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Moderator’s note: this link was posted by DaasYochid on page 2 of this thread, I thought I would bump it to the OP: http://www.theyeshivaworld.com/news/headlines-breaking-stories/228479/for-today-schlissel-challah-an-analysis.html
If you know someone who is in need of parnassah, what do you do?
maybe try davening for them.
If you know someone who is in need of parnassah, what do you do?
Help him find a job?
The Wolf
well there is another factor that goes into “get a job”.
It seems like its a secret amongst the Jews, though I will spill the beans. Its called………COLLEGE or EDUCATION
Schissel means bowl in Yiddish
The thread title is meant to be SCHLISSEL CHALLA (key challa)
“amongst the Jews”
Tiger, the jews? are you not one of us?
The source for the “segulah” of schlissel challah is that the Gemara in Ta’anis says that only HKBH has the “key” to parnassah. So some developed a minhag to bake a key into challah as a reminder that only Hashem has the key to provide for us parnassah (represented by the challah) and it should be inspiration to have more emunah, bitachon and daven harder. Anyone who thinks that baking a key into a challah somehow magically leads to parnassah violates the issur of lo senachashu.
Wow all these years ive been doing it wrong ive been hiding lox in my challah not a key darn.
KEY L’OLAM CHASDO…
simcha613 – thank you for that post!
The Goq- lol, the person who told you to do that probably said to bake challah with a key for LOCKS. You were like, “wha…what did he just say?? Locks?….OOOOH, probably meant LOX!
oh well, you hear what you wanna hear….
Quixotic613- LOL, or how about KEY HEIM CHAYEINU!
Anyhow, everyone enjoy your delicious $hli$$el Challah!!
The source for Schissel Challah is a Christian custom that long predates any Jewish custom of it. Making these Challos is probably, at best, an Issur D’Oraisa of Chukas Hagoyim and/or Darchei Ha’emori.
sam2- You are always so predictable. i was waiting for you to say that.
Chacham: Is it my fault that I don’t like it when we borrow Avodah Zarah Minhagim? This is worse than most as this one we know for sure what it means to them and that it came over to us several hundred yeas later at the very least.
Why is it called darchei haemori anyway rather than “darchei hachiti” or “darchei haperizi” or “darchei hamoavi”?
SAM2: Sorry to disagree with you but the Sefer Taamei Haminhagim calls this minhag VADAI TORAH HU! It dates back to when Klal Yisroel entered Eretz Yisroel in Yehoshua’s time. The MOHN stopped falling on 16 Nissan after the Korbon Omer was brought. Klal yisroel now had to rely on the tevua grown in EY. Since HASHEM holds the key to parnassa it has become a minhag to shape the challah into a key.
Writersoul: I would guess we call it Darchei Ha’emori because they were known for their superstitions. I think I saw that mentioned somewhere but I don’t really remember. It makes sense though.
I just want to clarify. I’m not against all Segulos or Minhagim based on Kabballah. Far from it. There are many Minhagim that we have whose Makor is in Kabballah. Those “Minhagim”, however, without a real Makor in Gemara or Kabballah or that we can clearly see where we borrowed it from the pagans (and this is the absolute best example) are clearly Assur Min Hatorah, no matter how many people picked up on it over the years. (And especially Bizman Hazeh, where everyone in our society loves to borrow Segulos and Chumros from each other, these types of things can spread so easily and quickly and it’s a real problem.)
My little granddaughter asked me why I made a “schissel” challah.
sam2 -chas vashalom do i disagree with you. This example I actually did not know to come from AZ. However, I expected you to know that there is such a mekor.
Fedup: That’s a nice Limud Z’chus at best, but we know that it’s just historically inaccurate. The Christians started shaping bread like keys (which were shaped like crosses) for the Sunday after Easter. They were doing this hundreds of years anywhere before any mention of this appears in any Jewish source ever.
Chacham: What do you mean by Makor? for making these Challos? The earliest Jewish source for this is from the Apter Rov in at the turn of the 18th century. Christians had been doing this since around the second century. This is not a Jewish Minhag in any way, shape, or form and is without a doubt Assur Min Hatorah.
This is not a Jewish Minhag in any way, shape, or form and is without a doubt Assur Min Hatorah.
Were you talking about irony in the other thread? lol
Squeak: I don’t understand. Care to elaborate?
