Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
tzedikis > Prayers are the most significant of all and you want to put a gun and harm someone whose soul and heart has been trained to sweetness Torah, and contemplation
If there were a consensus among Israeli Jews that they want a certain group to fight, and a certain group to learn and daven for them, that will be a great situation. This is like Yassachar/Zevulun agreement – that both sides sign. It is a contract, not just an agadah that one side can invoke unilaterally.
It seems that currently there is no such consensus. Then, every group need to fulfil their share. Maybe the group that thinks their learning is zechus for others, should be more outgoing in providing Torah learning, chesed, tefilos to the others – and hope that this will be appreciated. At minimum, have explicit tefilos for Tzahal in your shul; go bring food and medical supplies to the soldiers; and teach them some Torah and halochos of being in the army.Here is an example of cross-camp halachik cooperation:
R Ovadia Yosef has a teshuva whether a couple in Israel who got married outside of Rabanut requires a get (it is probably was some sort of a joke marriage between non-religious Israelis) and whether the lady is considered grusha for a kohen. He paskens that because Israeli Rabbanut requires marriage to be conducted through them, and the Hatan acknowledge their power when saying “al dat Moshe v _Yisrael_”, then the marriage is not valid.A little Trump Purim Torah: Rav and Shmuel disagree whether it was smart or stupid for Ahashverosh to entertain out of town guests first. The assumption there is that the in-towners will be just later. Maybe we are talking about populism here – Ahashverosh, an outsider himself, comes to elevate and flatter his populist “base” at the expense of the elite in the Capital.
It is great that we seem to have a majority here that are ready to accept the other side as being stam wrong and not kefirah.
The next question is who is right.
First version is – under the circumstances of the times someone lived and information he had, was someone right? In this case, most of those rabbonim were right in their own way, provided they were baki b’Torah and were able to approach the issues honestly. You go to shoftim of your times. Sanhedrin might need to bring a karbon if they make a mistake. So, if someone was a great Rav in all other aspects, he had a right to pasken according to his understanding. Should the Rabbis work hard to obtain military information about relative strength of Nazi, Soviet, and Polish army to figure out that Polish cavalry was doomed against tanks? Looking from our times – maybe, but nobody did. If they did ask Polish experts at the time, the answer was wrong.
Second version – what is the right decision from Hashem’s POV? I humbly think that we are not yet able to answer this question yet. The history is still being developed. When Jews started building second BM, there was abundant rain at night and they, thus, felt that there is Hashem’s brocha upon their work. Thus, (1) before the rain, they were not sure, (2) you need to watch for hidden signs. Are modern Zionists or modern Haredim experiencing hidden miracles? Maybe both are – Israel is a blooming country and Haredi yeshivos are full of students, all bli ayn harah.
Could they both be right? R Soloveitchik writes that one and same kohen godol has a tzitz (symbol of halachik decisions) and a choshen (symbol of politicla decisions). He says that “in our times” (1950s) the problem is that you have kohanim with tzitz (yeshovos) and kohanim with choshen (zionist politicians) trying to work on their own, ignoring the others.
yankel > But — Zionism is wrong but NOT heresy.
Yankel, what is “wrong”?
Are we talking about bringing Yidden into Palestine under a guide of non-religious Zionists? Imagine, Aguda would have called for more observant Jews to join that movement. In hindsight, not only this would have saved those Yidden from death under Nazis and Soviets, but would also make Yishuv much more observant. We know now that first Mizrachi and later Degel HaTorah joined government, so it was not a lost cause. Think if there were way more religious Jews in Israel, how different Israeli government and policies would be. Of course, we can’t blame gedolim of Europe that they did not predict the terrible future awaiting the community, they were not neviim. But also, I think, they saw immediate danger from engaging with non-religious Zionists, and it was hard to foresee how democracy is going to work in future Israel, with ability to influence the government even when you are in a minority. Jews did not have experience of democratic self-government, so it was a huge risk.HaKatan> In fact, Rabbi Dr. Soloveitchik acknowledged that he was breaking from his (rather strong anti-Zionist) mesorah in doing so, and the gedolim did not agree.
