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Myfriend,
Rabbi Broyde cites various “Rabbonim,” to use your term, who are matir Thanksgiving observances. Certainly there is no Jewish obligation to celebrate the day. But that’s a far cry from ever being pejorative of those who allow such activity, which is what you were with your post.
EDITED
Rabbi Michael Broyde authored a comprehensive analysis of the issue. He cites both sides of the debate, and essentially concludes that there is upon whom to rely in allowing a celebration of the holiday.
As it happens, I wore my black hat today. I rarely ever wear it, but somehow I had the urge this morning. It produced a few stares from the chassidim at Mincha who are used to seeing me in a gray or taupe hat. But thanks Helpful for letting me know that a Stetson is also oisgehalten. Is the tear drop crown an acceptable variation as well? As to the Homburg, when I was in college I made a pact with my chavruseh and best friend at the time, that we would both buy homburg hats on our 40th birthdays. When I turned 40 last year I called him and asked him to be mochel the chov as I don’t feel “old” enough to wear one, and we agreed to push off the purchase for another five years and reassess the situation then. And indeed I do most definitely wear a straw colored straw hat from Memorial Day until Labor day. I actually have two of them. One was a gift from my boss.
I was teased mercilessly over my middle name, Beno, my paternal grandfather’s name, who was martyred in Auschwitz. While I didn’t enjoy the teasing, I never “blamed” the name, rather the morons who poked fun at it. Telling them how he was murdered usually shut people up pretty good.
On a related note, what is it about the high crown and super wide brim that found favor among yeshiva leit? Personally, I think the Boraslino is too much hat for most heads. I much prefer the look of the Stetson fedoras. My true love however would be for the return of the homburg; the king of the hats.
There are so many biblical names that are not ever used. The names of the sons of the shvatim are never given (anyone ever meet someone named Chushim?). Zlaphchad was a tzaddik as were his daughters. With the exception of the occasional Tirzah and rarer yet Noa, their names have disappeared. The subject is a doctoral dissertation waiting to be written.
Myfriend nailed it.
What do you say when invited to wedding, held in a swanky country club, on a Sunday, and they order you a sealed, airline style meal (so kashrus is assured)to the invitation? I can’t make it because….. ?
Sure, you could make an excuse once, twice, a second time, But after a while, they see thru it and you look anti-social.
Think that’s a sticky situation? Hows this: You get invited to a mixed marriage. Do you go, and in effect, give this union your seal of approval? OK, this may not women in such a bind. But I(to the goyish velt) look very much like a Rabbi. In fact, more so than the “Brooks Brothers” rabbi who just performed the ceremony.
How do I get out of that one? Best bet: leave work at work.
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In the first instance one goes to the affair, is grateful for the thoughtful gesture of the host in ordering a kosher meal, and makes sure to congratulate the celebrants. In the second instance, one demurs going, explaining that while s/he wishes the young couple much happiness in life, given the very sensitive nature of the intermarriage issue, and given current Orthodox sensibilities, it would be inappropriate to attend. One then asks the host to please understand that it isn’t personal nor is it a matter of being judgmental. It’s simply a matter of religious sensibilities. Assuming one has generally been a mentsch until that point, and not inconsistent in his/her religious conduct at work, no offense should reasonably be taken.
What, pray tell, is the issue?
MyFried, it’s very slim pickins in my neck of the woods.
Aries and Real Brisker, what might you say to those of us who were in the schul before the rabbi arived, and voted against his candidacy?
I always read during the rabbi’s speeches for two simple reasons. 1. He sees fit to read a sefer during my Chazarat Hashatz. If he won’t pay attention to me, when I present davening that hearkens back to the neviim and chazal, why should I pay attention to him and 2. The books I bring with me are far more interesting to me than his drashot. As it happens, I’ rather grateful for his long winded speeches. I’ve gotten alot of useful reading done.
While we’re on the subject, has anyone noticed that the quality of rabbinic homoletics has seriously declined? Rabbis used to deliver some sort of learned exegesis, or at least some moral and ethical teachings. Now all I ever hear is silly and trite “feel good” drivel. It’s basically Deepak Chopra with a Jewish lilt. Where have our orators gone?
How about Italian products. After all the Romans put us in galut. If we are to limit this discussion to holocaust era culpability, why draw the line at Germany? Eichmann testified that no country more enthusiastically embraced the extermination of Jews more than Hungary. Why not boycott Hungarian products, including its tourism industry? How about Polish, Ukranian, Lithuanian,Romanian or Latvian products. How about Sweden which was a German ally, albeit a neutral one? How about the Swiss? Remember they closed their borders to Jews and actually deported illegal Jewish aliens. How about America (remember the St. Louis, or the refusal to bomb the tracks into Auschwitz)?
