And its not just that they all said "the hair is not avodah zorah" - they all gave the exact same detailed description of what happens together with the exact same understanding and interpretation, even though they have no idea what the other one said or who the others are.

Encyclopedias and books and diaries and descriptions of the process that have been written were written not for rabbonim asking kashrus quesiotns. And they, too, all match. Perfectly.

Everybody has one version of the story.

the article can be found at www.kashrut.com
here is the link:
www.kashrut.com/articles/L_cysteine/

Not true - Outcombed hair is long.

Moderator: And by the way, you may not rely halachicly on informaiton provided by vendors to determine the kashrus of their products. Even though aid echad ne'eman b'isurim, merchants are an exception, since people are suspect on violating lifnei iver lo sitain michsol.

No argument here - except that the "merchant" I quoted I also explicitly stated that he is no longer in the business. Therefore, your "by the way" does not apply to this specific case.

Teh rule of aid echad does not apply to a seller sellign you a product. In order to rely on a merchant, the merchant has to be established specifically as a reliable individual who would not lie to you in order to make money. Just because a person is a frum Jew, you may not assume that he is telling you the truth.
Again, no argument here - You should be aware though that a few of the people involved in the business have written haskomos that they are reliable and are "established specifically as reliable individuals who would not lie to you in order to make money."

By the way - I find it interesting that you have no problem quoting non-Jews and not giving any proviso as to the establishment of their character. Just because someone is not Jewish doesn't make him automatically believeable. You have no problem quoting the largest hair exporter (a man obviously in the business) and taking what he says as fact. You only seem to have a problem with a frum hair importer - and a retired one at that!

I contacted one of the large exproters of hair in India, and he told me that some outcombed hair and braber shop hair is long, and some is short. This s pretty obvious, since we're talking about all types of cuts and hair lengths being combed out. The hair used for wigs, she said, is usually of the long variety, which is also pretty obvisou, so even though cuttings and combings are used for wigs, a disproportionate amoutn of wig hair comes from tample hair, although as I mentioned in the name of Rav Shlomo Zalman, it still would constitute a safek, able to be incorporated into a sfek sfeka.

In addition, and if memeory serves Rav Moshe Sterenbuch points this out, a "rove" (I am spelling it that way so people wont read it rov as in "rabbi") has to be random, meaning, the item that is being judged has to have been randomly seperated from the group where the rove is present. However, where a person has the ability to choose whether he wants the rove or the miut, the rove becomes a rov hatalui bdaas adam and is not considered a full fledged rove. Thus, in our case, even if we establish that the majority of hair exported from India is outcombed hair, since the shaitel merchants have the ability to order temple hair specifically - perhaps because it is of better quality - then the rove is invalidated. What we would need to establish is that the majority of shaitel merchants choose or ultimately end up purchasing outcomned hair, and therefore the woman who wears the wig may have a rove that permits the wig.

That is, if. If it is not easily determinable by the woman that the source of the hair is temple, and if itr cannot be determined by the price fo the shaitel whether the hair is of the better quality temple hair or the lesser quality outcombed hair.

<<Moderator: And by the way, you may not rely halachicly on informaiton provided by vendors to determine the kashrus of their products. Even though aid echad ne'eman b'isurim, merchants are an exception, since people are suspect on violating lifnei iver lo sitain michsol.
No argument here - except that the "merchant" I quoted I also explicitly stated that he is no longer in the business. Therefore, your "by the way" does not apply to this specific case. >>

I was not only referring to your person, but the slew of posts that I have recvieved - and some are posted - by different people in the business. The problem istill is, though, that the source of the information that these people are getting needs to be determined. Lat time this tumult happened the shaitel people also came forward with lots of informaiton which was later found to be either plain falsehoods - it seems they knew from Rav shterenbuch years ago about the Indian hair problem and they covered it up in many ways - or misinformation. It is not easy to track the hair's origin, and when it was indeed tracked, it was determined that many shaitel merchants were unaware that the hair originally came from India, and then went to other countries before it reached them.

<<The rule of aid echad does not apply to a seller sellign you a product. In order to rely on a merchant, the merchant has to be established specifically as a reliable individual who would not lie to you in order to make money. Just because a person is a frum Jew, you may not assume that he is telling you the truth.
Again, no argument here - You should be aware though that a few of the people involved in the business have written haskomos that they are reliable and are "established specifically as reliable individuals who would not lie to you in order to make money." >>

That could be, but Id like to see those haskomos. It's hard to rely on anonymous character references by anonymous people about other anonymous people.

