Pashuteh Yid

It would be nice if somebody would bother answering my question from part 1 which is to show the s’if and siman of shulchan oruch or Rambam where the 3 oaths are brought down lhalacha. Easier to ignore the main question, score yourself a victory, and to go on to parts 2 and 3, then to bother proving your entire contention to begin with. Easy also to evade the question and say to look up this book or that by the proponents of NK philosophy. Obviously I don’t have those books, but I do have the primary sources from which all Jewish law is based. So show me a source from a recognized halachic work.

Again, all I ask for is a siman and s’if in Rambam, Tur, Shulchan Oruch, Chayei Odom, Mishna Berurah, or Kitzur Shulchan Oruch. Is that too much to ask?

BTW, In OC 109 I believe, Reb Moshe says that one who disagrees with him is not only allowed to pasken differently, but is MECHUYAV to do so.

Helpful, as people have stated here umpteen times, the halacha is that only derech chiba is assur. Reb Moshe may feel that a handshake is derech chiba, yet many other fine Rabbanim may feel that it is not. It really is very simple.

As far as the teshuvah about being friends, again it is complex. I believe Reb Moshe found an Avos Dreb Nassan which says Yachol yechabkenah vyinashkena vyidaber imah devarim betailim, T”L Lo sikrevu. Reb Moshe wants to learn that yidaber devarim btailim is inclided in the deoraisa of Lo sikrevu. Yet in another teshuvah, he goes into a very long arichus about yachol yisaper imah meachorei hageder. There he brings a kashya from one of the acharonim who asks where did we ever find an issur on dibur? The acharon remains with a kashya. Furthermore, he brings from a Maggid Mishna who discusses the Rambam that mentions that gesturing, kalus rosh, and many other things get makas mardus. The Maggid Mishna says it is Makas Mardus because it they are all drabanan. So it is not clear that speaking is deoraisa. It would seem that the devarim betailim of Avos Drebbe Nasan is referring only to intimate talk about things that relate to tashmish. This is rather clear from the other Reb Moshe about meachorei hageder, where he explains that it is because it is actually the preparation for tashmish that the fellow wanted. That is why chazal forbid it.

So it is not clear that mere friendly conversation with someone of the opposite gender is forbidden.

Furthermore, as I asked earlier, what if the two of them wanted to get married when they were older? It would then be considered dating which is ok. I know of other cases where people married next-door neighbors who grew up together. One is the daughter of one of the well known Chareidi maggidei shiur on all the national Dial-a-shiur networks who married the learning son of another Chareidi maggid shiur in a Yeshiva. It happens, and is actually a cause for much simcha.

In the case of Reb Reuvain, the story appears in the Reb Moshe Artscroll biography. Her father suddenly passed away very young, and she would often be in Reb Moshe’s house. He was close with the family, and did the tahara for her father.

Helpful, you need to acquire a taste for the depth and complexity of halacha, and the constant counterbalancing factors that go into one of Reb Moshe’s teshuvos. He could either say the Avos dReb Nassan was an asmachta to make it agree with the Maggid Mishna, but there was a Shach that he wanted to make the Maggid Mishna agree with, so he learned the Maggid Mishna that the makas mardus was not because of being derabanan, but because of lav sh’ein bo maysa. Clearly this is not pashut pshat in the Maggid Mishna. Reb Moshes gadlus was in trying to weave a path through his tremendous bekius which often brought him into contradictory situations which he had to iron out.

Those who think a Reb Moshe teshuva is only his last paragraph totally miss his gadlus. Today, people are brainwashed not to think, but to read Reb Moshe’s conclusion like the pope is speaking and scream Daas Torah, end of story. That is not the way Reb Moshe himself wanted them to be learned. He states he has a lot of hanaah when people actually take the time to read the teshuva and debate with him. The gadlus is in his methods.

