Home › Forums › Decaffeinated Coffee › How to survive a three day yom tov?
- This topic has 26 replies, 25 voices, and was last updated 11 years, 3 months ago by Rav Tuv.
-
AuthorPosts
-
September 9, 2013 2:20 am at 2:20 am #610545yoyaMember
What’s your secret to surviving a 3 day yom tov?? I always immensely enjoy the first 2 days but by the third day I feel like I’m going to lose it!! It’s the effect of too much food, not enough physical activity, and surrounded by the same people for 3 straight days!
Any advice for the next 2 sets of 3 day yomim tovim?
September 9, 2013 2:58 am at 2:58 am #974193VogueMembertry eating milchig meal for second day lunch. try having a guest over for a meal on shabbos.
September 9, 2013 3:05 am at 3:05 am #974194TorahUmadda-731-MelechYavanHarashaParticipantHow about eating a meal or two by someone else?
September 9, 2013 3:14 am at 3:14 am #974195live rightMemberI know the feeling….
September 9, 2013 3:16 am at 3:16 am #974196TheGoqParticipantand lets be perfectly honest everyone in the house badly needs a shower.
September 9, 2013 3:31 am at 3:31 am #974197🍫Syag LchochmaParticipantYoya- all those reasons you mentioned are the reason I like them so much.
September 9, 2013 3:54 am at 3:54 am #974198yentingyentaParticipantmilchig meals are a must. Fish, cheeses, and spreads. A light easy meal. Even nicer if you serve on plastic dishes so less clean up. In my house the rule of thumb is one milchig meal for every fleishig meal. Yes, seriously.
also try to eat out for a meal. Bonus points if its a mile walk uphill both ways.
I find if I get out of the house for at least one afternoon it saves my sanity. Find a friend and share a couple (hundred) belly laughs. Its highly recommended.
September 9, 2013 3:54 am at 3:54 am #974199EnderParticipantHow to survive? Thats easy, If you have smell/itchy issues, then shower. If you have digestive issues, smoke.
September 9, 2013 4:04 am at 4:04 am #974200Sam2ParticipantShower on the second day. That’s a big one.
September 9, 2013 6:57 am at 6:57 am #974201SaysMeMemberdon’t overeat, do go out to a friend or for a walk or for a walk with a friend. Also, take downtime if u need and read in ur room alone.
September 9, 2013 9:08 am at 9:08 am #974202Geordie613Participant1. I once went to a shiur on Yom tov, where someone asked “Why on yomtov do we eat sleep eat sleep eat sleep eat sleep?” The Rov, got very upset and said, “Don’t you daven!?” and then went into a half an hour mussar shmuess on the subject that Yomim tovim are only given for people to learn Torah. So advice number one is, Take a sefer, any sefer and sit and learn an hour or two.
2. Eat a milchik or parev meal on second night, or if you are makpid on meat, have cold cuts or something light.
3. Take walks or at least spend some time outside in the fresh air.
4. Cold showers are not fun, but it sure wakes you up for the next tfila. There is a mitzva called “Lo teshaktzu”, as well as the bein odom lechaveiro issues.
September 9, 2013 9:55 am at 9:55 am #974203shmoolik 1ParticipantCOME LIVE IN ERETZ YISROEL here we don’t have the problem except for this past Rosh Ha Shana
gmar chatima tova
September 9, 2013 10:27 am at 10:27 am #974204twistedParticipantAcclimate to kodesh. Walk far to do mitzvos, bikkur cholim, lhakbil pnei rabo, go to a distant shiur, and not overeating starts with not overcooking.
September 9, 2013 12:24 pm at 12:24 pm #974205oomisParticipantI invited a couple over for both evening meals of R”H, along with their daughter. They were otherwise alone for yom tov, had just made a wedding, and the mom was feeling very stressed over the thougth of preparing for the yomim tovim. We had a wonderful time and ate full courses with most of the R”H simanim incorporated into the meal.
The two day lunches were great but light, and without company. My daughter made tacos and salad, and we had some kugel and honey cake. Erev Shabbos we had cold poached salmon and salad. Friday night was a regular Shabbos meal of the delicious leftovers, minus soup (the soup is a really filling course, to begin with, so we just omitted it). I had two families over for lunch, which was gefilte fish, cholent, rice, kugel and chicken, plus fruit and honey cake or blueberry cake for dessert. We ate a lot, but not everyone ate everything, and having light lunches really helped.
It was fine. The hardest part was I made egg-free challah for the first time, and it came out SO yummy, people were eating challah all evening and I had to remind them there was actually food to eat.
