory and symbolic aspects of the holiday. 
In his Ziv ha’Minhagim, Rabbi Yehudah Dov Zinger paints a scene of  ”the bare fruit tree in the dead of winter showing little sign of vitality; nonetheless, as its New Year of 15 Shevat approaches, life begins to course through its roots once again, it revives with the flowing sap.” And Eliyahu Kitov, in Sefer ha’Toda’ah, explains why the fifteenth of Shevat is considered a rosh ha’Shanah and celebrated, “…because [Tu Bishvat] has an aspect of praise of the land, as this is the time that the soil renews its vigor and the fruits are full and praiseworthy, which is what the land is known for…Thus, the day the land renews itself is, indeed, a day of great joy for all of Israel.”
To reiterate, in Jewish thought and practice a tree is no simple metaphor. The trees of Tu Bishvat are at the essence of our understanding the interrelatedness of God’s world. The Torah, in fact makes the comparison over and over. In both Tehillim and in the Talmud we find fruit trees and cedars breaking into songful praise of God. And the prophet Isaiah declares explicitly, “For as the days of a tree shall be the days of my people.”
Indeed, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the last Lubavitcher Rebbe, pointedly asks us to “reflect on the lessons we can derive from our affinity with our botanical analogue.” The Rebbe goes on to suggest that, just as a tree’s primary components are its roots, trunk, branches, leaves, and fruit, so, too, people’s spiritual lives consist of the same: “The roots represent faith, our source of nurture and perseverance. The trunk, branches and leaves are the body of our spiritual lives – our intellectual, emotional and practical achievements. The fruit is our power of spiritual procreation – the power to influence others, to plant a seed in a fellow human being and see it sprout, grow and bear fruit.”
A WALK WITH RAV KOOK
This identification of human being and tree is the foundation of the moral dimension of Tu Bishvat. It is the living Torah teaching us Chesed, to feel compassion for all living things, and it is embodied in a living example recounted in the memoirs of Reb Aryeh Levin, who recalls an early afternoon stroll with Rav Kook in the fields of Jaffa: “On the way, I plucked some branch or flower. Our great master was taken aback; and then he told me gently, ‘Believe me: In all my days I have taken care never to pluck a blade of grass or a flower needlessly, when it had the ability to grow or blossom. You know the teaching of the Sages that there is not a single blade of grass below, here on Earth, which does not have a heavenly force (or angel) above telling it, Grow! Every sprout and leaf of grass says something, conveys some meaning… Every creature utters its song…’ ”
In I And Thou, philosopher Martin Buber explores how, as human beings, we come to understand the world by interacting with the others, the objects, and the creatures all around us. Buber posits a higher level of human existence that depends upon a series of  “I/Thou” relationships, the most exalted of which is with the Divine, “One who truly meets the world goes out also to God.”
Not surprisingly, Buber turns to a tree to help define his idea of an “I/Thou” relationship, asserting that “…as I contemplate the tree I am drawn into a relation, and the tree ceases to be an It…Whatever belongs to the tree is included…its conversation with the elements and its conversation with the stars…I encounter…the tree itself.”
A TREE’S EMBRACE
In her book Celebrate!, author Lesli Koppelman Ross catalogues many Jewish holiday practices and customs throughout history and from around the globe. Kabbalists early on created a Tu Bishvat seder that has been perpetuated in many fruits and many forms, ranging from the mystic to the ecological to the feminist, down to our own day. In some Mediterranean Jewish communities on Tu Bishvat “women would embrace trees at night, praying for fertility and many children. In Salonica, it was believed that the trees themselves embrace on Tu Bishvat, and anyone seeing them do so would have his/her wish fulfilled.” And so we seem to circle back, within a Jewish frame of reference now, to Tolkien’s Ents and Ovid’s trees and transformations.
The French linguist Émile Benveniste made the observation that “ ‘personal pronouns’ are never missing from among the signs of a language, no matter what its type, epoch, or region may be. A language without expression of person cannot be imagined.” Poet Maureen N. McClane offers her own riff on Benveniste’s thought, “To command you, to address you, I must think you. ’I’ must think ‘you. And yet even as I think you I interfuse you with my own nature…”
On Tu Bishvat, “I” must think “Tree,” “Tree” must think “Thou.” We may even, in homage to Benveniste, pun on the “Tu” in Tu Bishvat and think of it as “tu,” the French second person pronoun of affection and familiarity, reminding us that You, the trees of Shevat, and we, the people of this planet, share earthly and earthy roots from which we draw succor of body, mind, and spirit. In our oneness we join voices in celebration of our Creator.


R. Shlomo Yosef Zevin, Kitniyot, R. Judah Mintz, and More

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R. Shlomo Yosef Zevin, Kitniyot, R. Judah Mintz, and More
Marc B. Shapiro
1. The last post dealt with R. Shlomo Yosef Zevin and I pick up with him here. Before moving forward, I have to thank R. Moshe Maimon who sent me a PDF of the essay attributed to R. Zevin which I discussed in the last post. It comes from the hebrewbooks.org hard drive that was released some time ago.[1] You can see it here. I also thank R. Eliezer Brodt who pointed out that both R. Zvi Pesah Frank and R. Eliezer Waldenberg deal with the essay.[2]
One of the most famous examples of haredi censorship relates to R. Zevin. In his classic Ha-Moadim ba-Halakhah, in the section “Ha-Tzomot”, end of ch. 5 (p. 442 in the most recent edition), in discussing if one still needs to do keriah upon seeing the destroyed cities of Judea, R. Zevin writes:
מסתבר, שעם שיחרורן של ערי יהודה משלטון נכרים והקמת מדינת ישראל (אשרינו שזכינו לכך!) בטל דין הקריעה על אותן הערים.
This is not an extreme Zionist statement. It is simply an expression of happiness that the State of Israel came into being. I have no doubt that the typical haredi agrees that this was a good thing (and see in particular the comments of R. Moshe Feinstein quoted later in this post). However, even this very “pareve” statement was too much for Artscroll. Here is how Artscroll translated this passage (The Festivals in Halachah, vol. 2, p. 294):

It could be argued that since the liberation of the cities of the Judean hills from gentile rule, the law of rending the garment for these cities may no longer be in force.

The first thing to notice is that while R. Zevin wrote מסתבר, which must be translated as “it is reasonable”, “it makes sense”, or something similar, Artscroll has turned this into a tentative argument (“it could be argued”). Yet this is not what R. Zevin is saying. “It could be argued” implies that R. Zevin is on the fence on this matter, while מסתבר shows clearly what his view is.[3]
However, the really egregious action of Artscroll comes later in this sentence where Artscroll deletes mention of the establishment of the State of Israel and, most significantly, R. Zevin’s feeling of joy at this event: אשרנו שזכינו לכך!
I have learnt that the men who run Artscroll did not originally know about the censorship just mentioned. They never authorized any distortion of the translation and were surprised to find out what had been done. Yet once learning what had happened, they never took any steps to correct the translation and even defended the alterations. To this day, the matter has not been rectified. It is one thing if in its own works Artscroll tolerates or even encourages distortions, but to take the work of someone else, especially a great Torah scholar, and “correct” it so as to bring it into line with haredi “Daas Torah” is unforgivable. Furthermore, it is a violation of a sacred trust which every translator should be cognizant of. I also wonder if there isn’t a real issue of geneivah involved. If you sell a book supposed to be a translation, and you alter the translation, it is not merely a matter of geneivat da’at but real thievery, since you are selling a product that is not authentic.[4]
When this matter was raised in Tradition by Jack Feinholtz, Rabbis Nosson Scherman and Meir Zlotowitz replied by quoting one of the translators, Meir Holder:[5]
Mr. Holder has, for many years, maintained the closest contact with Rav Zevin’s family and has been a prime force in the dissemination of this great Tzaddik’s writings, in both Hebrew and English. It is unthinkable that he would tolerate or engage in any attempt to misrepresent Rav Zevin’s thoughts. . . . According to Mr. Holder, the lines which Mr. Feinholtz quotes were added to the edition published just a few months after the State of Israel was founded, a time when Rabbi Zevin and others still held high hopes for the spiritual impact of the State upon the lives of those Jews living there. As time went on, Rabbi Zevin became disappointed and, in the opinion of the members of his own family, his final Halachic opinion with regard to the law of rending garments on seeing the Judean hills is more accurately reflected in the Artscroll translation than in the version of the passage cited by Mr. Feinholtz.
There is a good deal of falsehood here. To begin with, other than Shemirat Shabbat ke-Hilkhatah, I think Ha-Moadim ba-Halakhah has been reprinted more times than any other modern halakhic text. Neither R. Zevin nor his family ever made any changes to the work. So who are these mysterious family members that Mr. Holder consulted with? R. Nahum Zevin, the one grandson of R. Zevin who is a haredi rabbi, is completely honest in his descriptions of his grandfather’s strong Zionist feelings.[6] R. Nahum tells anyone who asks that the change in the English translation was done without his (or anyone else in the family’s) knowledge or approval. He completely rejects the attempts to distort his grandfather’s legacy, as his grandfather never moved from his Zionist outlook. Thus, in addition to what has already been noted, the distortion of R. Zevin’s words must be seen as a betrayal of the family’s trust. (See also the second to last paragraph of the Hebrew article included in this post.)
More offensive than Artscroll’s distortion of R. Zevin’s halakhic opinion is the omission of his words of thanks for the creation of the State, an omission that goes unmentioned in the letter of Scherman and Zlotowitz. In a typical debating tactic, they offer a response that allows them to pretend that the only issue being discussed is R. Zevin’s halakhic view of rending garments rather than the deletion of his comments about the State of Israel. (Regarding the first matter, does this really have anything to do with Zionism? Is there anyone today, even among the non-Zionist haredim, who rends his garment upon seeing the cities of Judea?[7] Even when it comes to mekom ha-mikdash it seems that for many the practice of keriah has fallen by the wayside, and a number of people have written to justify this. And while I am on the topic, is there any halakhic justification for people not to do keriah when they see places like Bethlehem that have been returned to Arab rule?[8])
Before going further, let me present a short article in Hebrew written by a friend of mine that also details Artscroll’s fraudulence in this matter.

בשו”ת אגרות משה או”ח ח”ה סימן לז כתב, וז”ל: בענין חיובים דקריעה על ראיית ירושלים וראיית מקום המקדש, ודאי הוא חיוב, כמפורש בברייתא דמו”ק דף כ”ו ע”א. וגם על ערי יהודה איתא שם דקורע, ואיפסק כן ברמב”ם פ”ט מאבל ה”ב, ויותר מפורט בסוף פ”ה דתעניות. ובטור וש”ע סימן מיוחד באו”ח סימן תקס”א, וגם ביו”ד סוף סימן ש”מ . . . . [אבל] עתה שבחסדי השם יתברך אין מושלים האומות על ערי יהודה ועל ירושלים, והם גם מיושבים, הוא טעם גדול שלא לקרוע, אף שעדיין לא באה הגאולה ע”י מלך המשיח ואנו מתפחדים מהאומות, אין לקרוע, דהא הקרא שלמדים משם שצריך לקרוע על ערי יהודה . . . ויבואו אנשים משכם משלו ומשמרון שמנים איש מגלחי זקן וקרעי בגדים וגו’, הרי באו אחר שנחרבו ממש, שאין ללמוד מזה אפילו ליום אחד קודם החורבן, אף שהיה ידוע על ידי ירמיהו הנביא ועוד כי יהיה החורבן. וכל שכן עתה שמקווים אנחנו שמלך המשיח יבוא בקרוב כשיהיו כל ערי ישראל על מכונם, שאין צורך לקרוע. אבל כשרואה מקום המקדש שעדיין הוא בחורבנו, ולא שייך שיבנה אלא על ידי מלך המשיח, צריך לקרוע בפשיטות. וכשיבוא מלך המשיח במהרה בימינו, אף אם נימא שיהיה קצת זמן עד שיבנה, יורנו מלך המשיח וסנהדרין איך לעשות עכ”ל.
וכ”כ הגאון ר’ שלמה יוסף זווין זצ”ל בספרו “המועדים בהלכה” בפרק חמישי של חלק “הצומות” (במהדורת תשמ”ג – עמוד תמב), שגם טרם מלחמת ששת הימים “מסתבר שעם שיחרורן של ערי יהודה משלטון נכרים והקמת מדינת ישראל (אשרינו שזכינו לכך!) בטל דין הקריעה על אותן הערים”. עכ”ל. 

אמנם בתירגום “המועדים בהלכה” לאנגלית שנעשה בחסות הוצאת “ארטסקרול-מסורה” חלק שני (הוצאת “מסורה” תשמ”ב), עמוד 294, עשו המו”ל שני שינויים לקטע זה: (א) במקום “מסתבר” כתבו “יש מקום לטעון”; (ב) השמיטו מ”ש הרב זוין: “והקמת מדינת ישראל (אשרינו שזכינו לכך!)”. וכבר עוררו על שינויים אלו במכ”ע “טראדישען” ה’תשמ”ז-ח (במדור ‘מכתבי הקוראים’) – ראה מ”ש מר ג’ק פיינהאלץ (טראדישען 22:4, עמוד 120).

 

העורכים הכלליים של ספרי “ארטסקרול” (הרבנים מאיר זלאטאוויץ ונתן שרמן שיחיו) התייחסו לטענת מר פיינהאלץ במכתב למערכת “טראדישען” [שנדפס ב”טראדישען” שם]. במכתב זה הצדיקו את השינויים האמורים, אשר לפי דבריהם נעשו בשיתוף פעולה עם מר מאיר הולדר ז”ל, (בעל בית הדפוס “הלל” בירושלים עיה”ק, שעמד בראש מלאכת התירגום, ואשר הי’ שותף לארטסקרול בההו”ל של ספרי הרב זוין באנגלית), על יסוד מסורה בע”פ שקיבל הלה ממשפחת הרב זוין. לפי מסורה זו, סיגנון השורות המופיעות ב”המועדים בהלכה” בלה”ק (עד עצם היום הזה) ע”ד ביטול דין קריעה על ערי יהודה אינן מתאימות לסוף דעתו של הרב זוין. שורות אלו ניתוספו ע”י הרב זוין במהדורת הספר שי”ל כמה חדשים לאחרי התייסדות מדינת ישראל, נכתבו בתקופה שהיו, להרב זוין (ולאחרים כמותו), תקוות גדולות לעתידה של המדינה ולהשפעתה על החיים הרוחניים של הגרים בארץ ישראל. ברבות הזמן בטלו סיכויים אלו, אז התאכזב הרב זוין וחזר בו ממ”ש ב”המועדים בהלכה” הנ”ל. עכת”ד מסורת מר הולדר.

 

 

הרבנים שרמן וזלאטאוויץ טוענים שאין להעלות על הדעת שמר הולדר, שהי’ [לפי דבריהם] מידידי בית הרב זוין ואיש רב פעלים בהפצת “כתבי הצדיק הזה” [=הגרש”י זוין] זצ”ל, הי’ חשוד על נתינת יד למזייפים. עאכו”כ שלא הי’ עושה בעצמו שום שינוי ב”המועדים בהלכה” שאינו בהתאם גמור ל”מחשבת הרב זוין”. ע”פ שנים עדים אלו (הרבנים שרמן וזלאטאוויץ) הסיגנון המופיע ב”המועדים בהלכה” מהדורת ארטסקרול משקף ביתר דייקנות את משנתו האחרונה של הרב זוין בקשר לחיוב קריעה על ערי יהודה.

 

[יש לציין שגם במהדורא חדשה של “המועדים בהלכה” שנדפסה ע”י “ארטסקרול” בשנת תשנ”ט – בה תיקנו כמה שגיאות וכיו”ב – עמדו הרבנים זלאטאוויץ ושרמן על משמרתם והניחו את הגירסא החדשה (שע”פ מסורת מר הולדר) במקומה. לאידך גיסא, בכל המהדורות של “המועדים בהלכה” שי”ל בלה”ק לאחרי פטירתו של הרב זוין (שראיתי) נמצאות השורות הנ”ל כצלמן וכתבניתן במהדורות שראו אור בחייו].

 

מר הולדר כבר שחל”ח וע”כ אין אפשרות לברר אצלו אם אכן הי’ ממעתיקי השמועה ומה באמת היתה מדת מעורבתו בהשינויים הנ”ל, שע”פ העדים הנ”ל נעשו ע”פ מסורת שקיבל ממשפחתו של הגרש”י זוין. [אם אמת נכון הדבר שמר הולדר הי’ מחולל השינוי, צע”ק שלא מצא מר הולדר לנכון לעשות השינויים במהדורת “המועדים בהלכה” שהו”ל באותה תקופה בלה”ק, ועכ”פ לציין בשוה”ג שהנדפס אינו אלא משנה ראשונה של המחבר]. ובכל אופן, נ”ל שטענות הרבנים זלאטאוויץ ושרמן [ומר הולדר?] ע”ד עמדתו של הגרש”י אינן עומדות בפני הביקורת, ומפני כמה טעמים. [מקצת מטענות א-ב דלהלן כבר הביע בשעתו מר טרי נאוועטסקי במכתב תגובה לטענות הרבנים הנ”ל ונדפס במכ”ע טראדישען שם 23:1 עמוד 98 ואילך].

