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Yeshivaguy > if a 9th grader would come to ask a 12th grader a question in learning or in hashkofah, the 12th grader would answer him warmly and cordially, being friendly.
I believe this is how Volozhin and maybe other early yeshovos operated, with Rabonim running major shiurim and after that older students helping younger ones. They did not have a full staff of babysitters.
well put, especially for online discussions. There is even less to gain here by questioning someone motives and putting people down, so we will be better served by responding to the logic.
That said, ad hominems got a bad name, especially in modernity, as so many people conduct baseless attacks on their opponents in the “free speech”/”everything goes” environment.
How do Jews deal with it? On one hand, we generally avoid ad hominems against Talmidei Chachomim – a lot of Gemorah discussions are based on someone reporting what he heard from his teacher’s teacher – and integrity of that is not questioned. On the other hand, we clearly check integrity of a witness, and discard his opinion when he is shown to be not kosher – especially
if his behave is trief in the area that is being discussed.an example of inappropriate ad hominem – R Yohanan commenting on Resh Lakish’ knowledge of sword making. examples of inappropriate ad hominems – discussions (Avraham, Moshe) with Hashem, insisting that He should do according to what He promised.
Cheap ploy. Most people here expect Moschiach to come from a yeshivish or, ok maybe, a chasiddish community. So, his language will be according to the school he attended.
Of course, one could observe that Jewish leaders were always expected to communicate well with the world – from Moshe’s education in the palace to R Gamliel having 1000 Torah students and 1000 Greek students in his household … So, either Moschiach will have to come from YU or Lakewood needs to improve on Yinglish classes. Maybe, though, Moschiach will come from lepers in Rome as Gemora suggests, so maybe he’ll speak Italian with the Pope.
akuperma> since when do we vote? it isn’t an elected position
I think some vote is expected, if not for a specific person: First two kings were appointed by a Navi Shmuel, after people _elected_ to have a king. Previously, Shoftim were appointed by some or other body. So, at minimum, Jews need to consent to having a ruler with certain powers, and then delegate, in some Republican manner, the actual appointment.
> This is not my Beis Hamikdash. This is not my kibbutz goliyos.
This is a dangerous thing to say… Like some JEws complained tht Moshe was not giving them cucumbers, or Ezra taking them into a sakonah. How do we know what Hashem’s plans are, just because things are not going the way you would have done that.
Re; expanding territories: indeed, if Jews are legitimately settled in EY, they are entitled to protect themselves, including creating defensive borders. If Arabs did not attack, one could have argued that there was no basis for expanding.
Avira > We are definitely not bound by them in the wars of moshiach – how else is he supposed to fight them?
And that may be the point of the disagreement. Some claim – controversially of course, that Medina is Reishit Tzemichat Geulateinu, and you would agree that – according to their shita – fighting is appropriate. So, you feel strongly that Medina has no value, then it is possible that fighting is not OK (although the UN vote argument might still hold). Of course, this is, again, a circular argument as you brought shevuos to show that their policies are wrong…
Now, both sides can bring arguments whether Medina is Reshit or not, we will know at due time, so, literally, Teiku.
does blended whiskey count as two?
what is the minimum (and maximum) shiurim?if you are plowing a field, see people marching to Yerushalaim, you ask them and they say “to greet Moschiach” -finish plowing and go. So, speculation may be for those who are not doing anything else, which might be an aveira delaying Moschaich’s arrival.
PS Plowing is _not_ a recommended job l’hathila, a clean and easy job is preferred.
Shimon > remnant holdover from prewar Europe,
R Berel Wein similarly (but with slightly different emphasis) traces the way non-religious parties relate to datiim in Israel to the history of Jews under Russia, where Russian government forced kahal to be in charge of selecting who will be drafted into Russian army, leading to corruption of the kahal, bribery, oppression of orphans, leading to the strife and alienation between leaders of Jewish community and the “masses”.
Gemora has a lot of conditions that describe Talmidei Chachamim, such as “merabim shalom b’olam”.
If you dismiss these issues just because other people are worse or “they started first”, seems like you are treating “yeshiva” as just “my team”, which kind of misses the point. Rav Salanter was holding the opposite: if a professor in Paris is spouting apikorosus, it means we in the yeshiva are doing something wrong.
> Let those who are fully able to do this mitzva properly do it without being told off or prevented in any way. And if you can’t handle alcohol, then stop pretending
Well, who is deciding whether the person is able to do it properly? Surely, someone who already decided that majority of poskim approve of this and reads MB accordingly is in the best control of his faculties to make the evaluation. As R Twersky writes – smarter alcoholics are hard to cure as they are good at coming with tirutzim justifying their behavior.
