Avram in MD

akuperma,

You’re going to argue the definition of private with a lawyer? 😂

Sechel HaYashar,

“But of course, if they aren’t Lubavitch, their Minhag doesn’t bother anyone…”

The people from Dzhikov aren’t here on the CR trying to convert the nebach non-Dzhikovians. If they were, you bet they’d be asked about it.

I may be beating a dead horse, but the irony of the “Holocaust on your plate” folks taking exception with common idioms makes me sick as a dog. This is the straw that broke the camels back, and I am going to take the bull by the horns and kill the fatted calf. Thankfully there’s more than one way to skin a cat.

Eli Y,

“So we began making flashcards the showed the Mitzvot and the Hebrew Pasuk but neither of us understood the the actual Hebrew–rather, we were looking for key words or characters that would be unique to the pasuk so he could recognize it as the one the Mitzva was derived from. IMO, this was ridiculous since we were learning nothing”

I disagree that you were learning nothing by doing what you were doing. Especially if you were combining finding key words/letters with reading the pesukim, however slowly. Any and all exposure to the pesukim will help. The ultimate goal here is not to get to the fun Crown Heights trip, but to build those learning skills. At first, yes, it’ll be picking out only key words, and very slow reading. But as you keep seeing and reading the same words over and over again, they’ll become more familiar, and your ability to read them and pick them out in other pesukim will improve. Unfortunately yes, there is now a steeper learning curve for your son to pass these tests and go on the trip. But rather than closing the book on the higher goal of acquiring the skills by demanding everything in English, is it possible to seek out some additional help? Maybe an older boy in the school needs some chessed hours? Or an older person in your community wants an opportunity to do a wonderful mitzva by tutoring?

MrSarahLevine613,

While it may be convenient to your argument to frame the charedi position towards army service as “we prefer to learn and not lift the burden with you”, it is simply not a correct representation. The army historically and currently has been perceived by all sides as serving two purposes: the primary being protection of the nation, and the secondary being a vehicle for acculturation and assimilation. It is this secondary purpose that chareidim oppose. While Avi K may be a full-throated supporter of both aims, chareidim value their mesora and culture, and do not wish their lifestyle to be destroyed.

So to reframe the debate – if the Israeli government really wants chareidim to serve and want to serve, why are they unwilling to make accommodations? Or, for the cases when accommodations are not possible, why not accept and respect, as the U.S. military does, that there are some who are conscientious objectors, and provide an alternate means of service?

username123321,

“Saying that we’re Kofrim over this [davening late] is another. And getting insulted when we argue back is surprising.”

I don’t think I’ve seem or heard anyone assert that Chabad chassidim are kofrim due to zmanim. Certainly not me. That’s a straw man. The concerns are about the perceived deification of the Lubavitcher Rebbe ZT”L and changing the definition of Moshiach to fit him. And the idea that all Jews must accept these precepts or they are spiritually inferior.

username123321,

“The Heicha Kedusha by Mincha.”

Watch out for the pot calling the kettle black. The only time I have ever witnessed a “heicha kedusha” davening within the Orthodox sphere was at a Chabad house for shacharis. And I’ve been to Chabad events where a minyan was present, and yet the rabbi refused to set up a mincha minyan, even though it was a small town and there certainly wasn’t any other mincha minyans available. Even the chol hamoed mincha at the zoo by the elephants I went to once had a full chazaras hashas.

Milhouse,

“Not from any one incident, but over time they could have realized that something is very wrong.”

Agreed. Should those within the Chabad community be realizing that something is very wrong when the Lubavitcher Rebbe ZT”L is being increasingly deified?

TomimTihyeh,

“Careful – you dont want the snags to know that the Frierdiker Rebbe revealed to us that they think this way! Lol”

You like telling it like it is, “lol”? Fine, I’ll tell it like it is. Better to be snags than ovdei avoda zara. We hope for the coming of melech hamoshiach every day, but we do not hope for a replacement of Hashem, R”L. Yes, I know it is much easier to have a relationship with a man – someone you can see, someone who smiles at you. It is scary to try and relate with a Creator Who is infinite and beyond our limited senses and perceptions, but that is what Hashem asks of us. That is what Avraham Avinu did. That is what Moshe Rabbeinu did, and exhorted us to do. You hold that the Rambam is the final word on Moshiach. Fine. Did the Lubavitcher Rebbe ZT”L build the beis hamikdash? Are we all living in Eretz Yisroel? Is he sitting on the throne of Dovid Hamelech in Yerushalayim? Was the korban tamid offered this morning? No. Therefore, the moshiach has not yet come, and you cannot redefine what the moshiach is to get around that, changing him into some sort of deity. The Christians already tried that 2000 years ago, so you’re late to the party.

