Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
Hulu; are you implying that philosophical or ideological conclusions reached solely from one’s intensive Torah study without an admixture of secular education are inferior to the perspective of one who has received a thorough education in secular studies?
Toras Hashem temimah. That is precisely the alikorsus Rav Boruch Ber in birkas shmuel end of kidushin is referring to. That there is some sort of greater understanding besides Torah. Pi le’oznaim shekach shomos, oi lehem librios mayelboneh shel Torah.
Also, I’ll have to take issue with tha assertion that gedolei yisroel did not have their wives work outside the home. Rebbetzim kanievsky worked as a bookkeeper for many years. Many rebbetzins had jobs.
AY – the gedolei yisroel were and are extremely upset over the way things are nowadays. They’re more concerned, however, about the pitfalls of unfiltered internet and social media. At the major asifa for post seminary women a few weeks ago, kol kevudah in that context was not discussed, because they pick their battles. They know the generation and what’s the ikkar vs what’s the tofel.
Also, ujm…while there is no Din that a woman must help her family have a parnosa, there is likewise no Din that a man must support his children once they are of age to beg and/or work.
I think it’s extremely selfish, and perhaps a violation lf lo saamod al dam reicha if a woman’s family is starving, the husband is unable to work, and she “unilaterally” decides to sit by and do nothing. While perhaps a beis din cannot force her, it is the normal, natural thing to do when one’s family needs her to help.
The Torah wasn’t given to vildeh chayos and pereh odom’s
Also, please look up the sources i quoted; they’re very clear. Rav Hirsch was from the emunah peshutah/mesorah camp. Ask anyone from Washington heights; I have plenty of friends who went through the yekkishe system, as quite a few went to my beis medrash. They are the progenitors of Rav Hirsch’s hashkofa and while there was a difference between Rav Schwab and Rav Breuer, it had nothing to do with limiting “austritt”, Rav Hirsch’s clear plan of separation from foreign garbage and alikorsus. We don’t practice Austritt by learning apikorsus; we run from it like corona.
Does anyone else realize what happens when you translate “pursuing a livelihood” into lashon hakodesh? “Redifah achar hamamon”…kinda makes you think of it differently…should we really be using such language when referring to the mitzvah of earning a livelihood? Do we likewise say that one is “pursuing” tzedaka or the mitzvah of tefilin?
Acharei mitzvosecha tirdof nafshi…. our souls should chase and pursue mitzvos…. just a thought
That’s not german culture, as in german philosophers or literature, but rather how to live, “fir zich” in whatever society we live in. Nowehere in “maintaining the social order” would we include learning Immanuel kant or nietzsche. He’d say to consult an expert in german etiquette. Happens to be that burping in public is a flattering gesture in Germany; it shows the host that you arr satisfied with the meal; those things change and are of no intrinsic value.
He was also living in a time when modesty, fairness and real justice were championed; american culture with its many immoralities, its love of gender benders, toevos and “pride” would be shunned by any ehrlich jew, especially someone like rav hirsch. Rav hirsch would not want one to be in any way engaged in sodom ve’amorah.
Israel is home to fewer Jews than America.
More Jews are killed in Israel due to terrorism r”l than in the rest of the world put together, multiplied by 10.
Rav Hirsch, again….was opposed to learning philosophy and echoed the Gaon’s criticism of the Rambam(19 letters, Letter 18, p. 264-5. He also advocates learning science, math and language, but omits goyishe literature and philosophy in the curriculum for his school (Horeb, ch 3).
This distinction is literally the crux of our discussion. Rav Hirsch makes learning Torah “from its own perspective” through chazal and not our own(or kofrim’s) view over and over…its where german reform, MO and Rav Hirsch completely differ. Rav Hirsch was a purist who did not use goyishe ideas to influence his Judaism, but rather viewed everything goyishe through the crucible and viewpoint of Toras Hashem temimah.
I should have clarified that there are definitely circumstances where working is a good idea, if a woman has extra time and isn’t ready to do things like volunteer for chessed, etc, then the alternative of wasting time and sitting idly is much worse than sacrificing the idealism of kol kevudah bas melech penimoh. Chazal say that batalah leads to licentiousness and madness.
