I enjoy listening to the Rav’s drashos and was hoping that he wouldn’t mind if I began this drasha like he begins his, so birshus Harav, I will begin…

Good Shabbos, Raboisai.

In the days of the wild west, a wagon train was lost and low on food. Suddnely they saw an old Jew sitting beneath a tree. The leader rushed to him and said, "We're lost and running out of food. Is there someplace ahead where we can get food?"
"Vell," the old Jew said, "I vouldn't go up dat hill und down de other side. Somevun told me you'll run into a big bacon tree."
"A bacon tree?" asked the wagon train leader.
"Yah, ah bacon tree. Trust me. For nuttin vud I lie."
The leader goes back and tells his people that if nothing else, they might be able to find food on the other side of the next ridge.
"So why did he say not to go there?" some pioneers asked.
"Oh, you know those Jews-they don't eat bacon."
So the wagon train goes up the hill and down the other side. Suddenly, Indians attack and massacre everyone except the leader, who manages to escape back to the old Jew. The near-dead man starts shouting. "You old fool! You sent us to our deaths!
We followed your instructions, but there was no bacon tree. Just hundreds of Indians, who killed everyone."
The old Jew holds up his hand and says "Oy, vait a minute."
He then gets out an English-Yiddish dictionary, and begins thumbing through it. "Gevalt, I made myself ah big mistake. It vuz not a bacon tree. It vuz a ham bush!"

As we know, the 180 day feast that Achasveirosh threw consisted of treif foods. Speaking of foods – not necessarily treif, in fact definitely not treif - one of the best things about Shivtei Yeshurun Kiddushim on Shabbos is the Rebbetzin’s famous cholent. And, yes, I was slightly disappointed to see that today, at an official KSY function we do not have the Rebbetzin’s famous cholent. So, l'zecher the cholent, I would like to give over a short d’var Torah connecting Cholent to Purim. Most surprisingly, there are actually 127 hidden references to Cholent in the Megillah. I would like to mention only three of them today.

1) As we know, in the midbar Moshe instructed the Yidden to take a double portion of mannah on Friday – for Shabbos as well. What is the reason for this? To make Cholent! How did I come to this conclusion? They needed to stew the cholent for 22-24hrs thus they needed to prepare the cholent well in advance of Shabbos. This seems to make sense. Sort of…As we know, there are no coincidences – everything is Hashgocho. That being the case, we can only surmise that the fact that the evil character in the Megillah has the same name as the man that fell from heaven is an irrefutable connection between cholent and Purim.

Speaking of the length of cooking I have an interesting question: Cholent is always ready regardless of when it was put on the stove. That doesn't make sense. How can it always be ready at 1pm on Shabbos, and make no difference whether it began cooking at 10am or 2pm on Friday?

The answer is simple. There is a guardian angel of Cholent which stands guard to be sure the Cholent turns out OK. But which angel could be recruited for such a task? It has to be an angel who is more or less free on weekends.. ah! It is the same angel which ensure that the blasts of the Shofar are carried heavenward. But wait! What happens if Rosh Hashana falls on Shabbos.. how can the Shofar angel perform his Cholent guardian duties at the same time?

Good point. That's why we don't blow Shofar on Rosh Hashana which falls on Shabbos!

2) My second proof is in the actual loshon of the Megillah itself. The first section of the first perek of Megillas Esther describes Achashveirosh’s feast. It says that there were elaborate wall hangings etc suspended by Chavlei-Butz – cords of fine linnen. Anyone who has read Shai Agnon’s story about the sherut traveling from Yerushalayim to Tel Aviv will know that it got stuck in mud – Botz, and botz is very close to the word Butz, as mentioned in the megillah. The fat guy in the sherut compared the mud to a Hungarian goulash called Burgul. Now, which Jew cooks burgul for Shabbos? So obviously the burgul is a type of cholent. It is crystal clear from this that cholent is mentioned in the Megillah.

3) My third and final proof that cholent is inextricably interwoven into the Megillah comes from a story told about the former municipal doctor of Chrzanow, Dr. Klein. Dr Klein always said that he denied all the principles of the Jewish faith, except for the principle of resurrection of the dead. Jews who suffer bitterly all week long, don't eat when they should or as much as they want to, nevertheless when the Sabbath afternoon comes, they make kiddush on an empty stomach over 96-proof liquor and a cracker, then they eat a portion of shmaltz herring, cholent with fatty kishka, kugel dripping with chicken fat and lots of heavy dessert and then, their stomachs stuffed to the maximum, they take a mid-day snooze. And if these Jews are able to get up again, it's truly resurrection of the dead. Hashem must hide himself in the cholent – just as he hid himself in the story of Purim.

Just one quick point to round off this cholent drasha…If there is such a strong connection between cholent and Purim, then why don’t we have a messorah to eat cholent on this day? The answer is as follows – and this is my chiddush, so you can blame it on me: If you look carefully at these proofs, you will see that cholent actually has negative effect, while today, Purim, is a positive day.

Proof 1: Man in the dessert has the same letters as Haman from the Megillah
Proof 2: The proof in the loshon of the megillah that butz=botz=burgul=cholent falls in the section of the 180 day feast of treif foods in the King’s palace
Proof 3: Survival after eating cholent depends on a miracle, according to Dr Klein of Charnow.

To back me up in this, I have several raayos:
1) After a search on the internet (and if its on the internet it must be true) I found a definition of cholent that proves this point: “Cholent, a combination of noxious gases, had been the secret weapon of Jews for centuries”
2) One of the great cholent meforshim, the singer satirist Country Yossi (no relation), says that “cholent is its name, heartburn is its game, at first it looks so innocent its deadly just the same.”
3) I have a real-life textual proof that cholent has negative properties – that Cholent is a mazik. Misnah Berurah, Hilchos Shabbos, Siman "reish nun zayin" states that: "Aval mi shemazik lo hachamin, mutar leechol tzonen" - Anyone who suffers from eating cholent is permitted to eat cold foods. Undeniable, irrefutable, text-based proof that cholent is a mazik and that is why we do not eat cholent on Purim.

Happy digesting….Chag Sameach.