You’re getting so bent out of shape over perceived disrespect of your rebbe. But unlike you, who has used nivul peh CV”S to refer to Rav Kotler ZT”L and other precious and holy Torah leaders, nobody here has insulted the Lubavitcher Rebbe, ZT”L. We’re just not accepting him as the moshiach, based on the very clear criteria of the Rambam, and you seem to interpret that as disrespect. Well, guess what? You are disrespecting the Lubavitcher Rebbe, ZT”L much more than anyone else here, because he is certainly not getting nachas in shamayim when a supposed chassid of his makes him into a god, R”L.

There is only ONE G-D, and that is Hashem. And He is not a man.

Slight edit

coffee addict,

“Are you saying that the gaonim tannaim and amaroaim who spanked their kids had their kids turn out violent?”

There is a world of difference between “100 years ago” per your OP and the way chazal lived and did things. They are not interchangeable. Don’t look at the early 20th Century or the 1950s as some sort of gold standard.

“I understand that there is a way it should be done, with love and respect but it’s not the spanking it’s the way it’s done”

The problem is, there is almost nobody on this planet who will spank a child for the “right reasons” and in the “right way.” Spanking is almost always the last resort of impatience and frustration with a child, because it yields the “results” of submission and obedience quite effectively. The problem is, while the parent wins the short game, in the long run, submission and obedience aren’t the true results we seek. It’s proper chinuch that we want, and spanking is more often a short circuit than a shortcut to that end. A child spanked by a rageful or frustrated parent, or one embarrassed by his child’s behavior in public, will submit, will cry, and may even apologize for his behavior when that is demanded of him, but he won’t be feeling regret over his actions and a desire to do better. He will be feeling rage towards the parent, or his own humiliation and embarrassment over the spanking, not the behavior.

Chabadshlucha,

“I remember the time in high school when we heard how that day’s story in Yeshiva was that a visiting Rebbe had asked a Lubavitcher bochur a question. The bochur reverently listened, and then registered shock, before he recovered and answered.

The teacher was curious what had transpired, so he asked the bochur what had happened. The bochur said the Rebbe had asked him what the good tourist sights were. He hadn’t expected such a question from a Rebbe.”

You forgot the end of the story. As the rebbe left, his attendant asked him, “why did you ask that bochur about tourist sites when you’re planning to spend the day in the beis medrash?” The rebbe replied, “nu, it’s a mitzva to love every Jew, so I talked to him about his own interests!”

Meno,

“First let’s take a simple case: Light travels 186,282 miles per second. Let’s say I’m running in a straight line at 1000 miles per second, and lightning strikes exactly 186,282 miles ahead of me. How much time passes (on my watch) before I see the lightning? The answer, I believe, is exactly 1 second, because light travels the same speed in every reference frame – that’s Einstein’s chiddush.”

Correct.

“So now the train example. To make it simpler, lets say the train is 372,564 miles long (2 x 186,282 miles). The guy on the platform sees both lightning strikes simultaneously after 1 second – simple. But why doesn’t the guy on the train also see them simultaneously? Why is it different from my case? Is my conclusion in my case incorrect?”

The flashes were 186,282 miles from each observer, so they both figure that the light from each flash took 1 second to reach them. But the observer on the platform saw the flashes as happening at the same time, and the one on the train saw the flash at the head of the train happen first. In the inertial frame of the platform observer, the man on the train was moving away from the light coming from the back flash and towards the light of the front flash, so the light from the front flash traveled less than 186,282 miles before reaching him, and the light from the back flash traveled further than 186,282. But to the man on the train, the light from each flash traveled exactly 186,282 miles before reaching him.

Doing my best,

“Yes, but the man on the platform will not see the strikes at the same time. This should prove that it is not only movement which can change your perception.”

True, he wouldn’t, but he’d know that the strikes occurred at different distances from him, and, doing the math, he’d still calculate that the strikes occurred simultaneously. Setting up the thought experiment with the two strikes being equidistant from both observers is done for simplicity, but it doesn’t change the fact that in one man’s inertial frame of reference the strikes were simultaneous, and in the other man’s frame of reference they were not.

Also, if the man on the train had super long hands and one was in front of the train and and the other in back, he would feel both strikes at the same time.

No he wouldn’t. Let’s say his nerve signals could go from his hands to his brain at the speed of light, i.e., the signals are moving towards his brain at the same speed as the light from the flashes (in reality they go more than a million times slower). As we saw above, the light/nerve signal from the front of the train arrives to his brain before the light/nerve signal from the back of the train. So he both sees and feels the strikes as non-simultaneous. The truth is, they were non-simultaneous to him. Just as much as they were simultaneous to the guy on the platform.

And even though he sees them at different times, that’s because of the fact that the back light hasn’t hit him, but it’s still there.”