I think he does acknowledge this difference from his grandfather (but not his father). It does not mean that he abandoned his grandfather’s Torah. In multiple places, he brings his grandfather’s ideas, explains them, uses them as a guide. Every generation has their own issues to deal with, you don’t expect every rav to just confirm what his grandfather said. For example, when outlining his plans for YU Rabbinical school, he focuses on a streamlined system preparing multitude of local rabbis for many small communities that lacked them – so that they are able to do basics according to halakha and be attractive to American Jews: run the shul, say dvar Torah on shabbos, deal with kiddushin, and refer get cases appropriately. He contrasts it with Litvishe yeshivas (in Lita), where he says, in addition to gadlus of certain individuals, you had people who were hanging around for decades without any specific learning and outcome achieved.
Anyway, I have a feeling that your references here reflect that you read articles arguing against the Rav on specific controversial topics. I don’t think you ever opened an article by him.
Repeating myself as several people repeated the same – do not use phone, do not use laptop in your room. Put a desktop (or at least attach your laptop) in the living room where others can see what you are doing. Several people might have a whole row where you’ll be successfully using laptop to access torah materials; national geographic; and SAT prep classes. Also, have that laptop being used by several people in the same account. And put opendns and safety options into your search engine.
you should also put your laptop (or better desktop with a large screen) in a living room so that others in your family see your screen.
opendns is free
yankel, thanks for trying to find a consensus. You need to define what “zionism” is and what “bad” is. If we talk about pre/poast war period, we are mostly talking about pre/early Israeli government. I think everyone agrees that they are “not part of Torah”. R Soloveitchik describes how a non-Jewish kid was watching with them an Israeli minister during 1950s pre-war events saying that he has faith in British minister and “Arab youth” that they’ll not savagely deal with Jews. The kid remarked “I would put more faith in G-d of Abraham” …
related questions are
– is it appropriate to cooperate with them to achieve better outcomes. In one narrative: Mizrachi thought so from the beginning and achieved a lot by both being in the government and quitting it when they could not agree. And Rav Schach and others agreed to that policy many years later. (I think this narrative is too simplistic, but still has something to think about).– are there any redeeming qualities in the Z leaders and their followers? I think this is where opinions differ the most.
Baruch> Seriously one benefit of Biden was that we could ignore him.
it is the difference between a hospice/drug dealer v. a doctor. Biden soothed everyone with excuses – there was no other way out of Afghanistan; we sternly warned Putin but it did not help; I did not find vaccines in the oval office; inflation is supply chain disruption, no just transitory, not just us everywhere, oh look it is already ending; borders are closed, they were open under everyone, look we are already closing them… Trump is trying to address the issues. Is there risk? Sure. Can he be wrong? Sure. Hopefully, he corrects, including by the voter feedback.
here is some history between early zionists and Rav Chaim Brisker
In 1904, years before Menachem Begin was born, Theodor Herzl, the founder of modern Zionism died, and Zev Dov Begin, one of the leaders of the Brisk kehila, wanted to hold a memorial service in the main shul. Rav Chaim Brisker said no and locked the shul. Menachem Begin’s father and his friend, Mordechai Schneidermann (whose grandson Ariel Sharon would later play a powerful role in Menachem’s life) broke the lock of Rav Chaim Soloveitchik’s synagogue to conduct a service in Herzl’s memory.
