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“Everyone in Israel has a gun.”
That is a false statement.
no links
Rabbeinu Tam appears to have participated in falconry, a form of hunting, prior to the invention of firearms.
‘I forgot who it was that said that it’s actually permitted, but it’s not “jewish” to do. ‘
Noda B’Yehudah.
“The confiscation of guns undertaken by the Nazis”
The Nazis didn’t confiscate any guns in Germany. The Weimar government had banned guns in 1919, before the Nazi party even existed. The Nazis actually relaxed Germany’s gun laws so that their thugs could terrorize people legally.
“lots of Jews own guns, carry them openly, not much shooting going on”
I wish the US would adopt Israel’s gun policies. The National Rifle Association would probably turn anti-Semitic, though, as Israel has draconian restrictions on who is permitted to have a firearm.
“It’s fact at this point, nobody is debating teh existence of the program, just how far reaching it is and the legality of it”
Not true. Rand Paul has introduced a bill in the Senate to end the program. HaShem help us if he somehow becomes President.
“Jackie Mason is indeed Jewish.”
Not only is Jackie Mason Jewish, he has semicha and worked as a rabbi for a few years before becoming a comedian.
Yes, and I’m glad that they will pay me a visit if they notice that I have been making a lot of phone calls to Afghanistan!
“is it at least better that they consider themselves orthodox, Daven, keep kosher etc.”
Of course!
“Do you consider them frum still?”
Anyone who is shomer Shabat and keeps a kosher home is in a very real sense part of the community even if they keep no other mitzvot. We certainly consider ganavim to be a part of the community even though certain types of business fraud are also described in the Torah as a toeivah.
While income and sales taxes are higher in Canada and the US, property taxes tend to be much lower, especially compared to the suburbs of New York City. And the government pays most of the cost of your health insurance, which is a huge savings.
Also, some provinces make a very large contribution to the cost of Jewish day school education. (I know that Quebec and British Columbia do and that Ontario does not.)
“It’s a losing battle and is just causing more animosity”
There is actually room to compromise here, but both sides will have to stop digging in their heels. (The same applies to the charedi draft issue.)
BTW I happened to have a conversation recently with one of the co-founders of Women of the Wall. She is a very frum and very learned woman whose late husband was a big talmid chacham. She told me that the original goals of Women of the Wall were “tefillah, talit, and torah”: Women praying at the kotel, wearing a talit, and reading from a sefer torah. She told me that she is not sure from where the more recent emphasis on tefillin came, as it was not one of the original goals of the WOTW group. (She herself wears neither a talit nor tefillin but does participate in a women’s tefillah group.)
“why would you keep citing the gemara as if that has any relevance in the face of Rav Moshe’s psak?”
I don’t like repeating myself, but I guess I have to here. Not everyone paskens like Rav Moshe and I’ve given examples. I would not dispute someone who follows Rav Moshe, but you can not dispute the actions of someone who follows Rav Soloveitchik or Rav Henkin!
“while there is no chiyuv for a woman to be wearing Tefillin (b’tzniyus), there is no issur”
And that is the conclusion that one gets from today’s gemara. It concludes the discussion with a machloket tanaim between Rabbi Yosei and Rabbi Shimon permitting, and Rabbi Yehudah prohibiting. In disputes between Rabbi Yosei and Rabbi Yehudah we pasken like Rabbi Yosei.
Rishonim bring up other issues and there is an opinion in the Yerushalmi that the sages objected to Michal Bat Shaul wearing tefillin, but it is difficult to prohibit women wearing tefillin based only on the Bavli.
And in any case we do not follow the Yerushalmi in Eretz Israel regarding tefillin. Anyone who disagrees should try putting on tefillin at the Kotel on Chol HaMoed and see what happens.
Regarding tzitzit, there just isn’t any source in Chazal to prohibit women wearing them.
“they could look at the teshuva from Rav Moshe I linked a few posts ago. “
It is possible to pasken differently from Rav Moshe. Rav Soloveitchik did.
