At Last!

For years, I've been failing to get a good answer to why kohanim (or their wives) take challah. After all, we take off a piece of dough when we bake as a gift for kohanim... So what gives? Both Husbinator and I have asked various rabbis, kohanim, and wives of kohanim in the U.S., but we've never gotten a solid answer.

Yesterday, Husbinator asked our shul rabbi, who immediately responded that the challah that must be separated from the dough is not just a gift for a kohen, it's also a requirement for the dough: unlike pidyon haben, there are two distinct requirements that are met when challah is taken. "Wait..." said Husbinator making the obvious analogy, "So kohanim also separate trumos and ma'asros from their produce?" To which the rabbi answered, "Of course!"

So I'm very glad to have a satisfying answer, but now I'm left with a new question. Did our rabbi know the answer due to his intense torah learning, or is this common knowledge among the religious Israeli population? After all, this is a mitzva that is closely tied to the land of Israel.

I mean, I never thought twice about Shavuos being chag habikkurim (the holiday at which we historically took the first fruits of our orchards to the Temple) until I moved to Israel and looked at my pomegranate trees one Shavuos and realized that something just didn't add up. Completely taken aback, I asked the ladies at shul how on earth people brought their first pomegranates to the Temple in late spring if pomegranates only ripen in the middle of the autumn.

My neighbor's teenage daughter told me that Shavuos marks the first date at which people can bring their first fruits, but bikkurim can be brought through Channukah. Now my former neighbor's daughter does happen to be a very well-educated young lady, but it turns out that isn't why she knew that piece of information. Eventually I got to the relevant Torah Portion in my pre-schooler's Hebrew parsha book. There, between the colorful illustrations on the tear-resistant pages, the book informs the little Israeli children that Jews took their first fruits to the Temple at some point between Shavuos and Channuka. Common knowledge around here.