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Nechomah, as I am not familiar with exact procedures mentioned here, I do not have an opinion on how rigorous they are and – if they have lower standards – whether they are justified. I just pointed out one extra consideration for these conversions v. , say, someone converting in NYC for marriage considerations.
BY1212, we were able to take at least a million of Jewish souls in the 90s who were behind the iron curtain for 70 years already. I don’t think there was an ability to immediately vet all families for everyone being Jewish, and presumably there would be many who would stay if their non-Jewish spouses were not allowed in. There was no way to predict whether USSR was dissolved forever or would come back in 5 years or would be a mild dictatorship like it is now. US and Israel succeeded before with getting a trickle of Soviet Jews out in the 70s and then it stopped.
Halachically, when we do pidyon sheviim – do we vet every person to be a Jew, or can we just say, there is 50% surcharge for saving each of the Jews?
Also, note that these non-Jews married Jews in an anti-Semitic country. How bad can they be (I am sure some are, I am talking averages here).
US was sending materiel to Britain and USSR starting 1941 already through lend-lease. Given intensity of the fighting on Eastern Front, this clearly made a difference. As well as helped Western front going.
Refuah Shleima,
you should either test or presume that you have Covid and isolate. If continue not feeling well, one recommendation is to measure your oxygen level with an oximeter, should be available in CVS, ask someone to pick up for you. Levels below 90 are worrisome.Avira > consider what the liars who pretend to be totally frum would do if they dressed the way they behaved in private
You are right that the dress would limit some people from additional aveiros, but it also comes at a cost: people will equate their behavior w/ Talmidei chachamim … not an eas y trade-off.
Avira, thanks, look like you are right. Rambam puts a reason of not giving money to people who prosecute Jews, but Rashi, SA and later stand by all non-Jews. So basic exemptions are exactly the thread title: avoiding Hillul Hashem (purse lost in a Jewish area, business loss that will be later attributed to you …), or, as mentioned creating Kiddush Hashem: put your biggest hat, write “Rabbi” on the envelope … R Lebovitz adds a hiluk of doing a normal action of returning to the “lost and found” that could be made in polite, not antisemitic society, and making a major effort, which can be done with accompanying Kiddush Hashem. He quotes Smag, R Aaron Soloveichik (that not pursuing moral behaviors may be the reason for current Golus) and Beer Hagolah who says that he knows many people who took advantage of non-Jewish mistakes and became rich but at the end did not have brocha, and many who did opposite and had brocha. So, this seems a complicated subject…
> , halacha is very clear that not returning a goy’s aveidah when failure to do so will result in a chilul Hashem is assur
Maaseh Rav, when he found a purse, he called the owner/neighbor and asked him to stop by the shul, specifically to enhance kiddush Hashem. when you consider a desire not to return, you may be looking at discussions related to Avdei Avodah Zara. This is not a given for an average American.
DY > kikayon wasn’t made by reshaim with the intent to destroy Yiddishkeit.
Hashem explains his moshal to Yonah – think of multitudes of people and even animals .. I am not sure would this include reshayim or are we saying that Ninve did teshuva and only therefore deserve being saved. Even in the second case, surely that current Israel has multitudes of observant Jews (if you count wider than a specific political group) that deserve protection.
HaLeivi > no person in Tanach or Torah Shel Bal Peh criticizes Gedolim of previous generations. S
I agree that we need to show respect to all (acceptable) opinions in the past. The current machloket is on what is “acceptable”. Gemora filtered out those that were not. We are not counting various sects mentioned on Gemora as viable opinions. An extremist view (both on the left and on the right) is only to count your own group as acceptable. A more expansive view is to count anyone who is a great Talmid Chacham as acceptable as long as he affirms halakha (Acher was a learned person, but rejected halakha openly, as do many academics or reformim).
Another question is – where is boundary between generations. Sometimes it is imply teacher-student (R Akiva wins against chaverav, but not against his teacher), but more generally we have longer divisions – tannaim/amoraim/rishonim and there are arguments within them. When did the previous era ended? Maybe with Shoah and move to US and EY? Or with Mishna Berurah?
Volozhin example is something to think about, for sure, but differences are too stark: we are talking to an only Yeshiva, forced by a hostile government to introduce Russian classes, informers, etc – totally breaking educational process. Rav Salanter was offered a job of heading a system of Russian schools and he refused (after a lot of consideration, thinking that he’ll make it less painful).
HaLeivi, I think people are “triggered” by the differences themselves in the time of “equality”.
smerel > However from a frum perspective government funding of private schools would be bad news. There will almost certainly be rules attached that will exclude Yeshivas.
