Israel – Researchers from Bar-Ilan University’s archeological botanics lab say they have identified the strains of olive upon which the minimal halachic requirement of matza consumption is based. And their conclusions, if rabbinically endorsed, would be good news for those who have trouble digesting too much of the unleavened bread.
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The size of an olive (kezayit) provides the Talmud’s standard for the smallest amount of matza a Jew is obligated to eat at the Pessah Seder within a very short time. But because strains of olives come in various sizes, the precise required quantity has been unclear.
Prof. Mordechai Kislev, who headed the team with Dr. Orit Simhoni, Yonit Tabak and Ofer Tzarfati-Zuta, maintains that Syrian and Nabali strains, whose weight per olive is only around five grams (about a sixth of the weight of a machine-made matza), are the model for the halachic standard. The researchers said these types of olives, smaller than today’s olives, were the most common during ancient times.
There are rabbinical arbiters who maintain one must eat a whole machine-made matza at the Seder, while others are more liberal and require only half of a matza or even only five percent of a matza. While eating a whole matza is usually not a problem for healthy people, it is for some, and especially for celiacs, whose digestive systems are highly disturbed by the gluten in wheat flour; some buy special, expensive matza made of oats, which do not contain gluten, but too much of these can cause digestive problems.
read extended article [Jpost]
2:17 is on the money, but on a side note, the minimum amount of olives that you would have to eat is more than one. Even if you had the right olive, the olive is a measure of volume. because you can’t eat the pit, an olive is ALWAYS less than a kazayis.
Next between some university professors (even if he wears a koppel) and the gedolei achronim, i believe it would be safer to side with the most makel of the gedolei achronim, then the most machmir of university professors. I personally am very involved in shiurim. I’m writing a sefer on chai rotel lifee shitas haChazon Ish zt”l.
according to Reb Chaim shlita, the size of kezayit, is like the third of an egg.
in sefer halichos shlomo on hilchos pesach it is brought down in the chapter regarding maror, that there was a frum profesor who claimed that the white maror that we eat is not in fact real maror that one can be yotzei with. Rav S.Z. Aurbach rejects this and says we must follow our mesorah and one may eat it….
Uh, why not just eat what you want, and dispense with all these arbitrary rules?
You guys completely lost the point. The Noda bYehuda lived 200 years ago, in NORTHERN EUROPE. The fruits of NORTHERN EUROPE are smaller!
Further, when Eretz Yisroel was under klala, before returning from a wasteland to a flowering fruitful land, the fruits WHERE small!
BTW, go to your US grocery store where there are 3, count them, 3 sizes of EGG. So, if a shiur is an eggs bulk, is it a USDA Grade A Small egg, Medium egg, or Large egg?
wow bigwheel, good point.
I think I’m going to eat a pound of matzah seder night.
Anon. 4:32PM Recently scientists found evidence, and University Professors confirmed it (not to mention the Archaeologists who voched for it) that [Jewish] people (maybe palestinians, too) (ask arafat YMS”H) in Jerusalem (the UN-approved “International” City, of course) were using cellphones, about Two Thousand years ago. The evidence; that some streets [of the Second Temple era] were dug-up and no [phone] cables were found. That proves they were using cellphones [and other wireles devices, and systems such as Wi-Fi and “Voice-over-powerlines”
Anon. 2:17PM. You (or your keyboard) took the words right out of my keyboard! To enhance your point. (for those [readers/posters]who got it, in the first place. Rabbi A.C. Naeh painstakingly measured each standard (shiur) mentioned in Tanach and CHZ”L, as recounted by his daughter, that as a little girl her father used to send her to the local Jewelry maker/goldsmith to weigh some products (non-jewelry items) and check on their accurate weight, reasoning that the G. Smith has the most accurate measuring instruments (at that time)!
p.s.: To all those readers who don’t understand the “foreign” [language] words, my sincerest apologies!
It’s not a question about who’s a bigger halachic authority, it’s not halachic issue. We all agree the shiur of matza is ‘like an olive’.
The real issue is:
Who is more qualified to tell us what size olive chazal was referring to;
a) Achoranim, through ‘ruach hakodesh’ or some other un-named method.
b) Scientists with hard proof evidence.
Yidden should always know how to compromise and not turn everying into a machlokes. I say that we compromise and use Professor Kislev’s shiurim for marrar and matzah and the Chazon Ish shiurim for karpas.
How do you know the professor is anti-Torah?
Think before you speak.
Firstly Why are we even giving credence to some anti-torah professer.
Secondly from the meraglim to now fruit have gotten smaller.
When the Noda Yehuda said that olives have gotten smaller, he was saying this as a SEVORA, not a FACT.
In other words, he had a kashia and suggested this possibility as a TERUTZ.
Like any other TERUTZ, the possibility exists that soemone could come up with a better teirutz that gives a better answer to the kashia.
In our case, scientists have offered a suggestion that is based upon METZIUS. (Obviously, there’s subjective interpretation going on as well.)
The question then becomes whether one prefers to go with a sevora that is counter to everything we know about REALITY or with a sevora that is consistent with what we know about reality.
What makes you think that the Noda BeYudah would not have kissed these scientists on the cheek and thanked them for coming up with a better teirutz than his own?
Anon 2:17;
The bloggers of course!
QUESTION: Who is the greater halachic authority?
A) the Bar Ilan professors
B) the bloggers on this site
C) the Achronim – Chasam
Sofer, Noda Beyehuda,
Chazon Ish, and R’ Chaim
Nah
This theory of shrinking fruits has never even been mentioned in any scientific study or suggestion.
If anything, with selective breeding, fruits have become BIGGER.
I think we should continue our modern practice of increasing all shiurim, especially if they result in as harsh a chumra as possible. Chas v’sholom we should never entertain the idea of any kulos at all. Ans also if we can institute chumros that will make the lives of a majority of klal yisroel highly uncomfortable.
I don’t get it. First of all according to the Noda B’Yehuda that the fruits today have shrunk from ancient times, why does identifying the strain help? Even that strain would have shrunk.
Also, a KeBeitzah according to Chazal is twice the size of a KeZayis. So how can the species used be so tiny? Don’t tell me the eggs then were a quarter the size of our eggs.
that’s right 12:17pm,
Chazal probably chose the most rare and unknown species to pass on this knowledge to the generations. They purposely chose that unknown and rare , egg sized olive, so we would be confused until the king messiah returns to reveal this secret huge olive to prove that the achoronim picked that size with ruach hakodesh.
All matza is expensive, not just special matza….
Who said these olives were the speceis used by Chazal to determine the shiur?