Avodah Mailing List

Volume 04 : Number 419

Tuesday, March 7 2000

• Re: MiSheberach for Cholim
• RE: Livin' in the USA
• living in USA
• Re: Dat U'Medina
• Re: medinah and halachah
• Re: MiSheberach for Cholim
• Re: TuM and TIDE
• Livin' in the USA
• Re: TuM and TIDE
• Subject: Re: Torah u'Melocho
• Re: Livin' in the USA
• Livin' in the USA

In a message dated 3/7/00 12:37:14 AM Eastern Standard Time, 
gershon.dubin@juno.com writes:

<< 
    I have heard of this solution,  and wonder whether it doesn't somehow
 detract from the tefilas hatzibur on behalf of the cholim.  I grant you
 that shmoozing during the misheberach does not constitute tefila for the
 cholim,   and that there is a problem which needs to be addressed.  This
 solution,  however,  just doesn't sit right with me.
 
 Gershon
 gershon.dubin@juno.com
  >>
We do this as well and I always wonder if the kahal should say the whole 
misheberach text and what actual language makes sense in this format

Kol Tuv,
Joel Rich

On 7 Mar 00, at 9:29, Akiva Atwood wrote:

> >
> > 	I actually read it all the way through and enjoyed it.
> > I agree with
> > everything you say.  There really is not and has never been as great
> > a haven for Jews,  Orthodox or not,  as America.
> 
> Including Eretz Yisrael during the Shoftim/bayis Rishon? (There have
> been several posts now claiming that there has *never* been as good a
> place for the Jews as America.)

I assume that he meant that there has never been as good a place 
in galus for the Jews as America. 

> >
> > 	BUT,  it must always be in the back (or not so far
> > back) of the mind of
> > every Jew that as good a place as this is,  it isn't home.
> 
> This is the real problem. When someone posts a message that implies
> that they are an American Jew, with "American" taking priority over
> "Jew" in their self-identity, then you are going to get into this
> argument.

I'll go a step further. To me, the problem is that too many Jews, 
even fruhm Jews (especially in America) think America IS home. If 
Mashiach came tomorrow, one of the biggest problems he would 
face is convincing them that they should come NOW, and not wait 
for them to close down their businesses, sell off their houses, or 
worse. Not directed at this specific poster - just a general comment.

-- Carl


Carl M. Sherer, Adv.
Silber, Schottenfels, Gerber & Sherer
Telephone 972-2-625-7751
Fax 972-2-625-0461
mailto:cmsherer@ssgslaw.co.il
mailto:sherer@actcom.co.il

Please daven and learn for a Refuah Shleima for my son,
Baruch Yosef ben Adina Batya among the sick of Israel.
Thank you very much.

> hmaryles@yahoo.com writes:
> 
> << So, in conclusion, I do not think you can compare the
>  USA with any other country of today or yesteryear.
>  There is not nor has there ever been another country
>  like it.
>   >>
> 
> Hear, hear! Yea! You tell 'em, Harry!
> 
> David Finch
> 

I just heard a story this shabbat about R. Blau Zt'l former head
of Neturei Karta

he tried to stay in Israel but once had to leave for medical reasons.
Someone found him in NY in a small hut.
They asked what he was doing there.
He responded that it was bad enough having to leave Israel,
he certainly didn't want to enjoy the US of A.

Eli Turkel

On 7 Mar 00, at 14:59, SBA wrote:

>        I do not criticize the Maalos of Israel - aderaba - I am quite
>        jealous that you have such a large choice and variety of
>        educational institutions a such affordable rates. OTOH it does,
>        however, seem  that almost every major Mokom Torah in Israel
>        resorts to fundraisng in the Golah (yes, even in Australia).
>        How   many of
>         their buildings  display plaques commemoratuing the generosity
>         of some "rich American"?

Ain hachi nami. That doesn't mean that it's more important for them 
to stay there and donate money than it is for them to fulfill mitzvos 
that can only be fulfilled here. Besides, how many American Jews 
are on the level of donating buildings to Yeshivos? And how many 
of them are really staying in America only so that they can have 
the zchus of donating tzedaka to Yehivos? Think about the 
discussion about "Simplicity" a few months ago, and about some 
of the issues I raised in my unanswered (except by one person off 
line) post about "How Much is Too Much" on Sunday. Is our tachlis 
in life really to make more and more money so that our maaser 
ksafim is a bit bigger? I find that difficult to swallow.

