We begin today’s daf on the first column of the tenth page, with the Mishnah, four lines down: “One may not have fewer than twenty-one blasts in the Temple, nor more than forty-eight.” In the Temple, the blasts were sounded every day. They signaled different procedures. For example, every morning, when the gates were opened, they sounded three blasts. When they were about to offer the required sacrifices, they sounded nine blasts, followed by another nine, for a minimum of twenty-one blasts on an ordinary day.
On certain days, however, there could be as many as forty-eight. When there were additional sacrifices, they sounded additional blasts. On Friday afternoon, for example, they sounded blasts to warn people to return from the fields and to remind them that Shabbat was approaching. Thus, the number of blasts depended on the day and symbolized the different procedures taking place. The minimum was twenty-one and the maximum was forty-eight. Our Mishnah does not explain these numbers; the details are explained in the chapter called “The Flute” in Massechet Sukkah.
The Mishnah then discusses the instruments. The minimum number of these instruments was two and the maximum was six during the singing. These were not precisely flutes, but another type of instrument that accompanied the singing—something resembling a bagpipe. The flute itself was called a halil, because it was hollow. The maximum number of flutes was twelve.
Rashi comments, “Two lyres, two lyres,” explaining that each Levite carried one. I am not sure what point Rashi is making. What would I have thought—that one Levite played two instruments? Nevertheless, Rashi emphasizes that there were two lyres and that the number did not exceed six. He then explains the final words of the Mishnah regarding the flutes.
The Mishnah says that the flute was played before the altar on twelve days of the year. This does not mean that there were twelve flutes on each of those days. Rather, on each of those twelve days, a flute had to be played with the offering. If the Levites wanted to bring twelve flutes on a particular day, they were permitted to do so, but the requirement was only that a flute be played on those twelve days.
Why was it called a flute? The explanation given is that holes were made in it, and the player struck the holes with his fingers. In any event, the maximum number was twelve, while there were twelve days each year on which a flute had to be played before the altar. Those days were the slaughtering of the first Passover offering, the slaughtering of the second Passover offering, the first day of Passover, Shavuot, the eight days of Sukkot, and Shemini Atzeret.
Rashi explains why the Mishnah calls the instrument a flute. There were holes in it, and the player struck the holes with his fingers in order to produce a pleasant sound. He then discusses the slaughtering of the first Passover offering. It is interesting that Rashi says that Hallel was recited in the Temple courtyard at the time of the slaughtering. The Gemara in Massechet Pesachim says that the people were divided into three groups, and each group entered the courtyard at the time of the Passover offering. As they began the slaughtering, they recited Hallel.
What, then, is Rashi referring to here? Is he speaking about the Hallel recited by the people, or about the flute played by the Levites? Here we are discussing twelve days on which the Levites played the flute, and Rashi seems to be saying that they played it while the people were reciting Hallel. We will have to see whether that is in fact what Rashi means.
The Mishnah continues: “They did not play with a metal flute, but with a reed flute.” That is the simple reading. Sometimes the simplest explanation is the best. At the conclusion of the song, only one flute would sustain the final note. One flute would continue slightly longer than the others, because a single flute produces a more pleasant sound than several flutes playing the final note together. This was done in order to end the song with a beautiful, pleasant sound.
The explanation is that there is a distinction between one pleasant sound and another. The question is when the Levites sang and played these instruments. Normally, the singing and instrumental accompaniment took place during the offering. On the festivals of Passover, Sukkot, and Shavuot, there were offerings that included the pouring of wine, and the singing took place during that pouring. Why, then, does the commentary say “at the time of the offering” rather than “at the time of the pouring of the wine”?
The answer is that the Passover offering does not include the pouring of wine. In that case, the relevant service is the slaughtering of the offering. Regarding the other offerings, the relevant service is the pouring of the wine. If the commentary had said “at the time of the slaughtering,” that would not have applied to the other offerings. If it had said “at the time of the pouring of the wine,” that would not have applied to the Passover offering. Therefore, it used the general expression “at the time of the offering,” which applies to both cases.
There is a second point in the commentary. It says that during these twelve days, the Levites sang Hallel with their mouths. That is a significant novelty. Until now, we have been discussing the playing of the flute. Rashi is introducing another law: on these twelve days, the Levites themselves also recited Hallel.
