What is your most controversial opinion?

Let me try once more.

If I let this without rebuttal I’m afraid of ??? ?????? ??????? ?? ????.

Oomis, Feif, and anyone else who’s against Torah study.

There’s a big difference between one who must go to work, while being truly ????? Torah, and those of you with attitudes like “what’s he doing for the world anyway..”, “obligated to work at least half, presumably more..” etc. Again as I wrote, “where the wife consents”.. there is nothing greater. Obviously, it’s not for the wife your sticking up for, it’s the Torah learning you’re against. I’m truly sorry for having been brought up with Torah – true values.

And Simcha613, I’m, too, referring to to real Torah study. One enough to share with the wife and supporters.

Again this is all when feasible. When not, we apply the ruling ???? ????? ??????. (hey, did that come from some Talmud somewhere?) But an all out “KOLLEL LIFE IS TERRIBLE”, “say no to learning” sounds like pre-Chanuka days. Let me be a Modern Day MACABI. Whoever is for HaShem and His Torah, let’s hear it.

Oh, one more thing. People should be learning, and I mean LEARNING more Navi. The moral lessons there are powerful and important.

I agree with lots of the posts here…I must be very controversial…

ZeesKite: I’m not opposed to Torah study. God forbid! I study Torah all the time. I’m just opposed to the modern kollel system.

No educational institution should honor someone who does not live the ideal lifestye (however they define it).

Any man who is not willing to honor their commitments as written in the Kesubah has no business getting married.

If anyone makes a statement, it is OK to question whether they have ulterior motives. (And I do mean anyone.)

“Yehuda Tzvi- If women have a chiyuv to bentsch then why not to make a mezuman?”

I said they should.

“With that logic if women have a chiyuv to daven then why not make a minyan?”

Because they don’t have a chiuv for minyan. There are those who hold they have a chiuv for mizuman. MY opinion is that this should be followed and not poo-pooed as something controversial.

147 – Good for you. More people should do it and yeshivos should stress it.

Our whole understanding of atoms and subatomic particles is simplistic. One day, our whole ‘particle’ universe will be turned on its head like the old astronomy.

Longarekel: “2)Tallis and Tefillin should be worn by mincha, Tallis by maariv. 3)all boys should wear talleisim and cover their head with it. 4)ben shmone esrei l’chupa. 5)One should not live in eretz yisrael today. 6)the yemenite havara is accurate. 7)it is not necessary mai’ikar hadin to wear a yarmulka. 8)there is no mitzva to do kiruv unless the non-religious person is a child or a tinok shenishba. 9)shaving the beard is in most cases an issur d’oraisa many times over. 10)the kashrus industry is (for the most part) treif. being so involved in gashmius is not kosher(like having 35 flavors of potato chips,45 flavors of ice cream etc.) 11)yeshivos should learn tanach and shma’atsa aliba d’hilchisa. I have other opinions which I’ll save for another time.”

I’ll address some of these because I’m not sure where you get them from.

2) The only thing I can disagree with is Tefillin. It’s enough to wear it when the Shulchan Aruch limited it to. If Chazal decided that we are only capable of wearing Tefillin for that little each day, then that’s all we can do.

3) Why? The Mishnah Brurah 91:2? That’s a Zohar that most people who wear Taleisim aren’t even Yotzei anyway.

4) Hal’vei that we can all find the right person by then.

5) I saw your earlier comment on that. It was ridiculous and deserves to response. You created an Aveira to call it a Mitzvah Haba’ah B’aveira.

6) True but irrelevant. We have our Mesorah.

7) You mean because the Nosei Keilim in Siman 2 call it only a Midas Chassidus? See Taz 8:2. And K’lal Yisrael has accepted it as a Minhag. And Orach Chayim 91:3 says that while Davening (and probably learning too) or in a Beis Medrash you need to wear one.

8) I’d be interested to see a source for that. All the Poskim and Gedolim now seem to assume that anyone capable of doing it can. 9) How so? An electric shaver should be Mispara’im K’ein Ta’ar and Muttar (I think, I haven’t learned that Sugya in a very long time).

longarekel: 7)it is not necessary mai’ikar hadin to wear a yarmulka.

