Washing Hands - Part 1 - Rabbi Reuven Lauffer

[Music] okay here we go what H how you supposed to wash your hands how you supposed to wash your hands come on you're you're uh just just put latex gloves on and it's F the truth of the matter is that it's fine however however you do it it's going to be okay right if you do it one two one2 or 11 one two2 whatever it's fine it's going to be fine the important thing over here is that the water covers the ho of the hand okay um and you should uh you should just you should look at your hands briefly before you wash your hands just to make sure there's no obvious dirt on them because that means it's going to be a problem with regards to the water um the water's got to touch all over your hand so if you got like a piece of something on your hand then it's not going to it's not going to touch it however if it's something which is sort of like I don't know ink for example so ink is okay because ink is not uh it's not sitting on it's it's sort of worked its way in that's not considered in the to be something which is a barrier between the water and the Hand itself um other things that you need to be in concerned about um especially I guess if you're a woman which I'm not convinced I haven't come to a final decision over here but I'm not convinced that you are um perhaps I'm wrong if you you know if you wear rings for example is a ring is a ring considered to be something which gets in the way of the water well it does very much depend if you never take your ring off right and some women don't they just stay on some women don't take their rings off because they can't get them off you know the wedding rings for example they put them on many many years ago and now they have a bit of trouble um actually you know getting getting it off at all um but some people they don't care right so what what is it what is the measuring Rod if you don't care at all then you don't have to take your ring off when you come to wash your hands because that's not called a barrier right but if you would take off your ring for example one of the classic examples it's given is when you come to knee dough right lots of people they may keep their rings on for all kinds of things but needeing dough is a very uh it's a very messy very sticky business and uh so if you take your rings off to KN the dough then you should take your rings off when you come to wash your hands uh men you know men I don't know again men that wear wedding rings for example so the chances are that they very very rarely take them off if at all I don't know um I don't I don't wear one but uh ask ask your friends you know I don't know but in general right if you if you take if you take your weding ring off then I guess you have to take it off when you come to wash your hands as well it shouldn't be any different the for men shouldn't be any different than the for women um what what do you do if you're working yeah you're working construction for example or you work as a Sofer right a scribe or you make filling right you're working constantly with black dye that's uh you know uh and and I don't know you you're working you work in a in a garage right you know fixing cars you know it's they've got this Gunk that they put their hands into to get rid of but you know the you can you can see somebody who's involved in that kind of work what does somebody like that have to do he's okay that's considered to be a part of his hands already and uh you know and uh he doesn't have to he doesn't have to get get it on in order he doesn't have to take it off in order to be able to wash his hands that's okay small stains again you don't have to worry about little St we're talking about we're talking about th yeah take a look have a look and see right yes a little bit of ink over there is third grade though might be the last time you ever wrote anything actually what about if you've got a scab so having a scab is also not considered to be a a barrier between the water and the Hand um and it's okay to wash your hand you don't have to you don't have to pick it off in order to to wash your hands properly here an you know there interesting over here it's not it's just like a piece of advice women very often when they take off their rings in order to wash their hands so you know in order to not to lose their Rings you can put them down they're rather small little things that might disappear so they'll put them in their mouths they hold them and then hands the problem is if you're coming to make the Brer right then you've got to your your mouth you know either swallow the ring or you've got to take it out but you should not be making a bro otherwise you've got a ring stuck in between your teeth um I once heard a story I really don't know until today if the story is apocryphal or not about a uh a family who became ballet Chu they they became more observant you know and uh they sent their daughters off to the the local bakov school and after they finished school they went off to Seminary for the year you know come to Israel and uh when the daughter came back for pesak so parents asked her she had had her birthday asked her what did she want for her birthday so she said that she wanted a ring so actually we're talking about this the other day um said she wanted a ring so they they were a bit you know a little bit taken a back because they they hadn't brought her up being particularly interested in jewelry and off she goes to Israel to Seminary and comes back wanting a ring it's like a little uh you know hello um so they asked her wife so she said she wants a ring for the Mitzvah so the parents were completely flocks like what is she talking about so they said what MIT are you talking about the MIT of washing hands so they're like what have they been teaching you what's going on she says no she says she sees that all the girls when they come to wash their hands the first thing they do is they take off a ring and they put it in their mouth right in between their teeth and then they wash their hands and she thought that was an