TorahUmadda-731-MelechYavanHarasha

I honestly think that TUM731 is indicative of them problems that come up when people apply Lomdus to practical Halachah too much. The fact is, the Rishonim were incredibly clear with everything they said.

I didn’t invent this rule myself. I got it from my Rebbeim who got it from multiple gedolei hador. I am not saying which yeshiva I go to.

And while the current mode of learning might respect the ability to find a way to prove that a Rishon really meant the exact opposite of the words he said, when we get down to the Aliba D’hilchasa aspect of the Sugyos, we have to understand that the Rishonim’s Shittos are, well, the Rishonim’s Shittos.

This is not a “mode” of learning, even if it’s some peoples’ excuse to make up retarded pshatim. This is emes. You need a rebbe for rishonim too. I am not presenting an entire philosophy of shas axioms.

My lack of knowledge and understanding is not a reflection of the “nebulousness” of mesora.

If you don’t do it, it’s because of practical reasons (making you “pattur”), once those reasons are not there, you need to do a mitzvah.

That’s not true. You are inventing on your own the basis for not doing it. There are other considerations.

did you ever ask him why he doesn’t wear it? Maybe he is just relying on other people who don’t wear it who are in turn relying on other people and no one actually knows why. Also maybe he has a reaon that only applies to him. R’ Aharon Lichtenstein does not wear techeiles but he tells his talmidim to wear it.

Unlike his rebbe, who apparently does not tell his talmidim not to.

What I’m saying is that if your rebbe knows every detail of the subject of techeiles and knows all the metzius then it makes sense to rely on him. If not…

Again, you are not just paskening, but claiming what makes sense [and by extension what does not make sense] — on your own — for someone else what the criterion are for having a halcahically justifiable basis to not wear techeiles. You do not necessarily need to go through the sugya to not have to wear it if you’re following your mesora. Or if you’re following R’ Chaim. Or R’ Elyashiv. (It might depend on what the mesoras svara not to wear it is.) And just because there are poskim who hold you do does not make it binding on all kllal yisrael. It makes far more sense for him to follow his rebbe than some anonymous person in the CR.

“Two things:

1- You are making up that techeiles not being stopped by choice invalidates a Mesora saying to maintain the practice!!!!!!!

2- You are yet again substituting ignorance for understanding in thinking that you know “the” Mesora / its applicability on this. (This particular point happens to be a machlokes.) Your arbitrary assumptions are without merit in practical application.”

You are being a politician and avoiding my question.

You are spewing blistering rhetoric to mask your ignorance. The truth is you simply do not know how mesora functions, its scope, applicablitity, etc enough to claim anything.!!!! Ignorance does not mean something is wrong. That is a basic principle of intellectual honesty. I am not the propagator of any mesora that i have to have the answers. In fact, I do not understand or know what the svaras are. But that doesn’t mean anything to an intellectually honest individual, because I am not the source of any mesora. I am not “avoiding” your questions. You are being intellectually dishonest.

How is it that by tzitzis out we can go against the mesorah but by techeiles we can’t.

If you have a kasha on a tosfos that you can’t find an answer for, do you assume the tosfos is wrong?? Go find someone from the mysterious mesora that you’re speaking of and ask why. Parroting already dealt with questions does not reinforce your position in any way. Unless you think you’re the first to have such a question in which case there are far worse problems. (And the comparison to tosfos is valid to bring out the concept — even if tosfos is a more extreme instance of it — that something that by default is valid is assumed to be valid even if you personally can’t figure it out, because vis-a-vis the concept, the difference is irrelevant.)

Again I think you misunderstand my argument. My point was that it is hypocritical to claim that we shouldn’t wear Techeiles because of mesorah (especially considering that Techeiles was never not worn by choice,) yet at the same time wear your tzitzis out, directly flouting the mesorah to wear them in which unlike Techeiles was done by choice.

Two things:

1- You are making up that techeiles not being stopped by choice invalidates a Mesora saying to maintain the practice!!!!!!!

2- You are yet again substituting ignorance for understanding in thinking that you know “the” Mesora / its applicability on this. (This particular point happens to be a machlokes.) Your arbitrary assumptions are without merit in practical application.