Just checked the teshuvos in Reb Moshe, and in at least two of them he says that frum people (yirei shamayim) who do shake hands hold that it is not derech chiba and we should be dan them lchaf zchus. However, he finds it hard to rely on this heter. He says I don’t see a contradiction to the fact that I was matir buses, because there it is not derech chiba for just about everybody.

(Please note that your writing makes it seem like Reb Moshe is screaming that shaking hands is terrible, and NOT comparable to buses, etc. However, the actual language is much more gentle and understanding, and clearly there is what to rely on for another Rov to pasken differently. It is all a matter of judgment as to how much derech chiba there is in a handshake. He doesn’t say asur lismoch al zeh or chas vshalom lismoch al zeh. He says kasheh lismoch al zeh.)

In social settings, it is much easier to avoid, (like make sure you are carrying a hot plate of chulent or even chopped liver in your hands at all times, so nobody will want to get near you). However, on a business interview or mtg, it is much harder to avoid (even if you excuse yourself for religious reasons), and may cause bad feelings like this guy is a really strict, unfriendly fellow and hard to get along with. With eating kosher, it seems people are much more understanding and do not take it as unfriendly. This is just my observation.

However, I do see a reason to be machmir, because if one lets down his guard too much, then it may lead to touching where it is derech chiba. It is much easier to tell people negia is always assur, rather than making subtle distinctions that it is assur if there is derech chiba and permitted otherwise. Simple rules are easier to follow than leaving it up to people’s judgment in each situation, because where do you draw the line.

I would be surprised if they could not squeeze your girls in. It would be a shame to send them to Queens, when their Shabbos friends will be the local girls who live and go to school in the Five Towns. It is very important to have friends where you live. Keep trying for TAG. It is a great school. It is true that they are crowded, because their bldg expansion plans fell through with the economy, but keep pushing.

Helpful, please post the sources about shaking hands from Reb Moshe.

In general, the way I look at it is like this. I personally didn’t create the terrible yetzer hara men have for women. In addition, I didn’t create women to begin with. If it were up to me, I would have created maybe only a few, and on a remote desert island. But they are all over the place. Many studies have shown, and Charlie who is an expert in Statistics can back me up on this, that up to 50% of all people are women! And this cuts across all socioeconomic, geographic and religious categories. Yes, every single religion and group has a huge problem of women. For a long time this was swept under the rug. Many groups would claim or believe that they were men only. Gradually it became known that this conforting thought was not the case. It was discovered that even among the most religious Jews, a huge number were women. This terrible problem of society in general which we thought we were immune to, managed to infiltrate our religion. Finally Rabbanim are dealing with this. And whether the families were rich or poor seemed to have no effect on the statistics. The very best families fared no better.

It is better that it is out in the open, because now we can come up with rational strategies for dealing with the female problem. It is nothing to be embarrassed or ashamed about if you have one in your own family. They are all over the street. It is likely that if you take a train, you will encounter these creatures. They have been known to go to stores, libraries, colleges–even synagogues! I don’t think anybody knows the true extent of the problem. The govt needs to invest huge amounts of money now to find a solution before it is too late. They are literally swarming about town, a silent infestation that threatens to take over.

But seriously, since there is no way to avoid them, it is hard to believe that the Torah wants us to give up every possible activity, because there may be a woman there. Are we really supposed to spend all our energy avoiding 50% of the population?

Note that in Sotah the gemara says that a husband who is overly strigent with his wife will cause embarrassment to her and people will say mai hai dka bodeles min haanashim. (What is with her that she separates from men.) There must be some happy medium which allows people to function normally, but stay away from potentially problematic situations. I don’t think that locking oneself in a room is the answer.

