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I am confused with responses here: some deny chazon ish would let anyone into the army, others saying that army changed, then a hint that this material is correct but there is something else. Why is it so hard to bring up relevant information from the most famous leaders?
I think some disrespectful sentences inop are not from Prof. Brown but from the article, follow quote marks. Professor is at Hebrew University and is studying various charedi and general Orthodox topics. There is 2013 lecture on chazon ish on yutorah.
Yya, I understand your argument and I don’t defend anti religious activities. Still, your defence of Arab regimes is a sign that there are weaknesses in your position. The idea that it was ok for jews to live under “secular ” socialist dictatorships is very insensitive. Those regimes prosecuted a lot of groups not just zionists.
It is a difficult question why zionists were zoche to understand the dangers of 20th century and others tragically didn’t. I am not proposing theological explanations, just suggesting we look honestly at the facts. Note that zionists were not always so proactive. It took them some time before they stood by jews in the soviet union, who were in harder and longer suffering than Sephardim.
Yya, I am saying that in order to achieve a reform, you need a support of supermajority. If your current attempt to change is supported by 51% vote, it might not happen. Don’t get bogged down in details of who voted for what and what was blocked. Try to create a position that unites more people around it. That might mean changing yours a little bit. It is not easy, I understand. It is easier to say, like Yankel does- we are going to fight each other our way, don’t interfere with your lessons from other places. Then take the lessons from the times of BM2 and how it was impossible to stop all groups fighting each other.
Yya, I am glad that you criticized just one person on my list! Or maybe you are just starting.. the reason Mendelssohn is first on the list is because he was earlier. I believe r Hirsch is respectful of him, if I recall correctly. Is downfall of his generation his fault? Maybe those rabbis who opposed him but didn’t offer better solutions are also at fault? They were all confronted with new challenges, we can agree at that. Mendelssohn tried to offer something to respond to the situation the best way he knew. Those who did nothing didn’t really help more. If you or I were there, we would not do better. Just try to put yourself into that situation without your current knowledge.
some> He specifically brings the avnei nezer’s statement
so, what is Satmar Rebbe saying about the argument about halachik codices that do not include discussion of 3 shevuos?
yankel> you can have 60 % of the knesset voting with you and the evil SC will strike it down regardless
This is not how complex democracies work. If you have a super-majority for certain position, then the politics change. One of the major goals of these systems is to prevent minor majorities from doing big changes, and then next year changing back because 2% of population switched their minds. It is a feature, not a bug. If you were to have a position supported by super-majority, then the politics will change. It is not simply votes in Knesset, it is how PM can make his decisions without being afraid that the government falls, how various appointments are made … so, whether political system reacts to large majority is not an issue; the issue is that Israelis do not seem to be interested in achieving such consensus, but rather prefer to push their views through on others. In that sense, you totally assimilated in the Israeli culture, despite your claims of opposing it.
YYA> Your conflating naïveté with laxity in observance is another example of misreading. In the shtetl in Europe 200 years ago, or in the Middle East 100 years ago, one could “go with the flow” passively and still remain a fully observant Jew. The challenge of Haskalah and modernity etc. forced a need for more proactive education and being more careful about things that used to be taken for granted.
I agree here. But even if you think that Sephardim were in urgent need of charedization, does not mean that it was natural for them and only tricksters lead them astray.
YYA, yes,
one aspect is that those who involved in relationships with non-Jews need that. So, the charedi government of Israel will need that. Also, we are all using “greek” technology (not just machines and computers, but politics and democracy, all greek words).Note also that prohibition is also based on a historical episode with two brothers fighting for the kingdom ending up with Romans/Pompeo getting control. This was definitely not the moment to admire roman culture.
But there is also ambiguity of our attitude towards greeks. What I remember from the discussion that this contradiction may be explained by different aspect of greek culture, and probably roman also. Rambam, and the whole science, for thousand+ years were following Aristotle, Pythagorean theorem is still true. Adrianus was a friend of R Yehudah … Thanks for reminding of this sugya, I’ll look at it again.
