Halakhah zu Bereschit 24:70

Birkat ha-mazon is recited with at least three adults, as it is said, “Exalt the Lord with me.²³³Ps 34:4: Gadlu la-Shem iti. Gadlu is a plural imperative, so it includes at least two; iti – “with me” adds one more, making it at least three. With three, one says in the zimmun “nivarekh she-akhalnu mishelo” – “Let us bless Him from whose food we have eaten” without mentioning God’s name. And with ten one does mention God’s name: nivarekh eloheynu– “Let us bless our God.”²³⁴B. Berakhot 49b, and so the Tur and Orah Hayim 192. And one does not say “Barekhu eloheynu” – “Bless our God,” in other words, one should not exclude himself from the group. Thus I conclude that “nivarekh” is preferable, but if someone has said “barekhu,” one doesn’t hold it against him.²³⁵B. Berakhot 50a. In other words, it is acceptable to say “barekhu.” Regardless if the number of diners is eleven or 110,000, one says, “nivarekh eloheynu she-akhalnu mishelo,” because ten is the number that includes everything and there is nothing after it, unless it is doubled [?]. If one leading a zimmun of three says, “nivarekh she-akhalnu mishelo” – “Let us bless Him from whose food we have eaten,” the other two reply as if he were beginning with “Barukh she-akhalnu mishelo uv-tuvo hayinu” –“Blessed be the One from whose food we ate and by whose goodness we live.” If one leading a zimmun of ten says, “nivarekh eloheynu she-akhalnu mishelo” – “Let us bless our God from whose food we have eaten,” the rest reply with “Barukh eloheynu she-akhalnu mishelo uv-tuvo hayinu” –“Blessed be our God from whose food we ate and by whose goodness we live.” Those outside of the table answer “Amen,” which is like the matter discussed in tractate Yoma:²³⁶B. Yoma 37a. “For the name of the Lord I proclaim; Give glory to our God!”²³⁷Dt 32:3. When “I proclaim the name ‘Lord,’ You give glory to ‘Eloheynu,’ namely, you should answer “Amen.”

And you need to know that because the sages z”l said, “a bat kol went out and said that a cup of blessing is equal to forty pieces of gold, it is clear from this that each blessing of the hundred blessing equals ten pieces of gold.”²⁴⁰B. Hullin 87a. Since there are four blessings in birkat ha-mazon said over the cup of blessing – you do the math. This is also an allusion to the tradition that one said say at least a hundred blessings per day. And there’s support for this in the verse: “one ladle (kaf) of ten [shekels] of gold filled with incense,”²⁴¹Nu 7:14. that is to say, every “one from Ka”F,²⁴²Ka”F is numerically equivalent to 100. which are the one hundred blessings equal to “ten gold [pieces].” And you will also find in another place, “esreh zahav mishkalam” – “ten gold shekels in weight”²⁴³Gen 24:22, the value of the gold armbands Eliezer gave Rebekah as a present after she gave his camels water at the well. to which armbands Scripture follows with the phrase “Then I bowed low in homage to the Lord and blessed the Lord.”²⁴⁴Gen 24:48, immediately preceded in 24:27 with “And I put the ring on her nose, and the bands on her arms,” i.e., the ten shekel gold bands, which are equal to one blessing. The reason why every blessing is equal to ten shekels of gold is to hint that it is possible to include the 10 sefirot in each and every blessing. And the reason for 100 blessings every day is their correspondence to the 10 sefirot, ten blessings for each and every sefirah. And this what is written, “And now, O Israel, what (mah) does the Lord your God demand of you.”²⁴⁵Dt 10:12. And our sages z”l said, “Don’t read mah – “what,” but rather me’ah –“a hundred,”²⁴⁶B. Menahot 43b. that is to say, “A hundred the Lord your God demands of you.” And there are 99 letters in this verse; adding the letter aleph makes it 100.²⁴⁷That is, adding an aleph to the word mah, making it me’ah, give the verse 100 letters. In his commentary to the Torah R. Bahya brings this interpretation as the sod – “the mystical interpretation” of Dt. 10:12. And we found in King David (peace upon him), who said, “The utterance of the man set on high [‘al],”²⁴⁸2 Sam 23:1. The Hebrew word ‘al is numerically equivalent to 100. because one hundred men of Israel a day used to die in that generation, and deeply moved by this, David instituted [tiken]100 blessings.²⁴⁹Midrash Tanhuma Korah 12. Tiken – “instituted” of course also has the connotation of tikkun – “repair,” as in the sense of a cosmic repair through blessings of a world diminished by the loss of 100 lives. He didn’t institute them per se, but rather re-established them, since they had been forgotten, and David came along and re-established them.²⁵⁰Ibid. According to this midrash, Moses originally established the blessings, and afterwards, whne they had been forgotten, David came along and re-established them, and after David’s era they were forgotten again until the sages of the Talmud re-established them (Chavel). And thus is written, “So [ki khen] shall the man who fears the Lord be blessed [yivorakh].”²⁵¹Ps 128:4. The word yivorakh – “shall be blessed” is spelled without a vav, which means that by the numerical equivalent of K”I Khe”N – 100 – will the person who fears the Lord both bless and be blessed.²⁵²Lacking the vav, the Hebrew word can be read either actively as yivarekh – “he will bless,” or passively as yivorakh – “he will be blessed.” Therefore a person needs to recite 100 blessings and fulfill them each day. And on Shabbat, when it is not possible because the Amidah for Shabbat contains only seven blessings, as it is written, “I praise You seven times on theday,”²⁵³Ps 119:164. the day which is well-known and special, namely, Shabbat, our sages z”l already said, “one completes them with aromatic herbs and fancy fruits.”²⁵⁴B. Menahot 43b, i.e., one enjoys lots of extra snacks and aromas that require blessings to make up for the shortage of blessings.