For the majority of Jewish people, who want some combination of Jewish and general education, the current system is totally unmanageable. It makes no sense to lose $10K/child to send him to a totally private school. So, it is either sacrificing quality in one of those areas, or a great financial burden that causes parents to be at work full day and stressed on shabbos. For many, other attractive options cause people move to non-Jewish suburbs, etc.
If you prefer to keep your schools as is, then you can keep them. Or, more likely, take government money for minimal secular education, equivalent to bad public schools. Ideally, government should pay at different tiers depending what your school wants.
akuperman > any standards on teaching secular subjects would be hard to meet for the better frum schools (i.e. the ones that offer high quality Torah education).
a fair point. There are different needs. I presume that if some of parents in these schools would like to teach their kids professions, even a minority, they can organize such a school. If traditional schools will cooperate a little, then such schools can exist as separate entity or as an option in the school.
HaLeivi > This whole idea — that simply doing any Mitzva openly, even when it’s despised, is a Kiddush Hashem — seems to be a reaction to the opposite idea, that we should be ashamed of Mitzvos deemed inappropriate by the outsiders.
I think you are right that we often stand by a point to separate ourselves from others. IT is often important to protect community in a short term, but, in a long term, distorts who we are. One example I saw quoted is emphasizing that Judaism is a religion of actions/mitzvos rather than stam belief (from lo lishma, etc) that we affirm in the face of neighbors who insist on being saved through faith. Similarly, emphasis on miraculous in the face of haskala rationalism.
So, I hope Supremes will clarify that paying just for secular studies has nothing to do whatever else schools are doing with private funds. The next case should be to demand that NOT allowing private schools is unconstitutional: a state has a need to teach three Rs and they should allow any qualified operator to fulfil that need, same way the government buys everything else on private market. If US can buy destroyers and missile defense, it can test math knowledge at a high-school level with an online test.
Gadol > for the statute claimed that it was because the state did not have the ability to to monitor whether a fringe religious school was including such teachings
By this logic, we should close most public schools and stop giving state funds to any universities. I closely monitor kids in online schools and they have a lot of fringe views. In one case, an English teacher included a Middle East map with “Palestine” (sic) in green and Israel in white ( that is as almost not there, same color as off-map) and balanced a Palestinian anti-Israel story with an Israeli anti-Israel story. This was a one-off, but teaching US Government starting that Electoral college is in the way of progress before explaining why it was created, is more routine (maybe in half of the cases)
Gadol > state did not have the ability to to monitor whether a fringe religious school was including such teachings,
The idea is that state pays school or parents for teaching kids skills and knowledge. This can be verified by a test. Presumably, if kids passed the test, it means school spent the money to teach it. Whatever they do during remaining hours of the day is up to them and private funds they want to spend.
It seems that we mostly agree that learning quick lessons from history is presumptuous. On the other hand, as RebE says the lessons are surely there, whether we are talking Shoah or Covid or any other world event. After naviyut, it is said that the way to interpret is through midah k’neged midah, but supposedly we are not smart enough to see that nowadays also.
Maybe a practical path would be to generate possible hypotheses of midah k’neged midah, verify that they are not simply your personal/group bias (blame every event on smartphones), and carefully verify that possible solutions are not against halakha or have danger in them (for example, create machloket by by blaming some group of Jews). Then, emphasize those areas, understanding that this may not be an ultimate answer, but something that is worth working on anyway and is a possible path for us to take.
Gadol, agree but you are also taking too much on yourself
>> I’m sure the Ebeshter is aware of the concept of the “shortest distance between two points is a straight line”
and I am sure Eibeshte is aware of Riemann and Bolyai-Lobachevskian geometries.Daf yomi: one of possible reasons for maamadot not to fast on yom rishon is because of Christians … This seems ahistorical, but an interesting consideration anyway
M, thanks for bringing other opinions. All seem to agree that we need to balance a mitzvah of davening with inconveniencing others, but disagree either on the extent or possibly the circumstances. R Sheinberg presumably travels on routes typical for having a lot of religious Jews, while other answers may relate to a typical goyishe environment. We need several of those rabbis to travel together for a total of ten and see if someone will dare not to join the minyan! I think this underscores the idea I stressed before that when being Adam lhavero is involved, solutions are not always the same. Luckily our days you can snap a picture, email it to your daas Torah and ask him how to daven in the current circumstances.
somehow we take halakha l’Maase seriously and many people will not entertain partaking of a meat soup with a drop of milk without asking a shailah. But, somehow, everyone has a quick explanation for the reasons while millions of souls that perished, one way or the other. Maybe because you don’t think it is a practical matter and you can say whatever? For some reason, Hashem felt a need to afflict that and other tzoros on us and taking them unseriously denigrates both the neshomos and the One who Did it. Real Talmidei Chachmim are more honest (R Steinsaltz, for example, said that it is too early to answer. Maybe because the question came from a survivor, I don’t know …)
> his opinion was based on foreign influence.