MW13, Unfortunately, those kind of answers bother me, like we are no longer on the madreiga for this or that. Yiftach bdoro kShmuel bdoro. It is sort of an easy way out type of thing when we can’t see something, we say it only happened at XYZ generation to XYZ people. Another thing that bothers me about that approach, is why do Chazal bother talking about it at all if it has no relevance to me whatsoever? Supposedly there is a Maamar Chazal that there were actually 600,000 Neviim throughout history. But we only have 24 books of Nach, because all the others were only for their dor, and were not relevant for later on. Only the ones in Nach are applicable for all time. So why do Chazal talk about things that are not applicable to me? And if you say it is relevant for the future, but the gemara also asks sometimes: Hilchesa limeshicha? In other words when mashiach comes, we will be taught the relevant halachos by the gedolim of that time.

In general, here is another issue to think about. I just learned in Rambam Issurei Biah 12:17 that if a non-Jewish baby gets mixed up with a Jewish baby, we convert both of them, and they are both safek gerim lhalacha. But at the time of Chazal, wouldn’t you think there were big mekubalim everywhere who could look at the babies and see their neshamos and easily tell the difference between a Jewish neshama and a non-Jewish neshama? Vaiz doch ois that in Yiddishkeit, we really don’t decide anything of importance by supernatural means, but we do so only by natural means. And both babies remain safek geirim. Same for Agunos. If a man didn’t return, couldn’t we go to the nearest mekubal and ask if he was still alive? Again, divination, even by great gedolim and mekubalim seems to have no place in halacha.

It would be interesting to know what the halacha would be if a Navi would say this baby is Jewish, or this man died. Would one be able to follow the Navi, or would he have to continue to treat it as a safek?

MW writes: “Again, nobody is saying that sheidim can do things without Hashem’s approval/instruction. I always thought that they operated like a wild animal: a ferocious, monstrous creature that can tear you limb from limb. After all, just because there are wild animals doesn’t mean that Hashem CH”V isn’t running the show, does it?”

The only problem with that is that people see animals in operation all the time and know they can be ferocious. Nobody that I know has ever seen a sheid, or even described what harmful things they do, or how they go about doing those things. Nobody has ever even given an example of any damage that we could not explain through purely physical means, such that we would have to look for some other cause.

MW13, Yes, clearly the Rambam is lsheetoso. If he believes sheidim don’t exist, then the only way he can explain those gemaros is to say they are not-literal.

HaLeiVi, the Rambam says in Hilchos Avodah Zara that Ov and Yidoni were illusions and not real.

I will now say something which may upset some people, but please consider with an open mind. Possibly the belief in demons was a fear that people had in earlier times. Before people began to understand that disease was caused by germs, genetics or other natural causes, possibly it was common that great fear of unknown or supernatural beings existed because they were thought to be a cause. (Of course Hashem runs the show, but we now believe He does that in a natural, rather than supernatural way.)

I had occasion to look at the Encyclopedia Judaica under Demonology today, and there is a fascinating article on the topic. The writer collected from gemaras, psukim and many other sources (before the internet existed). What disturbs me is that many of the non-Jewish demons had the same names as the Jewish ones. So some of this may have been a pervasive belief or fear in ancient times. I find it troubling that these concepts have entered Yiddishkeit when they seem like Avoda Zara, and pagan beliefs. Don’t frum Jews believe that Hashem runs the show, period?

To amplify my earlier objection in previous posts, a (morbid) mashal is for example when we appeal for clemency of someone accused of a capital crime. Nobody tracks down the name of the executioner, say Mr. John Doe, and then writes a letter to the authorities saying please protect me from this horrible man, John Doe. Rather, one writes to the Governor and says, please commute the sentence of so and so. John Doe only does what he has been ordered to do. And if John Doe is off-duty that day, they have other executioners available. John Doe is not in charge of anything and has no say in the matter, and he does not affect the outcome in any way.

Why do we get involved at all with these supposed supernatural creatures, and not just daven to the RBSH?

What kind of wine do you need for kiddush levana?

One thing I will say is that I believe a potch should only be used for chutzpah or defiance or emergency like running into the street.

I also do not believe that a Rebbe should potch except in extreme behavioral situations, if ever. I think in the past, it was common that if a child lost the place, or his mind drifted off or he did not know the answer, he was potched. This seems totally cruel and will likely turn off the child to learning for life.

