Avodah Mailing List

Volume 06 : Number 055

Friday, December 1 2000

• Fwd: Hasakamot
• Rashi question
• RE: parts of psukim
• RE: Re[2]: Living in dangerous locations
• RE: Avodah V6 #54
• Re: Living in Gaza
• Borders of Eretz Yisrael
• RE: Avodah V6 #54
• RE: Avodah V6 #54
• Re: Avodah V6 #54
• Re: Contacts
• Re: Avodah V6 #54
• Women learning TSBP: GRA Yoreh Deah 246:6 s"k 26
• Re: Rashi question
• Re: Women's education: the views of RYBS and RSYW
• FW: Nishmat
• Re: Rashi question
• Re: Rashi question
• Re: Yitzchak's response to Esav
• Intent to write a get
• Re: Yitzchak's response to Esav
• Re: Yitzchak's response to Esav
• Re: Yitzchak's response to Esav

[The following is forwarded from a private dialogue, with Carl's
reshus. -mi]

In a message dated 11/28/00 12:53:09am CST, sherer@actcom.co.il writes:
>> my experience, the best thumb test of a person's openness on these issues
>> are whether he /she learns from sefarim that are mugah or with nekudos
>> such as Rishonim, the Mishna Brerurah and the Minchas Chinuch 

>  Please explain what you meant by this.

if you learn from the old Ritva and to use a new version because your father 
learned from that edition or because Mossad haRav republished it, I have to 
say that the Ritva you are learning may not be a Ritva. r Elchanan has a long 
discusssion on the confusion between the Rashba and the Ritva in many 
Masectos. The false kedusha of ksav Rashi is hust that-many frum historians 
will tell you that it's a ksav hadfus and not ksav rashi. If learning from a 
Mishna Brurah mnekud enhances your learning because the Roshei teivos are 
spelled out and because the sefer is readable, harei yeh mshubach. Similarly, 
the machon yerushalim edition of the Minchas Chinuch allows you to learn 
different inyanim under rashei prakim and with excellent cross references. 
The phenomenon of charedim who edit Rishonim and Acharonim can only lead to 
harbatzas Torah . The new editions of the Tur and the SA are also examples of 
where a revised edition leads to greater limud haTorah
                                              Steven Brizel
                                              Zeliglaw@aol.com

Rashi says that the posuk says padan Aram because there are two Arams,
Aram Tzova and Aram Naharaim.  How does padan Aram define which is
referred to here?

Gershon
gershon.dubin@juno.com

Having said the Yom Kippur Kattan tefilos this Erev Rosh Chodesh, it is 
clear that they must rely heavily on the hetter of fragmenting a pasuk 
b'derech tefilah.

KT,
YGB
ygb@aishdas.org      http://www.aishdas.org/rygb

Simcha Klagsbrun replied to R' YH Henkin in private email:
> There may be two very different answers to the questions of whether there
> should be Jews living in place 'A' and whether I have the right to be that
> Jew if it means taking my children there.

> In the extreme, we obviously need chayalim in combat areas during wartime.
> I would think that it would be assur to take your wife and children with
> you into the tanks and fighter planes.

I agree with you with regard to Rabbi Henkin's rationale, but not with
regard to the ones I offered.  RH argued that one is *permitted* to risk
one's life if this derech yishuvo shel olam.  However, it is not mandatory,
and this leads to SK's question of why risk the lives of your
children--perhaps it's sufficient to have the men there alone.  (RH might
answer that you can't have a viable settlement unless you have men, women
and children--otherwise the Arabs won't respect this as a true settlement
and will view it as a place that the Israelis can easily evacuate because
(the Arabs would argue) the Israelis aren't truly *living* there.)

My answer dealt with the Minchas Chinuch's view of yishuv/kibbush EY (which
I personally disagree with).  A Milchemes Mitzvah is mandatory.  If the only
way to have Gaza under Israeli sovereignty is by having men, women and
children there, then it would be mandatory to bring them all there.

Kol tuv,
Moshe

From: "Shoshana L. Boublil" <toramada@zahav.net.il>
> The sources Micha brings from Gittin deal with the question of differences
> in the process of giving a Get between Eretz Yisrael and Eretz HaAmim.
> 
<snip>
> Apparently (Rishonim), the "borders" here have nothing to do with Kedushat
> HaAretz but rather with places where Jews actually lived in Eretz Yisrael,
> and not just in small communities but where there were larger communities.

This makes sense because the issue in Gittin is which places are people baki
in gittin (so you wouldn't have to say b'fani nichtav...)

Kol tuv,
Moshe

Simcha Klagsburn wrote:

> 2. Yishuv EY, if a chiyuv today, can be done in Sanhedria or Har Nof.

R. Hershel Schachter understands the Ramban in the back of Sefer HaMitzvos 
(Mitzvos Aseh Sheshichechan HaRav, IIRC #7) as saying that there is a mitzvas 
aseh of not leaving any part of EY unsettled.

Gil Student 

From: "Shoshana L. Boublil" <toramada@zahav.net.il>
: Apparently (Rishonim), the "borders" here have nothing to do with Kedushat
: HaAretz but rather with places where Jews actually lived in Eretz Yisrael,
: and not just in small communities but where there were larger communities.