“TU731: Your dismissal of Rishonim’s opinions as being irrelevant today is more than reprehensible. Unless you can prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the Metziyus has changed to such an extent that their statements are no longer relevant, then what they say is far more binding than just about anything else we have. To dismiss Rabbeinu Yonah as being outdated is beyond arrogant and misguided.”

Thank you Sam2 for expressing my exact sentiments in such an eloquent way and allowing me not to have to be the one to say it.

I did not simply “dismiss” the opinions of any rishonim. Again, my point is that once there are legitimate people who hold of such a shitta, then you cannot out of ignorance think that your kashas are unanswerable.

Now about rishonim. Firstly, the simple reading is not always the correct understanding. Sometimes rishonim use language that nearly black-and-white indicates one side of a chakira when they hold of the other. That is a general rule of learning. Secondly, even if your understanding is correct, it is not necessary to conform to all rishonim, or even to most, in order to be a legitimate shitta. Now, on this premise, if there is a shitta advanced by legitimate people that disagrees, or seems to disagree, with rishonim, it is not arbitrary dismissal of rishonim for me to say that in this instance that may be pshat. This is because I am only stating such after the fact that the shitta exists. I am not claiming that as a general principle we need not be choshesh for rishonim. I am saying that it could be what the proponents of Mesora suppressing techeiles hold. That is not in any way arrogant. On the contrary, it is both arrogant and naive for anyone to claim that they know and understand the guiding principles of how “bound” we are by whats written explicitly in rishonim and how to interpret what they wrote better than gedolim. And that is true even if these principles themselves are disputed by gedolim/poskim, that you and I do not have a relevant opinion in the matter.

Furthermore, no one nowadays can make up such a shitta without backing it up with rayas.

You keep saying things that were never disputed and making it seem like what I’m saying is dependent upon them. I said to go ask them. Exactly how could you possibly understand that, or anything else I said, to mean that the baalei Mesora can simply invent things out of thin air?? And the extent of the raya need be only the dictates of their Mesorah itself. And you cannot claim from ignorance about Mesoras to “prove they get that sort of authority”. Go learn about Mesoras first.

“What is the therefore of this??”

The therefore is that since the gedolei haposkim held that Techeiles was not nignaz forever, I am not meshubad to R’ chaim.

I never claimed you are. The only point I took issue with was your systematic, definitive rejection of R’ Chaim as a valid shitta. Being a valid shitta does not in any way dictate that you follow it.

“My point was that there is no raya from these rishonim that we absolutely can.”

For the second time, I am not bringing a raya that we absolutely can, I am bringing a raya that the rishonim and acharonim held that mesorah is not a reason to not reinstitute Techeiles.

This is logically incoherent, as that is not a different point in reference to the structure of the argument. My point was that there is no raya, even according to those who base their suppression of techeiles on Mesora.

TorahUmadda: I can’t even begin to fathom how you can think that you are on defense and I am on offense. The Torah says to wear Techeiles. The starting point is that we follow everything written in the Torah.

Wrong. The default is to follow the Torah as explained and instructed by the Rabbis. They have to instruct according to the dictates of the Torah. Mesora is b’geder “listening to the rabanan”. There are rules governing how to apply what the Torah says. We are ignorant of quite a few. It is not close to a pashut sugya.

You want to claim that you have a valid reason to not follow this command of the Torah. Therefore you are on offense.

Mesora is a valid basis. I don’t need to personally substantiate that, because others have already. If you can convince them that they are wrong, then fine. But until then, you cannot claim that they are inventing things without a sufficient understanding of Mesorah. So you can’t claim that they are wrong. Which puts you on offense.

A claim that the mesorah is against Techeiles has to be proven which you have yet to do.

True, but the default once there are legitimate people who hold of it to an outsider trying to make an objective assessment is that their shitta is valid. Your ignorance doesn’t dictate that the shitta is invalid until proven otherwise. As Chazal ekoquently put it, “Ain re’iya aino raya” (dikduk maybe off a bit). If you want to be intellectually honest, go find out what they say. And I don’t have to name anyone in particular, because they’re easy enough to find, and they probably don’t want to be quoted (at least the one I’m thinking of in particular).

