pcoz

kares means that a jew is excised from their spiritual source

Kozov – if the jew has destoyed their chelek elokah mimaal (im timze lomar), then they are no longer a chelek elokah mimaal

shaigetz – Aryeh Kaplan has the observation that every Jew is descended from approximately every Jew that lived 500 years ago about every 500 years

I was once at an aufruf in the Mir, one of the roshei yeshiva was talking and everybody was being very attentive. Rb Chaim Shmuel Lopian z”l though was enjoying his apple strudel, I was very impressed by this (although I never have understood anything he says on shev shmatsah)

although I think the gemara is keneged the metzudos becuase the gemara explains lo kom ruach be’ish since krias yam suf means no-one frequented that establishment

the teachers are chayav misah!

the gemara says that when dovid’s only killed the male amalekim becuase his teacher taught him timcheh es zachar amalek – dovid hamelech said to the general’s teacher – arur oseh meleches hashem remiyah vearur moneah charboh midam, ika de’amri katlei (dovid hamelech killed the teacher) veika de’amri lo katlei

far east – I think the point is – ein hachi nami – klal yisrael needs all sorts – but the Rambam is just coming from a perspective of ‘why me?’ – why should I be the dufus (like me) who goes to work and not learn. He is not making an empirical statement.

This is along the lines of the gemara which says ee ephshar leolam belo burseki uvelo bursi – aval ashri mi sheumnosoh bursi oy lemi sheumnosoh burseki.

Sure the world needs both, but why do you need to be the sucker if you don’t have to be?

Apologies to all in the trhead if this is a bit straightforward

The worst thing is when people try to cater for you and then you get there and you figure out that you don’t eat from the standard of kashrus they have organised – that can get veery sticky

What is the father of all corny jokes? Pop corn

One word for an ill bird? Illegal

One termite walked into a bar and asked the other termite, Where is the bar tender?

keep formal records of what you are accomplishing and chat with him about it informally

“Is a goy better off in the Olam HaEmes if he is mgayer” – if a goy is megayer then he is Jewish and not a goy

Some gelatin which is used to make lollies and ice-cream is made from cow face pieces. That means you have a person standing in the tannery cutting the faces of the cows from the hides, they remove the ears becuase these are made into dog chew treats. I hope your animal rights activists don’t like ice-cream.

I don’t think according to the Rosh there is a chiyuv of maaser kesafim. I think the link to dinonline is incorrect becuase the sort of precedences listed in the link relate more to the type of town centric tzedaka that you find in the first perek of bava basra, not to an individual’s obligations. I can’t remember off hand who wrote the hagahos but it has a haskomoh from Rb Avrohom Gurwicz shlit”a.

ItcheSrulik – you can get shlil today, the industry term is slinks. These are normally from aborted foetuses taken from milk cows where the cow was brought to that state in order so that it would produce milk. Slinks are quite cheap becuase they don’t have many other uses.

I have seen the diamond pattern, but I guess not all klaf is necesarily dried the same way. There were some yungerleit who started producing chemical tanned klaf in Israel a few years ago. Anyway I doubt if you are buying klaf today that this is hand tanned and frame dried unless you paid a premium for it.

most klaf nowadays is machine processed, not ‘stretched between a wooden frame etc.’ That’s why if you look at the klaf of new sifrei torah you will see a diamond pattern which is the pattern of the metal grid the klaf was dried on. Also I’m not sure it’s still done with lime (which is quite slow). The old style klaf is becoming difficult to get hold of and does provide a better writing surface.

This thread is out of my depths, but here’s a thought from Rb Yitzchak Blazer z”l

The passuk says hu yeshufcha akev veata teshufenah rosh – he will strike at your ankle and you will crush his head.

He explains that when the yetzer hara attacks he does so in a way in which the situation gets progressively worse, the attack starts from the heel and works its way through the rest of the body. However when the yetzer hatov wins the situation changes suddenly for the better, similar to the snake’s head being crushed.

I don’t believe that any effort anyone ever made was lost, so regardless of whether or not there seems to be an effect at the moment, something always sticks.

funny you ask

apushatayid: This is absolutely incorrect, the halacha is that if a rich man becomes poor you are obligated to give him tzedakah so he can resume the standard of living he once had including slaves to run before his chariot. Mah nomar umah nedaber in this case. In the days of the shulchan aruch it was not possible to treat these things medically, now it is.

Rb Frand gave a shiur that this is mutar – he was discussing faxing to America when it is shabbos in USA but in your timezone shabbos is out or not yet in. He said it would also be mutar for the recipient of the fax to read it in this case.

Sam2: This is not the minhag ha’olam. According to that psak if you ever loaded a website or document that showed a shem Hashem you would have to leave your computer and monitor running forever untouched.

I don’t but I have figured out a great get rich scheme. You publish a book, get it put in cherem, and keep a few copies to sell yourself on e-bay.