I am confused, which nation is teaching Gemorah to girls so well that they influenced R Soloveichik? If you suspect the infuences, they would surely have come from his German university training. We can presume that even if he was influenced in 1930s, he was aware of the failure of German philosophy to form a society at the end, so he would surely take that into account. Your argument might hold more for Rav Hirsh, for example, with his respect to German culture.
charlie > Judaism is really the original nationalism
not in the modern sense. Judaism does not excuse behaviors because of his nationality. Tanach differs from many ancient texts and stellas by recording negative events about Jewish leaders and people, rather than just victories. In our days, I don’t think the Author of the Tanach would able to get a haskomah or print most of the Tanach at a Jewish publisher despite his infinite powers.
charlie > he orders a school to all their limdei kodesh classes be co-ed.
One possible reason for mutual misunderstanding is that you and your opponent address different communities. I would question whether Rav Soloveichik would suggest opening a similar school in boro Park. To the best of my knowledge, he did not. Similarly, people from different communities can not comprehend his approach.
PS a case of society affecting halakha from Daf Yomi Tannis: community fasts and davens for rain and gets it. It then stops the fast and says Hallel Hagadol. Before hallel, in Israel, everyone goes home to eat to say Hallel in the proper satiated state. In Mehuza, Persia they’ll say Hallel before dinner. Why? Because in Mehuza they might drink too much at the dinner (to prevent the drink driving back to shul?)
DY, what is twisted here? I am trying to apply halakhic concepts to the issue. If you disagree, say why. Or ask you Rav and tell us what he thinks. Just because the concept does not look usual to you, does not mean you dismiss it by that.
Notice an interesting weaving of multiple concerns by r Schachter in his case: on a short flight, one should not bother anyone and daven sitting. on a long flight, you would need to stretch your legs (allowing to bother people), and you can then daven as well. I did not connect these things before, but after reading, I would not call it twisted, just “weaved together” 🙂
Is state of Israel less important than a kikayon?
Syag, your question came before my next post, where I clarified that I did not close that sefer, I just did not read the same one next time. I would not notice who is looking at me until I finished the sugya!
charlie > And an even bigger hitch is that the schools participating in these programs have to accept all students. They can’t discriminate on the basis of religion.
This might go back to Supremes similar to Catholics health plan that does not cover contraceptives. But, in a bigger picture, you are right, there will be some yeshivos that will not want to get into secular education. They are not spending much now on teaching math, so there will no benefit in increasing time on “goyishe subjects” and be paid for that (I am using the phrase borrowed from a Rav who was teaching English and History in his Chassidish yeshiva and introduced himself as “goyishe teacher”). So, this approach will strengthen only those schools that combine Jewish education with a decent general one. Or, open a way to separate Jewish schools (in the afternoon?) who may train bochrim and meidelah from multiple schools (possibly only a small percentage whose parents care about it).
Gadol > doesn’t want to have to monitor beliefs/teaching of religious schools
why should they? State is funding general education that they can monitor by testing. If the bochrim can’t write or count, the subsidy goes away. As I suggested above for people, you can do this for schools – every school (including public?) is reimbursed after a test. As of now, some Jewish school participate in private-school tests, but do not make test results available even to parents, at least in my experience.
Syag > You closed a sefer
PS I don’t think I closed the sefer. That would not have helped, maybe even made it worse. I would usually take a small Gemora volume (just one blatt of Aramaic is sufficient to put me into philosophical mode and then into sleep, so Brochos worked for many years), so I packed either an English sefer or a math one for next trips. Both sefer or math are not really hukas goyim in USA.