A man’s divinely imposed obligations cannot be relegated to “traditional gender roles”. A man who supports a family is serving Hashem every minute he works, if he has that in mind.
For a woman, it’s either a tremendous zchus in helping support Torah, or a necessary evil to help support the family. Or it’s poisonous careerism, a dereliction of duty and a statement that Hashem does not know how to run his world cv”s.
Avi, do you think that there was this massive movement after the shulchan aruch, that literally everyone stopped sharing ideas with philosophers and only the maskilim kept the “mesorah”? Rav Hirsch opposed learning any philosophy at all, though he clearly advocated learning science, language, history and other studies. I know of no accepted acharon; be it from Litvish, Hungarian, Sefardi, Chasidish, or otherwise, who felt that hashkofa was a free for all where we should mix in with goyim.
The chossid yaavetz writes that during the inquisition, the only jews who stayed behind and became marranos (hardly heros… They broke halacha openly) were those who were involved in philosophy.
Avi, i realize that’s how Wikipedia writes about “Jewish scholars”, but besides implicit “proof” such as the aforementioned shvil hazahav, where do we find that chachamim were so readily open to reading every apikores’ book? When one is into hashkofa, there will be overlaps and coincidences.
Who thought that Rav Shlomo ibn Gavirol was not Jewish? An academic? Seriously, we know of him from the piyutim that he wrote, all of which were in prestine lashon kodesh.
Like I said, the amount of rishonim who eschewed philosophy is great. The Rashba banned any and all non Jewish literature, to name but one source. Many rabbis who lived during the time of the rishonim were not necessarily gedolei yisroel; I’d refer you once again to “Torah Chazal and science” by Rabbi Moshe Meiselman for a lot of researched detail on that subject.
Rabbeinu yonah’s regret over his machlokes with the rambam wasn’t in his opposition to the shita itself, but rather in that he did not, in his understanding, give proper kovod to the rambam. Nowehere in shaarei teshuva does he advocate philosophy. The amount of other rishonim who argued with the rambam were copious…see the hakdama lf yam shel shlomo for some very, very strong words from the maharshal, who was an early acharon. To see a wide array of sources regarding the mesorah’s opposition to philosophy and “rationalism”, see the lev tov’s introduction to chovos halevavos.
Ever since hisgalos hakabalah, the tone of the vast majority of baalei machshava; the maharal, ramchal, gaon, chasidim, chid”a, and tons others has been a rejection of the philosophical approach to emunah of the rambam and instead the kabalistic approach of other rishonim including the ramban. At the same time, you have ancillary rabbis who were influenced by European enlightenment who all of the sudden found a leg to stand on with the rambam,. while lacking his allegiance to chazal and mesorah.
As stated above, the rambam was not anti-kabalah, he was simply not exposed to it; when he was, he expressed regret that he had not had it sooner – that’s a fact recorded by the abarbanel in the end of pirkei avos, perek 3. There is a famous testimony of the Migdal Oz as well, in which he found a letter of the rambam saying that he discovered kabalah and that he wishes to be more involved in it, and that the chachmei hakabalah are emes.
The rambam does not quote Aristotle for his shvil hazahav opinion, nor in any other context besides science and logic. He says clearly (deos, 1, 3-4) that “tzivu chachamim”, the chachamim commanded us to follow this path. Secular scholars on the rambam say that he got his middos teachings from Aristotle. The fiercest critics of the rambam, even the raavad on the mishnah torah, do not make this accusation. The Gaon, when arguing with the rambam’s denial of magic etc, says that here the rambam was drawn after philosophy. If his ethical approach was so greatly impacted and inspired by Aristotle (of which the Gaon knew a lot) he would have accused him of such. The rambam was not averse to quoting Aristotle when he sourced him, so why would he never – not once – quote him in an ethical or moral context?
As to chazal and their acceptance of three trials, see “torah chazal and science”, by rabbi moshe meiselman; he deals with that topic at length.
