n0mesorah

Dear Menachem,

It depends what going crazy means. I have heard of those who had complaints about the first sichah and were opposed to the messianism as early as the Fifties. I can’t even talk about 1989 because I wasn’t born yet. The vehemence against Chabad has gone down the last decade in my circles. It does seem to me that very few non Lubavitchers ‘go crazy’ about what the Rebbe or random Lubavitchers say. If you go through the archives of this site, you will see that there aren’t that many Chabad haters. It’s it only a couple of posters per thread. There are more posters that just want an easy explanation for some of the Rebbe’s statements. These aren’t easy statements to clarify and they are not interested in all the Chassidus that is needed to understand these concepts in their proper context. So, it is good fodder for a bunch of long and pointless threads. The real life haters that I know, mostly are not interested in learning anything ever. They just want to reaffirm their stances even though they don’t know the foundational concepts of their own hashkafa.

Dear Qwerty,

You are aware of the different outcome of Chassidus for Lubavitch. But you are not getting into what makes it so. For all you know, The Rebbe Is Moshiach is the authentic outcome of Chabad.

1) Everybody today is careful about ‘My Leader Is Moshiach’ statements because they don’t want to be compared to Chabad. So that isn’t evidence. There are yeshiva bochurim that are just as enchanted with their Rosh Yeshiva as a Meshichist.

2) Paranormal stories that lend credence to tzaddikim being neviim are in abundance. I have not heard Chabadtzkers saying the Rebbe was a prophet as a general statement.

3) Other Chassidim have claimed their Rebbe to be among the living dead. Lubavitch is the only large group to make such a claim. Please realize that they are the only large group to stay intact for thirty years without a rebbe. The question is what do they mean by this statement and is it rooted in Chassidus.

4) We are not bothered by what they do on the street. It’s benign. Chabad is not a threat to missionize anyone of us to Chabad as long as the subject knows anything. A lot (Not all.) of the anti Chabad is missing out on the basics. So I’m fine with it. Let Chabad open their eyes a bit.

5) That Rabbi is not a lone wolf. Degenerating other gedolim is a big issue which not all of Chabad is personally aware of. And too many of them deny it. But it is just as bad in other groups. Sometimes even worse.

6) So what if Chabad believes they are exclusive? That put’s them with Brisk (Each version separately.) Half of Ponovezh, Segments of Breslov, and several small cult like groups.

7) If you want to say we disagree on certain major points with Chabad, that is true. But it is even worse with some other groups. And disagreement is not automatically heresy. There is no schism between Chabad and the rest of Klal Yisroel.

Dear Ujm,

The RY who told me the whole story is long gone. I don’t see any point in publicizing politics from long before I was born. Maybe I would give one example.

Dear Taka,

Torah is compared to the midbar. There is no higher levels. The only catch is the humility of the student.

Dear Avira,

Ketzos is learned in Chabad yeshivos. And some of them are pretty good at it.

Dear Mods,

What happened to some of the threads and posts?

There counldn’t have been any moderation on the first six posts on the eidele bochur thread. I can’t see them anymore.

Dear Qwerty,

You did not say that, it was a different poster. Now it is two posters. They are not even making an argument. Maybe when they say Christianity, they mean Breslov or Brisk. Okay, Chabad is like Breslov or Brisk.

You say that Lubavitchers treat their rebbe like a god. The Gemara tells us to have awe of our masters like the Awe of Heaven. Both Lubavitchers on this thread admitted that the Rebbe could have made a mistake.

Chabad atributes special powers to tzaddikim and they think of their rebbe as a real big tzaddik. this is not very unique to Chabad. Though they do have more of a thought system for it. If you have a problem with it, take it up with the Sefer Tanya. If the sefer is no good, than go check all the classics and see who agrees with the Tanya. It’s a sugya to learn no different than any other.

My position in regard to Chabad is that there is no reason to analyze their beliefs. Their positions are no less absurd than Satmar or Ger or Skver. And atleast they have a legitimate history of these concepts and can trace the outlines of their ideas throughout the centuries.

Since you are the one attacking, it is on you to explain why it is problematic for people to have absurd ideas. And why we should debate them as if they need to drop it or face excommunication.