>        And BTW maybe if the millions that American Jews donate to
>        Israeli Mosdos stayed in America, the high tuition fees
>         (which you so correctly identify as a major problem in
>        the US)  could be substantially reduced...?

Maybe and maybe not. A lot of the people who donate large sums 
of money to Israeli mosdos are people who would not donate to 
mosdos anyplace else, or at least not on the same scale. It makes 
them feel like they are helping Israel when they donate to mosdos 
here. And besides, did you ever try fund raising for an elementary 
or high school? Ask someone who has - it is MUCH easier to fund 
raise for a Yeshiva Gdola, which of course would do nothing for the 
costs of tuition that place the most pressure on galus Jewry. 

In the alter haim, the Yeshiva Gdola built a million dollar building 
and was able to burn the mortgage a few years later, while the 
Yeshiva Ktana - backed within town by the same people, but 
without the out-of-town backing - continues to raise tuitions to nose 
bleed level and squeeze every nickel and dime it can from its 
parent body (by necessity not by choice).

>         (What it would do to Israeli tuition fees - is another
>         question.)

It would probably have little effect. When I was here as a bochur, 
most of the buildings were quite Spartan, and Israeli talmidim 
would put up with much more Spartan facilities than their American 
counterparts. I recall writing a letter to a friend in the Mir in New 
York and saying that I thought one had to be willing to be in a 
situation of "pas bamelach tochal" etc.; I didn't think it was actually 
a chiyuv. He wrote me back to tell me that when his father was 
learning in Europe, he beat the bed bugs out of his bedding once a 
week for Shabbos, because it took too much time to be worth 
doing more often than that. So if you don't become accustomed to 
a higher standard of living, you never know what you are missing.

Even today Israeli yeshivas don't survive on the donations from 
chu"l (not to say they're not a factor). Some do, but AFAIK not 
most of them. Many Israeli yeshivas survive on TUITIONS they 
receive from foreign students, but I happen to think that's *wrong*. 
That's a personal bias there - had Yeshiva tuition twenty years ago 
been at the level relative to university tuition that it is today, I'm not 
sure my parents would have let me "waste" one year in Yeshiva, let 
alone two. (For you young ones - when I was in Yeshiva here 
twenty years ago, a year's tuition here was about $1000 and a 
year's tuition in university was about $6000. Today there is much 
less of a gap).

>        > I was speaking in terms of metzius And the metzius is... that
>        it is much >easier to be a fruhmmer yid in Israel than it is in
>        the United States
> 
>         Israel is good not only  for frummer yidden...half a million
>         Russian Goyim can't be wrong...

Look, we all have our problems. No, I'm not happy that we are 
letting Russian goyim come here and settle as Jews. But you 
know what? If all of the fruhmmer yiddin in the golus who are 
wringing their hands about that were living here instead, maybe the 
election results would have been different, and then we wouldn't 
have a Russian interior minister who has to pander to his 
"constituency." You know why the Russians were welcomed so 
enthusiastically? I'll give you my cynical view - until the Russians 
started coming, the Charedi "population bomb" would have made 
the majority of the Jews in this country Charedi by 2020-2030. The 
"Russian aliya," which is almost entirely Chiloni and non-Jewish 
defused that population bomb. Unless of course, some of our 
counterparts on this list are willing to start it going again....

>        But seriously, every time I hear of the Rishus of those in
>        authority in your country towards their religious brethren - I
>        feel sick. American (or Australian) religious Jews do not have
>        to put up with Sonei Hadas
>         of the calibre of Chief Justice Barak or Education Minister
>         Yossi Sarid - just to name a few.    Do American religious
>         Jews suffer the kind of harassment, the Israeli High
>        court dishes out to them every  Montig and Donnershtig?

