Amid Swine Flu Fears, Rebbe Changes Tisch

Gerrer Rebbe bans communal kiddish cup, orders individual disposable plastic cups instead.

Amid Swine Flu fears, Hassidic rabbi ditches communal cups
Yair Ettinger, Haaretz

The swine flu scare has recently prompted one of the leading spiritual figures of the ultra-Orthodox world to change one of Judaism's time-honored traditions - that of drinking wine together from the same glass. 

Yaakov Aryeh Alter, seventh and current rabbi of the Hasidic dynasty of Ger, instructed his disciples in Jerusalem a few weeks ago to toast with individual and disposable plastic cups containing a few drops of wine from the rabbi's own glass. 

Hasidic Jews have toasted from the same cup at events and meals for at least 200 years. 

The rabbi, who heads the largest Hasidic group in Israel, is known for his sensitivity to health issues. A few years ago, when Israel was gripped by the avian flu scare, he refrained from eating eggs until he received ones specially-imported from abroad. 

Sources close to him say that his latest decision about toasting was in no way meant to protect his own health, but that of the thousands of people who follow him. 

Yeshiva students who recently came from the United States and sought to meet the rabbi were asked by his aides not to shake the rabbi's hand when they see him in his Bnei Brak home. 

A popular story about the rabbi's grandfather, Abraham Mordechai Alter - the dynasty's second head and a prominent writer and ruler on religion - says that when he visited Israel in the early 1900s, he rebuked a man who hesitated about drinking from the communal glass of wine. 

"A hundred Jews sipped from this glass, and yet you think the wine isn't clean enough," the popular legend quotes him as saying to the germophobe. 

So far, Israel has had more than 750 confirmed cases of the virus, many of whom frequent of the crowded seminaries of the ultra-Orthodox public. 

Alter is not the only ultra-Orthodox leader to take precautions. Other spiritual leaders and yeshiva heads are reportedly weary of the prospect of infection in their institutions. 

This concern is also reflected in Haredi media, though they prefer the term "Mexican flu." The Health Ministry, under Deputy Minister Yaakov Litzman from United Torah Judaism - who is known to be Alter's right hand man - calls the virus by its scientific name, H1N1.

Comments

[critical_minyan]

The Gerer Rebbe is the most modern of the Israeli Chasidic Rebbes; he is only 149 years behind the times, instead of 150 years, like the rest of the dinosaurs.

[soso]

See, at least he has some sechel...

[Ben]

If I read the article properly what we have here is replacement of communal kiddush cup, where virus can be passed from everyone drinking before you, to rabbi's kiddush cup, where virus can only be passed to you and everyone else from the Rabbi himself.

The Rabbi drinks from his cup, then pours to everyone else's cups a few drops of his wine combined with his viruses and bacterias. The Rabbi at the same time would not drink from anyone else's cup and even not shake hands with students coming from America.

New system is better the the old custom, but not safe yet. What if the Rabbi is sick? All of his Hassidim will become sick.

[Yochanan Lavie]

Red kiddush wine (apologies Bob Marley)

Red Kiddush wine
Go to my keppie
Makes me forget that I
Still need a flu shot

Red Kiddush wine
It's up to you
Thanks to swine flu
We use paper cups
We use paper cups

I'd have sworn
B'li nedar
Thoughts of flu
Would leave my keppie
I was wrong
Now I find
Just one thing makes me happy

Red Kiddush wine
Stay on my tisch
Don't let me be alone
It's tearin' apart
My blue tzitziyot

I'd have sworn
B'li nedar
Thoughts of flu
Would leave my keppie
I was wrong
Now I find
Just one thing makes me happy

Red Kiddush wine
Stay on my tisch
Don't let me be alone
It's tearin' apart
My bluish Jewish heart

[Dr. Dave]

Just waiting for one of the Rebbes to pass around the kiddush cup and cake and say :This is my blood. This is my body.

[Dr. Dave]

Oh wait. They already do it at chabad don't they?

[WoolSilkCotton]

They should pass around Kool-Aid.

Our (Chabad) rabbi says kiddish, then pours a bit out into another cup which gets mixed with more wine and then distributed, then he drinks from his cup. We've always done it that way, so there's no contact. We've got a shul of mostly doctors and lawyers.

[yidandahalf]

This rebbe recycles so it's O.K.

[MisterApikoros]

In my reformed synagogue the wine is poured into individual cups, about 1/2 oz worth per cup.

My only beef with this is they could be a bit more generous with the wine, and use a kosher wine other than Manischewitz. There are a lot of good kosher wines out there.

I don't need to point out that it's unhygenic for everyone to partake from the same glass. Do the Hasids also share toothbrushes?

It's also the antithesis of "hygenic" to drink a baby's blood after a briss. That custom, among Satmars and other frumbags, is more appropriate for Transylvanian vampires and their descendants with sexual hangups. But I digressed...

[Ben]

Yohanan, I love your line "I'd have sworn
B'li nedar".

WSC: Our Chabad rabbi drinks first from his cup, then pours some wine to the second cup, then adds more wine in the second cup and then pours for everyone from that second cup. Thus there is contact, but only with the rabbis saliva, not anybody elses as in the more traditional Gur hasidim custom.

[Yochanan Lavie]

Thanks, Ben. I like your posts. Shabbat shalom.

[Office of the Chief Rabbi]

The Gerrer Rebbe?
Do not read "Sfas Emmes," rather "Sfas Amus": from your lips I'll die.

[Maven]

OCR: no reason to knock the Sefas Emes, it is one of the great works of the last great generation of serious rebbes, along with the Pri Tzadik, and nothing he did deserves mocking. Current Ger took a very open turn from the Sefas Emes with later generations of leaders, including the strange issues around tzniyut, etc, that are not present with the Sefas Emes or Hidushei HaRim.

Of course, in theory, real wine shouldn't transmit infections, as it contains alcohol which is the best antiseptic around, its almost certainly safer than shaking hands.

[WoolSilkCotton]

Recognizing the germ theory and principles of epidemiology could put them on the slippery slope towards recognizing other facts of science. What next? The earth is round? Evolution? Mixed dancing?

[Ben]

Thanks Yohanan, Shabbat Shalom.

[Ben]

Yes WSC, this is a slippery slope the next thing they would say that lice doesn't self generate out of nowhere. This would of course contradict talmud (which comes in unbroken chain from Sinai) and Rambam and Tur... But wait, they might even admit that lice does come from eggs.

[Dr. Dave]

maven - the alcohol content of wine is not sufficient to be germacidal in all cases.

A nice 100 proof cask strength single malt.

Now we're talking!

[maven]

Dr. Dave: L'Chaim!

[kathiego]

Our Rabbi is a sort of wine connoisseur and often brings or has there some very nice kosher wines yet some of the congregation insists upon Manischewitz. Go figure. We all drink individually from separate disposable cups. :) L'Chaim!

[MisterApikoros]

Covenant Vineyards, a Napa Valley grower, makes some outstanding kosher wines. Problem is they're expensive, costing well over $50 and in some cases close to $100.

Kinneret makes some fine product for $20 and under.

All wine starts out kosher. The problem is that in order to be certified as kosher, all stages of the manufacturing process must be performed by Sabbath-observing Jews, which is racist on its face.

The savants who came up with this nonsense, however, provided an out: If the wine is Pasteurized, then anyone can handle it, even heretics such as myself. Of course, Pasteurization affects the taste of the wine, and not for the better.