[Avodah] Rav Melamed on Metal Pots

[Akiva Miller via Avodah]

R' Micha Berger and I keep writing in this thread, but there seems to be a
communications problem. I suspect we may be using the same words for
fundamentally different ideas. In hopes of making some progress, I'd like
to give some basic concepts as I understand them, and perhaps someone can
show me my error.

Let's begin with the following two cases where a keli needs to be "clean":

1) The keli is one which does not absorb ta'am, so I can use it
interchangeably. This is because ta'am is the only worry, and there isn't
any ta'am to worry about. This logic works only if the keli is clean; if
there is any food residue on the keli, then we are not dealing merely with
"ta'am" and "b'liah", and the halachos are much stricter.

2) The keli does absorb ta'am, but I can get rid of that ta'am by kashering
it with hag'alah. Hag'alah only works on ta'am and b'liah. It does not get
rid of food residue. Therefore, I have to get rid of all the food residue
before the hag'alah begins.

My understanding is that the rule in case #2 is whether or not there is any
tangible residue on the keli. Soap is extremely helpful in getting rid of
residue, with the result that a keli can be successfully cleaned where soap
is available, enabling us to the kasher that keli. If soap had not been
available, we might have had to discard the keli (or kasher it with libun).
Similarly, a smooth surface is easier to clean than a rough surface, and so
the quality of modern kelim makes them easier to clean, and hence easier to
kasher.

But the goal of all this cleaning is simply to remove the mamashus. Once
the mamashus is gone, THEN we can either:
1) use it as new (if it doesn't absorb ta'am) or
2) kasher it with hag'alah (if it is metal).

The point I'm trying to establish is that a clean pot is *not* a new pot.
No matter how well you clean the pot, that is only the first step towards
removing the INTANGIBLE ta'am that got absorbed into the pot itself. The
ta'am is not hiding in the rough surface of the pot - it is absorbed into
the very material that the pot is made of.

Does anyone see the point where I erred? Is it possible, for example, that
a non-absorbent keli could be switched between meat and dairy even if it is
not totally clean? Is it possible that a certain small amount of actual,
tangible, mamashus residue could be considered negligible for these
halalchos?

Akiva Miller
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