[Avodah] Grape Juice

[Micha Berger]

On Tue, Jul 23, 2013 at 05:38:19PM -0400, Prof. Levine wrote:
> At 05:13 PM 7/23/2013, martin brody wrote:
>> Because Chazal tell us to spoil it. How? By cooking it!

> Is wine made today the same way it was made in the time of Chazal?  From 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_wine it seems not.  Also,  the 
> kind of grapes used clearly play a key role in the kind of wine produced.

You would be arguing, though, that the loophole of yayin mevushal is no
longer valid. Perhaps lives on because the taqanah against stam yeinam
was legislated that way, so today's no-worse-than-regular mevushal simply
isn'tpart of the taqanah. "Bemaqom shelo gazru chakhamim."

Our wine isn't syrupy that it requires mezigas hakos. Nor is its taste
of the sort that people would spice it to make it more palatable.
Taste-wise, no conclusions could be drawn from Chazal's wine to ours
without checking if its true experimentally, I'll agree.

But it is at least halachically inferior, since chazal declare mevushal
to be by definition not-quite-real-wine. As you yourself later put it:
>                               Thus,  "best" may not be the end all and be 
> all when it comes to wine for kiddush.

Or, best may end up being by criteria other than "do I enjoy the taste
the most"?

R' Chaim Brisker avoided yayin mevushal for the 4 kosos. It seems RMBrody
adopted a similar chumerah. But then, you note the preference for 4 kosos,
so why can't you understand someone wanting to apply the same preference
across the board for the same reasons?

> While cooking wine in the time of Chazal may have spoiled it,  it is not 
> at all clear to me that the wine that we have today is spoiled by  
> cooking.  My limited experience with boiling non-mevushal wine is one  
> counter example.

Mevushal grape juice does taste more astringent. I don't think it's
"ruined", because I only noticed last pesach by intentionally doing a
taste test. But it's there.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

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Micha Berger             Brains to the lazy
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