September 9, 2013 1:07 pm at 1:07 pm #974206mddMemberWork on your ahavas ha’mitzvos. It is all in the attitude. Short term — eat less, go for a walk and visit a friend.
September 9, 2013 4:19 pm at 4:19 pm #974207DaMosheParticipantI didn’t have such a hard time other than feeling disgusting on Shabbos afternoon for not having showered in a few days. Yes, I felt like I didn’t want to each much. So Friday night I had a very small meal, with no guests. We put the kids to bed early (they’re only 5), and had gefilte fish and chicken soup. There was some chicken in the soup, so we had the meat as required for Shabbos. We had some other things on the hotplate in case we were still hungry, but my wife and I both agreed we weren’t hungry at all, just tired, so we went to sleep early. There’s no mitzvah to stuff yourself to the point where it’s uncomfortable!
September 9, 2013 4:47 pm at 4:47 pm #974208miritchkaMemberTake a long walk. I find that being at home over a regular weekend is soooo long and hard to bear. I love my kids so much but being in the house from Friday afternoon through mid sunday, is really difficult! Going out to the park or just taking a walk (even with the kids!) for at least an hour, does wonders!
Going to the in laws for sukkos, dunno how i’ll survive if i dont get out… I love them too, but…
September 9, 2013 4:59 pm at 4:59 pm #974209dafyomi2711Memberyou are not allowed to shower on shabbos even in and on yom tov as well its a gezeira and you are not supposed to have milchig meals on yom tov “ain simcha ela bbasar”!!!
September 9, 2013 6:53 pm at 6:53 pm #974210WolfishMusingsParticipantyou are not supposed to have milchig meals on yom tov “ain simcha ela bbasar”!!!
That does not mean that *everything* you eat has to be meat.
Or are you also going to get on people’s cases if they drink soda or juice at their meal and not wine?
The Wolf
September 9, 2013 7:14 pm at 7:14 pm #974211dafyomi2711Memberno of course you can have other stuff as long as the main course is basar veyain! (for a man)
September 9, 2013 7:45 pm at 7:45 pm #974212WolfishMusingsParticipantno of course you can have other stuff as long as the main course is basar veyain! (for a man)
Who says the main course has to be meat or wine? Why doesn’t one meal of meat fulfill the obligation?
The Wolf
September 10, 2013 12:06 am at 12:06 am #974213zahavasdadParticipantain simcha ela bbasar
What if someone doesnt like fish , meat or wine because frankly I cant stand Gefitle fish and I hate challah too for that matter.
How is it Simcha if I am forced to eat Challah and Gefilte Fish (In my house you will not be served Challah Gefilte Fish or Chicken (Dont really care for that either) that I dont like.
Wine I am picky about, I dont like the cheap stuff. Its undrinkable
September 10, 2013 1:43 am at 1:43 am #974214steven2MemberIs there anything wrong with a hot shower or going on a jog after those heavy meals?
September 10, 2013 3:37 am at 3:37 am #974216Bookworm120ParticipantNext year’s secret will be to always wear comfortable shoes (heels, even if they’re under 4-9 inches feel like Gehinnom). Standing for 6 hours in shul doesn’t have to be a pain in the foot.
September 10, 2013 9:21 am at 9:21 am #974217takahmamashParticipantQuoted from Shabbat b’Shabbato
HALACHA FROM THE SOURCE by The Center for Teaching and Halacha, Directed by Rabbi Yosef Tzvi Rimon (Today’s responsa was written by Rabbi Eli Taragin)
Taking a Shower on a Holiday
Question: Is one allowed to take a shower from water that was heated during the holiday in a solar heater?
Answer: In the Mishna there is a dispute between Beit Shamai and Beit Hillel whether one is allowed to heat up water on a holiday for the purposes of washing (Beitza 21b). The Shulchan Aruch follows Beit Hillel and rules that this is permitted. The accepted explanation for this is that the principle that some labors are permitted on a holiday for the purpose of providing “food for a person” is not limited strictly to food but includes other bodily pleasures, such as washing (Hilchot Yom Tov 1:16).
However, when washing the entire body is involved (as in a shower), there are two possible prohibitions:
(1) The prohibition to warm up water on a holiday. This appears explicitly in the Talmud (Shabbat 39b), and it is quoted in the Shulchan Aruch (511:1). The early commentators suggest two possible reasons for the prohibition. Tosafot explain that the permission to perform labor for “food for a person” (which is the basis for allowing water to be heated on a holiday) is only for a case which is equally available to everybody, and this corresponds only to washing separate parts of the body (Beitza 21b). They feel that heating up water in order to wash the entire body is a Torah violation. On the other hand, the Rambam (Hilchot Yom Tov 1:16) and the RIF (Beitza 11a) wrote that by Torah law the water can be heated, but that the prohibition to heat the water is a rabbinical decree.
