Reb Barry's Blog ... neshamah.net

Ripple and Adon Olam

One of the things I love about living in Jerusalem is being pleasantly surprised by all sorts of things.  The most recent was this past Friday night.  Friday nights I usually daven at "Mizmor l'David," aka "the Carlebach minyan."  I suppose in Jerusalem it's more accurate to say "a" Carlebach minyan, since there are many of them.  Anyway, we normally finish the Friday night service by singing Adon Olam – to a Beach Boys melody, the Sloop John B.  This week we had a change: instead of the Beach Boys, we had the Grateful Dead.

Now I'm what you might call a "non-hard-core" Grateful Dead fan.  I have a Dead album, I went to a Dead concert "back in the day," which is to say something like 1972.  But I certainly don't qualify as a "Dead head."  So I immediately recognized that it was a Grateful Dead melody, but I couldn't place the name of the song or the lyrics.  Thanks to the wonders of the internet and how people post stuff, I was quickly able to figure out it was "Ripple."  So I got curious about Ripple, and discovered it really doesn't have anything to do with the horrible wine of the name we drank back in the early 70s.  It's rather a very beautiful poem, and the sentiments of the song are actually somewhat apropos to Adon Olam.

Thanks to David Dodd for his posting of the lyrics and his commentary.

My commentary follows:

"Ripple"

Words by Robert Hunter; music by Jerry Garcia.
("Ripple" composed and written by Jerry Garcia and Robert Hunter. Reproduced by arrangement with Ice Nine Publishing Co., Inc. (ASCAP))

>>comments come after the brackets

Shvi'i shel Pesach

Tonight begins the 7th day of Pesach . . . for those of us living in Israel, the end of the holiday.  Those of you still living in "galut," in the Diaspora, still have an extra day beyond that.

Chol hamoed Passover is certainly a very different experience in Israel than anywhere else. 

This Year in Jerusalem

Note: This week's post first appeared at www.israelatsixty.org.il

Every year we close our seder with the words “L’shana haba’ah birushalayim,” “next year in Jerusalem.”  Unlike the requirement to mention the Passover offering, maror, and matzah this phrase is not found in the Mishnah or even in the Talmud. But the roots of the saying are found in the Mishnah, which is to say from about 1,800 years ago. In Mishnah Pesachim we are told that Rabbi Akiva would conclude his seder with the following: “SO MAY THE LORD OUR GOD AND THE GOD OF OUR FATHER SUFFER US TO REACH OTHER SEASONS AND FESTIVALS WHICH COME TOWARDS US FOR PEACE, REJOICING IN THE REBUILDING OF THY CITY AND GLAD IN THY SERVICE, AND THERE WE WILL PARTAKE OF THE SACRIFICES AND THE PASSOVER-OFFERINGS.” These sentiments are brought into the final bracha of the seder…”and rebuild Jerusalem, the holy city, speedily in our days, and bring us up into it. Let us rejoice in it, and bless you in holiness and purity…” It’s pretty easy to see how we naturally go from that blessing to a call for “next year in Jerusalem!” And I did find a reference to saying “l’shana haba’ah birushalayim” in Minhagim Yisrael, from the early 1600s, so the custom is at least that old.

“Next year in Jerusalem” was clearly a cry from a people living in exile.

Another only in Israel moment...

Friday morning I opened the newspaper (the Jerusalem Post in this case; we subscribe to both the Post and Haaretz) and was greeted by the following headline:

"Matza relief! A 'kezayit' may be smaller than we thought"

Unless you've studied a little bit of Talmud or halacha, you probably have no clue what this headline is talking about.  "Zayit" is an olive; "kezayit" means "like an olive." Many measurements in halacha are tied to this measure.  How much bread do you have to eat to be obligated to say the blessings? A "kezayit."  How much matzah do you have to eat on Passover to fulfill the mitzvah of eating matzah? A kezayit.

So only in Israel is it front page news on the newspaper that someone claims he now has proof that a kezayit is less than 5 grams, substantially less than what has generally been considered the proper amount.  Researchers looked at the olives from some 3000 year old olive trees and concluded in the days of the Talmud, olives were pretty small.

Who cares?  Most of us eat lots of matzah at the seder.  This is really for the benefit of those who have a digestive condition, such as celiacs, that make it difficult for them to eat wheat.

Not a headline you are likely to see on the front page of the Toledo Blade...

Shavua tov,

Rav Barry