 

(א) מאז היווסד מדינת ישראל נדפס ספר “המועדים בהלכה” בכו”כ מהדורות בחייו של הרב זוין [
מהדורא שניה – ירושלים תש”ט; מהדורא שלישית – ירושלים תשי”ד; מהדורא חמישית – תל אביב תשט”ז; מהדורא שישית – ירושלים תש”כ. ועוד]. הרב זוין עשה כמה כמה תיקונים והכניס כמה וכמה הוספות קטנות וגם גדולות במהדורות השונות של הספר. על כן, למרות שבספרו זה “לא נתכוון המחבר להקנות לקוראיו דינים ופסקים” (הקדמת הרב זוין ל”המועדים בהלכה”), מ”מ בהתחשב עם זה ש”הספר נועד בעיקר לקהל הרחב . . . מורים ומחנכים” (הקדמה הנ”ל שם) מסתבר שאם באמת חזר בו הרב זוין לא הי’ מניח משנה ראשונה במקומה, וע”ד האמור (איוב יא, יד. כתובות יט, ע”ב) “אל תשכן באהליך עוולה”. ומדחזינן שבענינים אחרים אכן שינה, הוסיף וגרע [אפילו בכה”ג שלא הי’ מקום לחשוש לביטול מצוה או לאפרושי מאיסורא], ובנדו”ד השאיר את הדברים על מכונם, מסתבר לומר שבאמת לא חזר בו, וחזקה על חבר שאינו מוציא מתח”י דבר שאינו מתוקן.
(ב) אין התשובה ממין הטענה כלל, דאם אמנם על השינוי מ”מסתבר” ל”יש מקום לטעון” [אין ולאו ורפיא בידי’] אנו דנים, אכן יש מקום להסברא שהתאכזבותו ממצבה הרוחני של מדינת ישראל גרם להרב זוין לנטות מצידוד חזק [“מסתבר”] לביטול חיוב קריעה [כשיטת האג”מ הנ”ל] ל”הלכה רופפת” [“יש מקום לחלוק ולומר”] בענין זה, וע”פ המבואר לקמן בפנים שיש אומרים דשלטון מדינת אינו בגדר שלטון ישראל. אבל אין אכזבה זו דורשת (1) העלמת שם “מדינת ישראל”, שם שהרבה הרב זוין להשתמש בו בכ”מ. (2) השמטת ביטוי של שמחה והודי’ להשי”ת – “אשרינו שזכינו לכך” – על הקמת המדינה. הגע בעצמך: אין ספק שהגרמ”פ (שהי’ מחברי מועצת גדולי אגודת ישראל) גם הוא התאכזב ממצב היהדות בארץ ישראל תחת שלטון מדינת ישראל [ראה מ”ש באג”מ יו”ד ח”ב סמ”ה בא”ד ש”במדינת ישראל, אין אנו אחראין להנהגת המלכות דשם שהיא בעוה”ר אצל כופרים ומומרים ואין מתחשבים עם . . . כל איסורי התורה החמורים ביותר והמפורשים בגמרא ובקראי”. וראה גם אג”מ חו”מ ח”ב סו”ס סט, ועוד], ואעפ”כ כתב באג”מ בשנת תשמ”א, וכנ”ל, “עתה שבחסדי השם יתברך אין מושלים האומות על ערי יהודה ועל ירושלים [הוא טעם גדול שלא לקרוע]”, הרי שהעברת השלטון מידי האומות לידי ממשלת ישראל הוא מ”חסדי השי”ת”! ואם הגרמ”פ הי’ מודה להקב”ה על חסד זה, מה הכריח את הרבנים זלאטאוויץ ושרמן לעשות את הרב זווין (שגם בסוף חייו פירסם בקהל רב שהוא נוהג להצביע עבור רשימת המפד”ל) לכפוי טובה שאינו מכיר בניסו?
והוא העיקר: יחסו החיובי של הרב זוין למדינת ישראל בא לידי ביטוי בעוד מקומות מפיו ומפי כתביו. הנה שתי דוגמאות לכך: (1) בספרו “לאור ההלכה” (מהדורא שניה, תל אביב תשי”ז, כמה שנים לאחרי הקמת המדינה) תיקן את מאמרו “המלחמה” והוסיף בה דברים שלא היו יכולים להכתב במהדורא הראשונה של המאמר שהדפיס לפני הקמת המדינה (ב”לאור הלכה” ירושלים ה’תש”ו), ובתו”ד (עמוד סה) כתב לאמר: “בימינו אנו שזכינו לתקומת מדינת ישראל העצמאית, משוחררת מעול מלכויות . . . הרי מלחמת השחרור ברור שהיו לה כל דיני מלחמת מצוה וחובה”. [גם ספר “לאור ההלכה” חזרה ונדפסה כמ”פ (במשך ימי חיי הרב זוין) עם תיקונים והוספות, ומשנה זו לא זזה ממקומה]. (2) (2) בראיון שהעניק למכ”ע “הצופה” שי”ל לראש השנה ה’תשל”ו קרוב לשלשים שנה לאחרי הקמת מדינת ישראל וכשנתיים לפני פטירת הרב (בשנת תשל”ח). באותו ראיון אמר הרב זוין: “הרי מדינת ישראל עם כל ליקוייה הרבים בשטח החינוך הלא-דתי וכו’ הרי עם כל זה עלינו לראות את צדדיה החיוביים: הלא רק בחמש השנים האחרונות בלבד היא הצילה יותר ממאה אלף יהודים מטמיעה מוחלטת ושמד רוחני ברוסיה הסובייטית, אשר רבים מהם לומדים עתה כאן בבתי ספר דתיים ואף בישיבות; ועוד היד שלנו נטוי’ לקלוט מהם בעז”ה כהנה וכהנה”.
לית דין צריך בושש שהרב זוין, שהכיר מקרוב את תהליך התפתחות אופיה הרוחני של מדינת ישראל, כבר ידע היטב בשלהי שנת תשל”ה את כל מה שיש לדעת ע”ד צביונה החילוני של מדינת ישראל, ובכל זאת הרי שלך לפניך, שהביע את הערכתו הרבה להקמת מדינת ישראל וחזר והדגיש באר היטב שלמרות כל חסרונותי’ וליקויי’ (‘רבים הם ואי אפשר לפורטם’) הרי הקמת המדינה בארץ ישראל והרווחה בגו”ר שהביאה לעם ישראל הינה זכי’ גדולה וה”ה מהטובות הגדולות שעשה הקב”ה לעמו ישראל וחייבים אנו להודות להקב”ה על קיומה. וא”כ אי אפשר לומר שהשמטת תיבות ההודאה על קיומה של המדינה [“אשרינו שזכינו לכך”] הולמת את שיטת הרב זוין לאחרי אכזבתו.
אמנם למרות כל הנ”ל לא מלאני לבי לבטל מסורתם של מר הולדר ויבלחט”א הרבנים שרמן וזלאטאוויץ עד שהתקשרתי עם משפחת הרב זוין ע”מ לברר וללבן את הדבר. ה’משפחה’ שאיתה עמד מר הולדר בקשר מתמיד, ה”ה הרה”ג ר’ נחום זווין שליט”א, רב בעיה”ק חיפה ת”ו. [בנו יחידו של הגרש”י זווין נלב”ע בחייו, ובנו הרב נחום ירש את הכתבים וכו’ של הגרש”י והוא הוא שמכר את רשות ההדפסה באנגלית למר הולדר]. בשיחה טלפונית שקיימתי עם הרב נחום ביום חמישי י”ד טבת ה’תשס”ד אמר לי בלשון צחה וברורה שלא היו דברים אלו מעולם. הרב נחום זוין נתן לי רשות לפרסם בשמו את אשר מסר לי בענין זה: (א) עד יומו האחרון לא זז הגרש”י מעמדתו ויחסו החיובי למדינת ישראל, עמדה שהתבטאה בכמה משיטותיו והנהגותיו [ולדוגמא: עד שנתו האחרון עלי אדמות ועד בכלל נהג הגרש”י לומר הלל (בלי ברכה) ביום העצמאות וביום ירושלים]. (ב) מעולם לא שמע ממנו שחזר בו משיטתו ע”ד חיוב הקריעה על ערי יהודה, ועד היום הזה (שהודעתיו ע”ד השינויים הנ”ל ב”המועדים בהלכה” מהדורת ארטסקרול) לא ידע אפילו שהי’ אי פעם איזו סברא והו”א (בתוך המשפחה או מחוצה לה) לומר שהגרש”י שינה את דעתו בנידון, ולמותר להגיד שמעולם לא דיבר, לא דבר ולא חצי דבר, לא עם מר הולדר ולא עם שום נציג הוצאת ארטסקרול, על דבר ענין זה. והשתא הדברים מחוורים כשמלה, שמעולם לא היתה ולא היתה יכולה להיות ‘מסורת חשאית’ ממשפחת הרב זוין בנדו”ד, כי מעולם לא חזר בו הרב זוין מדעתו הראשונה, ואין שום סתירה כלל במשנת הגרש”י שהיתה קב ונקי. אין כאן המקום להאריך בהשערות, על מה ולמה החליטו המו”ל של כתבי הגרש”י באנגלית לעשות בדבריו כבתוך שלהם ולייחס אליו דברים שהם זרים לרוחו. מה שחשוב למבקשי האמת הוא, בירור דעתו של הרב זוין בנידון, ולזה הגענו בעז”ה – ואין שמחה כהתרת הספיקות.
[דא”ג: ראה זה פלא! לאחרונה יצא לאור “תלמוד בבלי מסכת מועד קטן” מהדורת שוטנסטיין (דפוס “מסורה” ה’תשנ”ט) תחת השגחת הרבנים זלאטאוויץ ושרמן, ושם דף כו ע”א הערה 43 ציינו (בקשר לחיוב קריעה על ערי יהודה וירושלים בזמן הזה) לדברי הגרמ”פ באג”מ ח”ה הנ”ל, שם כתב שבזמן הזה בטל חיוב קריעה גם על ירושלים עיר הקודש, ולא ציינו כלל להפוסקים הרבים המובאים לקמן בפנים דס”ל שחיוב קריעה על ירושלים במקומו עומד, גם לא ציינו לעמדתו הרופפת של הרב זווין (ע”פ ‘מסורת מר הולדר’) שקנתה שביתה במהדורתם של “המועדים בהלכה” לפיה אין להחליט שחיוב קריעה (אפילו על ערי יהודה – ובמכ”ש על ירושלים) בטל בימינו. וצע”ג].

 

In Saul Lieberman and the Orthodox, I called attention to two other examples of censorship (omitting Lieberman’s rabbinic title) in Artscroll’s translation of R. Zevin, so it is obvious that the translators felt it was OK for them to take liberties with the text. I know from speaking to people in the haredi world that this sort of thing is very distressing to them. It is no longer surprising when we see censorship and intentional distortions in haredi works. We even expect this and are surprised when a haredi work is actually honest in how it presents historical matters and issues that are subject to ideological disputes. Yet it doesn’t have to be this way. There is no fundamental reason why haredi works can’t express their position without the all-too-common falsehoods. I think the ones most offended by this are those who are part of the haredi world and believe in its ideology, and don’t understand the need to resort to distortions in order to further the truth.

 

 

In a recent post I gave an example of fraudulence when it came to a haredi newspaper’s obituary of Louis Henkin, the son of R. Joseph Elijah Henkin. In this post, I mentioned that R. Henkin sent his sons to Yeshiva College. R. Eitam Henkin kindly sent me this picture of the tombstone of R. Henkin’s son, Hayyim, who predeceased his father.

 

