☕ DaasYochid ☕

You have not provided a source.

I guess you missed it. It was embedded in my post, in the words this article, footnote 6. I’ll post it again. Moderator, can you kindly allow it again? Thanks.

http://www.dinonline.org/2010/08/12/laws-of-tzedakah-part-ii-who-to-give-first/

The Gr’a Offen Ort … is disputing the Mechaber about the priority of beis haknesses.

Poor Torah learners, children or adults, take precedence over anyone but relatives (poor relatives who are Torah learners would be the absolute priority*, aside from pikuach nefesh).

Children take precedence over adults because their Torah is b’li chet. Otherwise, there’s no difference relative to other tzeddakah needs.

Whether poor relatives take precedence over Torah learners seems to be a machlokes (check out the sources in the article which I linked to earlier) although the C.C. seems to give priority to krovim.

My point about chomesh was to demonstrate the primacy of supporting Torah learners. Although there is a chiyuv to give “tzeddakah” (to poor people), the bulk of one’s donations should be to support Torah.

* Exactly opposite Feif Un’s misinformed position.

I’m just wondering (once again) if helping couples have babies merits our giving Tzedaka monies.

And I’m telling you that it is a valid tzeddakah, and that to suggest otherwise, aside from being wrong l’halachah, is insensitive to those suffering through infertility.

The only one that the Mechaber mentions is children learning. If you have a source stating that adult learning is more important than Tzedaka – please cite the source.

Ahavas Chessed, chapter 19.

Relatives do come first, though.

Which Gr’a? It would indeed be curious if the Chofetz Chaim paskened against the G’ra and Nosei Keilim.

APY,

“The term you use, “emotionally charged situation”,”

Is actually a term someone else used, which is why I commented on it, and also put it in parenthesis.

I’m not sure what your point is.

Are you saying that the emotions of the recipient are not a factor in tzeddakah allocation?

Challenging Times

Hashem, in His infinite wisdom, saw fit to allow the internet to be introduced in our day and age. It is our weak generation, battered by the tests of so many centuries, that is being confronted with the nisayon of modern technology. Yet the Torah response is timeless. There is no question that unfiltered use of the internet is completely forbidden, no ifs, ands or buts.

Statistics show that a typical browser changes screens every two minutes. Links permit one to connect to new sites tens of times a minute. If one site does not catch you, the next one will. Surfing the web means dodging burning coals as they are falling from the sky like hail. What are the chances of avoiding burns? Of emerging alive?

You consider chareidi to have a higher standard, so if we’re not perfect, you think someone who notices that should leave and join a community with a lower standard?

Well I expect more from MO than secular, so I guess according to your logic, we should all become secular.

Your thought process is cloudy.

As far as the hatikva incident, it’s not your fault for not understanding the context because I didn’t provide it, but saying he shouldn’t have taken the position is wrong.

42,

I have absolutely no idea; I use a dumbphone. I just copied and pasted.

Daas Yochid- i guess thats just a matter of opinion. I cant see myself burning for listening to all different types of music

We all (myself included) have a tendency to disregard the smaller aveiros because there are more important things to work on.

But after 120, nothing is ignored.

I dont remember what the Netziv answered him, anyone?

Betzalel’s chochma was in knowing how to assign contributors’ donations to items of higher kedusha according to purity of intent. So too, if the donor to the yeshiva has a pure intent, the money will go directly to support Torah. Someone who donated with less commendable intent will have the z’chus of paying for the horse and wagon.

Emotionally charged is not one of the criteria mentioned in the S’A.

I think pcoz was arguing, very reasonably, that it is.

If donating for a formerly wealthy man to have servants run before a chariot is valid tzeddakah, it’s reasonable to assume that the reason is because of the emotion of shame that he would otherwise feel. It’s obviously not a physical need; it would be a waste of tzibur gelt to pay for the same thing for someone without that emotional need.

It’s clear to me that the emotional needs of a childless couple are very much a factor in determining priority for tzeddakah money to help them bear a child.

May Hashem bring simchah, speedily, to all, especially those who are suffering so terribly.

GAW,

I think you missed my point, as did ZD in his response.

Of course there will be people who are guilty of L”H in every community. And, of course, people will tend to say L”H about things which bother them. If someone, for example (based on the discussion in this thread) wears jeans, it won’t be a topic of L”H in a M.O. community, although it might in a right wing community (wrongly so).

Something else might make waves and cause L”H in a M.O. community (I remember, for example when a right wing rov in a M.O. community refused to allow hatikvah to be sung at his shul’s dinner, there was a lot of L”H said about him).

What ZD was saying, in essence, was that since he doesn’t agree with the hashkafos upon which the L”H being said in a RW community is based, the RW community is by definition not a Torah community.

