Thumbs and Eggs
Singer, David
THUMBS AND EGGS DAVID SINGER Why was this Passover different from every other Passover? Because along with large numbers of other Orthodox laymen, I had access to Rabbi Shimon Eider's A Summary of...
...Before long, academies for advanced Talmud study were founded, tight-knit communities were established, and elite Orthodox patterns of thought and behavior began to make themselves felt in the Orthodox community as a whole...
...Of course, the mandatory silence during this part of the seder helps...
...And there is a bonus for the women: after all the matzah and bitter herb, who has room for a multi-course festive meal...
...Reflecting the aggressive mood of contemporary elite Orthodoxy—an Orthodoxy cut off from its roots in Europe, and thus from any organic ties to the folk religion of the masses—he wants to make every Jew aware of the exact requirements of the halachah...
...that rice, corn, and legumes may be owned and displayed (though not eaten) during the holiday...
...Which brings me to the thumbs and eggs...
...It is expressed primarily through ritual and symbol, rather than precise doctrinal formulation, and is rooted in tradition and custom...
...What they did do, in the classic fashion of folk religion, was to take note of the practices that prevailed at home and in the community...
...installments dealing with forbidden and permissible products, and with the requirements of the seder...
...Sometimes—as with the laws pertaining to the seder ritual—these practices did not measure up to the standards of elite Orthodoxy...
...To be sure, the exact ritual requirements of the holiday are laid out in the corpus of rabbinic writings...
...Until fairly recently, the message of elite Orthodoxy was conveyed by men who spoke only Yiddish—a factor which hindered the full dissemination of elite ideas and perspectives among the highly Americanized "modern" element of the Orthodox community...
...It is difficult to imagine a set of circumstances arising that would make for a revitalization of Orthodox folk religion on the American scene...
...that the haroset is shaken off the bitter herb before the latter is eaten...
...dox Jewry, at that point in time, constituted, with but few exceptions, a community of am haratzim...
...In terms of Orthodox Judaism, elite religion is best represented by the circles of rabbinic scholars, while folk religion finds a place for itself mainly among the unlettered masses...
...Since, he reasoned, the size of the human thumb had not doubled since talmudic times, it had to be that the typical egg is only half the size of the one the Talmud had in mind...
...Now, however, a large body of English language material has made its appearance, including several works by Rabbi Eider...
...Elite religion, as Charles Liebman has expressed it, consists of the "ritual, belief, and doctrine which the acknowledged religious leaders teach to be the religion...
...Let me explain...
...As Rabbi Eider explains it, it has its source in the fact that the Talmud mentions two ways of determining the proper measure...
...For the first time, large numbers of Jews, deeply committed to elite Orthodoxy, and most particularly to its emphasis on lernen, i.e., intensive Torah study, came to the United States...
...men who were determined to recreate in the United States the pattern of life they had known in the Old World...
...that it is not permissible to point to the shankbone on the seder plate...
...Every Orthodox Jew is aware that it is obligatory to eat an olive-size piece of matzah at the seder...
...that a portion of the Haggadah has to be read in the vernacular if the seder participants do not understand Hebrew...
...Next year, when Rabbi Eider presents his final installment, taking up matters relating to the disposal of hametz and the kashering of utensils, he will have said just about everything that can be said about Passover from a halachic perspective...
...With the Second World War, however, a radical change came about...
...While the rabbinic leadership was well aware of this situation, it did little about it, in part because it lacked an effective communications system, and in part because it felt little compulsion to act...
...It turns out that perfume, hair spray and roll-on deoderant are hametz and are not permitted on Passover...
...one involving the use of thumbs, the other of eggs...
...Rabbi Eider and the elite Orthodox possess the additional knowledge that the same measure applies to the bitter herb, the korech (the matzah and bitter herb sandwich) and the afikomen that are consumed...
...When Rabbi Ezekiel Landau, a noted 18th century scholar, compared the two methods, he discovered to his dismay that they did not square...
...Hence his use of English, and his preparation of tape cassettes...
...In Stamford, Connecticut, where I live, there was palpable tension in the air prior to Passover, as people fretted whether they would be able to "do it right on seder night...
