besalel

when you learn neviyim or ksuvim, according to our yeshivos.

AZOI.IS has every right to feel dejected. It does not matter that the couple is BT or anything else, the decent thing to do would have been to invite (thats really the least one can do) and by not getting an invite the shadchan has every right to send the email. that being said, i dont know if there is any way to “get to the bottom of it.”

apushatayid: youve got it right. zionists are alive only by means of the artificial life provided by satmar and the muslims. they see zionists under the bed, in the sink, behind the door, in the glove compartment of the car, underneath the chair, way up the chimney hole and even deep down inside the toilet bowl.

The Zionists chashvuhu leru’uh and said eretz yisroel ocheles yoishvehu hee thinking yidishkiet would be devoured by the eretz but eloikim chushuv letoiva and was mekabeitz the galuyois, performed open miracles to assist the mitzvis asseh kibbish eretz yisoel and put us on the path of geuleh.

the zionists are fading and the torah is winning. but with winning comes responsibilities. will the torah world be up for the responsibilities?

hakatan, you do know that zionism existed before hertsel, right? the ramban who believed that kibbush eretz yisroel is a mitzveh never heard of hertsel who was born 600 years later. all the mamrei chazal teaching us the importance of living in eretz yisroel were written before hertsel.

what has changed is that the state was born and today it is made up of some zionists of old, some torah jews, some arabs and some goyim. if the trends continue the zionism of old will no longer be a factor in israel within one generation.

there can be no doubt that the zionists of europe(religious and not religious) were not pro-torah and perhaps in some ways ovdei avoda zuru in placing their medina as god. they tried, like you say, to eradicate by force the torah of the sfardim who came and the ashkenazim they can influence. where they made accommodations for torah it was only done in order to further their own agenda and on the theory that the torah will be lost soon. but guess what? they lost and torah won and very soon torah jews will be the overwhelming majority of the state.

i am kind of curious if yeshiva ponovitch will display the flag this year or not and if not if this is the first time it will not.

Although I mostly agree with the OP there are some differences between the average chiloni and a NK. First, the NK are responsible for a terrible chillul hashem and there is nothing worse a person can do. But that is not the main difference. The main one is that the NK do things that do not even serve their own purpose but do so only lehachis – to inflame the passions of others religious Jews. Burning a flag (or a Koran) never helped anyone and is done only to instigate. See, e.g., Pastor Terry Jones. Just as we have felt repulsed by Pastor Jones we feel repulsed by NK.

And this is the major difference between Satmar and NK in the eyes of the hamon am. No one feels negatively towards Satmar the same way they do towards NK even though they share almost identical ideologies towards Zionism. But Satmar does not engage in chillul hashem and does not do things solely to instigate. They have a mehalich they truly believe in and they act responsibly towards pushing their mehalich. You can disagree but you cannot feel negatively towards that.

And I think most American Chareidi Jews would feel negatively towards a chiloni who purposefully acts in a way to instigate against Torah. We do not hate the neighbor who doesn’t know any better and drives a car on shabbos but the neighbor who purposefully drives his car into charedi neighborhoods honking his horn down bar ilan street on shabbos only to instigate the frum are viewed negatively.

pba: even the agudah accepts people who you would consider “modern orthodox” and who dont cover their hair and have named their gemurus after such people. im sure the aguda accepts them not because they have money but because they accept accept shomer shabbos jews of all kind and will accept them even if they were poorer than dirt.

Hakatan: I most certainly would not call myself modern orthodox and would prefer not to be called orthodox either. I’d most prefer the label yid if a label must be issued.