That plays into RDF's argument - if we separated synagogue and 
state, then all we could all be happy with our "freedom of religion" 
and everyone would go their merry way. Then Barak couldn't 
interfere with "Who is a Jew" because there would be no Law of 
Return. Then Yossi Sarid wouldn't have any fruhmmer schools 
under his jurisdiction, because all of the fruhmmer schools would 
be "private." Of course, then we would all be paying the same 
outrageous tuitions that are paid in the US, and we would have no 
legitimate claim to the land of Israel in the eyes of the world 
(amongst other issues). So I guess having to put up with the 
Baraks and Yossi Sarid is the price we pay for being a Jewish 
state. As long as there are more people learning Torah on a higher 
level here than anyplace else in the world, it's a price I am willing to 
pay (not that I won't fight to pay less :-).

>        >If you think I'm wrong, ask Yonasson Rosenblum.
> 
>        Indeed, I would love to hear his opinion about this.
>        I wonder if he reads Avodah?

If anyone knows how to reach him, I would love to get him on here. 
Bli neder I will see what I can do about it myself. (When we were 
discussing Lashon Hara and the study of history a couple of weeks 
ago, I tried unsuccessfully to reach Rabbi Wein through the Post's 
web site to get him involved). I think someone like Yonasson 
Rosenbloom would enjoy this list, even if he didn't always have 
time to contribute.

>        >It is no secret that the Supreme Court here is anti-religious.
>        All of you >heard of the demonstration that took place here
>        last year, which I proudly attended.
> 
>        Exactly. Have you heard of American (or Australian) Jews
>        needing to organize mass demonstrations to express their
>        frustration against a bigoted and prejudiced system?.

Again, because we have a Jewish state the extent of whose 
Jewishness is still under dispute, we have to deal with issues that 
people in galus don't have to deal with. The US government doesn't 
care who is a Jew, because being a Jew carries no additional or 
special rights in the US system, and because the US constitution 
refuses to get involved in adjudicating religious questions (thanks to 
the person who posted the cite for the New York court decision last 
night - fascinating read on this issue). So you don't see these 
kinds of issues in chutz la'aretz because they are largely irrelevant. 
By the way, the one non-Jewish court system where they might 
have seen these kinds of issues was Germany in RSRH's time. 
BE"H we will have a better outcome here.

>        Do we have to fight wars to ensure that post-mortems are not
>        performed against families wishes?

Actually, yes. There have been instances in the US where people 
have had to go to court to prevent autopsies. BTW - those battles 
(autopsies) are B"H largely over here. 

>        Do Australian or American governments
>        treat the remains of our ancestors in such a disgraceful manner
>        as Israel allows? 

AFAIK the last time graves were moved, it was with R. Elyashiv's 
haskama. 

But in any event, I doubt that the American and Australian 
governments would behave any differently than the Israeli 
government behaves with respect to unmarked graves (which is 
what we are talking about here). Not to say that the Israeli 
government should not hold itself to a higher standard - it should. 
But I think you have to keep in perspective that the Israeli 
government has not gone and bulldozed any marked cemetaries 
either.

		In fact, it is the goyishe Americans who are
>        in the forefront of defending historic Jewish cemeteries in
>        Eastern Europe. (I have just been informed by an askan from
>         Asra Kadisha, that Madeline Allbright will be taking up the
>         problems of the attempted desecration of the ancient Jewish
>         cemetery in Prag - when she visits the Czech   republic
>         shortly.)

I understood that was resolved already. In any event, Madeline 
Allbright is Jewish herself. Maybe there's still a spark of a Yiddishe 
neshama there after all.

>        And do you honestly think that the army problem is such a
>        simple matter? In America, frum young men who wish to work,
>        have the choice to do so. Not so in Israel, where they must
>        first do time in the army. And then some time - 3 years plus
>        4-5 weeks every year for decades - and that's when there is no
>        war...

You and I both know that much of the Charedi world - and for that 
matter the dati world - puts in less than three years in the army. 
And most reservists are not called anywhere near 4-5 weeks a 
year. But you know what? When I turned 16 in 1973, they gave me 
a draft card in the US. Because in those days, the US still had a 
draft. The "all volunteer" army is a recent innovation. And it is one 
that is a lot easier to do when your neighbors are democracies like 
Canada and Mexico (or the oceans in Australia) than it is when 
your neighbors are tyrants like Assad and Sadam Hussein, a 
puppet regime in Lebanon, an unstable regime in Jordan and an 
undemocratic regime in Egypt. Did Hashem excuse Bnei Yisrael 
from settling here because they had to engage in war? Did Hashem 
give us America so that we would have good neighbors, or did He 
give us Eretz Yisrael? Obviously, if Hashem chose to give us Eretz 
Yisrael and not America or Australia, He had His reasons.

