As we have explained last week, there is a fundamental difference between Sephardim and Ashkenazim regarding the recitation of haGomel. In the Ashkenazi tradition, haGomel is recited only when one has recovered or was saved from some sort of a life-threatening or dangerous situation. For the Sephardic custom, haGomel is recited in four scenarios: imprisonment, illness, sea- sailing and traveling, even if one’s life has not been compromised.  For the Sephardic tradition these four cases represent an exhaustive list of the cases in which haGomel is recited, while for the Ashkenazi tradition these four cases are examples of “dangerous situations”, and haGomel should be recited in similar scenarios.  For example, a car accident, or when one is a victim of an armed robbery or an attack by a wild animal, etc.  These two opinions are brought explicitly in the shulhan ‘arukh 219:9

Let us see now a summary of the rules of haGomel according to the Sephardic tradition.

Prison. If a person was imprisoned, kidnapped or deprived of his physical freedom, when released, has to recite haGomel.

Illness: As we have explained, once recovered from an illness that required bed-rest, one has to recite haGomel even if one’s life or health was not compromised (shulhan ‘arukh 219:8). A woman who gave birth, yoledet, belongs to this category. According to Ben Ish Hay haGomel should be recited only if one had to be in bed-rest for three or more days.

Sea-sailing: When going in a cruise, a ship or even in a fishing boat, into the open sea for 72 minutes or more, one has to recite haGomel when back from the trip (“open-sea” to this effects is considered when one cannot see the shore anymore,  Halakha Berura, V.11, p 208).

Traveling: The basic rule is that when traveling from one city to another city, traveling at least for 72 minutes outside the city, haGomel should be recited.  This rule applies for traveling by car or by plane. The application of this halakha is relatively easy in places like Israel where the definition of “the city” is simple. In big cities like Los Angeles or New York, it is more difficult to define “the city” that one has left, to the effects of this halakha: if you travel, for example, from Manhattan Beach NY, to Deal NJ, is Manhattan Beach considered “the city” that you just left? Or is it Brooklyn? Or is it New York State to the effects of this berakha?

In this last case and other similar cases, when we are not sure if the particulars of our traveling fit into the above mentioned categories, the best suggestion would be to ask the local rabbinic authorities about the halakhic precedents (=the Minhag) of the community, or to be included in the recitation of haGomel of someone who for sure has to say haGomel.

One of the names by which we call HaShem is TSUR (צור). This name or attribute of God appears many times in the Tora and in the Tanakh, especially in the book of Psalms. The word TSUR referring to God is also used very often in our Tefila, for example at the end of the Amida (ה ‘צורי וגואלי).

In Hebrew, the word TSUR means “rock.” When God commanded Moshe to extract water from the rock, the Tora used two words interchangeably: one is sela ‘(סלע, or “stone” BeMidbar 20: 8) and the other is TSUR (or rock, Shemot 17: 6).

But why would the Tora call HaShem “rock”?

Three explanations. Not possible but complementary.

The first explanation, which seems to be the peshat (=the literal meaning) is brought by Maimonides in his More Nebukhim (1:16).  HaRambam explains that the word TSUR is used metaphorically to refer to God as “our source”. As we all know, the Jews in the time of the Tanakh were experts in extracting, transporting and working the stone. The land of Israel is arid and mountainous, and stone extraction was one of the most common industries then. Until today there is a unique stone, famous in the world, called in Hebrew EBEN YERUSHALMI, the typical stone of Yerushalayim, the stones of the Kotel and the only stone that is permitted to be used when building in the Old city of Jerusalem.
People were very familiar with the origin of stones. All stones have ONE origin. The Rock (=rocky-mountain) or “quarry”. According to this beautiful Biblical metaphor, we are to HaShem what the stones are to the “rocky mountain”. This is what Yesha’ayahu (51:1) told explicitly the people of Israel, urging them to return to God: “Hear, you, who pursue righteousness and who seek HaShem; watch The Rock (צור חוצבתם) from which you were cut… . “.

According to this explanation, when we say TSUR in reference to HaShem we should think that He is The Source of all that exists. The Tora uses the word TSUR to refer to God as YOTSER, the Creator of everything and everyone (the beautiful word TSURI means:  “My Creator”).

The second explanation (or application) of the word TSUR referring to Hashem can be learned from David HaMelekh. In Tehilim 144, for example, the Psalm in which David prays (or talks) to HaShem in the battlefield. In the first pasuq David calls HaShem TSURI. There, David is not referring  to HaShem (only?) as his Creator but as his Protector. On the battlefield, the rock helps the soldier to hide and to protect himself from the arrows of the enemy. David HaMelekh understood that what protected him from the enemy’s weapons, and what made him invisible to the eyes of the enemy, was not a stone but HaShem, “his Rock”, his Protector.