HaKatan: disagreements are welcome and yes the amoraim and rishonim and achronim all used sharp language to point out where they thought the other was mistaken but in their heart of hearts they loved and respected each other.

the posts i enjoy reading the most on this forum are those i usually strongly disagree with but which are articulated in an intelligent, rational, unemotional and respectful way; see, e.g., akuperma.

takkeh: earlier today on this very site Rabbi Hoffman wrote on his entry (which, derekh agav, reads like a clone of the analysis done by Rabbi Ari Senter 2 years ago for Kof K magazine – Nissan 5772, Page 5 – i wonder if rabbi senter gets royalty payments for rabbi hoffmans article), “One last question remains. Why was the Mishna Brurah silent? This author would like to suggest that at the time the Mishna Brurah was written, the other underlying issues were still a factor and had not been adequately resolved. We can conjecture that etc etc etc

I dont see how my maggid shyr is any different.

i heard its better to drink some minute amount of soap (non toxic of course) before consuming matzo because the matzo will go into your digestive tract and mix with the digestive juices and maybe there was some flour in the matzo which you failed to chew down and then it will become chometz before reaching your stomach. so just like when you do hagolo you add a little soap you should do the same before eating matzo. i heard this is not halocho but just a chumrah in order to just be a little more certain. does anyone know the source for this?

along the same lines as HaLeivi, I dont know if its true or not but i heard the chofetz chaim used to sit on seforim given to him for haskomos in order to raise him higher to reach the table on the grounds that it was never learned from. i heard he stopped the practice when a mechabir saw him sitting on one of his seforim and the chofetz chaim was afraid the mechabir was embarrassed and never wanted that to happen again. true or false? i dont know.

yekke: there are some who believe that everyone in the world should be learning and not working. you think they are wrong but you need to be considerate and tolerant of this view even if you disagree and think its wrong. similarly, rav yoel believed that the state of israel is a frustration of gods will. i may think that the dass torah which disagrees is right and that rav yoel is wrong but how can i disagree with rav yoel? i cant. i need to be tolerant of this view even if i disagree and not only that but love the jews who subscribe to this view.

i need to accept that there are beliefs i accept as true but i can’t foreclose the possibility that i am wrong and they are right. in other words, i believe in what i do but i cant say there is no other way.

there is right and wrong but you shouldnt be so sure of your rightness that you become intolerant of a view you think is wrong.

the only positions that i am intolerant of are those which justify evil and are therefore a chillul hashem. a position that its permitted to steal or kill or injure, for example.

we should be able to debate our viewpoints without being intolerant of another’s. the key is to love every jew and treat every person with respect. disagreements have always been part of the jewish dialogue. there is no reason to frustrate disagreements but there is no reason to be intolerant either.

if in the rambam’s time there were already at least four different world views, who are we to regrind ground flour? in my small view, the torah is not a “how to get into heaven for dummies” guide but a guide on how to live a rich life on earth. people disagreed with this view 900 years ago and there will be those who disagree today.

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Perek Tet Zayin.

apushita: its not that i havent seen explanations is that the explanations dont always seem the most plausible. i see toast.

haleivi: to support your point, the tiferes yisroel explains a mishna which speaks out against sichas yeludim, as speaking out against humor which is “light headed babble” and that good humor would be one which you can learn something from it.

on the other hand, we have some stories that really do not come to teach any apparent lesson. for example, a gemoro in shabbis which relates a story of a mother in law pulling the ultimate punking of her daughter in law by getting the daughter in law to light herself on fire. seems hard to find a lesson there. or a gemoro in bava kamma which says chanan bija who couldnt find someone to make change for an old zuz in order to pay someone half a zuz which he owed as a penalty to someone he hit so he fixes the problem by hitting the victim a second time in order to pay him a full zuz. lesson? or the story in sota where the gemara says ever since rebbe died there are no anuvim left in the world and rav yosef says “what about me?” looks like a joke for the purpose of a joke. there are other examples.

maybe its a cultural thing. i think if you look at real sfardishe baalei shiyur like rabbi yosef, ztl, there is humor spread out throughout the shiyurim. it plays a big role. seems to me that culturally, that part of the world had humor as a very regular part of life. conversely, rabbi yisroel salant, listed 13 important values in life and did not include humor as one of them. the gaon, who came from lita also refused to see idle humor in shas (and for example, explains rav yosef’s statement to be talking about someone named ‘anna’ and not that rav yosef was trying to be funny. and explains sasson and simcha to be teaching a deeper lesson.)

or maybe there are some that are like this (lesson teaching jokes) and some are like that (just jokes) and some of those that i fail to see a lesson in its because i havent delved into them enough. or maybe all of them have lessons. i am open to the idea that my theory is wrong and that i just need more convincing. i dont pretend that i am always right.

