[Avodah] German siddur questions

[Zev Sero]

Michael Poppers wrote:

> :-). For more on this issue (which both RMK and RRW appear to have a 
> handle on, and which I'm sure has been discussed exhaustively on Avodah 
> and on other fora in the past), see Section III of 
> http://www.lookstein.org/articles/veten_tal.htm.

A pretty good exposition, but there are two mistakes:

1) He writes that "most of the Jews of South America and Australia
abide to this very day" by R Chaim Shabbetai of Salonica's teshuva
to the Jews of Recife, never to say "tal umatar" in Birkat Hashanim,
and instead to insert it into Shomea Tefila as required.  I don't
know what happens in South America, whether among Sefardim or
Ashkenazim, but in Australia I've never heard of such a thing.
Every shul I've been to in Australia says Tal Umatar according to
the seasons of Bavel, despite the fact that this makes no sense at
all, because that is the minhag of all Jews of chutz laaretz.
(Unlike EY, there is no season at which rain is an unmitigated curse;
there's always *someone* who needs it.)  As for what people insert
into Shomea Tefila, of course I wouldn't know what others do, but when
I lived there I used to insert it from Pesach through 4-Dec, except
during Sukkot.

                ============


2) He starts with the fact that the September Equinox is on the 23rd,
states as fact that 23-Sep Julian = 7-Oct Gregorian, and goes from there.
Except that there are several problems with this: 

a) 23-Sep plus 13 days brings us to 6-Oct, not 7-Oct;
b) the most common date for the September Equinox is on the 22nd;
c) and most importantly, the real tekufot are not evenly spaced, but
   Cheshbon Shmuel assumes for simplicity that they are.

>From Wikipedia:
"It is 94 days from the June solstice to the September equinox, but
only 89 days from the December solstice to the March equinox.  The
seasons are not of equal length because of the variable speed the
Earth has in its orbit around the Sun."

Cheshbon Shmuel allows exactly 91.3125 days for each tekufa (365.25/4);
the March Equinox, which is the important one for determining leap years,
is on the 20th or sometimes the 21st, and 182.624 days later comes to
about 19-Sep, not the 22nd or 23rd.

The key to the solution becomes apparent when one considers that Xmas
is on 25-Dec, not 21-Dec as one would expect.  I leave the actual
solution as an exercise to the reader (email me if you like).


-- 
Zev Sero               Something has gone seriously awry with this Court's
zev at sero.name          interpretation of the Constitution.
                       	                          - Clarence Thomas