Skip to main content

Thought for the Day: Is "Not Forbidden" Equivalent to "Permitted"?

Of course a Jew may not eat meat from a treifa.  That is, from an animal that has certain simanim that basically means the animal would have died if it hadn't been killed.  That is different than n'veila, which is meat from an animal that was killed by some other means than sh'chita.  For example, a deer killed by a rifle bullet or the bumper of a 4x4 filled with drunk would-be hunters.  (I suspect a lot of those "hunters" actually just got lucky and caught a deer in their headlights.)  Then there is meat from a b'heima t'mei'a -- pork, for example.  Who cares why it's forbidden?  Forbidden is forbidden, right?  Well, l'ma'aseh, maybe; though it often comes up in case of situations where the details of what actually happened are not clear.  But philosophically, there is a lot to learn from the details.

For example, the Torah only prescribes a punishment (lashes, in this case) if one ate a "shiur" (in this case a k'zayis) of the issur.  What about eating less than the torah prescribed shiur?  That is the subject of a machlokes Reish Lakish and R' Yochanon; Reish Lakish says chatzi shiur mutar m'd'oraisa (but, of course, assur m'd'rabanan), while R' Yochanan says chatzi shiur assur m'd'oraisa. We pasken like R' Yochanan, but I saw a fascinating question regarding this machlokes this morning.  Since we are all going crazy about shiurim now ("Abba!  Are you sure that I need to eat that much matzah?!?  Any how fast?!?"), I figured that siting was propitious timing.

According to Reish Lakish, would a person be allowed (on a d'oraiso level) to shecht an animal on yom tov that he knows is a treifa with the intent to eat only pakos pakos min ha'shiur; say less than an ounce every 11 minutes or so (just to be safe)?  It's such a cool question because one is allowed, of course, to shecht an animal on yom tov l'tzorech ochel nefesh -- the the sake of eating -- because freshly shechted meat is much yummier than the stuff that's been sitting on the shelves for a few days/weeks/...

This question was discussed by R' Kahaneman (Ponevezh Rosh Yeshiva) in his youth when he was sitting at the yom tov table with the Aruch haShulchan (its author, actually, R' Yechiel Michel Epstein).  The Aruch haShulchan said he would be amazed if the Torah would allow such a thing.  The heter of tzorech ochel nefesh, he reasoned, is based on enhancing one's yom tov experience; how could such a thing be possible?  Besides, who says the Torah even allows one to shecht any animal with the intent of eating less than a shiur?  Maybe the Torah only allowed sh'chita l'tzorech ochel nefesh for something that has a din "achila"; ie, a k'zayis or more.  R' Kahaneman wasn't so sure one needed to be some amazed if it would be that the Torah allowed that.  After all, the Torah does not forbid it and it could increase one's simchas yom tov; so maybe.

For my part, I was amazed (still) at the huge gap between the conversation at my yom tov table and the yom tov table of g'dolim from the not too distant past.  You'd think I would be past being amazed.  Isn't it amazing that I'm not?
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Thought for the Day: Pizza, Uncrustables, and Stuff -- What Bracha?

Many years ago (in fact, more than two decades ago), I called R' Fuerst from my desk at work as I sat down to lunch.  I had a piece of (quite delicious) homemade pizza for lunch.  I nearly always eat at my desk as I am working (or writing TftD...), so my lunch at work cannot in any way be considered as sitting down to a formal meal; aka קביעת סעודה.  That being the case, I wasn't sure whether to wash, say ha'motzi, and bentch; or was the pizza downgraded to a m'zonos.  He told if it was a snack, then it's m'zonos; if a meal the ha'motzi.  Which what I have always done since then.  I recently found out how/why that works. The Shulchan Aruch, 168:17 discusses פשטיד''א, which is describes as a baked dough with meat or fish or cheese.  In other words: pizza.  Note: while the dough doesn't not need to be baked together with the meat/fish/cheese, it is  required that they dough was baked with the intention of making this concoction.  That is, even th
Post a Comment
Read more

Thought for the Day: אוושא מילתא Debases Yours Shabbos

My granddaughter came home with a list the girls and phone numbers in her first grade class.  It was cute because they had made it an arts and crafts project by pasting the list to piece of construction paper cut out to look like an old desk phone and a receiver attached by a pipe cleaner.  I realized, though, that the cuteness was entirely lost on her.  She, of course, has never seen a desk phone with a receiver.  When they pretend to talk on the phone, it is on any relatively flat, rectangular object they find.  (In fact, her 18 month old brother turns every  relatively flat, rectangular object into a phone and walks around babbling into it.  Not much different than the rest of us, except his train of thought is not interrupted by someone else babbling into his ear.) I was reminded of that when my chavrusa (who has children my grandchildrens age) and I were learning about אוושא מילתא.  It came up because of a quote from the Shulchan Aruch HaRav that referred to the noise of תקתוק
Post a Comment
Read more

Thought for the Day: What Category of Muktzeh are Our Candles?

As discussed in a recent TftD , a p'sak halacha quite surprising to many, that one may -- even לכתחילה -- decorate a birthday cake with (unlit, obviously) birthday candles on Shabbos. That p'sak is predicated on another p'sak halacha; namely, that our candles are muktzeh because they are a כלי שמלאכתו לאיסור and not  מוקצה מחמת גופו/intrinsically set aside from any use on Shabbos. They point there was that using the candle as a decoration qualifies as a need that allows one to utilize a כלי שמלאכתו לאיסור. Today we will discuss the issue of concluding that our candles are , in fact, a כלי שמלאכתו לאיסור and not מוקצה מחמת גופו. Along the way we'll also (again) how important it is to have personal relationship with your rav/posek, the importance of precision in vocabulary, and how to interpret the Mishna Brura.  Buckle up. After reviewing siman 308 and the Mishna Brura there, I concluded that it should be permissible to use birthday candles to decorate a cake on Shabbo
Post a Comment
Read more