Always_Ask_Questions

sechel > just learn chassidus

why don’t you also learn Divrei Yoel, R Salanter, R Hirsh, R Soloveichik, and then intelligently discuss how they relate to your chassidus so that we all could appreciate it?

Having a mashgiach criminal is an appropriate mida kneged mida for being a convicted criminal.

n0 > I can’t think of anything outside the Yeshiva that would help one be more mindful. Can you?

yes, hard facts. Getting low grade on SAT/LSAT/GRE, getting rejected at job interview, effort to get to the train on time very day, fired from a job for being late or rude to customers, hard (mental) work required to either do a job or come up with something new – all of that might give a person objective feedback and impetus to change. I am not saying that this cannot be learned in yeshiva, but I think general educational trend is “lake wabegon” where “everyone is above average”. And I am not saying that everyone will learn from school of hard knocks – some might simply blame anti-semites for their problems, as the Mishna says – not every socher becomes chacham.

Just a personal illustration. I thought I am reasonably polite to people at work, until I had a colleague (who himself trained himself from a lowly background) who would know by name, say hello first, and cheer up every guard and other invisible people … I hope I learned something from that.

I don’t think it is a problem that Chabad is learning seforim of their Rebbe seriously. A response that sure many gedolim wrote something and this is light reading is strange. Obviously, leaders of our time address issues relevant to our time and it is worth studying in depth. Previous Torah is of course important and we can’t just red recent responsa without learning earlier material, but we are not resolving last centuries’ issues, but the current ones!

So, a possible problem arises when someone insists that everyone should learn their derech in a significant way, otherwise, why can’t they learn their own Rebbe and share that Torah with us?

n0 > He should stay in yeshiva and be mindful of others

Great suggestion. But what takes? If he learned a masechta and did not start implementing it yet, why would he suddenly change? In other words, is Bava Kamma addressing someone who already learned and somehow did not start doing!?

mdd > Belarus and Lithuania were parts of the Pale.

of course, all Polish areas occupied by Russia were the Pale, Russia proper did not let Jews in from very early in Moscow history. I don’t think this was the case in other slavic and eastern european lands: Jews settled in Poland, Belorussia, Kievan Rus, Crimea. Not sure, were there any other countries in Eastern Europe who did not allow Jews? (in Western: England for a time)

Smile, thanks for clarifying your position. Let me propose a difference:

1) in case of price and quality, there are established halochos to what degree one should favor the Jewish store. And if the store owner is T’Ch or/and an Ehrliche Yid, I am sure people will push it further. Still, if I prfer to feed my kids fresh food, I’ll go where it is.

2) in your case of a chumra, you have a halachik balance between being machmir l’Hashem and being supportive of another Yid. As many say, as Hashem also wants you to support the Yid, the halachik decision is to favor the Yid v. a chumra that becomes simply inapplicable in this case. You literally have nothing to lose – the Yid is happy, and Hashem is happy. Why aren’t you!?

This is just a milder form of a chosid shoteh who would not touch a woman to save her from drowning. Evidently, Hashem wants him to touch her in this case, so he has nothing to be machmir about.

n0 > Learning them isn’t what makes one a chossid.

n0, thanks for the correction, of course it is “doing” (lekayam, BK 30a). But that requires learning (lo am haaretz hasid) first, and as we are discussing learning, I got carried away and misquoted… My apology.

Of course, the next question is whether learning leads to doing it, I did not want to run away from that question. So, say someone learns nezikin, but did not accustom himself to do it all the time. Should he skip avos and go to brochos, or should he first take a semester off and practice nezikin?

If we take a high road and say – mishna is meant for someone who already learnt everything, and now needs to focus his maasim in one area, it is still unclear – was he simply learning before and not doing any of them? maybe, with f/t learning and no opportunities to interact with people, and now preparing for that?

re: shaharis. People used to daven early and then going (walking or riding a donkey) to work. Unless they were bnei melachim. Some still do this, but others daven at more convenient times. Maybe we should search for halochos for bnei melachim – were they supposed to also starve?

