Always_Ask_Questions

Health, these medicines are early interventions and cheap, right? Why does the patient need hospital permission? I understand that there could be a freak case of someone who has no relative to help and isolated, but that would not be a typical patient.

Charlie > he paskened differently to different people in different circumstances

Indeed, but I witnessed that students from “MO” schools often do not know that. I may have told this story before, this was in response to a Rav saying that he gives different advise to the same question – can I attend class on comparative religions. “Kids” were shocked.

But maybe also, R Soloveichik addressed a much wider range of people, so his advise may be of a larger range. Rambam also speaks seemingly in a different voice (and language).

> rebbe akiva was against the death penalty

I understand that he, and R Tarfon, want to minimize it. True, Gemora brings technical examples where these 2 will inquire one way, and Rabonim differently, but it seems to me that Mishna clearly talks about disagreement about social policies. Their statement is between (1) one that executes once in 70 years is excessive and (2) R Shimon’s retort that their liberalism will lead to more murders. I think you can reconcile technical and social approaches saying that RR Akiva & Tarfon would go to great length to find such arguments and others will simply not.

I don’t think it is a controversial idea that Rabbis were guided by social motives. I am not sure why you are triggered here. Maybe you see me as an advocate for some liberal anti-death-penalty thing? I am not, and I don’t think I learned Makkos (or anything else) with someone who is, or at least obsessed about it. Is it an “MO” thing in your circles?

He probably meant Normandy.

> which of the two is the better shot.

Diversify! by the data reviewed by FDA advisors, J&J and then mRNA produces as much antibodies as third mRNA booster. Does not seem to work this way in opposite direction though.

Health > So why did these people take these hospitals to court?
Why doesn’t the hospital just give in?

Could you clarify – is this your observation that all or majority of hospitals prevent patients from taking this medicine, or you are simply quoting a news article that this happened somewhere?

> two students can cite him as supporting completely polar opposite positions.

Maybe because he was not afaird of addressing controversial topics and also taught students to be thinkers? (yes, there is a risk in that, but also a reward)

> simply being willing to defend the Jewish state is grounds for being considered a member

I am not saying it is sufficient, I am saying it can be a factor. One issue for giyur is sincerity of the convert. Similarly to Shlomo’s times, one might say that if emigration from Russia to Israel would be conditioned on a conversion, we could suspect insincerity despite all other factors. I understand it is not a condition, as people immigrate together with their Jewish relatives. Still, a conversion would make life easier as you are saying – marriage, work, etc and makes a convert suspect. I thought the reference was to military giyurim and I counted this as a possible indication of sincere attachment to Am and Eretz Israel – presuming the person is not serving in combat role, and not in the office.

Such factors play role some times. I read that early Soviet dissidents were often married to non Jews. Someone did giyur to some of them while their husbands were in prison based mostly on their devotion and risk. These were more dramatic circumstances, of course.

More generally, quoting my F-I-L, in mixed marriages, it is a Jewish side that is doing the aveirah, while the non-Jewish one is a tzadik(es) – getting disapprovals from her society for marrying a Jew. In the case of anti-semitic Russian society, it is even more true.

Precise question – kidush or hillul Hashem? You start first with basic halakha – I quoted some above.
My vastly incomplete understanding so far is that the person was not right starting davening standing and also should (rather than can) sit down when told. Again, I did not expect the latter part and not completely sure I am reading this correctly. I would appreciate other opinions.

But, presuming the person was supposed halakhically to sit down and did not, this does not seem to be a kiddush Hashem if it is a violation of ratzon Hashem (aka halakha). It is hilluel Hashem? R Lebowitz who discusses a similar episode in newspapers, even quoting some bochrim who explain that “this was the right thing to do” milder as “not the best moment for the Jewish people” or something like that.

If, on the other hand, he was not supposed to interrupt shmone esre, as most of us commonly assume, then it can’t be Hillul Hashem in that action.

If he could have foreseen the problem, then it is clear from sources above that it is halakhically incorrect and possibly hillul Hashem – caused not by continue standing, but by starting standing. So, interesting nekuda here, that he was an over even before flight attendant came by, so consider her coming as a punishment for the previous aveirah.

In a gray area, where he considered everything and then a wild flight attendant appeared out of nowhere, he may not be over.

Now, an interesting inverted question – if he were to sit down (presuming it is halahkically correct): would that quiet action be considered Kidush Hashem? Or if he would be sitting whole shemone esre?

You can say – how is this kiddush Hashem when it is not in anyone’s face?! (and it is not so inspiring to do a thing that nobody notices anyway, despite Gemorahs saying opposite, like grandson of Choney Hameagel in Tannis who hides from sheluchim his going to daven for rain, pretending that the cloud came by itself)

Possible answer – someone sees other Jews doing it wrong and then sees this guy doing it right and concludes that this is a real Jews following real Torah and now he praises Hashem.

ujm, – in the opposite order, though! That is Gadol’s obligation to not see me precedes my obligation to protect myself. If he fails in his obligation, I then have to protect myself and sue him to get my money back. Right?

> you learn/don’t learn Daf Yomi
you are allowed to not admit that you did not learn something, so you should not be bothered by that

> Are/Are Not a Ba’al Teshuva
And if not, “why not”? (Gerer Rebbe)

> Don’t you think Issachar could benefit more from this?!?

First, Zevulun ideal is not a lawyer, but a merchant. Real business. When I thought lawyers are making real money, one of them said – how do you think I feel assisting people making deals while just charging per hour?

Second, Issachar did not talk like that.

R Lebowitz 10-min lecture Dec 29, 2009. As he quips “here is the STANDING psak of many gedolim”: (each line below has a page reference that I omitted).