It is noteworthy that R. Henkin saw fit to mention on the tombstone that Hayyim was a student at Yeshiva College (= Yeshivat R. Yitzhak Elhanan).
I would now like to point to an unintentional error in Artscroll’s translation of Ha-Moadim ba-Halakhah. Before last Pesah I took out my copy of The Festivals in Halachah. In reading the chapter on kitniyot, p. 118, I came across the following.
By way of reply, Rav Shmuel Freund, “judge and posek in the city of Prague”
((דין ומו”צ בק”ק פראג published the pamphlet Keren Shmuel, in which he demonstrates at length that no one has the authority to make these prohibited items (kitnios) permissible.
I immediately suspected something wasn’t right, and when I looked at the original I saw that R. Freund was described as דיין מו”ש דק”ק פראג. In translating these words into English, דיין מו”ש  became דין ומו”צ  (since the English version puts vowels on the Hebrew words  דיין became דין), and דק”ק became בק”ק (this latter point is only a minor error).
R. Zevin’s description of R. Freund is put in quotation marks since it is taken from the cover of his Keren Shmuel, as you can observe here.
The translators (who must never have seen the title page of Keren Shmuel) didn’t know what to make of מו”ש  and assumed that it was a mistake for מו”צ. They therefore “corrected” R. Zevin’s text. This is one of those cases where a few well-placed inquiries would have solved the translators’ problem. Some of the blame for this error should be laid at the feet of R. Zevin, for he never bothered explaining what מו”ש  is and he should have realized that that the typical reader (and translator) wouldn’t have a clue as to its meaning.[9]
מו”ש refers to the highest beit din in Prague, as used in the phrases דיין מו”ש and בית דין מו”ש. But what do the letters מו”ש stand for?[10] This is the subject of an essay by Shaul Kook,[11] and he points out that there has been uncertainty as to the meaning of מו”ש.[12] In fact, R. Solomon Judah Rapoport, who was chief rabbi of Prague and a member of the בית דין מו”ש, was unaware of the meaning.[13] After examining the evidence, Kook concludes that מו”ש stands for מורה שוה. This appears to mean that all the dayanim on the beit din were regarded as having equal standing. The בית דין מו”ש of Prague actually served as an appeals court, something that was found in other cities as well, even going back to Spain.[14] R. Yair Hayyim Bacharach, Havot Yair, no. 124, refers to one of the dayanim on this beit din as  אפילאנט, and the new edition of Havot Yair helpfully points out that the meaning of this is דיין לערעורים.[15]
Some people have the notion that the appeals court of the Israeli Chief Rabbinate is a completely new concept, first established during the time of R. Kook. This is a false assumption.[16] (The Chief Rabbinate’s בית דין לערעורים is also known as בית דין הגדול).
R. Moshe Taub has called my attention to another error in the translation of Ha-Moadim ba-Halakhah. In discussing what should be done first, Havdalah or lighting the menorah, R. Zevin writes (p. 204):
ברוב המקומות נתקבל המנהג שבבית מבדילים קודם, ובבית הכנסת מדליקים קודם
The translation, p. 89, has this sentence completely backwards: “Most communities have adopted the following custom: at home – Chanukah lights are lit first; in the synagogue – Havdalah first.”
Since we are on the issue of errors in Artscroll, here is another one which was called to my attention by Prof. Daniel Lasker. In the commentary to Numbers 25:1, Artscroll states:
After Balaam’s utter failure to curse Israel, he had one last hope. Knowing that sexual morality is a foundation of Jewish holiness and that God does not tolerate immorality – the only time the Torah speaks of God’s anger as אף, wrath, is when it is provoked by immorality (Moreh Nevuchim 1:36) – Balaam counseled Balak to entice Jewish men to debauchery.
Yet Rambam does not say what Artscroll attributes to him. Here is what appears in Guide 1:36:
Know that if you consider the whole of the Torah and all the books of the prophets, you will find  that the expressions “wrath” [חרון אף], “anger” [כעס], and “jealousy” [קנאה], are exclusively used with reference to idolatry.
The Rambam says that the language of “wrath” is only used with reference to idolatry, but somehow in Artscroll idolatry became (sexual) immorality. This text of the Moreh Nevukhim is actually quite a famous and difficult one, and the commentators discuss how Maimonides could say that ויחר אף is only used with reference to idolatry when the Torah clearly provides examples of the words in other contexts. In his commentary, ad loc, R. Kafih throws up his hands and admits that he has no solution.
ושכאני לעצמי כל התירוצים לא מצאו מסלות בלבבי, והקושיא היא כל כך פשוטה עד שלא יתכן שהיא קושיא, אלא שאיני יודע היאך אינה קושיא
Returning to the issue of kitniyot, in a previous post I raised the question as to why, according to R. Ovadiah Yosef, all Sephardim and Yemenites who live in Israel are to follow the practices of the Shulhan Arukh but he doesn’t insist on this when it comes to Ashkenazim. If R. Joseph Karo is the mara de-atra, shouldn’t this apply to Ashkenazim as well?[17] I once again wrote to R. Avraham Yosef and R. Yitzhak Yosef seeking clarification. Here is R. Avraham’s letter.
Unfortunately, his history is incorrect. To begin with, it is not true that all of the Ashkenazim who came on aliyah before the “mass aliyah” (which apparently refers to the late nineteenth century) adopted the practices of the Sephardim.[18] It is also not true that the beit din established by the Ashkenazim in the nineteenth century is the beit din of the Edah Haredit. The Edah Haredit is a twentieth-century phenomenon. The historical successor of the beit din of R. Shmuel Salant was the Jerusalem beit din of which R. Kook was av beit din, as he was the rav of Jerusalem (and R. Zvi Pesah Frank served on the batei din of both R. Salant and R. Kook). The Edah Haredit beit din was a completely new creation. As for the Yemenites, Moroccans, and Iraqis, when the great immigration of these groups occurred, many thousands came on aliyah together, (i.e., as complete communities) and thus they never saw themselves as required to reject their practices in favor of the Shulhan Arukh. The fact that they didn’t establish special batei din is irrelevant. In fact, R. Avraham’s last paragraph is a good description of how these communities arrived in the Land of Israel, and is precisely the reason why their rabbinic leaders almost uniformly rejected R. Ovadiah Yosef’s demand that they adopt the Shulhan Arukh in all particulars.
Here is R. Yitzhak Yosef’s letter to me, which has a different perspective.
He cites R. Joseph Karo’s responsum, Avkat Rokhel, no. 212, which requires newcomers to adopt the practices of the community to which they are going even if they come as large groups. He then says that Ashkenazim never adopted this viewpoint, but instead held to the opinion of R. Meir Eisenstadt (Panim Meirot, vol. 2, no. 133). According to R. Eisenstadt, only individuals who come to a town must adopt the local practice, but not if they come as a group and establish their own community.[19]
Let me now complicate matters further. If you recall, in the earlier post I discussed how R. Ovadiah Yosef’s writings assume that Ashkenazim have to abstain from kitniyot on Pesah. I raised the question if an Ashkenazi could “become Sephardi” and thus start eating kitniyot (and also follow Sephardic practices in all other areas). R. Avraham Yosef wrote to me that this is permissible while R. Yitzhak Yosef wrote that it is not.
R. Yissachar Hoffman called my attention to the fact that in the recent Ma’yan Omer, vol. 11, p. 8, R. Ovadiah was himself asked the following question:
אשכנזי שרוצה לנהוג כמו הספרדים במנהגים ולדוגמא לאכול קטניות בפסח, אך רוצה להמשיך ולהתפלל כנוסח אשכנז. האם הדבר אפשרי.
R. Ovadiah replied:
 יכול רק בקטניות, אך עדיף שבכל ינהג כמרן
What R. Ovadiah is saying (and see also the editor’s note, ad loc., for other examples) is that R. Avraham’s answer is correct, namely, that an Ashkenazi can “become Sephardi” (and eat kitniyot). It is significant that R. Ovadiah allows such a person to continue praying according to Ashkenazic practice. Here are the pages.
2. On my recent tour of Italy I spent a good deal of time speaking about the great sages of Venice and Padua. One such figure was R. Samuel Judah Katzenellenbogen (1521-1597), known as מהרשי”ק, the son of the famous R. Meir Katzenellenbogen, known as Maharam Padua. While R. Samuel Judah Katzenellenbogen is basically forgotten today, he was the most important Venetian rabbi in his day. He was also the father of Saul Wahl, who became famous in Jewish legend as Poland’s “king for a day.”[20]
In 1594, R. Katzenellenbogen’s collection of derashot, entitled Shneim Asar Derashot, appeared. Here is the title page.
When the volume was reprinted in Lemberg in 1798, the publisher made an error and on the title page attributed the volume to מהר”י מינץ , the son of Maharam Padua.
Apart from not knowing who the author of the volume was, the publisher also didn’t realize that R. Judah Mintz (died 1508[21]) was the grandfather of Maharam Padua’s wife, meaning that he was the great-grandfather of R. Samuel Judah Katzenellenbogen.
When the volume was reprinted in Warsaw in 1876 the publisher recognized the problem but confounded matters.
Rather than simply correcting the mistake from the 1798 title page by attributing the volume to R. Samuel Judah Katzenellenbogen, he kept the information from the mistaken title page but tells the reader that מהר”י מינץ is none other than “R. Samuel Judah Mintz”, a previously unheard of name.
The most recent printing has gets it even worse.
Now the original title of the book, שנים עשר דרשות, is simply omitted, and the book is called דרשות מהר”י מינץ
The authentic R. Judah Mintz of Padua is known for his volume of responsa that was published in Venice in 1553, together with the responsa of R. Meir Katzenellenbogen. Here is the title page.
R Judah Mintz’s responsa were reprinted in Munkacs in 1898 together with a lengthy commentary by R. Johanan Preshil.
The book was also reprinted in 1995, edited by R. Asher Siev.
Unfortunately, Siev was unaware of the 1898 edition. He also makes the mistake (see p. 353) of stating that R. Samuel Judah Katzenellenbogen was referred to as מהר”י מינץ because his mother’s family name was Mintz. I have seen no evidence that he was ever referred to as such in his lifetime or in the years after, and as mentioned, this was simply a printer’s mistake. I consulted with Professor Reuven Bonfil and he too is unaware of any reference to Katzenellenbogen being referred to as מהר”י מינץ, which supports my assumption that this all goes back to the mistaken title page.[22]
3. In my last post I mentioned how in years past there were shiurim combining students from Merkaz and Chevron and also Merkaz and Kol Torah. This is obviously unimaginable today. For another example showing how Yeshivat Kol Torah has changed, look at this picture, which appears in Yosef and Ruth Eliyahu, Ha-Torah ha-Mesamahat (Beit El, 1998), p. 105.
I guarantee you that even on the hottest of days, none of the Kol Torah students will be wearing shorts. For those who don’t know, Kol Torah was founded by German Orthodox rabbis and was originally very different than it is today. Here is how it was described upon its founding, in a short notice in Davar, August 27, 1939.
It is hard to imagine today, but this was a yeshiva that actually intended for some of its students to take up agriculture. See also here which cites R. Hayyim Eliezer Bichovski, Kitvei ha-Rav Hayyim Eliezer Bichovski (Brookyn, 1990), p. 180, that the Chafetz Chaim said that yeshiva students in Eretz Yisrael should learn nine months a year and work the land the other three months
Speaking of shorts, here are a couple of pictures showing how the boys of the German Orthodox separatist Adass Jisroel community looked when playing sports (also notice the lack of kippot).
This was the community of R. Esriel Hildesheimer and R. David Zvi Hoffmann. The pictures come from Mario Offenburg, ed., Adass Jisroel die Juedische Gemeinde in Berlin (1869-1942): Vernichtet und Vergessen (Berlin, 1986).
Here is how the girls dressed for sports, also with shorts and sleeveless.
And here is how the boys and girls looked when not at a sporting event.
These pictures come from Max Sinasohn, ed., Adass Jisroel Berlin (Jerusalem, 1966).[23]
4. Some people didn’t appreciate the humor in my post with regard to the Gaon R. Mizrach-Etz. I think they should lighten up, and in a previous post, available here, I gave some references to humor in rabbinic literature. This was followed up by a more extensive post by Ezra Brand, available here.
According to the commentary Siftei Hakhamim, it is not just the talmudic sages who would at times show their humorous side, but on at least one occasion Moses thought that God himself was joking with him!
In Ex. 33:13 Moses says to God: ועתה אם נא מצאתי חן בעיניך. Rashi explains this to mean: “If it is true that I have found favor in Your eyes.” This means that Moses was in some doubt as to whether he found favor in God’s eyes, but this is problematic since in the previous verse Moses quotes God as saying to him, “you have also found favor in My eyes.” So if God told Moses that he found favor in His eyes, how can Moses be in doubt and say to God, “If I have found favor in Your eyes”?
Here is the Siftei Hakhamim.
According to Siftei Hakhamim, Moses was in doubt if he really found favor in God’s eyes, since even though God said he did, perhaps God was joking just like people joke around!
דלמא מה שאמרת מצאת חן בעיני מצחק היית בי כדרך בני אדם
5. I want to call readers’ attention to a recent book, Shevilei Nissan, which is a collection of previously published essays from R. Nissan Waxman. There is lots of interesting material in the book, and let me mention just a few things.
In Studies in Maimonides and His Interpreters, p. 75 n. 302, I referred to R. Yaakov Avigdor’s strong criticism of R. Hayyim Soloveitchik’s approach. R. Avigdor also criticized R. Solomon Polachek, the Meitchiter. R. Waxman was a student of the Meitchiter, and on p. 23 n. 1, he comes to his teacher’s defense.
On p. 150, R. Waxman, who was the rav of Lakewood, mentions the problem of how some yeshiva students are halakhically more stringent than their teachers. He quotes R. Yaakov Kamenetsky in the name of R. Aharon Kotler how a student once visited R. Kotler and when the latter offered the student some cookies, the student was reluctant to take before asking which bakery they came from. (Perhaps this behavior can be explained by what I have heard – and maybe someone can confirm this – that in R. Aharon Kotler’s day the Lakewood bakery Gelbstein was not under hashgachah, and yet R. Kotler bought his challot from it. See also here and here The original post referred to in these links has definitely been taken down.)
On p. 233, R. Waxman notes that even though we have the principle, “A Jew who sins remains a Jew”, in actuality, it is possible for a Jew to so remove himself from the Jewish people (e.g., apostasy) that as far as most things are concerned, he is indeed no longer regarded as Jewish. This essay was written concerning the “Brother Daniel” case, and R. Waxman’s approach is similar to that of R. Aharon Lichtenstein who also wrote a famous article on the topic, “Brother Daniel and the Jewish Fraternity,” republished in Leaves of Faith, vol. 2, ch. 3.
On pp. 251ff., R. Waxman deals with Menahem Mendel Lefin’s Heshbon ha-Nefesh, an influential mussar text which as many know was influenced by a work of Benjamin Franklin.
6. I want to also call readers’ attention to two other books recently sent to me. The first is R. David Brofsky, Hilkhot Moadim: Understanding the Laws of the Festivals. This is very large book (over 700 pages) dealing with the Holidays and is a welcome addition to the growing number of non-haredi halakhah works in English.. In a future post I hope to deal with it in greater depth. The second book is Haym Soloveitchik, Collected Essays, vol. 1, published by Littman Library, my favorite publisher. This book is required reading for anyone with an interest in the history of medieval halakhah. I was happy to see that it also includes two essays that appear here for the first time. Furthermore, Soloveitchik’s classic essay on pawnbroking (which was his first significant article) has been expanded to almost double the size of the original. In the new preface to the essay, he writes: “Every essay is written for an imagined audience, and mine was intended for the eyes of Jacob Katz, Saul Lieberman, and my father.”
[1] I also must point out that someone involved with hebrewbooks.org informed me that the essay was not removed from the site because it was viewed as “problematic”, but because they were requested to do so by one of the members of R. Zevin’s family who claimed to hold the copyright to the work. This is obviously a false claim, since as we have seen there is no proof that R. Zevin wrote the essay.
[2] See R. Waldenberg, Hilkhot Medinah, vol. 2, pp. 14, 60, 62, and R. Frank’s haskamah, ibid., pp. 17.
[3] See Jack Feinhotz’s letter in Tradition 22 (Winter 1987), p. 120. R. Zevin’s view, that there is no need for keriah, was also advocated by R. Reuven Katz, Sha’ar Reuven (Jerusalem, 1952), p. 32.
[4] See Terry Novetsky’s letter in Tradition 23 (Summer 1987), pp. 98-99.
[5] Tradition 22 (Winter 1987), p. 120.
[6] In the interview with R. Zevin that appeared in my last post, R. Nahum’s comments tended to be somewhat dogmatic, even “haredi”, and should be contrasted with his grandfather’s words.
[7] Even among the vast majority of Lubavitchers this is the case (so I am informed by R. Chaim Rapoport). This is quite strange since the Rebbe held that you have to do keriah. What this shows us is that not everything advocated by the Lubavitcher Rebbe was adopted by his hasidim.
[8] See R. Dov Lior, Devar Hevron (Kiryat Arba, 2009), Orah Hayyim no. 567
[9] Even the incredibly learned Meir Benayahu was stumped by מו”ש. See this page from his Tiglahat be-Holo Shel Moed (Jerusalem, 1995), p. 21.

 

Regarding Benayahu, a recent book argues that the missing pages of the Aleppo Codex were not destroyed in Aleppo, but were actually stolen by Benayahu after arriving in Jerusalem. See Matti Friedman, The Aleppo Codex (Chapel Hill, 2012).
[10] I have found one occasion where it is written מ”ש, although this is probably a typo. See R. Yaakov Reischer, Shevut Yaakov, vol. 2, no. 129. R. Reischer was a member of this beit din,
[11] Iyunim u-Mehkarim (Jerusalem, 1963), vol 2, pp. 179ff.
[12] In the Vilna Shulhan Arukh, Yoreh Deah, there is a commentary by R. Jacob Emden. Yet R. Yaakov Hayyim Sofer, Menuhat Shalom, vol. 6, p. 116, shows that it was not written by him, and one of his proofs is that the commentary refers to הגאון אב”ד וב”ד מו”ש, implying that the author lived in Prague.
[13] See Kook, Iyunim u-Mehkarim, p. 180.
[14] See Simhah Assaf, Batei ha-Din ve-Sidreihem Aharei Hatimat ha-Talmud (Jerusalem, 1924), ch. 11.
[15] See ibid., pp. 80ff. for other examples of אפילאנט
[16] This statement should not be taken to imply that the leading rabbis in Eretz Yisrael were happy with the institution of this court, which was pretty much forced upon them by the British. See Amichai Radzyner’s book-length article, “Ha-Rav Uziel, Rabanut Tel Aviv-Yafo, u-Beit Din ha-Gadol le-Irurim: Sipur be-Arba Ma’arakhot” Mekhkerei Mishpat 21 (2004), pp. 120-242.
[17] R. Ovadiah Hadaya, in his approbation to R. Amram Aburabia, Netivei Am (Jerusalem, 1964), states that everyone in Jerusalem should follow “minhag Yerushalayim”. If his opinion is accepted, it would mean the end of any Ashkenazic practices in the city.
[18] Regarding earlier in the nineteenth century, see Yehoshua Kaniel, “Kishrei ha-Edot be-Inyanei Halakhah u-Minhag bi-Yerushalayim ba-Meah ha-Yod Tet,” Morashah 4 (5736), pp. 126-136. In the eighteenth century, the Vilna Gaon was of the opinion that Ashkenazim who come on aliyah should indeed adopt Sephardic practices. See Bezalel Landau, Ha-Gaon he-Hasid mi-Vilna (Jerusalem, 1978), p. 250, n. 30.
[19] This has indeed been the Ashkenazi approach, yet R. Abraham Danzig disagreed. See Hokhmat Adam: Sha’ar Mishpetei ha-Aretz 11:23:
נ”ל דהבאים לא”י אם יקבעו עצמם בעיר שיש שם מנין אעפ”י שהבאים הם מרובים יש להם דין יחיד וחייבים לנהוג חומרי מקום שהלכו לשם ופקעו מהם החומרות שהיו נוהגין במקומם.
[20] As far as I know, R. Samuel Judah Katzenellenbogen was the first great rabbi to have his picture made (unfortunately, it no longer exists). See R. Moses Porti, Palgei Mayim (Venice, 1608), p. 6b (referred to by R. Gedaliah Oberlander, Minhag Avoteinu be-Yadenu [Monsey, 2012], p. 451):
והלא אנכי הייתי הראשון שבקשתי להציב תמונתו לנגד עיני ע”י הצייר ואותה לקחתי לי והצבתיה בבית מדרשי לקיים מה שנאמר והיו עיניך רואות את מוריך
While this picture was hung in the beit midrash, see this post where I mention how R. Pinchas Teitz took down the poster of R. Elchanan Wasserman that I hung up in a room used for tefillah. (R. Porti’s Palgei Mayim is devoted to the famous dispute about the mikveh in Rovigo.)
[21] The standard biographies all record that R. Judah Mintz lived a very long life. This is based on R. Joseph Yavetz, Hasdei Ha-Shem (Jerusalem, 1934), Introduction, p. 9, where R. Yavetz’s son mentions that R. Mintz recited birkat ha-hamah when he was כבן מאה שנה. This would have been in 1505, and he lived another three years after that. R. Meshulam Fishel Behr, Divrei Meshulam (Frankfurt, 1926), pp. 147ff., rejects the younger Yavetz’s testimony and claims that R. Mintz died in his seventies. See, however, R. Naftali Yaakov ha-Kohen, Otzar ha-Gedolim (Haifa, 1967), pp. 35ff.
[22] See also Jewish Encyclopedia, s.v. Katzenellenbogen, Samuel Judah. R. Yissachar Hoffman called my attention to She’elot u-Teshuvot Hakham Zvi, no. 15, where R. Samuel Judah Katzenellenbogen is (mistakenly?) referred to as מהר”י מפאדואה. See also R. Aryeh Yehudah Leib Lifshitz, Avot Atarah le-Vanim (Warsaw, 1927), p. 48 n. 44
[23] When I was in high school in the early 1980s, in the New Jersey-New York yeshiva league only the girls of Bruriah wore sweat pants during basketball games (and the boys were not allowed to attend home games). At the other high schools the girls wore shorts. Today, the league requires all girls to wear sweat pants (i.e., not even long shorts). For a wonderful discussion of the yeshiva basketball league, see Jeffrey S. Gurock, Judaism’s Encounter with American Sports (Bloomington, 2005), ch. 7. Gurock discusses how for six years in the early 1950s, Yeshiva Chaim Berlin was part of the basketball league together with the Modern Orthodox co-ed high schools, something that could never happen today. During this time co-ed schools had cheerleaders, and this was a major factor in forcing Chaim Berlin to leave the league. (Mesivta Tifereth Jerusalem was also in the league for two years.) When I mention cheerleaders, don’t think of current NFL cheerleader outfits. Here, for example, is how the Brooklyn Central girls looked (from Gurock, p. 143).
Yet Gurock, ibid., points out that “as the 1950s progressed, the Brooklyn Central cheerleaders’ skirts also got shorter and shorter.” (Speaking of short skirts, anyone who has looked at Modern Orthodox yeshiva high school yearbooks from the early 1970s will see that the mini-skirt craze was also tolerated at these institutions.)