Does that mean that Begin’s father was not respectful of the Rav? When Begin visited the United States as prime minister, he visited the great rabbis of the Agudah in Rav Moshe Feinstein’s home. He also paid a call on the Lubavitcher Rebbe and held a meeting with Rav Yosef Dov Solovietchik, who insisted on coming to meet Begin, not the reverse. Rabbi Soloveitchik reminded Menachem Begin of the incident in which his father had disobeyed Rav Soloveitchik’s grandfather. The Rav told him that, in the family, they said that this was the one and only time the elder Begin did not follow the Brisker Rav’s guidance in regards to the kehila. Menachem used to tell another story of how his father and the Rav were walking together, and an anti-Semite began harassing the Rav. Zev Dov Begin took his walking stick and hit the gentile over the head. He went to jail, but he was proud that he stood up for the honor of a Jew.
second part:
Yet, not long after this incident, in 1954 or 1955, Rav Aharon reached out again to him and enlisted him in efforts to raise funds for Chinuch Atzmai. The high point came at the first Chinuch Atzmai dinner where Rav Soloveitchik made the most remarkable speech I have ever heard…[R. Soloveitchik] then lavished praise on Rav Aharon, comparing him in elaborate language, first to the Vilna Gaon, then to Rav Akiva Eger and finally to his zeide, Rav Chaim. I was standing directly behind Rav Aharon as Rav Soloveitchik spoke and as each of these comparisons were made, Rav Aharon tugged at Rav Soloveitchik’s jacket with one hand and implored him to stop and with the other hand he pounded on the table and intoned repeatedly, “Das iz nisht emes, das iz nisht emes.” As I looked more closely at Rav Aharon, I saw that he was crying…
here is from 1955:
After more than a half hour of futile effort to get Rav Soloveitchik to publicly oppose giyus banos [female draft into the IDF], Rav Aharon [Kotler] came up with the following brilliancy, of course in Yiddish. He said, Bostoner Rav [R. Soloveitchik], imagine that instead of the three of us discussing this issue, there were another three who were judging the appropriateness of drafting girls into military service. Instead of the Bostoner Rav, there was your zeyde, Reb Chaim. Instead of the Radiner Rosh Yeshiva [R. Mendel Zaks], there was your father-in-law, the Chafetz Chaim. Instead of me, there was my father-in-law, Rav Iser Zalman Meltzer. Bostoner Rav, what would your zeyde have said?This masterstroke did not result in a shift in Rav Soloveitchik’s position. He got up and said that he had to leave, “Kletsker Rosh Yeshiva and Radiner Rosh Yeshiva, a gutten tag” and left.
HaKatan, you keep bringing those who disagreed with RYBS and he would agree with you (as he answered the question whether his secular learning interferes with his Torah learning, he replied – when other T’Ch learn, I learn; when others tell lashon hora about me, I study philosophy). But, as mentioned, R Kotler’s position was somewhat nuanced.
I came up to seemingly a factual story – when Rav initiated Talmud Class for college girls in the 1970s, R Schwab and some other Rabonim were considering a cherem and wanted to have R Moshe onboard. Some of Rav’s students went to R Moshe hoping to explain that they are not initiating “new reform”, R Moshe dismissed their defense and said “r Soloveitchik’s teaching approach does not require my defense”. Cherem did not materialize. Seems that we can learn from this
(1) R Moshe respected RYBS’s approach even if it was different from his. Possibly because they were addressing different audiences.
(2) R Schwab and others maybe did not like RYBS’s approach but did not consider him a heretic at least until 1970s (and RYBS was a public figure from 1930s).
(3) a harrowing lack of communication between the gedolim from my perspective. Why didn’t they get in the same room or a conference call and discuss all views and implications?Of course sending monthly checks for the same amount should have lower overhead than a real insurance.
1% known error? So if you pay 20 bills monthly on autopay, you will somehow miss 2 payments every year? Those two mosdos will not be happy.
HaKatan refers to specific sources arguing against r Soloveitchik. How do they argue? Do they use the same terms as you or do they simply argue with the viewpoint? And I hope you are using moderate sources that I am interested in. We are already established that there are extreme views on both sides that fully reject the opposite view. The question is that what is the position of the moderates, how do they think of the both extremes.
Incidently, while researching this issue, I saw a reference that r Aaron Soloveitchik wrote after his brother’s petirah in response to what he saw as disrespectful article about him. Does anyone have this article? Not sure whether it is in English or Yiddish. This would be a source that both sides could respect, even if not totally objective.