YYA> How did those countries, where Jews had lived for over 2,000 years, become hostile to Jews in the first place? Not that antisemitism didn’t exist before, but there was no urgent need to flee until a very specific point in history…
We touched on that before. In 1950, I might have agreed with you, probably would have said same myself. But look now at last 80 years of Arab world. This was not all zionist fault. They all went through socialist and islamist dictatorships, all non-Muslims either emigrated or worse, everything not agreeing with regimes tortured and killed en masse. This is all sounds abstract to us, but imagine ISIS taking charge of Aleppo Jewish community; Saddam prosecuting Baghdad Jews; Syrian Jews searching opened prisons in Damascus looking for long-gone relatives.
See, as in Europe, arguably questionable actions lead to saving millions of Jews. I don’t know what the theological explanation is, why Hashem used these kelim to save the Jews, but facts are clear.
I hear you, but do you think Avraham would send Eliezer if he were able to zoom in to Lavan and settle it himself?
It is actually ironic – that Avraham leaves his elderly father in Suria [several meforshim explain why he has a right/obligation to listen to this tzivui despite a general mitzva of kibud av) and then has to send a shaliach to fetch a wife for his son from there. I don’t know what to do with this observation …
So, given that AI bots can be tuned to produce somewhat randomized output (use parameter temperature – that increases randomness and parameter top_k that tells it to consider more than top selections at every step) – then Siyata Dishmaya can apply directly to people looking for match rather than to a shadchan.
By analogy – would you say that having Siyata Dishmaya for a trip requires a driver and a self-driving car will not lead to a successful trip? We do have such thinking in mezuza writing, etc
you don’t necessarily need acceptance by hard lefties, although that is not impossible, but if it would be good if you aim to get acceptance/respect from other pro-religious and traditional people in the “middle” of political spectrum. If you can form a position acceptable to such groups (and maybe do some compromises with them, not simply hope that they’ll join all your positions) – then you can have 60% support instead of 51% and with that, you’ll find a way to change political system.
This method is easier to see in US – here people are forced to be in 1 of 2 parties. So, each of them tries to one hand find consensus within itself and at the same time broaden the coalition. When the majority has 51% support – there is always some chamber that is not under control, or one senator who decided to switch, it is not working. When one side achieves a larger consensus that it is able to change character of the country for decades to come (including assigning judges). It is harder to see in Israel as groups continue coalition bargaining even after elections, and people tend to form narrow political groups, but it should work the same – elect a larger coalition and then you’ll change what you want. For example, the things you don’t like in Israeli system are often a product of pre-1970s system when left had a super-majority.
yankel > they are looked at with deep disdain and are considered abominable and hideous
yankel, you are obsessed with analyzing feelings of other people, whether they are posters here or abstract representatives of social groups in Israel.
As meraglim said “we were grasshoppers in their eyes”. According to your thinking, everyone is so bad that you can discount all of them/us and say/do whatever you want. There is no halachik basis for such behasvior.YYA, I looked up the numbers of abducted children (I understand this is not the only issue, but the most outrageous one) – out of 500K+ sephardim in general, several commissions talked at most of hundreds, and highest wild estimates talk about 10K. These are big numbers, if true, but they are still just a small part of the community. I agree that this will be a larger proportion for Yemenites.
Your explanation of Sephardi path – re-education, followed by teshuva, followed by stockholm syndrome seems to be biased … I know both sephardim who came to US directly and those who were in Israel, and their hashkafot are very similar to each other. It all various a lot by country and personal caes, of course – but many were “observant” in a very marginal way – they just lived in places that certain things were done; they were relaxed about many halachot because people around them were muslims. I know one such man whose wife was a little more advanced and she had to list all potential ingredients he might encounter in american food to impress him enough to start being products with hashgaha. He was “observant” buut he only knew what his local muslims would put into the pita – flour and water. I presume our ashkenazi ancesstors were in a similar position in 18th century when it became possible to travel away from the shtetlach. This is what R Hirsh was writing about – those who are not ready to confront the world will go OTD.