There is no difficulty with the Levites reciting Hallel on the festivals. The difficulty is that this list includes the slaughtering of the first Passover offering and the slaughtering of the second Passover offering. The Mishnah in Massechet Pesachim says that it was the people who recited Hallel at that time. This is the source for the custom among some communities to recite Hallel while baking the matzah, recalling the custom in the time of the Temple, when the people filled the courtyard and recited Hallel as the Passover offerings were being prepared.
Rashi is adding a new point: at that time, the Levites also recited Hallel. We therefore have two separate laws. There is the law applying to the entire Jewish people, who recited Hallel as an expression of praise. In addition, there was a law connected with the Temple service: at the time of that service, the Levites also recited Hallel.
Where did Rashi derive the connection between the flute and Hallel? The Brisker Rav asked this question. Rashi seems to connect the word for flute with Hallel, but where did he find that connection? The Brisker Rav discovered that it is based on the Yerushalmi in Sukkah.
The Yerushalmi says that on the twelve days of the year listed in the Mishnah, they played the flute before the altar. It then quotes a verse in Isaiah: “You shall have joy of heart, as when one goes with a flute.” The Yerushalmi derives from this that whenever the flute was played, there was also a form of joy and song. “Whenever the flute is played, the flute is played”—the flute is associated with the recitation of Hallel.
According to this, there are two laws. There is the regular Hallel of the Jewish people, which was recited on the appropriate days. But whenever the Levites recited Hallel as part of the Temple service, the flute was played as well. This explains Rashi’s connection between the flute and Hallel.
The Mishnah continues: “The priests would play the instruments; these are the words of Rabbi Meir.” According to Rabbi Meir, who played the flutes? The priestly servants. If a priest had a Canaanite servant, that servant was permitted to play the instrument.
Rabbi Yose says that the instruments were played by members of the families of Beit Pegarim and Beit Tziprayah, who came from the city of Emmaum. The Mishnah then discusses the genealogical status of the people from that city. Priests were generally careful about whom they married, because they wanted to ensure that their lineage was unblemished. They checked families carefully to make certain that there were no disqualified individuals or other problems of lineage.
The families from Emmaum, however, were known to have particularly reliable lineage. Their ancestry was considered so well established that priests would marry into those families without conducting the usual investigation. The Mishnah says that Rabbi Chanania ben Antigonus held that the instruments were played by Levites, because playing them was a service of the Levites.
The Gemara now returns to the beginning of the Mishnah. The Mishnah says that on any given day in the Temple, there were at least twenty-one blasts and no more than forty-eight. The Gemara explains that this ruling is not accepted by everyone. Rabbi Yehudah gives different numbers: a minimum of seven and a maximum of sixteen. Ultimately, however, the Gemara says that Rabbi Yehudah and the Sages may be expressing the same view and are merely counting the blasts differently.
According to Rabbi Yehudah, a sequence of a blast, a broken sound, and a blast is counted as one unit. According to the Sages, each blast is counted separately: the first blast is one, the broken sound is another, and the final blast is a third. Therefore, Rabbi Yehudah’s seven units amount to twenty-one individual sounds, while his sixteen units amount to forty-eight. The difference is not necessarily in the number of sounds, but in whether one counts each sound separately or counts the complete sequence as one.
The Gemara asks for the basis of Rabbi Yehudah’s method. Rabbi Yehudah understands the verses concerning the blasts that Moshe was commanded to sound with the silver trumpets in the wilderness as treating the sequence as one extended unit. One verse says that they shall sound a broken sound, and another says that they shall sound a broken sound and then travel. From the repetition, Rabbi Yehudah understands that the broken sounds are viewed as one continuous, extended sound.
The Sages, however, explain those verses differently. One verse teaches that a blast must precede the broken sound, while another teaches that a blast must follow it. Thus, every time there is a broken sound, it must be preceded by a blast and followed by a blast. The two verses establish the structure of the sequence; they do not teach that the three sounds are counted as one.
The Gemara then asks for the basis of the Sages’ position. When the Torah describes gathering the people for a meeting, it says, “They shall sound a blast,” using the singular. If the three sounds of a sequence were viewed as one unit, the Torah would be instructing them to perform only part of a unit when they sounded a single blast to gather the people. Would the Torah command them to perform half of a mitzvah? Rather, the Sages understand that each blast is an independent act.