And you need to know that because the sages z”l said, “a bat kol went out and said that a cup of blessing is equal to forty pieces of gold, it is clear from this that each blessing of the hundred blessing equals ten pieces of gold.”²⁴⁰B. Hullin 87a. Since there are four blessings in birkat ha-mazon said over the cup of blessing – you do the math. This is also an allusion to the tradition that one said say at least a hundred blessings per day. And there’s support for this in the verse: “one ladle (kaf) of ten [shekels] of gold filled with incense,”²⁴¹Nu 7:14. that is to say, every “one from Ka”F,²⁴²Ka”F is numerically equivalent to 100. which are the one hundred blessings equal to “ten gold [pieces].” And you will also find in another place, “esreh zahav mishkalam” – “ten gold shekels in weight”²⁴³Gen 24:22, the value of the gold armbands Eliezer gave Rebekah as a present after she gave his camels water at the well. to which armbands Scripture follows with the phrase “Then I bowed low in homage to the Lord and blessed the Lord.”²⁴⁴Gen 24:48, immediately preceded in 24:27 with “And I put the ring on her nose, and the bands on her arms,” i.e., the ten shekel gold bands, which are equal to one blessing. The reason why every blessing is equal to ten shekels of gold is to hint that it is possible to include the 10 sefirot in each and every blessing. And the reason for 100 blessings every day is their correspondence to the 10 sefirot, ten blessings for each and every sefirah. And this what is written, “And now, O Israel, what (mah) does the Lord your God demand of you.”²⁴⁵Dt 10:12. And our sages z”l said, “Don’t read mah – “what,” but rather me’ah –“a hundred,”²⁴⁶B. Menahot 43b. that is to say, “A hundred the Lord your God demands of you.” And there are 99 letters in this verse; adding the letter aleph makes it 100.²⁴⁷That is, adding an aleph to the word mah, making it me’ah, give the verse 100 letters. In his commentary to the Torah R. Bahya brings this interpretation as the sod – “the mystical interpretation” of Dt. 10:12. And we found in King David (peace upon him), who said, “The utterance of the man set on high [‘al],”²⁴⁸2 Sam 23:1. The Hebrew word ‘al is numerically equivalent to 100. because one hundred men of Israel a day used to die in that generation, and deeply moved by this, David instituted [tiken]100 blessings.²⁴⁹Midrash Tanhuma Korah 12. Tiken – “instituted” of course also has the connotation of tikkun – “repair,” as in the sense of a cosmic repair through blessings of a world diminished by the loss of 100 lives. He didn’t institute them per se, but rather re-established them, since they had been forgotten, and David came along and re-established them.²⁵⁰Ibid. According to this midrash, Moses originally established the blessings, and afterwards, whne they had been forgotten, David came along and re-established them, and after David’s era they were forgotten again until the sages of the Talmud re-established them (Chavel). And thus is written, “So [ki khen] shall the man who fears the Lord be blessed [yivorakh].”²⁵¹Ps 128:4. The word yivorakh – “shall be blessed” is spelled without a vav, which means that by the numerical equivalent of K”I Khe”N – 100 – will the person who fears the Lord both bless and be blessed.²⁵²Lacking the vav, the Hebrew word can be read either actively as yivarekh – “he will bless,” or passively as yivorakh – “he will be blessed.” Therefore a person needs to recite 100 blessings and fulfill them each day. And on Shabbat, when it is not possible because the Amidah for Shabbat contains only seven blessings, as it is written, “I praise You seven times on theday,”²⁵³Ps 119:164. the day which is well-known and special, namely, Shabbat, our sages z”l already said, “one completes them with aromatic herbs and fancy fruits.”²⁵⁴B. Menahot 43b, i.e., one enjoys lots of extra snacks and aromas that require blessings to make up for the shortage of blessings.

