Etrog Helps with Pregnancy: The Origin and Development of A Folk Practice

ABSTRACT According to Jewish folklore, the etrog has a special supernatural influence (segula) that aids in having an easy birth. This is accomplished in different traditions by biting the tip of the etrog or eating etrog preserves. Other traditions state that this aids with fertility. This association evolved from the early Ashkenazic practice of distributing pieces of the communal etrog among the community to be eaten on Simchat Torah, with women tasked with biting off part of the etrog first to render it ritually unfit, thus resolving some complicated halakhic issues relating to when an etrog can be eaten. As the practice of etrog distribution began dying out in the eighteenth century, the women biting part of the etrog became reinterpreted as having special curative power for anything related to pregnancy.