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The Torah world in America today stands on the shoulders of Rav Moshe Feinstein, the Satmar Rebbe and Rav Aharon Kotler, who essentially built it up almost from scratch.
This isn’t a matter a person has the nilly willy right to decide what they like better and go with that.
Yeshiva of Brooklyn, too.
But there were precious few yeshivos in prewar America, as most Jewish kids went to pubic school. And most were lost to yiddishkeit forever.
It is an affront to Hashem, who is the One who decides whom to give children to.
Not everyone celebrates their birthday, let alone half and quarter birthdays.
APY, try making a grand total of all such American based authors over the 200 year prewar period. Let us know the exact number of such high caliber talmidei chachamim mechabe seforim over 200 years. (Recall, everyone agreed it is above zero.)
It’s part of the YWN CR beta software that automatically detects, and Zaps!, any and all halachicly prohibited speech from being posted.
Glad to see that it’s working. Thank you for the feedback!
cherrybim, Goren would be correct that a conversion that didn’t have the proper kabbalos ohl mitzvos is invalid. Where he went off the rails was that in that particular case the convert did have a proper kabbalos ohl mitzvos and remained a fully religious Jew from time of conversion though death, but Goren for political reasons falsely claimed otherwise. Rav Yosef Shalom Elyashiv, Chacham Ovadia Yosef and many others said exactly this.
ubiq, I meant the later generations not the original immigrants. Thanks for asking for clarification.
58% includes all Jews, including Orthodox who have close to a 0% intermarriage rate. The non-Orthodox rate was over 70% 10+ years ago. The non-Orthodox was over 50% many decades ago.
Avi, how do you posel Conservative and Open Orthodox conversions?
CTL, nowhere did I say the point was 100% universal. I specifically stated there were exceptions. Such as your noble family.
Rav Ovadiah Yosef, Rav Elyashiv, and many others of their stature clearly stated that Goren’s position was *not* l’sheim shamayim..
Fact: Most frum Jews who left Europe between the 1700s and WWII to come to America were no longer frum by time they passed away in America. Their children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren have a strong possibility of not even knowing they’re Jewish. Most intermarried.
Fact: There were very very few rabbonim in America prior to WWI. Indeed, many shuls were led by laymen without having a rabbi. Even shuls with a rabbi, more often than not said rabbi knew precious little.
Real fully Torah true observant Jews didn’t come to America in great numbers until the runup to WWII, and especially in the aftermath of WWII.
Prior to WWI the state of American Judaism was very religiously poor and bereft of much real rabbonim.
Eliezer, why’d you send him to PS?
My family were the Jewish passengers on the Mayflower.
moshearyeh45 is equivalent to a bochor learning in Brisk 14 hours a day. (The other 10 hours is divided between davening, eating and sleeping.) He deserves the cream of the crop.
Is it also prohibited to discuss Henry Kissinger’s level of observance?
Goren’s lax attitude towards geirus is amply documented. Three years before the Langer case, he converted Helen Seidman, a Christian woman “married” to a kohen and living on a secular kibbutz and the couple’s young daughter. In return, Seidman agreed to withdraw a suit to the Israeli Supreme Court demanding that the State recognize her Reform conversion. As was frequently asked at the time of the Langer case: If Seidman, who had consistently proclaimed her lack of intention to live a Torah life prior to her conversion by Goren, was a Jewess, why was Reb Avraham Borokovsky a goy? Goren converted dozens, if not hundreds, of people barely observant to not at all observant.
JTA, Jan 5, 1973
RAV YOSEF CALLS GOREN DICTATOR
…
Meanwhile new trouble has developed between Rabbi Goren and his colleague Sephardic Chief Rabbi Ovadia Yosef. In an emotional speech to Jerusalem’s Oriental community last night. Rabbi Yosef described Rabbi Goren as a “dictator,” implied that he twisted halacha (religious law) for his own purposes, and begged the Sephardic community to support him in his confrontation with the Ashkenazic Chief Rabbi.In a voice choked with tears. Rabbi Yosef said, “I live under a dictatorship. I am alone on the battlefield. I need your help to carry on. You do not know what is going on in the Chief Rabbinate. I am alone fighting every hour. I cannot sleep nights.” He alleged that Rabbi Goren imposed his will at Chief Rabbinate meetings by “banging his fist on the table and saying, ‘that is it.’”
Rabbi Yosef made no direct reference to the Langer ruling. However, he said. “I am opposed to extremism but I believe halacha should be dispensed without publicity and without sensationalism. I am of the school of Belt Hillel but I cannot make halacha so plastic that it can fit into any mold. I cannot tell the crowd that everything is permissible, everything is forgiveable.
The only lh/marry Reb Avi, is your untrue allegations against Reb Avraham Borokowsky, a true ger tzedek who from the time he became a ger in prewar Europe until the time he was niftar in Eretz Yisroel was a full shomer Torah u’Mitzvos who davened three times a day in shul, only ate mehadrin kosher food and fully kept every Shabbos.
Edited
RY, it was plastered all over the news, with pictures of them seated inside and names of restaurants, of where she and he dined. Both pre-conversion, when she was his girlfriend, and post. Fancy Manhattan restaurants famous for their non-kosher menu where they dated and went together for their birthdays. And this was years before Trump ever ran for President. They were both media celebrities in their own rights for many years (in addition to both of their fathers, for notorious reasons.) The wedding dress, which occurred shortly after the conversion she underwent at the behest of the mother in law who didn’t want a gentile daughter in law and was done for the express purpose of attaining marriage with a Jew (in contravention to prevailing geirus halacha) was immodest as well.
Avi, I’ve addressed all your points earlier. See above where I commented on the Langer/Goren case.
If the Jewish groom eats in non-kosher restaurants and travels on Shabbos, and she’s converting so she can marry him and intends to also eat in non-kosher restaurants that he took her on dates before she became Jewish, and otherwise like her Jewish groom intends to not observe the same mitzvos he doesn’t, that isn’t a valid kabbalos ohel mitzvos. It is no different than a Conservative conversion. Even if the people she’s relying on call themselves Orthodox.
Are you arguing that if a potential convert relied on Conservative Jews her conversion is valid even though the Rabbis she is relying on are wrong for permitting some of the abovementioned? Or that it is LH/HSR to say a Conservative conversion isn’t valid? Or that to make it valid they just have to call themselves Orthodox instead of calling themselves Conservative?
Imagine being known as Katrina all your life when suddenly when you’re 50 years old, or 30 years old, you have to change to a nickname due to a hurricane.
How do all the existing Katrina’s handle the embarrassment?
Apparently the politically correct troopers couldn’t stomach the idea of female only named hurricanes.
But no one explained why for many decades they only used female names.
Shulchan Aruch, Yoreh Deah 344:1:
“it is prohibited to exaggerate his praise excessively. One mentions his good qualities and adds a little…”
The hesped should be appropriate to the deceased; one may exaggerate slightly.
Rosh, Moed Katan 3:63There is usually a bit more to praise about the person than we necessarily know, so that, on the contrary, adding a bit makes the tribute closer to the truth.
based on Taz, Yoreh Deah 344:1They only name hurricanes after females. (I wonder why……….)
You’re also allowed to exaggerate a bit when giving a hesped at a levaya.