When Exactly Was Techeiles Lost?
Parsha Talk – Teruma 5781 – 04 – How Tekhelet got Lost
Mar 12, 2021
Rabbi Avi Grossman interviews Dr. Baruch Sterman on Tekhelet.
Mar 12, 2021
Rabbi Avi Grossman interviews Dr. Baruch Sterman on Tekhelet.
Regarding yesterday’s remark that bald monkeys aren’t “Nazirites” (נזירים)! — secular Hebrew to the contrary notwithstanding.
Rabbi Avi Grossman writes in:
Adderebba.
Not only is it clear that the Hebrew nazir is one who abstains from wine and grape juice (״מיין ושכר יזיר״) nothing like the Christian concept of an ascetic monk, our nazirim did not take on the ridiculous, unnatural, and perverse practice of celibacy, and more importantly, just like the word for abstention, yazzir, is of the root nun-zayin-reish in the hif’il conjugation, the simple segolate-noun form of the word, neizer, a type of crown, is specifically referring to the nazirite’s long hair. Intentionally removing all of the hair of one’s head is the opposite of being a nazirite.
(Avoiding contact with the dead is not referred to with the same term, and is instead referred to as it is with regard to priests – avoidance of ritual contamination. See also my earlier essay about how nazirisim is basically a means of opening the priesthood and its attendant higher sanctity to those who are disqualified from the actual priesthood.)
Rabbi Brand demonstrates at length that “Habayis Hagadol Vehakadosh” the Rambam records entering in Jerusalem (on Vav Cheshvan) was certainly the Temple Mount, contra Shut “Minchas Yitzchak” and others.
Needless to say, the case for ascending the Temple Mount today doesn’t hinge on this at all, but on the ancient tradition identifying the Dome of the Rock with, well, the “Rock” (and much more). Still, it is a nice thing to know we retrace the steps of the Rambam, as well.
But prolific anti-Zionist rabbi, Aviad Neiger, in his anti-Temple Mount tract (ויעמד על ההר אשר מקדם לעיר p. 67-69, and elsewhere) argues the Jews were reduced to visiting a substitute location on Har Hazeisim since the time of the Geonim instead of Har Habayis.
He writes, p. 14 (Bolding, underlining, etc. omitted):
מלבד כך שהיהודים לא הורשו להכנס לירושלים ק”ו ב”ב של ק”ו להר הבית בגלל — ‘חוזה עומר’, אזי שישנה סברא שגם בשאר השנה לא הורשו היהודים להיות גם בהר הזיתים, אלא רק בחודש תשרי, ולכן מציינים באגרות חג הסוכות עד הושענא רבה (ומשום כך גם היה נהוג בימי הגאונים שראש ישיבת ‘גאון יעקב’ היה מכריז ומודיע על סדר קביעת המועדים למשך כל שנה הבאה, והכרזה זו ידועה בשם ‘הכרזת הר הזיתים’).
So, that’s where the Rambam went, says Rabbi Neiger.
But let’s bear some facts in mind:
Feel free to weigh in here, my dear readers!
UPDATE: Rabbi Neiger responded to this over here.
In reference to yesterday’s article, Rabbi Avi Grossman writes:
“I had a similar incident whereby the police forcefully seized a large sum of money from a neighbor.
Considering the claimant was looking for about 2,000 NIS, the police must have kept the other 2,900 NIS for themselves.”