Interesting dichotomy: when we discuss the Pesach aspect of it, there are learnt references. When we discuss l’havero aspect – everyone is wandering in the dark.

common > AAQ, “so you should probably ask a Rav …”
You don’t believe in that.

Stop trolling me. I explained already – I do not believe in Daas Torah. Why? Because I asked the Rav and he said so.

Avira > so all the working amei haaretz have impeccable manners?

I was pondering the same question. hillel in Avos 2:6 is pretty sure that bor is not yere het and am haaretz is not chasid, a shy person can not learn and an angry person can not teach (my kids had a question on the latter – so how do we call angry teachers!?), but then a strange expression (my translation) “_not everyone_ who increases in selling becomes wiser”. It does not say – “a businessman can not be wise”. So, this seems to be saying – as you do – that while it is reasonable to presume that engaging in business will make one smarter, it is not always, especially of you overdo it. Unless, Hillel is using this for irony to mock those who think that selling is beneficial, and it went over my head. As a reference, Alter from Novordok would teach his students chochma in addition to mussar – “someone who can not buy a wagon of wood without being swindled must be lacking in his ruchniyous also”, referring to Rivka and Eliezer’s camels.

I also did not mean this as a general statement, but specifically for your situation and what you are lacking. Also, most modern jobs are close to trades than business and that is what I recommend (even as I am nominally in business, most of my day is spent on tradecraft rather than running the business). Yitzele Peterburger married his son to a daughter of a craftsman and people were appalled. He replied – if he were to mayy into a shopkeeper who possibly swindled a lot of people, this would be ok, but somehow a person whom Hashem loves for earning his bread honestly is not ok … Not sure whether this was in Yerushalaim or Kovno. And no mention of marrying into a rabbinical family either ;).

> I just would rather give a yid parnassah but only if he gives me the products that I want.

“I want” seems like such a goyishe attitude, you should probably go to walmart lehathila!

Posters here raised good objections that this chumra is a kula towards the Jewish sellers, so you should probably ask a Rav …

In defense of the poster though – if you are in a place where a Jewish grocer raises prices thanks to the monopoly in the Jewish commuity, you might be justified going to walmart not only because it is 20% cheaper for you, but in order to break the excessive pricing for the whole community.

By the way, current estimates of Jewish casualties are lower than it was before – in tens of thousands rather than 100,000 and higher, primarily because Jewish communities in Ukraine were small and dispersed, as the Jews were managing Polish farms, and probably had 50,000 people total. By those times, it was understandable that stories and rumors created an impression of an even bigger suffering that it was, given the high proportional devastation.

At the same time, this rebellion led to further occupation of Poland by Sweden and Russia, leading to huge losses both in Polish and Jewish population immediately then, and eventually bringing Jews into Russian empire, with all the suffering that this entailed. So, maybe the focus of remembering 1648 is in a longer term effect rather than immediate.

which is mostly the same as niftarim from the wars.. does this override the minhag of using the date the person was last seen?

for people looking for chumros – why not do chumros in this issues?

If you are not currently able to fully avoid being supported, try to minimize relying on kulos. Say, return part of government subsidy back to the government. Even a small part, just as a statement of intent. Then see if you can increase that. Consider all your expenses with a fresh eye as Alter from Novordok did – if I live at someone else’ expense, how can I reduce my spending and return the money?

It is not just tannaim and amoraim who paid their own way, pretty of modern T’Chachamim did that (including not working as a Rav). Chofet Chaim sold his books and had a story. R Salanter refused Rabbinical position. R Yitzele Peterburger served as a Rav but then went back to having a pub with his wife, if I am not mistaken. Someone asked him whether pouring mashke was better than being a Rav?! He said – of course. I can think of Torah while filling glasses, but I can not while dealing with balabosim.