>        And let's be honest, the main reason frum parents don't want
>        their sons in the army - is the danger of them going right off
>        Yiddishkeit. And who can blame them, as the gemoro says - Ein
>        Apitropus L'Aroyos, Uma Yaseh haben shelo yechtoh. But even if
>        the ("cowardly") reason is, that they don't want to risk their
>        son's life or limb, isn't that a valid and reasonable
>        consideration for every resposible parent? Shouldn't every
>        American family thinking of making Aliya, seriously consider
>        the fact that if they plan to comply with the army thing - 100%
>        correctly - they and/or their sons may have to make the
>        ultimate sacrifice? Isn't the Sakono Gashmi veRuchni something
>        to be very carefully  weighed?

And if America was attacked tomorrow and suddenly started 
drafting everyone, it wouldn't be as bad or worse? I'll give you a hint 
- there wouldn't be any Kosher food, there wouldn't be any 
consideration for Shabbos observance, and there wouldn't be any 
ptur for religious women. Whom are you trying to fool? So what do 
you do? Wait until that happens and suddenly decide to go on 
aliya and expect all of us who are here already to bend over 
backwards to support you? 

I'll go a step further. When I posted all of the aliya posts that I put 
on mail jewish the last month or two, I got tons of responses. Every 
last one of them in one way or another gave one reason for not 
coming on aliya. MONEY, MONEY and more MONEY. One person 
mentioned the army. Do you really think the army is what worries 
people? I would say it comes second (maybe) - after money.

>        >And if there is no need for such organizations in the
>        >United States, why does the Aguda maintain a
>        >legal department, what is COLPA
> 
>        Is COLPA still around? I haven't heard a lot about them in
>        recent years - but I didn't think that their aim was to defend
>        religious Jews from defamation, muckraking and libel - which I
>        understand is the the role of AE.

They're defending the Beis Din in the New York case. 

>        >...and why do organizations like the American Jewish
>        Congress...
> 
>        What I know of the AJC - if they had the possibility, they
>        would do with  religious Jews exactly what the above mentioned
>        Israeli authorities do. BH the US is a Malchus shel Chesed and
>        the AJC have no power of us.
>         (And zeit mochel, but comparing Am Echad to the AJC is like
>         comparing  chulent to pork.
> 
>        >...(who, say what you will about them, have a fruhm
>        >general counsel who knows how to learn quite well)...
> 
>        Are you saying this to prove how hard it is for a religious
>        lawyer in America to find a job? - a choice between
>        anti-Semites and the AJC...

I'm saying it to show that the AJC has a Ben Torah who is 
defending the rights of Jews to practice their religion. BTW - the 
General Counsel of the AJC defended the Beis Din in another well 
known divorce case in New York. (Actually I think that one was 
brought in New Jersey).

        >... Carl Sherer is a big fan of Yonasson Rosenblum.
> 
>        And let me end by saying - that (whilst I may sometimes
>        disagree with you) SBA is a big fan of Carl Sherer's posts.

Thanks for the compliment :-) I hope I didn't let you down.

-- Carl


Carl M. Sherer, Adv.
Silber, Schottenfels, Gerber & Sherer
Telephone 972-2-625-7751
Fax 972-2-625-0461
mailto:cmsherer@ssgslaw.co.il
mailto:sherer@actcom.co.il

Please daven and learn for a Refuah Shleima for my son,
Baruch Yosef ben Adina Batya among the sick of Israel.
Thank you very much.

On Tue, Mar 07, 2000 at 11:08:36AM +0200, Eli Turkel wrote:
: 1. Criminal law - without semichah this basically does not exist.
:    There is no jail system in halachah and without semichah no bodily
:    punishment.

Yes there is. How else do you think they dealt with the fact that:
: In general the chances of getting two witnesses for any crime is negligible
: (not to speak of a warning)

The majority of violators were thrown in the kippa (with a normal diet).