Rabbi Yehudah can respond that the blasts used to gather the people were not a mitzvah at all; they were merely a signal. Since they were only a means of gathering the people, there is no concern that a single blast represents only half of a mitzvah. In the context of the Temple service, however, Rabbi Yehudah maintains that the sounds form one complete unit.
Rav Kahana says that there may be no interruption between the blast and the broken sound, or between the broken sound and the final blast. There may not be any interruption at all. The Gemara asks whose view this follows. It must be Rabbi Yehudah, since Rabbi Yehudah considers the three sounds to be one continuous unit.
The Gemara says that this seems obvious. If the ruling were according to Rabbi Yehudah, why would it be necessary to state that there may not be an interruption? Since he considers the sequence one unit, it is self-evident that the sounds must be connected. The Gemara answers that one might have thought the ruling was actually according to the Sages. Perhaps the Sages agree that there may not be a substantial interruption, even though they consider each blast a separate act.
According to that possibility, the ruling would be directed against Rabbi Yochanan, who says that a person can hear nine blasts over the course of nine hours and fulfill the obligation. One could have thought that the Sages permit a short interruption but not an interruption of several hours. Rav Kahana therefore teaches that there may be no interruption whatsoever, which indicates that the ruling follows Rabbi Yehudah.
The Gemara rejects the possibility that the ruling follows the Sages. The wording is that there may be no interruption “at all.” If the intention were merely to prohibit a very long interruption, the language would not be so absolute. The phrase “nothing at all” is consistent only with Rabbi Yehudah’s view that the sequence is one continuous sound.
Tosafot derives from this discussion the practice concerning the two sounds that can make up the broken sound of the teruah. Sometimes they are sounded together, and sometimes they are sounded separately. This is reflected in the different forms found in the prayer books. The discussion here serves as the basis for that distinction.
We now return to the laws of the flute. Before doing so, I want to point out how precise the language of the Mishnah is. Look at the order of the twelve days. It begins with the slaughtering of the first Passover offering and the slaughtering of the second Passover offering, and only afterward mentions the first day of Passover, Shavuot, and Sukkot.
For the Passover offerings, the Mishnah uses the expression “at the slaughtering,” because the relevant service is the slaughtering. With the other offerings, the relevant service is the pouring of the wine. The Mishnah therefore uses its language very carefully. There is another point I noticed in the Mishnah, although I do not have an answer for it, and we will continue because of the time.
The Gemara asks why the flute was played on these particular days in addition to the other instruments. The Gemara does not initially explain the reason. Without the Yerushalmi that we cited from the Brisker Rav, one would not necessarily know why the fact that the individual completes Hallel should require the flute to be played. The Yerushalmi connects the two through the verse in Isaiah: whenever there is this form of song and praise, the flute is played.
Rabbi Yochanan, citing Rabbi Shimon ben Yochai, says that there are eighteen days of the year on which an individual completes Hallel: the eight days of Sukkot, the eight days of Chanukah, the first day of Passover, and Shavuot. In the Diaspora, where the festivals are observed for an additional day, there are twenty-one days: the two days of Passover, the two days of Shavuot, the eight days of Sukkot, the additional day of Shemini Atzeret, and the eight days of Chanukah.
There is a mnemonic for the twenty-one days: “Two, two, they came, to Noah’s ark.” The two days of Passover are represented by “two,” and the two days of Shavuot by the second “two.” The word “they came” has the numerical value of nine, representing the eight days of Sukkot together with Shemini Atzeret. “To Noah” refers to Chanukah, whose eight days complete the total of twenty-one.
The rule is that whenever the individual completes Hallel, the flutes are brought out, and the Levites sing and play. The Gemara notes that the first two days of Passover in the Diaspora are included, but not the intermediate days. On those first two days, complete Hallel is recited; on the intermediate days, only partial Hallel is recited.
This leads to a major discussion about the nature of Hallel on these twenty-one days. The Rambam, in his Sefer HaMitzvot, establishes certain principles before counting the 613 commandments. He says that the 613 commandments are fixed and are not open to discussion, but that rabbinic commandments are not included in that count.
The Rambam says that many people made mistakes when counting the 613 commandments. They counted such things as one hundred blessings, the practices of mourners, the obligations connected with burying the dead, the laws of nakedness, the calculation of the seasons, and the eighteen days on which one completes Hallel.
