Gadolhadorah

Yidden already have enough chumrahs w/o having to postulate a new “shteeble hopper rule”. There are legitimate restrictions that chazal bring down regarding a shul’s ability to “fire” its Rav; there is no restriction I am aware of that limits the ability of a davener to “fire” its shul and relocate to another. There are limits stemming from the inyan of “aseh l’cha rav” that discourage venue shopping among different rabbonim to get the psak din you want on a particular issue and encourage us to establish a relationship with a local rav/posek for all our questions. That doesn’t mean over time you cannot change your shul (and by implication, your rav for those of us for whom the rav of the shul is the rav we use for any halachic questions).

If you voted for racism, xenophobia, msycoginy and vulgarity, you are a winner…for a change, a politician who is delivering on what he promised…

Obviously, the answer is contextual…..if a shul were to post a picture of Trump in the lobby as a sign of respect, there is little likelihood (with the exception of a few resident Trumpkopfs) of such a picture triggering any concerns of avodah zarah. Likewise, the obligatory photo of the Rebbe, TZL, in many chabad homes is no more or less avodah zorah than the guys who run up and down Eastern Parkway with yellow flags singing “Rebbe is Moishiach”. Same, I’m sure for other chassidus where I’ve seen playing cards (like baseball cards) with photos of their rebbe and other rabbonim in that Chassidiseshe Court. Not sure about Litvish practices on photos but just about every Livtvish home has family photos on the wall

“since he has been “good for the Jews”, we shouldn’t complain

Yes. we should just keep quiet until we wake up one morning and read his latest tweet about yidden.

You can read anything you want into any natural event. When you get to olam habah, please post here and let us know if you were correct in your speculation as to the REAL reason why the Ebehster took the action he did. Per my prior comments, I’m skeptical poishete yidden can postuate a cause-effect relationship or point to a specific message from shamayim for even tragedy that occurs.

Meno….”we” obviously have a (reading) issue…I’ve read multiple stories on this and other frum websites about efforts to restrict expansion of frum neighborhoods, location of shuls and mosdos etc., many of which focus on the “excuses” provided for blatantly anti-Semitic efforts to exclude yidden…first and foremost are that large frum families somehow don’t keep up the properties or are not good neighbors. sadly many of these allegations come from other jews in the same neighborhoods. As to my “hated” of religious yidden, I’ll just wish you a g’mar tov and leave it at that.

Avram…..agreed that everyone’s body clock is different but you have to start somewhere. This guy acknowledges he is a “big night owl” and thus another option would be to go directly from the late-night pizza place to daven vasikim….but not sure that would work well either.

It is as much as a mitzvah as would maintaining a non-historic home in good condition with attention to its appearance and how it affects neighboring homes. We read here frequent complaints about how yidden often fail to pay attention to the upkeep of their homes relative to their neighbors by not maintain the landscaping, paving the lawn to park cars, not cutting the lawn (if there still is one) , putting out too many bags of trash motzi Shabbos and yom-tovim w/o taking care they are tied up, leaving childrens’ toys lying in the front yard,etc. All of these factors have a big impact on the visual quality of life in a neighborhood and are as important as painting an historic home in the right color, not using period doors and window in a remodeling project etc. As yidden, we should always strive to be a model neighbor and comply with housing codes, HOA rules etc.

the obvious intention is to be certain that the bus driver cannot see through the window and has no idea that a jaywalking guy wearing his latest shemira einayim sunglasses cannot see the bus…….at some point, you simply take a deep breadth and hope that this is truly Fake News and there is no substance behind the story….

To Gaon:
R’ Kanievsky, Z”TL, was wise enough to avoid putting down someone who was clearly in a moment of emotional distress and came to him for help. Clearly, the Editor’s request was for some simple and meaningful d’var torah tha tmight be invoked by this well meaning Zaidah that would inspire her granddaughter at this simcha (probably at a MO shul) but not offend. There are multiple references in Torah and Tehillim to the concept of tsa’ar ba’alei chayim that might be woven together to provide a short d’var torah that is appropriate for the occasion (w/o getting into a broader discussion about bat mitzvahs, what and who should participate etc).