Actually, Sesame Street in Iraq may be not bad. During Reagan times, we subsidized radio propaganda towards the Soviet Block and it was a great source of information there and presumably contributed to their downfall . Maybe, you want some edgier than Sesame Street, but maybe that is the level that works for current generation …
Daas,
I think they want to have some sort of certification and, hopefully, meaningful education. They want stop you from offering a shidduch same way as hairdresser union is not going to stop movers from cutting their child’s hair (or will they?).Maybe, instead of certification, we can have disclosures of education, endorsements by rabbis, (verifiable) statistics – 100 shidduchim based on 10,000 dates .. although even that might call people to fudge their numbers … not sure about endorsements also – I asked one rav who, bli ayin hara, already married double digits of children, he shrugged: “shadchanim did not work out for any of mine”.
coffee > Extra kneich to Aaq if GH told you not to believe me
?! cool down your coffee. GH and my posts came in the same batch. I do not get private previews from the mods. And when do I do as I am told by either hagadol or hakatan.
Chaim > The Ashkenazim joined the govt way before R shach . The imeri emes sent R itcha Meir levin to the kneeset. R shach came into the picture after Beagin won
you are right. they supported from outside of the government without joining. Still. R Schach’s position was a change from the previous one. Was previous position conditioned on what party was in charge? After all, Begin was still a Zionist … I am bringing this as an example that very strong position can suddenly change over time…
Note that R Schach did not have any illusions about the government. Begin offered to fully support charedi yeshivos the same way as other schools. Charedi politicians were very happy – but R Schach said to refuse full support. His rationale: you will dismantle your financial support network and when a government changes and takes away the benefits, you will have to close yeshivos.
Chaim > Firstly yes R kook is relevant
And ZSK similar.I am thinking it is a stretch to try to have antiZ acknowledge R Kook and similar rabonim. It would be easier to have a dialog about Rabbonim that were well known to have respectful relationships (even with disagreements) with Rabbonim antiZs consistently recognize.
ZSK > They also (incorrectly) lump ideologically secularist Zionism together with Religious Zionism
Right. That is why I would advise these guys to go open a sefer from the Rabbonim they can accept and then let’s have an informed discussion. Let them point out what exactly they disagree, how R Yoel argues on R Soloveitchik and let us understand those disagreements. I am shocked, shocked that they are not showing any signs that they opened a sefer. It is not osur to read a kosher sefer that you disagree with. Beis Shammai & Beis Hillel knew other’s halochos.
Gadol, there is a yeshiva l’maalah (see Taanis ~ 20) that sends shalom to Rava before every Yom Kippur; to Abaye before every Shabbos; and to an erliche bloodletter – every day. So, I am sure there is a hashgocha l’maalah that visits most famous restaurants every year and small ehrliche kebabbers every day.
Dr. Pepper – as far as I understand, sawyouatsinai is a generic “Jewish” dating site with YUConnects being a YU segment of that that will presumably not match you to shiksas or apikoiresim. It provides access for shadchanim, whether professional or amateur. I suspect that many of them are just interested yiddishe mamas. I don’t think this service is used wide enough in observant communities, maybe more in more modern, but still not enough.
There needs to be a “network” effect for something to work – shadchanim that talk to each other have more clients.
> what’s wrong with creating a barrier to new entrants?
that’s an old question. In middle ages, and before, there were guilds in each area ensuring limited service to keep prices high (and, presumably, quality too). Bava Basra describes such a situation and seems to conclude that if there is a talmid chacham, then he should decide, otherwise guild members are free to establish their rules and slash the tires (skins in that case) of those who break the rules.Halakha also lists exceptions when unlimited competition is allowed – teaching and selling perfume. In both cases, benefit to customers (students and poor women) is so important that loss of income by the sellers is allowed. I would reason that shidduchim are in the same category (affecting both Torah students and poor girls 🙂 for marrying people, not for providing income to shadchanim.
re: loading resumes
Advertising directly might work, but will create an unhealthy situation with shadchanim bad-mouthing the service and probably lining up rabbis who will pasken against. I am thinking of buying them out – by paying for the data or by outcome on their customers, lederech shalom.coffee, Z met a group of senators from two parties. I think there is a principled disagreement on policy between T and Z:
1) T proposes a new approach that has a good chance to work when everything goes well. This is better than the status quo. Except Z, and his country, are not ready to take chances as it is very personal for them.