He asks how anyone could count Hallel as a commandment from the Torah. The Hallel that we recite was written by King David. How can it be a commandment given to Moshe at Sinai if the text was composed by David? The Rambam therefore does not count Hallel among the Torah’s commandments.
The Ramban, in his well-known work on the commandments, strongly challenges the Rambam. He says that the Rambam’s question should not be difficult. The Rambam himself counts prayer as a Torah commandment, based on the verse, “You shall serve Him.” Yet the Gemara says that the regular prayer service is rabbinic, and that the prayers were established by the Sages to correspond to the offerings and by the patriarchs.
Who established the specific prayers? The Men of the Great Assembly established the fixed wording. The text and structure of the prayers were formulated later, and at the beginning people prayed according to their own wording; there was no single official text. Nevertheless, the Rambam considers prayer a Torah commandment in principle, even though much of its formulation is rabbinic.
The Ramban therefore argues that the same distinction applies to Hallel. The obligation to praise God when He performs a miracle can be a Torah obligation, even if David later composed the specific chapters and established the wording. It is similar to the Grace after Meals. The obligation to thank God for food is from the Torah, while the specific blessings were formulated later.
The same applies to the blessings of the Grace after Meals. The first blessing is attributed to Moshe, the blessing concerning the land to Joshua, and the blessings concerning Jerusalem and the other matters were established later. The precise wording is not all written in the Torah, but the Torah establishes the obligation to bless God after eating.
The Ramban therefore maintains that Hallel is a Torah obligation. This creates a major dispute between the Rambam and the Ramban. According to the Rambam, Hallel on the relevant days is rabbinic. According to the Ramban, reciting Hallel when a miracle occurred is rooted in a Torah commandment, while David provided the chapters and wording that we recite.
The Ramban adds another point. How can the Rambam be certain that David wrote all the chapters of Hallel? The Book of Psalms also contains chapters written by Moshe, including “A prayer of Moshe.” It is therefore possible that some of the chapters recited as Hallel were composed by Moshe or by another earlier figure. In any event, the Ramban argues emphatically that Hallel has a Torah basis.
The Gemara then asks why we recite complete Hallel every day of Sukkot but not every day of Passover. The first answer is that on Sukkot there was a different offering each day. Since each day had a new offering, Hallel was recited. On Passover, the same offering was brought each day, so complete Hallel was not recited every day.
The Midrash gives a different answer. When the Jewish people left Egypt and reached the Sea of Reeds, the angels wanted to sing. God said to them, “My creations are drowning in the sea, and you wish to sing?” From this we learn that Hallel is not recited on the days of Passover in the same way, because the Egyptians died during the redemption.
At first glance, these are two entirely different explanations. The Gemara speaks about the offerings, while the Midrash speaks about the death of the Egyptians. The explanation is that there are two types of Hallel. One is Hallel connected with the Temple service. Since the service was not different each day of Passover, the complete Hallel was not recited every day. The other is Hallel as praise and thanksgiving for a miracle. Regarding the miracle at the Sea of Reeds, there is an additional reason not to recite Hallel, because God’s creations were drowning.
This distinction also explains the Hallel recited on the first night of Passover. One of the commentators points out that we recite Hallel at the Seder even though we already recited Hallel in the synagogue and will recite it again the next day as part of the festival service.
The answer is that there are two different obligations. The Hallel recited in the synagogue is the Hallel of the festival. The Hallel at the Seder is connected with the obligation to see oneself as though one personally left Egypt. Since a person must present himself as having left Egypt, he must also offer praise and thanks for that redemption. That is a different obligation from the Hallel of the festival itself.
On the first night of Passover, there is also the fact that the firstborn were struck. One must recognize that this was performed by God. The other parts of the redemption are a separate matter, but the first night contains its own obligation of praise and thanksgiving for the miracle that took place that night.
The Gemara then says that Shabbat also has a different offering, because there is an additional Shabbat offering. It asks why complete Hallel is not recited on Shabbat. We now have a list of conditions: there must be a distinct offering, and the day must be called a festival.