A person ought to be modest in his eating and drinking, not be short-tempered at the table,⁴Derekh Eretz Rabba 6. not eat or drink standing, nor eat before the fourth hour of the day.⁵Derekh Eretz Rabba 7, around 10:00 AM (van Loopik, 115). When two are eating, each one waits for the other to take from the plate, but with three, one does not wait. A person should not grab in his hand a serving larger in size than an egg, because that is being a glutton.⁶Derekh Eretz Rabba 6. One should not wipe the plate with his fingers, not eat from a head of garlic or onion but from its leaves.⁷Ibid. And one should not bite from a piece of food and then give it to his companion, because not all creatures feel the same way [about how hygienic this would be].⁸Ibid., 9. One should not bite off piece of bread with one’s teeth and then return it to the table. Once it happened that there was someone who picked up a piece of bread and let it hang from his teeth. R. Akiba said to him, “Not so, my son. You might as well put your heel on it and rip it off.”⁹Ibid., 7. A person should not drink his cup in one gulp, and if he does so, he is a glutton. Two sips are polite; three sips, vulgar.¹⁰Ibid., 6. One should not drink from one’s cup and then give it to his companion because of the health risk. Once it happened to R. Akiba when he was a guest at someone’s house that his host gave him a cup from which he had sipped. R. Akiba said to him, “Drink it yourself.” Ben Azzai said to him (the host), “How long will you keep giving R. Akiba cups that have been sipped from!?”¹¹Ibid., 9. A person should not put the plate on top of the bread. Once it happened to R. Akiba when he was a guest at someone’s house that his host took a piece of food and put the plate on it. R. Akiba grabbed it and ate it. He said to his host, “How could I imagine that you would be hurt by lukewarm water when you’re not even hurt by boiling water?”¹²Ibid. The story “proves” that it is wrong to cover food with the plate. Following Chavel’s explanation, I think Rabbi Akiba reproaches his host for ungraciously not offering him the piece of food and trying to hide it under the plate. R. Akiba explains his own bold gesture -grabbing the food and eating – euphemistically. In other words, with someone as rude as you who doesn’t know better than to put a plate on a piece of food, only something as rude as what I did (“boiling water”), not a gentle or subtle hint (“lukewarm water”), could get it across to you just how wrong and rude you were to put the plate on top of the food.

Five are the things they said about bread: (1) Don’t put raw meat on bread; (2) don’t put the cup on top of the bread; (3) don’t put the plate on top of the bread; (4) don’t throw the bread; and (5) don’t sit on the food – so it is taught in the laws of Derekh Eretz.¹³Ibid.Rejoice over your table when the hungry come and enjoy from your table, for that will lengthen your days in this world and earn you life in the world to come. And so also from Derekh Eretz we learn: “Let no guest say, ‘Give me and I shall eat,’ until they speak to him, though it is not necessary to say explicitly that he should eat when on the table in front of him is whatever he needs and is able to eat. For thus it is written in the Torah: “But when food was set before him, he said, ‘I will not eat until I have said what I have to say.'”¹⁴Gen 24:33. Who said anything to Eliezer about eating that he should reply, “I will not eat,” unless he was responding to the fact that the food was prepared, set before him, and up to him to eat? There was no one putting himself between him and his food for him to say to him “I will” or “I will not eat.”

It is permissible le-khatḥila to pray in the plaza of the Kotel (the Western Wall) because it is surrounded by walls on three sides. Moreover, the holiness of the site reinforces one’s love and awe of God, causing one’s prayer to be said with more kavana. The patriarch Yitzḥak did this when he recited Minḥa on Mount Moriah, which was then an open field, as it says: “Yitzḥak went out to meditate in the field” (Bereishit 24:63; Berakhot 26b; Midrash Tehillim §81).

