Blooper Reel 1

I have several long, serious, and research intensive posts in the works. One is on the economics of STA"M, another on the precise definition of "shinui tzura". Unfortunately I have no time so here are some pictures instead.

Retzua held together with duct tape

Tefillin straps are leather made of the skin of a kosher animal. Which species of bovine grows a duct tape hide? Obviously a retzua cannot be held together with duct tape, but what about using it to cover up faded bits? 

There is nothing wrong with the dye used in duct tape per se. The problem is that it is a new layer, not dye. This is similar to the issue of tiach -- a manufacturing practice where the battim were covered in putty instead of painted. The halacha is that if the putty comes of in small flakes, it might as well be paint; otherwise it hasn't been painted. Therefore covering an unpainted retzua in tape would not make it kosher.

Textbook bal tosif

This past shabbat we read about the prohibition of Bal Tosif -- not adding to a mitzvah. The classic example of this given in the literature is "not putting 5 scrolls in your tefillin." I recall that every time we came across this in school someone would ask "but why would anybody do that?" and the response was always something like "I have no idea. It's hypothetical."

Well, here you go. It is common to stuff tefillin with scraps of parchment so that the parshiyot don't rattle around. This shel-yad was stuffed with many extra pieces as shown here ... including an extra parsha taken from a shel rosh (the scroll on top.)

A question of chatzitza

I've decided to postpone the series on checking tefillin for a week or so, when I get a load of new parshiyos which should provide some material. In the meantime, here is a halachic question for my vast readership. Come on, at least two of you are rabbis. :)

There are various foul-smelling chemicals available to sofrim to clean klaf, smooth it, or produce other desired effects. Every once in a while, a new additive comes out and people wonder if it constitutes a chatzitza. The latest round of this debate is about a product which raises a variety of other questions, but one remark that I read piqued my interest: "A layer one millimeter thick is obviously a chatzitza and one molecule is obviously not, but what is the cut-off?"

1. Is that premise true? Or is a contiguous layer deliberately applied to the klaf (or the hand, or anything else where these laws come into play) a chatzitza regardless of its thickness? Do those criteria even matter?
2. Even granting the premise, is that discussed anywhere? 

The Rambam in Yesodei Torah 6 about erasing Shemot on your skin comes to mind but it's unhelpful because all it tells us is that there is something that can block the water without being a halachic barrier. Same for the halacha about ink on one's hands for נטילת ידים -- the fact that you can wash means the ink is too thin to constitute a chatzitza, but I'm not sure there is any upper limit anywhere.

Hilchos Legibility I

I titled this post with a "one" even though I don't plan on doing a series because a major component of the specs for any product is usability, and for manuscripts that means legibility so I'll probably be writing about it a lot. Last week I finally got around to getting certified as a sofer by the Vaad Mishmereth STa"M, the self-declared international regulatory body for scribes. (They used to do a lot of consumer protection seminars and things. Now they license sofrim under the assumption that if the scribe has an up-to-date license a consumer can trust him.) In true Israeli style this involved under one hour of testing and paperwork that blew up into a full-day ordeal thanks to travel time, waiting time, and another-two-hours-because-that's-how-we-do-things time. I can now compete with my friends' tzav rishon (Israeli draft board) stories.

Anyway, on to the topic. One of the questions on my written exam was "what if the leg of an ayin is horizontal and short?" I answered that it is passul (invalid) because it looks like a tet. No idea how they graded it, but I think I was justified the very next day while trying to read something in yeshiva.

This is one style of the font family commonly known as "rashi script." In fact this is the kind used in the older prints of books found in yeshiva libraries. Look at the tet and the ayin (the 9th and 19th letters going right to left); it wouldn't be too hard to confuse them if you didn't see them in the context of the whole alphabet in order.