2) the plan includes unwritten parts that depend on T’s (or US) will. T knows better what his options are. Z does not. So, there is no meeting of mind.
This is a typical game situation with asymmetric info. Say, coffee is trying to sell me his used car. He knows it is a great car that only drove around the coffee room. So, he is asking for $20K. I suspect that this car travelled to florida and back every month, got into accidents and has fake odometer reading. So, I am offering $5K. We can’t make a deal until we find out how to trust each other.And then there is VP who wants to show off in front of his boss. And feels righteousness because he “found religion”. Don’t joke in front of him about “there is a lot at stake”. He can fire up a literal stake for you.
Gadol ™ > that can be done surgically and would have very widespread support. Instead, their meat-axe
R Berel Wein recommend an approach to history that judges personalities relative to what alternatives existed at the time, rather than in absolute terms.
In this case, events are fresh and still progressing, so may be too early for non-neviim to judge the outcome, still we already have solid baseline – first Trump term and Biden term that can be presumed similar (at best) to would-be Kamala’s term, lo aleinu.
So, “can be done ” and “better attitude towards Ukraine” are theoretical constructs – realistic D- alternatives are Biden/Kamala’s mindless expansion of government and giving free money “surgically” – to their own supporters (humanity students, unions, etc) and similar mindless Ukraine policy that did not try to achieve nor victory, nor peace, just to make sure there is no second Afghanistan that will hurt them politically.
Would Mitt Romney achieve better results? (1) he would not have a chance because he was not prepared to fight against such dirty allegations as “eighties calling back” (when he called out Russia as enemy) (2) even if he were to become a President, maybe he was not ready to fight real enemies who are not less vicious than democratic media.
When talking about historical attitudes, one interesting nekudah is a question of participating in Israeli government.
I’ll put it in broad terms, please correct me if I am off: initially, haredim were against participation. Then, sephardim formed their own party and started participating (presumably getting financial benefits for that), while ashkenazim said that it is impossible (essentially HaKatan’s position). Then Rav Schach changed position and formed Degel HaTorah to follow it. Other disagreed. For example (young) R Sternbuch wrote something against this. R Schach did not respond directly but wrote a letter (that was, of course, publicized) to someone else explaining his change.
HaKatan > Rabbi Kook and Eim HaBanim Semeichah are both irrelevant
I agree with you that the point of this discussion is not to rely on those with the most pro-zionist position. You obviously disagree with them vehemently.
It would be more productive if you can address more mainstream rabbis (quoted above all over) who accepted interaction with zionists – to some degree, in a limited way, conditionally, with reservations – but more than Satmar Rebbe. The best way would be for you to quote their seforim and explain what you think of those. This is not too much to ask.non-political > I see parody has become the order of the day
yes, please explain me who will call himself a “katan”? I am not talking about the humbleness, just the nikudos. Nukudos are either Sephardi or Israeli, but position is ostensibly of the loshen koidesh derech. So, maybe it is just a mean zionist plot to discredit their detractors by painting them as stubborn and illogical.
A freiliche Pirem.
Chaim > they all held of Zionism
Chaim, maybe you need define what the “held of Zionism” means. I presume they were not members of the hashomer hatzair. Were they supporting settling EY; or said that it is better for all Jews to be in EY than die under Commies and Nazis; or agreed to join government, etc. There are a lot of gradation.