integral part of the the Mitzvah it's like what we were talking about right the other day yeah but uh um be you got to be careful be careful what you do because people people will follow you I remember I mean you got you got to be English to really appreciate this one but uh my when my brother got engaged so his father-in-law made a very big engagement party and they put up a big Marquee in the garden and it was a real fancy thing and it had a chandelier in it and it had this fountain in one side there was a fountain in in this Marquee and uh everybody was lining up to wash their hands right in order to be able to eat eat bread and uh you see all these English people they see a line they just get in it it's like you know afterwards they'll find out they're lining up for but in the meantime to line you know so they they right A Q they I would have said q but I don't think everybody here knows what a q is I mean they know it's a letter but aside from that um yeah what we call a Q and uh which has got a rather bizarre spelling it's q u e u e it's kind of a whatever you you really do have to be English to appreciate a q that's for sure um so everyone's lining up to wash their hands and you see these people getting up then they get to the thing and they fill up they fill up this things like you know spritzing out the whole time out of these little forets so they're filling up the cup and they wash their hands and then you you see them going like this and then they turn to the first moment and say this is not water it's apple juice and the person behind is like uh H okay and then he just picks up the cup and fills it up and starts washing his hand and then repeats the the whole thing wait wait no this is Apple okay you know then just like one one after the other it's like this English thing you know I stood in this line right so I may as well uh you know I may as well go through all to the end a drinks Fountain but it didn't say anything and everyone just assumed it must be it must be for n for sure um yeah so be be careful be careful what you do because people copy you and then all of a sudden you've got a whole a whole following of people doing these bizarre actions because you never realized that uh what you were doing was bizarre whatever anyway what about nail polish I don't know if anyone here is wearing nail polish are you wearing nail polish no no okay not today not today weekend Sunday today um what about what about what about nail polish is that considered to be what's called a k is that a barrier between your nails and the waters the answer is no everyone's busy saying no already um so the answer the answer is no no it's not it's considered to be an integral part of the uh the natilla of of your hand however there is an opinion which says that if the nail polish is cracked and it's brittle and it's been on for a while and it's obviously you know beginning to flake off and everything so then it could be that it really is a uh a problem with washing your hands and you would either have to you know refresh the nail polish or to take off the nail polish before washing your hands to recite the BR again I imagine this is probably something that you people may not have to worry too much about but for the future in the in the future just in case don't say I never warned you right okay let's talk about something which maybe we can all relate to and that's Band-Aids what happens if you got a little boo boo on your finger right and you put a a what we call a plas of it you people call a Band-Aid so take it off not to take it off yes to take it off um so there an interesting thing over here if it needs to be on right it's very often at the beginning when you've got a you've got a little boo boo it doesn't need to be on the whole time uh so you can keep it on uh if it something that could be taken off and put back on afterwards so it would be better to do that uh if the Band-Aid falls off during the meal so there is an opinion which says that you should rewash your hands without a broer right just go back and rewash your hands in order to wash the part of the hand that was covered with the Band-Aid to begin with um here right what should you do any any one of those things will do um how are you supposed to wash your hands well you're supposed to use something called what's called kak gav K gav is that you are washing your hands you're doing something in order to wash your hands which means you cannot just go to an open force it and stick your hands underneath it that's not going to cover the obligation for washing your hands uh and if there is no if if you've got nothing to pour the water into right so you're all familiar with the you know the the uh Kaye which has got the two little handles on the side and uh if you don't have anything like that what what is the best thing to do well the best thing to do is to open the foret and then um let the water pour out of your hand close the foret then open the foret again and let it pour out over your other hand and then close the foret and keep doing it that way because at least that way you're involved in pouring right in in you're involved in getting the water out of your hands that's what's called kak gav the uh the initial I mean the best thing to do is to have something to pour the water into the water into from the tap in order to be able to pull that over your hands though I read that that wasn't Hally permitted what the the opening closing of the for it's it's h again what I've told you is based on the Mish it's based on a ER as well um which means that it's it's uh it's not it's what's called B that's for sure right there are two different ways of doing your mitas one is one is is doing it the very best way and that would be using a uh you know some kind of a vessel in order to pull the water out of your hands with uh but the evid if you don't have any other alternative so the correct thing to do is to open up the foret and close the foret um what's the problem the problem is like this that when you open the foret the kav this idea of