I’m all in favor of punishing those who harmed our people, but why only the Germans?
As one who has practiced law for fifteen years, Akuperma is completely wrong about the practice. Law is what you make of it. Rarely are people completely “innocent” or entirely “guilty.” Like the rest of life, there are significant gray areas. Most disputes are often honest misunderstandings of the facts with the sides having divergent interpretations or recollections. Having said that, there are honest lawyers and dishonest ones. The betters ones, those who are well respected and the most successful, in my experience, are the honest ones.
I can’t imagine any father who beheld his son at his bris, who ever invested an ounce of effort into building his daughter’s self esteem, who worried one sleepless night over his children could ever be so cavalier about… exposing his kids to OTD friends.
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You’re mixing issues. Who my children socialize with is not the same as who should not be kicked out of a school. Moreover, I’m getting a sense that the “velt” is very quick to label someone as OTD, when in fact the child just not fill every nook and crany of the “mold.”
WIY, I’m going out on a limb here, but do you have children? I can’t imagine any father who beheld his son at his bris, who ever invested an ounce of effort into building his daughter’s self esteem, who wvwe worried one sleepless night over his children could ever be so cavalier about such an issue. Frow up, have some kids of your own, love them, and then let’s talk.
I forgot, the Talmud refers to Kimchis and Beruriah by name.
Ben Torah, where does the Torah refer to Mrs. Avraham Avuinu, Mrs. Yitzchak Avinu, or Mrs. Yaacov Avinu? I don’t recall a mention of Mrs. Moses Rabbeinu either. Devorah is not ever referenced in terms of her husband, and now that I’m thinking about N”ach, where is Mrs. David Hamelech mentioned?
Isle of Jura, Dewer’s Aberfeldy (it’s Dewars single malt and absolutely divine), Johhny Walker Green (in my opinion, while not quite as good as Blue is so good that it’s not the worth paying extra for the Blue), and of course, the true apple of my eye,the Edradour.
Ben Torah, what then is your justification for women working outside the home; i.e. the entire structure of the kolel system?
The Jewish Week. It’s the only local Jewish newspaper written in English.
Wolf, you assume too much.
WIY- “I look neat for the most part” and what about the other part(s)? I looked up “shluchy” in English, Yiddish, German and Hebrew dictionaries, and found nothing. What language is it, and what does it mean? Moreover, my comments were something of a generalization of how yeshiva leit often look. I intended no real ad hominen comment.
Shave every day. Good grooming is also part of being an ehrlich Yid. I never understood why so many yeshiva leit, consistently look like they sleep in their clothes and have such poor personal habits. Is it really so difficult to keep one’s clothing presentable, shave and comb one’s hair? Is there such a dearth in kavod atzmi these days?
Ben Torah
Member
Making of a Gadol was banned by the Gedolim shlita, and hence is completely unreliable.
Reply: Actually that is the best testament to its reliability. But be that as it may, this conversation has easily dovetailed into the issue of appropriate supervision of our children; an age old dilemma. How do parents teach their children to be independent people, and still protect them from harm until they develop good judgment? As Will Rogers put it: “I got my good judgment from experience. I got my experience from bad judgment.” I don’t think there is a universal answer. But I think any answer begins with two basic premises: 1. Know your children. Make an honest assessment of who your kids are, what are their individual strengths and weaknesses. Do what you can to amplify the strengths, as it is those characteristics that provide the basis for good judgment. At the same time, make your children aware of their weaknesses in a way that enables them to manage them. The key to this is communication. Your children can only learn from you if they feel safe “failing” in front of you. My son, when he was about 7 or 8 years old, once went to a friend’s house and they were playing on the computer. Somehow they innocently stumbled upon an adult site, looked at it briefly decided it was “yucky” and moved on. When he came home he told me about it, asking why anyone would want to go to such a “stupid web page.” It gave me and my wife a perfect opportunity to teach him something about human dignity and tzniyut. The key to imparting the message was to not get angry that he saw something we would have preferred he not see. We had a decent talk about things and that was that. Will the message have to be repeated when he enters his teen years and his perspective on such things changes? Of course it will; probably many times. But hopefully we’ve laid a bit of a foundation to do so. And while I am very concerned for the future, I have to set boundaries for myself too. The only way my kids will feel secure in approaching me with such issues, is if they know I’m not looking under their mattresses behind their backs. Be forthright with your kids. Their trust is not a G-d given right. It’s a privilege to be earned. 2. Lead by example. You don’t want your kids looking at certain websites, reading certain types of literature or watching certain types of television programs, refrain from them yourself. Kids hate hypocrites, and hate hypocritical parents most of all.
