Avodah Mailing List

Volume 43: Number 68

Mon, 10 Nov 2025

• 1. sim shalom to shalom rav (Joel Rich)
• 2. Re: sim shalom to shalom rav (Micha Berger)
• 3. Did Adam Speak Hebrew? (Micha Berger)
• 4. Re: tachanun/chatan (Micha Berger)

I have been comparing sim shalom to shalom rav and was wondering about the
significance of the ordering of the words (shalom, tova?) and why the
phrase aleinu val kol yisrael is found in sim but not in rav? Who is that
referring to? Thoughts?
KT
Joel Rich
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On Wed, Nov 05, 2025 at 06:08:01AM +0200, Joel Rich via Avodah wrote:
> I have been comparing sim shalom to shalom rav and was wondering about the
significance of the ordering of the words (shalom, tova...) and why the
> phrase aleinu val kol yisrael is found in sim but not in rav? Who is that
> referring to? Thoughts?

I cannot tell you what Chazal meant, but I can share what I think about
when saying it (the times I am thinking).

R Dovid Lifshitz zt"l taught us that "Shalom Rav" is a specific kind of
peace.

"Shalom rav le'ohavei Sorasekha ve'ein lamo mikhshol." Shalom rav is the
peace obtainable by someone who is refined, and has no mikhsholim. Inner
peace and sheleimus being extended to become being at peace - shalom.

And so for a while I prefered saying Shalom Rav, for which I had a kavanah,
and kind of frustrated in the morning.

Then I realized something:
    Sim (1) Shalom (2) Tovah (3) uVrakhah (4) Chain (5) veChessed
    (6) veRachamim

We ask for 6 things. But our "ki" for asking them involves Hashem having
already given us 7:
    ... nasata lanu (1) Toras Chaim (2) veAhavas Chessed (3) uTzdaqah
    (4) uVrakhah (5) veRachamim (4) veChaim veShalom.
In addition, the first two of the 7 are clearly about sheleimus, not
external shalom.

Leaving me to believe Sim Shalom is asking Hashem to give us external
peace, and thus 6 items like the directions in space. Why? Because You
already gave us the path to inner sheleimus. Which goes beyond the 6
of the externals, or the days of the week. The 7th, the Maharal writes
in Gevuras Hashem is the unreachable internal, the middle point between
the object's six sides.

So that Sim Shalom and Shalom Rav are both asking for the opportunity
to become shaleim and from there to achieve shalom.

(Like the way being fractured internally cost us two uprisings against
Rome. Or, if I were dare to get more political, 7.10... What is true
for Jewish society is true for the individual.)

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 What you get by achieving your goals
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   is not as important as
Author: Widen Your Tent      what you become by achieving your goals.
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF            - Henry David Thoreau

I know we all assume Adam spoke Lashon haQodesh, but...

Sanhderin 38b has Rav Yehudah amar Rav, "Adam haRishon spoin in the
Aramaic language." Citing Tehillim 139:17-19 that slips into Aramaic in
retelling what Adam said upon his creation -- "im tiqtol Eloak rasha".

I have a theory that both are true.

We know that HLashon haQodesh evolved during the course of Tanakh. Hashem
didn't dictate to Moshe in the same language Ezra spoke.

For example, there is no "she-" prefix in Chumash, it only uses the full
word "asher". When Shemu'el haNavi wrote Shofetim and Rus, the prefix
was "sha-" even when it wasn't short for "she-" + "ha-". But Nevi'im
Acharonim use the "she-" common ever since.

If if we take Adam, Noach, and Migdal Bavel as history, we have to also
accept the evolution of language.

Which means that it could well be that in Adam's day, Hebrew and Aramaic
hadn't branched off yet. The language Adam spoke, being an ancestor of
the Torah's Hebrew and containing the tools to best communicate with the
RBSO, was Lashon haQodesh. Even if it was also the ancestor of Aramaic.
Maybe he spoke proto-Semitic, proto-Afroasiatic, or something yet earlier.

The Rosh explains the idea that Qaddish is in Aramaic to hide it from
mal'akhim. He says that Aramaic is "Lashon haQodesh hamequlqul", so
mal'akhim don't want to use it. Perhaps we could say that it's in the
"uncanny valley", where something looking almost right is worse than
not trying to imitate at all.

:-)BBii!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 Take time,
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   be exact,
Author: Widen Your Tent      unclutter the mind.
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF          - Rabbi Simcha Zissel Ziv, Alter of Kelm

On Wed, Oct 22, 2025 at 09:16:29AM -0400, Akiva Miller via Avodah wrote:
> R' Joel Rich asked:
>> S"A O"C 131:4 states "nahagu shelo lipol al pneichem... bbeit
>> hachatan." Does nahagu imply amcha did this and the rabbis didn't
>> resist?

> Isn't that how ALL minhagim get started?

> In fact, my understanding is that the main difference between minhagim and
> d'rabanans is that if it starts with amcha and the rabbis don't object,
> that's a proper minhag. (As opposed to many examples of minhag shtus, which
> the rabbis fought against, with varying degrees of success.) ...

I would divide it three ways:

A minhag starts with amkha and the rabbis find a meaning in it. Like the
Rama or other explanations for eating milchig on Shavuos.

A practice they don't object to but haven't found a way to make religiously
meaningful is fashion. No reason to ban it, but no obligation to keep it going
either. The term in gemara in minhag kalah, but in Judeo-English I don't
think we would dip out of English for the word "minhag". In Hebew and
Aramaic, the technical term "minhag" *is* the simplest term for what
is popular and fashionable.

A practice that defies halakhah, and likely "just" halachically off,
is a minhag shetus. And that's when the rabbis will object.


On Wed, Oct 22, 2025 at 08:33:15PM -0400, Michael Poppers via Avodah wrote:
> In Avodah V43n63, RJIR asked, "...why the focus on bet hachatan (like bet
> haavel) and not just in his presence? Is there a higher degree of joy there?"
> As can be seen from BT Sukah 25b
> <https://www.dafyomi.org/index.php?masechta=succah&;daf=25b>, it's not just
> about the chasan -- it's about him and the kalla being together under
> the chuppa; and NB how Tos'fos (d'ham' "ein simcha ela b'chuppa")
> stress the chuppa aspect and how the g'mara dismisses sukka as
> equivalent to being under that chuppa (basically because the chasan
> cannot interact w/ his kalla in the same manner should the simcha be
> moved to a sukka).

Revering to RJR's parenthetic remark and how it impacts RMP's response:
The neshamah of the meis hangs around the beis ha'avel. So there is
something special to that space too.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 When memories exceed dreams,
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   The end is near.
Author: Widen Your Tent                      - Rav Moshe Sherer
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 Live as if you were living already for the
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   second time and as if you had acted the first
Author: Widen Your Tent      time as wrongly as you are about to act now!
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF          - Victor Frankl, Man's search for Meaning


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