For example, R Soloveitchik criticizes both non-religious leaders of Israel (and before) and also those religious leaders who refuse to cooperate with them …
in one 1945 speech, he talks about Tzitz (head, halachik decisions) and Hoshen (political decisions) being attributes of the same Kohen Godol. That politics should be dealt with, and dealt with in torah ways, and he says unfortunately we now have Kohanim with Tzitz and Kohanim with Hoshen each dealing only in their own area and refusing to cooperate.HaKatan, thanks for starting addressing the arguments.
> Rav Elchonon famously wrote then that the letter’s subjects should emigrate from Europe to the US only if they will not be going into an impossible spiritual sakana, like emigrating via YU instead of via Torah VoDaath, for example.
To be clear, I am not “blaming” REW – he was not a navi, like most other gedolim, and he tried to make best decisions he could. Let’s make a thought experiment: REW has perfect knowledge of what will happened during WW2 – what would he do? He could have (theoretically) come to NYC himself and open a yeshiva there and walked around the beach with R Herman, or maybe figure out a more effective approach similar to what later rabbis figured out.
So, if someone else happened to come out with a more helpful answer, whether by chochma, bas kol, or pure luck, do we need to disregard them?> . The topic is the lack of any sources for the Zionists’ impossible attempt to insert their idolatry into the Torah.
Several people here brought different sources. You can go to those sources, read them, and then challenge them, or maybe agree with them. But answering that there are no sources when you shown them is not productive.
R Steinberg passed away less than a year ago.
> which the Zionist both caused a to which the Zionists contributed
this could be a source of viciousness. Someone needs to defend how their leaders discouraged their followers to go to EY or US or other countries, so the only way is to blame others. Beltzer Rebbe seemingly was able to face the problem directly.
Chaim > There is no requirement in our Torah that another gadol needs to defend his hashkafa or approach.
I think you are right, and even more: when an important gadol takes a controversial position, others would surely join if they want to support him. So, if they politely stay quiet, it means they all do not agree with Satmar, just don’t want to openly contradict him.
Dr Pepper > I just consider it a tax that I’m not receiving any benefit for. A small price to pay to this wonderful country that took in my ancestors with open arms when they had nowhere else to turn.
finally, we agreed. Of course, you get benefits – zechus for supporting old people, see Kiddushin ~ 30. But if you complain about it – then you might, H’V lose the zechus.
But I agree with your overall theme – consider the system as a whole. In a complex society, you will obviously have some aspects that do not benefit you personally. Same, l’havdil w/ halakha – “do not steal” is to disadvantage of people who currently have nothing. “do not commit adultery” disadvantages people who are currently looking for more partners. ..
somejew, you say well – but then you don’t follow up on your own pronouncements. We had here several people talking to you and referring each to a different source. It does not look like you bothered to read on and analyze any of them, while calling upon all of us to take Vayoel Moshe seriously. Why can’t you take R Soloveitchik (the one I was referring) or any of others mentioned here seriously? Why are we often having detailed discussion on respected “charedi” rabbis, but not on others? Keep it up.
ard > lets say the ben ish chai told you personally to do xyz, you would have to listen unless…
I don’t know whether any ashkenazi ever travelled to get psak from ben ish chai, but, if I recall correctly, R Akiva Eger refused to answer a shailah sent from another country, replying – go to your country’s posek.
I solve it by pressing “edit profile”, “save” and going back
Dr Pepper > I can’t see the shidduch process being automated. Finding one’s bashert is much more complicated than purchasing a plane ticket
This goes without saying. Sotah mentions an example of a matrona trying this by lining up men v women (by age? by height?). So, we need to think what can be automated. I presume most singles or their parents can handle the task of filtering out resumes by parameters instead of waiting for a shadchan to “decide” who might be a good match – based on her (often limited and biased) understanding.
Let’s take one most innocent step: load all existing resumes into a computer but not shown to anyone. All you could do is do a search by parameters and see how many matches are there. So, a girl searches for someone who is under 30, finished shas, has a master’s degree and loves skiing and gefilte fish. She sees that this generates 0 (zero) matches. So, she sobers up and can start relaxing her conditions to see what gives.
