Hot answers tagged eggs
14
Chulin 8 / Yoreh Deah 87:3 - Rabbi Akiva holds that the prohibition of eating chicken with milk is Rabinnic (M'Drabanan) - the reason is to avoid confusion as people consider chicken meat. Fish would not be confused as it does not require slaughtering, however chicken does require slaughtering.
Once eggs are laid they are completely developed; and they ...
13
To your last point, traditional caviar comes from sturgeon fish, which are not kosher.
Eggs from kosher fish, such as whitefish, are kosher, so you can find kosher-certified "caviar" made of such eggs.
8
You seem to be looking for the Bar Yuchnei. Talmud Bechoros 56b:
פעם אחת נפלה ביצת בר יוכני וטבעה ששים כרכים ושברה שלש מאות ארזים
Once the Bar Yuchnei's egg fell and it flooded sixty cities and destroyed three hundred cedars.
The gemara there says that normally this wouldn't happen, but this particular egg was rotten so the bird threw it away.
It ...
7
Despite it's apparent similarity to pagan practices dating back thousands of years, this custom exists in some communities (particularly among Lubavitchers and some other Chassidic groups) and dates back at least several decades. Similar customs (such as eating colored eggs on Purim) existed in Jewish communities in Afghanistan and Yemen, and women in ...
6
The Remah (Shulchan Aruch Orach Chaim 576:2) says that some people have the custom to eat eggs at the Seder, as a sign/remembrance of mourning. He posits two reasons:
The first night of Pesach is always the same day of the week as Tisha Be'av
To remember the destruction of the Temple. Where it not for the destruction we would be eating the Korban Pesach.
...
6
The Taz (OC 473:4) suggests the reason is so that we can eat it, because it is forbidden to eat roasted meat on the Seder night.
The Mishna Berura (:23) quotes two other reasons. First, that we use an egg, which is commonly served at a meal to mourners, to represent our mourning the loss of the Beit HaMikdash and the Korbanot. Second, the word for egg in ...
6
The Shulchan Aruch (OC 473:4) says that the custom around him was to cook the egg in liquid. The Mishna Berura there explains that this is because the egg represents the Korban Chagigah which, unlike the Korban Pesach, could be either roasted or cooked in liquid. The Rama there notes that the custom in his city is to have the egg roasted, as was certainly a ...
5
There is a responsa of the Ben Ish Hai brought in the fourth volume of the set published by Ahavat Shalom, that says it must be for the sake of taking the eggs(or young) on account of Tzarat Ba'alei Haim, as the mother may not return and you would thus be the cause of the starvation of the young.
4
In answer to your question, according to this article from OU, no:
There is no problem with eating eggs cooked in the shell (boiled or roasted), even though these cannot be checked.
However, note that this would only apply to non-fertilized eggs (as are commonly available today). If you're dealing with fertile eggs (usually available at a premium), ...
4
The Encyclopedia Yehudit suggests the salt water is for the following reasons, though I don't know what the source is for what is written there or if the suggestion offered is their own. This does relate to the reason given for the egg as having to do with the destruction of the Beis HaMikdash - http://www.daat.ac.il/encyclopedia/value.asp?id1=2351):
1) ...
3
The Shulchan Aruch Harav says that the egg should be either cooked or fried.
Nonetheless, the footnote quotes Sefer Haminhagim that in Chabad, the egg is hard-boiled and eaten with salt-water.
3
I actually have heard of this minhag before, although I have never seen an ostrich egg in a synagogue myself. It was a fairly common symbol in both Christianity and Islam, and so churches and mosques would frequently have ostrich eggs in them as well (see this book, for example). The symbolism is largely what has been mentioned above with regard to the ...
2
There are two cases I can think of in which having a majority of eggs will help.
If you mix up the eggs and don't remember which was the non-kosher one, you can have any of them if rov were kosher
If the eggs got mixed up, but they all taste the same, then you only need a rov (51%) to permit the entire thing (Yoreh Deah 109:1).
2
Like Dave, I also did a little bit of internet searching. The only thing I could find out about religious symbolism was Christian symbolism. Also, it's generally (in most Christian symbology that I've found) seen as very negative - the ostrich is the symbol of the bad mother for not sitting on the eggs.
Speculation: Maybe it was discontinued when people ...
2
You don't have to. In fact, it is impossible to do so since after cooking, the blood can get mixed up and not be noticeable. Since it is impossible to check, we rely on the rov (majority) or eggs that are not bloody.
Source: here
2
Who said we don't treat fish eggs the same way?
You can certainly buy OU-certified black caviar (from whitefish, for instance, see: http://www.amazon.com/Kosher-Black-Whitefish-Caviar-Orthodox/dp/B000LR0MHI) So it follows the same rules as all of the items you mentioned -- as long as it was supervised when it was extracted to make sure it came from a kosher ...
2
This is a big dispute between halachists who are more rationalist vs. those who are more mystically oriented.
According to 'rationalists', who view it as an act of mercy, if you don't need the eggs / chicks, then it is an act of cruelty, for no reason, so of course you should not chase away the mother bird. Ones who hold like this include Rokeach, Meiri, ...
2
http://www.kehillastorah.org/practical-teves-5760.html
If you find a blood spot in a hard boiled egg does that affect the
other eggs boiled with it in the pot?
If there were 3 or more eggs cooked with it in the pot then there is
no problem with the other eggs [because of the concept of 'batleh
b'rov' (nullified in the majority)]. If there were ...
1
It sounds to me like an halachic ex-post-facto rationalization of a superstitious practice -- see comments above and other answers. It is actually quite common to see rabbinic explanations of what are ultimately traceable to superstitious non-Jewish peasant beliefs. (As a random example off the top of my head, R' Menashe Klein's explanation of children ...
1
From Halachically Speaking Volume 4 Issue 18, "Blood Spots In Eggs":
When eating hard boiled eggs, Harav Moshe
Feinstein zt”l had the custom to peel back the
white to check the surface of the yolk for blood
spots, which would appear as black spots. [ This is not required (This is the opinion
of Harav Yisroel Belsky Shlita (Hakhel Janurary 2006
...
1
When the Lubavitcher Rebbe would eat the Beitza by the Seder, he would not check it for blood. Otzar Minhagei Chabad quotes the Taamei Hamitzvos who says that the AriZal would eat fried eggs and was not concerned for the occasional blood spot.
The Eishel Avraham (Buczacz) writes that because a majority of eggs have no blood-spots and it's hard to check ...
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