That is the biased, hateful statement to which I objected.

iPhone

The problem with both of these filters is that they are designed to protect children, not adults. As such, whoever downloads the

browser also knows the password and can bypass the filters. In addition, these filters are not foolproof. In short, at this point in time there is no satisfactory filtering solution to protect iPhones from accessing unsuitable websites.

To further protect your iPhone, you should download an app lock and lock the app store,Safari browser and YouTube to guarantee that unsuitable content will not be accessible.

There is one additional solution for the iPhone: mymobilewatchdog.com provides a good monitoring service, but this service has issues and may be difficult to use.

Sam2,

I wasn’t referring to this particular situation. Maybe if someone feels that they’re uncomfortable in a particular community, they should move.

The implication, though, as you picked up, wass that somehow the further to the right you lean, the less nizhar you are in hilchos loshon hora. That’s patently ridiculous.

Finally I might suggest moving from your community. A “torah” community that tells Lashon Horah about its residents because they dont follow their exact Hashkafa is no torah community. You can debate about Hashkafa, but Lashon Horah is an AVERIRAH M’Doraisa.

By making the accusation that a certain community is more guilty of loshon horah than another, you’ve just been motzi shen ra on that community.

Happiest,

The one you’re referring to, I believe, is the last track on Avraham Fried’s first album, “No Jew Will Be Left Behind”. It’s also the final track on Mona Rosenblum’s “Di Groissa Chasunah”. MBD sang it as part of the “Emunah and Bitochon” medley in “Once Upon a Nigun”, and for a simple but stunningly beautiful instrumental version, the final track on Andy Statman and David Grisman’s “New Shabbos Waltz” is a must listen.

Moshe Laufer also performed it instrumentally on “Mitoch Haneshamah” (track 7) as part of an Ani Ma’min medley, and that’s also very nice.

Sam2,

How do you respond to my last point (jungle music)?

Don’t you agree that there is music which is objectively offensive?

I posit that there is, and that unfortunately much of it has made its way into “Jewish” music.

And I don’t want to completely capitulate just because it’s difficult to precisely define and qualify.

Sam2,

Despite the negative tone, which I am in no way defending, musicaldignity does have a valid point. We have all been exposed, to one degree or another, to music which, for lack of a better term, has no dignity. That desensitizes us, or in the words of a great Jewish musician, “kills our ears”. Music which is refined and has kedushah sounds old fashioned and boring, when it should be beautiful and uplifting. Music at which we all should cringe has no effect on us, or worse, we dance to it (literally or figuratively).

Of course, if you don’t accept the premise that there is some objective measure for “musical dignity”, you won’t accept my argument. I’ve been informed by people have studied music, though, that there is a objective “formula” for determining which types of beats and sound will arouse certain emotions and feelings.

I don’t accept that the same type of beat which is used in the jungles to whip people into a frenzy of passion for avodah zarah, arayos, and retzichah, can really have a positive effect on people towards avodas Hashem.

In a situation where dollars are finite, what worthy cause has priority is a question for your Rav, not your emotions.

Yes, but the depth of emotions involved is certainly something a rov will consider.

And, the depth of emotion involved is a good reason not to post some of the insensitive comments which were made here.

Web Chaver

Popa,

Did you see that on your bag?

I will not be destroying or discarding any Mattisyahu CDs, no matter what he does.

As implied in my earlier post, neither will I.

I dont know that it is DY i was just posing what i felt is the essential question of this thread.

I think we can dismiss that possibility, and maybe discuss whether a Yid appearing on a TV show which presumably has content which is not to the Torah’s standard (I’ve never seen it, but it’s probably the case) is definitely the opposite of a kiddush Hashem.

Sam2,

I’m not arguing how big a tzaddik Matisyahu is or isn’t. What I’m saying is that if you go by the theory that the music is a product of the person who composed or performed it, IF in fact a composer/performer leaves the fold, it’s likely that he was harboring such thoughts even before it was externally manifested.

There’s a book recently published, Through Music and Song-Music from a Torah Perspective by Rabbi Elysha Sandler which discusses the idea in a rational, sourced manner.

I personally have no idea at what level Matisyahu is, nor do I care to discuss it, but I will say that in my opinion, listening to that musical style is not good for the neshamah.

I think the question we have to answer is, is it all right to make it appear that orthodox jews can be like “regular folk” in other words is it a kiddush hashem to make non jews or unafilliated jews say wow that kid is cool it just so happens he wears a yarmulke.

That may make some people feel good, but why is it a kiddush Hashem?

Neither. Since he is 12 years old he isn’t a bar-mitzva and by definition is patur from mizvos, although his parents have a chiyuv to be mechanech him in mitzvos.

You’re addressing whether or not he gets the blame or credit. The issue being discussed, however, is whether there is a kiddush Hashem, or chalilah the opposite, being created.