pouring the water out of your hands it's only applicable to the first bit of water that comes out because you open the temp and that caused the water to come out afterwards the water is pouring out by itself and it could be that the water that comes out Afters doesn't have a din of being kav so it could be that the best thing to do maybe is to open and close the foret you know often like a few times in order to make sure that your whole hand is covered with water that comes out immediately from the fored rather than just letting it run okay who needs the Tas dive well we spoke with a little bit at the beginning but anybody uh who is over the age of anyone over the age of Education which is normally we're normally working everything from five six seven depending on how smart the kid is um the uh what are he supposed to do so again a child from the age of is supposed to be using kav um if he's a little kid so somebody else can wash his hands as well the V God says that it's okay even if he doesn't have he he even doesn't understand what's going on you see little kids when they get up in the morning like very little kids you know like two two years old and they'll get out of bed the first thing they do is they pat off to the sink and they hold their hands up like this waiting for somebody to nle master for them right to wash their hands and uh yeah good that's okay that's very good um before you wash your hands your hands should be dry right so you'll see that some people actually have the custom to wash that to dry their hands with a towel before they actually wash their hands in order to make sure that they're uh that they're that the hands are dry when you pour the water over them right again we're doing this is all ritual stuff um what does it mean to that your hand should be completely covered in water from the wrist downwards right so from the wrist downwards that's how much water needs to be poured over and uh not to use the cup sparingly which means if needs be fill up the cup again and and pour it out over again to make sure you've got enough water all of this is only a able when there's plenty of water like so for example here in you can open up the foret and you can get lots of water coming out if you go camping for example and you need to bring the water or not you maybe but somebody else I'm sure you talk somebody else into going down to the rivered which is you know like a mile away and bringing back large amounts of water for you to be able to wash your hands with so no that's not the best thing to do at that point the best thing to do is to use the minimum amount of water that's a very famous story they tell that ravus salanta the founder of the Muslim movement who uh when he used to go to people's houses when he used to wash his hands for Nas so he used to use the minimum amount of water possible and when they went to one of his hosts once asked him why he said Rabbi you know we've got plenty of water over here um and he said because the people who are going to get the water are the servants in your home uh you know the hired help who are normally widows and orphans because they need it you know they need the the livelihood the parosa and they're the ones that have to go down to the river or to the to the well and to bring the water back to here he says that's a lot of it's a lot of hard work he says I don't want to be the reason why this person has to work even harder therefore we use I use the minimum amount of water possible in order to fulfill the Mitzvah without right without causing somebody else to have to go and walk you know get down to the river or to the well and bring back these very heavy um bucket buckets of water when you when you've washed your hands it's a good idea to lift lift them up right why is that to let the water trickle all over the hand right make sure that you're it's covering everything you know your your fingers should be open so that the hands the hands can get wet in between the fingers as well all of that um should be done what what what is what is the minimum amount of water to be using is up to the second knuckle right so here's your second knuckle over here or here what's this is that a knuckle no that's a knuckle right says a second knuckle over here here right yeah that's what I thought too I just want to get a professional opinion that's all right so up up to here covering covering the fingers that's a minimum um the uh the idea over here is what that if a person I know if a person has a wound up here somewhere and it's difficult for him to be able to uh to wash his hands so okay to wash over up to here uh on a fast day uh especially on yum kipur or on Tish so when we wash our hands we only wash up to here we don't wash up to the wrists we're careful not to use too much too much water even if we're washing our hands after the bathroom listen if if your hand if your hands are dirty for sure there's no problem at all right yeah you can wash them you can wash them up to up to where wherever they're dirty from um otherwise if they're not dirty which hopefully going to the bathroom is not going to cause them to be dirty then uh you should just really should just wash them up up to here um but like I said if you're if you're worried you know if if there's a what about wet towels you know those little towels yeah so so can you use them you can use you got to be very careful with them not to not to squeeze them out once you squeeze out any of the liquid it's a problem that's a problem on chabas chabas and on yur's a problem baby wipes baby wipes so what I heard from what I heard from somebody not very long ago that baby wipes from the top part of the packet is okay because you know baby whites what happens that they sit they sit on each other they actually they're pretty weighty these packets and the the as they sit on each other they squeeze themselves you know I don't I don't know how much experience should people have with baby wipes and it's probably better that I don't know but uh the the you know like the last the last the last