Rosh Chodesh is also called a festival and has an additional offering. Why, then, is complete Hallel not recited on Rosh Chodesh? The answer is that work is not prohibited on Rosh Chodesh. The verse connects complete Hallel with a day that is sanctified as a festival, on which work is prohibited and song is required. Rosh Chodesh is called a festival, but it does not have the full status of a festival because one may work.
The Gemara then asks about Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. They are called festivals, they have their own offerings, and work is prohibited on them. They appear to satisfy all the conditions. Why, then, is complete Hallel not recited?
The answer is that the Jewish people cannot sing Hallel when the books of life and death are open before God. The day is too serious. How can Israel sing before God when judgment is taking place?
The Rambam gives a beautiful formulation of this idea in his commentary on the Mishnah, at the end of the fourth chapter of Rosh Hashanah. He explains that Hallel is not recited on Rosh Hashanah or Yom Kippur because these are days of service, submission, fear, dread, and trepidation before God. They are days when a person runs away from sin and seeks repentance, fasting, forgiveness, and atonement.
But where can a person run? The King is present. One is afraid, but one also knows that the King is the One to whom one must turn. The atmosphere of the day is not ordinary joy and celebration. The proper mood is fear, submission, repentance, fasting, and a request for forgiveness. Therefore, it is not appropriate to recite Hallel in the manner of excessive joy.
Nevertheless, the Gemara seems to imply that the angels did recite song on Rosh Hashanah. Tosafot says that this is what the Gemara appears to mean, although Tosafot does not bring a definitive proof. This creates a difficulty based on the teaching of Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin in Nefesh HaChaim.
Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin explains the statement, “The angels sanctify God’s name above, corresponding to the sanctification performed by Israel below.” The angels cannot say “Holy, holy, holy” until Israel first says its own sanctification. Although the angels’ sanctification is higher in meaning, they do not have the power to begin on their own. Israel must give them the power to praise.
He explains that when we recite the sanctification, we elevate the worlds and prepare the angels to recite their sanctification. This is not within the power of any angel to accomplish independently. The angels will not open their mouths to sanctify God until Israel below has first done so.
Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin says that if, for whatever reason, all the Jewish people in the world were silent and did not recite the sanctification, the angels would also be silent and would not recite it. According to this principle, how could the angels say their song on Rosh Hashanah if Israel does not say Hallel?
Rabbi Chaim Soloveitchik gives a different explanation. The sanctification of the angels requires a congregation, but the angels do not have the status of a congregation among themselves. They therefore need to join with Israel’s congregation. Once they join with our congregation, they have the required status to recite the sanctification. According to this explanation, the angels’ sanctification depends specifically on Israel’s communal recitation.
The Gemara then discusses Chanukah. Chanukah does not have the characteristics listed earlier. It is not called a festival in the same way, it has no Temple offerings, and work is not prohibited. Nevertheless, complete Hallel is recited every day. The answer is that Chanukah is different because of the miracle. Its Hallel is not based on the status of the day as a festival, but on praise and thanksgiving for the miracle.
The Gemara asks about Purim. Purim also involved a miracle, so why do we not recite Hallel? Rabbi Yitzchak answers that we do not recite song for a miracle that took place outside the Land of Israel.
The Gemara challenges this answer from the Exodus. The miracle of the Exodus took place outside the Land of Israel, yet Hallel is recited for it. One answer distinguishes between the period before the Jewish people entered the Land and the period afterward. Before they entered the Land, all lands were available for song. Once they entered the Land, miracles that occurred in other lands were no longer commemorated through Hallel in the same way.
According to this explanation, after the Jewish people went into exile, they returned to their earlier status, and miracles that occurred in other lands could again be commemorated through Hallel. Nevertheless, Purim does not have the same form of Hallel as Chanukah.
Another explanation is that the reading of the Megillah itself is the Hallel of Purim. According to this view, Purim truly has an obligation of praise, but the praise is expressed through the reading of the Megillah rather than through the recitation of the regular Hallel.
The Meiri understands that if a person cannot read the Megillah, he should recite Hallel instead. The Rambam’s wording may support this approach. The Rambam writes that Hallel is not established on Purim because the reading of the Megillah is its Hallel. This could mean that if one cannot read the Megillah, one should recite Hallel. Alternatively, it could mean that since the Sages did not establish Hallel on Purim, one may not create a replacement practice on his own.