<<By the way - I find it interesting that you have no problem quoting non-Jews and not giving any proviso as to the establishment of their character. Just because someone is not Jewish doesn't make him automatically believeable. You have no problem quoting the largest hair exporter (a man obviously in the business) and taking what he says as fact. You only seem to have a problem with a frum hair importer - and a retired one at that!>>

Halachah is indeed interesting. The issue here is not just the person's character as much as it is the person's having an agenda. Written letters from businesses about the way they conduct their business are reliable says Rav Moshe ZTL because they can be held legally accountable for lying. This is true, too, in Indian law.

I did not only rely on that one letter. The 2 letters I quoted are but a sample of many. It;s too time consuming to retype all of them - although they all have the same story, down to the last detail. The only differene is, some of them say that they personally get the hair exclusively from Temples and some get their hair from other sources as well.

The reason these particular companies were contacted was because they were submitted to the Rabbonim by the Indian Consulate as the biggest exporters of human hair from India. They were all contacted and all but one answered. Not only did they not know that the issue that was beign discussed was a halachic issue, but one of them even asked "I would like to know why you are making htis inquiry", and another one stated "the informatio nthat I am saying is only for informational purposes and oyu may not commercialize it". They hadnt a clue.

And these very letters were the ones that wer sent to Rav Elyashev that he relied on as well.

Another issue here is the differene between testimony and a professional-educated opinion. If someone says "I export this type of hair" they are witnesses; if someone in the business says I understand from my contacts and sources that the hair comes from such and such place, he is not a witness to anything except what he understands and/or what he was told, and the original source of the information has to be determined.

There is a halachah whic says that in a mixture of items of different nature, any given one of those items is assumed to be have the nature of the majority of items. So for example if you have 3 meatballs laying on the table, 2 kosher and one treif, and you dont know which is which, you may eat a meatball because we assume that the meatball you picked up is one of the kosher ones.

This has nothgin to do with "majority of rabbis" or, more accurately put, "majority of poskim." That is a completely different concept.

To apply it, you need to consider quantity and quality of poskim, as well as the strength of their proofs. Not to mention that the Maharalbach says that "majority of rabbis" only applies when the rabbis first sat down together to discover the halachah together, and upon discussion, a majority decided one way, and a minority the other. But if many rabbis decided independently on the halachah, without duscussing it together with each other, and came up with their own conclusions, there is no halachah that the majority in that case rules.

He adds, that even if the rabbis would, subsequent to their decisions, get together to discuss the halachah, their discussion would no longer be abel to create a halachah of "majority", since once they decided on their own, they are no longer able to be objective, and so the "majority" rule would not apply.

And in our particular case, the most important factor here is simply: Who has the right information? No matter how you cut it, there have been rabbonim who paskened based on faulty information. Rav Moshe Sterenbuch's version of the story and Rav Elyashev's are two totally differnt versions - and Rav Elyashev's current version is obvisouly different than that with which he paskened back then.

You are being very funny. This is an anonymous site. I could give you my credentials off-line (should I say in exchange for yours?) I could also give you the names of shaitel machers and the rabbonim who vouch for them off-line. Doing so on this site would constitute an advertisement and an endorsement of sorts. The point of this is not to make blanket statements with the implication that no one can really be believed. Am yisroel kedoshim - and that includes merchants. Don't get me wrong. I agree with you for the most part. I just feel you are extropolating too much.

BTW - just a guess - does a little known t'shuva about geirus and the gemora shabbos 31 mean anything to you? Did you (or one of your coleagues at this site) share it with someone? If so, you (or that other person) do know me.

re: haskomos. I am assuming that the haskomos were written for the public. You may remain anonymous, but those rabbonim apparently dont want to. So whats the problem?

Am yisroel kedoshim is not relevent to our discussion, since the shulchan aruch paskens that if those kedoshim are merchants discussing their own wares then they are not considered believable until proven otherwise. (Just because someone is a kodosh doesnt mean you can believe him ;-) )If you have some that are proven otherwise, them please let me know who they are. It would help.