Chochma doesn’t mean ethics and morals, and yes, the definition of altruism is a moral construct with unavoidable moral implications. The gemara itself asks how rebbe meir can learn Torah from acher, and answers that since he was a gavra rabba – a title of immense weight – he was able to “eat the fruit and discard the shell”. We cannot, or at least we can’t without risk. If people are worried about the chance of catching corona, wouldn’t they also be worried about catching apikorsus? Isn’t that worse?
The rambam didn’t invent kabel es haemes mimi sheomro; it’s chazal, and again, the rambam (nor any other rishon) never quotes Aristotle from his moral and ethical teachings. He skipped that part. He used him for what we would call science and logic.
Many, many rishonim argued with the rambams use even of that – are we to pasken like him with a shailah of such magnitude without a clear psak from achronim? Actually, the achronim say something quite different. The abarbanel writes that sof yamav, the rambam was shown kaballah and had regret about being psek with Aristotle, preferring chochmas hakabalah. The gaon famously said that the rambam was influenced by philosophy.
Who are we to go around reading whatever we want when chazal say that one who reads seforim chitzonim (which the bartenura says means books of heretics) has no place in olam haba?
Well… If someone advocates rishus, evil, or apikorsus, are we to treat such statements as if they were offering a different pshat in a tosfos?
Avi; I’m proud that you embraced part of your heritage and used a yiddish word; frum! Maybe I’m having an impact here after all
Reb Eliezer; according to that reasoning, selling bosor becholov also shouldn’t be an issur hanaah either. Rather, a good definition would be any benefit that comes from the use of the object, so if i use the bosor becholov to feed the dog, and that act makes me happy to see him eat it, that pleasure is coming from the use of issurei hanaah.
I know of no concept that we don’t use chazal to define. That’s a problem with looking at Torah as just laws and stories…the Torah defines for us any value…this is touching on a great divide between the yeshivos and the MO world. MO believes in “other things” outside of yiddishkeit, values that are general and not dependent on Torah. We don’t. For us, kudsha brich hu istakal beoraysoh ubara alma – everything that exists only does so because it’s in the Torah.
Rev Eliezer; what does the halacha of tevilah have to do with my statement that abstract hanaah may not be considered such? Actually i do need to be chozer from it for a different reason. It says you can’t feed animals bosor vechalav, even if the animal is not yours, because you have hanaah from the animal eating it.
Re, chesed leumim chatas – I’ll admit that my knowledge of the inyan was from my tanya learning days, as quoted in the end of the 1st perek, which he quotes from the arizal in aitz chaim shaar 49 when discussing the intrinsic spiritual differences between the beshomos of goyim and jews. He says that there is no true Tov, goodliness in the former, and that all the chesed that they do is to glorify themselves. It would seem that the arizal is paskening not like the maskana of the gemara in bava basra (happens to be that immediately after RYBZ, the gemara says that while it may be good for them, it is bad for us because it holds back the geulah when goyim have zchusim). I have a mahalach that the arizal can fit perfectly fine with the maskana, since if you look at the maharsha he says that the way Rebbe nechunya ben hakana(and RYBZ) read the pasuk, it’s saying that tzedaka and chesed are for yisroel, and the kaparah is for the goyim – meaning that even when yidden do lower levels of chesed not lishma, says the maharal, they count. With this we can understand the arizal – they indeed do chesed for themselves, due to their spiritual nature, but it is still a cleansing for them.
Chatas vs chait – we find many times that chatas means sin as well….al na sashem aleinu chatas…a korban chatas itself is a sin offering..
Nowehere does the rambam say that YOU should learn philosophers. He actually writes in the same hakdama that he did it so that Jews wouldn’t have to search elsewhere for hashkafa – there was a lot of, aptly named nevuchim – confused people, who were into philosophy. It’s true that the rambam holds one is mekayam vehashayvosa al livavecha through philosophy, but even that’s only A) people who have filled their “stomachs with shas and poskim” and B) about yichud Hashem, which brings me to my next point – the rishonim who were busy with philosophy were studying logic and concepts to understand emunah. Nowehere does the rambam get his morals or values from Aristotle. See the first bartenura on pirkei avos – he says that avos starts off with the chain of mesorah because you shouldn’t think that ethics and morals are a free for all with the rabbis making things up as they see fit or according to their own understanding. Rather, he says, just as every other mishnah is torah she baal peh, so too are middos and ethics – purely Torah.