Halocha thrives on creating objective measures that leave nothing to Yetzer Hara to hang on: arba amot, 50 amot, etc. I see above such an emerging list – wine, at the end of seuda, being able to say birkat hamazon…
Police ask drunk drivers to say alphabet backwards and walk along a straight line. Maybe similar measures can be established? Recite mishnayos .. find Amalek posuk in Chumash
simcha> though I can’t say for sure if it’s my Yetzer Hara or my Yetzer Tov driving me
Both are OK, as long as you are not driving yourself.
It is ok to be ambivalent towards political movements, but that does not mean that you need to reject the good out there. One Rav told me that when someone asks him whether he is a Zionist, he refuses to say “no”. He says instead – yes, in the sense of “mehazir shechinato leZion”
Refuah Shleima!
Avira > they’re excluding themselves from the yeshiva worlds definition of the term gadol. So why are they upset when we don’t call them gedolim?
more true scotsmans here.
> there were gedolim who had positive views of the state early on, including the ponevezher rov. That doesn’t mean that they would say so now,
again. So, you easily presume that some “gedolim” were holding to their opinion due to the pressure of time. Then, others can say that Chazon Ish would change his opinion now, seeing how many kosher things happen in Israel. Your belief in daas Torah seems to be pretty shaky.
> But that view doesn’t mean that they believed in nationalism, or other foreign ideologies – they viewed the state as a Hatzolah, not as an ideal.
agree. And you deal with non-ideal reality, not withdraw from it. Jews are surrounding by “non-ideal” surroundings for centuries.
Avira > what we’re really saying is that to be a gadol beyisroel, one needs to be free of all foreign influence. One must have pure daas torah.
Please define what “free of foreign influence” is and what the source for that is. Was Rambam tainted by secretly reading Aristotle and studying Muslim science? Was Rabban Gamliel tainted by his atrsolobe and having 1000 members of his household studying Greek? Rav Salanter’s son was a mechanical engineer and an inventor and Rav was proud that he was able to re-engineer his son’s invention by seeing the drawings. Is mussar out now?
Avira > he said they’re real, and very important. And what he says fits into what the “derech moshol” might mean in the iggeres, but in no way has any authority ever said that the shevuos just don’t matter, or we can disregard them because they’re “just agadeta”, again, whatever that means.
I think we now agree here that the shevuos are, on one hand, important and are there to guide our attitudes but, on the other hand, not simplistic halachik conclusion that any movement towards EY is verbotten unless it is fully in conformance with Beis Shammai. In fact, I recall Vilna Gaon’s commentary on Hagada HaLachma Ani is that Jews will first go to EY and only later become Bnei Chorin.
Des[ite some Rebbes here admiring themselves and their colleagues, there are, unfortunately, enough teachers who are suboptimal even in their sober state, kal vahomer drunk. I presume every Teacher who understands the challenge of his job would think thrice before diminishing his capacity. Maybe a better question would be a testimony of how gedolim behave on Purim. Chafetz Chaim? R Aharon Kotler? Rav Soloveichik? Rav Feinstein?
> NO gedolim whatsoever follow the Zionist/Mirachi/Daati Leumi/Modern Orthodox shittas
“No True Scotsman” fallacy.
> Do you deny the validity, importance or existence of the Rambam’s Igerres Teiman?
Avira just brought his Rebbe as an authority on this. Question him first.
Avira > I’ve heard a different reason from Rav Belsky, who said that the shvuous might not be a din, but they are a metzius … emulate yaakov avinu’s behavior with eisav before they met goyishe leaders
ok, this makes sense, not sure why this was not posted earlier! If this is a general approach of avoiding haughty behavior whether in EY or outside, I am totally on board. It is also in Beitza 25 – Hashem gave us Torah and derech eretz inside it to prevent us from overwhelming other nations (that is, their negative reaction to our hutzpah/azut is a problem for us and Hashem, but our azut is undesirable by itself and goyim need to live their life too in the eyes of Hashem).
But with this definition, state of Israel is no more a theological problem, but a practical problem on how to deal with their errors and excesses.
> Tappan Zee Bridge
Is it back already? I ended up in Vermont while looking for the sign.
Lie detector test is a good addition – “do you plan to cut social security”, “are billionaires at fault for everything” … but I believe best liars pass it with flying colors.
This is not a big stretch, btw, no legislation required, just a private initiative. Maybe YWN can organize a debate and add these rules.
The only downside is that Indians and Chinese will have highest SAT scores. But we are not requiring them to get into Oxford, just an assurance that they can do basic math.
some strong points above!