That can only make sense if the speed of light from one flash was slower than the speed of light from the other flash, which is impossible.

Health,

“Pres. Trump is NOT PC & feels no need to defend his comments! Therefore if right wackos decide to turn his words around – he doesn’t respond!”

And that is wrong. Words matter. Communication matters.

“Trump remembers a world that wasn’t guided by PC. He lives in that world. Unfortunely you only live in your PC World, NOT the Real World!”

If it were the 1950s, Donald Trump would have had his mouth washed out with soap by now. This “not PC” nonsense is just an excuse to be false, uncivil, and nasty.

Doing my best,

“Anyone know more about this? or how this would work?”

Einstein used a thought experiment involving a speeding train to demonstrate that time is relative to the inertial frame of the observer.

Suppose there is a speeding train, and there is a man in the middle of this train. Another man is sitting at a platform outside of the train as it speeds past. Right as the middle of the train is passing the platform, the man on the platform sees lightning strike both ends of the train simultaneously. What does the man inside the train observe? As light from the lightning heads towards his eyes, the train is moving in the direction of one of the bolts, and away from the other. Thus, the light from the lightning strike at the front of the train has a shorter distance to travel to the eyes of the man in the train than the light from the strike in the back. So he’d say the strikes were not simultaneous.

Health,

“Stop with your lies about Trump!”

I have not lied. Sorry. כל הפוסל במומו פוסל‎

“Where were you when Obama was president?!?”

What does this have to do with President Trump?

“We don’t even know whether Obama is an Antisemite or not, because it was hidden.”

Given his lame duck slap of Israel via the UN and his administration’s general tone-deafness, I’d say it was quite possible. President Obama’s rhetoric reflected the anti-Semitism on the left (anti-Israel, anti-milah, anti-shechita, etc.), while President Trump’s rhetoric stirs up the anti-Semitism on the right (Jews control the world and seek to undermine nations, are polluters of purity, etc.). I’m happy to call out both, but the latter is more threatening and imminently dangerous right now.

Gadolhadorah,

“To those idiots like Limbaugh, Savage etc,, I’d just wish one of these “toys” shows up in their mailbox so we can wish whats left of them a refuah shelamah.”

And this rhetoric is just as terrible as what you’re so bothered by from the other “side”.

Well Health, what’s the latest false-flag conspiracy spin on this?

“Why send so many?!?”

As you said, to scare e/o!

“These devices weren’t meant to do tons of harm.”

They were packed with shards of glass. No, these weren’t meant to take out a city block, but they do seem to be designed to kill or maim the ones opening them.

“Why not send very powerful ones?”

Because that would require greater intelligence, skill, and resources than this guy likely had. And more powerful bombs would be heavier and harder to send in the mail.

Civility, listening, empathetic communication, and evidence-based persuasion rather than fear tactics and threats.

Anti-vaxxers are not selfish. They love their children more than anyone else does, fear for their safety more than anyone else does, and want to do what is best for them, no matter what anyone else says. And this is exactly what they are supposed to be doing as parents. We are living in a generation where trust has completely broken down. Conservatives don’t trust the government, and think doctors are tools of the government. Liberals don’t trust Big Pharma, and think that doctors are Big Pharma’s drug dealers. Both feel that these big, scary entities do not have their children’s best interests at heart. And when a harried doctor steps into the exam room and explodes at a parent who spent 45 minutes in the waiting room before raising a concern about a vaccine, or the aggressive vaccine schedule, and gives no reassurance, no information, and does not acknowledge the fear that is behind the concern, and instead threatens to refuse care to the child, how is that going to help change minds?

1,

“Anyone with a brain should be questioning the legitimacy of the story, especially after it was confirmed that the package sent to CNN was harmless.”

There have been numerous instances of white powder getting mailed to prominent figures, and subsequent analysis showing that the powder is harmless. Sometimes the intent is to terrify, not necessarily kill.

Neville ChaimBerlin,

“He’s managed to get like 60% of this thread to be about women going outside when it was supposed to be about Chabad hats lol”

Meh, smooshed hats are boring. Given your 60% figure, had this thread stayed on topic it would’ve been less than half as long.

Joseph,

“Was exercising and mental health concerns non-issues from the time of Sarah Imainu through Chazal and the Mechaber of S”A that all cited this restriction, and they only became relevant for the first time in history in recent years?”

Stop for a minute and think. Today we have cars that allow us to travel for miles while sitting down. We have washing machines, so we don’t have to schlep clothing down to the creek and use a washboard. We have electric stoves and running water, so no more bringing firewood into the house and trips to and from the well with heavy pails. The need for exercise has always existed, but in our generation the opportunities to get it via our daily routine have all but disappeared.