It the problem that we're trying to apply a relatively modern notion of
what a country's border is to an entity that was essentially a city-state?

-mi

RYGB wrote:
> You are all ignoring the teshuvos by the Lubavitcher Rebbe and RMF 
> forbidding abandonment of Jewish neighborhoods, even in Chu"l. The LR was 
> mechaddesh a din if nachalah and RMF agreed with him. Presumably the LR was 
> referring to Crown Heights and RMF to the Lower East Side. They held 
> individuals may not sell their homes in a Jewish neighborhood to non-Jews.

	The only problem with applying RMF's psak to the lower east side is
the fact that until recently, you  could not sell your apartment. The
apartments were part of a co-op and if you moved out and gave up your
apartment, it went back to the co-op. Just recently, people were given
ownership of their apartment. Interestingly, Rav Dovid Feinstein has
paskened that although it is preferable to try and sell one's apartment to a
jew, if you can get a better price you are not mechuyav to do so. I wonder
how this fits in with RMF's psak. I sthe metzius different?

At 05:05 PM 11/29/00 -0500, Markowitz, Chaim wrote:
>The only problem with applying RMF's psak to the lower east side is the 
>fact that until recently, you  could not sell your apartment....
>                                   R. Just recently, people were given 
>ownership of their apartment. Interestingly, Rav Dovid Feinstein has 
>paskened that although it is preferable to try and sell one's apartment to 
>a jew, if you can get a better price you are not mechuyav to do so. I 
>wonder how this fits in with RMF's psak. Is the metzius different?

Seems to me that the metzi'us is not different, but perhaps RDF does not 
fully agree with his father. That is, of course, his right.

KT,
YGB
ygb@aishdas.org      http://www.aishdas.org/rygb 

> Why are RSZA and R. Neuwirth not considered "contemporary poskim?"  Do
> RSZA's psakim become less relevant after his recent petirah?  Moreover, the
> objection that RDN has to RSZA has nothing to do with whether he is alive.
> RDN believes that RSZA misunderstood the metzius.
 
this type of comment/psak is "very shver " indeed. In Shulchan Shlomo Vol 2
(I don't have the page in front of me) RSZA states that if an umbrella is 
openned before Shabbos in a city that has an eruv, neither make bpatish, 
binyan nor muktzah are implicated . it is no different than sitting under an 
awning that was openned befrore Shabbos. I wonder what the revisionists of 
RSZA would say about this comment.
                                            Steven Brizel
                                             Zeliglaw@aol.com

(Similar response to Chana Luntz is apropos:)

At 04:48 PM 11/28/00 +0200, Daniel wrote:
>In my case (very nearsighted), I simply cannot see as well with glasses...
>                                                    Wearing lenses
>overnight, even if they are extended wear officially, increases  the risk of
>infection significantly....

Well, in that case, indeed, I am bewildered by the alleged issur.

KT,
YGB
ygb@aishdas.org      http://www.aishdas.org/rygb

> Indeed, the way you approach this is more of a classic "Hora'as Sha'ah" 
> justification - I highly doubt RYBS held that this was the rationale to 
> allow TSBP for women.
> Rather, I think he held it is not actually forbidden, so why not?
 
> And, RSYW held either that it is actually forbidden, or that if not, 
> devastating results precluded the practice regardless.
 
Thanks for your kind and quick resonse. My analysis of RYSW and RYBS was on 
lshitasam basis and not to , chas veshalom, as some sort of hacrah. Noone on 
this list is capable of such a decision. However,to the extent that RYBS and 
RYSW hels widely diverging mutually exclusive shitos on this subject,   I 
believe that we can only say dor dor vchchachav etc and leave this subject 
before we start RW/LW bashing again on this basis .

      Perhaps mussar is a poor cousin to pure limud haTorah because we take 
neither it nor chassidus, its intellectual cousin very seriously and we 
ignore halacha in the bein adam lchaveiro area more than we admit it because 
Choshen Mishpat, unlike Orach Chaim, lacks a Mishna Brurah in which we would 
learn that lo tigzol  has no kulos and that the requirements for edus, etc 
are quite high indeed. I once heard Rav Schachter say that one baale bayis 
told him that he necer learned that gnevah was assur in all of his years in 
yeshiva. This is our lack of ability to see the forest between the trees. 
                                   Steven Brizel
                                   Zeliglaw@aol.com

Carl must have been referring to the GRA in Yoreh Deah 246:6 s"k 26
quoting Tosfot in Sota. It's *mashma* here that the GRA holds that the
REMA would require women to learn Torah she'b'al peh regarding halachot
that are *shayach* to them. [This would obviously be against the shita
of the Rambam].

Josh

In a message dated 11/30/00 11:42:39 AM Eastern Standard Time, 
gershon.dubin@juno.com writes:

> Rashi says that the posuk says padan Aram because there are two Arams,
>  Aram Tzova and Aram Naharaim.  How does padan Aram define which is
>  referred to here?
>  
Which one it was says before 24:10.