As one who favors a high level of formality in schul, especially on Shabbat and Yom Tov, I sympathize with the OP. There should be dress codes, at least informal understandings of what is acceptable. Some formality adds to the dignity of the place and the subject matter at hand. At the same time, better the people come, even if informally attired, than be put off by the formality and not come at all.
I live in the Monsey area. The local library is always patronized by chareidim. And due to the demographics, the library responds in kind. It has a large judaica section, and an even larger Yiddish section. As a community resource, it aims to serve the community.
Those who suggest that the frum world has created enough literature so as to obviate the need for our children to read any secular literature, are deluding themselves. Great works of literature are great and become “classics” because they are both timeless and universal. Take a relatively benign example of Tolsty’s Ivan Ilyich, who imparts so much to us about how to live a fulfilling life, in his failure to do so, and then what it is like to see the hope and dreams of life fade away when it too late to make things right. Does not Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness not give us a window into the heart of evil? Does not Lord Jim teach us something about repentance? Fitzgerald’s Gatsby slaps us in the face with own venality. I could go on. I can’t think of a single contemporary work of Judaic literature that come near to those great works.
Libraries are also research centers. Children should learn and know how to use those resources. The sooner they start, the sooner they can begin to think and look at the world independently. The only reason not to expose a child to the library is because one wants to close the world off from him. But “mayim genuvim yimtaku” and doing so only increases the temptation to access that which is denied them. Or as the old joke goes “. . .Oib kenst Ich nisht geyin ariber di vant, az gei Ich arunter. . .”
Tomim, indeed I didn’t consider “Ein simcha k’hatorat hesfeikot.” Your diyuk seems most prescient in this discussion. BTW I’m not convinced, based upon that bloggers own writings, that he is in fact a non-believer. I think he might be going through a period of intense introspection, self doubt and self castigation.
WellInformedYid, the question is not if belief is less stressful than non-belief. The question is if non-belief is less stressful than doubt, and if belief relieves more stress vis-a-vis doubt than does non-belief. On a more parochial level, the article you cite has philosophical value if one buys into the “Pascal’s Wager” justification for belief (that the potential payoff of theism, both corporeally and possibly non-corporeally, vastly outweighs both the corporeal inconvenience of leading a theistic life as well as the potential incorporeal punishment for not doing so, thus necessitating transactional theism). That notion was not seriously pursued in Jewish thought and in fact seems to be rejected in the Talmud. Consider “All tihiyeh k’avadim hameshamshim et harav k’dei l’kebel pras. . .”
It’s interesting. There is a blog out there whose author claims to be an Orthodox rabbi who no longer believes in G-d. He says his agnosticism/atheism is psychologically liberating. I think that doubt is a big burden. At times it’s a necessary burden and even a worthwhile one; but a burden nonetheless. But I’m not sure that belief provides any more relief than does non-belief. Nor am I convinced that either one quantitatively resolves more conflicts/questions/doubts.
What’s the purpose of this thread? Mindless lashon hara? Will anything said here make a difference anywhere? Shut it down.
The comedian was Michla Rosenberg, a well known Yiddish comedian. He used this character in other settings as well. The Hy Elokeinu he sang is a cantorial piece by Oscar Julius, well know choir leader in the 1920’s-1950’s(?). Moishe Oysher sang it with great success.
The current style of yeshivish dress hearkens back to the Alter of Slabodka, who encouraged his students to dress like middle class European business men; a hat, jacket, pressed trousers and a waistcoat. He felt that if his students dressed and looked dignified, they would act dignified and their characters would be refined in the process.
I also seem to recall that R. Moshe Feinstein held it is forbidden to strike. But R. Moshe is not the only authority. R. Kook, before he moved to Israel, paskened that a local rav can refuse to pasken shailes if the kehilla does not pay the contracted for salary. Moreover, other rabbanim were to respect the strike and not pasken for the kehilla if question if asked. Thus a kehilla could find itself without someone to resolve kashrut questions, or more importantly questions about tahrat hamishpacha. Additionally there were charamot on rabbis assuming pulpits until the prior rav was paid any money owed him. I think the two situation are arguably analogous.
If he’ll place chazzanut on top, I’m all in favor of his war.
“g73, it seems to me that Rashi is saying that Yitzchok waited until she was 3 to marry her because she was then “raoi l’biah”; this implies that they did indeed “get married” when she was that age. At age 13, according to Rashi, Rivka was capable of becoming pregnant, so that Yitzchok waited 10 years from that point before concluding that she was an akarah. “
I think you have it backwards. The gemara derives the principle of “bat 3 shanim reuyah l’biah” since it is possible, based on calculations derived from the text that Yitzchak was 37 at the Akeidah and this Rivkah was three at their marriage. Yitzchak did not wait for Rivkah to turn three in order to comport with the Halachik norm. Rather the Halachik point is derived from his conduct. But that Halachik point really says nothing about the history involved. All it says is that since, theoretically, Rivkah might have been three at her marriage, a three year old girl is physically capable of biah (i.e. that the simanei betulah will not regenerate).