Also, as long as we described these historical grievances, we need to remember that those zionists actually saved all these sephardim from the wave of brutal regimes in their countries. At the time, some people might thought that zionists were “uprooting” communities, but now we know what was ahead in Iran/Iraq/Syria/Yemen. Without those resettlements efforts, their life would be totally different. I asked a friend whose family is from Aleppo whether he thought about it when Russian air force was bombing the city held by Islamists in support of Baath regime .. he said he did not, they all never looked back and do not even think what would have happened to them …
yankel >then it is AAQ who complains that mentioning stasi is ‘immature’
I called for respectful dialog, asking not to use stasi approach, and you responded – yes, do more of that. That is “immature” when done in cyberspace and may be way worse IRL.
YYA> about students of R Gamliel:
> 1. Who says they were in elementary school?
I meant that you need someone who is now in elementary school to start learning science if you want them to lead army research 20 years from now. Same for politics, etc.> 2. Who says those were the leaders, and not the others?
I presume both will be. That is what I see the message of R Gamliel. My naive question is why he did not have students who were learning both, the way modern thinkers trying to do sometimes, like R Soloveitchik. Maybe at that time, when so much memorization was part of learning, there was just no place in one head for both?> 3. The whole point of the Midrash is that they were killed by the Romans, many meforshim say BECAUSE IT WASN’T A GOOD IDEA despite the good intentions.
Stop taking Chazal out of context.this is gemora, not midrash, right? I don’t think I am taking Gemora out of context. I might not have learnt this in depth, so there are relevant meforshim, please quote. I would appreciate of there are different opinions, please quote all of them.
YYA, I don’t think this is the answer. You are looking at it from the benefit of hindsight. As we discussed many other cases – it is not always known what the right course of action is. Mendelsohn, R Hirsh, Besht, Chaim Volozhin, R Salanter, R Kook, Saul Liberman, R kotler – my list is on purpose in no order – they all tried to address urgent issues with some approach.
As one American gadol said: “You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take”. So what unites all of them:
1) they actually tried to solve problems
2) they were criticized for thatI am not a baki on Lieberman, but it seems that he, and many in his time, were under assumption that Conservative movement will be dominant among those who keep some idea of adherence to “halakha” – way larger in numbers than Orthodox in America., so it is vital to work trying to bring that movement closer. This was not a crazy idea. I heard from R Nosson Sherman that his father was urging his elderly congregants to continue coming to the shiur through rain and snow – “because who knows what will be after you”. He did not know that his son is going to publish so many biographies of gedolim that the problem now is not lack of information, but our inability to figure out what is true among so much published ….
And as we see from this apparently recently uncovered letter, Lieberman consulted some unnamed rabonim about this decision.
hakatan> omission does not at all mean disagreement.
omission in a major code that summarizes halochos is definitely a factor, as yankel mentions, avnei nezer talks about it. But we are not here to weigh on whose rav is bigger, but how do the arguments actually go.
so, it is multiple codes that seemingly talk about related issues. I don’t think it means “disagreement”. It may be simply a “disregard”. Nobody before Rambam, as far as we know here, put “3 oaths” into a halachik book (Saadiya gaon?). So, he did not have to disagree – which he has no problem doing when needed. He simply did not think that this is halachically binding. Maybe if you find anything mentioned about 3 oaths in related seforim like beis yosef, then we can discuss this further.