S”A is pretty much mashma the same

–

???? ???? ????? ????? ??? ??? ?? ???? ????? ????

It’s mashma that only walking bekoma zekufa is ossur however, the next halacha is advice. I saw in halacha berura in the back that discusses it at length, and concludes that it’s only middat chassidut to wear a yarmulka.

147: Recitation of Tachnun on Yom ha’Atzmaut, and Yom Yerusholayim; Tachnun has no place in the liturgy of these 2 important holidays.

Prove to me that nowadays we can be metaken our own holidays. And I’m not talking about herzl, begin and other reshoim that have no say or place in true Torah Judiasm, but even the Gedolim nowadays don’t have that power.

Controversial opinions? This sounds like fun. I have a couple.

I believe in complete separation between state and religion. The same way it is in Europe – much more than in the US.

(For Americans: in Europe, in most countries, for example, the *only* way to legally get married is a civil marriage via your local municipality / council. Religious ceremonies, whether performed by a rav, a priest, imam, or anyone else, do not have any relevance or any standing for the law. The only place one can get legally married for the law is via the government.)

Mixing state with religion only gives trouble. I believe Israel should dismantle the “Rabbanut”. The state should focus on being a state – and religious people should focus on managing their own affairs.

Why? Because that will guarantee freedom of religion – without the government’s interference. I am referring, for example, to the Rabbanut being forced by a court to grant a hechsher to a bakery owned by “J for youknowwho’s”, or the court ordering the Rabbanut to allow people with fake IDF ‘conversions’ to register for marriage.

Totally separating state from religion will allow each and every person to lead their life the way they want it. Each religion can practice its own practices.

I would even go as far as to say that, that being considered, I don’t even oppose gay marriage. Again: freedom. If they want to do that, let them. Why should I care? Why should I force my views on others? I just don’t care, and I don’t see the problem. I really don’t understand why Americans care so much about this issue in New York at the moment either – what does it matter? Why does it bother you? Let them be happy… it’s their issue, not yours.

Uneeq: Rav Schachter explains very well why feels that we are able to do such a thing (interestingly enough, he holds based on a Ramban that Yom Ha’atzma’ut is much more important than Yom Yerushalayim.) If you actually are interested, search for it on YUTorah. He’s given the Yom Ha’atzma’ut Shiur many times, I’m sure it’s on there.

ZeesKite: Those who are in Kollel because it is popular ruin it for everyone else. That is what you see here, how the “sitters” and “kollel bochrim” cause Sinah for Lomdei Torah (and it is something that will have to be answered for).

“females should dress with an awareness that they are going into the PUBLIC arena before they go out. no, not don’t look. don’t wear!”

Git gezugt.

Wow, I agree 100% with Chassidic Gatesheader

I am sure none of you agree with me on any of these

Kars-4-Kids not telling people where the money goes, (I am not against raising the money for yeshivas. Just tell people you are)

Askans (I think alot of our disputes here would be elimimated of the “ASKAN” was removed)

“Hemish” kashruth stickers put on products like Twizzlers and Mike & Ike

Educational System. Secular Studies is almost totally eliminated when many times its needed for life like Math, Proper english skills (The grammar in some of the English Seforim is TERRIBLE), boys are not allowed breaks for anything because its “Bittul Torah” like sports for exercise

The myth of what judiasm was like 50,100 or more years ago. This was even obvious here when people were debating what frum women dressed like. People who lived then said one thing and others said it wasnt true. Its even more so when Shtel life was like. Bnei Brak or Kiryat Joel is not remotely like the Shtel was like in Europe.

Evolutionary mechanisms (not necessarily Darwinian) are a plausible way of explaining variety in species

That this popa character is hilarious.

gaw- but they turn it into much more. ayin shum, and what the rebbe said doesnt make it any easier to be dan likaf zchus.

Fair enough.

But we should not try to force anyone. I believe that if I want others to respect me, then I must also respect them. And as long as what they do isn’t against the law and as long as they don’t do it in public, I see no reason why I should care. It’s other people’s private business.

