Who Will Be Eating
Green Beans On Pesach?

ELIZABETH APPLEBAUM ASSOCIATE EDITOR

Q: Why is it that only some Jews eat legumes,

rice and corn on Pesach?

Pant hem with
incoming order

limit one per customer
$6.00 value

,

411V.

• Eating legumes and rice on Pesach is
• acceptable in Sephardi homes, but
not in Ashkenazi ones.
The tradition of not eating
legumes stems from two appar-
ent sources: first, a fear that
people will confuse grain with
legumes (both being small)
and thus produce chametz
on Pesach. Second is the
practice in some places of
making bread from
legumes, and again, the
fear that people will be-
come confused and make
bread from grain.
Such anxieties were
found in Ashkenazi rabbinic
literature only. Sephardi rab-
bis and their communities
munched on rice, beans, peas and
corn throughout Pesach and still do.

Ashkenazim, however, continue to maintain
the ban on legumes (including green beans
and peanuts), rice and corn as a ha-
lachic principle of minhag, tradi-
tion.
In America, where there are
few Sephardim, it is easy to
avoid the forbidden foods
(known in Hebrew as
kitniyot). But in Israel,
where the majority is
Sephardi and Oriental,
problems sometimes
arise. That is why candy
produced in Israel for ex-
port to America often bears
a label stating "kitniyot
free" (as some Is-
raeli candy makers
Oh,
use corn syrup in-
beans!
stead of sugar as a
sweetener).

‘A.000:•,

I YOUR EXERCISE CONNECTION

• TREADMILLS Electric/Manual
• STAIR CLIMBERS
• HEALTH BIKES
Manual/Dual Action/Electric
• ROWING MACHINES
• MISC. GYM EQUIPMENT

LARRY ARONOFF

ACTON RENTAL & SALES
f... 891.-6500
540-5550

p lease

call —

development of the record player?

• The next time you sit down to a nice
evening of Ralph Vaughn Williams (or a
painful one as your kids blast Metallica), you can
thank a German-Jewish immigrant named Emile
Berliner.
Born in Wolfenbuettel, Berliner came in 1870
to the United States, where he worked as an as-
sistant in a chemical laboratory. In 1876, he be-
gan experimenting with a new contraption called
the telephone. He ended up adding an improve-
ment to its transmitter that brought him a job, as
chief electrical instruments inspector, with Bell
Telephone. (The same improvement made the mi-
crophone possible.)
In 1887, Berliner suggested the use of a flat,

(ALL ITEMS DISCOUNTED)

Providing the Best
Prices and Service
in Oakland County!

: Did Jews have anything to do with the

grooved disc rather than a cylinder on the phono-
graph. The Victor Talking Machine Company ac-
quired the patent (it's Berliner's invention you see • c /\
on the famous RCA label showing a dog with his
ear to a Gramophone), and Berliner's device served
as the prototype for the modern-day record play-
er — on it's way to obsolescence, thanks to the
compact disc.
Berliner also constructed three helicopters as
early as 1919 and was active in public-health is-
sues. He founded the Society for the Prevention
of Sickness and organized the first American milk
conference, which paved the way to pasteuriza-
tion. He was among the early supporters of the
Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

Q: What's the appropriate English term for

the Kotel?

DAVID BIBER

541-4133 • (810) 656-9500 Crestview Cadillac

Q: What investment offers

'!--'-competitive rates

great tax advantages

';- -,complete safety

A: U.S. SAVINGS BONDS

THE GREAT AMERICAN INVESTMENT
1.800-US-BONDS

• The Kotel is the only extant wall from
A. • the Temple. Located in the Old City in
Jerusalem, the Kotel has been held sacred by Jews
since talmudic times.
In Hebrew, the name is hotel maaravi, liter-
ally, western wall. Nineteen-century European
visitors to Jerusalem, seeing Jews in mournful
prayer at the wall, described the scene as the place
where the Jews come to bewail their fate. Thus,
in English and most European languages, the site
became known as the "Wailing Wall" or a varia-
tion thereof. Today, many Jews find "Wailing
Wall" condescending and disrespectful.
The best choice is to identify the wall by its He-
brew name, the Kotel, though "Western Wall" also
is appropriate.

Western: Not Wailing.

Send questions to "Tell Me Why" c I o The Jewish News, 27676 Franklin Rd., Southfield, MI 48034