By COLlive reporter
A Chabad Rabbi from Israel has instructed his community not to spend their hard-earned money on the pricey Yanover esrogim for Sukkos this year.
Rabbi Zalman Yaroslavsky notified Lubavitchers in the city of Elad that his shul is purchasing a $200 esrog that originated from Italy and that there is no need for them to purchase their own.
Chabad custom is to prefer an esrog grown in the sun-baked region of Calabria in southwest Italy. Lubavitch esrogim murchants have traveled there since the 1950s to oversee the harvest.
But a highly unusual winter frost in January 2017 brought 4 days of below-zero weather to the region, Chabad.org reported. It destroyed 80 percent of the citron trees, causing the worst citron crisis in the area in the last half-century.
Partially damaged trees have been trimmed down to their stumps, while other trees have been destroyed completely and must be replaced. It takes about 3 years for a newly-planted citron root branch to grow into a tree and yield its first esrogim.
With fewer Yanover/Calabria esrogim available –and those that are of high-priced and of poorer quality– Rabbi Yaroslavsky asked each family in his community to pitch in $7 to purchase the communal esrog.
Tzfas Shliach Rabbi Yosef Chitrik recently wrote in the Kfar Chabad magazine, “I suggest to anyone who thought of purchasing a Calabria esrog for a high price, to invest the money in tzedaka instead.”
What a business! Thousands of esrogim being scrutinized under lights by non-Chabad Chassidim. I got a very nice one, small but almost perfect, for about $60. Could we have gotten cheaper somewhere else? Of course, but we know that this is Kosher.
Chag Sameach!
…city of Elad… What are other Chabad communities using?
21 should be clear and clarify otherwise its a terrible loshon hora
To number 21,
That is a very serious accusation. If it’s true the tzibur has a right to know which esrogim have this shaila.
Did you really say that almost everyone can afford a Yanover Esrog?Are you serious? What planet are you living on? Perhaps you would like to buy one for everyone in the community?
There are lots of other hidurim in the Kfar Chabad Esrog that Italy doesn’t have. The first one being that we know it’s for sure Kosher. Enough said.
Didn’t the Rebbe say that there will be a time when you won’t be able to find a kosher Yanover and thats why the rebbe said to plant one in Kfar Chabad
There is one field in Calabria where no mashgiach or other person than the Lubavitcher`s involved are allowed.
R.Moshe Landa tried a few times to send his botanist, but was refused.This year the riddle was answered, when the one of head Rov from a Hashgocha from America called a meeting of all the mashgichim,the mashgiach fromthis closed Lubavitch field said “we have a heter to take a sapling from a grafted tree and replant it as an Esrog tree.
The Rov replied “this is the heter of the Beis Efraim( also the Mate Efraim) whom the majority Poskim dissagree with.
The communal one is probably only for the brocha.
In 1875, the Esrog growers incorporated themselves into a cartel and drastically raised the price of each single etrog to six florins, assuming that the Jews would have no choice and pay the price. There was an underlying misconception, that there is a belief by the Jews that whoever doesn’t reveal a Corfu etrog for Sukkot will not survive the next year. However, this was not the case. The rabbi of Kovno, Rabbi Yitzchak Elchanan Spektor, intended to stop this record-breaking monopoly, and banned the Corfu etrog until the prices would be lowered, and the status of kashrus clarified. The… Read more »
I was in the same position and was not able to find one yanover that was completely clean. I bought a beautiful kfar chabad esrog that is (much more?) mehuder and will Imy”h give the difference I saved towards lulav & esrog mivtzoim. Next year when we’re able to get decent yanavar esrogim that are mehudar, I plan to switch back.
When life gives you lemons, make lemonade 🙂
BS”D just curious, how does an entire community Doven on one Esrog especially HR and if want a coffee need to walk to where the Esrog is and then back home
Buy Israeli esrogim like most of klal Yisrael and support your fellow Jews in the holy land.
I can’t speak for the above mentioned community, but most people in the day and age are not scraping pennies just to live a basic life, so esrogim are scarese this year and cost more so give up on some other gashmiyusdiker taayvo and spend the hard earned cash on a mitzvah behiddur! scrap one chol hamoed trip or fancy steak! i’m sure there are many other things the average person can be cheap on before he has to be cheap on G-d and our minhogim that rebboseinu nessieinu were moser nefesh for!
Guarantees that it’s not murkav, but it’s still not a genuine Yanover. There are plenty of guaranteed non-murkav esrogim in other countries; our custom is to use Yanover because only Magna Graecia has the brocho of “mishmanei ho’orets”, and the alter Rebbe taught, presumably from a tradition he’d received, that Moshe Rabbenu got his esrog from there.
1) As someone who worked on the Esrogim fields in Calabria some 30 years ago, how can you say that 90% of Esrogim are from Murkovim trees? that was not the case back then and the farmers that grow Esrogim know that the value of a Non-Murkov tree is much more profitable. 2) I was told that planting seeds or a twig from a Murkov tree to grow a new tree, whereby you would not able to detect it’s source, only about 5% will grow into a tree and grow Esrogim, so the farmers don’t bother. Nowadays Rabbonim and Mashgichim… Read more »
He always has the best Italian ones. And especially the ones from kfar chabad from the rebbes esrog!
I understand what these Rabbonim are doing. However, they are also ensuring that in the near future there will no longer be Yanover esrogim to buy. The Italian farmers have no interest in cultivating crops so they can sell just one esrog to every community around the world. The Chabad Moichrei esrogim will also not be able to make a parnoso if only communities buy the esrogim. We will end up without Yanover esrogim. Do such people have no foresight as to what will happen as a result of their actions? Throughout history, Yidden were moser nefesh It is not… Read more »
For almost half the price I could have gotten a kar chabad esroig which looks awesome with no comparison nicer in shape, size, color, etc. I feel like I got a lemon,😂
the “every man an esrog” way is very new when you look back at Jewish history. One for the community is how it was always done.
The yishuv of Bat Ayin also purchased one directly from Calabria through a Lubavitcher soicher – as a communal esrog
I’m not a big מומחה in these things, but if the Rebbe was מוסר נפש for a הידור מצוה – i. e. A yanover esrogim – (for further reference watch 2 min clip of the story at https://youtu.be/jAaCNpdKRKo ) then shouldn’t WE be מוסר נפש with our money? (ואהבת וגו’ בכל מאדך וארז”ל בכל ממונך)
That’s why we must have a mesorah about the trees, and that’s also part of why they are so expensive—the esrogim mashgichim and sellers need to put in a lot of work to ensure that the mesorah remains and nothing is tampered with.
The whole thing is just another money maker.
What about every FEW People?
like every 2 or 5 people.
Its not THAT expensive.
There is a Lubavitcher man in cfar chabad who got the esrog that the rebbe used in תשנ”א and he cut it open and took the seeds to plant his own orchard in cfar chabad and the esrogim are calld אסרוגי ליובאוויטש so if you see a box that says אסרוגי ליובאוויטש you know it is not murkav and the man who took the esrog planted them himself and we of course know that the rebbes esrog was not from a murkav tree
2 questions
what cost you more your esrog set or your chol hamoed outing?
what cost more your matzos or the kids shoes for yom tov?
stop blaming the esrog
It is easy to inspect a tree to see that it is not MURKAV. 90% of the Etrogim trees are MURKAVIM by the gentiles. How about trees that were planted from branches taken from a MURKAV tree? How do we know that a tree is not the son of a MURKAV tree?