“There certainly is no halachic barrier for a woman in the woman’s section to wear a tallis.”
While there is absolutely no halachic question that a woman can wear tzitzit, there may be an issue if the woman is wearing a talit that looks like a man’s talit. I’ve seen Rabbi Yehuda Herzl Henkin quoted to that effect. The photographs I have seen of WOTW seem so show them in talitot that look like those of men. I don’t know why they don’t follow Rabbi Henkin who is a huge supporter of increased roles for women in Orthodox Judaism and is a posek that anyone could rely upon.
If anyone actually cares about the halachah of women wearing tefillin, it will be discussed in tomorrow’s Daf Yomi. It was an issue 3,000 years ago.
One more thing: You should go to medical school in the country in which you intend to practice. So if you want to make aliyah eventually, do that FIRST and then attend Israeli universities and an Israeli medical school. You will also save a ton of money, which will be essential as physician salaries in Israel are MUCH lower than those in the US. You will need to be fluent in spoken modern Hebrew.
Good luck!
“Am I crazy? Does anyone know people who have done something similar?”
I know someone who learned at Ner Israel for years and recently graduated from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine.
“Touro doesn’t have a medical school”
Touro has at least four medical schools, in California, Nevada, Manhattan, and Westchester County. All are Osteopathic schools except for the one in Westchester County.
My wife didn’t earn her BA until she was 32, and then she had to go back to take pre-med courses. She graduated from medical school at age 40. She was able to arrange for a shomer Shabat residency even though one didn’t officially exist where she was training.
Good luck!
“you THINK based on the verses he quotes that he means what you think he means”
It is very clear that Ibn Ezra to Devarim 1:2 means that there were some post-Mosaic changes to the text of the Chumash. It is also clear that Chazal thought the same thing (see Kiddushin 30a). Rashi and the authors of Midrash Rabbah clearly had a sefer Torah with variant spellings, see for example Rashi to Bereshit 25:6 and Bereshit Rabbah 61:4.
I’m not sure why Artscroll claims that it is a unanimous opinion that there have been no changes to the Torah since the time of Moshe Rabbeinu; that clearly is not true.
“Rambam codified the 13 cardinal beliefs (codified, not made them up)”
Not exactly true. The 13 ikkarim are in his Mishnah commentary, not his halachic codification (the Mishnah Torah). And not all the 13 ikkarim were accepted; even today we say prayers to angels in direct opposition to the 5th ikkar.
“If you found out today that you aren’t Jewish, what would you do?”
I’d convert to Judaism.
For Tanakh, I would strongly recommend no links. It is the site for Yeshivat Har Etzion, one of the few yeshivot that teaches a lot of Tanakh. Its former Roshei Yeshivot, Rav Amital z’tz’l and Rav Lichtenstein, still alive but taking a much less active role today, were two of the leading dati leumi rabbis in the world, and respected by the charedi world as well. It has a huge amount of material on Nach.
yutorah.org is a fabulous resource, but it is mostly audio shiurim rather than printed sources. You will need to live as long as Moshe Rabbeinu to go through all their material.
Chabad.org has the Jewish Press translation of Tanakh, and the Touger translation of Rambam Mishnah Torah. Those are good translations, probably better than the JPS. Their commentary would of course reflect the Lubavich perspective.
myjewishlearning.com is a non-orthodox site.
Hope this helps!
Charlie
“I’m sure MO people are just as annoyed “
I’m MO and I’m annoyed.
“The Germans almost got to Eretz Yisroel”
That isn’t really true. Rommel — who wasn’t much of a Nazi and was later involved in the plot to kill Hitler — never got past the western part of Egypt (El Alamein). That is sill six hundred kilometers from Eretz Yisrael. Rommel never had anything like the supplies he would have needed to continue an offensive much further.
I don’t see how anyone could understand masechta eruvim without a good high school math background.