-mi

R. Micha wrote:
The reason why I would like to see change is because you
lost the kahal's attention. Mi Shebeirach licholim, at least
where I daven and have davened,has become a shmooze break.

Interestingly enough, the Mi Shebeirach Lecholim tends to be
a break until it hits close to home.

Ever since "Boruch Yosef ben Adina Batya" has unfortunatly
become part of the nusach of the Mi Shebeirach where Carl,
Boruch Yosef and myself daven, I find that people listen
carefully to make sure they don't miss out on the closing
"Omein".

Just my 2 agurot,

Danny Schoemann
Product Manager
DoroTree Technologies Ltd.
Tel: +972-2-679 7490 Ext. 221
Fax: +972-2-679-7470
dannys@dorotree.com
http://www.dorotree.com

--- Micha Berger <micha@aishdas.org> wrote:
> On Mon, Mar 06, 2000 at 05:17:00PM -0800, Harry
> Maryles wrote:
> In v4n406, R' Harry Maryles defines TIDE and writes
> that from its perspective:
> :>: a) you need [secular studies] for parnasah and
> that
> :>: b)it helps one to live in and understand one's
> environment ...
> 
> :>: I believe that TIDE also grants intrinsic value
> to secular studies but only
> :>: in an instrumentalist way.
> 
> I said that the latter contradicts A&B, but I felt
> it was more accurate.
> 
> Harry replied:
> : The fact that TIDE has intrinsic instrumentlist
> value
> : is really a synthesis of A and B, isn't it?  
> 
> Your A&B make DE out to be a necessary evil of
> living in Olam haZeh, the
> only "value" being in its meeting that necessity.
> 
> TIDE, AIUI, meens that using DE in avodas Hashem is
> the tachlis ha'adam --
> not an evil, necessary or otherwise.

The infference is that it is necessary... not evil.
Necessity can be and often is very positive.  No?

Also, what do you mean "that using DE in avodas Hashem
is the tachlis ha'adam"? 

If you mean that this is the ONLY tachlis HaAdam than
I disagree. I don't think that TIDE was meant by RSRH
as the best but not only way whereby Man can acheive
G-d's ultimate role for himself.  That would deny
legitimacy to some of Gedolei HaDor of his time.  (I'm
sure there were some who disagreed.) The DE part of
TIDE is certainly not a universally accepted
philosophy today. The Torah Only approach does not
believe in it certainly.

HM
__________________________________________________
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Talk to your friends online with Yahoo! Messenger.
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>So, in conclusion, I do not think you can compare the
USA with any other country of today or yesteryear.
There is not nor has there ever been another country
like it.


Dang it, I must have been out of my mind to leave!

:-)

I agree with Harry that the only feeling we must have towards the USA and
its people is gratitude.

Unlike most olim, we did not make Aliya because life in the old country was
intolerable.  We came kommemiyut" - upright.  And we thank the Ribbono Shel
Olam for that every day.

I only wish the same to you and your descendents . . .

-Kira

On Tue, Mar 07, 2000 at 03:22:04AM -0800, Harry Maryles wrote:
: Also, what do you mean "that using DE in avodas Hashem
: is the tachlis ha'adam"? 
: 
: If you mean that this is the ONLY tachlis HaAdam than
: I disagree.

The implication I get from the SE is that just as DE without Torah lacks
its proper tzurah and tachlis, Torah without derech eretz is as meaningful
as a tzurah without chomer.

-mi

From Shlomo B Abeles <sba@blaze.net.au>
Subject: Re: Torah u'Melocho

Yosef Gavriel and Shoshanah M. Bechhofer wrote:
>- ----- Original Message From: Harry Maryles

> I don't think you can equate the heavy presence of
> Chasidim in the work world to  Torah u'Melocho - Torah
> and Labor.....Bearing that in mind,
> working L'Shem Shomyim, in an ehrlich way etc. is just
> another way one can achieve Dveikus.
>

>>>Unlikely. I think you picked that up from
R' Lamm. It is not borne out in Chassidus itself.<<

