R' Kook's Introduction to Eitz Hadar Part 3

we saw that Irv Kluck is focusing on the fact that he's addressing what's been happening for the past, really the past century, right? He's writing in 1907, and he's describing a situation in which, as we talked about last time, there was a controversy that unfolded over the course of the 19th century around a Srogim, particularly the Srogim from Corfu.

It was very well-known controversy around the surrogate from Corfu.

And what had happened over the beginning, at the end of the 18th century, beginning of the 19th century, is that there was a major change in the source of a surrogate coming to Europe.

For many centuries, typically, the Jews in Europe got their surrogate from Italy.

Italy was the closest place the closest to a climate that could produce Estrogim.

It was closer to the Mediterranean.

They had a Mediterranean exposure.

They had a Southern European Mediterranean exposure and they were close enough to the Jewish communities and the rest of Europe that they could actually get Estrogim from Italy.

So the Italian Estrogim were pretty much what was being used in Poland, in Germany, in Galicia, in Russia.

That's where the Estrogim were coming from.

As the political and technological changes occurred in the 18th and 19th century, and movement of people and goods became easier throughout Europe and beyond, There was now access to other places.

They could get things from other places more easily in other parts of Europe.

And some of these enterpreneuring, enterprising people started going deeper into the south to get a stroke from North Africa, from Spain and from Greece.

and other places around the Mediterranean.

And the place that apparently became the center of this controversy was Corfu, which is an island that belonged to Greece.

And the surrogates from Corfu apparently were very beautiful and also cheap relative to the surrogate from Italy.

And so the surrogate from Corfu came to really become a presence in the market in Europe.

And there was a controversy throughout the 19th century.

It flared up at various points because of various reasons around whether these Estrogim were good or not, whether they were kosher or not.

now so so there was this whole sort of thing about you know these are new right these are new and so maybe they're not good just plain just plain and simple now they look different than that strogan that everyone was used to everyone was used to a strogan from italy that looked a certain way these are strogan that came from from corfu looked different and And there was this accusation that they look different because they're not kosher, because there's what's called morkav.

So they're grafted together with other fruits that are making them look different.

We'll talk about why it was even being done.

But the accusation was that these esrogim are no good.

And there is a literary debate throughout the 19th century around how can you prove whether an esrog is Morkav or not? How can you establish the cautiousness of an esrog? Now, keep in mind, what complicates all of this is that nowhere in Shulchan Aruch does it say that an esrog can't be Morkav.

So it's not in Shulchan Aruch.

So because it's not in

Shulchan Aruch, the

Shulchan Aruch also didn't give us a way to determine if something is kosher or not based on these.

So this literary fight over the 19th century was around all these questions.

It

is, but the accusation was that maybe it has enough of a mixture in there that disqualifies it.

And that was the fight.

So that's the backdrop to, that's the first half of the backdrop.

Now, of course, mixed into this controversy are questions around whether the merchants who were bringing this from Italy were really behind these accusations, a whole separate question.

Rav Kook is now in the early 20th century, Rav Kook is now in the early 20th century trying to promote the yeshiva in Eretz Yisrael.

And he's basically saying, and with this book, he's saying, look, we have the solution.

We now have farmers in Eretz Yisrael raising a serokim that are kosher, they have a yichas, and they're being supervised by Jews.

Whereas the serogim being grown in Korfor, they're not being grown by Jews, they're being grown by Gentiles who are doing whatever they're doing with no supervision.

Here we have Jewish farmers in Eretz Yisrael raising a serogim.

And so now we have an opportunity not only to fulfill the mitzvah in a better way, in a for sure kosher way, we also are supporting the yeshuv in Eretz Yisrael.

And this goes back to the first part of the introduction where he talks about how the halal, the Mitzvah of Dal and Minim is the sort of intermediary Mitzvah between Mitzvah Sathluyot Baaretz and Mitzvah that's Chovah Sagov, which is an interesting thing.

So he says the Mitzvah of Dal and Minim is tied in many ways to the land and to agriculture.

And it's very special to fulfill it, especially with Peros of Eretz Yisrael.

And so here you can do the mitzvah with greater hiddur by getting a surrogate from Eretz Yisrael.

So he's making this sort of double or maybe even triple argument in support of the surrogate from Eretz Yisrael on both halachic grounds and then hashkafic grounds as it pertains to the mitzvah of Tal and Minim, but then in an even broader sense about supporting the development of Eretz Yisrael.

So that's the background.

That's the first, you know, the first half, the first two thirds of this introduction.

All of this is an introduction to what the actual book is, which is the basics of the halachas of Estragon, how you can establish whether something is Morkav or not.

He also argued earlier on that the whole debate that went on over the 19th century around this, starting from Corfu, whether they are Morkov, they're not Morkov, can you tell them Morkov, can you not tell them Morkov? He says, nobody holds for real that Morkov is actually okay.

The only thing they're debating is how bad is it? Is it a problem of the rights? Is it a problem of the Rabbanon? Can you use a Bediyevet? Can you prove one way or the other whether it's Morkov or not? But he's making the claim Not everyone agrees with this, but he's making the claim that everyone agrees that fundamentally, a Nasser that's Morkav is not good.

And if we have an alternative, we certainly would prefer an alternative.

That's the premise.