So, it is mentioned that Stamar Rebbe took issue with the issue of omission, can someone summarize his argument?
yya, a good point, but how is relying on an algorithm is different from relying on a shadchan?
a programmer coded the algorithm (or wrote chatgpt prompt) – it is the same as “most” shadchanim who have their own algorithm – hashkofa? height? weight? college h’v? you can train an algorithm according to a high-end shadchan expertise so it will be better than 90% of the “professionals” who write down their notes on a piece of paper and forget what the customer told them a week ago.I’ve looked at US index – the lowest component 2/4 us for minority rights, and the write-up is a mixture if somewhat liberal ideas with actual facts. Most categories, such as votring freedom, re written in reasonable academic language. Language also differs by country. It seems that some categories are given to staffers with biases in that area and their general culture affects the results. Your results will be more accurate of you first look at categories, select the ones you think are more important and more objective and use only them.
Still, the main point broadly stands – Israel is part of a cluster of free countries. US is probably lower than UK & EU because it is such a heterogeneous country, not everyone is happy.
Interesting heritage economic freedom index – US, Israel, UK are all 69-70. In 1995 and 2005 Israel was at 62, US/UK at 77 and then 79
US fell from 76 to 70 in 2020-24
uk fell 10 points in 23022-23
Israel jumped up in 1998 from 62 to 68 mostly because government integrity went from 30 to 70Definition of T’Ch may vary. Gemorah has a lot of discussions about T’Ch that go beyond just being “book smart” into middos and ability to recognize emes and do timely teshuva. And a classic apikoires Acher is not called T’Ch, I think, even as R Meir learns from him (the good part).
On the legit question on difference between RJBS and Saul Lieberman: R Moshe has a teshuva allowing to use Lieberman’s edition of Tosefta. He does not treat RJBS same way, he treated him as a chaver and a cousin. To what degree they were close? Relatives did not tell elderly RJBS that R Moshe passed away being afraid that this will affect his health, but he figured it out – as that yomtov was R Moshe’s turns to call him and when he did not, RJBS called himself and found out.
Unrelated, here is some interesting info I found on this topic
Saul Lieberman (son-in law of Meir Bar Ilan)was apparently drive by (1) desire for economic security that he could not obtain in other places (2) a hope to move JTS students towards more observance – his way of kiruv different, obviously, from the ways others looked at kiruv
When Agudat ha-Rabbanim publicly burned Kaplan’s prayer book in 1945, they wrote a public letter to ” “ha-Rav haGaon R. Shaul Lieberman, gavra raba ve-ish ha-eshkolot.” Quoting a secondary sourtce: The letter continues that they have heard that Lieberman treats Kaplan as one who has been excommunicated, but adds that this is not a solution. The letter concludes by stating that since they have so much respect for the learning and personality of Lieberman, they have therefore published this open letter. “We are concerned for his honor, which is the honor of the Torah.”
In a later discovered letter from Sail Lieberman, he responded: Lieberman expresses his pain that the open letter was published. He goes on to state that if the heads of Agudat ha-Rabbanim thought that it was forbidden for him to teach at the Seminary, why did they not summon him to appear before a beit din. Lieberman further states that before he accepted the job, he consulted with three universally recognized sages in Jerusalem. Although he does not reveal their names, he says that he is prepared to do so if necessary. only one of these sages refused to give a ruling. The second said that he did not see any clear prohibition against accepting the position at the Seminary. This is perhaps understandable; after all, there is no prohibition to teach non-Orthodox Jews. In accordance with this, R. Moses Feinstein ruled that as long as one is not pressured to teach anything in opposition to tradition, and especially if one needs the money, it is permitted to teach at a non-Orthodox Talmud Torah. The third sage said to Lieberman: You are the man, go and be successful, but only if you do not remain at the Seminary permanently … at the Seminary he is permitted to teach what he wishes. He also mentions that if another two or three Orthodox teachers joined the faculty, they could turn it into a wonderful place…and he would later successfully recruit a number of outstanding Orthodox scholars to join the faculty, either as permanent appointments or as visiting lecturers. Lieberman adds that since the Seminary officially recognizes the authority of the Shulhan Arukh, as long as this remains the case he hopes that much good will result from his presence there. “I say, with all due responsibility, that I am sure that my presence at the Seminary prevents the outbreak of a great dispute which would lead to a terrible hillul ha-shem.