Reb Shlomo Carlebach ZL had a brilliant insight. He asked why after the Holocaust did many gave up their Yiddishkeit and become totally non-frum, but others decided to hold onto it and raise their kids frum.

He answered that those kids who were potched by their parents or Rebbes for Yiddishkeit felt, I was potched enough by the Nazis, who needs additional potching for religious reasons.

But in those houses where Yiddishkeit was taught with warmth and happiness, the families said after the Holocaust, I can’t wait to teach my kids about the beauty of a Shabbos meal, having the family around the table, singing zemiros and eating delicious kugel.

MW13, it is not so simple, since the bottom line is what would the sheid do? Give someone a potch? Take away his parnasa? What is the sheid doing that the RBSH is not doing directly.

In other words, what does the sheid add to the old concept of schar vaonesh? If somebody falls into a pit, why say it was some putative sheid that pushed him there. Why not say Hashem caused him to trip? Is there any way to detect the presence of a sheid? If not, can they add any info to our understanding of our world? Give me a hechi timtza where something happens that could only be explained by the existence of a sheid. I.e., an occurrence where clearly Hashem decided to operate via a sheid, rather than through nature.

For example, somebody chas vshalom loses his job. We generally say, Hashem made the boss decide to fire him or lay him off because business was bad and he could no longer afford to pay his salary. Is there anything to be gained by saying, Hashem told a sheid to transmit a message to the boss to lay him off. What has this second scenario added to our understanding of the situation, and how would one distinguish between the two possibilities? If one cannot, then do sheidim really exist? What is the operative definition of a sheid?

Hi Mod-80, you are very perceptive. The truth is that I became very disillusioned with segulos and all types of superstitions recently. The crazy mayseh of the supposed dibbuk of the past year really upset me. How can we Jews become laughingstocks for the whole world–on video yet.

You see, I have nonreligious relatives who seize on this to make hilarious fun of religious Jews. We are supposed to be an Am chacham vnavon. I hate having to defend behavior which I can’t. Don’t people realize how weird this stuff looks like to the outside world?

Finally, I believe that the RBSH rules the world, period. I do not understand what role could be played by sheidim, for example. If ploni is righteous, then Hashem will treat him well. If not, then he may get in trouble CV. However, how will his plight be affected by a sheid for good or for bad?

Same with keshafim. While there are mekoros in sefarim that seem to indicate this may be black magic or magical powers, how can anybody verify this. Do we have anybody today who understands how to do it? If so, please let them give a demo that we can all see. I am very skeptical that this ever existed, so I choose to be a rationalist like the Rambam, unless somebody will conclusively prove to me otherwise.

I know this is difficult from a number of gemaras. For instance in Bava Basra, it tells of a non-Jewish woman who could turn water into a bowlful of scorpions. However, I believe the Rambam would not take this literally.

The whole topic is fascinating, though.

Squeak, I tend to disagree with you on that. The beauty of the theorem is that if one adds two cubes together, he will always either overshoot or undershoot another nearby cube, but never hit one on the nail. Just because things are “complex” doesn’t explain why this always must be. It is amazing that it is so.

I know what it is. Her mom once burned a cake she was baking. This obviously must be kept very quiet, and if word gets out, it will ruin shidduchim for all the children.

But seriously, people need to grow up and stop with all this FBI stuff. A person can be a great girl and come from nothing or from a very problematic family and it doesn’t reflect at all one her. Years ago, when people met on their own, they only judged by the person. Or friends would informally say, I know a nice guy or girl who is in school with me, would you like to go out. The answer was yes or no on the spot with no investigations.

Let’s be honest. All this checking out is totally for one reason–Kavod. I want to be able to brag to my friends how well known, prominent or rich the family is. But the gemara says, hizaharu bivnei aniyim shemehem teitzei Torah. Torah comes from the simplest and most sincere families, not from the bigwigs. Yesh nosei isha lshem shomayim.