Georidie: Not sure I understand….aren’t their rabbonin at the Yeshiva? Do you mean the out-of-town bochrim go home to their families for the yamim noraim?

For a change I agree with Zahavasdad. Many cities are taking steps to make it easier to use bikes for short trips in lieu of auto traffic which results in air pollution, noise and congestion. In Willy, there are two bike shops that cater to the frum tzibur. Biking is a healthy option for trips to shul, market, work and mikvah. Women can use bikes for light shopping trips to the market, riding with the kids to school (if they are too close for school bus service) or just visiting friends. Yiddeshe mosdos can help by putting in bike racks, allowing public rental bikes to set up on the sidewalks out front and not fighting bike lanes because c’v they might see some “hipster” riding by from outside the neighborhood. Bikes are a win win option for yidden and goyim alike. I’m not that familiar with Lakewood’s traffic issues but I’m certain that BMG can take a lead role in promoting bike usage among their bochurim around the campus and local shuls and commercial establishments.

Putting aside common sense, which is the norm on some of these threads, a yid walking into a new shul typically doesn’t first search for a seating chart hidden behind the door or wait for the gabbai sheini or shlishi (who was supposed to be standing by the entry door and instead is schmoozing with his chevrah by the bimah) to point him to a seat not covered by the local minhagim governing makom kavua. My experience is that 9 of 10 times, you walk in and absent a simcha where you search out the family, you take whatever seat appears empty.

Edited -79

Its a real stretch to extend the inyan of chazaka in baba basra as cited above to stand for the notion of makom kavua and a license to demand someone who comes to daven change seats if there has been no financial commitment in relation thereto. If a shul wants to “reserve” particular seats for certain individuals, they should be clearly marked as such. In most shtieblach, one would logically conclude that a chair and shtender in the corner by the bimah piled high with seforim “is reserved” for the rav, gabbai, etc….not so for a unmarked seat in a row of otherwise identical seats in a shul with many rows of seats

To Ubiquitin….yes, I understand the concept of chazaka but don’t know of where chazal bring down that x times provides such ownership rights….presumably, it varies from shul to shul but my point is that whatever the number, a more rational approach in a large shul, as many have posted, is open seating, especially after a certain point in the davening whether it be baruch she’amar, nishmas or borchu..

The concept of a “makom kavuah” or having “chazakah” over a particular seat in shul is an anachronism except perhaps for seats reserved for the rav, gabboim, elderly, disabled or small shtieblach where the seating is sort of random and movable chairs are paired with a shtender where one stores his tallis/teffiin/seforim. Otherwise, in a moderately or larger sized shul with fixed seating, it should be “open seating” period, without regard to whether certain baal habtim consider themselves to be sufficiently important to warrant having seats permanently dedicated to them regardless of whether they are in shul when davening starts. There is no more or less important chair from the perspective of the Ebeshter who could care less where you are seated and is more concerned with your kavanah, even if you are hanging from a chandelier or mistakenly seated in the varbeshe section.

Think of all the time wasted (aka bitul torah) by yidden attempting to learn a dead or dying language for “ole times sake”….Its fine for those who are already fluent in English or Hebrew who find comfort in learning in the style of the their parents/grandparents but only contributes to dysfunction if kids are forced to live in a “Yiddish -only” world at school and at home.

Some of you treat the “yetzer horah” as some type of living, active and uncontrollable force in our lives separate from our mainstream existence. Yes, we have urges of all types, both spiritual and physical, that may not be good for us but we also have the strength and discipline in most cases to push back on most, albeit not all, of these urges. We know not to start eating ice cream directly from the quart container, lest we end up eating most of it. Rather we dole out a small portion in a cup to discipline our culinary gluttony. Likewise, we don’t willingly set ourselves up to be alone with a woman not our wives on a business trip to avoid both inappropriate business outcomes, but more importantly, our spiritual geder that shields us from what some might call the siren song of our yetzer horah. Do we always show such strength….obviously not but most of us seem to have won the large percentage of these battles w/o making the looming shadow of a yetzer horah the overriding focus of our daily lives.