Here TSUR is used to say that HaShem, beyond being our Creator, is also our Protector.

(to be continued …).

Rabbi Emanuel Abohab was born in the city of Porto, Portugal, in 1555. He was the great-grandson of the famous rabbi Isaac Abohab, also known as the Gaon of Castile (d. 1493).

Rabbi Abohab lost his parents at an early age and he was raised by his grandfather, Abraham Abohab. In Portugal the Jews had to live like anusim (crypto-Jews) or Marranos, unable to practice Judaism. In 1585 he emigrated to Italy and since then he dedicated his life to encouraging anusim living as Catholics to escape from Portugal and Spain and embrace Judaism in Italy and, from 1596, in Amsterdam, Netherlands.

He lived for  short time in various Italian cities, such as Pisa and Spoleto. His writing career began in an unusual way. In 1608 he wrote a treatise on the famous Latin phrase “Humanum est peccare, angelicum se emendare, diabolicum perseverare”, “To err is human, to amend [our mistakes] is angelic, and to persevere [in one’s sin] is perverse.” In this short treatise Rabbi Abohab exposed this sentence from the Jewish perspective of Teshuba. By doing this, he wished to to reach out to the crypto-Jews, who knew Latin better than Hebrew, and persuade them to amend their ways and come back to Judaism.

In 1615 he established himself in Venice,  a major center of Jewish life at the time, where he was invited to serve as the rabbi of the Jewish-Portuguese community of that city. That year he began his most important book, “Nomology or Legal Discourses”.

Towards the end of his life, Rabbi Abohab led a group of Yehudim to Erets Israel and he finally settled in Yerushalayim. There, he also continued his work to encourage anusim to come back to their origins. He died in 1628.

This book was originally written in Spanish and first published in Amsterdam in 1629, a year after the author’s death. The book “Nomology or Legal Discourses” deals primarily with the subject of Tora she be’al pe, commonly known as the “Oral Law”, which Rabbi Abohab with an excellent judgment calls “Mental Law”, i.e., the explanation, exposition and application of the Mitsvot, as our Sages taught.

This topic was very critical for the anusim since most of them were educated in convents, and although they knew very well the Biblical text, all they had learned was the Christian explanations of it, and they lacked the mental apparatus to process the Tora in the original Jewish way.

One example: In his book Rabbi Abohab dedicates two chapters (Section 2, Chapter 18 and 19) to denounce how contemporary Catholic translations deliberately deviated from the literal meaning of the Biblical text to suit their dogmas of faith. This sort of things contributed to the “mental” switch, from the Jewish to the gentile mode of understanding the Bible.

The book “Nomologia” (nomology means “the science of the laws of the mind”) is divided into two sections.

The first section contains 25 chapters and 30 chapters the second section.

Some illustrations

Section 1

1: 9: (original text) “En el qual se prueva como es impossible entenderse el perfecto modo de la observancia de los preceptos divinos sin la doctrina de los Sabios”(“In which it is shown that it is impossible to understand  the perfect way for the observance of the divine precepts without the doctrine of the Elders”)

From Chapter 15 to 21 the author shows that the Mental Law is necessary for the observance of mitsvot, and as an example he brings the Rabbis’ calculation of the complex Hebrew calendar, which combines the cycles of the sun and moon.

In chapters 22, 23 and 24 he exposes the 13 principles of Halakhic interpretation (hermeneutics) of Rabbi Yshma’el.

Section 2

This section explains that HaShem gave us the written Tora and the “Mental Law”; how is the level of prophecy reached; the superior level of Moshe Rabbenu’s prophecy and the history of the uninterrupted transmission of the “Mental Law” since Moses until his own days. One of the last rabbanim mentioned is Rabbi Yosef Caro (1488-1575)

More, from the original Spanish text:

Chapter 14 (on the authority of the Sanhedrin). “En el que se trata el principio y institucion del Supremo magistrado de los setenta y un Senadores [Sanhedrín] y de la obediencia que le devia todo el pueblo de Israel”

Chapter 26 (on the Expulsion of the Jews from Spain) “En el que se cuenta el destierro de los iudios de los reynos de Castilla en el año de cinco mil y dozientos y cinquenta y dos, y el de Portugal que sucedió de alli a seis años,las causas que movieron a aquellos reyes a desterrarlos etc.”

To download the book “Nomologia” click  here

NOTE: When reading this book, the reader should know that in old Spanish (and English) the letter “S” at the beginning or in the middle of the word, is used to be written taller than today’s “s”, and it gives the feeling of being an “f”.

