Always_Ask_Questions

yankel> not the extreme voters , but the voters in the middle … the power does not lie with the voters anymore

baruch shekevanti. Your attitude has very serious implications – you feel you deserve power (you live in a “modern democracy”) but you are denied your “rights” by the evil entities. Note that this was not a thing pre-modernity – as YYA argues, Jews have a lot of experience surviving under dictatorship. Indeed, one can argue that we have the best score here over centuries. So, your attitude is very “modern”.

So, when you feel self-righteous and entitled – then what are you supposed to do? Maybe you can clarify what is your other options if you don’t want to pursue your goals democratically.

Possible “solutions” go back at least to Dostoevsky (“if there is no G-d, everything is permitted”) – who traces it back to Napoleon; and to marxists – working people are permanently “exploited” therefore they need to destroy everything to save it. The dumb-down version for US it is “no justice, no peace” …

But I wonder whether you can demonstrate that you are indeed right – do you have examples where Israeli SC blocked significant super-majority?

MK Porush > Not to abandon children aged zero to three to unsupervised daycare centers or family daycares without any regulations or safety guidelines.

Where are all anti- and non-Zs protesting this invitation to deliver our precious babies to the Zionist state?! From age ZERO – worse than the Teimeni affair.

This sounds like he is advocating state supervision of the daycare centers, but I would presume he is really demanding the state to pay for all daycare and schools and not much state supervision.

YYA> Those regimes didn’t exist in ’48.

And, again, like in Europe, zionist movement acted in advance of the danger. Whether it is their political wisdom, siyata d’shemaya, random luck (that we do not believe in, I presume) – I do not dare to speculate, but we need to acknowledge the facts before trying to analyze.

Comparison w/ Latin America is strange. Most dictatorship there count thousands or at most 10s of thousands victims, nothing comparable to 100,000 and more of victims in almost each arab country. And I dont know any sephardi, even most charedi ones, who contemplate moving back to any of the arab countries to avoid Israeli or American decadence.

I am not even sure this denial of what happened with sephardim is germane to defend your position overall, it sounds like you just don’t want to give any credit to people you don’t like.

YYA, you also helped me clarify why Lubavitcher Rebbe (a pioneer of “kiruv”) and, l’havdil, AAQ do not like the word “kiruv” – not only it is too presumptuous that you are closer to Hashem that the recipient is (that I understood before) but also that all you need to guide the recipient in your own derech – you need to help him discover his own derech. Sounds a little new-age, sorry for that.

agree with the complainer, sheheyanu. Even for me, it is very startling to see YYA saying such apikorosus until I realize he is stam quoting AAQ. H’V others will think you wrote that and your einekels will have problems with shidduchim, H’V. Use “” or >>

YYA> The Chareidi parties as a matter of principle don’t interfere in issues not related to Torah and Mitzvos.

again, agree. This started when observant Jews were a minority – and over time, this position shifted, with stronger community and friendlier government after 1977. There were reasons given to to those shifts. It is not inconceivable that when your leaders see a good reason to be further involved, they will.

Maybe you can use R Soloveitchik’s shitah in US that allowed cooperation with non-O and other religions on social issues, but no compromise or even discussions about religious issues.

YYA 2 SQRT> You made an outrageous claim in the name of the Chazon Ish,

He was transparent, quoting a specific article. there is no indication that he tried to mislead anyone. It would be great if people simply add other information they have.

Haimy, first could you bring those quotes from Chazon Ish and R Kanievsky? Printed material often are from politically motivated sources from both sides: one claims that all Rabbis were against the state because they support that and others claim that to denounce them. It would be good if we show real respect to talmidei chachamim by learning what they actually said!

That said, it is not clear that modern Israel is in some sense “worse” than before. True, the external sakanah at that time was apparent, but also the people in power were in large part very anti-religious. Right now, a majority of Israelis are positive towards Judaism and anti-religious group is smaller in numbers.

YYA> the way, the Gemara there, and hence the Chazon Ish, ISN’T talking about תלמידי חכמים, ONLY about a Chosson during Shana Rishona, or someone who built a house or planted a vineyard.

Thanks for providing context to the quote. Things should be quoted in context. This raises a question about halochos of talmidei chachamim.

I was recently learning a teshuva by Noda Bin Yehudah about a “hoshuv” “learning” person in his time getting entangled into inappropriate relationship with his no-less-hoshuv in-laws and then asking for leniencies based on his status. I asked why certain points in the teshuva do not match what gemorah assumes of talmidei chachomim and maggid shiur suggested that clearly Noda bin Yeuhudah does not consider these gemoras applicable to people in his generation.

To the esteemed chevra trying to convince me that you can’t find common language with the HCJ. I am not asking you for that. Maybe R Kook could have done this, maybe not, but this is not what I am suggesting.

I am suggesting finding common position with others that are close to you, not the furthest enemies. With non-charedi religious Jews; with traditional sephardim; with political centrists, who can be convinced with the argument that HCJ stiffles democracy; with Russians whose anti-religious views are shaped in several generations by their prosecutors .. and I am not talking necessarily about their leaders, as most politicians are driven by self-interest, but by the voters themselves – find positions that unite you all. They might require some compromises – not of the Torah as you suggest, but of politics.

Mickey, you can be justified in being suspicious of an academic author, but he is not a rando, he is writing about Orthodox jews for quite some time. It would help if you can point to his specific mistakes and what is a better source.

Also notice that this was an article quoting the professor, not everything in the article is a direct quote. So you will be better off reading his original articles or books.

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?

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 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.

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, 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.

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

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.

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, 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 that

I 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.

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.

Definition 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.

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.

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).