From razors back to learning. We went through this sugya before and I fully admit that modern poskim are ok with taking funds. Aveira inference from “rav of the city” to anyone with a desire not to work is unfortunate, probably just an accident, he used to give better sources. I can’t say to what degree poskim accept funds – nobody quoted Moshe Feinstein allowing using welfare and such, if I recall, but given wide acceptance of the practice, I presume someone paskens this way privately.

I am not against looking shulchan aruch haRav, just don’t call it “a shulchan aruch”, as if it is a legit series from Mehaber to Alter Rebbe to Kitzur.

Reminds of someone who was willing to do a shevua on a monetary issue. The Rav said – our sul has a special minhag, we are not using sefer Torah [turns to the gabbai]: BRING SHNEI LUCHOS HABRIS. The person shrieks and runs away in horror. The gabbai brings the sefer.

Unless you live in Medinas Yisroel or in certain enclaves or on a kosher farm, the trade-off of cost and quality should be an issue.

So, especially, if your lifestyle is subsidized by a generous shver, or you rely on kulos to accept communal funds or goyishe welfare or pandemic emergency funds – and spend that money on less healthy amd more expensive foods? Then, H’V spend additional funds on treating health of children who were not eating healthy. I am not saying this is a clear cut issue. Just wondering whether people thought of the issue and have enough health education about this.

references:
R Salanter disregarded pas yisroel when on a health trip to waters, subsidized by a friend.
Alter from Novordok would not let his daughter buy new dress as they were paid as part of yeshiva funds.

Avira > Imagine if someone(and there were) convinced me that I wasn’t cut out for learning, and i would have just gone to college

So, then by now, you will work for 10 hours a day and spent the rest of the day in learning. Your middos would be also better because you’d learn some manners, as when you are talking inappropriately in business, you tend to lose customers. I am puzzled how so many hours of learning did not have similar effect – up to now, at least. Maybe it is an indicator that a system of learning by hours of Gemoras not always affects the person, despite the promise of lo lishma not leading to lishma. Please note, this is not personal.

edited

CTL,
it is fair to say that religious education should not be publicly funded according to US minhagim, but why we need to pay double for professional education? As we both seem to agree, it is proper for at least some Jews to have both just because we want our kids to be “separate but equal”. In the current system, poor chareidi parents are against a lot of odds – from the government that would not reimburse them for general education, and those in their community that do not value general education. And currently in the cases the government does pay in some roundabout ways (lunches, transportation), the funds empower the schools and not parents, so general education is not getting better off. And middle class educated parents are spending ridiculous amounts of money to afford day schools and have no time to spend with kids. No wonder such lifestyle is not attractive to the kids. Straight vouchers to parents would solve lots of these problems.

food prices fluctuate … in Gemora, chicken was a delicatessen, now it is viewed inferior to meat. Maybe our chicken is not like their chicken.

Also, maybe CTL owns a fleishig farm somewhere in Texas. US probably was the first to have general population eat a lot of fleishig after railroads in 19th century enabled delivery of meat from Midwest to Northeast. I presume CTL’s forefathers bet on a farm early on.

hm,, maybe this pool is too smal. Let’s widen it – do you know of any 2020 T voters who will not vote for him in 2023 genera;?

> “time for people to stop spreading hate and realizing the lubavitcher rebbe was a גאון עולם

I don’t think this says what you meant it to say! A more serious point is that if you have seforim (witnesses) that have verifiable inaccuracies, the eid is posul (or at least uninformed), and you should view such books accordingly. It would be especially sad if people put misleading information in books about their Rebbes. So, if I were, I would get to emes on this and maybe confront the publishers.

To put chumros and kulos together: what if one can learn more by eating cholov hacompanies – cheaper and healthier? would you rather be machmir/meikel on the milk from a factory or on limud Torah? Maybe your answer would be – stay on bread & water, respect.

And, as we discussed before, “tzedoka” here may not include using non-Jewish programs to support poor, or taking money from unwilling public. I am sure there are kulos to support (pardon the pun) these positions, but, as we established in other threats, you could expect others to consider this treif. And the value of learning that general public might see as treif may not be kashered (what is crooked …)