Haleivi: I believe the purpose of both story one and story two is to be humorous. We have enough instances throughout shas where the purpose is to be humorous or entertaining that I am ok seeing the toast and not the Jesus. Of course there are those that see the Jesus and I am not there to argue with them and tell them I’m right and you’re wrong. I’m just saying I see toast. Of course not all aggaditeh are meant that way but many are.

haleivi: it does not trouble me greatly to believe that the gmara wasnt precise in its recollection of a story that does not perform a haluchaic function. i understand that there are some (many) who disagree. i, personally, would need much more “of a reason” (to use your words) to change a girsa which implicates haluchu.

although i havent seen this explanation anywhere i dont think its unreasonable to conclude that the gemara quoting sasson and simcha as heretics was a typo. i say this because there is nothing heretical in what they say and the very next story is about a heretic with the same name. i think its not unreasonable to conclude that the heretic is only in story two and the identification of these men as heretics in story one is a typo. again, this is not a pshat i have seen anywhere – just personal reflections.

in the times of the second beis hamikdash we had the abtinas family and the garmo family. today we have shietel machers, those who sell matzo and arba minim in their place.

So I sat down with my boys to watch the film. Absolutely brilliant. The music was incredible. The storyline was genius. The script was fantastic. The only negative thing I can say is the animation was not perfect but knowing how time consuming and expensive animation can be you can’t blame them. And it genuinely seems like the producers considered the possibility that kids will be influenced negatively and made a concerted effort to avoid the problem. The film was an absolute home run and I hope it becomes successful enough to warrant further productions.

whats troubling is not the ban itself. the rabbonim are certainly entitled to their position. what saddens me is the language used in the ban “divoeineninu vedivoin eneinu” calling the script “marid” and using the term “racmunu litzlnun” isnt that overkill? wouldnt it be more rational and measured to simply state – we dont believe you should buy this. why all the drama? at some point people are going to stop running to the call of wolf.

Logician said: There are very clear statements that certain Gedlom advised against emigration to America DESPITE the obvious dangers in Europe.

I heard the following story from someone who was present. Rav Zelig Epstein ztl, once recounted that certain individuals within Mir were scared of the situation as it was unfolding before WWII and found a way to get papers to go to China. They asked the roshei yeshivos at the Mir what to do and were told not to get the papers to China because everything was going to turn out okay in Europe. The bochrim went out and got the papers anyway. When things got bad they were able to get everyone out. When Rav Zelig was telling this story the listeners asked him how could the Mir Bochrim do such a thing and go against “daas torah.” he responded by saying, “this story happened before daas torah was invented.”

I would like to take issue with the term HaKatan uses for the army which is shmad, or to destroy. The term has historically meant to make someone not observant anymore. It is probably true that the army causes one to lose his or her chareidi culture (or furthers a decision by one to do so) but it is not fair to call someone who is no longer chareidi as destroyed. I do not mean to minimize the loss of someone’s chariediness as someone who has a deeply-held, sincere, religious belief should not be forced to walk away from it. For someone who is chareidi it is a tragedy to make them no longer chareidi. But it is not shmad or destruction for that person to become an observant non-chareidi. nor do i take any position about the “share the burden” legislation as I hear both sides, am not intimately involved or familiar with the law and am confused about the whole thing myself. but calling it shmad is wrong. i grew up in a chassidishe environment and have rachmunu litzlan seen many of my classmates/friends go on to completely lose their religion. these kids’ parents would be thrilled if their children were now no longer chassidic but observant. what has happened to them is shmad. losing your chareidiness, while tragic in its own way, is not shmad. since so many of those who serve in the army come out observant using the term shmad is offensive because it suggests that anyone who is not chareidi is “destroyed.” this is not fair and inflammatory.