“The Ibn Ezra writes that Yitzchak was 13 at the akeidah, which means it would be another 24 years until Sarah died. In that case, all the events mentioned there didn’t occur at the same time, so there is no way of knowing how old Rivkah was at her wedding.”
The Ibn Ezra does not in fact opine on how old Yitzchak was at the time of the Akeida. Rather he comments on what the simple menaing of the word “na’ar” is and says that it normally refers to a lad of approximately 13. But he does not do any of the calculations traditionally done to make this determination.
The Midrash Rabbah states that Yitzchak was 37 at the Akeidah. But it also contains a variant reading in parenthesis of 26, which is consistent with the Seder Olam Rabbah’s statement that Rivkah was 14 when she married.
The Seder Olam Rabbah (Ratner Ed) clearly says she was 14 when she married Yitzchak.
The Talmud Torah in Kisvarda had such a minyan. They even had a “gabbai” who sold the kibbudim, just like in the Groisse Schul. That money was paid to the Kehilla for rent of the room in the Talmud Torah for the minyan and use of a Sefer Torah. It was a serious enterprise.
slow
Derech HaMelech, it’s been a long time since I saw i that Toseffta; some 25 or so years. I’m relying on girsa d’yankusa in my reference to it.
I always thought that the source for annointing oneself with Havdalah winde was a Toseffta in Pesachim that says that psiah gassah takes away 1/60th of one’s eyesight. The cure is Havdalah wine.
I have no issues, as I use bronf’n the year round for Havdala; scotch generally and slivovits or arak on Peasch. My zeides and ihr zeides on both sides of my family were noheg thus.
As a teenager my father was critically ill, dying of leukemia actually. My mother spent weeks and months with him in the hospital seeing to his needs. My sister and I were essentially orphans with living parents. Thee was a very kind lady in our community, who often cooked for us for Shabbat. The feasts this lady made for us were fit for a king. Stuffed cabbage, brisket, kugels, soup, cake, side dishes etc. From one shabbos of her’s we ate for ten days. And it was done out of the blue completely, and simply to be nice.
During the same time in my life, an aunt, who was no especially loved in our family (for reasons I never understood), noticed I had holes in my shoes and my suit was ridiculously small. One day she showed up at our house and took me shopping. New shoes feel very good when the old ones don’t function.
I’ve never forgotten those gratuitous acts of kindness done to a kid who was lonely, scared and in need. Ki avi v’imi azavuni, vaHashem y’aa’sfeini.
According my father z”l I’m a mazik, if that helps.
Professor Menachem Friedman, one of the authors of new biolgraphical study of the Lubavitcher Rebbe, summed up the issue wonderfully during a private conversation some twenty years ago: “Habayah im hachozrei b’tshuvah hi SH’BE’EMET hem maaminim.” FFB’s are very uncomfortable in the presence of true believers and sincere seekers of the Truth. The flip side is that BT’s are fanatics as described by Sir Winston Churchill: “A fanatic is someone who can’t change his mind and won’t change the subject.” Nuff said.
Two quotes from English philosopher, David Hume, are often misstated. What he actually said was: “You cannot eat your cake and have it” and “The proof of the pudding is in the eating.”
Nothing I post, ever makes it through. The moderators squelch any honest conversation on any topic of intellectual weight. G-d forbid people here actually do some serious thinking about issues I guess.
Why are my posts constantly deleted? I’m starting to feel very unwelcome in these parts.
Kitniyot …..was the invention of the foolishly pious.
the hoary old custom
It’s high time that Ashkenazim abandoned this silly practice of not eating Kitniyot on Pesach
Yes, almost all your posts are deleted. I don’t want to give the specific reasons so as not to embarrass you. The readers can decide for themselves.
As it happens cherrybim I too save my better suits for Shabbat or Yom Tov. But if I have a VERY big court appearance or meeting I might break the rule. As to the shirts, you’re right there are times when a white shirt is a must. But a regular Shabbat, especially Friday night when I wear slacks and a blazer to schul (yes with a tie), I go with the colors.
We tend to socialize with the same group of friends every Shabbat. I do have one particular Shabbat practice though it’s not a hard and fast rule. I prefer wearing colored shirts on Shabbat. I think they are nicer than plain white. Thus I save them for Shabbat or Yom Tov.