Matrona, I recall, sorted her servants by height – not far from modern resume focus on easily observable parameters. Chatbot could do better than that.
YYA, I am with your history up to & including discrimination of Sephardim. After that, the question is how prevalent each of these things were.
How many sephardim wanted to join charedi schools and were prevented by the government v. how many did not want to or were prevented by schools teaching in Yiddish and general attitude towards sephardim even among charedim. (not to pile on here, but I heard from a charedi black ger who was asked directly what problems he encountered in Israel – mentioned that their kids had a hard time in Israeli charedi schools, and he quipped “we converted because of Judaism, not necessarily the Jews”. This was somewhere in 1990-2000s.)
How many parents were fooled that their children were sent to a yeshiva and sent to kibbutz instead?Again, I am aware of these stories, but I do not know whether this explains major population trends. For what I know, most Sephardim are reasonably “traditional” – either observant in large part or non-observant in some way, but still respectful of chachamim and religion in general, not like Ashkenazi leftists. So, even if someone tried, this was not very successful. At the same time, many are pro-Israel, pro-Army – and I hope that charedi kahal develops a coalition that includes these Yehudim (and their opinions and sentiments) into a grand Jewish coalition.
Katan> and brought liHalacha by poskim throughout the ages (see the Satmar Rav for a long list) and are invoked by even the Rambam himself in Iggeres Teiman.
See the OP for the list of MAJOR codices that allegedly omit this issue. Does the Satmar Rebbe’s list mention this code and the OP simply could not find the right seif? Let’s compare the lists.
For example, you seem to imply that the only place Rambam mentions the oaths is in his letter that he surely did not expect to be an appendix to Mishne Torah. If it is not in his major works – is there a general principle here that explains what is and is not included in Rambam? Same question for other seforim.
yankel> SC’s unauthorized [critical fact , not to be ignored] grab of power at the expense of the elected representatives renders israel into a pseudo democracy or not
I see, thanks for reminding me. As I mentioned, it is a feature of modern democracies to have separation between political and judicial power. That means that, usually unelected or rarely or indirectly elected, judges have power at the expense of elected representatives. As a classical example, US Supreme court under John Marshall “grabbed” the power of judicial review over duly voted and signed laws (if I am not precise, I am sure there are lawyers here who will correct me).
You may point out specific Israeli features that are not in others, then please do exactly that, otherwise your statements do not have the power of conviction you think they have.
PS Note that Jewish law has also features of separation of power: Sanhedrin is parallel to a King. King is recognized to have powers outside of Sanhedrin, for example, he does not need all this witness business to execute a rebel. Kohanim have power over Beis Hamidash procedures and finances. There is even a federal system – Horayos discusses implications of some or majority of the tribes following erroneous decision of their tribal courts. Including a question – is majority of the tribes counted by population or by count of tribes (as in electoral college in US).
YYA> It is composed by Leftist Progs who rate countries by how Progressive they are… If Israel went up the list it is NOT a good sign
I see your concern. Economist Intelligence Unit is indeed considered slightly-left. Freedom house is more to the right. It grades Israel 73/100 free, USA 84, UK 92.
Freudian slip – r Blau, not r Lau, chief rabbi and a talmid of r Auerbach.
Any details omnn this story – Was Rav Lau one of those Mafdal Zionists who was protesting Chilul Shabbos in Israel and wanted to improve observance of Israeli population? what was exactly protested, and what was in the protest that lead to imprisonment?
