Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
“Just stop any arrival, even indirectly from West Africa. Many countries will follow!”
Actually you can’t fly from any of the three countries that have been affected by this epidemic (Guinea, Liberia, or Sierra Leone) to the US. There are no flights.
There are, however, flights from Texas from/to the rest of the US. Quarantine Texas. The rest of the US would be better off, anyway.
“living in Eretz Yisrael is like being on the front lines in a war”
The enemy is Hamas. Not the people protecting us from them.
The main effect of these protests is to generate free advertising for an opera that would have played to half-empty houses. The Met isn’t going to cancel the opera as it has too many contractual obligations in the way.
“And don’t try to stop us from following our mesorah and minhag of using chicken for kapporos.”
I wasn’t trying to stop anything. YOU were the one who brought up the issue of overruling the Rema; I was simply pointing out that many have done just that.
“The reason must have eluded the Rama and all the many others.”
Wrong. The Rema knew what the Mecaber though of Kaporot; he just disagreed.
“You think the Geonim, who came immediately after the Gemorah, just invented it on their own for fun?”
There are numerous shitot of the Geonim that don’t appear in the Gemorah; some have become normative halachah even when they conflict with explicit decisions brought down in the Bavli. For some of these we do not know their source.
“You’re trying to overrule the Rema”
While I am a big fan of the Rema, it is a fact that many Ashkenazim do not follow the Rema on many matters. Do you keep an hour between meat and milk? Will you be donning tefillin a week from today? Do you recite Hallel in synagogue on seder night?
Bible codes were debunked 15 years ago. The reference is Maya Bar-Hillel, Dror Bar-Natan, Gil Kalai, and Brendan McKay, “Solving the Bible Code Puzzle”, Statistical Science, Volume 14, Number 2 (1999), 150-173.
Here is a link to the paper:
(Edited: google it)
Warning: I have a PhD in Biostatistics and *I* found it challenging. However, if you can debunk the debunking, I am sure that the editors of that journal would love to hear from you.
‘When women “switch” sides so they are the ones celebrating the Torah they are essentially declaring their desire to do that which God has said is not wanted.’
If God really didn’t want women to dance with a Torah scroll, He would have said so.
“Any communal change that doesn’t have this motivation, as noble and legitimate as the motivation may be, by definition is changing our Judaims from a more authentic version.”
Indeed the authentic version of Judaism is that women are not prohibited from dancing with a sefer Torah.
A more interesting question is why the things even MEN do on Simchat Torah are permitted — it was a change from the “more authentic version”, significant changes in normative practice (>5 aliyot on YT, leining at night, delaying the leining until after dancing, birkat kohanim at Shacharit and not at Musaf….), not ordained by any gedol or beit din, and something that spread from the bottom up in the diaspora. But Judaism survived that change. (And it will even survive Maharats!)
Gmar chatima tova!
“While I agree that women are the backbone of their husbands learning, that doesn’t mean they can’t learn, especially women who are not married. “
My wife has learned three tractates of the Bavli — AFTER we got married — and a lot of other material as well.
“How many of the male posters here learn Torah on a regular basis? “
I do. I attend daf yomi almost every morning and I also am learning Nach Yomi. I also attend occasional other shiurim and pick up other sefarim from time to time (including completing four tractates of Yerushalmi to date not part of daf yomi).
“And how many of you consider the experience of hearing the parsha read in shul to be a significant portion of your weekly Torah learning? “
Yes, hearing it with the trope is important, especially since I’ve never gotten around to learning the trope on my own.
“Additionally, if you learn the parsha on your own during the week, is that a significant portion of your weekly Torah learning?”
Absolutely.
“I’m fairly sure you predate me by an amount of time measured in decades, hence the honorific.”
Thanks! Not necessary, though. I don’t give my exact age out on the internet, but I was old enough to have a summer job in a US immigration office back in the 1970s while in college. I learned a lot about how the immigration system in the US works and the basic laws have not changed since the 1960s.
“I know nothing about US deportation policy, even whether it’s a federal or state-by-state law.”
All matters regarding immigration are federal matters. However, many states will turn over suspected illegal aliens to the federal government for possible deportation.
It is actually quite rare for it to be a crime to be in the US illegally. Most of the time, it is a simple violation, like a parking ticket. Usually the federal government will allow an illegal alien who has been detained to leave on his/her own, at his/her own expense. This policy saves the US taxpayer a huge amount of money, and allows them to apply to enter the US legally at a later date. Generally, anyone who is actually deported is ineligible to even apply to come to the US for ten years, and permission for someone previously deported to come to the US legally is very rarely granted. About 40% of illegal aliens actually came to the US legally, but overstayed their visas. Furthermore, a huge fraction of the illegal aliens actually qualify to be in the US legally by doing something like enrolling in school or enlisting in the US military. President Obama has been savagely attacked by the nativist bigots by encouraging illegal immigrants to do this rather than getting deported; many of them were brought here as children by their parents, have little or no memory of their country of nationality and have close relatives who are US citizens.
