n0mesorah

“The truth is that the Conservative movement in America was started jointly by the left-wing of the Orthodox movement together with the right-wing of the Reform movement.”

So in plain English, nothing to do with MO.

Very, very sadly, the Orthodox have the same inclination toward conversions.

The mechitza was the biggest divider between Conservative and Orthodoxy.

Being that there is ‘Conservative with a Mechitza’ even the divide is on the scale.

Female clergy is on the Orthodox side too. You didn’t need me to tell you that.

Arayos is Arayos. It’s pretty clear in my books. The public aspect is a scale. You can even find some very frum online characters that won’t miss an opportunity to say hi to girls.

Shabbos Observance is the most obvious scale of all.

Rabbi Zechariah Frankel would be somewhere between Yeshivish and Chassidish in our day. He was considered very frum and traditional. That is why his students had such license.

Dear Ujm,

JTS was the best American Orthodoxy could do in the 19th century.

Note that American Rabbinate is still woefully understaffed in 21st century.

Why can’t the Ultra Orthodox produce Community Rabbis?

The mitziyus (That we went back and forth on.) is irrelevant to Rav Moshe’s psak on Brooklyn. I don’t know what you see here. Why would 2.5M be different than almost 3M? And my point was that Rav Dovid knew this claim and wasn’t fazed by it. He thought 2.5M to be accurate. Why didn’t anyone convince Rav Dovid of this?

I expect that in a number of years the claim will be that Rav Dovid was also mislead. I know personally that he knew that Rv Moshe wasn’t misled.

“Rav Moshe disagreed regarding their halachic concerns, because there were city’s that established eruvin whose population was greater than 600,000 (but he had his own reason to oppose).”

And therefore?

Rav Moshe’s teshuvos lay out his reasoning. I don’t know what is missing here.

To make the 16 supporters of the Manhattan Eiruv into rov against the 5, they would have to be disagreeing on one specific reason (besides for other factors). Rov poskim is still a din of rov.

I’m not really interested in debating what rov poskim is or isn’t. There have been hundreds of dissertations on this topic. And I don’t know why you mentioned the Manhattan Eiruv from sixty years ago. It’s not up anymore.

Eiruvin had to be reassessed in North America. Modern Cities and suburbs was a new concept in Halacha. Besides, every city and county has it’s own logistical challenges.

Anyways, Rav Moshe has written many teshuvos that only discuss what would or wouldn’t happen from issuing a psak that is fully compliant with Halacha. What do you make of that?

“..not many other inyanim have followed suit.”

Kashrus is in constant flux. Zmanim have been reimagined. Commercial Arba Minim has exploded. Brochos on food have undergone intense reinvestigations. The halachic concept of Khal is nearing extinction. Where have you been? Halacha in the Modern World is constantly in motion.

(Before we get sidetracked, I am not endorsing the idea that halacha is transitory.)

Dear Always,

Reform came from the ability of European Jews to assimilate. It was like a half assimilation.

You can’t really become Reform anymore. They aren’t promoting anything Jewish.

The intention of JTS was for it to be Orthodox. That is a fact. Why deny it?

CJ in America really started postwar. It rose and fell with the move to the suburbs.

It came from pursuing the promise of The American Dream. Which has nothing to do with MO or Reform.

As much as we convince ourselves otherwise, the fact is that there is more of a gap between Conservative and the other non-Orthodox groups than between Conservative and Orthodox. There is a steady grade form extreme Orthodox to Conservative. After that, there is a steep drop. Then it’s another steady grade all the way through the new category of ‘Jews with No Religion’.

Dear Coffee,

True. I was focusing on the prep and not the bugs.

If they clean the bugs off their lettuce it’s the same as any other lettuce.

It’s not like even the frummest kitchens are guaranteed to know how to be bug free.

In the above story, are you sure the restaurant and the boys home are using different lettuce?

Dear Da,

How is Conservative an offshoot of Reform? It starts off in mainstream Orthodoxy.

The second story comes down to if the mashgiach was just overseeing the food preparation or certifying the caterer.

Dear Ujm,

You can eat salads from most Barely Orthodox homes. Unless in/from Israel because of terumos u’maseros.

Dear Yankel,

“…. but definitely not to represent klal yisroel.”

Chabad doesn’t represent klal yisroel. Nobody does. Where does such a concept even come from? I would expect such a statement from an atheist.

I was there for a shabbos when the eiruv was new and people had no idea how vast it was. I returned recently, and most of the new people don’t know the large eiruv exists, and only use the smaller neighborhood ones.

It’s weird that you will kahser an eiruv that you only heard an online poster mention.

That was the thrust of this post.

And it is what irks the YV.

The Yeshivshe Velt takes the Brooklyn Eiruv personally because it was aggressive toward the status quo of the leadership at that time. It was much more contentious then eiruvin that had a lot less validity. It’s one thing to claim that a Ry doesn’t know the halacha. It a whole nother ballgame to claim that a RY is being paid off to be against the Eiruv because he doesn’t care about the Torah. Do you really want to go through all the mud?

Almost all of the gaonim that came out of the pre war yeshivos were against the eiruv in Manhattan. Some were even older than Rav Moshe. Their opinions are published in their seforim. Or can be found in their notes. They mostly thought that allowing an eiruv in such a metropolis is a chiddush. I didn’t mention the kol korei.

The Boro Park Eiruv features many poskim of little renown. They had dozens of peers that were still in kollel. I don’t think such would count as rov poskim. It’s not bechachma or bminyan. It was not in my mind to belittle them CH”V. Mostly they signed to announce to their peers that they felt ready and able to defend the eiruv.

I don’t go care for either KK. I just posted because you mentioned something like rov poskim.

You are so wrong that it was only about halacha for Rav Moshe and Rav Aaron. They felt an obligation to turn the entire Jewish Diaspora back to the Torah. They both continually expressed how lacking they were to fulfill the task. It’s an absolute sin that their legacy heirs today do not understand how active they were on behalf of yidden that were far removed from Torah. Rav Aaron especially, wouldn’t tell his inner circle muttar or assur. He would say, zuhl tun, cen tun, besser nisht tun, and most commonly, nisht kdei.

“This point has changed dramatically, and not many other inyanim have followed suit.”

Are you referring to my posts, or actual society? Other inyanim in eiruv or other fields of halacha?

Please clarify.

Dear Avira,

Cherem is a measure for one that is within the community.

What do you make of the din of putting a nidui on oneself?

Dear Yabia,
OPen Orthodoxy was a pressing issue in 2015. Pre Trump and Cancel Culture the frum world still had a pulse about religious matters. It’s part of why the coffeeroom deteriorated.

Dear Yserbius,

Where did you get the idea that Rav Hirsch’s views changed throughout his life? He is more consistent than most. The Letters (His first publication.) are talking throughout all his later works.

Dear Avira,

Wayward Jews do not get expelled from Judaism.