Rabbi Blogs is just me, Mrs Joe Blogs, appealing to those readers who cannot accept that I am a woman. If it is easier for you to think of me in trousers then so be it, and since Mr. Blogs is my other half and I cannot use his name, I must be Rabbi Blogs of course.
Now, at the end of my last post someone asked me at which yeshivo I learnt. As you can imagine, this is a bit of a poser. But think about it: "yeshiva" (or "sitting place") is where the men go to literally SIT and LEARN. So I went to the BSM yeshiva, that is the British School of Motoring. Here I literally sat (at the wheel) and learnt (how to drive). I then graduated to a yeshiva where we actually stood rather than sat, and learnt (by trial and error) how to cook and to cater for 99.9% of eventualities than can arise in any domestic Jewish environment. Not everything can be learnt from a book, after all. Sometimes you just have to do it and learn the hard way.
So when some rov comes along and quotes sources about what constitutes chometz in any practical sense, until this rov undertakes the WHOLE of the operation, from start to finish, of "the pesach season" including changing back to chometz and doing all the laundry after the holiday and getting the household back to normal routine again, until he has done the whole lot, the sources he quotes are just words. A noble aspiration on paper but otherwise meaningless.
Sadly, in all the centuries it never seems to have occurred to any rov to get "the housewife view" of it all. On the whole she is the one doing the work, and yet the discusssions and arguments about what constitutes chometz and how to kasher the television for pesach seem to be male-dominated, theoretical and largely inpractical (naturally) treatises - which most home-makers don't have the time to sit and learn anyway. It is beyond patronising really. Nauseating.
At my next shiur, we will learn how to make pesach if you are a housewife. This has never, ever, been learnt in any yeshiva. And my learned friends think they know it all!
I've always wondered, somewhat wryly, why Pesach is referred to as (z'man heyruteinu') - season of our freedom. Evidently for the majority of frum homemakers/mothers it is anything but. Our erstwhile and some of our present rabbinical sages could not have too much compassion in mind when deciding the dinim, and ever more stringent and bizarre chumrahs/rules in order to ensure a kosher l'pesach. Nor is too much sympathy apparent towards the health and practical difficulties that these stringencies impose on the elderly and physically disabled.
ReplyDeleteYouo really got me thinking. How does one kasher a tv for pesach. It often has chomets adverts or people eating chomets in their films and shows, They even have dogs eating as well. I have never thought of this problem before but I can understand that for people like you it can be very serious. The only thing which could help would be a filter to stop them over pesach. Well you have to filter water as well so its not so absurd as it sounds. I am not sure if kedassia provides one yet, or if their tag experts are trained for it. But it certainly is a thought. The real frum people make sure not even to see chomets on pesach its very bad for the eyes which would have to be afterwards washed with havdala wine.
ReplyDeleteKedassia again had no kosher chickens, and Knopfler has officially gone to the 'other' side. Expect some really interesting developments soon. The Eckstien shop will soon be going to his namesake dayan. And the Satmar 26 weekly news sheet or update advertised their meat. Their own shop looks like will also be going there. Wosner at least will be able to get his hands into something. In Kedassia he has no chance. Kedassia is finished.
Of course Pesach is zman cheyruteinu - courtesy of ElAl and Dan Hotels. One really enjoys the seder knowing full well that there won't be a rerun the following night. And beer, whisky and felafel in pitta never tasted better when enjoyed in the knowledge that those in chutz l'eretz are facing an eighth day of matzah
ReplyDeleteChag sameach
That's all this blog needs - a Zionist. One minute we're reading about Satmar and Dayan Eckstein, the next we have to choke on felafel in pitta. Rabbi Blogs, your next shiur please. Its just a week to pesach and my wife is waiting for guidance.
DeleteTraditions die hard, and even if they serve no technical purpose, they still have a social value. We need to remember that we are not just a group of individuals keeping the same holiday. We are a collective group - and it is things like pesach that keep us a collective entity.
ReplyDelete