Wine Strength and Dilution

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Wine Strength and Dilution
by Isaiah Cox
June 2009

Isaiah Cox trained as an historian at Princeton, and conducted postgraduate work in medieval history at King’s College London. He is also a technologist, with over 50 patents pending or issued to date. iwcox@alumni.princeton.edu

There is a common understanding among rabbonim that wines in the time of the Gemara were stronger than they are today.[1] This is inferred because we know from the Gemara that wine was customarily diluted by at least three-to-one, and as much as six-to-one, without compromising its essence as kosher wine, suitable for hagafen.  While repeated by numerous sources and rabbonim, the earliest suggestion that wines were stronger appears to be Rashi himself.[2]
[3]
In the Torah, wine is mentioned many times, though there is no mention of diluting it. The only clear reference to diluted wine in ancient Jewish sources is negative: “Your silver has become dross, your wine mixed with water.”[4] In ancient Israel, wine was preferred without water.[5]  Hashem would provide “a feast of fats, and feast of lees — rich fats and concentrated lees,”[6] ‘lees’ being shmarim, the sediment
from fermentation. Lees are the most flavorful and strong part of the wine, particularly sweet and alcoholic – more like a fortified port than a regular wine.[7]
Yet if we jump forward to the time of the Mishna and Gemara: wine was considered undrinkable unless water was added?!
In Rashi’s world, wine was drunk neat, and he concludes that wine must have been stronger in the past. We could work with this thesis, except that there is a glaring inconsistency: the Rambam a scant hundred years later shared the opinion of the Rishonim: we require wine for the Arba Kosot to be diluted “in order that the drinking of the wine should be pleasant, all according to the wine and the taste of the consumer.”[8][9] We need not believe that wine was stronger both during the time of the Gemara, and in Rambam’s day — but not for Rashi sandwiched between them.  Indeed, Rambam seems to put his finger on the nub of the issue: the preferences of the consumer.[10]
Today we drink liquors that are far more powerful than wine (distillation as we know it was not known in Europe or the Mediterranean until centuries after the Rambam): cask strength whiskies can be watered down by 4:1 and achieve the same alcoholic concentration as wine – but we like strong whiskies. Wine itself can be distilled into grappa, and we enjoy that drink without adding water. Given sweet and potent liqueurs like Drambuie, it seems quite logical that if wine could be made more alcoholic, we would enjoy it that way as well.
While the Mishnah and Gemara are clear that wine should be drunk diluted, the opinion that wine was too strong to drink came from later
commentators, writing hundreds of years later. In the Gemara itself, Rav Oshaya says that the reason to dilute wine is because a mitzvah must be done in the choicest manner.[11] Indeed, the Gemara itself seems to allow that undiluted wines were drinkable – it was just
not considered civilized behavior. A ben sorer umoreh, a rebellious son, is one who drinks wine — wine which is insufficiently diluted, as gluttons drink.[12] In other words, undiluted wine was drinkable, but it was not the civilized thing to do.
A review of the history of civilizations reveals the origin of the preference for diluting wine: Greek culture. The first mention of diluted wine in Jewish texts is found in the apocrypha: about 124 BCE, “It is harmful to drink wine alone, or again, to drink water alone, while wine mixed
with water is sweet and delicious and enhances one’s enjoyment,”[13] The source, it is critical to point out, was written in Greek, outside the land of Israel.
Greek culture and practices started being influential in the Mediterranean in the final two centuries BCE, and by the time of the Gemara, had become the dominant traditions for all “civilized” people in the known world. When the Mishna was written, for example, all educated Romans spoke Greek, and Latin had become the language of the lower classes. Greek customs were the customs of all civilized people.
And Greeks loved to dilute their wine. Earlier in the latter part of the second century Clement of Alexandria stated:
It is best for the wine to be mixed with as much water as possible. . . . For both are works of God, and the mixing of the two, both of water and wine produces health, because life is composed of a necessary element and a useful element. To the necessary element, the water, which is in the greatest quantity, there is to be mixed in some of the useful element.[14]
Today, wine is not diluted; the very thought of it is repulsive to oenophiles. But just as in Isaiah’s day diluted wine was considered poor (and concentrated dregs were considered choice), the Greeks only liked their wine watered down.[15] We have hundreds of references to diluting wine in ancient Greece through the late Roman period – ancient Greeks diluted wine that Israelites preferred straight. In Greece, wine was always diluted with water before drinking in a vase called “kratiras,” derived from the Greek word krasis, meaning the mixture of wine and water.[16]   As early as the 10th Century BCE (the same time as Isaiah), Greek hip flasks had built-in spoons for measuring the dilution. [17]  Homer, from the 8th or 9th Century BCE, mentions a ratio of 20 to 1, twenty parts water to one part wine. But while their ratios varied, the Greeks most assuredly did not drink their wine straight.[18]  To Greeks, ratios of just 1 to 1 was called “strong wine.” Drinking wine unmixed, on the other hand, was looked upon as a “Scythian” or barbarian custom. This snobbery was not based solely on rumor; Diodorus Siculus, a Greek (Sicilian) historian and contemporary of Julius Caeser, is among the many Greeks who explained that exports of wine to places like Gaul were strong in part because the inhabitants of that region, like Rashi a millennium later, liked to drink the wine undiluted. This fact leads us to an inescapable conclusion: there is no evidence that Greek wine was any stronger than that of ancient Israel, Rome, Egypt, or anywhere else. Greeks and Romans liked their wine with water. Ancient Jews and Gauls liked the very same wine straight up.[19]  We know that it was the same wine, because wine was one of the most important trade products of the ancient world, traveling long distances from vineyard to market. A major trade route went from Egypt through ancient Israel to both northern and eastern climes.[20] Patrick McGovern, a senior research scientist at the University of Pennsylvania, and one of the world’s leading ancient wine experts, believes wine-making became established in Egypt due to “early Bronze Age trade between Egypt and Palestine, encompassing modern Israel, the West Bank and Gaza, and Jordan.”[21]
[22]
By the time of the Gemara, Hellenistic cultural preferences had become so common that nobody even thought of them as “Greek” anymore; civilized people acted in this way. Rambam would no more have thought having water with wine to be a specifically Greek custom than we would consider wearing a shirt with a collar to be the contamination of our Judaism by medieval English affectations.
Another possible reason why certain peoples preferred their wine watered down[23] is that ancient wine was more likely to cause a hangover. The key triggers for a hangover are identified as follows:
1. A bad harvest. If you are drinking wine that comes from a country where a small change in the climate can make a big difference to the quality of wine (France, Germany, New Zealand), then in a bad season the wine contains many more substances that cause hangovers.
2. Drinking it too young. Almost all red wines and Chardonnay are matured in oak barrels so that they will keep and improve. If you drink this wine younger than three years there will be a higher level of nasties that can cause hangovers. If left to mature these nasties change to neutral substances and don’t cause hangovers. As a rule of thumb, wine stored in oak barrels for six months should be acceptable to drink within the first year. If the wine is stored for twelve months or more in oak barrels, it should then be aged at least four years. Some winemakers have been known to add oak chips directly into the wine to enhance flavors (especially in a weak vintage and especially in cheaper wines); this can take years to become neutral.[24]
In other words, in the ancient world, with less precise agriculture, and minimal control over fermentation – and the common consumption of young wine that was not kept in barrels, the wine was surely “stronger” in the sense that the after-effects were far more potent, meriting dilution.
We can also explain the Rashi/Rambam difference of opinion using cultural norms. Greek culture, which dominated the Mediterranen  and Babylonia for hundreds of years, ceased to be dominant in Gaul and elsewhere in Northern Europe after the decline of the Roman Empire. But in the Mediterranean, region, Greek and Roman customs remained dominant in non-Muslim circles for far longer. Rashi was in France, where the natives had never preferred their wine diluted. The Rambam was in Alexandria, where wine, made anywhere in the Mediterranean region (including Israel) had been drunk with water for a thousand years.

 

Part II
A Brief History of Wine Technology and Dilution
Wine is one of mankind’s oldest inventions; the archaeological record shows wine dating back to at least 3000 BCE, and the Torah describes Noach consciously and deliberately planting a vineyard and getting inebriated. But technology has changed a great deal since then, not always for the better. For starters, wine was always basically made the same way: crush the grapes and let them ferment. Grapes are a wondrous food, in that they collect, on their outer skins, the agents for their own fermentation. Yeast, of various kinds, settle on the exterior skin, and as soon as the skin is broken (when the grape is crushed), the yeasts mix and start to react with the sweet juice inside.
The problem is that there are thousands of different yeasts, and while some of them make fine wine, many others will make an alcoholic beverage that tastes awful.[25] Additionally, there are many bacteria that also feast on grape juice, producing a wide range of compounds that affect the taste of the finished product.
The end result, in classic wine making, was that the product was highly unpredictable. Today, sulfites (sulphur dioxide compounds) are added as the grapes are crushed, killing the native yeast and bacteria that otherwise would have fermented in an unpredictable way. Then the winemaker adds the yeast combinations of his choice, yielding a predictable, and enjoyable product. Today, virtually every wine made in the world includes added sulfites for this very reason. Adding sulfites prior to fermentation was NOT employed in the ancient world, and was only pioneered two centuries ago. There is no mention of killing the native yeast in the Gemara or in the Torah, nor of adding sulfites.
With the advent of Pasteur  in the 19th century, and a new understanding of the fermentation process and of yeasts, the process of winemaking turned from an art to a cookbook science. Wines steadily improved as winemakers learned to add sulfites and custom yeasts, leading to today’s fine wines.
Ancient
Israel and Egypt
Ancient
Greece and Early Rome
Late
Roman – medieval
Europe,
16th Century onward
Europe
19th century to present
Controlled
fermentation
Poorly understood. Unstable results.[26]
Though when wine was boiled before fermentation, it allowed for a more
controlled product.[27]
Poorly understood, with unstable results. Salt-water was often added to the must to
control fermentation.[28]
Wine cellars were sometimes fumigated prior to crushing the grapes.[29]
Grape Juice was known, and could be made to keep.[30]
Poorly understood, with unstable results. Salt-water was often added to the must to control fermentation.[31]
Wine cellars were sometimes fumigated prior to crushing the grapes.[32]
Sulfides became known, and then consciously applied.
Controlled
environments became the norm.
Storage of wine was another matter. The ancient world was better at preserving wine after it was made. In the ancient world (from Egypt through Greece and early Rome), wine was kept in amphorae.
Amphorae are earthenware vessels, typically with a small mouth on top. The amphorae were sealed with clay, wax, cork or gypsum. The
insides of the amphorae, if made of clay, were sealed with pitch, to make them airtight. It was well understood that if air got in, the wine would turn bad, and eventually to vinegar. Some amphorae were even made of glass, and then carefully sealed with gypsum, specifically to preserve the wine.

 

Wine Strength and Dilution
With proper amphorae, if the wine was good when it went into the vessel, it was quite likely to be good when it was retrieved, even if it was years later. The Egyptians and Greeks and Romans had vintage wines – wines that they could pull out of the cellar decades after it had been made.

 