I do care. None the less, I won’t force the issue for the reasons you say.

Gatesheader and gavra:

To be consistent and avoid hypocricy, you surely support legal polygamous marriage which is far far less problematic (to put it mildly) than homosexual marriage. Fundamentalist Mormon’s practice it, and you surely do not want to interfere with their religious practices, as you’ve put it. And Sefardic Jews also can do it (they only don’t because it violates secular law; but once it’s legalized they can marry as such.)

According to the Rambam, the moon is a spiritual place and not a physical place meaning the moon landing is impossible

Rav Yaakov Kammentzky according to his son wanted to see the moon landing see if the Rambam was false. So he watched the landing on TV and saw the moon landing.

Later accounts of the story removed the fact that CH”V Rav Kammentsky watched TV

I actually find it disgusting, with or without the Torah. I don’t ‘wish it weren’t in the book’! Perhaps I am influenced by the Torah, but is that worse than what influences the rest of America? Lo Tehei Torah Shleima Shelanu Kesicha Beteila Shelhem. And I have the right and reason to vote for and against what I personally feel appropriate.

I don’t advocate legislating Succah or even Eiver Min Hachay, but I’m all for laws against society-debasing behaviors.

sushe: (most)sefardim follow a tshuvas rashba who says that the chosson makes a shvua when he gets married not to marry an additional wife. I believe this is normative practice today among sefardim.

Longrakel: yet not all sefardim. i.e. the Teimanim can marry multiple.

My point still remains.

Oomis, Feif, and anyone else who’s against Torah study.

There’s a big difference between one who must go to work, while being truly ????? Torah, and those of you with attitudes like “what’s he doing for the world anyway..”, “obligated to work at least half, presumably more..” etc. Again as I wrote, “where the wife consents”.. there is nothing greater. Obviously, it’s not for the wife your sticking up for, it’s the Torah learning you’re against. I’m truly sorry for having been brought up with Torah – true values. “

Whoa, don’t hold back, tell us what you really think! First of all, please do me the courtesy not to tell me I am against Torah study. Perhaps you did not actually read what I wrote, and if you did, you did not comprehend one word of it.

I believe with all my heart that a Jewish man has an obligation to learn Torah (if he is capable of same, not all men are) every single day, for some portion thereof. I also believe that if he is getting married, his primary obligation according to the kesubah, is to provide for his wife and family. It is not HER obligation or her parents’ obligation to do so. If and when they do, it is a chessed on their parts. But it is no chessed to force her to work twice as hard as need be in today’s two-income necessity per family, in order for her to pick up the slack her husband is leaving by not doing his fiscal share.

I have seen wives who were wearied and harried and bone-tired from trying to be all things to their husbands and families, while the husband sat all day in the Beis Medrash. THAT is not the Torah way, you can say it 1,000 times to the contrary, but that does not make it any more right than being a frum guy who sits in an OFFICE all day and night and makes NO time for learning, even if he IS providing everything his family could desire. Both are situations that leave something to be desired.

Not all women have the luxury of Bubby watching the children for them, either. More often than not, a non-Jewish, non English-speaking housekeeper is raising our precious children for the better part of the day, in lieu of the person who has been entrusted with their care. THAT’S what Hashem wants? Sorry, but I don’t buy it. It’s not enough to learn Torah. One must LIVE Torah.

There are a relative VERY few iluyim whose learning brings great zechuyos and light to the world. Unquestionably, these are people who should be doing nothing but learning, because they are our next generation of Gedolim and leaders. But every boy cannot be and is not an iluy, and most of them can manage to earn a living and learn as well, in the course of a day. They are more than comfortable however, in leaving that achrayus to their wives and shvers, and convincing themselves that they are doing it to “support the world” through their learning. It is THAT mentality which I personally find problematic. It causes that ubiquitous mindset of entitlements that has become pervasive in many of the full-time learning families. That is not an opposition to learning Torah. It is an opposition to using learning Torah as an excuse to avoid one’s responsibilities. “Im ein kemach, ein Torah.” I did not make that phrase up.