> needs to be interrogated stasi like
I usually skip immature language, looking for substantive arguments if any, but this is a good illustration what could go wrong when “Torah-self-true” community will get a majority of votes. Will their increased involvement in the world lead to adopting the good things that Esav developed in the last several centuries and discard the rest [the way R Meir was able with Acher], or will it adopt new technical capabilities without using them properly. We see this danger with lots of under-developed communities, where wilde chayos are using modern weapons and propaganda technologies to subdue population and attack neighbors (this probably started 100+ years ago – would nazis & commies be that successful without modern communications and weapons?). Obviously, observant Jews are not holding at the same level, but will we be able to read population surveys, understand how non-direct democracy works, deal in international affairs. If the plan is to have a religious majority in Israel in 10 years, and a charedi majority in 20 years – start designating 1000 students of Greek in the elementary school as Rabban Gamliel did, so that they’ll be ready to lead the nation in 30 years.
Gadol, you would need to train this chatgpt on the whatsapp chat between teenage girls though!
so that it can reason on whether someone who studied english in an online college is already OTD or still has some hope.
KGN> there are many Observant Jews in the army who want more of such units such as the “Haredi” unit. … but it’s also the PM’s fault.
Maybe the goal should be to find a position that unites a large block of population. It is usually about getting 51% to push a position and then it gets bogged down somewhere in the system. It is more beneficial in a long-term to get to 60% consensus – that in this case should include a larger percentage of non-charedi religious; of “traditional”, and maybe some “secular” who want shalom in society. With 60%, you can find out that PM and others will support that. As it is now, PM needs to balance multiple interests on multiple important issues, so he can’t advocate a position where he’ll lose support on other issues.
I don’t think you can get further than 60% – NY Jews are only 67% united against the muslim socialist, while opposing groups shows at 95%.
It is not just about NY. NYC is a symbol of America’s ideal, maybe of capitalism and certain idea of freedom worldwide. That it was captured by a joint force of communists and political muslims is no small matter. Maybe, there is hope that these two groups, both prone to violence, will turn against each other.
Notice also there are at least a couple of Jewish names around the mayor-elect that are involved in developing his demagogy, not just chatGPT.
KGN, if someone is suspected of stealing and he goes to a public place and shows stolen items – he can be arrested for stealing
in this case, someone claims (1) being 100% occupied by learning, (2) being untrained to fight and get involved in risky things (3) being unable to get involved in things where his Torah morale will suffer.
So, a person who has time to climb up the unfinished building without owner’s permission effectively disproves all points above.
Whether he should be drafted is a separate discussion, but this is the premise here.
could someone address the OP claim about lack of attention in halachik sources? This is not a simple matter, there are various patterns for various codes on whether to address things, especially if they are shaiah to the generation when the code is written.
Thank for your attention to this matter.
YYA> That RJBS was a Talmid Chacham is beyond doubt. To say he was the preeminent Daas Torah to measure everyone else against is something else altogether.
I am talking about the first part. To the second, my personal opinion is that he has a lot of right insights on issues of dealing with modernity. You don’t have to agree. I am saying that those who reject the first part are showing themselves as not talmidei chachomim, I am not listening to them further. That’s all. I have no problem respecting those who simply disagree, and I don’t think he expected everyone to agree.
A separate issue is that often psak or shitah is addressed to certain audience. RJBS was addressing educated and often assimilated Jews; while some others addressed very segregated communities. Not the same advise is needed for both. RJBS writes about this explicitly in 1950s – describing how he spent an evening with college students who were excited to talk to someone who can address their issues. Otherwise, their choice was either reform or NY-based shtetl rabbis who could not relate to them.
This was at the time – all proto-charedim were recent arrivals and they were addressing those who arrived with them, but could not relate to the American Jews who were in US for 2nd generation already. He similarly criticizes Mizrachi – who were coming to collect from American European-based Jews. He says – you do not see what happens with their children? they will not donate to you … opening schools in US is more important than in Israel, because in US they’ll assimilate while in Israel, they’ll still be accessible. Things are of course different nowadays.
YYA> There are thousands of living survivors, pictures, etc. Not enough for you?