But amphorae represented the pinnacle of wine storage, unmatched until the glass bottle was invented in the 19th century.
Around the time of the destruction of the Second Beis Hamikdash, the technology shifted. Barrels became prevalent[33], and remained the standard until the advent of the glass bottle in the 19th century. Barrels are made of wood, and they breathe. Without proper sealing, wine that is uncovered, untopped or unprotected by insufficient sulfur dioxide has a much shorter shelf life. Once a wine goes still (stops fermenting), it’s critical to protect it.[34]
Ancient
Israel and Egypt
Ancient
Greece and Early Rome
Late
Roman – medieval
Europe,
16th Century onward
Europe
19th century to present
Storage
Sometimes sealed amphorae; sometimes poor ones.[35]
Amphorae with good seals.[36]
Sulfur candles were sometimes used. Romans and Greeks continued to add salt
water when the wine was sealed – as well as boiling and using pitch.[37]
Sealed wine is valued.[38]
Even so, amphorae fell out of use, and were replaced with wooden barrels,
which breathe.  But  Gemara forbids sulphur in korbanos.[39]
Wooden
barrels continue.
Wine bottles are used. For the first time since the time of the Beis Hamikdash,
wine can be safely stored for a long time.
Predictability proved to be another major problem for winemakers, especially in the ancient world.
Ancient
Israel and Egypt
Ancient
Greece and Early Rome
Late
Roman – medieval
Europe,
16th Century onward
Europe
19th century to present
Predictability
of product
If the wine was good when sealed, predictability was excellent.
But sulfides were not understood well enough to make the raw product consistently drinkable.
Unpredictable.
Very much a “buyer beware” market, with no warranty, and a belief in mazal to
keep wine good.[40]
Slightly more predictable, as sulfides were sometimes used.
Very good. Storage was good, in barrels.
Excellent. Advances in understanding the role of yeast and bacteria, and the addition of
selected wine yeasts means that wine is highly predictable.
Marcus Porcius Cato (234-150 B.C.), refers to some of the problems related to the preservation of fermented wine. In Cato alludes to such problems when he speaks of the terms “for the sale of wine in jars.” One of the conditions was that “only wine which is neither sour nor musty will be sold. Within three days it shall be tasted subject to the decision of an honest man, and if the purchaser fails to have this done, it
will be considered tasted; but any delay in the tasting caused by the owner will add as many days to the time allowed the purchaser.”[41] Pliny, for example, frankly acknowledges  that “it is a peculiarity of wine among liquids to go moldy or else to turn into vinegar; and whole volumes of instructions how to remedy this have been published.”[42]
Sulfites, which are used now for fermentation and also for stored wine, were in occasional (if not consistent) use in the ancient world as well. The Gemara speaks of “sulfurating baskets,” for example.[43] It is well-documented that by 100 B.C.E. Roman winemakers often burned
sulfur wicks inside their barrels to help prevent the wine from spoiling.[44] They also sealed barrels and amphorae with sulfur compounds, with the same goal. The practise was not universal, and it was not well understood, so results varied widely. Freshly pressed grape juice has a tendency to spoil due to contamination from bacteria and wild yeasts present on the grape skins. Not only does sulfur dioxide inhibit the growth of molds and bacteria, but it also stops oxidation (browning) and preserves the wine’s natural flavor.[45] From the Romans until the 16th Century, wine preservation in the barrel was not reliably achieved; throughout the medieval and early modern period all wine was drunk young, usually within a year of the vintage.[46]… wines kept in barrels generally lasted only a year before becoming unpalatable.
In the 16th century, Dutch traders found that only wine treated with sulfur could survive the long sea voyages without it turning to vinegar. [47] 15th  century German wine laws restored the Roman practise, with the decree that sulfur candles be burned inside barrels before filling them with wine, and by the 18th century sulfur candles were regularly used to sterilize barrels in Bordeaux. The sulfur dioxide left on the container would dissolve into the wine, becoming the preservative we call sulfites. Even then, they were clever enough to realize that the sulfur addition improved wine quality.[48]
Ancient
Israel and Egypt
Ancient
Greece and Early Rome
Late
Roman – medieval
Europe,
16th Century onward
Europe
19th century to present
Shelf
life
Boiled wine lasted a long time, making storage and exports less risky, at the cost
of reduced quality.[49]
Variable, but could be excellent. Vintage wines existed, and old wines were prized.[50]
There were no corks, so wine did not breathe in storage.[51]
By the time of the Gemara, wine only 3 years old was considered very old.   Wine aged very poorly. And the Romans
abandoned the use of sulfites in wine storage.[52]
Shelf life is somewhat longer, as sulfides are rediscovered.  Bottles were introduced in the late 17th
century. Corks also come into use.
Vintage wines once again exist. Corks allow for wine to age in a bottle – the
tradeoff is that shelf life is more limited than in the ancient world.[53]
In the ancient world, wine flavorings appear to be as old as wine itself! The oldest archaeological record of wine-making shows that figs
were used in the wine as well – as we have said, wine made without benefit of sulfites, will be unpredictable at best; fig juice would sweeten the wine and make it more palatable.[54] But with all the added flavorings in the world, the process itself often led to some pretty unattractive results.
The impregnation with resin has been still preserved, with the result of making some modern Greek wines unpalatable save to the modern Greeks themselves. … Ancient wines were also exposed in smoky garrets until reduced to a thick syrup, when they had to be strained before they were drunk. Habit only it seems could have endeared these pickled and pitched and smoked wines to the Greek and Roman palates, as it has endeared to some of our own caviare and putrescent game.[55]
When Hecamede prepares a drink for Nestor, she sprinkles her cup of Pramnian wine with grated cheese, perhaps a sort of Gruyere, and flour.[56] The most popular of these compound beverages was the  (mulsum), or honey wine, said by Pliny (xiv. 4) to have been invented by Aristaeus.
Ancient
Israel and Egypt
Ancient
Greece and Early Rome
Late
Roman – medieval
Europe,
16th Century onward
Europe
19th century to present
Flavorings
Highly variable, and usually added.[57][58]
Added in copious quantities and varieties, almost surely to cover odd tastes and oxidation caused by poor manufacture and storage techniques.[59]
Cornels, figs, medlars, roses, cumin, asparagus, parsley, radishes, laurels,
absinthium, junipers, cassia, peppers, cinnamon, and saffron, with many other particulars, were also used for flavouring wines.[60]
Greeks added grated goat’s milk cheese and white barley before consumption of wine.[61]
Discriminating Romans even kept flavor packets with them when they traveled, so they could flavour wines they were served in taverns along the way.
Became less common, as it is acknowledged that flavorings were to cover failings in
the wine.
Post fermentation,
flavorings are almost never used.
Wine from a bottle is consistently more pure in the modern age than it
ever was before.
Virtually unheard of; to add a flavour to wine would be considered a gross insult to
the winemaker, and the noble grape itself.
Trade also changed greatly over time.  The ancient Mediterranean was a hotbed of trade, and wine was also shipped overland. Many wine presses and storage cisterns have been found from Mount Hermon to the Negev. Inscriptions and seals of wine jars illustrate that wine was a commercial commodity being shipped in goatskin or jugs from ports such as Dor, Ashkelon and Joppa (Jaffa). The vineyards of Galilee and Judea were mentioned then; wines with names like Sharon, Carmel and from places like Gaza, Ashkelon and Lod were famous.[62] Wine was a major export from ancient Israel.
This situation was mirrored in Greece and Rome. Wine was traded throughout the Mediterranean (it was as easy to ship wine 100 miles by
ship as it was to haul it 1 mile across land). But Roman wines were popular, and were shipped overland to Gaul and elsewhere.
In the later Roman period, the spread of winemaking inland (away from the convenient Mediterranean) meant that wines were rarely shipped far. The wine trade remained for the benefit of the very wealthy for over a thousand years, only resuming in the 16th and 17th centuries. And today, of course, the wine trade is ubiquitous, with wines available from around the world.
Grape juice was almost always fermented; before Pasteur, avoiding the fermentation of wine was not well understood, and any grape juice
that is not sulfated will ferment if yeast is added to it. Still, the concept of grape juice was understood before wine – the butler squeezed grapes directly in Pharoah’s cup, after all.  And the Gemara calls it “new wine.”[63] It certainly could be drunk then, though it was far from achieving its full potency.
Ancient
Israel and Egypt
Ancient
Greece through medieval
Europe,
16th Century onward
Europe
19th century to present
Cultural
consumption
In Israel, wine was drunk straight.  Drunkenness was discouraged; self control
praised.
Drunkenness was http://seforim.blogspot.com/2012/10/wine-strength-and-dilution.html#_ftn64″ name=”_ftnref64″ title=””>[64]
wine was consumed in large quantities.
Dilution is seen as a way to cheat the consumer; common in lower class taverns.
Social drinking is praised; wine is drunk to achieve the same buzz the Greeks
praised.
It is evident that wine was seen in ancient times as a medicine (and as a solvent for medicines) and of course as a beverage. Yet as a beverage it was always thought of as a mixed drink. Plutarch (Symposiacs III, ix), for instance, states. “We call a mixture ‘wine,’ although the larger of
the component parts is water.” The ratio of water might vary, but only barbarians drank it unmixed, and a mixture of wine and water of equal parts was seen as “strong drink” and frowned upon. The term “wine” or  oinos in the ancient world, then, did not mean wine as we understand it today but wine mixed with water. Usually a writer simply referred to the mixture of water and wine as “wine.” To indicate that the beverage was not a mixture of water and wine he would say “unmixed (akratesteron) wine.”[65]
There is some question whether or not what “wine” and “strong drink” Leviticus 10:8, 9, Deuteronomy 14:26; 29:6; Judges 13:4, 7, 14; First Samuel 1:15: Proverbs 20:1; 31:4,6: Isaiah 5:11, 22; 28:7; 29:9; 56:12; and Micah 2:11. “Strong drink” is most likely another fermented product – beer. Beer can be made from any grain, and would be contrasted with wine most obviously because it was substantially less expensive  (typically 1/5th the cost, in ancient Egypt) while still offering about the same alcohol content.[66]  (Yeast works the same way in both).
Ancient
Israel and Egypt
Ancient
Greece through medieval
Europe,
16th Century onward
Europe
19th century to present
Watered
down
Isaiah refers to watered wine perjoratively.
Greeks watered down wine, as they preferred to drink large quantities. They knew of
people who drank undiluted wine, but considered it a barbaric practise.. Wine was customarily diluted with water in a
three-to-one ratio of water to wine during Talmudic times.[67]
Still even the famously strong Falernian wines were sometimes drunk straight.[68]
Wine is not diluted, at least not in better establishments
Consumer never drinks wine known to be diluted.
Why did people water down wine? One possibility, given in Section I is that certain wines were more likely to cause a hangover. [69] The more commonly suggested solution than the presence of hangover-inducing components, is that wine served as a disinfectant for water that itself might be unsafe.
Today, we know this is true. Drinking wine makes our water safer to drink, and it also helps sanitize the food we eat at meals when we
drink wine. Living typhoid and other microbes have been shown to die quickly when exposed to wine. [70] Research shows that wine (as well as grape juice)[71], are highly effective against foodborne pathogens[72] while not significantly weakening “good” probiotic bacteria.[73]
In one study, it was shown that wine that was diluted to 40% was still effective against foodborne pathogens, and drier wines were much better at killing dangerous bacteria.
The ancients believed that wine was good for one’s health[74], even if they didn’t have the faintest idea why this was so. Microbes were only discovered in the 19th century, and ancient medicine was in many respects indistinguishable from witchcraft.  Still, it seems hard to deny that Romans and Greeks at least grasped some of the medicinal value of the grape; wines were a common ingredient in many Roman medicines.[75] And given the antibacterial powers of wine, it is obvious that a patient who drank diluted wine instead of water would be helping his body by not adding dangerous microbes when the body was already weakened by something else.
Still, the evidence remains anecdotal. The Torah does not mention wine as having medicinal benefits, though the New Testament does suggest wine as a cure for poor digestion[76] – entirely consistent with what we know about wine’s antibacterial properties. And as noted by the Jewish Encyclopedia, the Gemara reflects many of Galen’s positions on the health-giving qualities of wine:
Wine taken in moderation was considered a healthful stimulant, possessing many curative elements. The Jewish sages were wont to say, “Wine is the greatest of all medicines; where wine is lacking, there drugs are necessary” (B. B. 58b).  …  R. Papa thought that when one could substitute beer for wine, it should be done for the sake of economy. But his view is opposed on the ground that the preservation of one’s health is paramount to considerations of economy (Shab. 140b). Three things, wine, white bread, and fat meat, reduce the feces, lend erectness to one’s bearing, and strengthen the sight. Very old wine benefits the whole body (Pes. 42b). Ordinary wine is harmful to the intestines, but old wine is beneficial (Ber. 51a). Rabbi was cured of a severe disorder of the bowels by drinking apple-wine seventy years old, a Gentile having stored away 300 casks of it (‘Ab. Zarah 40b). “The good things of Egypt” (Gen. xlv. 23) which Joseph sent to his father are supposed by R. Eleazar to have included “old wine,” which satisfies the elderly person (Meg. 16b).   Until the age of forty liberal eating is beneficial; but after forty it is better to drink more and eat less (Shab. 152a). R. Papa said wine is more nourishing when taken in large mouthfuls. Raba advised students who were provided with little wine to take it in liberal drafts (Suk. 49b) in order to secure the greatest possible benefit from it. Wine gives an appetite, cheers the body, and satisfies the stomach (Ber. 35b).[77]
Others have made the bolder argument  — that the core purpose of dilution was to purify water for drinking.[78]
The ancients began by adding wine to water (to decontaminate it) and finished by adding water to wine (so that they didn’t get too drunk too quickly). A letter, written in brownish ink on a pottery shard dating from the seventh century BC, instructs Eliashiv, the Judaean commander of the Arad fortress in southern Israel, to supply his Greek mercenaries with flour, oil and wine.
The [Israel Museum in Jerusalem] exhibition’s curator, Michal Dayagi-Mendels, explains that the oil and flour were for making bread; the wine was not for keeping them happy, but for purifying brackish water. To prove her point, she displays a collection of tenth-century BC hip flasks, with built-in spoons for measuring the dosage.[79]
While the archaeological record is strong in this respect, the lack of textual support, in this author’s opinion, means that there is more evidence that wine was diluted for cultural reasons than because there was a conscious understanding that wine made water safe to drink.
Ancient
Israel and Egypt
Ancient
Greece and Early Rome
Late
Roman – medieval
Europe
19th century to present
Used for health reasons
No direct evidence
Mainstay for medicine; perceived as valuable to health
Mainstay for medicine; perceived as valuable to health
With safer water, wine not as important.
Recently, wine is prized for its resveratrol for health and longevity, instead of anti-microbial properties as previously.
[1] “Up to and including the time of the Gemara, wines were so strong that they could not be drunk without dilution…. Nowadays, our wines are not so strong, and we no longer dilute them.” Rabbi Avraham Rosenthal (link), “During the time of the Talmud, wine was very concentrated, and was normally diluted with water before drinking. “Rav Ezra Bick (link), “In Talmudic times, wine was sold in a strong, undiluted form, which only attained optimal drinking taste after being diluted with water.” Rabbi Yonason Sacks,  (link), “Records indicate that the alcohol content of wine in the ancient days was very high. Therefore, it was a common practice to dilute the wine with water in order to make it drinkable.” (link), “In ancient times, wines were powerfully strong and adding water to dilute their taste and power was common. … Pure wine, undiluted with water, is highly concentrated and difficult to drink. Rabbi Gershon Tennenbaum, (link), “In the days of the Talmud the wine was so strong and concentrated that without dilution it was not drinkable.” Zvi Akiva Fleisher, (link), “During the time of the Talmud, wine was very concentrated, and was normally diluted with water before drinking.” Rav Yair Kahn, (link), “Our wines, which are considerably weaker than those used in the days of Chazal, are better if they are not diluted.” (link)
[2] Rashi on Berachos 50b
[3] Wine naturally ferments to no more than 16% alcohol (typically 12-14%) before the alcohol kills the yeast off. Alcohol boils away at a lower temperature than water, so boiling wine does not concentrate it. And without the technology of distillation (which was not known in the ancient world), the only practical method that might have concentrated the alcohol in a wine would be to add plaster of paris; water would be absorbed, and the alcohol would be concentrated. But we have no evidence that this was done; it would have been far more than a mere flavoring. (see)
[4] Isaiah 1:22
[5] Spices and flavorings, on the other hand, were considered fit for guests and offerings: Proverbs 9:2,5 and Isaiah 65:11 both refer to wine which is “mem-samech-ches”, meaning that it has been spiced and is ready to serve. This is the best of wine, though as warned in Proverbs 23:30, such wine has dangerous side effects. This is entirely consistent with what we know of wine flavorings in the ancient world (see Part II): spices made wine more palatable, so it could more easily be consumed to excess.
[6] Isaiah 25:6
[7] Dr. Uprichard adds: Fermentation is the conversion of complex sugars, via glucose and pyruvic acid into ethanol and CO2. Natural yeasts die when the alcohol content of their culture medium (i.e. the liquid that is being produced for human consumption) exceeds a certain limit. Limit varies depending on the yeast and other factors, but is generally somewhere between 12-15% alcohol by volume. For wine to be stronger, it has to be fortified. Fortification is a process in which spirit is added to the wine. There are many fortified wines made around the world. However there are only two basic ways of fortification:
1: The Sherry Method – the must, which is a mixture of juice, pulp, skins and seeds, is fermented out, leaving a dry wine. The spirit is then added. Consequently all sherry method wines are dry to begin with. If the final style of wine is other than dry, sweetening is added prior to bottling. Sherry was invented in the 8th Century, CE.
2: The Port Method – the must is only partly fermented, and the process is stopped by the addition of sufficient spirit to prevent the yeast working. ie the alcohol content is raised to a level which kills the yeasts and leaves much of the sugar unfermented. Consequently port-method wines are generally sweet. Adding sugar will feed the process but only until the yeasts (which are effectively the enzymes in the reaction) are used up (or in this case killed off). The Rambam, who diluted wine, did NOT consider fortified wine to be suitable for Kiddush; his wine was unfortified, and undistilled, and therefore could not exceed 15-16% alcohol.
[8] Hilchot Chametz UMatzah 7:9
[9] Rambam considered young new wine (presumably only lightly fermented) to be distinctly unhealthy (see).
[10] It is clear that personal and cultural preferences remain very important when talking about whether to use wine or grape juice for Kiddush or the Arba Kossos. Rav Soloveitichik writes that if one does not enjoy wine, he should use grape juice for the Arba Kosot, as that will be a pleasant drink according to his taste.
[11] Berachos, 50b
[12] Sanhedrin 70a. The Greeks had the same standard: to drink wine diluted 1:1 was repudiated as disgraceful (see).
[13] II Maccabees 15:39
[14] Instructor II, ii, 23.3—24.1
[15] Athenaeus quotes Mnesitheus of Athens: “The gods has revealed wine to mortals, to be the greatest blessing for those who use it aright, but for those who use it without measure, the reverse. For it gives food to them that take it and strength in mind and body. In medicine it is most beneficial; it can be mixed with liquid and drugs and it brings aid to the wounded. In daily intercourse, to those who mix and drink it moderately, it gives good cheer; but if you overstep the bounds, it brings violence. Mix it half and half, and you get madness; unmixed, bodily collapse.” [Odyssey IX, 232.]
[18] Pliny (Natural History XIV, vi, 54) mentions a ratio of eight parts water to one part wine. In one ancient work, Athenaeus’s The Learned Banquet, written around A.D.  200, we find in Book Ten a collection of statements from earlier writers about drinking practices. A quotation from a play by Aristophanes reads: “‘Here, drink this also, mingled three and two.’ Demus. ‘Zeus! But it’s sweet and bears the three parts well!’”
[19] http://www.mmdtkw.org/VRomanWine.html.  Why did the Greeks enjoy diluted wine, and the Jews of ancient Israel preferred it straight?  We cannot be certain of the answer, but it is clear that the Greeks praised drinking very large quantities; it was a feature of every meal, which regularly lasted for hours. For them, wine was a necessity, and the culture rotated around its unrestrained consumption – the Greeks drank by the gallon. Undiluted wine, however, cannot be drunk by the gallon. Greeks liked to get drunk, but they wanted it to take time. Ceremonious, sociable consumption of wine was the core communal act of the Greek aristocratic system. [http://tinyurl.com/cmlsbu].
By contrast, in the Torah wine is consistently praised – in moderation. Drunkenness is never a virtue in Judaism, and the shucking off of self control and loss of inhibitions that was part and parcel of Dionysian rites is considered unacceptable to G-d fearing Jews. So wine, in full strength, was praised and consumed, but consumption for its own sake was not encouraged.
[20] Hundreds of clay jars of wine (with a total volume of some 4,500 liters (118.78 gallons) were buried with one of the first Egyptian kings, Scorpion I (about 3150 B.C.E.). Analysis of the clay shows that the jars were made in the modern Israel-Palestine region. http://www.answers.com/topic/wine-in-the-ancient-world
[22] Had there been any significant qualitative difference between wine grown in one place as opposed to another, it would be apparent by the archaeological and written records we have; the ancient Greeks, for example, spent a lot of ink writing about wine, with no mention that any wine was significantly stronger than any other.
[23] Proposed by Brian Foont
[25] As written about a modern wine that is made without sulfides: “we had an organic, ‘no sulfite added’ chardonnay on the menu. It was an amazing wine to behold. That is when it wasn’t brown and vaguely reminiscent of sewage, which was about one out of every four bottles.” http://winekulers.com/11_1_08.htm . See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yeast#Wine for more information about the process in general. Ancient wineries, lacking modern sanitation, would have had a much lower “success” rate.
[26] Egyptian wines cannot have been very stable because the grapes were picked and crushed in August, then were slowly crushed and pressed and then rapidly fermented, all in the summer heat. http://www.answers.com/topic/wine-in-the-ancient-world
[27] http://tinyurl.com/dl5ypr . Though according to oeniphiles, boiling the wine at any time destroys the flavor. Boiled wine was not allowed as a korban, though it would have led to a more predictable (if mediocre) product. Terumos 11:1 – Rabbi Yehuda, in a minority opinion, considers boiled wine to be superior.
[28] “Some people—and indeed almost all the Greeks—preserve must with salt or sea-water.” Columella, On Agriculture 12.25.1. Columella recommended the addition of one pint of salt water for six gallons of wine.
[30] Fresh must, when boiled, could have been stored in amphorae and kept sweet, and this could be the boiled wine mentioned in the Gemara. Certainly we don’t need to speculate in the case of the Romans, as http://www.biblicalperspectives.com/books/wine_in_the_bible/3.html writes: Columella gives us an informative description of how they did it: “That must may remain always as sweet as though it were fresh, do as follows. Before the grape-skins are put under the press, take from the vat some of the freshest possible must and put it in a new wine-jar; then daub it over and cover it carefully with pitch, that thus no water may be able to get in. Then sink the whole flagon in a pool of cold, fresh water so that no part of it is above the surface. Then after forty days take it out of the water. The must will then keep sweet for as much as a year.”  [Columella, On Agriculture 12, 37, 1]… This method of preserving grape juice must have been in use long before the time of Pliny and Columella, because Cato (234-149 B.C.) mentions it two centuries before them: “If you wish to keep grape juice through the whole year, put the grape juice in an amphora, seal the stopper with pitch, and sink in the pond. Take it out after thirty days; it will remain sweet the whole year.” [Marcus Cato, On Agriculture 120, 1.]
[31] “Some people—and indeed almost all the Greeks—preserve must with salt or sea-water.” Columella, On Agriculture 12.25.1.
[33] Barrels have many advantages: they are less expensive and less prone to breakage; they stack and roll, and generally allow for easier transportation. The downside of a shortened shelf life for the wine was apparently considered an acceptable price to pay for these advantages.
[35] In Egypt, the clay jars were slightly porous (unless they were coated with resin or oil), which would have led to a degree of oxidation. There was no premium on aging wine here, and there are records of wine going bad after twelve to eighteen months. http://www.answers.com/topic/wine-in-the-ancient-world
[36] Jeremiah 48:11, Moab is compared to a container of fine wine that is not disturbed: “therefore its taste has stayed in it, and its scent was not diminished.” Unsealed wine in the ancient world was known to lose its essence.
[38] The foster-mother of Abaye is authority for the statement that a six-measure cask properly sealed is worth more than an eight-measure cask that is not sealed (B. ‑3. 12a)
[39] John Kitto’s Cyclopedia of Biblical Literature says: “When the Mishna forbids smoked wines from being used in offerings (Manachoth,
viii. 6, et comment.), it has chiefly reference to the Roman practice of fumigating them with sulphur, the vapor of which absorbed the oxygen, and thus arrested the fermentation. The Jews carefully eschewed the wines and vinegar of the Gentiles.” But presumably smoked wines were acceptable for consumption, even if not for offerings?
[40] Rab said that for three days after purchase the seller is responsible if the wine turns sour; but after that his responsibility ceases. R. Samuel declared that responsibility falls upon the purchaser immediately upon the delivery of the wine, the rule being “Wine rests on the owner’s shoulders.” R. ‑Hiyya b. Joseph said, “Wine must share the owner’s luck” (B. B. 96a, b, 98a). If one sells a cellarful of wine, the purchaser must accept ten casks of sour wine in every hundred (Tosef., B. B. vi. 6).
[41] On Agriculture, Chapter 148. http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Cato/De_Agricultura/J*.html .  Cato shares the opinion of Rav: “For three days after purchase the seller is responsible if the wine turns sour; but after that his responsibility ceases.” B. B. 96a.
[43] Berachos 27b, line 14.
[46] Wine and the Vine: An Historical Geography of Viticulture and the Wine Trade Tim Unwin
[47] http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fg20040813wc.html . Even snakes could recognize the dropoff in quality– only boiled wine, if it
were left uncovered, could be drunk the next morning (Avodah Zarah 30a).
[49] Yerushalmi, on Terumos 11:1 notes that cooked wine is inferior in quality to uncooked wine, but is superior in the sense that it lasts longer.
[50] “The good things of Egypt” (Gen. xlv. 23) which Joseph sent to his father are supposed by R. Eleazar to have included “old wine,” which satisfies the elderly person (Meg. 16b). At the great banquet given by King Ahasuerus the wine put before each guest was from the province whence he came and of thevintage of the year of his birth (Meg. 12a). In Rome, wines were preferred to  aged anywhere from 10 to 25 years. In fact, the Emperor Caligula was once presented with a 160 year old vintage that was considered a supreme treat. http://penelope.uchicago.edu/~grout/encyclopaedia_romana/wine/wine.html
[51] Vintage wines of the ancient world were lost when sealed amphorae were replaced with wooden barrels at the end of the second century, AD (Techernia, 1986), and their reappearance had to await the development in the 17th century of glass bottles stoppered with cork. From “Wine and the Vine: An Historical Geography of Viticulture and Wine Trade”
[52] If William Younger is to be believed, the Romans had entirely abandoned sulfites by the end of their millenium of winemaking. http://www.winecrimes.com/winecrimes/
[53] Singer, Holmyard, Hall et cie “History of Technology”
[55] http://chestofbooks.com/food/beverages/Drinks-Of-The-World/Roman-Wines.html
[57] To prevent wine from becoming acid, moldy, or bad-smelling a host of preservatives were used such as salt, sea-water, liquid or solid pitch, boiled-down must, marble dust, lime, sulphur fumes or crushed iris.
[58] The aroma, taste and texture of Egyptian wines are lost to us, but in any case the wine was often flavored with herbs and spices before being consumed. [http://www.answers.com/topic/wine-in-the-ancient-world]
[59] (1) “alun‑mit,” made of old wine, with a mixture of very clear water and balsam; used especially after bathing (Tosef., Dem. i. 24; ‘Ab. Zarah 30a); (2) “‑3afrisin” (caper-wine, or, according to Rashi, Cyprus wine), an ingredient of the sacred incense (Ker. 6a); (3) “yen ‑ìimmu‑3in” (raisin-wine); (4) “inomilin,” wine mixed with honey and pepper (Shab. xx. 2; ‘Ab. Zarah l.c.); (5) “ilyoston”, a sweet wine (“vinum dulce”) from grapes dried in the sun for three days, and then gathered and trodden in the midday heat (Men. viii. 6; B. B. 97b); (6) “me’ushshan,” from the juice of smoked or fumigated sweet grapes (Men. l.c.); not fit for libation; (7) “enogeron,” a sauce of oil and garum to which wine was added; (8) “api‑3‑mewizin,” a wine emetic, taken before a meal (Shab. 12a); (9) “‑3undi‑mon” (“conditum”), a spiced wine (‘Ab. Zarah ii. 3); (10) “pesinti‑mon” (“absinthiatum”), a bitter wine (Yer. ‘Ab. Zarah ii. 3);
[63] Rabbi Hanina B. Kahana answers the question: “How long is it called new wine?” by saying, “As long as it is in the first stage of fermentation . . . and how long is this first stage? Three days.” Sanhedrin 70a.
[64] The Greeks were aware of the results of excessive consumption of wine, and it was recommended that wine be diluted with water in order to avoid this. It was also seen as socially stigmatizing to drink undiluted wine, and this was often seen as “a habit confined to barbarians”. The Romans were also well aware of the results of drunkenness, and Pliny’s famous comment “in vino verias” is not to be a disinterested observation, but a chastisement of those who “do not keep to themselves words that will come back to them through a slit in their throat.” [http://www.mta.ca/faculty/humanities/classics/Course_Materials/CLAS3051/Food/Wine.html]
[66] Beer is typically less alcoholic than wine; typical brewing yeast cannot survive at alcohol concentrations above 12% by volume. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beer Wine can run to 15-16%.
[67] R. Eliezer says “boreh pri hagefen” is pronounced only when the wine has been properly mixed with water.
[68] Catullus wrote: Postumia more tipsy than the tipsy grape. But water, begone, away with you, water, destruction of wine, and take up abode with scrupulous folk. This is the pure Thyonian god. [http://ammonastery.wordpress.com/2008/03/16/wine-le-vin/ ] . Falernian wines were as strong as fifteen or sixteen percent alcohol. http://penelope.uchicago.edu/~grout/encyclopaedia_romana/wine/wine.html
[69] Proposed by Brian Foont
[70] http://tinyurl.com/cnzwes [The Origins and Ancient History of Wine By Patrick McGovern, Stuart James Fleming, Solomon H. Katz]
[71] Grape juice and wine are much more beneficial to health than beer with the same alcohol content – other properties of the grape, even before fermentation, are good for people. This means that diluted grape juice (and boiled grape juice or wine) also had health benefits even without alcohol.
[72] such as Helicobacter pylori, Listeria monocytogenes, Escherichia coli O157:H7, Salmonella Typhimurium and Shigella boydii,
[74] A passage in the Hippocratic writings from the section “regimen in Health” draws upon this basic assumption: “Laymen…should in winter…drink as little as possible; drink should be wine as undiluted as possible…when spring comes, increase drink and make it very diluted…in summer…the drink diluted and copious.” [http://www.mta.ca/faculty/humanities/classics/Course_Materials/CLAS3051/Food/Wine.html – Hippocrates dates from 400 BCE] Drugs such as horehound, squills, wormwood, and myrtle-berries, were introduced to wine to produce hygienic effects.
[75] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Rome_and_wine The Romans believed that wine had both healing and destructive powers. It could heal the mind from depression, memory loss and grief as well as the body from various ailments-including bloating, constipation, diarrhea, gout, halitosis, snakebites, tapeworms, urinary problems and vertigo. Cato wrote extensively on the medical uses of wine, including espousing a recipe for creating wine that could aid as laxative by using grapes whose vines were treated to a mixture of ashes, manure and hellebore. He wrote that the flowers of certain plants like juniper and myrtle could be soaked in wine to help with snakebites and gout. Cato believed that a mixture of old wine and juniper, boiled in a lead pot could aid in urinary issues and that mixing wines with very acidic pomegranates would cure tapeworms.[23]
The 2nd century AD Greco-Roman physician Galen provides several details about how wine was used medicinally in later Roman times. In Pergamon, Galen was responsible for the diet and care of the gladiator. He made liberal use of wine in his practice and boasted that not a single gladiator died in his care. For wounds, he would bath them in wine as an antiseptic. He would also use wine as analgesic for surgery. When Galen became the physician of Emperor Marcus Aurelius, he worked on developed pharmaceutical drugs and concoctions made from wine known as theriacs. The abilities of the these theriacs developed superstitious beliefs that lasted till the 18th century and revolved around their “miraculous” ability to protect against poisons and cure everything from the plague to mouth sores. In his work De Antidotis, Galen notes the trend of Roman tastes from thick, sweet wines to lighter, dry wines that were easier to digest.[14]
[76] Paul commands Timothy to use alcohol with his water due to his frequent illness (1 Timothy 5:23). Evidently Timothy had been drinking only water, and that was causing sickness.
[78] Inhibitory activity of diluted wine on bacterial growth: the secret of water purification in antiquity, International Journal of Antimicrobial Agents, Volume 26, Issue 4, Pages 338-340 P.Dolara, S.Arrigucci, M.Cassetta, S.Fallani, A.Novelli