(2) Washing using water that was heated before the holiday. This is the subject of a dispute of the early commentators. The Shulchan Aruch (511:2) rules following the RIF and the Rambam (quoted above), that this is not prohibited, while the RAMA prohibits it in the wake of the Tosafot (39b) and the ROSH (Mishna Shabbat 3:7).
In view of the above, there would seem to be a double problem in taking a shower on a holiday: a prohibition to heat up the water, and a prohibition to wash (for Ashkenazim).
In spite of this, in modern times we might still be able to allow taking a hot shower, for several reasons.
(1) Heating the water. Rabbi Akiva Eiger in a novel ruling writes that when the water is heated on Shabbat or on a holiday in a natural way, without any human action, it can be considered as having been heated up during the day, before the start of Shabbat or the holiday. This implies that it is possible to use water that was heated up in a solar heater during the holiday, as if it was heated the day before the holiday. This is also the opinion of Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach (Shemirat Shabbat K’Hilchata 14:3, and see note) and Rabbi Ovadia Yosef (Chazon Ovadia, Yom Tov, page 41). This then is a possible “solution” for the problem of heating the water.
(2) Using the water to wash. In light of what was quoted above from the Shulchan Aruch permitting the use of water that was warmed during the day before the holiday, the Sephardim have broad permission to take a shower using water from a solar heater. It would seem that this is forbidden for Ashkenazim, as indicated by the RAMA. This is indeed the ruling of prominent rabbis of the Ashkenazim, such as in Shemirat Shabbat K’Hilchata (14:7) and Rabbi Karlitz (“Chut Hashani,” page 122), among others.
Evidently these rulings were correct in previous times, when it was quite rare for people to wash their entire bodies. But today when the norm (at least for our sector) is to take a shower every day, we can assume that the law has changed. There are two reasons for this.
1. In modern times, washing the entire body has the status of something that is “freely available to everybody”
The RAN (Beitza 11a in the RIF) explains that the prohibition of washing the entire body is not an independent law but is a rabbinical decree in order to avoid heating up the water on the holiday. This was copied from the laws of Shabbat, where there is a rabbinical decree not to wash the entire body in hot water even if the water was heated up before Shabbat, in order to avoid the prohibition of heating water. The RAN explains, based on this, that the prohibition of washing the entire body on a holiday is only relevant for those who feel that washing the entire body is a Torah violation (on a holiday as on Shabbat). In this way, he explains why the ROSH and the Tosafot prohibit washing, since they feel that heating enough water for the entire body is not freely available to everybody and is therefore a Torah violation, while the Rambam and the RIF, who feel that heating water is prohibited by a rabbinical decree, did not forbid washing.
According to the Tosafot and the ROSH, the prohibition of heating up water to wash the entire body stems from the fact that this act is not freely available to everybody. But today, when this has become a basic necessity for everybody, it is clear that they too would allow heating the water. If the reason that washing the entire body is forbidden is because of a fear of heating the water, then this prohibition is no longer valid. We can therefore state that Ashkenazim too are allowed to shower using water that was heated before the holiday (or using a solar heater on the holiday). This idea was brought as a suggestion in Shemirat Shabbat K’Hilchata (14, note 21), without a final ruling. However, according to Shulchan Shlomo (page 198) rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach allowed a student of his to shower based on this tpe of reasoning. This is also a ruling taught by Rabbi Aharon Lichtenstein.
(2) One who is “suffering.”
In Practice: In principle, one is allowed on a holiday to take a shower in the usual way, using water from a solar heater. One who would like to be stringent can use lukewarm water. Only liquid soap should be used, and it is important to avoid wringing out water and combing the hair.
September 10, 2013 11:08 am at 11:08 am #974218147ParticipantEnder:- FYI:- It is Ossur Min haToroh “veNishmartem Me’od leNafshoseichem” to ever smoke:- Period!!
Have different outfits for each day, such as a light grey suit in addition to a dark suit, and several ties & cufflinks:- This will keep you somewhat occupied & distracted.
You may also care to go to a Hashkomo Minyan 1 or more of the days, putting you on a different schedule, in addition to not going without food until lunchtime for 3 days running. Eating at regular hours:- i.e. Breakfast time, takes off the pressure to gouge down a huge lunch.
September 11, 2013 10:58 pm at 10:58 pm #974219Rav TuvParticipant147,
I usually think (dream) about Yom haatzmaut and Yom Yerushalayim and get so excited time goes quickly.
-
AuthorPosts
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.