Well, I don’t want to make trouble between us again by telling you what I really think. But I chalk up that statement of yours to youthful impetuousness. The great Sam2 has declared that schlissel challah is idol worship and assur min hatorah in the face of so many rebbes who were unable to see that for themselves? Do you think you are the first person to come onto that knowledge? Even if you were entirely correct that would be the wrong way to enlighten the world about it.
The irony is something else….
Squeak: I don’t know what those Rebbes knew. It’s entirely possible they didn’t study the history of every single Minhag. What I do know is that this is clearly a pagan Christian Minhag. The evidence is more than overwhelming. I know when I’m willingly taking on everyone when I’m completely outgunned. This isn’t one of those cases.
And please, by all means say what you think. There is very, very little that I take personally.
Segulot for parnassa work for those who sell them.
Sam2- out of curiosity, do you have any sources that this segulah is based on Christianity? Or are you assuming that since it is so similar to the Christian custom, it must have been based on that.
I point you to Sefer Tamei Hamihagim siman 596 and 597.
The key is a response to various pesukim regarding treasure rooms and parnassah.
This particular Shabbos is chosen because it is the first shabbos that we can eat all grains (when it all turns to yoshon); It is also the first Shabbos that the Jewish people totally relied on grown grain upon entering E”Y as the Mon (manna) that was saved from the desert ran out.
A poster here posits that we are following a religious practice from a religion that started over 1,000 years after the Jewish people entered E”Y. It is as easy to say that the foreigners may have co-opted one of our minhagim for their own.
A few other examples of minhagim that were adopted by other religions are:
We no longer throw seeds at a chuppah because another religion took the practice as their own.
We no longer use ksav Ivris because it was taken by another sect.
The vort, tenayim and aufruf is done by the above mentioned relatively new religion and is called banns.
Dullradiance: The difference between all of those customs and this is that those were mentioned in Jewish sources long before the pagans did it, or at least long enough ago that we can assume that our custom predated theirs. This has not been a Jewish custom for thousands of years. If it was, some Rishon, Acharon, or Kabbalistic work would have mentioned this. The custom doesn’t show up anywhere until the year 1800. The Christian custom, on the other hand (same custom, same time of year, same stated effect-Parnassah), predates that by well over a millenium. There are cases where other religions co-opted our customs. This, Rachmana Litzlan, is a case of the reverse.
???? ????? – ????? ????? ?????
note his first words in that section: “minhag avoteinu vadai hu torah” so this seems to predate his writing it.
the apter rebbe died in 1825. the book was not published until 1863.
i’m not saying i’m for or against it, but this is the oldest reference to the minhag that i could find.
http://www.hebrewbooks.org/pdfpager.aspx?req=20974&st&pgnum=183
Sabzi: That is the oldest reference that exists. Correct, the Minhag predates writing it. So, as I said earlier, it’s around the turn of the 19th century or a bit earlier. The Christians’ Avodah Zarah Minhag in this regard predates it by over a millennium. I don’t know why people can’t see, at the very least in this case, that it is obviously a borrowed Minhag with roots in Avodah Zarah Mamash.
Sam, like squeak said. You rwally think all the gedolom of the previous doros were blind to what you see? You really think some Achron invented this or worse copied it, and other Achronim blindly followed it?
Sam2: Minor quibble; didn’t the Christian custom also start more recently than a millennium ago? I thought it was a late-medieval thing.
The Rov of my Shul spoke about this last Shabbos.
He explained that in medieval Europe trade guilds controlled various trades.
Many small towns and some larger towns would only allow non-Jewish bakers to operate commercial bakeries (Jews were barred from these bakery guilds). This is the reason use of Pas Palter was so widespread and became normative.
However, Jews were revolted at using breads that had keys put inside of them at Easter time so they wouldn’t buy the breads that week. The guilds then relented and allowed the Jews to bring their own keys to be put into the breads they buy.
This was a way to get around the problem and it eventually became a Jewish custom.
It also was a way that Jews identified bread that was baked after Pesach since a key is unique and is a sort of Simman.
I believe the non-Jews make a mark in the shape of a cross on the top of their breads, the Friday before Easter. Never heard of them making the shape of a key. They have this custom to this day, and that’s where the expression “hot cross buns” comes from.
Patri: I think they saw a custom that a lot of people did and defended it. I don’t think the Gedolim borrowed this custom from Christianity, I think the Hamon Am did.