1) Jews did not return to EY by force, this was immigration over decades, mostly with permission of the current authorities, and without weapons. Neighboring Arabs were not an authority, Brits under UN mandate were, thus UN vote seems like an authoritative call. As Avira says, when other countries attacked, self-defense seems legit
2) a letter to Teiman not making it into codices. How often do we have issues of such importance not making it into halakhic books? do we have examples?
so many good questions!
> drinking is a סרך איסור כרת?
surely, drinking leads to a lot of issurim. Read R Twersky’s books that our community is not immune to that.> can be an example of drinking the way as appropriate for yidden
this is a good idea and is very convincing – especially after a couple of shots! Do I think that when I drink l’chaim (and my neighbor joins me) and then I stop (and he does not), that he will feel an urge to stop when he seems me _walking_ home – or he might still get into his car? Absolutely! (not).> Fortunately, most who do drink, don’t drive and many don’t even have a car.
“Rov” is not good enough measure here. If we don’t do shofar on Shabbos because of someone who might carry it (even as the only ones without eruv are OOTers) – might think twice about drinking atmosphere that createsa permissive environment.> We have to worry that those who wear a sign saying I don’t drink on purim/I don’t get drunk on purim,
you might live in some liberal enclave that I am not aware of. Discussion is not about signs “I don’t drink” but rather about NOT having signs “I am drunk”.> It’s left a deep scar on his psych.
this is way worse than drinking.Kids say that Miami vacations are not cool anymore, Dubai is. So, when there will be a first Pesach hotel on moon and there will be a spirit flight there, the halachik solutions will follow.
Some problems will go away if you stay on a geo-stationary orbit, that is above a specific place on earth. Then, you can apply the times of the closest (Jewish) place on earth, same as you do above the polar circle.
> What did Mir do in Shanghai?
Learn?
Even experienced bikers get into accidents. Also, you are negatively affecting the Jewish people by using bike paths (or even worse, signing petitions to create new ones). You then force Yidden with kids in minivans to squeeze by in the remaining part of the road, leading to a lot of bitul Torah and mental aggravation from being locked up with the kids in traffic while you are enjoying your ride in gasoline-infested air.
Avram > ignores the reality of how smartphones and their apps are designed.
Indeed. I first got struck by that when I let my young kid to play an innocently-looking game, and we had to go somewhere, so I asked to play “until the end of this game”, and he replied – “what do you mean, this game does not end”… But this is also true to any other information source: we are currently at disadvantage: information holders, whether game, search engine, Russian hackers, computer shadchanim – all have information about large number of us and can tune their message to convince us.
I see an analogy here with 19th century disbalance between factory owners and workers, leading to a lot of turmoil in society. We eventually overcame this somehow, and not just by unionizing and killing factory owners, although that happened also. Same should happen with information holders – we should make ourselves smarter and stronger.
Avram > It’s already Adar where you are??
[After taking some time to consider the question] Yes.
While we should respect the elderly, we also need tests – and not just for elderly. Put them all through a battery of tests – IQ, SAT, LSAT, NYT crosswords – as a condition to participate in the debate. It is silly that we are selecting leaders of the free world with less information than the college gets about applicants.
Wolf, kol hakavod. We are not doing yevamos any more as we are not sure we are doing it “for the mitzva”. I am not sure I know people who drink “for the mitzva” also … Given what is going on in our society, not drinking is probably the right thing to do. Even if you personally think you can do it right, you are encouraging others and who knows where they stand.
The question is – what do you do with 4 cups on Pesach? This is a more restricted environment, so my objections above do not hold.
Baby > I see this as a waiting game
Yes, maybe more than just being a passive observer. Most of Tanach is about Jews fighting with each other for this thing or another, I don’t think there ever was an expectation that we should only live on EY and be brothers with other Jews only when everything is according to our favorite hashgoho. Even our most revered Kings were appointed after Shmuel castigated the Jews for their desire to appoint one.
> Israel has a world-class military, world-class firepower, and world-class trained soldiers. The Palestinians have old kalashnikovs, poorly trained fighters, and very little resources. No, it is not a neis nigleh that Israelis can trounce them.
Maybe the fact Israel has a world-class miitary is a neis nigleh?
“halacha was given with galus in mind, ” – where did it have in mind polar circle or southern hemisphere where seasons are upside down?
so, if we are supposed to do hishtadlus for frei yidden, then we probably should meet them where they are – and half of them are in Medinat Israel. Not sure then what “supporting medinah” mean v. other activities? None of us are voting in UN … many gedolim support voting for various reasons …
does working and paying business count as “supporting”? Maybe you consider paying taxes to “medinah” an aveira and prefer to avoid those, or allow taking their money because you will be a better judge of how to use it? I don’t see how this is different from getting into a business partnership with some frei Yidden – I presume you should respect common interest and be an honest partner, while still protecting your keeping shabbos and all. Do you have classical sources how to behave in such partnership?