Judaism posits yet another regulation regarding the welfare of animals which is regarded as biblical in nature even though the law is not reflected in a literal reading of Scripture. The biblical statement "I will give grass in thy fields for thy cattle, and thou shall eat and be satisfied" (Deuteronomy 11:15) is understood in rabbinic exegesis as forbidding a person to partake of any food unless he has first fed his animals.⁶See Berakhot 41a and Gittin 62a. See also Rambam, Hilkhot Avadim 9:8; R. Meir Rothenberg, Teshuvot Maharam ben Barukh he-Ḥadashhot, no. 302; R. Jacob Reisher, Teshuvot Shevut Ya‘akov, II, no. 13; Magen Avraham, Oraḥ Ḥayyim 167:18 and 271:12; Ḥayyei Adam 45:1, and R. Joel Schwartz, Ve-Raḥamav al Kol Ma’asav, pp. 59-62. R. Jacob Emden, She’elat Ya‘ave&x1E93;, 1, no. 17, rules that there is no absolute requirement to feed a dog or a cat before eating oneself since those animals sustain themselves on table scraps and forage for foods but that it is nevertheless proper to feed them first in order “to acquire the trait of compassion.” Magen Avraham, Oraḥ, Ḥayyim 324:7, declares that providing food for any animal, including animals belonging to other persons and ownerless animals, constitutes a miẓvah. See also R. Simeon ben Ẓemaḥ Duran, Teshuvot Tashbaẓ, III, no. 293; R. Jacob Ettlinger, Teshuvot Binyan Ẓion, no. 103; and R. Eliyahu Klatzkin, Teshuvot Imrei Shefer, no. 34, sec. 1. Cf. R. Moses Sofer, Teshuvot Ḥatam Sofer, Yoreh De‘ah, no. 314, s.v. ve-la’asot, and no. 318, s.v. ve-hinneh. This regulation is derived from the order in which the two clauses comprising the verse are recorded. The passage speaks first of providing for animals and only subsequently of satisfying human needs.⁷Similarly, Scripture records that Laban gave straw to the camels and only afterwards did he provide food for Abraham’s servant. See Genesis 24:32-33 and Sefer Ḥasidim (ed. Reuben Margulies), no. 531. Cf., R. Joel Schwartz, Ve-Raḥamav al Kol Ma’asav, p. 60, note 4. Amplifying this rule, the Palestinian Talmud, Yevamot 15:3 and Ketubot 4:8, declares that a person is forbidden to purchase an animal unless he can assure an adequate supply of food on its behalf.

If he gave her a Prutah and said to her “Be betrothed to me with this on the condition that I will give you a maneh.”¹¹²Originally the shekel was a unit of weight for means of payment in gold and silver. In the third millenium BCE one finds this unit of weight in Babylonia. Sixty Babylonian shekels were a maneh. When this system of coinage was introduced into Israel the maneh generally consisted of only 50 shekels. The shekel as a unit of weight for gold is first mentioned in Jewish sources in Genesis 24:22 and Joshua 7:21. In Genesis 23:16 one finds mention of the shekel as a unit of weight for silver. When the condition is fulfilled the betrothal will take effect retroactively even if he did not say “from now.” For anyone who says al menath it is as if he had said “from now.” Yet if she accepts betrothal from another before the conditions are fulfilled and afterwards the conditions were fulfilled, the betrothal of the second man is void. But if he said to her “on the condition that I will give to you a maneh within 30 days,” if he gave it to her within the thirty days behold it is a betrothal retroactively; if he did not give it within thirty days she is not betrothed, and if she accepts betrothal from another man during the thirty days she is betrothed but she is not betrothed¹¹³i.e., this is a pending situation. until thirty days. When the thirty days are completed if the conditions of the first man are not fulfilled the betrothal of the first man is cancelled and the betrothal of the latter is complete and she does not require a bill of divorce from the former. If the former fulfills his condition she does not require a bill of divorce from the latter.

If you own animals or birds (poultry), and it is your responsibility to feed them, you are not allowed to eat anything until you feed them, as it is written (Deuteronomy 11:15): "And I will put grass in your fields for your cattle (animals) and you will eat and be satisfied." Thus the Torah has given preference to feeding the cattle [animals] before the feeding of man. But as regards drinking, man comes first as it is written (Genesis 24:14): [Rivkah said] "Drink first and I will also give your camels to drink." Similarly it is written (Numbers 20:8): "And you will give drink to the congregation and to their animals."