[Avodah] Shlissel Challah

[Prof. Levine]

At 02:32 PM 4/29/2011, Micha Berger wrote:

>I assume by now most of you have read R' Jeffrey Saks' post at
><http://torahmusings.com/2011/04/shliss-challah>. He gives three reasons
>for the minhag:

This "minhag" is supposed to be a segulah.  (My 
quotes around minhag are intentional, because I 
am sure that many of us have never heard of it 
and that in previous generations it was unheard 
in many Ashkenaz communities. I really think that 
a discussion of this issue is in order.)

I will kick it off this discussion with

The Hamodia gave me permission to post on my web 
site an article that it printed some time ago about segulos.  It is at
http://www.stevens.edu/golem/llevine/hamodia/segulos.pdf) 
In part the article quotes  the Mezhbuzher Rav, 
Harav Avraham Yehoshua Heshel Bick. According to him

[Segulos ] are nothing more than bubbe maasos, eitzas yetzer hara that
give people a license to spend money way beyond their means and then ask
for a yeshuah. All these formulae ­ saying Shir Hashirim forty times, Tehillim
HaChida, etc. ­ are methods used by the yetzer hara to take from us the little
[spirituality] we have left.

Prayer, on the other hand, is not a segulah ; 
prayer is a way of communicating with the Ribbono
shel Olam. When we use segulos to get what we 
want, it’s as if we are stealing something from Him,
something that is not rightfully ours. It reminds 
me of today’s Chinese auctions at charitable events.
Whereas women used to give charity without 
ulterior motives, they have now replaced their mitzvos
with Chinese auctions.

See also what I have posted it at

http://www.stevens.edu/golem/llevine/yated/kishke_segula_1.html

and at

http://www.stevens.edu/golem/llevine/yated/kishke_segula_2.html

and what Moshe Ben-Chaim wrote about segulos at 
http://torahmusings.com/2011/04/shliss-challah

Yitzchok Levine 
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