There is a practical question related to this. Suppose Purim occurs on Shabbat in a walled city, and the Megillah cannot be read on Shabbat. Would that mean that Hallel should be recited instead? We have never heard of such a practice. Perhaps one could read the Megillah from a prayer book, but these are hypothetical questions that require further discussion.
There is also a third reason why Purim may not be suitable for Hallel. The Hallel says, “Praise, servants of God.” On Passover, this is appropriate because the Jewish people became servants of God and were freed from Pharaoh. But on Purim, the Jewish people were still servants of Achashverosh. They were still in exile. How could they say, “Praise, servants of God,” when they remained under the authority of a foreign king?
On Passover, one can say Hallel because the redemption represented complete freedom. On Purim, the Jewish people were saved from destruction, but they were not redeemed from exile. That may be another reason that the ordinary Hallel was not recited.
The Gemara then returns to the flute. The Mishnah initially calls the instrument a flute, but later calls it an avuv. Rav Pappa explains that these are two descriptions of the same instrument. The word flute indicates that its sound was sweet. The instrument was made of smooth, very thin reed and produced a pleasant tone.
The Gemara says that there was an ancient flute in the Temple dating back to the time of Moshe. It produced a very sweet sound. At one point, the king covered it with gold. Once it was covered with gold, however, the sound lost its sweetness. They removed the gold and returned the instrument to its original state, and the sound became pleasant again.
The same happened with the cymbals. The mortar used to grind the spices and the instruments used in the Temple were made of copper. They attempted to repair the mortar, but after the repair it no longer produced the proper sound. They therefore undid the repair and returned it to its original form.
These stories teach that sometimes a repair makes something worse. A person may think that widening a channel will cause more water to flow, but the opposite can happen. The same occurred with the spring of Shiloah. They widened the channel in order to increase the flow of water, but it did not work, and they had to return it to its narrower form. Sometimes one should not try to improve what one does not understand.
There was also an instrument with a bell, but the bell was not used in the Temple. When struck, it continued to echo, and the echo interfered with the other sounds. Therefore, they did not use it.
The Gemara describes another instrument with ten holes. Sticks were placed in the holes, and each stick produced multiple sounds. The description reaches one hundred sounds, and then one thousand sounds. How are we to remember which opinion said what? The final number is usually an exaggerated expression. The Mishnah sometimes speaks in an exaggerated manner to emphasize the magnitude of something.
The Gemara then returns to the two instruments that could not be properly repaired. The instruments remained in the Temple, but once they became defective, they could not be restored to their original quality. David referred to them as polished copper, comparing them to gold. They were precious and beautiful instruments.
One opinion says that each of the two instruments was worth the equivalent of two gold vessels. Another opinion says that together they were worth one gold vessel. Rabbi Yosef brings a tradition supporting the second view: the two instruments together were equal to one gold vessel.
The tradition then interprets the wording to mean that there were actually pairs of the instruments. If one broke, they had another one available. The expression “two” is read as indicating that they had duplicates.
The Gemara’s final stories return to the same idea. When they attempted to repair the spring of Shiloah by widening it, the repair failed. When they repaired the mortar, the result was also defective. When they plated the flute with gold, it lost its beautiful sound. In each case, the attempted improvement caused damage, and they had to return to the original form.
We once gave a lesson on why the Gemara spends so much time describing the flute. What difference does it make that the flute was made from thin, smooth reed, that it was ancient, that it came from the time of Moshe, and that covering it with gold ruined its sound?
The flute represents the Torah given by Moshe. It was smooth and refined, and it produced a beautiful sound. It was also humble and unadorned. The Torah given by Moshe pushes away impurity and possesses its own authenticity and beauty.
Then later generations come and say that the Torah needs to be improved, adjusted, enhanced, and modernized. They think that because the generation has changed, the Torah must be changed as well. They add their own “gold” and attempt to make the Torah more attractive or more acceptable.
But once the gold was added to the flute, the sound became muffled and lost its sweetness. The solution was to remove the additions and return to the original instrument. The same lesson applies to the Torah. When something authentic is altered by people who believe they can improve it, it may lose its original effect.
The message of the Gemara is that when something comes directly from Moshe, one must be careful not to tamper with it. The original Torah is authentic, humble, and beautiful. When people add changes and enhancements because they believe they know better, the result may be worse rather than better. Only when the additions are removed does the original beauty return.