Several years ago, Prof. Yitzchak Levine, who writes a Jewish history column for the Jewish Press and is a university math professor, suggested that yeshivot reorganized their curricula so that the secular studies would be more integrated with the Torah study. For example, mathematics could be integrated with eruvim and biology with chullin. He got lots of support for the idea from frum academics like me, but no rosh yeshiva signed on.
“One should be embarrassed that those agitarors embarrassed a Gadol.”
It would be nice if the Gedol would say something about this.
” Don’t you repect Rov Soloveitchiks decision not to allow women to hold roles of communal leadership?”
I will not dignify this insulting question with a response other than to point out that The Rav’s wife and one of his daughters both held positions of communal leadership at the Maimonides School.
“YCT are accusing Chaza’l of considering women unequal not because of an actual Torah truth, but because they were men, and did so to inflate their egos.”
I have never heard any YCT rabbi say anything like that.
That is a false statement. R’Avraham’s essay on how to interpret midrash/aggadata is printed as the introduction to every edition of the Ein Yaakov collection of aggadata!
“you do not respect Rav Soloveitchik who says a women cannot be a president of a shule”
Next you will be saying that Rabbi Hershel Schachter does not respect Rav Soloveitchik because he wears techelit in spite of Rav Soloveitchik saying that we can never re-establish a lost mesorah.
“you do not respect Rav Soloveitchik who says a women cannot be a president of a shule”
Motzi shem ra.
“I believe it was Rav Aharon Kotler who said that Rabbi Soloveichik destroyed an entire generation. “
I would be very surprised that he said that since Rav Kotler had Rav Soloveitchik appear as the featured speaker for the first fundraising dinner for Chinuch Atzmai.
“maybe you shouldn’t troll and start specifically inflammatory OPs to create controversy”
Well said. This issue has been well addressed in other threads.
“called Zionism the Avoda Zara/apikorsus that it is. “
And yet they respected Zionists such as Rav Reines, Rav Kook, Rav Herzog, and Rav Soloveitchik. They would not have done so had they thought that they were apicursim.
“There are no other valid shitos in this regard”
I just proved you wrong on that one.
” these contemporary Rabbonim assumed that pants were solely a man’s clothing Mimei Kedem”
Obviously they were misinformed. You don’t follow a psak when it is based on wrong information. (If you know that a restaurant is serving chazir, you won’t eat there even if the gadol hador is the kashrut supervisor. Of course you’d probably call the gadol hador to let him know!)
“There is a machlokes Rishonim about what beliefs are necessary components for yiddishkeit. Learn what they are and then come back.”
I’ll save him the trouble: Neither Rambam, nor Crescas, nor Albo included “I believe with perfect faith that women can not get semicha” as one of their basic principles.
“smicha today is not halachic smicha anyway but allowing women to do bedika and calling them Rabbis and having them poskin shailos or be presidents of shules is completely different.”
“Smicha or not, you cannot psak halacha. “
Plenty of poskim PERMIT women to be presidents of shuls. And if you are knowledgeable you are OBLIGATED to address halachic questions, whether you have semichah or not. All semicha is is a declaration that someone is sufficiently learned to be trusted; there is really no halachic or other reason why women should not be included among the persons who should be able to receive this declaration in the areas for which they are chayev. And as pointed out, women used to do bedika in talmudic times.
“These women should either learn the sugyos of tevila b’iyun or not make these halachic determinations.”
Agreed. And that is precisely what happens at Yeshivat Maharat and Nishmat.
“I have come across a few stories (first and second hand) of Mikva Women making terrible halachic mistakes with potentially grave consequences.”
And that is why we need institutions like Yeshivat Maharat and Nishmat.
“Unfortunately, this does not seem to be the aim of groups such as YCT.”
YCT has an all male student body.
” Dr. Elman holds that most of the Minhagim of Niddah are taken from the Zeroastrians. (He may not be wrong on that entirely and it’s hinted in the Gemara, but he takes his opinion way, way too far.)”
