Each week we discuss one familiar halakhic practice and try to show its beauty and meaning. The columns are based on the commentary "Meaning in Mitzvot" on the Kitzur Shulchan Arukh, which is serialized on Yeshivat Har Etzion's "Virtual Beit Midrash", www.vbm-torah.org. Subscribers are currently learning about Shabbat. NOTE: This piece was submitted by Rabbi Meir for the Pesach issue, but didn't make it in. Although it deals with an aspect of CHAMETZ, its theme reaches beyond Pesach, and relates to matters of K'DOSHIM.
"ISSUR MASHEHU" (an arbitrarily small amount of prohibition) What happens when a forbidden food becomes mixed together with a permitted one? The usual rule is that the prohibition can be nullified if the amount is so small that its taste is no longer distinguishable; in general we assume that a mixture of one in sixty is nullified in this way. (SA YD 98:1.) However, chametz during Pesach is an "issur mashehu" - even the smallest amount of chametz prohibits the entire food. (SA OC 447:1.) What is the meaning of this stricture? It is easy to understand why most foods are nullified when they are indistinguishable. What enjoyment do we get from a food which we can't taste? Yet there are a few kinds of prohibited substances which our Sages decreed are never nullified. It is useful to divide these into three categories: 1. Some foods never get overwhelmed in a mixture because they just don't mix. If I take one forbidden apple and place it next to a million permissible ones, there is no reason the forbidden apple should be nullified by mere proximity. It is distinct by virtue of its unique identity. This is one way we can understand the exception of a biryah, a distinct creature. Since we can always identify it, it can never get lost in the crowd. (Based on a lecture of Rav Aharon Lichtenstein.) 2. Some prohibitions don't get overwhelmed because even a tiny amount is dangerous. If we know that a tiny fraction of the oil in a particular food was rancid, we may still eat it; but if we know that a tiny fraction was tainted with botulism poison we would probably refrain. Likewise, foods prohibited because of danger may not be permissible in a mixture of sixty. (See Taz YD 116:2.) 3. Some things have the ability to replicate themselves. How would you like to buy a grain silo and be reassured that there were only two mice in the entire area - one male and one female? Or receive a transfusion and be reassured that there were only a few germs of plague present? This is one way to understand the exception of pagan worship, whose appurtenances are never nullified even according to Torah law. (SA YD 140:1.) Regarding idolatry the Torah commands (Devarim 13:18): "not the slightest bit of the interdiction shall adhere to your hand". Even the slightest amount of idolatry can not be ignored, because such beliefs actually replicate. This is the plague of missionizing, which the Torah warns us about many times. For instance, the verse we just cited is taken from a passage warning of the worthless people who attempt to brainwash (hadiach) the people of their city to worship pagan gods. The likeness of chametz, leavened matter, to an infectious organism needs no elaboration. Yeast is in fact a microorganism which succeeds in inflating the dough by natural increase - actually "infecting" the dough. The Talmud explains that this is indeed one element in the special stringency of the prohibition of chametz (Avodah Zara 68a). The issur mashehu of chametz reminds us that evil is often contagious. An act which is immoral in itself could perhaps be "nullified", outweighed by the general norm of proper behavior. But the immorality of a single individual has a way of demoralizing others. A person who cheats others not only garners unfair gain, but also stimulates a general decline in ethical standards, as no one wants to be the only sucker who plays fairly. Envy, immodesty and insolence are other examples of corrupt traits which can spread through society like a kind of rot. At Pesach time, we are reminded that the kind of wrongdoing which multiplies and corrupts society requires special effort to identify and root out.Rabbi Meir is in the process of writing a monumental companion to Kitzur Shulchan Aruch which beautifully presents the meanings in our mitzvot and halacha. Rabbi Meir - who had given a series on Business Halacha at the Center, and has taught a series on the Meaning in Mitzvot. We hope to have him back at the Center some time in the future.
Rabbi Asher Meir is in the process of writing a monumental companion to Kitzur Shulchan Aruch which beautifully presents the meanings in our mitzvot and halacha. Rabbi Meir - who had given a series on Business Halacha at the Center, and has taught a series on the Meaning in Mitzvot. We hope to have him back at the Center some time in the future.
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