Visiting the Har Habayis

OK

Moses Montefiore was aware of the ban, and tried to abide by it – he was in a fully closed box, carried around by the Muslims. He was still pelted in the best knesset and said that he won’t do it again. This was in 1855, at the end Crimean war with British having an upper hand. in 1856, Ottomans formally allowed Temple Visits (with individually paid for tickets). Baron Rotschild went up several times despite being admonished by Rabbis, including R Kook. Theodore Hertzl did not go in respect to the ban.

It’s also worth noting an additional concept which is left out of most discussions:
Going up to har habayis is a question of kares.
We find that when dealing with kares, especially in areas where there is room to make mistakes, we go overboard to prevent the slightest chance.

Thus chometz on Pesach is prohibited b’mashehu, even the smallest amount, because consuming it incurs kares.

Likewise, we put tremendous safeguards in place when a woman is a nida, in order to prevent her and her husband from inadvertently stumbling on this severe prohibition.
And the Torah prohibited Yichud with a forbidden woman- one of the very few examples of a siyag min hatorah- because of the issur kares involved.

When we are dealing with a shailoh of kares, and it’s an issue which is given over to regular individuals (as opposed to specific gedolei yisrael who are known for bein yirei shomayim), the proper thing to do is be strict.

There’s no chiyuv to go up to har habayis, and it’s not even clear there is an advantage to going up (instead of just going to the kosel) without having a beis hamikdash to do avodah.

Most of the reasons I’ve seen for going up fall in to one of two categories:
1) emotional, poetic claims- “AH, how amazing it is to finally be back on top after 2000 years! You can feel the kedusha here!”
2) nationalistic claims- we need to assert our sovereignty over Har Habayis, and the way to do so is by going up

The first reason is nonsense. Poetry has no place in halacha. And emotional claims of “feeling” kedusha are made up. (Almost) nobody can truly ‘feel’ kedusha!
(There’s the famous story of the woman who came to Rav. J.B. Soloveitchik asking permission to start wearing a tallis. He told her that she shouldn’t just “jump” into the mitzvah; she should start wearing it without the strings for a while, and them come back to discuss if she is ready to put the strings on.
After a while she came back, and he asked her about her experience. She said “Rabbi, I can feel the holiness in the tallis. I’m truly ready to put the strings on!”
He answered her, “A tallis without the strings is nothing more than a shawl. If you can feel so much holiness wearing a simple shawl, you don’t need to start putting on tzitzis!”)

nationalistic claims are also problematic. Where do we find that we bend the halacha because “nationalism” plays a part?
(We do find cases where chazal permitted certain things, where not doing those things would result in Jews losing out on owning Eretz Yisrael. But here the status quo is not being challenged by the arabs; we’re not in danger of losing control of Har Habayis, in the sense that chazal talk about.)

PS said YWN article also said that going on har habayis can be an issur kareis. Again ,that is incorrect. It’s “merely” transgressing the din of shiluach machanos. Going into the azara betumah would be an issur kareis.

The fact that the religion of Islam (which just copied the jews) does not offer sacrifices is a shtikel proof (as well as many proofs from the Amoroim and the Gemara) that the jews of post-churban did not offer sacrifices on Bamos. This kinda disproves Raavads shita, as NO ONE – including Raavad himself – brought korbonos after the churban.
remeber, if there is no kares or going on Har Habayis, there is no kares for Shita or Ha’alo Chutz – Bamos today would be permitted.
Halacha, only goyim are allowed to bring korbanos today.

“The Gedolim of the yeshiva world said not to go so we can’t go. Conversation over”

Not everyone holds by the hashkafah of the publishers of a social media site, even a frum site. Check with your LRP.

The Rambam’s view is that the sanctity is forever, so there is still a chiyuv kares for defiling the mikdash.

The Rambam ascended the temple mount when he visited! Because it’s allowed to ascend the mount. Just asur to enter the mikdash.

Dear Avira,

Nice guess. But Rav Moshe at times didn’t dissuade his sons from not doing things he held were prohibited. Proving what Rav Moshe’s opinion was from his silence is a fool’s errand. Rav Moshe did not assume he was Hashem’s enforcer on Earth.

“Entering the Temple Mount— in Halacha and Jewish History” available online on the Hakirah site addresses many of the issues discussed here.

Considering tendler is rav moshes only talmid who is modern and Zionist, i think it’s very telling that literally everyone else disagreed with him about rav Moshes views on those subjects.

