Always_Ask_Questions

RebE > for me it does not give a good taste when Orban is so close to them.

You are seconding your famous neighbor – Von Neumann. When he was a kid, he lived several months under Communist insurrection and then escaped and helped most of his family escape right before WW2 (and was in Germany for some time before). He stayed focused on both Nazi and Soviet threats as a result, even tried to join US Army to do more math work on munitions (he was rejected because he failed an exam on discipline and re-did it several weeks after he was not eligible by age anymore)

Avira > how dangerous things that are done by a large amount of people are not actually dangerous – this is based on shomer pesayim Hashem.

Maybe this is an explanation: why is Hashem protects peshayim and, presumably, does not protect people who know better? The fact that knowledgeable people are not protected means that the danger is present and presumably a smart person would have to avoid it. BUT, how would a simple person know a difference between a true and a false danger (false positives). He can trust his senses on obvious dangers when he sees a tiger or a car damaging a victim, but what about remote dangers where connection between cause and effect are not obvious. So, if you tell a simpleton to beware these, he’ll fall prey to all kind of superstitions, rumors, environmental propaganda. His life will be consumed in avoiding black cats and plastics. He will be advised to spend his time doing maasim tovim. If every climate protester would simply bring food to the neighboring elderly, the world be better, and cooler, of. What do you think?

n0, apologize, it is late tonight for me to go into the Rambam (even as the Rambam advises that best learning is at night, but who pasken like Rambam !?) – but my understanding was that Rambam thinks it is a disgrace for the Torah scholar to rely on charity, that is making other people to work instead of him. Obviously, this means that he himself thinks that his learning is more important than learning or any other mitzvos by other people, and he also causes other people to begrudge him and belittle Torah scholars.

I understand Brisker Rav brings these 2 Rambams, and concludes that 1st Rambam is for “general audience” and the 2nd for “yehidim” like Rashbi (and, presumably, Briskers).

Interestingly, Mishna Berurah takes an _opposite_ approach saying that we are too weak to work and learn, so if given just one choice, we should learn. chofetz Chaim himself was selling needles first and his seforim later on. I am not sure whether he has a position on using government funds, I don’t think Russian or Polish governments paid for Radin yeshiva.

Also, to paraphrase Mishna Berurah, as he conjectures that Rambam “at his times” would agree to learning for money, I am thinking that Mishna Berurah would agree “in our times” to work for a day a week and then learn for the rest while living modestly.

Even within the camp that supports using Zionist money for Torah learning, Rav Schach advised against accepting 100% funding from Begin government, warning that there will be a time when someone like Lieberman will “want his money back” and the system needs to be able to survive that. Why “frum” people do not listen to gedolim, I don’t know.

But the expression may be a hidden brocha, like this is a brocha of being like fish, or better to be like reed than like cedar (Yevamos). Mushrooms grow everywhere, often stay together, require water (Torah) and not a lot of government support.

reach out to Oorah and sign up for their summer camp ASAP, you’ll enjoy it and hopefully find friends there.

People need to make sure they can handle what they choose. I often see working people (doctors, lawyers, and other simple professions) who come both to hashkoma minyan and at 9pm to learn at kollel, and also there are people who live holy lives of learning and teaching and whose heads are worrying about where they can earn money to support their families. I don’t know percentages, but one should evaluate his own (and family) tolerances and be realistic in their lifestyle choices.

In theory, in modern world, one can spend 4 years to learn a good profession and then work 1 day a week (or 2 hours a day, if you prefer) and have a great learning life. I never met anyone following such an obviously correct way. R Lebowitz says that one YU student suggested a similar idea – be a lawyer full time until 40 and then retire, and Rav advised against that.

Syag > You must really love money or just be soo hung up on these thriving kollelites

I oresume this is for me. You are right – I am really concerned for the honor of Torah. I have no ill will to those who thrive in kollel. As they say, “my best friends went to kollel” and I learned a lot from my local Roshei kollel and some of the youngelites.

Obviously, it is OK for a person to go to learn and for his wife to support that. Starting from R Akiva …

I think Yabia is asking what is the social background here. If a girl is pressured into the arrangement in some way, or if she later changes her mind but is reluctant to speak out – does the husband have sensitivity to notice or the kollel a way to find out. Otherwise, this is similar to why we do not accept gamblers as eidim – because they “steal” as their opponents do not have full mind in accepting possible loss. Similarly, someone using pressure system to keep the wife “agreeing” may be guilty of theft from her.

