JUDAICA - Wisdom In Torah

dence with his relative Moses *Sofer, with Mordecai Michael
Jaffe, author of Beit Menaḥem, and with Israel Moses b. Aryeh
Loeb, author of Rishmei She’elah. His novellae were later published
as an appendix to his brother’s responsa (2nd part; 1938).
His sons were JOSEPH GINZ of Vienna, founder of the wellknown
publishing firm of Schlesinger; SAMUEL GENZ, rabbi
of Abrany (Hungary), who published many of his novellae in
the talmudic periodical Tel Talpiyyot (ed. D. Karzburg); and
MOSES, rabbi and preacher in Hamburg. His daughter married
Zalman Ulman, rabbi of Makow.
Bibliography: Wreschner, in: JJLG, 2 (1904), 34; Moses,
ibid., 18 (1927), 313f.; P.Z. Schwartz, Shem ha-Gedolim me-Ereẓ Hagar, 1
(1913), 20b no. 1; 2 (1914), 39b no. 63 (Samuel Ginz); I. Kunstadt, Lu’aḥ
Ereẓ he-Ḥadash (1915), introd.; B. Wachstein, Die Inschriften des alten
Judenfriedhofes in Wien, 2 (1917), 168; S. Sofer, Iggerot Soferim (1929),
2nd pagination, 42–44, 55; J.J. (L.) Greenwald (Grunwald), Maẓẓevat
Kodesh (1952), 140–2.
[Itzhak Alfassi]
EGER, SOLOMON BEN AKIVA (1786–1852), rabbi and rosh
yeshivah. Born in Lissa, he was the son of R. Akiva *Eger the
Younger, under whom he studied. Eger became a merchant
in Warsaw, but after losing his fortune in the Polish rebellion
in 1831, he accepted the rabbinate of Kalisz. In 1839 he was
appointed to succeed his father in Posen. Active in communal
affairs, Eger sought to direct the Jews from commerce to
farming, and in 1844 appealed to Frederick William IV, king
of Prussia, to assist Jews in founding an agricultural village
in the province of Posen. The request was granted, and Eger
took active steps to implement the plan. In 1846 he founded
an organization for agricultural settlement with the consent
and formal support of 21 local communities, with promises of
support. The project was, however, brought to an end by the
disturbances of 1848. Eger was also active in soliciting contributions
for Ereẓ Israel and in assuring their fair disbursement.
He also took a prominent part in the campaign for emancipation
of the Jews in his country. A strong advocate of traditional
Judaism in its strictest interpretation and an outspoken opponent
of the Reform movement, he sided with G. *Tiktin of
Breslau in his controversy with A. *Geiger and was influential
in restoring Tiktin to his position. Many of his responsa are
included among those of his father, particularly those which
he published together with his older brother, Abraham. His
own published works include Gilyon Maharsha, notes on the
Talmud and on Alfasi’s Code appended to the Vilna Talmud
(1859); Gilyon Rasha, notes on Yoreh De’ah (Koenigsberg, 1859)
and republished with additions in the Vilna Talmud. His letters
were published in Iggerot Soferim (1929), pp. 62–86.
Bibliography: Bloch, in: Jeschurun, ed. by B. Koenigsberger,
1 (1901), 5–8, 75–79, 104–8; Wreschner, in: JJIG, 2 (1904), 47–48; L.
Lewin, Geschichte der Juden in Lissa (1904), 245–8.
[Akiva Posner]
EGGED (Heb. “bundle”), Israel public transport cooperative.
In the 1930s small groups of drivers, each numbering
between 50 and 100, constituted themselves into cooperatives
eggs
to avoid duplication by abolishing parallel routes, and to increase
efficiency. Egged was founded in 1933 and established
branches all over the country. With the large increase in public
transport that followed the establishment of the State of
Israel, two other cooperatives, Shaḥar, which operated in the
Haifa area, and Drom Yehuda, which operated in Tel Aviv and
the south, merged with Egged, the merger being completed
in 1951. The Jerusalem transport cooperative, Ha-Mekasher,
joined in 1967.
Egged is one of the largest public transport cooperatives
in the world. In 1968, the company operated 2,200 buses,
which traveled about 620,000 mi. (1,000,000 km.) daily on
1,100 routes. At that time, Egged members numbered about
4,400, and there were also 2,200 hired workers. In 2004, Egged
employed 6,309 workers, 2,452 of whom were Egged members.
It owned 3,332 buses, traveling on 1,308 routes, and served
about a million people a day.
Egged owns four subsidiary companies: Egged Transport
offers personalized transport services, including VIP
limousines, company transport, a messenger service, and so
on. Egged Tours is an inland tourist company operating 300
tourist buses. Derech Egged offers air and recreation services.
Egged Investments develops new sources of employment for
Egged. The cooperative is governed by a general assembly,
composed of all members, which biennially elects a council
of 80, an executive of 20 from the members of the council,
and a secretariat with five members elected by the executive,
which runs the cooperative.
Website: www.egged.co.il
[Leon Aryeh Szeskin]
EGGS. One of the few references to the egg in the Bible, and
the only injunction connected with it, is the command to drive
away the dam before taking the eggs from the nest (Deut.
22:6). The only other references to birds’ eggs are in Isaiah
10:14 and the hatching of the egg of the ostrich through the
heat of the sun (Job 39:14). Viper’s eggs are mentioned in Isaiah
59:5. In contrast, the egg figures prominently in rabbinical
literature, both in halakhah and aggadah.
Halakhah
The egg belongs to two spheres of halakhah: as permitted food
and as a standard measure of volume (the tractate of the Talmud
called Beẓah (“egg”) deals with the laws of the festivals
and is so called merely because of the first word of its first
Mishnah, which deals with the question of the permissibility
of eating an egg laid on the festival).
(1) Although it is nowhere clearly stated in the Bible that
eggs are permitted for food (the Talmud sees a reference to it
in Deut. 22:6; see Ḥul. 140a), on the principle that “that which
emerges from a clean animal is clean and that from an unclean
animal unclean” (Bek. 1:2) it is established that the eggs
of clean birds are permitted for food, and those of unclean
birds, forbidden (Ḥul. 122a). With the formation of the hard
shell of the egg, however, even before the egg has been laid,
it is regarded as independent and no longer part of its dam,
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