Chaver….many schools in EY teach Arabic given that 20 percent of the population speaks that language; likewise, a large percentage of Palestinians speak Hebrew

There are several Jewish day schools in the U.S. that offer introductory Arabic as an AP option…probably not in any of the yeshivos or kollels

Does anyone doubt that if you daven with real kavanah and seek a yeshuah in the name of the the Satmar Rebbe, Z’TL, the Ebeshter would respond with a least as much rachmanis as would be the case if some third party left an email message by the tzion

Not sure what is meant by “traditional ashkenazay clothing”….most yeshivish dress today is best described as loosely fitting dark business suit, white shirt sans tie with black borsalino/fedora hat. Add the tie and a bit of tailoring to the suit and you couldn’t distinguish a kollel yungerleit from an investment banker. In either event, nothing really that are readily traced to the alte heim or czarist Russia or wherever….sephardeshe and chassidish lvush cut a more striking sartorial statement

More and more Litvish schools are teaching in English/Ivrit while retaining Yiddish in the upper grades for Talmud study etc…..need for basic English fluency for whatever secular studies they offer and job skills afterwards. Not sure that most take seriously the ludicrous notion that speaking Hebrew makes one a “Tzionista”. Does speaking some Arabic (as do a larger percentage of students in EY) make them Islamic Terrorists?

To CT Lawyer:
Yasher koach on an extremely thoughtful and analytic response. Very helpful in understanding the transition from first-generation (post WWII) immigrants to the Millenial look…

Froggie….

Again, not sure what the relevance of a natural gas pipeline system is to an electric power network. Whereas gas is effectively “stored” in a pipeline under pressure and can be released as necessary with variations in demand, electricity is unlike any other utility service since it must be supplied real time and generation must be balanced with load on 24×7 basis. Further, the IEA grid is has few interconnections with Jordan or Egypt unlike other countries that can import power when shortages arise. As noted earlier, AGC telemetry and advanced control algorithms have substantially reduced the need for human intervention but some amount of real time human intervention will be needed for the indefinite future. Computers cannot perform certain tasks which are needed for real time monitoring of system thermal stability and voltage support. If you still don’t understand, try reading some background material on electric systems on Wikopedia or other non-technical sites and it may become more intuitive. While individual homes can go “off the grid” and there are some “micro-grids” in Tel Aviv and Haifa, those account for less than 2 or 3 percent of total end-user demand. Individuals who worry about chilul Shabbos and illegally install their own generators in densely populated urban areas are endangering large numbers of people and their mindless behavior is beyond understanding. Fortunately, these individuals are being tracked down and prosecuted by the authorities and several have been sentenced to prison. If you don’t like the IEA services or don’t trust their assurances in reference to Shabbos, simply open the circuit breaker on your electric panel and have a guten Shabbos by candelight with the windows open.

Adherence to “rules” imposed by a private yeshiva/BY/kollel/pre-school etc. shouldn’t be a question…they are entitled under both secular law and halacha to impose such rules as long as they do not involve physical or emotional harm to children. (I’m putting aside the few schools that still claim a right to use corporal punishment which fortunately such dysfunctional practices are largely gone from Yiddeshe mosdos). The more prevalent issue in many schools are students who question or challenge the instructional naarative they receive from teachers. Many extraordinarily bright kids, some informed by their own internet research (where schools allow for such access) are getting suspended for speaking up in class, even when done so respectfully. Many kids don’t seem to have basic derech eretz and offer their “counterpoint” without being disruptive but often the smartest kids are most prone to be an azaz panim and disrupt the flow on instruction. Parents, teachers and school administrators need to get more involved with these types of issues and develop policies setting out boundary conditions for “intellectual disruption” on both limudei torah and secular subjects.