Would this be useful?
practically speaking, imetyouatsinai has interface with shadachanim, but I don’t the system is popular enough for some reason. What are the reasons?
Chaim > It makes you wonder if perhaps a bully tactic of spamming is being used.
I admit I never saw them together in one room. But I think they are 2 different humans, just happened to have drank from the same source. If they tell us how is their rosh yeshiva, or their rosh yeshiva’s rosh yeshiva, you can then go and talk to the latter and see whether he actually holds everything they do or they misinterpreted their teacher. One of them is actually responsive to the arguments. but you can try asking chatgpt.
DaMoshe,
this generation seem to accept that everything is easy and what is not easy “is too hard” and not worth pursuing. It does not mean that they need to struggle thru complicated arguments that they don’t understand, but it does mean that they need to be presented with intellectual challenges at their level.ard > you have to listen/accept/follow to anything that comes out of the mouth of a gadol. UNLESS you have a mesora/gadol saying otherwise.
Listen yes, but why would someone follow a gadol from a totally different derech “unless told otherwise”?! In older times, I would happily live in the outskirts of Vilna – without ever being bothered by what Ben Ish Hai is writing – and can be a tzaddik gamur. Were I to have a question, I would go to my local Rav who might forward the question to Vilna Gaon. If I then learn somehow about Sephardi minhagim – would I need to leave my local mishna sseder and start investigating all Sephardi rulings? I don’t think so.
I do agree with you that it is praiseworthy to learn what various gedolim write – and this should lead you to uncover new questions that you then might ask your local gadol and find out what he thinks.
somejew,
I am not 100% sure that you are right about Gedolim required to prove everything they write. They typically do, but when application is to something that did not exist during Sh’A times, as it often is, that proof also refers to modern facts and also to often intuitive considerations. But, more generally, we are commanded to listen to judges of our generations. And there are circumstances (some listen in Gemora) where a psak can be given on purpose without a reason, at least temporarily. The weight of such pronouncement would depend on speaker’s reputation. So, if R Moshe says something without fully explaining his reasoning, you would weight the fact that majority of his psak is accepted by the community and take it into consideration.I am also not sure how this relates to the debate here: most poskim in our times indeed explain their reasoning, whether they are pro- or anti-zionist. For example, R Soloveitchik explains his approach in the following way (my paraphrase): we are claiming that we inherited Hashem’s Torah and have unique insights in how world is run and how Jews and other people should behave. Therefore, we should address issues raised by changes of the society with our Torah knowledge instead of “hiding in the caves” (his expression).
This explanation convinces me. It also, in my mind, leaves space for others to say that their priority is not to engage with the world, but to preserve their Torah. Maybe it does not convince you, it is fine. I would be interested what fault you find in this argument.
Dr Pepper,
I think you are complaining that social security is not doing what you’d like it to do – work as a personal retirement account. It is just not – you are being taxed to pay for current retirees. Put it in your tzedokah column, not savings column. You also have some hope that when you retire, someone else will pay for your retirement. It will be up to the congress at that time to make that decision. If they don’t make no decision, then the current system will continue and may be insufficient to pay for what you think you deserve. Maybe our children will be generous enough to pay for that, or maybe not, or maybe US will be a province of China and it will be up to Xi to decide your pension benefits. Who knows.Now, the reason you are mislead is due to you being consistently told that social security is waiting for you … their website shows expected payments … these payments are not legal obligation, they are simply an estimate of what you might be paid if future congress continues the same laws as now. Again, any congress may change the law.
If you want a forecast – the minimal age will increase a little; there will be more immigrants at some point (despite current backlash); productivity will increase; Chinese will be defeated and continue their slave labor to send us cheap stuff – and social security will continue provide for retirement of most poor people – otherwise they’ll vote congressmen out.
Dr Pepper,
I am just pointing out that in the history of the world, nobody solved the problem of having quality brokers.