This Friday you can feel a sense of excitement at our home. My husband told me that this Shabbat we are hosting a group of young teenagers from South America, who we do not know, and need a place to say.  Besides our weekly preparations for Shabbatthere is plenty of extra work.  More beds are needed, may be. And we will have to add an extra table in the dining room. And more shopping, of course. We want to make this Shabbat’s menu special in honor of our guests.

This is my personal “Shabbat magic time”.  My daughter is singing while she sets the table. My son, who had to leave his room for our guests, drove already twice to the supermarket, but did not complain even once.  Everybody is willing to help, and happily! We have made the Mitsva of hakhnasat orehim part of our family’s mission statement.

But there is also a little bit of concern…. We don’t know how many guests are coming… “What if they are too many, mom? What if there is no room in the table for all of us”, my youngest daughter asks me.   The Mishna portrays the residents of Yerushalayim as very hospitable. During the three festivals they opened their homes for their brothers who would came from every corner of the land of Israel. And “No person ever said in Yerushalayim, the place is too small for me”. I think that this describes not only the feelings of the guests but also what the hosts felt. I explain my daughter that no place could ever be too small, because kindness expands your mind, and allows you to see that your house is as big as you want it to be.

“But, ima, do we know these boys or their families?”. No, I said, but what a great opportunity to meet Yehudim you never met before.  Remember in this week’s parasha the story of Ribqa? Did she know Eliezer? And still she acted with extreme kindness to him.”

In our Shabbat table our job will be to make our guests feel comfortable. Giving them the feeling that they are welcomed. We must engage in conversations that will be interesting for them. The focus of tonight’s dinner will shift from our own gratification to our guests well-being. We will allow them to have a glimpse at our family time. And at the same time we will be exposed to their lives and experiences.

And I think to myself: the reason of this Mitsva is to do hesed  (=kindness) with our guests. To help others, who we might not know, give them food to eat and a place to sleep. But hakhnasat orhim is transformative for my own family as well!  The real hesed is done with us, with my children.   One the most beautiful gifts I can give my children is the feeling that they are needed. Specially today, when entitlement is epidemic, this beautiful Mitsva allows each of my kids to unfocus on the “I” and refocus selflessly on the other.  Receiving guests is a priceless opportunity to open the doors to our homes and the windows into our lives to, sometimes our unknown brothers and sisters from Am Israel.

When Eliezer asked for a place to stay, Ribqa generously offered to host him, his men and his camels at her parents home. Now Eliezer realizes that she is the one that will keep the tent of Sara wide open.  Ribqa is the woman who will be capable of filling the empty space left after Sarah’s departure from this world.

Today, I see my children walking in the same path that Abraham and Sara, Ytshaq and Ribqa, walked a long time ago. Thanks to the Mitsva of hakhnasat orehim they will learn once again that to be a good Jew you need to be, first and mostly, kind and caring.

As explained before, the blessing haGomel is recited as a public expression of gratitude to God.

HaGomel therefore, should be said in the presence of a minyan (ten men). Although technically you can say haGomel in any instance where a Minyan is present, the custom is to recite birkat haGomel when the Sefer Tora is read.

Let us now explain in what circumstances is appropriate or justified to say haGomel.

There is a fundamental difference between Sephardim and Ashkenazim regarding the recitation of haGomel. For the Ashkenazi tradition, haGomel is recited only when one recovered or was saved from some sort of a life-threatening situation. For the Sephardic custom, haGomel is recited in four scenarios (imprisonment, illness, traveling, sea crossing) even when one’s life has not been compromised.

Examples:

According to the Sephardic custom haGomel is recited for any illness that required bed-rest. The Shulhan ‘Arukh (219: 8) explains that even if one’s life or health has not been compromised, if the illness or the medical treatment required bed rest or hospitalization, haGomel should be recited. According to this custom if one was sick with the flu or a stomach virus, etc. and had to spend even one day in bed, he should say haGomel. Many Sephardic Jews follow the custom of the Ben Ish Hay who slightly disagrees with the Shulhan ‘Arukh and says that the recitation of haGomel is required only if one had to be in bed rest at least for three days.

According to the Ashkenazi tradition, haGomel should be recited only when one has recovered from an illness or after a medical procedure that carries some risk of life. For example, pneumonia or an infection that, if had not been treated could have involved a life threatening situation. Rabbi Eliezer Melamed gives another illustration of the application of Ashkenazi custom. He says that for a surgical procedure that required local anesthesia (=anesthesia applied only in the area of the body that will be operated) one should not say haGomel. But if the surgery demanded general anesthesia, then haGomel should be recited, because regardless of the disease’s risks, general anesthesia carries a surgical risk. He also clarifies that the general rule for the Ashkenazi custom is that haGomel should be recited when one has recovered from an illness which is serious enough to justify transgressing the Shabbat.