Persons committed of serious crimes are generally deported after serving part or all of their prison terms. The US has agreements with many other countries where an illegal alien can serve part of their sentence in their country of nationality, again saving the US taxpayer a huge amount of money. Many countries release such persons fairly quickly, though.
And when persons who have been deported after having been convicted of a felony return to the US illegally, that is when being in the US illegally becomes a felony. One of the people we indicted had been convicted of first degree murder in Texas and had been deported back to his home country after serving about half of a 25 year sentence. He had returned to the US and I hope that he will be getting free room and board here for a long time. The Obama administration has been aggressively prosecution these previously-deported illegal aliens like no administration before. I was surprised by this when I served on the jury; I had assumed that corrupt politicians, stock swindlers, and drug lords would have been considered a higher priority, but 80% of our indictments were for illegal aliens who had previously been deported after having been convicted of a felony.
“CH how many of those illegal immigrants do you think are still here? percentage please?”
My guess is 100%. In prison.
“As a statistician, are you suggesting no significant deviation?”
I do not understand what you are asking. Care to explain?
“I’d also say that psychologists are not – as a group – particularly well studied on the functions and disorders of the soul. Do you disagree?”
Have you read William James?
Why do you have to act boorish in public?
” I’ve seen you previously acknowledge there is no evidence of harm from MBP.”
Actually there is. It just isn’t clear how MUCH of a risk that it is, and whether it can be contained. Agudath Israel deliberately misinterpreted a University of Pennsylvania study by claiming falsely that it showed that MBP was safe, and nobody in the frum community has been willing to do the right kind of study to prove whether or not it is safe or not. (This would requiring testing mohels, mothers, and babies.)
Here is what the UPenn study concluded:
” Neonatal HSV infection can cause severe morbidity and death, so mitigating potential risks for infection is critical. Current evidence suggests that direct orogenital suction during ritual circumcision was the likely source of infection in recent cases that resulted in significant illness and death. Future research using cohort or case-control designs that fully capture all of the relevant data are needed to more rigorously examine this association.”
(Such studies are not hard to design but they would require cooperation from the frum community.)
This is what the earlier version concluded (the version AI misinterpreted):
“Neonatal infection with HSV-1 carries a risk for potentially severe morbidity, including the possibility of death, so exposure to infection should be carefully considered. The available evidence indicates that circumcision with direct orogenital suction may be a risk factor for infection, but this evidence base is small and significantly limited. Hopefully, future studies will provide additional evidence on this and other risk factors for neonatal HSV-1 infection.”
As you can see this is NOT a statement that MBP is totally safe.
“There are halachic opinions the MBP is not needed , nobody says Milah is not needed”
Bingo.
“In the time when Beis Yackov was started there were many against precisly becuase it was against Mesorah.”
Actually, it wasn’t. Women were getting Jewish educations in Germany and America under Orthodox rabbinic supervision decades before Sarah Schenirer was born. It just took the rabbis of Eastern Europe a while to get with the program — and to their great credit, they did!
‘There’s no “long tradition” of Torah Jews going to college or driving cars or having running water at home. None of that gives a license to change Jewish traditions.’
I need to sell my car and cancel my water and sewer service because it wasn’t part of the Jewish tradition????
“Unlike the science of medicine generally, psychology does not lend itself to hard rules well.”
As someone who has written dozens of peer-reviewed scientific papers analyzing data from psychological studies, I have to say that you are wrong. Measurements of behavior are often as reliable as any other in medicine, and observable behavioral measures are now correlated with biomarkers from things like brain images. This has been seen in many studies, from with memory and behavioral changes in elderly persons developing dementia to biological changes in person suffering from traumatic stress (including holocaust survivors).
“I am curious what folks in the coffee room have to say about therapy (any kind, like CBT or psychodynamic), and medications (SSRIs, MAOs, Tricyclics…).”
Therapy and psychoactive medications have allowed many to live normal lives who had not been able to beforehand. I can’t see why this would be a problem for any frum Jew, or for anyone else. Be careful as there is a non-Jewish religious cult called Scientology that has been campaigning against therapy and medications for a long time and has poisoned the minds of many.
Psychology is just the science of individual behavior, so if you think that science is kefira you would think that psychology is kefira, but the idea that science is kefira is not one that Chazal would have accepted. Like any other science the knowledge can be used for good and for bad.
“But if done for the benefit of her husband’s Limud Torah then it is an accepted trade-off. And it is far from being newly fangled arrangement.”