Dear Follick,

For the purposes of the survey, he would be Orthodox like me and you. I think that is the whole point of the study. But everybody on this thread has a problem with that, so I’m probably missing something here.

In general we don’t term such people. Either ‘he isn’t frum/orthodox in private’ or ‘he has his struggles’ or ‘he is not in a good place’ or some other phrase, depending on the nature of the story.

If we must have a term for societal purposes, than I suggest ‘Orthophony’.

Sadly, I know a bunch of young people who left Orthodoxy. Some are still in the same general locale and some went across the country. Both may call themselves Ortodox but unobservant for this survey. It is a reflection of their inner confusions.

Dear Avira,

At one point, many rebbes were convinced that The Rebbe was about to reveal himself as moshiach. Though they moved away from him while he was still at the peak of his abilities.
This still reverbarates behind the scenes, and has an effect on many issues in chareidi society.

I don’t know who brought about more learning, it’s very debatable.

Though it would seem that Rav Shach was the greater hogeh batorah.

Dear Eidele,

Here is what you can do. Review, review, and review! Whatever you want to discuss, prepare it so well that you would not need to look inside to confirm how you understood it. Know the words that gave you your insight verbatim. The yeshivishe mehalech puts it’s preference on the key words of what is being understood. If you know exactly which words moved you to your conclusions, you would reach the conlusion of most of your interactions much faster. This would cut out a lot of the fighting.

Dear Sechel,

1) You are skipping a step here, so it’s not so obvious to me that it follows that The Rebbe is Moshiach. I am not fool enough to try to debate a Chabadsker online about the exact nature of Chassidus and Kabbalah. If we meet in real life, we would have a great bull session and it would be a fun, deep, and informative.

2) I don’t know why the Kabbalistic or halachic qualifications matter. In reality, we are still in Galus as much as fifty or a hundred years ago.

Dear Neville,

“How people self-identify is completely meaningless.”

Exactly! If a yid identifies as an athiest or nilhist it doesn’t change his status until he is actually meeting certain criteria.

“Would you eat the food of a polytheist … and still acts Jewish?”

So how is he a polytheist? If he serves as such, than he is a mumar l’avodah zara and is not believed on his food. If he is a mumar for just praxis his food may also be problematic. If a Yid is certifying the food, than e can eat it. How does this prove anything?

Leaving Judaism is a problem of a mumar l’chol HaTorah as I explained in the other post. Even if he believes and worships correctly.

“…then everyone is still considered fine.”

No. It is not fine at all. But we are still included in the mainstream enough that there is no benefit to calling out theological differences.

Even the failure of stupid planes can have severe consequences.

Before daf yomi, going to a daily gemara shiur was part of almost every frum man’s schedule.

To learn a sugya properly, requires a clear head. And some training.

It’s not like every yungerman in kollel is coming out with clear sugyos, either.

In any event, learning shas is special.

But why would chassidus be outside of it?

Dear Menachem,

.. questioning a tzaddik.. ..trying to understand…

I understood Tanya differently. But it’s only a small difference.

Just because I don’t question the tzaddik, it doesn’t make the tzaddik’s actions into proof for anything. Anything at all. Because who am I to know what is really going on.

Dear Neville,

You have my perspective completely wrong.

“Halacha has no concept of kefira”

It clearly does.

“Passul from aidus”

Rambam Eidus 11:10

“…beliefs alone if they make them public.”

Quite the qualifier.

“Jews for J”

Is a clear mumar. Even if he keeps everything.

“Judaism doesn’t care about belief.”

That is not my position.

“The original idea of Reconstructionism.”

Is to take everything apart. It’s a parallel religion. They even termed it as such.

“We don’t have to put people under a microscope.”

More than that. We are allowed to ignore their opinions. Especially if it absurd.

And I will prove it to you. I have never been shy about this topic and nobody felt required to stop me at all costs. Even though it has been much more threating to some posters than anything claimed by Chabad. So there is no obligation to shut down a random person’s opinion. My take is that most of this is about our own struggles being projected onto Chabad. Why does anybody care. It works somewhat for them. And if it fails, we will not be able to help much. Do you think that our group has a much stronger theology? Do you believe that we are free of any sacred goats?

Bonus question: Do you understand why Chabad has this specific absurdity and why it was always allowed to prosper?