Standing – to have better kavana, or as a servant, like bringing karbonos, Avraham stands “amida”
you can sit on a donkey and daven (Rebbe, brochos), on a boat (brochos 30a) because it is scary, shaky. Getting off the donkey prolongs the trip. You can make donkey go 3 steps back. Standing will ruin kavona. On a wagon, if you can – stand, if not – sit. S’A If you daven sitting, then re-daven standing. M’B says no.

on plane – R Moshe: if you daven sitting on the plane, do not repeat later, better to sit to begin with, but get up for bowing. R Wosner paskened for El Al’s Rabbi to direct passengers to daven in place and not do minyanim. R Auerbach – daven sitting on a plane, not to stand – you will be distract and distract others.

Davening on a bus – not proper, just to save time. R Kanevsky allows getting off a bus when you are davening (including – it is better to continue davening off the bus!). So, if stewardess tells you to sit – you just sit down and contiue davening.

I learn from hashgaha pratis: put a dvar Torah on youtube and put it on autoplay.

RebE > The mandate is a last resort to encourage people to vaccinate.

There may be smarter ways. Seems that making some requirements pushes the group that is on the fence, but not those who are totally obstinate. So, a hard mandate creates a conflict. Maybe, softer mandates would work better – charge people more, make them test weekly and pay in part. Also, there are lots of government programs that could be used as leverage – why not pay extra welfare or free food to those who vaccinate.

R Twersky reports that he had a group of CEOs that were routinely late (because they were busy people). They all agreed that a late comer should throw $20 for tzedokah – and this small change worked. Today’s Daf talks about a teacher of little children who would give kids a little piece of fish to interest them in learning. Being nice might work.

Avira > then use their chessed as an effective cajole to silence opposition,

Most of those who do preach their own ideology are sincere believers. We should expect them to fairly present other movements and many fail at that, but that they teach their own approach is understandable. Go open your own brisker houses and preach your approach. Competition between Torah teachers is allowed and encouraged and is good for the teachers in halakha

Avram > Chabad certainly is not the only group doing kiruv,

First Chabad does not do “kiruv”, they do no not (or at least not supposed to) look down at other Jewish people. Others have organizations that work on this. Most observant Jews, whether charedi or YI, go through their day without worrying much about their non-observant brothers. Jews used to have missions sometimes. For example, supporting Jews in EY, whether yeshivos or workers. There were wedding announcements in newspapers with a lists of guests and how much each donated for EY. The fate of disappearing Jews is not on the radar. This does not take away from shortcomings and problems that exist in the movement. but need to be modeh al haemes.

Syag, this AAQ guy you met somewhere and are describing here is a weird guy.

Does anyone use non-professional shadchanim? Parents, friends, teachers – people who know you.

Re: classes on campus.

Is this considered bad to have college classes on the yeshiva property? Is this decreasing kedusha of learning? Would people start reading math books during mussar shmoozim? This may be a valid concern, but on the other hand, would it not be better for bochrim to study college classes together rather than go to a different campus with all kind of problems there? In one of the high school yeshivos that starting using online public school for secular subjects, they have 2 floors – so they physically go to another floor to learn non-Torah subjects, use laptops there, then go back.

Furthermore, if they learn humanities or sciences like physics and psychology, it would be good for someone in yeshiva to address hashkofa questions that arise from there. I do this with my kids all the time – when they were at schools, where “goiyishe teachers” sometimes were disconnected from the Jewish curriculum and even better in online schools/colleges. In a recent class on astronomy, we did possibly whole maase bereshis 🙂 In psychology, read R Twersky’s teshuvos. In US Gov, discussed Jewish view of government starting with Shmuel…

phil, I am getting info from scientific articles. I do not read them all due to lack of time but a representative sample, as I am professionally interested in the statistical methodologies. You generally say “many experts”. You quoted Bob Malone. I looked up his linkedin page. He does not look like a world-famous person. He runs his 1-man consultancy for last 20 years, and he lists 10+ pages of companies that he either consulted or worked for over the years. Looks like almost all of them less than a year. I clicked on five – they all have linkedin descriptions but when you click ona web link – none currently exist. He has several references that seem pretty straightforward and do not even hint to his value to the world. Here is a typical one: Robert is a very knowledgable and detail oriented individual capable of managing multiple project timelines to meet deliverables on-time.

Torah learning should be free, but you need to pay for music.

> Where are you getting your info from?

I am not insisting on that, but several people in my community had a second sickness seriously harder than first . It may be that Jewish community was hit early, so with passing of time and change in variants, maybe some become vulnerable again, and will be again with new variant coming.

Actually, a fresh Lancet article from Britain talks about this: Reinfection with new variants of SARS-CoV-2 after natural infection, Dec 2021 says that re-infection was 8x less likely than new infection in nursing homes between spring 2020 and Jan 2021. Most importantly, it says that those who will re-infect all had low antibody levels.

So, the right thing to do seems to be at least measure antibodies. Previous advice I saw was to get at least one vaccine dose.

Avira, I think most are going off campus with some classes/programs on campus. Do you have a problem with second? when you get a college program without getting into classes with questionable behaviors and wasting commuting time. In recent times, you should be able to get an online degree also at any yeshiva – Floria State, Arizona State, New Hampshire Southern. From my kids’ emerging experience, it is much better to have a group – at least 2 kids – who enroll in the same class. Added bonus – kids learn to balance their learning with life responsibilities so you have more assurance that they are not falling apart after yeshiva.

agree with ujm: Esther became Rebbe of Mordechai not because she knew more rishonim, but because she was ready for mesiros nefesh. I don’t think our Torah learnt from seforim equal to the one of the Yidden who lived it.