I am not saying these horrible things did not happen. I am saying that majority of people did not go through them. Again, this is anecdotal, I may be wrong. If you’ll give me numbers showing opposite, I’ll be happy to revise my views.
yankel> adherence to ‘indexes’ and ‘scores’
this index is computed by international organizations for the whole world. It generally makes sense. It does not claim that China or Russia or Iran are democratic! If there is a possible bias, it will be anti-Israel especially in the last several years. I am not sure why it is “groupthink” to pay attention to a compilation of data. You seem to be rejecting it just because it exists.
Yya, this was from someone’s memoirs, probably several weeks after the war started, USSR attacked Poland 2 weeks after Germany did and lines of control were fluid at that moment.
Yankel, I agree, but so many people were following logic that sounded kosher at the time. At minimum, this shows limits of our understanding of current events. Or think whether it was possible for polish jews to figure out politics of the time? On one hand, ww2 events were unprecedented even after terrible ww1 where most casualties were soldiers, not including russian revolution. On the other hand, is it not delusional to think you are safe when sandwiched between commies and nazis with millions already killed even before ww2 on one side and specific prosecution of jews on the other.
YYA> Rabbi Chiyya and his sons who led a taanis-atzeres tefillah,
Hm, no, this does not sound it – no mention of “one street in Yerushalaim” or the notion of all chachomim in one generation. Thanks, though.
YYA> There was a general statement read publicly at the conclusion of the Atzeres, summarizing the united position on the issues. You missed it. Again.
> Maybe you should get some first hand information, a little goes a long way.Thanks, I am exactly asking you for 1st hand information! I heard about the statement but did not read it. So, this general statement feels like a joint statement, shoin.
YYA> So you’re quoting a joke, by a colorful and insightful person who did a lot of good things, but he wasn’t generally considered to be a Gadol, against several dozen leaders of thousands each. Um, OK.
I think I found a good use of his tongue-in-cheek in my tongue-in-cheek! And his jokes usually had a point, not like mine! And unless a young AAQ grossly misunderstood, the gemorah was quoted seriously.
It might be that AAQ comes from Rav S’s saying – Each language has more words abot what is important for the people – eskimos have 100 synonyms for “snow”, Arabs – for “sand”, Jews for “question”.
AAQ> There are many conclusions from that, including one that R Soloveitchik shitah has a lot to offer. Maybe not to everyone, but a legitimate Torah-based view.
YYA> What relevance does any of this have to the present situation? The IDF itself was radically different 50 years ago.
the relevance is that when someone talks about current IDF, I first check out, or ask, what he thinks about RJBS or about positions he was holding. If turns out that this person dismissed RJBS that I don’t think this source is of interest, whether he is mistaken, misusing Torah for his purposes or stam not smart enough. If someone says, like it seems you do, that he sees some emes in the RJBS position at the time, but things changed now, I am interested in the discussion. This heuristics, unfortunately, saved me a lot of time.
thanks, for the explanation. So, put forward legislation that changes that and makes such units possible. And if it passes, follow up on that. If it does not, the other Israelis will see that you at least tried.
I think the new point in this thread is a list of halachik sources that ignore the issue. The list is very impressive. I wonder what the other side thinks about that rather than 100th discussion whether Ohr Sameach wrote or not a letter.
> The amhaaretz who saw them expressed his frustration. The Gemara Yidden are still here, the Nazis are long gone. Our fate is determined by the same One who gave us the Gemara. אוי ואבוי if our “pride” is in Israeli politics רחמנא ליצלן. Participants in what exactly? The only reason anyone remembers Rav Soloveitchik himself is because of his Torah.
I think you are right here. R Soloveichik writes exactly that – Jewish community is formed around a Teacher, not around a politician or a party. Still, there is no denial that his Torah is about how to be involved in the world, how to navigate this world without losing integrity of Torah.
And, if you want, the demonstration that you enjoyed so much is exactly an answer to that confused observer – those Gemara Yidden can participate in politics all right when they decide to.