Also, anyone claiming that wife can be satisfied by illicit funds, whether taken from in-laws, unreported income, or inappropriately obtained SNAP is really adding to the abuse of the lady – she does not have to be forced to be part of such aveiros (if they happen)

RebE > Rambam in Hilchas Talmud Torah says that the support he lives on is theft and he is ashaming the Torah.

This was brought before. CR consensus is that we don’t pasken like Rambam, and – in this case – all the great people are meikel by definition. If you are so super-frum and follow this Rambam, I am with you.

Yehudis, we don’t always know where to go from common sense. Need humility and bitachon. See Europeans who put their trust in wind and sun, and became hostages to Putin. Not only their 20th century did not teach them humility, they still do not admit their errors and continue their self-righteous behavior. So, if we change our lives in pursuit of some lofty goals, we need to make sure that these goals do not lead to corruption. If you make goals simple – be honest, help others a little, and then pursue your own interest, people will do that. If you lure them tofar-awy goals, you never know where tish will lead.

common > look at the signs of acher and R Meir that really one shouldn’t learn Torah from apikorsim

due to my sins, I could not see to which post this relates, but this is an interesting topics in itself. Rambam seemingly ignores Gemora’s permission for “gedolim” to learn from “acherim”. Some (Rav Shach?) explain that he felt that in his times, there were no gedolim any more (sic!), others – that he is writing general advice or talking about public teaching. This is interesting in light of Rambam obviously learning (maybe not torah but Chochma only) from “Acherim”, at least Muslim and Greek ones.

Clearly, R Meir’s situation is pretty exceptional. I do not see this mentioned, but he apparently started ldearning from Acher before Acher went OTD. So, there is an issue of attachment and all Torah that he already learned.

R Soloveichik has a talk in 1991 about Acher and how he is a complicated personality who misunderstood himself

repaired

It is right to be conservative in using new things.

Moses Mendelsohn was very enthusiastic about new things, others – opposed. Is it intrinsically bad to read Chumash in High German? So, many people read ArtScroll now (ok, it may be High Yinglish), but at the time, it directly assisted assimilation.

Founder of Chabad opposed Napoleon and supported the Czar with spies, in part because of fear of modernity; others, including Chaim Volozhin – disagreed, even if they saw that Czar is likely to survive. Maybe a closer case, but still.

Still, sometimes one needs to act boldly in view of external changes. See Rabban Gamliel, writing of the Mishna, etc. Claiming that “power of meikel” is mis-understood by serious opponents is as credible as to claim that Chasam Sofer was talking about grain when he re-prohibited “chadash”.

With understandable opposition to ideological Zionists, was there a specific point on insisting that they do not go to EY? Same people will lead irreligious life in other countries and be a cause of trouble for those communities.

There could be a purist view that we want to keep EY populated by tzadikim only, and the rest can go to South America, but I don’t think this was a majority view. So, otherwise, we have an issue of Torah v. modern ideologies, but no specific reason to object Zionist settling davka in EY.

I also presume that R Aharon would welcome advent of, at least, email and Zello. He wondered what was his punishment that he spent so much time travelling to fundraise for the Yeshiva and attributed it to possibly not being sensitive enough towards his students.

Avira, while I agree that sometimes “modern” movements create bad ideas that we should not follow, still we can’t deny that humanity is creating useful things and ideas sometimes. I understand that one might be careful with internet, music, cars, or COVID vaccine. But I wonder whether we need to insist on things like slavery. We already use many social norms that the world adopted – one-wife-only marriages, elections, corporations, welfare, summer vacations, two-day weekend …

others who were elected in Sejm:
Alexander Zusia Friedman, R Rabbi Yosef Nechemya Kornitzer of Kraków, Leib Mincberg. So, we have 5 out of 6-7 that probably served in Sejms. R Mordechai Dubin served in Latvia.

Polish 1922 elections: 35 Jews (10%, about percentage of Jews in general population), of which 6 Agudas Isroel, incl R Shapiro. Apparently, he worked on his Polish a lot, not just Daf Yomi, while serving in Seim.