third of the packet is always a lot wetter yes than the top 2/3 because it's sitting and it's it's pushing down right you know what about your K the mother has to clean the baby oh for sure no she got she's got what about what about the Father the father as well we don't count I somebody has to clean did you did you change your baby do you change your baby yeah of course right you know I did it once only and I remember they used to be I used to be uh the uh diapers remember used to be you cover them up and you stick them down right I us talk one of my kids stomach my wife says that it okay you see it worked whatever you whatever you were trying to do it obviously worked very well right I think I did it on purpose yeah it's like it wasn't a safety pin no not that my wife won't bother me um but it's you know for sure it's okay on yumy PO it's also okay to change just got to be careful really have to be careful with uh with uh you know I guess maybe maybe have two packets of of baby wipes open and that way when you feel that you've got down into the point where it's getting a little bit damper you can move on to the other packet instead and use just use the you like the first the first two-thirds of the baby wipes as opposed to the very bottom because what what's the problem the problem is not the baby wipe itself the problem is that when you once you start wiping it it's going to squeeze some of its liquid out squeezing out liquid on shabas and yumore is a problem right so so whatever I mean the the uh I guess the answer to the question really is that is that just just stay sh and let somebody else take care of it there you go um when you come to wash your hands you should really wash your hands twice right when we're talking about over here washing hands for ntil in order to eat bread you should wash your hands twice why is that once is to get rid of any spiritual impurity you might have on your hands and the second time is to get rid of the water which is now left on your hands mixed together with a spiritual impurity okay makes perfect sense um however if a person were to take a rever of water we spoke about a r the other day right if you take a r of water which is a volume of water and you pour it over both the hands at the same time so you have fulfilled your obligation right according to the letter of the law you fulfilled your obligation to do n and uh you can you can make the brocker and you can eat the bread although still it's still better the best way to do it is to wash your hands twice that's why you'll realize that what you are both saying is fine however you do it right if you want to wash the first hand your right hand twice once after the other and then wash the second hand once after the other you can do that that's absolutely fine or if you want to wash the right hand once and the left hand once and then wash the right hand again and the left hand again that's also fine because you're doing what needs to be done um again uh the best way to do it if you can that's to wash each hands twice but to make a gap in between each time you wash just a very small little Gap this is B based on cabalistic reasons I of course understand it completely but I can't share it with you because you people are too puny for me to reveal cabalistic secrets to you right no no really it's got nothing it's got nothing nothing to do with my not understanding really nothing at all I don't know it says that it's it's I'll p s that for for reason cabalistic reasons you should make a gap in between the two I don't know maybe it's the idea when you come to wash your hands right so even if you're washing one hand twice and then the second hand twice one after the other but you wash your hand once pause momentarily and then wash it again okay right again what's the idea I'm not I don't know and even if I did I wouldn't tell you anyway when when you when you come to raise once you've washed your hands you come to lift them up you should raise your right hand a little bit higher than your left hand um interesting enough in AAS your dime you should write you should you should wash your right hand first yeah right even even if you're left-handed right you you're not left hand it are you no you look perfectly normal I got hold of a pamphlet ah yeah you found one where did you find it the rabbi Rabbi P CR that's really the mo wrote a document called y Ela and it's a whole selection of for left-handed people oh wait we were going to make our fortunes and also his wife is going to be in Jerusalem in a in a few weeks and she's going to bring me some copies of the pamplet to to add to the oh very good my son he what very good how was it you read through it I'm not the whole thing I I need to sit and give it a proper read through but it's interesting yeah it's there a lot lot of information over there lots of different uh times yeah be interested to see it actually anyway good okay so everybody even if you're left-handed when you kind to lift your hands up you should lift your right hand up a little bit higher than your left hand right that's because the right hand is considered to be more dominant than the left hand um once you've washed your hands and they're still wet be careful not to touch anything obviously except for the towel but but uh you're not supposed to be touching anything at all um and if your wet hands were touched by someone who hasn't washed yet so you've got to go and wash again and again what's up sh over here we understand hope everybody understands that you come to wash your hands the first time you're washing hands is to get rid of the spiritual impurity then you're washing your hands in order to get ready to eat the bread if somebody who hasn't washed their hands yet touches your hands then they've just brought you back to stage one again the only difference being though that you don't make a Bro you've already made the broer over washing your hands and uh you don't have to make another broer over here but you still you should be very careful trying not to touch anything uh once