Gittin 62 from another thread discusses minimizing saying shalom to non-Jews who work in EY during shemitah, maybe that can give some support to your position.
Seems like Gittin 62 revolves around this question – Rav Huna and Rav Ḥisda decide not to stand up for this Rav, who is BT, but still a baal machlokes, but then ask questions and listen to his divrei Torah.
Is it often that Resh Lakish would argue with R Yohanan on the basis of mesorah?
Seemingly, R Lakish has his mesorah _from_ R Yohanan, so he might argue based on his knowledge of how swords are made. Of course, one might read his story as he was a TC before becoming a gangster.
Also, note that R Yohanan “seduced” RL with the offer of his sister as a wife – and RL took him on the offer. Presumably, they waited for the chasaneh until RL showed that he is serious in his learning, so his learning did not diminish his interest in RY’s sister …
Of course, the simplest application of text learning is do the mod job. If the mods were to send me an archive of the posts they rejected, it should be possible to train a mod bot for at least some of that hard work.
Halakha adapted to a lot of things. We have so much of Torah relating to B’M, and we now live without it. Does it mean we need to strive to live on a planet with 7 moons? No, but if we end up there, we will figure out what to do. Maybe do rosh hodesh for each of the moons.
it makes sense to have 12 months by shvatim, but why is BHM the shortest? Let’s have 32 days in February
Re: Rambam and the oaths. I don’t think this has the weight you imply. This is a letter to a subjugated community under duress, and he is trying to stop them from a rebellion that will surely lead to their full destruction. How would Rambam react to a viable Jewish state in EY remains unresolved from that, I think.
We might infer Rambam’s view on desirability of modern Israel in EY here: he asks you to consider the world to be balanced in mitzvos and aveiros and yours to be a deciding factor, so presumably he would just sum up mitzvos v. aveiros in EY to make a decision. I don’t know how to calculate this precisely, but it seems that proportion of Jews keeping shabbat, yomim tovim, kashrut, marrying Jews is way higher than in US or Ukraine for the lst 100 years.
> US makes it a lot easier to be a kolel family than israel does, with limitless opportunities for the women to work, and with better government programs.
Some of the Israeli social programs, as I understand, are directly supporting charedi communities due to their participation in politics, while US programs are geared towards supporting poor who are not able to find work, so they are not available for erliche yiden.
> i will aay that they take from us more than what they give. They are unauthorized to take taxes, yet they do.
there is such a thing as contract. People living together as one country agree on a government system that is entitled to govern within the norms. You are usually free to leave and join some other country if you wish so, but cheating while pretending to “contribute more” will not gain you many friends here or elsewhere. Even if you feel victimized, remember R Huna who refused to pay workers who already “helped himself” is shown to be wrong both min hashamayim and by other Talmidei Chachomim.
> Didn’t chazal cancel mitzvos in order to not do aveiros, like lulav and esrog on shabbos, because maybe, maybe one yiddeleh would carry?
Avira is seeing the light finally and starting to advocate for rescinding the chumros that lead some to see the rest of us as baalei aveira?
Avram, I am not insisting on ranking, just trying to understand the difference. To get to this –
are there TCim that are not ben Torah? learning well, but sometimes reads newspapers?
are there BT that are not TChim? guided by the Torah but not so good at learning it?ok, there is actually bar Torah in Gemora:
Brochos 11 Shmuel to Rav’s son, looks like this is a reference to his father’s sayings.
Sukka 43 – same thing reference to father’s statementOther references (only one in Gemora not to refer to someone’s actual father) seem to assume, like the posters here, that everyone know what this term means, even as it is pretty rare:
Gittin 62 has a Bar Torah Geneva (??) that Rashi explains as “ben Torah” who seems to like to argue – and has no (R) in front of his name.
More Nevuhim mentions that BT understands that even punishment from Hashem is not “bad”
Mishna Berurah uses the term in passing.Avram, I did not know it ended already! seriously, help me with the definition of “ben Torah” – what is the origin and definition of current usage? Gemora is full of discussions about Talmid Chacham should behave, but what do people say in shidduchim when the question is “is he ben Torah”? And is “bat Torah” a too modern term, or a BY graduate qualifies?
Even with TC, there are some ambiguities – Torah supposed to be founded upon middos and affect them and prescribes behavior standards, but there are Gemoras that imply that one can be an imperfect TC not living up to those standards – se Pesachim 49 – TC glutton, Shabbat 63 – nasty like snake, Taanit 4- angry.
CDc learnt shev v’al ta’aseh?! Do they also send out reminders to say “Oseh Maaseh Breishis”?