My rebbe rav belsky was close to rav moshe. I’ve met other talmidim too, but the list is very long and tendler is a complete outsider who went so far as to call on the government to interfere with parts of bris milah that rav Moshe held of and that he personally didn’t like

and the previous one? also spam?
if you send it to spam after it arrives in the inbox, it counts as deletion.

but hey maybe god, I meant mods, found my post tedious.
maybe too religious for such sensitive subjects like people going on har habayis who are too emotional to hear anything related to religion. (from me, of course. not anyone else.)

This is repeated ridiculous motzi shem ra on r Moshe. You are claiming that r Moshe got himself an inappropriate chatan out of all numerous humble students he had. You are disparaging either his own judgment or his parental abilities. Given that his sons became hoshuve rabonim, I don’t see a reason to think his daughter is different.

Avira, exactly, you have a proof that R Moshe raised great children who presumably chose great spouses. People, even gedolim, can disagree. Stop bad-mouthing those who happen not to agree with you.

Many, many gedolim had children who didn’t follow their derech. The fact that most of rav moshes children were not only frum but gedolei torah who grew up in a hostile environment is astounding.

That he had one son in law who turned out to be modern is not surprising; most people at that time were not what we would call yeshivishe, either his daughter wouldn’t fit with a yeshivishe guy and she needs to get married to, or tendler was a bochur who didn’t wear his hashkofos on his sleeve…or it could be he hadn’t developed those shitos yet. The possibilities are numerous, but none of them point to rav moshe being accepting of zionism, modern orthodoxy, or violations of halacha including ascending har habayis.

There’s also no way rav moshe would allow breaking minhag makom, as the rabbonim in yerushalayim had long since forbade the practice, even if (and there isn’t) there was a legitimate heter.

Tendler met his wife in the New York Public Library. He then kept coming back there to meet her. He himself explained this in an interview published in the YU Commentator. By time Rav Moshe got wind of it, he didn’t have too much influence over who she chose to marry.

If you’re going to give the analysis greater weight given his vastly greater intellectual understanding of the underlying science, then you’ll need to put Richard Dawkins and Stephen Hawking way ahead of him

Syag > You seem to have this point of gravitating towards rabbis who step over the line

This might be a bias of the discussion here. Not many people here disrespect Rashi, so I don’t really need to comment on this. And when I quote, say, R Twersky, you don’t object, so you don’t notice that. When I quote someone I know personally, I have a fair mixture of those who have a more traditional or more modern derech. For your benefit, I mention person’s derech sometimes.

My personal derech is to learn Torah from anyone who knows it well, whatever his derech is. And I am offended, in turn, by people who disparage someone just because they happen to disagree with them. I saw enough of Talmidei Chachamim on all sides of politics who do not behave like this.

Avira > Rav Tendler was also not a talmid of MTJ – he was in YU.

You are continue disparaging R Moshe. Now, he did not even read the shidduch resume. Could you please stop.

AAQ – by incorrectly, repeatedly referring to this as being about “someone you disagree with” you make it very clear that you don’t really get it. When someone, for example, makes declarations that are against torah, considers forbidden things permissible, cuts corners where not allowed it isnt a matter of disagreeing. When someone does something wrong, they are doing something wrong. You can’t pull a “different strokes for different folks” in judaism unless halacha is being followed. And you like that people are steeped in academia so you want them to be right, without researching it with those capable of making that determination. No, I don’t think avirah is that person, but you are just as blind as he calling certain rabbis honorable when they have proven themselves otherwise just because you do agree with them.

I provided the first hand shidduch story, as related directly by the protagonist himself.

Syag,
I am not familiar w/ R Tendler’s declarations that are “against Torah”. I am not fully familiar with all he said and did over years, I read some of his science-related work and it was reasonable. He was R Moshe’s s-i-l and not put in herem by him, as far as I know. A quick search shows that R Reuven Feinstein spoke at R Tendler’s levaya. All of this just has to give you a pause before proceeding, but I see no acknowledgement.

tp clarify, I meant his works on Torah & Science, not on pure science. I think hespedim are online. Maybe it is on you to find R Reuven’s hesped and see whether he says what you say.

Dear Avira,

Rav Moshe did not tell his sons that they were doing things that he held to prohibited. He never thought of himself as God’s policeman. Maybe he left that for you.