If you mean by "Korean shaitlach", shaitlach that are manufactured in Korea out of Indian hair, we have conflicting information. The exporters claim specifically that the hair that they get from the temples makes it way first to Korea wher it is processed and made into shaitlach and then sent wherever.

About the other part of your post: Yes! The Netziv's teshuva about gierus without kabolas Mitzvos! Yes, I did share that with many people - so I suppose we do know each other. (Incidently, that unkown teshuva was subsequently printed in the back section of a later printing of the theNtziv's teshuvos, so now it may be more well known.)

Hmmm. I am trying to jog my memory.

Mashma from here that anything that is not Ochlim or Kelim, does not have a din of Tikroves. And you can see another 2 Rayos of that.

1. Hagohos Maimonios in Perek 7 of Avoidas Kochovim said that pieces of wax that you put in front of Avoidas Kochovim are mutar because these are not Noy and not Tikroves of Avoidah Zorah.

2. Gemorah in Avoidah Zorah .&#1504;&#1488; says that stones of Markulis every one of them becomes Tikroves to another, and Rashi says Leinyan that another one is Neevad by it, but not tikroves of Zivhey Meisim (our Tikrovoys in the Rambam, YK)

Besides the whole that, even if you do not go in the massive information available on the Net, you can visit the site of Sri Venkataswara Temple in Pittsburgh, PA, which is the exact copy of the place in Tirumala (minus gold and diamonds), and they also have "Hair offering", but they say (and they are not lying, but just warning their public) that only 3 strands of hair will be taken by them, and if the person wants to have a complete tonsure, she has to go to Tony Barber Shop which is in 2 miles from the temple to have it. So, you see, even if we will say that this little amount of hair is sofek Tikroves (and even in Tirupati not everyone who wants a shave, wants a complete shave), which is not according to the Rambam,but even so, let it be sofel Tikroves, and because of that osur, when it mixes with the rest of the Temple hair, it becomes a sfeik sfeika, and mutar by the Rambam.

With all due respect, I did not mix-up two issues. I know that the rules of Majority are many and applied differently under different circumstances. I was just asking how it would apply in our case.
Also I did not misunderstand anything. I am aware of most of the information available to laymen at this time (I read R' Moshe Shternbach's tshuvah as well).

<<<This has nothgin to do with "majority of rabbis"...That is a completely different concept.>>>
That is why I made the distinction "not wigs".

<<<you need to consider quantity and quality of poskim, as well as the strength of their proofs.>>>

At this moment in time, if someone is not intimately involved with every nuance of the psak from any of the eminent poskim, let alone the "quality" of these poskim [I.E. How can you rate R' Elyashiv compared to R' Wosner or a different Rav Hamatir, etc...] isn't it a bit unjust to do so?

<<< Maharalbach says that "majority of rabbis" only applies when the rabbis first sat down together>>>
Firstly, is this the only opinion? Aren't there other opinions on this matter?
Secondly, can the fact that most (if not every) rav who paskened was in contact (telephone or otherwise) with R' Elyashev - or R' Dunner - can that not be considered a joint ruling?

<<<since once they decided on their own, they are no longer able to be objective, and so the "majority" rule would not apply>>>
Again, If their original ruling was done *after* contacting R' Elyashev et al, shouldn't that be considered as if they "sat" together?

<<< the most important factor here is simply: Who has the right information?>>>
Is this relevant once there is a psak from rabbanim? Who can tell me that they know as fact that R' Elyashev did not hear that there is in fact Takroves?
(I say this knowing that there have been testimony from all the Professors now and in the past.)

[Note: Your comparison of the Shabbos and the Electricity psak is really not relevant, since following that ruling would have been a da'as yochid, as is known.]

Haskomos: Judy Wigs owner - I believe their name is Berger - has a written haskomo as to their integrity and believeability from Rav Gavreiel Tzinner and a second rov whose name escapes me. Also, a verbal haskomo from Rabbi Blumenkrantz (besides his directive on the wigs themselves.)
Frieda Wigs - owner - has a haskomo on their integrity and believeability from a Rav Shmuel Kaminetzky (not the one from Philadelphia) in addition to a "hechsher" on the wigs themselves.
Clary - supposedly has a similar haskomo, but I personally have not seen it.