That’s a huge distinction.
One rishon holds “potrin oso miyad” by the case where every member of sanhedrin convicts by a chiyuv misa, that it means we kill him right away. The komarna rebbe in shulchan hatahor says that safek brachos lehakel means to make a bracha. Do we deal with those shitos in lractice? Not really. If there is such a malbim (source please?) It’s not what the rishonim on the gemara say, and it’s not pashut pshat. We wouldn’t use it to dismiss the idea of the gemara since it’s echoed elsewhere.
Also, rashi on mitzvos laav lehanos nitnu can fit – he’s not (nor is the gemara on that sugya) addressing abstract feelings, but rather hanaah in the context of every case in the gemara, which refers to physical benefit.
Rand’s theories on ethics and morals have as much place in a beis medrash as zeus and hercules
Yaakov called eisav “adoni” way before ivrit made it into an inconsequential term for “sir”. It’s galus; play your part and don’t be proud and stubborn with goyim
Also, where does rashi “negate all charity not done for a mitzvah”
The gemara itself says chessed leumim chatas, that chessed done by goyim is sin, because it’s just to boast and feel pride
Ayn rand also believed that the “guiding moral principle of man’s life is the pursuit of his happiness”
Lovely, truly an authority on morals and ethics
Avi, not to weigh in on a machlokes between goyim who you see as authorities on matters of hashkofa..
Rashi says chesed shel emes by burying the deceased is so called because “aino metzapeh leteshlum gevul”, he does not expect recompense. That’s my definition.
Chasidishe rebbes used to give a poor person tzedaka multiple times, because the first time it’s to alleviate tzaar that you feel, abd then afterwards eventually it’s totally lishma.
When I’m talking altruism, I’m discussing chessed lishma, for the sake of helping others. Not because of promoting peace between goyim and us, and not because the goy will help you in the future, or other ulterior motives
Olam chesed yibaneh, it’s a pasuk.
It doesn’t mean we throw away all of the aforementioned. We are, at times, forbidden to or discouraged from pure altruism with goyim.
Reb Eliezer, if i can be mahaneh a yid, why not?
The nazis did a lot of things. They clamped down on the media, confiscated firearms, indoctrinated youth, and employed propoganda. The germans didn’t hate jews because they were guilty of the sin of generalization. Let’s say all jews are bad, in their mind – let’s say I think most (blank) people are criminals and are a drain on society. Does that give them the license to kill and commit genocide? The two have nothing in common. Their evil and their crime wasn’t in their blanket judgement of the jews, it was in the genocide and oppression that they used that hatred as a justification therefore.The problem begins when people start looking at ancillary causes for anti semitism. Anti semitism, as my poem spells out, is a divine boon without a discernible cause, as no matter what jews sldo they are eternally hated. Attributing nazism to secular causes, aligning one’s self with liberals who preach that racism is the root of all evil, is to give a quasi idolatrous spin on history.
By playing into the narrative of the anti-racists and conceding that the holocaust was due to it, we are agreeing that if not for tha5t, the holocaust would not have happened. To milchomo-yidden, we were told never to bring up the aveiros and downward trajectory of European jewry, because the gemara says that if you tell someone that their suffering is because of their sins, it’s onaas devorim – hurtful words. Rashi says not because it’s not true, but rather because the person is pained by the realization that had he not sinned this suffering would not have come upon him.
How is it any less hurtful to tell a milchomo-yid that if not for racism, if only western liberalism had spread enough in germany, then your wife and kids would still be alive?
Attributibf our suffering to anything other than hashgocha is not in our frame of reference….if a highway rail fails, we examine our ways – and of course fix the railing! So if we can try to make kiddiush hashem with goyim and hope that maybe it will mitigate antisemitism…fine, but when i cross that line and start developing ideologies…. that racism need be avoided at all costs in order to prevent a holocaust, or that nationalism must be adopted to prevent another holocaust…. it’s missing source and attacking the rod, the shevet evraso of Hashem.