?להשתכר על ידי יין בפורים, זו מצוה או עבירה

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להשתכר על ידי יין בפורים, זו מצוה או עבירה?

נכתב ע”י משה צוריאל

Editor’s Note: Rabbi Moshe Zuriel’s latest book, Le-Sha’ah u-le-Dorot (two volumes) has just appeared. At over 800 pages, it deals with all sorts of Torah matters, both halakhah and hashkafah.

פסקו רבותינו: “חייב איניש לבסומי בפוריא עד דלא ידע בין ארור המן לברוך מרדכי” (שו”ע או”ח סימן תרצ”ה, סעיף ב’). העיר עליו רמ”א: “ויש אומרים דאינו צריך להשתכר כל כך, אלא ישתה יותר מלימודו [מהרגלו] ויישן. ומתוך שיישן אינו יודע בין ארור המן לברוך מרדכי”. בדורנו ישנם כמה אברכים צעירים הבוחרים להיות שיכורים ממש. אצל חלק מהם אין הפסד גדול בדבר, אבל אצל הרבה מתחילים הם לומר שטויות ויש המתחילים לצעוק ברחובות. יש המקיאים מאכל שבמעיהם לעיני הרואים, ויש הנופלים ברחובות מפני מעידת רגליהם. חילול השם בדבר הוא רב. באנו כאן לברר בעזרת ה’ אם דעת רבותינו נוחה מכך, ונביא סקירה מן גדולי הראשונים והאחרונים (ולא לפי סדרי זמניהם). [א’] ראשית יש להבחין מה פירוש מלה זו “לבסומי”. יש בארמית שתי מילים עבור מי שמושפע נפשית ושכלית מהיין. השיכור “שכרותו של לוט” עד שאיננו מבין מה נעשה איתו, נקרא “רויא” כלשון “שבקיה לרויא דמנפשיה נפיל” (שבת לב ע”א) והוא לשון מקרא “למען ספות הרוה” (דברים כ”ט, י”ח). עיין רשימה גדולה ב”ערוך השלם” (קוהוט) ערך: ר”ו. לעומתו “בסם” הוא מלשון פרסית, ענינה “משתה ושמחה” (ע”פ הערוך), אבל טרם הגיע לאיבוד החושים. אמנם בלשון הקודש יש רק מלה אחת המתארת שני המצבים והיא “שיכור”. אמנם כיצד מחלקים ביניהם? ע”י תוספת המלים “הגיע לשכרותו של לוט” או “לא הגיע לשכרותו של לוט” (עירובין סה ע”א). ולכן רש”י (על מגילה ז ע”ב ד”ה ואיבסום) לא חילק ביניהם וכתב “נשתכרו”, אבל הדיוק בגמרא הוא “לבסומי” ולא כתוב “למרוי”, כלומר התכוונו לדרגא החלשה יותר. הביאור היקר הזה למדנו מדברי “קרבן נתנאל” על הרא”ש (מסכת מגילה פרק א’, ס”ק י) הכותב: “לא קאמר כאן מחייב למרוי, דהתרגום של “וישכר בתוך אהלו” [אצל נח] הוא רוי. אבל הכוונה שמחויב להיטיב לבו ע”י שתיית יין. עד דלא ידע, זהו עד ולא עד בכלל”. עד כאן לשונו. [אמנם רש”י על מגילה ז ע”ב כתב מלה אחת “להשתכר”, כי בלשון הקודש אין לנו הבדלי ניב בין בסומי לבין רויא]. [ב’] וכן כתב ספר של”ה (“שני לוחות הברית”) בסוף פרשת תצוה (מהד’ אמשטרדם, דף שכ”ט ע”ב): “יש לדקדק דקדוק הלשון שאמר ‘חייב לבסומי’. כי השכרות הגדול אינו נקרא ‘בסומי’, רק ‘מבוסם’ נקרא מי שאינו שיכור כל כך. על כן אני אומר שאדרבה, מאמרם זה הזהירנו באזהרה שלא (נשכר) [נשתכר] כל כך, רק חייב איניש להשאר מבוסם”. עד כאן לשונו. [ג’] ובאמת אחרי שפרשנים הללו האירו את עינינו בהבנת מלת “לבסומי”, אפשר כי גם ר’ יוסף קארו הבין גם הוא כך. כי בפירושו “בית יוסף” על הטור (סימן תרצ”ה) שכידוע שימש בסיס לדברי השו”ע שהוא רק קיצור מדבריו בבית יוסף, כתב: “וכתב הר”ן בשם רבינו אפרים דמההוא עובדא דקם רבה בסעודת פורים ושחט לר’ זירא (מגילה ז ע”ב) אידחי ליה מימרא דרבא, ולא שפיר דמי למיעבד הכי. [תוספת המעתיק: ובמיוחד שהרי לשנה הבאה כאשר רבה הזמין את ר’ זירא שוב לבוא לסעודתו, ר’ זירא סירב באומרו “לא בכל שעתא ושעתא מתרחיש ניסא” ובזה הגמרא מסיימת את הנידון. כדלהלן בשם הב”ח]. [ד’] כותב על זה הב”ח שם: “והנכון מה שכתב הרב הגדול רבינו אפרים דמהך עובדא דשחטיה רבה לר’ זירא אידחייא ליה מימרא דרבא, ולאו שפיר למיעבד הכי. וכן כתב בעל המאור והר”ן משמו. ונראה דמהך טעמא סידר בעל התלמוד להך עובדא דרבה ור’ זירא בתר מימרא דרבא, למימרא דהכי הוי הלכתא ולדחויי לרבא. ומיהו דוקא לבסומי עד דלא ידע בין ארור המן לברוך מרדכי, הוא דדחינן לה. אבל מיהו צריך לשתות הרבה מלימודו שייטב לבו במשתה”]. [ה’] וכדברי הב”ח כתב “שבלי הלקט” (סי’ רא). וממשיך “בית יוסף” שם: ב”ארחות חיים” (לר’ יונתן לוניל, הל’ פורים אות לח כתב) חייב אינש לבסומי בפוריא, לא שישתכר, שהשכרות איסור גמור, ואין לך עבירה גדולה מזו, שהוא גורם לגלוי עריות ושפיכת דמים וכמה עבירות זולתן. אך שישתה יותר מלימודו [מההרגל שלו] קצת” עכ”ל “בית יוסף” וכנראה בזה סיכום דעתו כי לא הביא דיעה נגדית. ובכן בעל כרחנו כך היתה כוונתו גם במה שכתב בשולחן ערוך, “ביסומי” ולא “שכרות”. [ו’] וכדברי “ארחות חיים” כתב ג”כ בעל “המאורות” (על מגילה ז’). [ז’] וכן כתב כלשון זו ה”כל בו”. [ח’] והעתיק הדברים הנ”ל “אליהו רבה” (על אורח חיים, סימן תרצ”ה)

[ט’] וכן כתב המאירי (על מגילה ז’, ע”ב) “ומכל מקום אין אנו מצווים להשתכר ולהפחית עצמנו מתוך השמחה, שלא נצטוינו על שמחה של הוללות ושל שטות אלא בשמחה של תענוג שיגיע מתוכה לאהבת השם יתברך והודאה על הנסים שעשה לנו”. [י’] ומפורש כתב “חיי אדם” (הלכות פורים) “ואמנם היודע בעצמו שיזלזל אז במצוה מן המצוות, בנטילת ידיים וברכה וברכת המזון או שלא יתפלל מנחה או מעריב או שינהוג קלות ראש, מוטב שלא ישתכר”. [י”א] ודבריו הובאו ב”ביאור הלכה” (“משנה ברורה”, סי’ צ”ה, ד”ה עד דלא ידע). [י”ב] והעתיק הדברים “קיצור שולחן ערוך” לר’ שלמה גנצפריד (קמב ס”ק ו). [י”ג] וכן כתב תוכחות קשות על המצב המופרז בימיו “מטה משה” (ר’ משה, תלמידו של מהרש”ל, בס”ק תתריב) “עד כי נדמה לרוב המון [עם] שבימים אלו הותר לכל אדם לפרוק עול תורה ומצוות, וכל המרבה להיות משוגע הרי זה משובח. וכל זה בלי ספק רע ומר והוא עון פלילי, כי לא הותר לנו רק שמחה, לא שחוק וקלות ראש” עכ”ל. [וכל הלשון הזו הועתקה ע”י ספר של”ה (סוף ענייני פורים), גם העתיק הביטוי “נדמה לרוב המון וכו’ וכל המרבה להיות משוגע הרי זה משובח” (דף רס”א). [י”ד] דעת הרמב”ם. הזכרנו כבר שהרמ”א פסק שהמצוה היא שישתה קצת יין ויירדם, ובזמן שינתו איננו מבחין בין “ארור המן” ל”ברוך מרדכי”. מה המקור לדבריו? הרמב”ם (הל’ מגילה, פ”ב הט”ו) שכתב: “ושותה יין עד שישתכר וירדם בשכרותו”. מפני מה הרמב”ם הוסיף שתי המלים האחרונות הללו? והרי אינן כתובות בגמרא? אלא בא לבטל פרשנות מוטעית שהכוונה שיכור בשכרותו של לוט (עיין דברים נמרצים נגד השכרות במורה נבוכים, חלק ג’, פרק ח’). אלא כוונת חז”ל שילך לישון, ובמשך זמן שינתו אינו מבחין בין מרדכי להמן. זהו ביאור לשון מליצית של חז”ל “עד דלא ידע”. ומכאן העתיק רמ”א. [והגאון ר’ עובדיה יוסף בספרו “חזון עובדיה” (על הלכות פורים, עמ’ קע”ה) מביא מהספר “סנסן ליאיר”, עמ’ קכא שהמלה “פוריא” היא “מטה” (בבא מציעא כג ע”ב). כלומר “חייב לבסומי בפוריא להיות מבוסם על מיטתו, ואז יירדם]. [ט”ו] גם הגר”א סבור שאין להשתכר כפשוטו. בביאורו לשו”ע (או”ח סימן תרצ”ה) מבאר את המצוה “עד דלא ידע” רוצה לומר [שלא ידע להבחין על מה יש להודות יותר] בין נקמת המן לבין גדולת מרדכי. והוא מה שאמרו (ברכות לג ע”א) גדולה נקמה שניתנה בין שתי אותיות [שמות קודש]. ואמרו גדולה דעה [שניתנה בין ב’ שמות קודש]. וכיון שניטלה דיעה, לא ידע”. כלומר יש כאן הבחנה במחשבת ישראל אם לשמוח על החיובי או על השלילי. היהודי האמיתי שמח מאוד על ביעור הרשעות, ויש בזה כבוד שמים, כדלהלן. כך כותב הגר”א בביאורו לספרא דצניעותא (תחילת פרק ב’, עמ’ י”ז-י”ח): “וענין הכבוד [של הקב”ה] כאשר נכפין כל הדינים, והרשעים כָלים [כ’ מנוקדת קמץ], ושמו מתגדל בעולם כמ”ש ‘הראיני נא את כבודך וכו’ (שמות ל”ג, י”ח) ויעבור ה’ על פניו וכו’ הנה אנכי כורת ברית, נגד כל עמך אעשה נפלאות’ (שמות ל”ד, י’). וכן בקריעת ים סוף וכו’ ‘ואכבדה בפרעה ובכל חילו’ (שמות י”ד, ד’) וכו’. וכן לעתיד לבוא וכו’ ונאמר ‘תכבדני חיית השדה וכו’ (ישעיה מ”ג, כ’). [תוספת המעתיק: שיאכלו את הפגרים של גוג ומגוג שבאו להתגרות בישראל]. והגידו את כבודי בגוים’ (ישעיה ס”ו, י”ט). כי לי תכרע כל בֶרֶך (ישעיה מ”ה, כ”ג). ועוד ‘והתגדִלתי והתקדִשתי לעיני גוים רבים” (יחזקאל ל”ח, כ”ג). והכל שהרשעים כָלים וכו’ לאכפייא דינין”. עד כאן לשון הגר”א. וכמו כן יתרו שהיה גר חדש לא ידע לשמוח על טביעת המצרים בים סוף. כתוב “ויחד ישראל על כל הטובה אשר עשה ה’ לישראל, אשר הצילו מיד מצרים” (שמות י”ח, ט’). הלא משה סיפר לו בפסוק הקודם גם את השלילה: “את כל אשר עשה ה’ לפרעה ולמצרים” (י”ח, ח’). ולמה יתרו לא שמח גם על הרעה שהגיעה למצריים הרודפים? (עיין שם רש”י י”ח, ט’). גם בעלי דעת שלימה ידעו לשמוח על זה. וברור שהבחנה זו בחסדי ה’ עלינו בהגדלתו של מרדכי הצדיק, ומפלתו של המן הרשע, על איזה מהם יש להתפאר יותר. עיון כזה נהיה מטושטש אפילו בשתייה מועטת של יין, ולזה אמרו חז”ל כי די בבסומי ולא צריכים להגיע לשכרותו של לוט. הרי לפנינו שהגר”א שולל שכרות גמורה. אחרת לא היה צריך להביא דברי פרשנות לגמרא דווקא כאן במקום שייעודו לציין לדברי הלכה למעשה בשו”ע. [טז] גם הגאון ר’ אפרים מרגליות (“יד אפרים” על גליון השו”ע או”ח סי’ תרצ”ה) כתב “אין לו להשתכר יותר מדאי, שיתבלבל דעתו ולא יכיר בתוקף הנס כלל. “עד דלא ידע” הוא עד ולא עד בכלל. ומן הגבול הזה והלאה הוא ביטול כוונת חיוב שחייבו חכמים. וכו’ ויש לבסומי רק עד הגבול הזה, ולא יעבור”. אבל לנגדנו עומדים פשטות דברי אריז”ל, שיש להיות שיכור גמור (“שער הכוונות”, ח”ב עמ’ שלב-שלג) לברך את הניצוץ של קדושה שיש בתוך המן “אחר שהוא שיכור ויצא מדעתו”. וזאת היא תמיהה גדולה. אבל כאשר נעיין בגוף הטכסט ניווכח כי אין אלו דברי אריז”ל עצמו. דברי אריז”ל עצמו מסתיימים ארבע פסקאות לפני זה (סוף טור הימני) שם כתוב “עד כאן הגיעו דרושי הרב זלה”ה”. ובהערה בתחתית הדף כתב המעתיק הרב שמואל ויטאל כי רק עד כאן העתיק דברי אריז”ל. ובכן מי הוא המחבר של המשך הדברים, שם כתוב שיש לאדם לצאת מדעתו ממש? אין מנוס מהמסקנה כי אלו הם דברי דרשן אחד שהוסיף הדברים על דברי אריז”ל. במהדורת “שער הכוונות” הקדמון (דף קט סוף ע”ב) כתוב שהם דברי ר’ יעקב ישרוליג”א, לא של אריז”ל. נוסיף לטיעוננו שיש בדבר חילול השם נורא כאשר אברך או רב הידועים לעיני שכניהם וקרובים בציבור הישראלי כמציגים ארחות התורה, אם יהיו שיכורים אין לך בוז וקלסה לתורה יותר מזה. ובמציאות החיים מכירים אנו כי כל הרבנים הגדולים, בין בני פלג הליטאים ובין גדולי אדמורי”ם וכן מקבוצות בני המזרח, אינם משתכרים בפורים. וגם בדורות שהיו לפנינו, לא נודע על מי מהרבנים המפורסמים שהשתכר ממש. גם מה שכותב ר’ יעקב עמדין (בביאורו לסידור תפילות, מהדורת אשכול, חלק ב’, עמ’ תקנ”ח) ששמע מאחרים שאביו ה”חכם צבי” היה מקיים בצעירותו מצוה זו כפשוטה, מזה עצמו יש ראיה לשלול התנהגות זו. כי למה הפסיק אח”כ לנהוג כך כל ימיו? אלא ודאי כי ראה “חכם צבי” שיש הפסד בדבר. כיון שלכל הפחות ששה עשר מגדולי הפוסקים (כפי שפירטנו לעיל) שוללים שכרות גמורה, עלינו ללכת בעקבותיהם. יש לערוך בכל דבר חשבון של ריווח והפסד, ובמיוחד בדבר שיש בו חילול בשם. “אחד שוגג ואחד מזיד בחילול השם” (אבות, פרק ד’).



