[Avodah] Should Shiurim be Corrected to Archeological Data

[Arie Folger]

RMB asked whether we should revise the size of our shiurim, and gave three
possible answers. Implicit in his trichotomy is that all shiurim are
connected (he mentions olive and arm and dirham in one fell swoop, even
though the arm and the dirham actually clash).

So I thought that fellow Ovedim may be interested to hear of another
shittah, namely that we reject the dirham, that based on archaeology the
ammah is longer than Rav Chaim Noe, while the kazayit is small. To my
surprise, that is exactly what I heard from noted talmid chakham Rav Zalman
Koren when I visited him three weeks ago. He claims that there is no reason
and no archaeological support to claim that when Herod enlarged the Har
haBayit he added to the breadth of the plaza, and only added to the length.
Rav Koren argues that there are no tolopogical features forcing the large
narrow side (the Har haBayit is a trapezoid, not a rectangle), and after
bringing proof from teh Gemara's discussion of the mizbeach that when
Chazal state sizes, they mean the size of the circumscribed (this is
actually the wrong verb, but will make it understandable) rectangle, he
then argues that the size of the northern wall are the 500 amot of
Massekhet Middot.

He argues that tefachim have not changed and are a tefach, confirming the
large amah, and that we therefore must reject the dirham as a reference
size.

At the same time, he argues that the olive is not connected to the size of
eggs, and therefore a large etzba does not imply a large olive, thus
solving some of the problems raised by large shiurim (for example that
according to the Gemarah the beit habeli'ah can contain three olive sizes,
which cannot be the "Chazon Ish olives."

To top it all off, he claims that that was precisely the shitta of the
Chazon Ish and the Steipler, and has the quotes to support that
interpretation.

The only or greatest problem with the above, he admits, is that no less
than the Rambam used the dirham as a reference size, and he shows that the
Chazon Ish and the Steipler acknowledged this, and yet they rejected the
dirham reference shiur.

I haven't yet fully digested this, but thought Ovedim may be interested in
this.

Kol tuv,


-- 
Arie Folger,
Recent blog posts on http://rabbifolger.net/

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<http://rabbifolger.net/2016/02/15/koscheres-geld-podcast/>

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<http://rabbifolger.net/2016/02/14/kennt-die-existenz-nur-den-chaos-gttliches-vorsehen-im-judischen-gedankengut-podcast/>

* Halacha zum Wochenabschnitt: Baruch Hu uWaruch Schemo
<http://rabbifolger.net/2016/02/11/halacha-zum-wochenabschnitt-baruch-hu-uwaruch-schemo/>

* Is there Order to the World? Providence in Jewish Thought
<http://rabbifolger.net/2016/02/09/is-there-order-to-the-world-providence-in-jewish-thought/>

* What is Modern Orthodoxy (from a radio segment)
<http://rabbifolger.net/2016/02/08/what-is-modern-orthodoxy-from-a-radio-segment/>
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