It violates the clear language in every Ashkenazic Ketubah since the time of the rishonim, and was pretty much unheard of until the civil rights laws made it possible for women to earn equal pay with men.
“You should train yourself, even if it is difficult, to enjoy and treasure the day watching the menfolk dancing joyously with the Torah.”
Not possible in many shuls — the mechitzot are too high.
“Hashem gave us as a nation the Torah”
And that included the women.
” in a manner their ancestors have done for generations”
The lives of Jews trump even mitzvot from the Torah. MBP is not one of the three for which we give up our lives.
I served on a federal grand jury for a month. Totally boring. 80% of our indictments were for illegal entry into the US. (And they say that the Obama administration isn’t enforcing the immigration laws?)
“he says that it medicinal matters we hold like the scientists over Chazal”
Actually that halachic principle did not originate with Rambam; it appears in the writings of Rav Sherira Gaon, who lived centuries earlier.
If in medical matters we hold by contemporary medical experts over Chazal, kal v’chomer we hold by contemporary medical experts over contemporary rabbis based on yeridot hadorot. However, this should not be interpreted as saying that rabbis have no role to play. Here is an example: I know a frum couple whose first child was born by caesarian section and they were not sure whether they could have a second child via natural birth. (The husband is a physician but not an expert in obstetrics.) The medical evidence was not compelling one way or another (and this depends a lot on the individual woman and the type of c-section performed) and it was not clear what the answer should be. Their rabbi was able to discuss intelligently with them how the Torah views risks and benefits, and empowered them to make a decision based on Torah views in the presence of the evidence. At no time did their rabbi pretend to be a medical expert, and he did not make the decision for them.
Well if we are going to follow the Rema I look forward to everyone wearing tefillin on Chol HaMoed, eating dairy an hour after eating meat, and going home immediately after maariv on seder night rather than staying in shul to recite Hallel.
“US inner-city violent and property crime is much worse than Hamas rockets (and most big Jewish communities are in such areas).”
The NYPD precinct including Washington Heights, which includes the Breuer’s community I mentioned along with Yeshiva University, has not had a homicide this year as of 8/27/2014. There was only 1 in all of 2013.
New York is a very safe city compared to every other large American city.
I was told this past Shabat that the Breuer’s community in the Washington Heights neighborhood in Manhattan has a post high school learning program. Check out K’hal Adath Jeshurun and Yeshiva R. S. R. Hirsch. The community is also a short walk from Yeshiva University, with all its resources. Good luck!
Excellent! May the rest of them suffer his fate.
“Does Hamas accept paypal to fund their tunnel project?”
I’m sure it accepts bitcoins, which are the perfect means for terrorists, drug lords, and other unsavory folks to launder money.
Mazel tov!!!
The essence of spirituality is living a life in accordance with the commandments given by our Creator.
Actually there were rallies in multiple states and in multiple countries (including Australia, the UK, France, Tunisia, Turkey, Argentina, and Brazil) in early 1933 against the already nasty persecution of Jews by the Nazis in Germany, which had begun even before Hitler yemach shemo had become Chancellor on January 30. It was mostly the thugs of the SA but in early April 1933 the Nazis were putting their evil plans into law. The big step for the Nazis was the Enabling Act of March 23, 1933, which was enacted with the positive votes of every non-socialist member of the German parliament (and opposed by every socialist member of the German parliament, most of whom would be in concentration camps, in exile, or dead within six months). The Enabling Act made Hitler a dictator with neither checks or balances other than the 85 year old feeble and nearly senile President Hindenburg, who actually hated Hitler yemach shemo. But Hindenburg died in August 1934 and the rest is history.
The largest American rally was at Madison Square Garden on March 27, 1933, four days AFTER the Enabling Act. Geatured speakers included Al Smith, former Governor of New York (Irish Catholic); William Green, President of the American Federation of Labor (Welsh); Bernard Deutsch, President of the American Jewish Congress; Reform Rabbi Stephen Wise; US Senator Robert Wagner (German Catholic); New York Mayor John Patrick O’Brien (Irish Catholic); Episcopal Bishop William Manning; Methodist Bishop Francis McConnell; and at least one other Christian minister and nine Jewish lay leaders. Governor Herbert Lehman (Jewish) had to stay in Albany on state business but addressed a large rally there. It is clear that this and other rallies were in RESPONSE to the Nazi atrocities, not a cause of them.
It isn’t so densely populated. Much of it is empty space. Tel Aviv is more densely populated.
“Giving the get before the affairs are settled is foolish. Most batei din will not stand for it. “
I know lots of divorced couples where the get was given quickly and properly, long before the financial and custody issues were settled. As I pointed out earlier, if the husband really doesn’t want to be married any more, it is a mitzvah for him to give a get, and if the wife really doesn’t want to be married any more, it is a mitzvah for her to accept the get. A truly religious Jew will always rush to fulfill mitzvot.