Review of a Recent work of Rav Zvi Hirsch Grodzinsky

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Review of a Recent work of Rav Zvi Hirsch Grodzinsky

By: Eliezer Brodt

בית היין, על הלכות יין נסך עם ביאור קונדיטון, יצא לאור לראשונה מכתב יד, מאת הגאון רבי צבי הירש גראדזענסקי זצ”ל, מאנסי ניו יורק תשע”א, ש”ט עמודים.

In this post I would like to discuss an unknown Gaon – Rav Zvi Hirsch Grodzinsky, and a recently published manuscript of his on Hilchos Yayin Nessech. Not much is known about him except for what has been collected in a very nice article about him written by Jonathan Rosenbaum and Myron Wakschlag, “Maintaining Tradition: A survey of the Life and Writings of Rabbi Zvi Hirsch Grodzinsky,” AJH 82:14 (1994), pp. 263-288 which was of help to me when writing this post. R. Hirsch Grodzinsky was born in Lithuania in the year 1857. He was an older cousin of the famous Gadol Hador, Rabbi Chaim Ozer, and he learned by R. Chaim Ozer’s father for a few years. It is interesting to see what he writes about his younger cousin R’ Chaim Ozer:

ואת הגאון ר’ חיים עוזר ז”ל הייתי מכיר אותו מימי ילדותו… וכבר הכרנו אז הכשרונות של הילד הזה ר’ חיים עוזר ז”ל שעתיד להיות גדול בשיראל… (מקראי קודש, ג, הקדמה עמ’ 6).

In 1891 he moved to Omaha, Nebraska where he served as the Rav until he died in 1947 (and was known as Rabbi Henry Grodzinski). It is unclear why he chose to move so far out in the US rather than to a major Jewish center like New York City; perhaps it was so that he would be able to devote most of his time to his own learning rather than the pastoral duties of a rabbi in a large Jewish community. Evidently, this great gaon moved to the United States for parnassah, and is it perhaps due to this move he is basically unknown today. Had he remained in Europe he would likely have been better known and appreciated (but, of course, probably not with a peaceful end).


R. Grodzinsky was a prolific writer who authored many works on numerous topics. His first work, printed in 1898 was called Mikvei Yisrael, an in-depth work on Hilchos Mikvaos. He received haskamahs on this first work from various gedolim, among them R. Yitzchack Elchanan Spektor, (it is not established with certainty, but he might have even had semicha from him. According to one report R. Ephraim Oshry said that it was accepted as fact in the Litvishe yeshivos that R. Zvi Hirsch Grodzinsky had semicha from R. Yitzchak Elchanan). Either way, he was a great admirer of R. Yitzchak Elchanan, as he writes an incredible description about him in the introduction of his work on Hilchos Kriyas Hatorah, Mikroei Kodesh

לא כן רבותינו הרבנים והגאונים שהיו בדור שלפני דור זה, המה היו… ודעתם וסרותיהם הרחבה היה להלכה ברורה בכל מקצועות התורה בכל חלקי השלחן ערוך, כמו מרן הגאון האמתי רשכבה”ג מהרי”א זצ”ל אבד”ק קאוונא, שהיה ראשית דבר רב… בעל הוראה בכל ד’ חלקי השלחן ערוך, כבח”מ ואה”ע, כן בש”ע או”ח וי”ד כבש”ך וסמ”ע כן במג”א ופרמ”ג כבקצות ונתיבות, כן בחו”ד ודה”ח וח”א, כל רז לא אנס ליה, ומי כמוהו מורה ממנו יצא אורה בכל מקצועת התורה דבר קטן ודבר גדול, כמו בעניני עגונה כן בה’ ציצית ותפלין וקה”ת כו’, הכל גלוי וידוע לפני כסא כבודו מראשונים עד אחרון שבאחרונים, הוא היה בר סמכא, לסמוך על הוראותיו האמתי בכל הפרטים… פנו אליו בשאלות וספיקות לדינא בכל מקצעות התורה, ועל כולם השיב כהלכה לקטן ולגדולן גם לעת זקנותו… (מקראי קודש, ג, הקדמה עמ’ 5).

In 1916 he printed another work called Likutei Tzvi. In 1923 he printed another work called Mili Debrochos which is on part of Masseches Berachos (part two of this work was printed later). In 1936 he began printing his massive, three volume Mikraei Kodesh on Hilchos Kriyas Hatorah which he completed in 1941. This work is exceptional in both its breadth and depth. There are other important books on this topic from great gedolim such as the Chida and R. Ephraim Zalman Margolis, but none compare to this work. His later works do not have haskamos, as he writes against them in the introduction to the third volume of his Mikraei Kodesh.

ועתה בעו”ה נוהגין המחברים באמעריקא מנהג יפה מאד… לקבל הסכמה על חיבוריהם מהאי הדיוט בעל הלשון… דמיום שחרב בית המקדש גברו בעלי הלשון, ואל תהי הסכמת ההדיוט קלה בעינך ובדין הוא משום דלפנים היו מחברים ספרים בשביל ת”ח והיו צריכין להסכמת ת”ח הגדול בדורו, אך עתה במדינתנו שרוב המחברים מחברים ספריהם בשביל הדיוטים, לכן צריכין ליקח הסכמה ג”כ מהדיוט גדול, ובזכות זה יזכו שההדיוטים יקפצו לקנות חבוריהם ויראו שכר לעמלם, אשרי שככה לו, ואשרי הדור שיפתח בדורו כשמואל בדורו.

He left behind many complete manuscripts on different topics. After he died in 1947 his manuscripts were taken to Mechon Otzar Haposkim in Eretz Yisrael. Unfortunately almost nothing of his was printed except for a few teshuvos of his in various Torah Journals.[1] A few months ago a complete manuscript was printed, the Beis Hayayin, a complete work on Hilchos Yayin Nessech. This volume was published by Shalom Jacob, who has put out important and special works in the past (see here). The production of this work was a truly beautiful job. The work consists of two parts; the top is the Halachos in short, and the bottom part is called Kunditon. In the Kunditon, R. Grodzinsky goes through all the sources of each Halacha, starting from the Gemarah and going forward through the sugyos with the Rishonim and Acharonim. A small section was added by the editor at the bottom of each page called Mekorei Habayis which adds some additional sources and quotes related to the topics in the Kunditon section. The print and paper is beautiful, including small summaries on the side of each piece, making it a pleasure to use. Besides for these, there is an extremely thorough index of the work. To mention some of the interesting side points in this work; R. Grodzinski has a nice discussion of the way wine was made in the U.S. in his time (p. 42-43), as he was a rav hamachshir, he traveled to wine companies in California, to check out the exact way they made the wine. Another important piece is a lengthy discussion of the various levels of Mechalelei Shabbos in the U.S. (pp. 31-32, 190) in his time. This discussion gives us a sad but realistic glimpse of the level of American Jewish observance in those times. He writes that there were three categories; one group that came with the full intention of remaining frum, but due to the parnassah problem were forced to work on Shabbos, virtually having no other choice. This group he says, was very disturbed about having to be mechalel shabbos and whatever was not related to parnassah they were careful to observe the prohibitions. This group has a din of an oness. A second category were people who though initially forced to work on Shabbos due to parnassah issues kept on working on even when they became wealthy. Though they kept Shabbos in their homes, they do not have a din of an oness. The third category was people who besides working on Shabbos for parnassah never bothered to keep anything of Shabbos in their homes. These people, he writes, are the worst level of the three.
Another piece of interest to me was how he suggests a textual change in the girsa of a Yerushlami (p. 155). He is not one that is fast to do so in general, as a bit later where he quotes the Shach saying that there was a printing mistake, he goes out of his way to show that there is no need to suggest such a thing (p. 162). Another particular piece of interest for me was his using a piece of Rabbenu Chananel, from the fairly recently (in his time) printed manuscript on Avoda Zara (p. 54). There are two reasons why I found this interesting. One, in the journal Yeshurun (v. 2, pp. 202-205) there is a teshuva of his in regard to the custom of standing when the ba’al keriah recites the Aseres Hadibros (see here for more on this minhag). Someone had shown him a newly printed manuscript of the Shu”t Ha-Rambam who said it is improper to stand. R. Grodzinsky writes:

כי תשובות המיוחס להרמב”ם ז”ל לא נמצא אצלי ומעולם לא ראיתיו. רק פעם אחד הביא אלי השו”ב מק”ב את תשובות הנ”ל וראיתי כי נמצא שם כמה דברים הסותרים למ”ש הרמב”ם בספרו הגדול משנה תורה. ולבי אומר לי כי כמה דברים הנמצא שם ע”ש הרמב”ם הוא לא אמת רק איזה תלמיד טועה כתבם ויחסו ע”ש הרמב”ם ע”ד שאמרו חז”ל אם בקשת וכו’ התלה באילן גדול…

From this piece I generalized that he was opposed to “new rishonim” and the like. However, from this work I see it was not the case, or so simple, as he used the newly printed Rach. It is important to note that the Chazon Ish was against using the Rach[2] as he writes:

“וכן ראיתי בל’ ר”ח הנדפס בדפוס ראם, אבל לא ידענא אם אפשר לסמוך על הנדפסין מחדש שכבר הפסיקה המסורה בינינו, ואין אנו יודעין מי המה המעתיקים, שמלאכת ההעתקה כבדה מאד, ואף על ידי זריזין ומדקדקים מצוי ט”ס הרבה, ואם יעבור הדבר ע”י איזה רפיון בדקדוק הדברים יכול הדבר להשתנות לגמרי, ולכן הפוסקים שלא הפסיקה המסורה בינם ובינינו בכל הדורות, ששקדו עליהם חכמי דור דור, לשמרם ולנקותם, צריכים אנו לחשוב את ספריהם ליותר דוקנית, וכש”כ במקום שאין ללמוד מכונת הדברים אלא מדקדוק לשונם, שקשה לסמוך על החדשים…” (חזון איש, הל’ עירובין סי’ ס”ז, אות י”ב).

The Mishna Berurah argues, as we find numerous times he brings from the

ר”ח הנדפס מחדש [ביאור הלכה, סי’ ש”ב, ד”ה עליה; סי’ שט”ו, ד”ה טפח; סי’ תרכ”ו, ד”ה צריך; סי’ תרמ”ח, ד”ה מיהו, ועוד].

One thing I was rather surprised about was that there was no mention of the famous teshuva of the Rema on yayin nessech anywhere in this work. I was hoping to see his take on it. To summarize, this work is extremely important for anyone learning the complicated laws of yayin nessech and it is well worth the money.[3] The sefer is available for purchase at Biegeleisen in the U.S., and at Girsa and Otzar Haseforim in Jerusalem. I would just like to end by wishing Rabbi Jacob much success in printing the rest of the Rav Grodzinsky’s wonderful works from manuscripts.[4]

[1] Worth noting is the teshuvos printed in the Sefer Zicrhon Iyunim Beta’anis, pp. 174-183 regarding the fast that the Rabbonyim made during World War Two.
[2] For more on this topic see what I wrote in the Yeshurun 24 (2011), pp. 430-431
[3] I cannot neglect to mention that besides for this new work on YN, one’s understanding of the sugyos of YN, in the rishonim and the realia of their time would be greatly enhanced by using the special works of Professor Haym Soloveitchik on the topic (which will hopefully be translated into English in the future).
[4] Some of the notebooks have gone “missing” in recent years. If anyone knows their whereabouts it would be greatly appreciated if they would let me know.