As the reader can see, there are many customs regarding the details of the recitation of haGomel. It is recommended therefore, that each individual follow the traditions already established in his or her own community.

A “Berakha” is a statement, a formula by which we bless God.  First, we need to clarify what does it mean to “bless God” ? Usually, it is the one with a higher merit or the authority who grants the blessing to the needy. So, what does it mean that we “bless” God? In Hebrew “Blessing God”, unlike blessing another human being, simply means that we acknowledging God as the source of all our blessings.

For example: When we say a blessing before eating a fruit: barukh Ata HaShem… bore peri haets, we are saying, “I acknowledge, I declare, that YOU are the Creator of the fruits of the tree.

All the bearakhot share the words Barukh Ata haShem…   which should never be translated as “Blessed BE You, HaShem”, as if we would be wishing God to have something He lacks ח”ו;  but “Blessed ARE You, HaShem…” in the sense of “You ARE the source of …..”.

The berakhot are recited mainly for three different functions.

1. Birkot hanehenim, are the blessings we recite before we enjoy a  material event, even simple, routinary occurrences . For example, before we eat, drink, or enjoy a pleasant aroma we say a berakha acknowledging God as the source of that material blessing.

2. Birkot haMitsvot, these are the blessings we recite when we perform one of God’s commandments.  For example, before we fix the mezuza in the doorpost we “bless God” saying asher qiddeshanu bemitsvotav vetsivanu liqboa’ mezuza. “It is YOU HaShem the One Who sanctified us with His Mitsvot, and it was YOU the One Who ordered us to place a mezuza in our doorposts.” In other words, I’m declaring that the reason I’m doing this act is because I’m following YOUR commands.

3. Birkot haShebah, are the blessings of praise.  We also use the formula of a berakha barukh ata hashem  to praise HaShem for the multitude of events, occurrences in the past and in the present, that we know of or that we experience every day. Again, we declare that YOU HaShem are the source of these events. And by reciting a blessing we train ourselves to perceive HaShem’s subtle and invisible intervention in our lives. Illustartion: All birkot hashahar, the blessing we say in the morning when we wake up, belong to this category. We bless haShem, for example, saying that He “restores life to the lifeless bodies”, in other words, when we wake up in the morning we realize, thanks to this berakha, that our inert bodies were inert and passive (see this) but now, HaShem has given us our souls back.

Although a berakha is technically a plain declaration (or for Maimonides a “sworn declaration”), many or probably most of the blessings could be also classified as statements of appreciation and gratitude.

There is one blessing in particular that is known as the blessing of gratitude per excellence. And that is birkat hagomel.

Next Monday, BH, we will begin to explain what are we saying in this beautiful berakha.

There are several names by which we refer to HaShem (=God). The most prominent name is A-M-O-N-A-Y (reading D for the M). As you can see, one should be very careful not to write down any of the names of HaShem (technically, there are seven such names as per MT, Yesode HaTora 6:2) in its original way because we do not want to risk that, inadvertently, one would erase HaShem’s name, which is an explicit prohibition in the Tora “lo ta’asun ken….” (Deut. 12:3-4).

The name A-M-O-N-A-Y is also known in Hebrew as the Shem HaMeforash, which means, the ineffable Name of God (“ineffable” means: too great or extreme to be expressed with words).  In Latin the Shem haMeforash is known as the “tetragrammaton”, which means, the name of four (tetra) letters (gramma).

There is more to the Shem HaMeforash.

In the Tora every word is written without vowels. We know how to pronounce the words of our Tora thanks to the Mesora, the “Masoretic tradition”, which records and preserves the vocalization and punctuation (te’amim) of every word.

In the Mesora, the Shem haMeforash has three vowels. But these vowels do not indicate the original vocalization of the Shem haMeforash; rather, those three vowels indicate the way this Name should be read.

Confused?

Briefly, there are a few words in the Tanakh that for different reasons are written in one way and read in a different way. This event is known in the Mesora as keri ukhetib, which means: “Although this word is written in this way, you must read in this other way”.  To signal this variation, the consonants of the written word are vocalized with the vowels of the word that should be read.

In the times of the Bet-haMiqdash the Cohen Gadol (High Priest) pronounced the Shem haMeforash with its original vowels, a tradition that was known only to the High Priests. When the name of HaShem was uttered during Yom Kippur all the people of Israel would bow down and prostrate while saying out loud barukh shem kebod malkhuto le’olam va’ed, which means “May the Glorious Name of His Kingdom be blessed forever”.  This beautiful praise also served to maintain undisclosed the original pronunciation of the Shem haMeforash.