In 1922, 65% of Jews voted for minority parties, in 1928 – only 33%, 49% for Pilsudski’s block, 7% for Communists. 44% of Orthodox Xians voted for Commies. 16% of majority Catholics voted for Pilsudsky, 45% for left, 15% for right, 4% for Commies

As to attitudes to EY, someone asked Satmar Rov when he was leaving EY – who should I now give my kvitelach? The Rov said – go to any shul, see a person who puts a tefillin and has numbers etched under the tefillin; you can give your kvitel to that person.

My guess, R Aharon would be looking at google maps, planning a remote location for a place where Torah learning can happen without distractions. Maybe WV or KY.

As an insight into his thinking, one prominent South American Rav was thinking about moving to Israel. He asked R Aharon and he replied: I think the Jews in your country still need you. Maybe later, we will both go to EY … When many years later, that Rav finally decided to move, he encountered R Aharon’s levaya joining him on the flight from Paris to TLV and recalled that conversation.

Of course, there was anti-Semitism in Poland, but it has to be put in the context of alternatives – Prussia, Russia …. Jews willingly moved to Poland when invited as described above. Jews had their own government – Vaad Arba Artzot that was a pretty powerful entity for some time and declined in parallel to the Polish state itself. Poland fell behind economically – while other countries industrialized, Poland was charging them high prices for (in large part, Ukrainian) wheat, but this wokred only for some time. Politically, Seim had a 1 vote veto power leading to worse filibusters than US Senate, especially when Russians were able to buy off a couple of members. After Poland/Lita was divided by Germany/Austro-Hungary/Russia in 17xx-s, Jews mostly supported Polish rebellions against Russia. The short period of independence in 1920-39 had lots of stuff happening with both Polish and Jewish nationalism, socialism, and external attacks by Germany and USSR. A lot of Jews complained, but also a lot were pretty pro-Polish. When religious Jews in Warsaw saw planes over the city, they were sure, like all Poles, that these are mighty Polish planes on the way to repel German army. So, the bombs were a complete surprise. Turns out, Poles (and Jews) took years after WW1 to fight against each other while maintaining cavalry, and Germany and USSR were building tanks and planes together.

Avira, you are right that Zionists have their Jewishness at the center of their agenda, while other non-religious Jews did not. Still, many Bundists, Socialists considered themselves Jewish. Also, even many German Jews who converted did this out of convenience and felt some affinity to Jews and often married other Jewish converts. From Henrich Heine to Fritz Haber, they experienced their Jewish affinity at times of trouble.

The Madame speaker went for a day to give a speech at Brown, can’t leave a husband for a day without a drunken accident!

A good question, whether Rambam would live in Tel Aviv … On one hand, he suggests emigration and even desert if you are in a bad community (as Chazon Ish quotes him); on the other hand, he moved several times himself: from crazy kind of Muslims in Spain to Fes, a place of the first dual-track school (medrasa/university); then to Mitzrayim under Muslims with who he interacted daily, and with Karaims. None of these places had perfect communities at the time, and he did not go to Sahara. Maybe, he was satisfied by having some community in the location? So, he might be able to find a minyan in Tel-Aviv or even in Bnei Braq (if he were to accept modern psak allowing shanda of taking some else’s money). Need to look more into this.

For those who hope to convince the other side that there is fire behind these smoke signals, you are confronted with powerful psychological barriers: there were so many promising leads that most convincible people in the middle checked out already. We all worried about pings @ Alpha bank and read Mueller thriller, including footnotes (and I am skipping 100 stories in between). Most turned out to be untrue provocations or just disappeared from public view. Turns out Mueller could not even see that his sources were paid by Hillary and making “typos” on affidavits. This is not unusual for American politics, just more intense and one-sided with Trump. So, my free advise is to stop trying throwing more accusation and just wake us up in case you found something material. I am frankly shocked – shocked – that none of the unseemly claims about T were not proven yet. Given his middos and type of business he was involved in, there should be something. Look harder.

Avram
>> FIRST ARE THESE COMMERCIAL OR MEDICAL? COMMERCIAL ARE NOT THE RIGHT ONES.”
> Why not?

My understanding is that medical standards call for different filtration. Masks include special materials, such as electrostatic layer. I did not study this in depth. Look it up.

Overall, I agree that it looks like there are enough cases where wearing a valve makes sense. Maybe worth to revisit the original message. Tzarich Iyun.