” Brooklyn is not. Part of NY City. Brooklyn is a city itself just like New York City”
Brooklyn ceased to be a separate city in 1898 when it was merged into New York City along with Queens, Staten Island, and the part of the Bronx that hadn’t already been annexed.
It is proper to withhold a get if you want to continue to be married to your wife.
However, if you want to get divorced, it is a mitzvah to give the get. Period.
And if a beit din orders you to give a get, it is a mitzvah to comply with that beit din. Period.
Money and child custody are separate issues. If your spouse (or ex-spouse) is acting improperly, she will have to answer in olam ha-ba.
“is there a issue of mesira when it comes to being a prosecuting attorney? “
No. Because we are in galut and can no longer enforce criminal penalties against other Jews within our own courts, we need to let the secular courts deal with the murderers, rapists, thieves, and swindlers in our midst. In some cases it is a matter of pikuach nefesh!
The only reservation that I’ve heard from any rabbi on this is that the death penalty standards in the US are so far below what is required by Chazal and Rambam for gentile courts that it is not permitted for a Jew to have anything to do with a death penalty case here in the US.
I would hope that most Orthodox Rabbis can make far more than than!
“You are either intentionally trying to deceive us “
You just quoted the relevant section. Obama: 15 vacations to places he didn’t own. Bush: 51 vacations to his ranch.
51 is greater than 15.
I had secular education.
“Bush sometimes used the property”
Right. Bush owned a ranch in a remote area. And his family also owned a big compound in Maine. That is what you get when your family is so wealthy.
Obama, OTOH, had a single house in Chicago that wasn’t able to be secured.
Clinton didn’t own a house at all when he was elected President. He earned $35K as Governor of Arkansas and lived in that state’s modest Governor’s “Mansion”.
I guess YWN commenters think that only someone from a super wealthy family should ever be President.
No wonder so many folks here liked Romney. He owned so many houses I can’t count them all.
“This guy LOVES taking other people’s money!”
If you add up all the money raised by Romney and his supporters such as Karl Rove, they took in hundreds of millions more. Fortunately they wasted most of it.
” I do not get how anyone voted for Obama the SECOND time.”
Two words: Mitt Romney.
“If a prize were to be given for most vacations”
Statistics just compiled as of today on number of trips and number of vacation days as of this time in their Presidencies:
Reagan: 29 trips, 180 vacation days
Clinton: 11 trips, 84 vacation days
Bush 43: 58 trips, 349 vacation days
Obama: 15 trips, 96 vacation days
You can find this on Yahoo! News.
“With the stock market crashing”
Well now we know that the story was a hoax. I looked up the stock market 4 years ago and today. The Dow Jones Industrial average has increased 62%, the Standard and Poor’s 500 has increased 80%, and the NASDAQ has increased 97%. So much for a crash.
He probably listened to Glenn Beck and put all his extra money into gold, which has increased only 8% — not enough to keep up with inflation. And like most Republicans, he probably wants a bailout from his bad business and investment strategies. Never mind that the Republicans think that Walmart putting small businesses out of business is the American Way.
TEA PARTY: You have two cows. The government offers you ten cows for free but you not only turn down the offer but also kill the two cows you have because Barack Obama is in favor of cows.
FAR LEFT COMMENTER on dailykos.com: You have two cows. One dies, the other gets upset and gores you, and you write diary after diary blaming Israel.
CLIVEN BUNDY: You have two cows. You graze them illegally on public land, without paying, and you blame black people when the cows die even though no black person has come within a hundred miles of your cows and you threatened the veterinarian with guns when he came to try to save the cows because he also works for the government.
PHIL ROBERTSON: Who cares about cows? I want to shoot ducks!
YESHIVA BACHUR: Wow! The gemara didn’t say that cows were this BIG!!!
HEALTH FOOD FANATIC: Don’t make me pasteurize the milk! I want to be able to risk my own life and those of others!!!
MODERN ORTHODOX: You have two cows. You donate them to the local agriculture school, which breeds them with their dairy bull and comes up with a new grade of more nutritious milk. Meanwhile, you make aliyah to Israel on the next Nefesh B’Nefesh flight and get a job in computers making half what you made as a dairy farmer in America.
CHAREDI: You have two cows. You have two cows, your brother has a bull. You don’t breed them because that would be non-tzniut.
“The question is if your wife is happy.”
Probably happier than me. Her politics are to my left and she knows that it is a waste of time to argue with extremists on the internet.
Late in 1939, after the war had broken out but before the UK had experienced major fighting, it was suggested that the UK bomb munitions depots in the Black Forest in Germany. Air Minister Sir Kingsley Wood vetoed the idea, because private property would likely have been destroyed.
I wish I were making this up.