If evicting Palestinians was the “racism” referred to earlier….am i actually more right wing than you? Eviction is not an option because it puts jews in danger. But theoretically the halacha is lo yayshvu beartzecha. Goyim are not allowed to live in eretz yisroel, and if we had sanhedrin, moshiach and legitimate rulership of the land, that would be first order of business.
I have little sympathy – not none, but little – for a population that is overwhelmingly in favor of jewish genocide.
What i meant is that Hashem tells us what he cares about in the Torah. As far as i know, grouping people together and making fun kf them isn’t in the list of things Hashem tells us that he hates. Actually, Hashem groups people together quite often – allmon and moav, amalek, etc…of course there are details that allow for individual growth in most of those laws, but if someone is more bothered by racist humor than by chilul shabbos, that shows a profound lack of priorities.
I don’t know that we are in the position to decide how Hashem (capitol H) “feels” about him and we know not what his final thoughts of regret or tshuva were. Feel free to start a thread about the concept in general. – 29
It is very easy to dress up the term “mumar”, apostate….as “well, he used to be frum but we can’t judge him because when he wasn’t busy making fun of us he defended us from…. something”
If he had smicha, doesn’t that take him out of the fancied tinok shenishba category? If that doesn’t, what does? Are our enemies only those who physically oppose us? Are we any different from a non jewish nation which respects the rights of its citizens to cast off their traditions and is only mad if they oppose them politically?
Who is a rasha besides…neturei karta? Political enemies who believe in Hashem and serve Him, despite whatever delusions and garbage they follow.
Can modern orthodoxy admit to the concept that someone who breaks halacha openly is a rasha? We shouldn’t really have to have this discussion. It’s something that one gets from reading an english bible. Yet such baaic truths, in the words of the ramchal…in the degree to which they are revealed and known, they are hidden”… Modern orthodoxy grapples with the most fundamental ideas of Judaism, fighting with scripture in comical ways and inventing ad hoc systems of thought to gloss over biblical and talmudic realities. They deny the evils of homosexuality, feminism, abortion, to name but a few.
Someone who has smicha and goes off is a rasha, and a shoneh uporesh.
I only wish laitzonus of serious torah ideas and gedolim were greeted with the same oppobrium and visceral disgust that one has for racism, sexism, etc
I teach elementary school children; if someone makes fun of shabbos it’s ok, but if someone makes fun of the debased and repugnant culture of certain groups of people, they are chastised and not tolerated in the social group. Such is the norm in modern orthodoxy, a twisted ideology which champions ideals not found in chazal and repudiates those which are. Rabbi J.B. Soloveitchik aaid so himself; that there are people who would readily disagree with moshe rabbeinu, and we tolerate them in the interest of not appearing fanatical lr fundamentalist…yet if they disagree with the politics of (then) menachem begin…achas daso lehamis
If making fun of the holocaust evokes disgust and anguish – justifiablly so – should not the same feelings be felt if not more for the elbono shel torah? We are used to people mocking rabbonim and torah, because we let such things fester and grow. We don’t take torah seriously, or at least not as seriously as racism, sexism, or holocaust denial.
C’mon, i said a good pilpul… Let me enjoy myself
“al hakol” clearly doesn’t mean every single person, as chaz say kol hamerachem al ha’achzari, etc, and again the halacha of ain mefakchin
Notice how the rambam here omits the afilu akum, whereas by tzedaka he says it – must be because of darchei sholom exclusively! That by akum there’s a special reason to give tzedaka erc, irrespective of the other reasons that apply to ger toshav or avadim – and that’s darchei sholom. Your quote is a very clear diyuk – shkoyach for the proof!
If the rambam meant the idea of chesed, or emulating hashem as applying to akum, he would have said afilu akum in hilchos avadim, or at the very least said darchei sholom( if darchei sholom means the pshat you’re saying it means) by avadim too
Boruch – i repeat, gevalt…
He’s talking about eved cannaani, who is almost Jewish. He’s chayav in mitzvos as a woman. You’re only proving my point further.
