[Avodah] honey [was: Hakafot on Shmini Atzeret]

[Jonathan Baker]

RMi:

> But to add to what others said about the gemara and honey. I understood the
> gemara to be aware that it was using a homonym, and saying that the pasuq
> wouldn't speak of eating devash without a qualifier if the other kind of
> devash were okay. Besides, they didn't matir honey, they found a maqor for
> them common knowledge that honey was okay.

Last first:

As for the last reason, well, isn't that what a lot of drashot are?  We 
know the halacha is X, now how is that derived from the psukim?

A lot of this argument is about just that kind of position: it is
"common knowledge" that bee-honey is permitted only because of confusion
in the word "dvash" with date-honey, but now that we're trying to look
for textual evidence, it's not so clear-cut.

Usage in the time of the Gemara isn't at issue.  Of course by the time
of the Gemara it was a homonym.  The question is when did it become a
homonym?

A major rav & I have been arguing about this offline, based on the 
references in Shmuel and Shoftim.  As of our last exchange, I argued
that the two references quoted are 

  a) late (Shimshon is the last judge before the Eli-Shmuel-Saul-David
     narrative), about 300-400 years after entry into the Land;

  b) qualified: by Shimshon it specifies dvash from dvorim (why not dvorot?),
     and with Yonatan:

     i)  it's again qualified as y'arat dvash, or

     ii) it's not even clear that it is dvash dvorim, the commentators are
         divided whether it's bee honey or some plant syrup or sap (cf.
         Zev's posts).

300-400 years ago "corn" was a general word for grain, today it's used
for "maize" exclusively.  Usages shift, particularly as society changes 
(from Mitzrayim to Kena'an).  Although, it can't be that they didn't 
know from bee honey before then. I consulted a bee expert (Neil Tsutsui,
UC-Irvine; I had seen his name in the news), who said that honeybees
were in the area probably before human habitation.  (so I can't make a
domesticated-camels argument).

--
        name: jon baker              web: http://www.panix.com/~jjbaker
     address: jjbaker at panix.com     blog: http://thanbook.blogspot.com