I wouldn’t let it bother you. Whatever difficulties you have are a badge of honor which you have been able to overcome. There is no shame that your family is not perfect. Another secret: none are. Just some people are better at hiding things than others.

Dr. Pepper, the reason why I believe that Fermat did have a valid proof is that otherwise how could he have made such a bold statement that one will never find any triplet of integers a,b,c where a^n + b^n = c^n for any integral power n greater than 2. A single counterexample could have disproved his conjecture. A great mathematician would not have left himself open to ridicule by making such a sweeping statement if he did not have an ironclad proof.

Charlie: Did you get an email from me a few weeks ago?

When I was single, I made it a rule never to say no after one date. It is a crushing insult to the other person, if they are interested. After two dates, there is still no real attachment, so it won’t break anybody’s heart, and it won’t be hurtful to their self-esteem if one says no.

Imagine if one gets a string of no’s after a single date. The person may think they are ugly and totally lose their self-esteem and confidence. This overrides any consideration of tznius and any other stuff. As somebody said before, menschlachkeit is the ikar and the only purpose of the Torah.

Oomis, World War I broke out on Tisha B’av. Although the holocaust happened in WW II, they say that aschuli dpuranus adif. (A phrase which means the beginning of the tragedy is the main day. This is why we observe Tisha B’av on the ninth, and not the tenth. On the ninth at the end of the day, the fire was lit, but the actually destruction occurred on the tenth. This is also why we do not shave or eat meat until noon on the tenth.)

WW1 set the stage for WW2, because the Germans were embarassingly defeated, and forced to disarm and abide by various humiliating sanctions imposed by the Treaty of Versailles. This caused Hitler to steam and stew, and he looked for a scapegoat. He invented the concept that it was not the Germans that lost, but rather that the Jews in Germany had betrayed Germany and stabbed them in the back. It was an internal collapse. WW2 was to get “revenge” on the Jews for this defeat.

BTW, I read somewhere that 90% of the most successful CEO’s said their parents potched.

Example of situation that requires a potch. Your kid is jumping on the brand new sofa of your Shabbos lunch host. You tell him to stop, but he ignores. You carry him off, but he runs right back on l’hachis.

I would even go further and say that sometimes one sees a poorly behaved or chutzpadig child, and one can see immediately that there is no organic cause, but a simple lack of parental discipline. I think a lot of kids are being pumped up with medicines for all kinds of behavioral issues when often simple old-fashioned stern discipline is all that is needed.

I am not a heartless person, nor do I deny that clearly some kids do have a clear organic problem which requires special help. But Hashem created the midah of anger for a reason, and that is to raise our kids. One obviously balances it with much love, laughter, jokes and family trips, etc. A child needs a balance of positive and negative reinforcement, and a happy home life.

Maxwell, why don’t you succinctly summarize and share with us.

MSseeker, wouldn’t you think that if Zionism were the cause, it would have affected the Zionists, i.e., in Eretz Yisroel. Yet, EY was spared the Holocaust, while many anti-zionists were murdered. Even all the wars and terrorist attacks together in EY for the last 150 years did not claim as many victims as were lost in many periods and various places of our bitter galus. So let us not play Navi.

Sternberg is super-great. Wonderful warm girls of all types. Real ahavas yisroel towards all. My daughters love it every year. Simple living quarters, girls learn to get by without all the gashmius. They have a zoo and lake with paddle boating and pool, and every visiting day I meet all my old Chaverim from all kinds of Yeshivas. Very normal atmosphere. Accomodate special needs campers. Super camp.

Another point is that where I used to live, there were many parks and grassy squares all around town, and in the summer, there were tons of sunbathers wherever you went. Did one have to avoid taking his kids to the playground?

I mangled the joke last week. I really apologize.

Who said that the secular studies in Volozhin was just math? I believe it was Russian language and culture.