מנהג אכילת ה’סימנים’ בליל ראש השנה וטעמיו

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מנהג אכילת ה’סימנים’ בליל ראש השנה וטעמיו*
מאת אליעזר בראדט
מנהג אכילת ה’סימנים’ בליל ראש השנה נפוץ ומוכר בכל קהילות ישראל[1]. וכבר נתנו בו רבותינו הראשונים כמלאכים טעמים:
בעלי התוספות מסבירים: “ראש השנה, מפני שהוא תחילת השנה, מרבים בסעודה לעשות סימן יפה, וכמה ענינים עושים בו לסימן יפה, כדאמרינן במסכת הוריות וכריתות”[2]. ומהפנייתם למסכתות הוריות וכריתות ברור, שכוונתם לתת טעם למנהג ה’סימנים’.
אולם גם לאחר דבריהם עדיין לא מובן מדוע ראיית ירקות וזרעונים מסויימים או אכילתם מביא ‘סימן יפה’ לכל השנה; כיצד זה מתבצע?
לפיכך הוסיפו רבותינו האחרונים להמתיק המנהג בהוספת יסודו המפורסם של הרמב”ן בפירושו על התורה:
ודע, כי כל גזירת עירין כאשר תצא מכח גזירה אל פועל דמיון, תהיה הגזירה מתקיימת על כל פנים. ולכן יעשו הנביאים מעשה בנבואות, כמאמר ירמיהו שצוה לברוך: ‘והיה ככלותך לקרוא את דברי הספר הזה, תקשור עליו אבן, והשלכתו אל תוך פרת, ואמרת: ככה תשקע בבל’ וגו’ (ירמיה נא סג-סד). וכן ענין אלישע בהניחו זרועו על הקשת (מל”ב יג טז-יז): ‘ויאמר אלישע: יְרֵה וַיּוֹר, ויאמר: חץ תשועה לה’, וחץ תשועה בארם…’[3].
כלומר, כל ‘גזירת עירין’, גזירת שמים, הן טובה והן להפך, אין בהכרח שתצא לפועל, שיתכן שכביכול הקב”ה ינחם על הרעה או הטובה שגזר[4]. אולם אם הנביא היודע מאותה גזירה עושה כדוגמת אותה גזירה, כמו שהטביע אבן לנהר כסימן לטביעתה ושקיעתה של בבל, בוודאי ‘תהיה הגזירה מתקיימת על כל פנים’. לפיכך, כך ביארו האחרונים, בקיום מנהג ה’סימנים’ בליל ראש-השנה עושה האדם כדוגמא לגזירות טובות, זאת בתקווה שנגזרו עליו גזירות טובות ועשייה כדוגמתן תכריח ש’תהיה הגזירה מתקיימת על-כל-פנים’, שלא יגרמו העוונות שיתבטלו חלילה.
כך ביאר ר’ אברהם דאנציג בספרו חיי אדם: “וכיון שהוא תחילת השנה… נוהגים לעשות, לסימן טוב, לאכול דברים הרמוזים לזה. והטעם לזה עיין ברמב”ן, דכתב: ודע, כי כל הגזירות עירין כאשר תצא מכח גזירה אל פועל דמיון, תהיה הגזירה מתקיימת על כל פנים[5]. וזה נראה לי ברור, שהוא הטעם שאמרו רז”ל[6]: השתא דאמרת סימנא מילתא”[7].
כאמור, אחרונים רבים ביארו את מנהג ה’סימנים’ לפי יסודו של הרמב”ן[8]; שאין ציטוט דברי ר’ אברהם דאנציג אלא דוגמא מייצגת. ברם, קדם לכולם ר’ יהודה ליווא ב”ר בצלאל מפראג, ‘מהר”ל’, אשר בחיבורו באר הגולה דן באריכות בענין שלפנינו:
אמר אביי, השתא דאמרת סימנא מילתא היא, יהא רגיל למיכל בריש שתא קרא[9]… גם דבר זה מצאתי שהם תמהים, מפני שנראה להם שהם ניחוש, ודבר זה אינו, שאם כן יהיה מעשה אלישע ומעשה ירמיה ענין ניחוש…[10] ולא היה ענין אלישע וירמיה ניחוש. והנה, דבר זה סימן ואות להיות נגמר הדבר. ודבר זה ביאר הרב הגדול הרמב”ן ז”ל, אשר אליו לבד נגלו תעלומות חכמה וסודי התורה, וכתב בפרשת ‘לך לך’, וזה לשונו: ודע, כל גזירת עליונים, כאשר תצא מכח הגזירה אל פועל דמיון, תהיה הגזירה מתקיימת על כל פנים. ולכך יעשו הנביאים מעשה בנבואתם, כמאמר ירמיה לברוך… וכן אלישע… עד כאן לשונו. ודברים אלו ברורים, ומעתה תדע להבין דברים אלו, כי הדבר הזה הוא חכמה נפלאה, לעשות לגזירה עליונה דמיון וסימן למטה, כדי שתצא לפועל הטוב ותהיה מקויימת הגזירה לטוב. לכך ראוי לעשות סימן ודמיון, כמו שתמצא שעשו הנביאים. וזה ענין הדמיון ל’מכלא בריש-שתא’ דברים שיש בהם סימן טוב, כדי שתצא הגזירה לפועל, ואז תהיה הגזירה הטובה מתקיימת. ואין בזה ניחוש, רק הוא הכנה שתצא הגזירה לטובה. והיינו דאמר ‘השתא דאמרת סימנא מילתא‘, כי הוא מילתא לענין זה שעל-ידי סימן תצא הגזירה לפועל הטוב. ודברים אלו נעימים ויקרים מפז, וכל חפצים לא ישוו בהם[11].
אגב, הסיבה שמהר”ל מפראג נתן דעתו ועטו לבאר מנהג זה היא מפני לעגם של אנשי הכמורה הנוצריים לפיסקת התלמוד “השתא דאמרת סימנא מילתא…”, שהם כללו אותה בתוך רשימת הקטעים ה’מוזרים’ לטענתם-טעותם. כבר העיר, בצדק, מ’ ברויאר[12], כי למרות האגדות הרבות סביב חיי המהר”ל הרחוקות מן האמת ההיסטורית, בלשון המעטה[13], שאחת מהן מספרת על ניהול ויכוח דתי עם שלש-מאות כמרים במשך שלושים יום, אגדה שאין ידוע על נכונותה, העיון בספר ‘באר הגולה’ מוכיח שאחת המטרות שרצה מחברו להשיג היא ביאור ותרוץ האגדות התמוהות בעיני הנצרות ונושאי דגלה. פרט זה מוכח מכך, שלכל אחד מקטעי התלמוד התמוהים בעיני הנוצרים – שנאספו לחבורים מיוחדים[14] – הקדיש לו המהר”ל מקום בספרו ‘באר הגולה’ ועמל לבארו בטוב טעם ודעת.
* * * *
רבי משה ב”ר נחמן, הרמב”ן, ירה אבן יסוד ונבנה עליו בנין גדול ורחב. על-פי יסודו של הרמב”ן נתפרשו בידי חכמים מאוחרים דברי אגדה ומנהגים רבים, למרות שלא תמיד ידעו המפרשים המאוחרים מבטן מי יצא יסוד זה; עד כדי כך התפשט היסוד שטבע הרמב”ן.
לדוגמא בעלמא, אציין מספר מנהגים שהוסברו בידי חכמים לפי הכלל שקבע הרמב”ן[15]:
1. ר’ אלכסנדר משה לפידות מבאר שהתפילה בעת חיבוט הערבות בהושענא רבה מעלתה גדולה, מפני “שתפילה פועל יותר בצירוף מעשה בפועל בעת רצון”[16]. ברור, אפוא, שרעיונו מושתת על יסוד הרמב”ן.
2. ר’ יוסף חיים מבגדאד, בעל ‘בן איש חי’ כותב: “המנהג פה עירינו יע”א, כשאומרים פסוק ‘פותח’ הנזכר[17], פּוֹרְשִׂים כפיהם לעיני השמים. והוא מנהג יפה, לעשות בזה פועל דמיוני לקבלת מזלם את השפע מלמעלה“[18]. והסכים עמו ר’ אליעזר פאפו בספרו דמשק אליעזר: “טעם נכון למה שנוהגים כמה בני אדם כשאומרים ‘פותח את ידיך’, בתפילה ובברכת המזון, זוקפין ידיהם למעלה בפישוט ידים. וכוונתם הפשוטה, שהשם יתברך גופיה יפתח ידו ואוצרו הטוב להשביע לכל חי רצון, ואין מקום לבני אדם לפשוט ידיו. אלא האי טעמא שפותחין ידיהם, כדי לקבל השפע מאת השם, כמו שאומרים ב’ברך עלינו’: ‘ומלא ידינו מברכותיך’ וכו’. ואין לתמוה על מנהגן של ישראל, דיש להם סמך”[19].
3. את המנהג לקדש על היין בבית הכנסת בכל ליל שבת, הסבירו הגאונים שהוא משום סגולה לרפואה[20], ור’ יעקב שור ביאר דבריהם לפי יסודו של הרמב”ן: “ואף כי עיקר סגולת כל מצוה היא בקיומה, בכל זאת תפעול יותר כאשר תצא אל הפועל באיזו פעולה דמיונית המורה על חיבוביה ועל חוזק האמונה בתועלותה… [כ]אכילת מינים שונים בריש שתא… וכדברים הללו כתב הרמב”ן על התורה, פרשת ‘לך לך'”[21].
עד כאן רשימת מנהגים קצרה שכל אחד מהם הוסבר על-פי יסודו של הרמב”ן[22]. אך נתתי דעתי, שכיון שניתנה הרשות לחכמים לבאר, אוסיף – מדעתי – להמתיק בכך עוד מנהג:
ר’ יצחק ווייס, אב”ד ווערבוי, מספר: “ראיתי בילדותי, בהיותי ‘בעל מקרא’ דקהילה קדושה פרעשבורג, שכל בני בית-הכנסת עלו ועמדו על הבימה… משום שרצו להיות מכוין נגד פני הכהנים“[23]. הוא מוצא לכך מקור מ’ספר וְהִזְהִיר’, מתקופת הגאונים, הכותב: “והכהנים כשמברכין את ישראל, צריכין כל העם לנוד ממקומן ולהתקרב אל הברכה“[24]. אולם מקור למנהג עדיין לא הופך להיות טעמו, שעדיין יש להבין: מדוע יש להתקרב אל כהנים ככל האפשר? אלא שליסודו של הרמב”ן המנהג מתיישב על הלב, כי המתברכים רצו לעשות פעולה המשקפת את רצונם לזכות בברכה, ובכך אכן תחול הברכה עליהם.
הרמב”ן קבע את כללו על ‘עשה’ ולא ב’לא-תעשה’. כלומר, עשיית פעולה הדומה לגזירה גורמת ש’תהיה הגזירה מתקיימת על-כל-פנים’. אמנם יתכן, שכלל זה נאמר גם ב’לא-תעשה’, היינו, אי-עשיית פעולה כלשהי – נגד רצונו, לפעמים – מביאה שדבר הדומה לו לא ייעשה. לפיכך ניתן להמתיק את אי-השינה בראש-השנה, כי בכך לא יישן דבר הדומה לאדם, הוא מזלו.

[1] נוסד על-פי הוריות יב ע”א; כריתות ה ע”ב. ונפסק להלכה בשו”ע, או”ח, סי’ תקפג, סעיף א.
[2] תוס’ ד”ה ‘ערב יום טוב’, עבודה זרה ה ע”ב.
[3] פירוש רמב”ן על התורה, בראשית יב ו.
וכך ביאר את הפסוק (בראשית מח כב): “ואני נתתי לכם שכם אחד על אחיך, אשר לקחתי מיד האמורי בחרבי ובקשתי”, וזה לשונו על אתר: “…שעשה יעקב כדרך שיעשו הנביאים – נטה ידו בחרב כנגד ארץ האמורי וזרק שם חצים להיותה נכבשת לבניו, כענין שעשה אלישע: ‘וישם ידיו על ידי המלך, ויאמר אלישע: יְרֵה וַיּוֹר’ (מל”ב יג טז)… ויתכן שזה טעם אמרו ‘לקחתי’, כי מאז לוקחה הארץ לבניו”.
עוד בענין יסודו של הרמב”ן, ראה: מ’ הלברטל, על דרך האמת: הרמב”ן ויצירתה של מסורת, ירושלים תשסו, עמ’ 224-224.
[4] ראה, לדוגמא, ירמיה יח י: “ועשה הרע בעיני… ונחמתי על הטובה אשר אמרתי להיטיב אותו”.
[5] עד כאן תורף דברי רמב”ן, שם. ומכאן ביאורו של ר’ אברהם דאנציג למנהג ה’סימנים’.
[6] הוריות שם:
[7] חיי אדם, כלל קלט, דין ו.
[8] ראה, לדוגמא: ר’ חיים ב”ר אברהם הכהן מארם צובה, טור ברקת, סי’ תקפג, סעיף א; ר’ אברהם חמוי, מחזור בית דין, עמ’ כח אות ב; ר’ שלמה שיק, ספר תקנות ותפילות, מונקאטש תרנ, דף סה ; ר’ חיים צבי עהרענרייך, קצה המטה (על ספר מטה אפרים), סי’ תקפג, סעיף ט; ר’ משולם פינקלשטיין, אלף המגן (על ספר ‘מטה אפרים’), סי’ תקפג, ס”ק קטז; ר’ ראובן מרגליות, נפש חיה, סי’ תקפג, סעיף א; הרב עובדיה יוסף, חזון עובדיה, חלק ימים נוראים, ירושלים תשסה, עמ’ צח-צט.
[9] עד כאן הוא ציטוט מהוריות שם.
[10] כאן הביא את מעשה ירמיה (בהשלכת האבן לנהר) ומעשה אלישע (בהנחת זרועו על הקשת), ראה לעיל במצוטט מפירוש הרמב”ן.
[11] באר הגולה, באר השני, ירושלים תשלב, עמ’ לג-לד. ור’ יאיר בכרך, מקור חיים, ר”ס תקפג, ציין לו, עיי”ש.
בביאורו לאגדות התלמוד, הוריות שם, כפל מהר”ל את הדברים, יותר בקיצור אך בעקימת לשון חשובה, ולפיכך אצטטו: “שאין יותר חבור אל דבר כמו האכילה, ואין זה דבר קטן, כי כבר האריך הרמב”ן בפרשת ‘לך לך’, כי גם נביאים היו עושים סימנים שיהיה הסימן לטוב להם… לכך יסתם פיהם של דוברי שקר המדברים על צדיקים עתק, שחושבים דבר זה כמו ניחוש, ואין הדבר כן! רק שהוא סימן טוב בשעה שראוי על זה, וכמו שאמרו ז”ל: סימנא מילתא היא” (חידושי אגדות מהר”ל, הוריות יב ע”א).
[12] מ’ ברויאר, ‘ויכוחו של מהר”ל מפראג עם הנוצרים’, אסיף מפרי העט והעת, ירושלים תשנט, עמ’ 129-137.
[13] חלק גדול באשמת יהודה יודל רוזנברג, שזייף את הספר ‘נפלאות מהר”ל’ (דפוס ראשון: וארשא תרסט), בו התיימר לספר את “האותות והמופתים… מאת… מהר”ל מפראג… אשר הפליא לעשות… על ידי הגולם אשר ברא” (לשון שער הספר, במהדורה הנ”ל). על זיופו של הספר עמדו חכמים וחוקרים רבים, ראה, לדוגמא: רמ”מ אקשטיין, ספר יצירה, סיגט תרע (מלשון שער הספר: “כולל… הענין בריאה על-ידי ספר יצירה, ולברר אי אמתת הספר נפלאות מהר”ל הנדפס כעת…”); ג’ שלום, פרקי יסוד בהבנת הקבלה וסמליה, ירושלים תשלו, עמ’ 409, הערה 72; מ’ בר-אילן, ‘נפלאות ר’ יהודה יודיל רוזנברג’, עלי ספר, יט (תשסא), עמ’ 184-173, וש”נ הפניות נוספות.
[14] ראה: ח’ מרחביה, ‘קונטרוס נגד התלמוד מימי שריפת התלמוד באיטליה’, תרביץ, לז (תשכח), עמ’ 78-96; הנ”ל, עמ’ 191-207 ובמיוחד בעמ’ 204.
[15] על דברי אגדה ושאר רעיונות שאינם מנהגים שנתפרשו לפי יסוד הרמב”ן, ראה, לדוגמא: ר’ יעקב לורברבוים מליסא, בעל ‘נתיבות המשפט’, הגדה של פסח עם פירוש מעשה נסים, ד”ה ‘פרעה לא גזר אלא על הזכרים’, ד”ה ‘ובאותות זה המטה’, ד”ה ‘ואילו הוציאנו’, ד”ה ‘על אחת כמה וכמה’ בסופו [בטופס שלפני אין ספרור עמודים, לפיכך ציינתי לפי ד”ה]; הנ”ל, מגילת סתרים, אסתר ג ט, וראה עוד: ר’ יוסף פאצאנובסקי, פרדס יוסף, בראשית יב ו, ובכל הנסמן שם.
[16] הביאו ר’ אברהם הרשוביץ, מנהגי ישרון, וילנא תרצט, עמ’ מו. וראה, עתה: הרב נ’ גרינבוים (מהדיר), תורת הגאון רבי אלכסנדר משה, ליקוואוד תשסו, עמ’ תל.
[17] כוונתו לפסוק (תהלים קמה טז): “פותח את ידך, ומשביע לכל רצון”.
[18] ר’ יוסף חיים מבגדאד, בן איש חי, שנה א, פרשת ויגש, אות יב.
[19] ר’ אליעזר פאפו, דמשק אליעזר, סי’ ט, סעיף א.
לאור מקורות אלו תמיהני על הרב י’ גולדהבר, מנהגי הקהילות, א, עמ’ קט: “בעת אמירת הפסוק ‘פותח את ידיך’, הצמידו את כפות הידים יחד, ובתנועה זו הרימו אותם כלפי מעלה מול הראש”. ובהערה 2, שם: “לא מצאתי כזאת בקהילות אחרות”. הרי לך העלם דבר! וכבר הערתי על כך במאמרי ‘ציונים ומילואים לספר “מנהגי הקהילות”‘ ירושתינו, ספר ב (תשסח), עמ’ ר.
עוד על מנהג פרישת הידים כלפי השמים באמירת ‘פותח את ידיך’, ראה: י’ זימר, עולם כמנהגו נוהג, ירושלים תשנו, עמ’ 83, הערה 67; מ’ חלמיש, הקבלה, רמת גן תשס, עמ’ 310, הערות 150-151; ד’ שפבר, מנהגי ישראל, א, ירושלים תשנ, עמ’ רכז.
[20] ראה י’ ברודי (מהדיר), תשובות רב נטרונאי גאון, א, או”ח, סי’ עו: “הכי אמר רב נטרונאי ריש מתיבתא: מקדשין ומבדילין בבתי כנסיות אף על פי שאין אורחים אוכלין שם… מפני שהטעמת יין של קידוש שבת רפואה היא – וזה שטועם כל הצבור כולו, לא שחובה היא לטעום אלא שחובה לשמוע קדוש בלבד, וכיון ששמע קדוש יצא ידי חובתו ואין צריך לטעום. וזה שמקדש ומטעים לצבור, משום רפואה מקדש ונותן להם, כדי ליתן ממנו על עיניהם… זמנין דאיכא מן הצבור דלית ליה יין ומקדש אריפתא, ותקנו חכמים לקדש בבית הכנסת על היין, משום רפואה“. וראה שם בהערה, למקורות המביאים תשובה זו.
[21] יהודה בן ברזילי מברצלונה, ספר העתים, פירוש ‘עתים לבינה’ לר’ יעקב שור, ירושלים תשמד, עמ’ 179, הערה לג.
[22] היו שביארו לפי יסודו של הרמב”ן ענייני השקפה מחשבה ואגדה שונים, ראה, לדוגמא: ר’ שמואל אביגדור, הגדת תנא תוספאה, ירושלים תשנג, עמ’ כה; הגדה לליל שמורים, עם ביאור ‘אור ישרים’ לר’ יחיאל העליר, קעניגסבערג תריז, עמ’ ו’; ר’ שלמה זלמן אב”ד ניישטאדט, [נכד בעל מעלת התורה] בית אבות, אבות [פרק א משנה י], ברלין תרמט, עמ’ 60; ר’ שלמה שיק, סידור רשב”ן, וינה תרנד, כד ע”ב; ר’ ראובן מרגליות, נפש חיה, סי’ תרה, סעיף א.
[23] ר’ יצחק ווייס, אלף כתב, א, בני-ברק תשנו, עמ’ קנג.
[24] י”מ פריימאן (מהדיר), ספר והזהיר, ב, פרשת נשא, ווארשא תרמ, עמ’ קמג.