Policing and code of ethics is a good idea, but, again historically, will lead to just creating barrier to new entrants.How about a review board where customers can leave reviews of shadchanim behavior – this works on amazon.
Another idea would be for everyone, including those who are looking for themselves or their family to also keep in mind others.But as I mentioned regarding travel agents – the problem was solved by technology, where now everyone can buy their own ticket.
Similarly, a lot of financial middlemen were eliminated by muutal funds, index funds, robinhoods, etc.
Some sort of automatic information sharing should work in our community.Wolf, refuah shleimah.
Maybe you could make it easier on yourself and arrange to partner with someone and lain every second aliya so that you can rest and continue laining for many years to come?!Rocky, you have good points. On haskala, I am not sure you are right. Despite the efforts of some communities to isolate themselves from the modern world, intellectual stimulation is still available. It is arguably less dangerous – sciences continue to improve. And that is how science generally works by accumulating knowledge and fixing mistakes – except at major civilizational breakdowns, like dark/middle ages when Europe lost all Greek/Roman science.
So, there is less danger from secular philosophies, but (less dangerous) stimulation via engineering, computers, medicine is still available. While someone becoming a doctor can still be a talmid chochom, not like in 19th century – a secularly educated person still needs to be taught Torah at the level of the increased intellectual potential. I can compare – I have gemora classes both with a very traditional rav and with a group of highly educated professionals, and while halakha is undoubtedly clearer in the traditional class, understanding of Gemora’s historical/philosophical/science is better in the second. The Rav of the first class would be able to participate in the 2nd class discussion, but not the students .
My answer is A. Social Security is paid by current taxes.
You hope that future generations will be as generous to you as you were to the previous one. Of course, to quote a joke, previous generation won WW2 while the current one was challenged to sit on the couch to avoid a pandemic – and failed at that. It is now asked to defeat North Korean soldiers in Ukraine running without fire support and we are still on the fence. So, how are we sure that the next generation will respect us and pay taxes to support us? But I digress.
What _bothers you_ – is how social security is presented by media and politicians. And maybe it was like that from the beginning, maybe someone is better on history lessons here. These sources are convincing you that you have a helek in your social security taxes and then you are afraid of Ponzi scheme – because people live longer and population is not increasing fast enough.
First, life expectancy at 65 is not currently increasing, hope you are happier now 😉
SSA numbers: 2000: men 82 women 85, 2010 men 83, women 85, 2021 men 82 women 85Second, each generation has their own challenges: somehow next generation will address how to deal with poverty. As productivity increases, then pensioners of the future would presumable fair better than previous. Even now, they are watching netflix, skype their einiklach, and read books on kindles. Beats what existed 50 years ago. So, have some bitachon, pun intended.
SQRT> Jews who are not Sephardic totally ignore Sephardic Rabbis.
in fact, my local Ashkenazi Rav relied on R Ovadia Yosef’s psak (and sent a shaliach to confirm details of the psak in person). OK, he could not find any ashkenazi posek that would address the problem. Part of the reason was that R Ovadia’s psak recognized authority of Israeli rabanut over marriages in Israel … As part of that story, as part of the shlichut, rav sent an obscure quote from a rishon who seems to support R Ovadia’s psak, to which R Ovadia smiled and confirmed that he saw that rishon.
> The claim about Musk deleting hundreds of billions of dollars in wasted government money or stopped sending checks to dead Social Security recipients is fiction.
it’s not fiction, just a guzma. Lists of cancelled contracts is posted online as part of open database of government contracts. A contract has a ceiling – how much can be spent under the contract and actually allocated money that the government customer spent. Musk sums the ceiling of the contracts DOGE helped cancel. Some say, actual saved number would be less because some contracts purposefully have a high ceiling “just in case”. This is also true, so Musk’s numbers are less than true savings that will be achieved. I quickly search the names of the contracts, and I think like 20-30% of them had DEI-related words. So, Musk’s claim that he is cancelling nonsense contracts is also true. 🙂