Gadol; the gemara says one is not allowed to save the life of an oved avodah zara, even if paid to do so, except in a case where hatred of jews would become increased (mipnei aivah). Today’s goyim who believe in monotheism are not subject to that prohibition and one may save their lives regardless of the aforementioned, though it definitely is not an intrinsic obligation.
As it happens to be, the halacha i quoted above – ain mefakchin alav es hagal, that we are prohibited from saving the lives of ovdei avodah zara, should be proof enough that darchei sholom was never intended to mean more than promoting peace with goyim (mipnei aivah is different, it allows that which would normally be a worse sin, darchei sholom allows a lesser sin, though this is my own chidush and I’m not going to stand by it should it be disproven)
If saving their lives or healing them is assur, feeding them if they’re hungry should be no different, absent darchei sholom in the latter and aivah in the former
Worth noting in addition is that no other rishonim who bring this gemara mention the pesukim of the rambam or anything else; it’s not in the shulchan aruch or nosei keilim
Also, would you mind telling us where the tzitz eliezer and rav yaakov emden say such things?
Rabbi Dovid tzvi hoffman would not be surprising, as i mentioned sbove, yekkishe rabonim started going with this shita around the time of rav hirsh.
Rabbi kook’s use of it is no more convincing to me than his assessment of the nevala-painting Rembrandt as a “tzadik” because of his painting of the tosfos yom tov.
The term “gadol hador”…there were no zionist rabbis who were acknowledged by the entire torah world as being its leader. Whereas the converse is true – dati leumi people accepted the chazon ish, rav Moshe feinstein wnd rav elyashiv despite not being at all from their camp. The yeshiva and chassidish world did not accept rabbi yoshe ber soloveitchik as a leader of the generation, nor did they accept rabbi kook after the gedolim vegan distancing themselves from him.
There’s a reason why in no mainstream yeshiva will.you find the books of rabbi kook or rabbi yoshe ber soloveitchik, though the latter you will sometimes come across.
every dati leumi yeshiva has an igros moshe.
Gevalt – you quoted the last part of the halacha of the rambam and are…again….missing the first part of the same halacha regarding ger toshav, which the rambam says “yereah li” “it appears to me” that one must dl gemilus chasadim and derech eretz LIKE A JEW, making a clear distinction between jew and akum., Then he turns to akum and says “afilu” akum, meaning don’t think that since im saying to treat a ger toshav like a yid that a goy whos oved avoda zara you should treat like garbage, since tzkvu chachamim, the chachamim commanded us to feed their poor, etc (omitting.hashovas aveidah and other mitzvos), because of darchei sholom. “Harei neemar” with this the rambam brings 2 pesukim for 2 different ideas, the 2nd pasuk of vechol nesivoseah sholom means that the way we behave should lead to sholom, and the first pasuk is anyone’s guess, but if we are to say like you that it’s advocating altruism “lishma”, we wouldn’t need the two pesukim, would we? That would be enough of a reason without nesivoseah sholom…rather i think the two pesukim refer to the two people discussed in this halacha, the first pasuk of rachamav al kol maasav refers to the ger toshav and the 2nd, referring to making peace, refers to the akum
Have you ever “learned up” a rambam before?
In some people’s view, singling out Israel over other countries that have human rights violations (china, Russia, Arab world) is anti semitic bias. Why would B&J only boycott Israel, while ignoring actual genocide of Chinese Muslims and other atrocities?
I tend to agree, though I’m no fan of Israel or its policies, as I’ve made abundantly clear here over the past few weeks
Gadol….im surprised at the lack of awareness of basic halacha.
Shulchan aruch is full of examples of how mispronunciation can be assur. You need to make a distinction between vechara Aff hashem, lest it sound like vecharaf hashem, which would be a curse chas veshalom.
Of course Hashem “knows what we mean”, but davening is for US and affects US if we do it wrong.
Does davening for a choleh with his mother’s name also bother you? Have you only now started philosophically pondering the omnipotence of hashem?