> You closed a sefer to appease the gentiles
Nobody approached me, but people were suspicious of Muslim terrorists. If someone were to ask, I would explain, but they were not asking. I would guess that was the moment even for a true Chacham (from the joke about the bus) to change his turban for a black hat.
l’halakha, interrupting prayer would be midrabonan, so a miduraita issue would override it. For example, a concern for flight attendant’s mental health, if she is worried about strange behavior. Of course, if she is a pure anti-semite, then the situation is opposite. And if the davening is medauraita maybe halakha will be different (plane is not doing well or the davener is claustrophobic)
Also, if you daven well, you should expect most people to respect or even be in owe. I am told that one of the first Chasidishe Rebbeim from midwest visited Uman at the sunset of USSR, before Uman became Mardi Gra. His taxi was stopped by a Ukrainian policeman who started radioing to figure out what to do with the strange man. Rav opened a Gemorah not to waste time. The policeman got frightened by the view and told him to leave immediately.
ujm, thanks. It did change from the last time I looked it up years ago! Now, the challenge is to find the relevant ones in this ocean 🙂
Avram > And I am simply trying to extract a lesson about dan l’kaf zechus and regarding your fellow Jews with basic respect.
Ok, I think we both made the point and understood each other. Apologize to the readers for this long thread. For full disclosure, when I was listening to the frictionless plane classes, I would also interrupt asking about every possible real life artifacts. And what is more important in practice? All planes deal well with obvious gravity. Better ones are dealing better with friction and other smaller factors.
> would you declare that being secretive about praying was an aveira
Logically speaking, yes. First time this would be a shogeg, but if I continue, it would be mazid. Actually, some tiime after 9/11, I encountered suspicious views in the plane when I opened a sefer. I did not feel like explaining difference between Arabic and Hebrew. I switched to books with more English or math symbols.
> separation of church and state
RebE, the concept here is that government pays for general education and it should not care who provides that education. If government decides that they want all citizens to know calculus, then the government may provide such funds to everyone. In the simplest form, you go take a calculus test, and get paid if you pass, it does not matter whether you learned it in a school, yeshiva, convent, or online.
I think it is a good case. Current court has a good chance to put a good word for non-public and religious schools. The ruling may be more expansive than the question and also make non-public schools more mainstream.
the way it was explained to me by A Chassidic Rav: EY has kedusha on its own, other places do not. So, in EY, you benefit from it but also may get in trouble. Chutz – you need to make an effort to create your own kedusha. I am sure, for many people, Brooklyn made this hishatdlus.
In American polity, NYC is an island of arrivals from abroad that eventually learn/earn enough to move to the continent itself.
> Gashmius, he answered “everyone wants, but once you have it, there is no feeling of fulfillment
indeed. R Twersky heard that one of his former patients found a large sum of money and returned to the owner. He called the guy and asked how he feels about this. The guy answered: when I used to get high, I felt good for a day. Now it is 6 months after I returned the money, and I still feel good about it.
DY > because you do that all the time
I know I am overdoing it. I just found this whole sad story very revealing in gashmiyus and ruchniyus. To quote a market Chacham said: “when the water goes away, you see who is swimming naked”. Similarly, my Rav advises to listen to children: parents learned how to say things in a way people will accept, but the children will tell you what parents really think. So, Covid created a totally “novel” environment and we can’t simply copy previous behaviors. I focus here mostly on negative examples, but, in truth, there are lot of positive ones, people doing the right things, helping others, restraining themselves from doing things. Relevant to this thread – good cases are often invisible, but no less “kiddush Hashem”. You find out sometimes by chance. I once called an old gentleman who did not come for a yom tov, he said that one of his relatives got Covid and thus, he did not come not to risk exposing others. Now, when I see someone who is exposing others to risk, I know that, but how many people abstained – we don’t know.
Avram, I am not “against the Jews”, I am simply trying to extract a lesson for us from this to grow rather than getting warm satisfaction from how good we all are against a hostile world. This is a great Jewish tradition that seems to be lost in last American generations. And again, taking your description at face value, I am not even sure why he is being arrested – he is not doing anything, he is simply not replying. I don’t think this is illegal.
As to people reacting to tefilin, whenever I had to daven shaharis before an early flight, I either did it in the car at the airport or spent several minutes looking for an empty corner, so never encountered strong reaction. I once encountered a strong reaction on a flight from LA (Louisiana, not Los Angeles) to Texas. An exciting lady came and said – Excuuuuse me, are you JEEEEWISH!?! (staring carefully at my kippah to see whether I have horns), are you flying to Israel!? (despite the westerly flight)
PS. I personally do not recalling witnessing a case of such anti-Jewish attack in USA, not saying they do not happen. I saw them either in other countries or here by people from other countries. For example, my PhD advisor made a shiduch for me to a big German company for a small project. We met Dec 23 without much chemistry and they called me December 26 asking “how was your holiday” with some stress in these words. I replied “as usual”, the project did not go forward and the (middle eastern, liberal) professor could not figure out why.