If you want to claim that some mysterious rules of mesorah dictate keeping the status quo, the burden of proof is most definitely on you.

If I am the one initiating the claim, than yes. But I’m not. You can’t assume that something is wrong out of ignorance, which is what you’re doing.

You may have completely missed my point. You are claiming that the Mesorah makes it not a safek. But the safek that I am talking about is gufa whether mesorah discusses this issue. If you can’t prove that it does then there is a safek that it might not in which case we would have to wear Techeiles. So as I said, until you can prove that the mesorah is against Techeiles, safek d’oraisa l’chumra prevails.

Huh??? There are quite a few mesoras around today. I don’t think any of the R”Y or gedolim who are the primary bearers of them have any “sfeikos” about their mesoros. If your mesora says “don’t change”, for whatever reason, than you don’t, plain and simple. SDL has no place in that equation.

“Rabbeinu Yona expected the reader to have enough common sense to understand that he wasn’t referring to a (perhaps from his perspective purely theoretical) different situation where halacha would indicate otherwise, which on the tzad to keep the statu quo, it does so indicate.”

Again, you have yet to show that there is a tzad to keep the status quo.

I did!!!!!!!!! The existence of a shitta that one shouldn’t or doesn’t have to based on Mesorah, or nignaz!!! Once either of these shitta’s exist, than the tzad is demonstrated to be valid. Again you’re making a logic error. You can’t use R’ Yona as a raya to undermine the the shitta itself!!

Your fourth objection is stam not true because it was the same conditions – persecution of the Jews – that led to both.

If you want to only look at it from the most general perspective possible, than that’s a reasonable statement. But it’s absurd to think that the nature of the persecution was the same. Stuffing millions into CC’s while inhuman, does not create, for instance, the intense confusion and bilbul that constantly being on the move / run does. Which might be relevant. Which on defense is all I need.

Your third objection only has weight if you can show that hundreds of years of not doing something is mevatel it, which you have already agreed that you cannot show.

This is deeply flawed logic. The objection has weight as long as you can’t disprove it (offensedefense). If you want to shlug up using mesorah, you have to understand it first. You can’t assume the default is that mesorah works in the ways & says what you think it should.

“This is useless — R’ Chaim will still wipe the floor with you.”

R’ Chaim can wipe the floor with me from today to tomorrow. That doesn’t change the fact that the Radvaz says that the chilazon can still be around and that the Maharil says that it’s easy to rediscover with the simanim.

What is the therefore of this??

)Since there was a time when the mitzva was unable to be done, that creates a mesorah to not do this mitzva.

I never said that. It could just be that theres a reluctance to change on anything, and that could well be the sole basis upon which a Mesorah can suppress techeiles. Nothing to do with a mitzva-specific mesorah not to do it. It could also be that the reluctance increases as time goes on.

As far as “who these mysterious daas torah gedolim are”, go ask a R”Y whose yeshiva that does not wear techeiles because of Mesora.

And this entire argument inherently does not get off the ground. You don’t choose whether or not to follow a Mesorah or Rabbe because of an SDL which is against the particular Mesorah. And for those who follow said Mesorah, there is no safek in the first place as to what to do. Which means that this is no different than any other shaila about a D’Oraysa — we don’t say choose the posek who paskens lechumra!! So your argument talks to no one.

And contrary to what you think, we are not claiming that mesorah does not have depth, — in ways that conform to your preconceived conceptions about Mesora — nor are we chas veshalom being mezalzel mesorah in any way shape or form — intentionally. — That is what we call not having a brain and just roboticaly copying the things you see with no havana. Mesorah does not mean blindly doing everything exactly as it was always done. That is what we call not having a brain and just roboticaly copying the things you see with no havana. — Agreed.

Mesorah is understanding why we do things and applying the reasoning to guide life decisions.