Maybe I should just post my whole perspective on beliefs.

Dear Youdont,

I do not agree with anti eruv group. They are going to reimagine everything just to get their point across. But they never learned enough to make their own points. So they will just go around in circles, destroying whatever they are entrusted with.

But there is something else going on here. And you blissfully ignorant of it. Or doing a great job of faking it. You are throwing every half source at the issue to try to force it. Never mind that the petitioner didn’t care for any sources. He would carry as long as we (Or his real world associates.) don’t attack him for it. He is not here for the Torah at all. Neither are you.

Rav Shmuel Birnbaum, Rav Yisroel Belsky, and Rav Aahron Shecter, could have went to speak with Rav Elyasiv in person and he wouldn’t have felt the need to go along with them. No American Rabbonim where able to pressure him. There was a lot of people keeping him away from the public. Maybe you are lying on purpose. I can’t tell anymore.

Rav Elyashiv paskened against the eruv because of the only person who he esteemed for his Torah Knowledge. That is Rav Dovid Feinstein. Rav Dovid almost never got involved in halacha battles. Here he even brought in Rav Elyashic and Rav Chaim. He was very confident that he was right. And you shrug. Until you claim that he was mislead or whatever.

Dear Sechel,

Look up your source’s sources. You are not reading it right. It is not a halacha sefer.

Ther Litvaks shaved in Europe before Rav Moshe came around. For those that actually learn the sugyos, it is simple. Though some are not comfortable because the result is the same as the razor.

For certain reasons that we won’t get into, almost none of the poskim from Europe published on the topic.

Having learned most of Shas is very valuable to me.

Even learning one daf is more valuable than anything on this thread.

Somebody who learned when he was young should have no problem learning a daf gemara in roughly an hour if he does it consistantly.

A lot of the laypeople learn shas well. The issue is that they don’t retain it.

Dear Neville,

Why do you support collective disavowment on this site? Anybody who takes one poster’s statements and applies it to the group that poster speaks for will end up being wrong. That is this thread in a nutshell.

Dear Mdd,

I don’t follw the first line of your post.

That is not the correct way to read the Rambam.

You know the Rambam wrote about belief at length. He also wrote the Moreh.

It’s fallacious to quote the one liners from the Rambam on belief.

And, the Rambam clearly places all these heretics within the fold.

Dear Emunas,

1) Except that Chabad isn’t calling us to debate them. So no comparison unless you think that beliefs is some kind of spiritual team sport.

2) Are you predicting the future? And what did the Baal Shem Tov stand for?

3) Or maybe The Rebbe was trying to achieve a different goal with all his messianic talk.

… my point is only that al pi chassidus there is a deeper meaning in moshiach, and gemara and lomdus has everything to do with it ….

Fixed it for you.

I used to hope that it was obvious that Hashem can always do what he chooses, but somehow people have all kinds of reasons not to see that.

You seem to have Chassidus as seperate from the rest of Torah. You are making a big mistake and that is why you struggle with the issues in these threads. If Chassidus does not correlate to the rest of Torah, what gives it authenticity and value?

Dear Sechel,

There isn’t a need for a heter to shave. People always shaved. In some times and places, the majority shaved. The question is if an electric shaver is similiar to a razor. What exactly is arazor is an old question. To automatically include a shaver (which has to apply opposite pressure) with a razor is a blockhead idea.

“But anybody who believes… … …is outside the fold of Yidishkiet entirely.”

Yeah, yeah, blah, blah. This tired excuse keeps coming up. It is completely false. Jews do not do inquistions. We don’t have a belief police. If someone is missionizing or has a teaching position, then we would ask for clarification on certain trends. But we don’t demand of anonymous people in any group to confirm their fidelity to the mainstream beliefs. And someone who doesn’t advertise his doubts is definitely fully within the fold. I don’t how they judge doubtful or propagandized heresey in the World To Come. But I do know that they severely punish slander. Even when it is directed at those with questionable theologies.

I don’t understand.

These polls are generally about what people whoare part of a certain segment of society are doing/thinking/etc. If someone is part of an Orthodox Shul and drives on Shabbos to eat in a Burger KIng, then for the purposes of this survey he is Orthodox.

In general, I feel that there is a lot of denial about what goes on in full in a community.