If both sides want to argue with facts, you can go look at yutorah site and listen to numerous divrei torah there and form your opinion. Do we have a similar collection of other makomos Torah? In older times, there were lots of tape collections at the local kollel – R Avigdor Miller, R Berl Wein, more. I now see some occasional recordings but not systematic learning. Can someone recommend a place?
charlie, ten years is many days
Wth time getting hectic, esp last 2 years and more merger between home and work, I find reading a lot hits on the the faculties I am already using a lot. I am more and more switching to true “oral Torah” – zoom classes, recordings. This partially compensates for less in-person Torah and I also find speakers being more informal in speeches and less guarded than in writing. Maybe this explains why Talmud developed orally ,,,
CTLawyer is doing exactly the right thing. The biggest objection to Yidden going into professions is that the more you work, the more you ear. The more you earn, the more you work to earn more. Ctlawyer follows Chofetz Chaim and others – working enough to earn a living and then learning.
R Leibowitz says one student asked whether it is a good idea to work until you are 40, earn a lot of money, and then learn full time … His answer is, of course, no.
Lostpark, rather than asking CTLawyer to work and give his money to others, a true aspiring Talmid Chacham should ask him to teach him his middos and replicate his successful path.
Phil, a couple of clarification:
Linkedin is generally written by the person himself. Sometimes, people abandon the page and do not update it. Malone updated his page and lists lots of small jobs. It seems to be him and not another Bob as bios match. Why would he skip his best achievements, while looking for the new gig?
Linkedin also has reporting by people who worked with him. Wikipedia is a great source for general info, but not on controversial topics. It could have been written by you or me.Rav Chaim – there were multiple reports on YWN, including that Rav had a delegation of medics whom he was asking questions before announcing the psak. I am sure there are lots of people
here who are close enough to verify. Anyone? That you are chasidishe makes me feel better, as I was concerned how yeshivish/livish people come to such conclusion given the psak and sevorah. I am not familiar with chassidishe daas Toirah here – could you enlighten us please?Did not know about noses … I was wondering whether it is my fault that I notice that Jewish men have “Jewish” noses and women do not … A simpler case is braces – many girls seem to be doing that. Is this also negating what Hashem gave you? One could say that if “everyone” is doing that, then one who does not is at a disadvantage. Although, there will be always someone special looking for a genuine item!
Avira, where did she say “BT” background, she said “MO” background. “You have a right to your opinions, but not to your own facts”. Especially, Sephardim (as you are saying) do not have same prejudices as you do.
Serious question – what should be the shidduch. Historically, it used to be complimentary – chacham with ashir. Nowadays, the concept seems to be “same background” – “men and women are different enough”, probably due to divergence of communities. So, should a lawyer marry a lawyer – and then see each other and kids on Shabbat?
Gadol, Bava Basra first chapter goes trough all kind of scenarios.
basic rule – 2 neighbors need a wall and one can force the other to share the cost. P. 6 discusses one yard above the other. I’ll let more knowledgeable people pasken on halakha l’maaseh. In addition to stam obligations, there are also cases of hasidut and other considerations
There are several shocking stories:
A hasid that has Eliyahu coming to him, then he built a gatehouse (and stop hearing poor) and Eliahu stopped coming. My q: surely he did teshuva and took gatehouse off? and Eliahu did not return? sad…A major amorah Ravina forces a poor nebach via a trick (sending goats) to pay for the part of the fence between them. He is reprimanded, but still shocking.
Rav Yehudah’s student who refuses to admit he learned Torah to get food during famine.
Phil > I was simply pointing out that it’s hypocritical of him to say that when he does the same.
I went back to see maybe my posts indeed lack references, here is who I quoted just in this thread:
Karl Popper
Biontech CEO
Lancet article from Britain talks about this: Reinfection with new variants of SARS-CoV-2 after natural infection, Dec 2021
Malone’s Linkedin
Lower Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 Viral Shedding Following Coronavirus Disease 2019 Vaccination Among Healthcare Workers in Los Angeles, California
Paul C Adamson November 2021,
Scott Atlas
Riemersma KA, Grogan BE, Kirta-Yarbo A, et alVaccinated and Unvaccinated Individuals Have Similar Viral Loads in Communities with a High Prevalence of the SARS-CoV-2 Delta Variant. medRxiv. 2021 Jul 31;
Effectiveness of mRNA and ChAdOx1 COVID-19 vaccines against symptomatic SARS-CoV-2 infection and severe outcomes with variants of concern in Ontario
Rav Chaim