Is a Shortened Lulav Kosher?
“Remnants of Tzitzis are Kosher”
(Menachos 38b)
The leaders of the generations tried to understand the difference between the mitzvah of shofar and the mitzvah of tzitzis. Everyone agrees that their halachos differ.
When purifying a person who is tamei meis, one must sprinkle him with water mixed with ashes of the parah adumah by means of a bunch of hyssop branches of a certain minimum size. Our Gemara explains that even after sprinkling someone with a hyssop, if parts fall off it and it no longer has the minimum proper size, it may be used for sprinkling: “The remnants of a hyssop are kosher.” Also, cords of tzitzis on a garment that had the proper length and snapped are kosher: “The remnants of tzitzis are kosher.” The Gemara suggests that straps of tefillin that were severed are also kosher, but dismisses it because “they are for holy usage” as opposed to tzitzis that are for “mitzvah usage.” We thus have a rule that one can continue using an object which was originally fit for its mitzvah but which became smaller.
This Gemara presents us with a formidable question. We know that a lulav less than four handbreadths long is disqualified (Shulchan Aruch, O.C. 650), and the same applies to a shofar which is less than four thumb-breadths long. We have never learned that a tall lulav that was shortened to two handbreadths would be kosher or that a shofar a meter long that was drastically shortened would be kosher. In light of the rule explained in our sugya that “the remnants of a mitzvah are kosher,” we must thus understand why a lulav and a shofar differ from a hyssop and tzitzis. There must be an essential distinction between a hyssop and tzitzis, on the one hand, and a lulav and shofar, on the other hand, which will teach us the difference between them.
A Matter of L’Shma
Rabbi Shlomo Kluger, zt”l, asked this question, and the Chasam Sofer, zt”l (Responsa, Y.D. 256) answered as follows: The cords of the tzitzis must be woven for their mitzvah. On the other hand, a shofar or a lulav are kosher for their mitzvah as they are, and need not be specifically made for a mitzvah. Therefore, the dedication for the mitzvah when tzitzis are properly made does not leave them but becomes an inseparable part of them, even though they become shortened. But a lulav or a shofar are not made for the sake of a mitzvah, and once their size is lessened, they are no longer fit to serve for their respective mitzvah.
Broad Mind and with Love
This explanation does not help us understand the difference between a hyssop and a lulav, since there is no need for a hyssop to be made for the sake of its mitzvah. Indeed, the Chasam Sofer confronts this question (see ibid. what he wrote as a possible explanation) and concludes: “…and let someone whose mind is broader than mine tell us a proper solution and we shall receive it with love.”
Point of Obligation
The author of Or Sameiach (Hilchos Lulav 7:8) addresses the rule of “the remnants of a mitzvah are kosher” from a completely different viewpoint and finds another difference between a lulav, a hyssop, and tzitzis. In his opinion, the rule that “the remnants of a mitzvah are kosher” applies to objects with which a mitzvah was fulfilled properly and a new obligation of the same mitzvah occurs after the object became a mitzvah-remnant. However, a mitzvah whose obligation occurred before the object became a remnant must be observed only with an object of the proper size.
We can thus discern a sharp distinction between the mitzvah of tzitzis and the mitzvah of lulav. On the morning of the first day of Sukkos, everyone becomes personally obligated with the mitzvah of lulav, a mitzvah fulfilled in one moment. If one person takes up a lulav at sunrise and another takes it up before sunset, both have observed the obligation they incurred with the arrival of morning – to take up the lulav one time. However, tzitzis is different: It is not an obligation from which one becomes exempt upon its performance as the mitzvah renews itself at every moment. Tefillin would be the same as tzitzis; remnants would therefore be kosher if not for the straps being “holy usage.” A person who dons tzitzis at seven in the morning and another who puts them on in the afternoon do not observe the same obligation – one observed the obligation of that time and the other observed the obligation of another time.
Recurring Obligation
We thus understand that if someone puts on tzitzis in the morning and they later become “remnants,” he may continue to wear them as a renewed obligation continues to occur as they become remnants. The remnants, once having been kosher, remain kosher for continued usage. However, someone who wants to take up a lulav in the afternoon that was kosher in the morning and served its mitzvah purpose may not do so with only a remnant of that lulav, as he is only now observing the obligation he incurred in the morning and at that time the lulav was not a “remnant of a mitzvah” as no one had fulfilled today’s mitzvah with it. Sprinkling with a hyssop, in contrast, is not a personal obligation but a tahara procedure that begins for each individual at the time of sprinkling. When it breaks after one sprinkling, it becomes a mitzvah remnant usable for another (see Chazon Yechezkel, Sukkah 5:9, who devotes a long discussion to this halacha).