you've washed your hands before you eat the bread um if your hands are dry already and somebody touched your hands then you don't have to go back and wash your hands again right the only problem over here is when they're wet yeah the problem with liquid is that liquid transfers spiritual impurity it's very it's a very potent method of transferring spiritual impurity and therefore if your hands are dry you don't have to be concerned about it but if they're still wet you definitely do if two people wash their hands properly and they touch each other after their hands are wet that's fine right again why is that fine we all right why is it fine there's no spiritual impu no spiritual impurity so everything is okay good well done I you know I've missed having somebody who listens no really let go see he listens to the voices in his head sh talking the RAB okay what's the best way to do you fill up you fill up your N Out your diying cup you should TR you fill it up in your holding it in your right hand transfer it to your left hand right you with me you can't leave the people leave it in you can do that as well that's going to take that's going to take care of the first the first the first problem but if for whatever the reason you're holding it you should hold it in your right hand once it's full of water good morning sweetie pie once it's full of water we transfer it over to the left hand and you you wash your right hand first okay look at that he's 20 seconds he's been here he's already agreeing he's great I love him I'm telling you these guys have been sitting here all morning and they haven't said one one word of agreement nothing then once you come once you come to wash your So you you're holding it in your left hand you pull the water over your right hand you then transfer it to your right hand in order to pour it over your left hand all of this stuff is pretty it's pretty basic you'll be hard pressed to wash your left hand if you're holding if you're still holding the cup in your left hand you can try just don't try near me that's all we had do it have to be kaat yeah we we had I'm not kidding when I was a kid grow when I was a kid in school we had we had something called dinner ladies the dinner ladies came out they put out the you know put out lunch for everybody and they they were not necessarily always the smartest people and uh there was one lady in particular if you caught her on the right day at the right time when she was bringing out jugs of water and you asked her what's the time she go oh the time oh it's oh my gosh I'm so sorry and if you know a good day was when you could position her next to somebody you didn't like and oh by the way what's the time and H oh no no keep pouring it it's fine it's fine he deserves it really um so yeah don't don't try pouring water from your left hand over your left hand whilst you're holding the thing in your left hand I I don't I don't recommend it whatever anyway um if somebody else is washing your hands right so for whatever for example my mother-in-law has broken her wrist um yeah you should have seen the other fellow though I mean um so somebody has to wash her hands she can she's not really very uh dextrous at the moment so uh so um so what when you come to wash somebody else's hands or somebody's washing your hands first they should wash your right hand first right right hand left hand that's the best way to do it so here she has a cast on her you can't wear it on her left hand she has a cast on her left hand and it com it's coming down to here because she broke her wrist so she can't she can only wash her right hand she can't wash the left hand right now mem in a few weeks time when they take the cast off then she'll be be able to wash your hands properly right where the water that's be the water that's washing your hands unlike the water in the morning you know when you get up in the morning and you wash what's called Nagel Vasa the first time that you wash your hands in the morning so over there you've got to be careful with the water right it shouldn't spill out anywhere and you should TI tip it down the sink because it's got a residue of this what's called Ru this kind of this this uh un spiritually unhygienic I didn't want to say that cuz it sounds somewhat Antiquated but this spiritually unhygienic water that's to be taken care of over here you don't have that problem over here particularly and if needs be you can wash your hands just you know standing outside like when you go on a picnic or something you're on a teal and you want to wash your hands you can just go stand outside and you can wash your hands straight onto the ground you don't have to be concerned about the water it's fine what if there's no water you're traveling you're in a te let's say there's no water okay for as you done so let them let them meat cake yeah that's what I say no what let them meat cake you can make aoy you can make aoy but you don't touch the bread which means that we spoke about it the other day that if you got a pair of gloves or if you can wrap your hands up in something um the truth of the matter is now nowadays you know when when sandwiches comeing no you can't do that your hands have to be covered I you know what I'm I don't know I have to I have to look this up if you got if your if your uh if your sandwich is covered in plastic R you can't it says in this oh yeah the problem is with the hands hang on the hands have to be covered okay no water anywh good so you cover your hands bread is set of the hands no this method is not acceptable the hands must be covered not the bread good okay there you go which means you've got to have your hands covered somehow that means huh carry carry gloves yeah latex latex gloves right they should be absolutely fine of course when you get stopped by the police they want to know why you're walking around with lat of gloves in your pocket and you start explaining to them that it's because of my bread officer I say okay let's go talk about this good okay very good that's good me me bet is [Music] m