Itche: From what I saw, it was a Pagan/Christian idea as early as the second century CE.
what in the world is shissel chalah? help im lost!
To those telling Sam about all the previous Rebbes:
There is no reason to assume they were familiar with Christian customs.
Sam,
Darkei Emorei shouldn’t be a problem, since it is not done as a superstition. As long as people think the reason is a Zecher to the Maftei’ach Parnasa or to the Ness of the Noda Biyehuda or a Minhag Avoseinu from Pas Palter (first time I heared of that one — haven’t seen it, but it’s cute and charming), it isn’t Darkei Emori. Besides, the Chida writes that we don’t add anything to that category.
Chukos Hagoyim is even less of an issue. There is no Chiyuv to learn the history of every culture. The Issur is to follow their custom. We are following only our own custom, which is not an exact copy of theirs, anyhow.
Given the above, and the merits of following a Minhag Yisroel, I joined the rest of this large chunk of Klal Yisroel in making a Schlissel Challa, and enjoyed discussing the reasons for it. And now, thanks to HolyMoe, I have another one to say over.
Sam2:If you say so. I’ll tack it onto the bottom of my list of strange minhagim to research.
HaLeiVi: I know of that Chidah. It’s very much a minority opinion. We assume that baseless superstition is an Issur D’Oraisa. And it doesn’t matter whatever cute reasons we can give it. The Halachah is that any superstitious action which is believed to have an effect on this world that doesn’t actually is an Issur D’Oraisa of Darchei Ha’emori. This falls under that category.
Correct. There is no Chiyuv to research every culture to make sure we didn’t borrow from them. However, where we know that something is borrowed (actually borrowed, not started independently) that’s precisely what Chukas Hagoyim is. And HolyMoe’s story is textbook Chukas Hagoyim. We straight-up borrowed an Avodah Zarah Minhag if that’s the real source for this. If that’s not Chukas Hagoyim then what is?
The Sefer Chasidim writes that when you understand the reason it is not Nichush. In our case we aren’t doing it as a superstition at all. Whoever does it knows or thinks that it is for a reason.
The Chida’s main point is that in order to render an act a Derech Emori you have to be sure it is baseless. The most you can say is that you didn’t it in eearly sefarim and the key looks like a cross.
As to Chukas Hagoyim, the Issur is to follow them and their culture. That is not what we arte doing. If people did it once to follow their custom then they would have been Over the Lav. We don’t know how it went over — granted that it did — and we definitely aren’t following a Goyishe custom.
What does the topic of this post mean?
Mod 42: That was one of a few articles I thought of posting but didn’t think they’d get through. Thank you.
While I mainly agree with the article and don’t think that shlissel challah is of any value (if even muttar), I find part of the above article to be too sensational in it’s intellectualism. I don’t think that anyone who does this practice uses it as an intermediary for Hashem as the article asserts.
That is the big kasha that many people have on most segulos (and most chassidus, especially chabad). In essence the segulos and Rebbes are intermediaries to Hashem Ch”V, but the people practicing them don’t really mean it that way, and if they do they most probably don’t realize that it is wrong and very possibly A”Z.
When a Litvak asks Rav Elyashev shlit”a for a bracha or to daven for him, he too – like a Chosid – is asking for him to be an intermediate with Hashem.
As far as segulos are concerned, aside from finding them throughout the Seforim, we find it in the Torah itself. Like arichas yomim for Shliach Hakan (and Kibud Av).
Mermaid: Correct. There are true Segulos in many places. This isn’t one of them.
So we have a Machlokes. Sam2 says assur, and the Ohev Yisroel (and my mother) say (or represent) “Torah Hi”.
Presumably, the Ohev Yisroel was directly addressing the claims that it had other origins (otherwise his words are rather misleading). The small quote I saw here was not that it didn’t have other origins, but that since it came down from previous generations, it is correct. Sam2 says he knows better than the previous generations.
While I don’t have the knowledge that Sam2 is representing with his viewpoint (namely, that there is no legitimate source before 1800 or so, and that previous great ones and previous lesser ones were misinformed at best), Sam2 hasn’t proven the negative at all, let alone sufficiently to make him more credible than even my mother…
The main reason people abhor Segulos is because they cannot fathom the idea of non physical intervention. The Rishonim who had no problem with the latter have no problem with Segulos, just like Chazal. We are not holier than the Rishonim, we are just more physical oriented.
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