That’s your own very limited and very general definition. While part of a Mesorah is its methodology of prioritizing different factors, that is hardly the only thing. Mesorah can say something without a clear reason why, and that’s not by definition illegitimate. And there’s alot more to say. Again go ask someone.

But you have yet to provide a single source for such a bold claim.

I gave two – R’ Chaim and Mesorah. But from a halacha lemaisa perspective, as long as there are legitimate poskim/gedolim who hold (it’s ok) not to wear techeiles, there is halachic grounds not to, and therefore Rabbeinu Yona does not apply.

Furthermore, the Radzyner Rebbe says that this Rabbeinu Yona is SPECIFICALLY talking about Techeiles, considering that there is no other mitzva that was not done by your ancestors and city.

1- Is he the only pshat given in Rabbeinu Yona?

2- Even if yes, it is a valid argument that he wrote it almost 1000 years ago, and there are plenty of differences betw. now and then. (And you have no basis to invent that “but mesora is mesora!! what he held then he would hold now” etc, etc.)

“You are arbitrarily making up this distinction between intended discontinuation and passive discontinuation. Who said that is even a relevant criterion??”

If you can’t understand the difference between something that was leachatchila b’shita done and something that we was done unwillingly and for no other reason than that it was impossible to do otherwise, then as they say “you can bring the horse to the water but you can’t make it drink”.

You’re missing the point. Yes, it is obvious that such a distinction exists. But who said that being passively discontinued is grounds to say that there is no basis for what was discontinued to fall under the ambit of Mesora?? In which case your chakira is irrelevant because despite having been lost due to tragic circumstances, techeiles is not by dint of that outside the ambit of Mesora.

The very claim that there is a mesorah here is illogical. The fact that something was done or not done doesn’t make it “The Mesorah”. In the concentration camps people were forced to work on shabbos. Does that make it that now the Mesorah is to not keep shabbos? Obviously not. Something done under duress is simply something done under duress. It is unfortunate that sometimes we don’t have the ability to keep the entire Torah. But how could you even suggest that that creates a mesorah to not keep the Torah?!

Again, you are inventing you own havanah in Mesorahs to justify including Mesorah as relevant “illogical”. I never presented any parameters of what makes something a part of a Mesorah. The fact that something was done or not done doesn’t make it “The Mesorah”. You have no basis whatsoever for such a statement.

The truth is, sometimes that is true and sometimes it’s not. I don’t claim to know or understand the parameters of when it’s one or the other, though.

Furthermore, I never claimed anything specific to “THE mesorah”.

That also means that they held that “nignaz” does not mean hidden away forever. In fact the Eitz Yosef on the Midrash says that “nignaz” means forgotten, based on Rashi in Pesachim

This is useless — R’ Chaim will still wipe the floor with you. Repeating your kashas on him doesn’t add anything — that his approach seems very docheik has already been documented in this thread.

I ask you again to provide a source anywhere in kol hatorah kula (I know that’s exceedingly redundant) that you need a mesorah to allow you to do a mitzva, or that if people were unable to do a mitzva for a period of time then it becomes batel mevutal leolam va’ed.

I never claimed either. So naturally I did not provide a source. You are inventing reasons on your own. And you’re using language that implies a very different halachic basis for what I’m saying.

kfb- You asked “why does that make you think you can call him mr instead of his proper title as rabbi?” I posted the excerpt from a letter by HaRav Aharon Feldman Shlita to provide a potential (legitimate) reason / basis for this practice. I did not express my personal (and irrelevant) opinion on the matter.

Summary: Re: “update: Hear Rav Feldman strongly denounce Rabbi Lipman” where Rav Feldman openly states that Rabbi Lipman is a “shona uperish” (someone who learned Torah but then separated/removed himself from it) and point blank a “rosha” (wicked) for saying on Israel Radio that he would shut down the yeshiva ketanos (the high schools) in Israel for not teaching “limudei chol” secular studies. Furthermore, continues Rav Feldman, that this fits in with all the enemies of the Jews from the times of “Amalek”. And now in Eretz Yisrael the enemies of Torah want to “undermine everything” while claiming they “love” the Charedim when in fact they hate them and they hate the Torah.