...More precisely, we pored over two installments of his study...
...that there are specific points in the seder ritual when it is obligatory to recline, and that reclining is always on the left side...
...that romaine lettuce rather than horseradish is the preferred bitter herb...
...Indeed, Rabbi Eider, in addition to authoring volumes dealing with the laws of the Sabbath, Succot, and Passover, has prepared tape cassettes covering the same topics...
...Small wonder then, that Jewish education was woefully neglected, that religious observance was notoriously lax, and that so many nominally Orthodox Jews drifted into the Conservative movement...
...Because along with large numbers of other Orthodox laymen, I had access to Rabbi Shimon Eider's A Summary of Halachos (Laws) of Pesach...
...The victory of elite Orthodoxy is nearly complete and probably final...
...This year Passover, next year gossip and business ethics...
...Eating large amounts of matzah and bitter herb is no small trick, especially when you are trying to consume the individual portions in less than two minutes each, and when you have been drinking cups containing 3.3 ounces of wine...
...More remarkably, though, they also know that "olive-size" has nothing to do with the run-of-the-mill olive, and that, in fact, it represents, in terms of the realia of the seder, pieces of matzah 6'/4 x 7 inches, portions of romaine lettuce leaves covering an area 8 x 10 inches, and servings of horseradish sufficient to fill three tablespoons...
...hence—since an olive is considered to be half the size of an egg—elite Orthodoxy's super king-size olive...
...Sociologists distinguish between elite and folk religion...
...To anyone raised in a folk Orthodox environment, A Summary of Halachos of Pesach is an amazing eye opener...
...OrthoDavid Singer is Associate Editor of the American Jewish Yearbook...
...If A Summary of Halachos of Pesach stands out among this material, it is because it underscores especially well the demise of folk Orthodoxy...
...and, that under certain circumstances, it is possible to fulfill the commandment of the four cups by drinking coffee rather than wine...
...The much talked about Orthodox "move to the right"—a phenomenon which has been apparent for the past twenty-five years, and which continues unabated today—is directly attributable to the influence of the elite Orthodox cadres...
...hence also his explanation of the logic behind the laws, and his careful citation of sources...
...THUMBS AND EGGS DAVID SINGER Why was this Passover different from every other Passover...
...The point, however, is that the masses of Jews, throughout Jewish history, never (either because of a lack of ability or a lack of concern) consulted these works...
...Moment 717...
...In other instances—as in the case of the laws concerning prohibited foods—they went far beyond the demands of the halachah...
...Folk religion, on the other hand, is the popular religious culture...
...At their head were the talmudic scholars who had held sway in the great East European yeshivot...
...Hence his advocacy of doubling the egg measure...
...This is attributable to the fact that the rabbinic scholars and their followers refused to emigrate to a trefa land...
...Elite religion is fully self-conscious, well defined, and anchored in an authoritative interpretation of sacred texts...
...that milk, sugar, coffee, and concentrated frozen juice, if purchased before the holiday, may be used on Passover, even though they don't have Kosher for Pesach labels...
...By its very nature—i.e., because of the complexity of its laws, and because it brings to the fore powerful oral anxieties and cleanliness concerns—Passover provides a golden opportunity for folk religion to manifest itself...
...One looks forward, therefore, to a spate of publications by Rabbi Eider and other elite spokesmen covering the full range of the halachah, ethics as well as ritual...
...that virtually all of the laws relating to the seder are binding on women as well as men...
...In a very real sense, the story of Orthodox Judaism in America is a tale of the triumph of elite over folk religion...
...After all, folk Orthodoxy was the "law" as far as the masses were concerned, and could anything better be expected of amchdl Rabbi Eider will have none of this...
...How is this possible...
...it makes it easier to concentrate on the task of eating...
...He will have also—and Rabbi Eider may not be fully aware of this—driven the last nail into the coffin of Orthodox folk religion...
...It takes some doing for the folk Orthodox to adjust to elite standards...
...While in Europe both variants of Orthodoxy always existed side by side, in the United States, prior to World War II, it was the folk type that was completely dominant...
Vol. 3 • September 1978 • No. 9
