SATURDAY PRAYER: YESOD-YESHIVAT HAVERIM יְשִׁיבָה חברים – BABYLONIAN TALMUD p126

READING: BETWEEN MIDNIGHT AND DAWN OF SATURDAY

If one says: “Kill this cock, for he crowed at night; or kill this hen, for she crowed like a cock; or
I will drink and leave a little over,” because of superstition, there is apprehension that he imitate
the Amorites; but one may put a splinter of “Tuth” 1 or a piece of glass in a pot, that it may boil
the quicker. The sages, however, prohibited pieces of glass as being dangerous. The rabbis
taught: One may throw a handful of salt in a lamp that it may burn the brighter, or loam and
fragments of earthenware that it may burn more slowly. The saying “to your health” at winedrinking
is no imitation of the customs of the Amorites. It happened that R. Aqiba gave a
banquet in honor of his son, and at every cup that he drank he said: “To the wine in the mouth
and to the health of the sages and their disciples.”