I recently heard from a relative, a
Toldos Aharon Chosid, from way back since
the original Rebbe, Reb Aharele Roth zt"l (the Shomer Emunim),
that he (RAR) strongly held the Shita of both Avodah's -
Avodas Hashem and Avodah for Parnosso

SBA

--- Carl and Adina Sherer <sherer@actcom.co.il> wrote:
> > Date: Mon, 6 Mar 2000 17:13:21 -0800 (PST)
> > From: Harry Maryles <hmaryles@yahoo.com>
> > Subject: Livin' in the USA
> 
> I was actually going to let this ride until I saw
> this:
> 
> Anti-Semitism
> mentality
> > in the State Department during the Holocaust But I
> > think that it has been overblown  in recent years,

> I would suggest you read Arthur Morse's "While Six
> Million Died" 
> The State Department knew what was going
> on in the 
> camps very early in the war - certainly by 1942.

I read it. Of course it was appalling to me then to
find out the indifference at the aState Dept.  But the
Big villian in the Steae Dept. was Breckinridge Long,
who happened to be in a very powerful position then. 
Anti-semitism was on the wane at that time in US
history but was not gone. But there was also William
Pehle, a treasury Dept official (a Goy) who was in the
forefront of arguing the case for the Jews fate.  Even
Long was not necessarily the evil person Morse and
others made him out to be.  I believe it in the
Artscroll Bio of Mike Tress that a much more
sympathtic picture was painted of him.

> Even AFTER they 
> knew, they refused to so much as bomb the railroad
> tracks leading 
> to the camps. If the Nazi's YM"SH could not have
> moved the 
> people to Auschwitz, their killing machine would not
> have been 
> anywhere near as "efficient." 

True.  But I don't think that there is universal
agreement about bombing the tracks. Certainly not at
the time. 20/20 hindsight is always more accurate. 

> The State Department KNEW they were true. Read the
> book. 

Again, I did. What the state dept knew it knew from
cablegrams sent by a jewish operative in Europe. His
descriptions were of great atrocities. but if you
consider the fact that descriptions of this type were
considered exagerations (perhaps, partly due to some
latent anti-semitsm) and the thrust of Roosevelt
actions were to win the war it is somewhat
understandable. Again 20/20 hindsight.

> Franklin Roosevelt, who is venerated today largely
> because of his 
> wife, was a lush, a womanizer, and one of the
> biggest anti-Semites 

Not true! Roosevelt did more to open up American
society then anyone else in US history.  He had more
Jews in his administration.  He apointed the first
Jewish Supreme Court Justice. R. Aaron Soloveichik has
defended Roosevelt against those accustions of
Anti-semitism. His lack of action during the war, says
R. Aaron, is attributable to an assimilated Jew who
gave him bad advice.

> might come close is the Peanut Farmer
> from Georgia). 

I do not agree.  Jimmy Carter is NOT an anti-semite.

> > And which country is the biggest supporter of
> Israel
> > today?  I'll give you three guesses and the first
> two
> > don't even count. The USA supports Israel with all
> > that it has, maorally and financially as well as
> > militarily.  Every President and Congress almost
> > without exception since Harry S. Truman has been
> > pro-Israel some more some less but always pro.
> 
> Carter? Bush?

They are not anti-semites.

"it 
> could happen here."  Don't fool
> yourself.

Anything is possible. But the least likely place for
it ever to happen is here.

HM
__________________________________________________
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Talk to your friends online with Yahoo! Messenger.
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From Shlomo B Abeles <sba@blaze.net.au>

Carl and Adina Sherer wrote:
Subject: Livin' in the USA
>....read Arthur Morse's "While Six Million Died" ... The State Department
>knew what was going on in the camps very early in
>the war... they refused to so much as bomb
>the railroad tracks leading to the camps. If the Nazi's
>YM"SH could not have moved the
>people to Auschwitz, their killing machine would
>not have been anywhere near as "efficient."

If I am not mistaken, Rav Michoel Ber Weissmandl zt"l
was the first to write about this in his "Min Hametzar".

But at the same time he is quite damning about certain Zionist leaders
who - for their own future political reasons  (Rak B'dam Tihyeh Lonu Haaretz) -
were  prepared to sacrifice fellow Jews.

SBA

*********************


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