And why would that be a problem? It is clear from anyone who has completed masechta niddah that the practices became much more stringent over time. And he has documented Persian practices in this area. Chazal had the authority to institute halachic stringencies for whatever reasons they wished, and some such examples are documented in their own writings. Beyond the pale would be to say that these changes were no longer binding today.
“everything found in the words of the Sages whether in halachos or agados of the Talmud or in the
Midrashim, are all the words of the Living God”
That is not the same as saying that everything in the words of the sages needs to be taken literally. Rambam, Ramban, and Rabbi Avraham ben HaRambam explicitly said that was not necessary.
“Chaza’l knew scientific information which wasn’t known to scientists until hundreds of years later”
Examples?
“I have always thought that the Machlokes in the Gemara Megillah 7a, as to whether Hodu and Kush were on opposite ends of the earth or next to each other was a Machlokes as to whether the earth is flat or round.”
Much simpler explanation: Hodu is clearly India. Kush can mean Ethiopia, which was pretty much at the opposite end of the known world. But there is also a Hindu Kush mountain range in Asia that is not far from India.
” the concept of medical school certainly existed but in much more of an abstract way”
Not true; there were medical schools, not abstract but concrete, in ancient times and in the middle ages. Sforno got a medical degree from the University of Rome.
“It’s pashut that women cannot be Rabbis.”
No, there is no such pshat.
“Women have NEVER been Rabbis”
Regardless of what title you give them, Devorah and Beruriah would be of higher status than any rabbi alive today.
“argue with anonymous posters”
I’m not anonymous.
“We don’t know God as well as our sages did.”
True. And our sages interpreted the Torah to say that there are only about a dozen mitzvot for which men are chiyuv and women are patur — none of which are in the areas covered by yoreh yoreh semichah.
“I think saying Chaza’l were wrong about science is simplistic and wrong. “
It is simplistic. I take issue with the word “wrong” though. It is clear that we have a better understanding of HaShem’s creation than anyone did at the time of Chazal. Chazal consistently used the best non-Jewish methodologies available at the time and it is entirely inappropriate to criticize them for that. Were they living in our times they would use the best methodologies available today and would reach appropriate conclusions. Nevertheless it is also inappropriate to treat the talmud as a science text, and indeed that has been asur for a thousand years regarding medical science.
“use Talmudic medicine”
It has been asur to use talmudic medicine since the gaonic period. (That is another halachah that has changed since Ravina and Rav Ashi.)
“Read Yaakov Elman’s works. Then realize that you’re saying just like him. And realize that he has almost definitely crossed the border into Apikorsus.”
Accusing a talmid chacham who knows more than you do of being an apikorus is a pretty strong statement. You need to either back it up, or withdraw and apologize.
“It is, however, an Ikkar Emunah that all Dinim remain the same L’olam Va’ed “
Not only is it not an ikkar emunah, it is a false statement. Do you use toilet paper? Did you recite the shema on your wedding night? When was the last time you heard of a bechor animal being identified for a mum? When do you think the texts of selichot or tachanun were standardized? Can you divorce your wife without her consent?
MOST dinim don’t change. But a few have.
“The reason the Gr’a argues on the Ramba’m”
He doesn’t just argue on the Rambam, he argues on the Shulchan Aruch and the Rema as well.
” The Rav did not put that in writing “
It was in a private letter that was only made public within the past two years.
“How can it be bad for Jews to learn Torah, under any circumstance? “
It isn’t. Even learning Torah with the wrong motivation will eventually lead to learning Torah with the right motivation.
“in our generation when women are highly educated secularly, get very important jobs, and work outside the home, shouldn’t they also use these opportunities of advancement to learn?”
Lots of gedolim have said pretty much just that. Exactly WHAT women should learn is a machloket; Rav Soloveitchik z’tz’l insisted that women learn the same things as men, in the same classes. (Yes, he was a big supporter of co-ed classes and even put it in writing.)
“I have heard it used by 3 contemporary Rabbis as a source that pants stay Begged Ish L’olam Va’ed.”
How can something that was never worn by men until modern times be Begged Ish L’olam Va’ed?