Kol Tuv, 

Yitzchok Zirkind

Regarding RYBS's position on women learning Torah, an interesting online source 
is R. Mayer Twersky's Jewish Action article, available at 
http://world.std.com/~yi/brookline/written.html#a7

Gil Student

Here's some more from R' Weinberg, zt"l, with respect to chinuch habonos.

(You will notice that the last question has nothing to do with the topic of
chinuch habonos.  I have left it in because I think it demonstates one of
the major aspects of R' Weinberg's gadlus:  his insistence on emes; when he
didn't know the answer he said so.)

KT
Aryeh

-------
Q'S & A'S FROM TORAH UMESORAH CONVENTIONS:
"CHINUCH HA'BANOS"

QUESTION #37:
There is a certain pressure from parents who are willing to accept that
we aren't teaching Torah shebe'al peh to their girls that we equally
challenge them in a different area. Are we doing a disservice to them
by making them proficient in Ramban...?

ANSWER:
With Ramban you are doing a very definite disservice to them. There
is no possible reason for them to know Rambans-it is not going to help
them. Mucher nisht, plain and simple! [As far as teaching them the Sefer
Ha'Chinuch,] you have me at a disadvantage because I do not like his
"ta'amai ha'mitzvohs." I do not think they are helpful. But to that
type of study, I would say yes. There is [also] Hirsch and a variety
of challenging things that are wonderful for girls, that open up their
hashkafa, their understanding of midos and of how to meet other people's
needs...

QUESTION #38:
Why is Ramban considered Torah shebe'al peh if it is only a commentary
on Chumash?

ANSWER:
Ramban is entirely Torah shebe'al peh. There is not a word in it that is
Torah shebich'sav because a commentary on the Chumash is Torah shebe'al
peh. Rashi and Ramban are both Torah shebe'al peh. So it depends.
If it is the one that is more direct like Rashi... I want to tell you
something. If I wanted to teach a boy the three Bavas, that he should
know them thoroughly, I would teach him Mishpatim with Rashi. You teach
him that and he has got at least two of the Bavas in his hands, and he
will know it inside out. It's the best way to teach the fundamentals of
Bava Metzia and Bava Kama.

So the boys will avoid it. But the girls will be taught it so that they
should become experts and know the whole Seder Nezikin! Ramban is Torah
shebe'al peh on the highest level, the Torah shebe'al peh that is the
most abstruse, the one that is certainly the least needed for girls. Boys
have to deal with it...

It really amazes me. With the boys you have to work so hard to get
them to want to learn. You spill blood. The girls, on the other hand,
all want to become talmiday chachamim! It's a strange thing. The boys
are really dying to wear tefilin, right? The girls say, "Why can't we
have tefilin?" and the boys say, "Take it, gezunta hait, and leave us
out!" The yetzer hara is incredible!

QUESTION #39:
Does this mean that when you teach girls Chumash you should do it without
any commentaries?

ANSWER:
You can learn Rashi in a "shitchiyus" way, Hirsch, Seforno... You
can't do better than Seforno. It is filled with midos, hashkafa, and
wisdom. It brings out the nekudah ha'pnimis of the moral drives of the
Torah. It is a "sefer niflah" for boys and girls. For boys, you have to
make a judgement because they aren't going to do both. But for girls,
it is definitely a marvelous commentary.

QUESTION #40:
Our school is changing the English curriculum so that only Jewish
books are being taught but there are non-Jewish teachers teaching these
books. Is it better to read acceptable non-Jewish literature or Jewish
fiction taught by a Goy?

ANSWER:
I don't know. I don't know what a Goy does with it or what it consists
of. I just don't know, I'm sorry.

>> Rashi says that the posuk says padan Aram because there are two Arams,
>> Aram Tzova and Aram Naharaim.  How does padan Aram define which is
>> referred to here?

> Which one it was says before 24:10.

        True,  but if so,  what is Rashi explaining?

Gershon

In a message dated 11/30/00 1:38:35pm EST, gershon.dubin@juno.com writes:
>          True,  but if so,  what is Rashi explaining?

The Teitch of the word Padan (In the first Pshat pair like twin cities).

Kol Tuv, 
Yitzchok Zirkind

In a message dated 11/29/00 7:16:58am EST, ezsurf@idt.net writes:
> In reading this week's parsha, I am surprised by Yitzchak's reaction to
> Esav when Yitzchak realizes that it was not Esav who was blessed...

Off the cuff, it is possible that Yitzchak wanted to get Esav used to the 
idea slowly, from the least hurtful explanation to the most hurtful. This is 
with the understanding that Esav would eventually discover the truth, 
especially since the the truth is the way his own Mother wanted the Brachos 
to be given in the first place. 

But this reaction could also be revealing of Yitzchak's relationship to the 
events.

Initially, Yitzchak intended, for whatever reason, to give the Bracha to 
Esav. As it dawned on him just what happened, he too had to confront his 
mistaken plan, which was subverted by the correct understanding of Rivkah. 
Initially, he felt tricked. As he realized what happened, he was able to put 
a finger on it, attributing the trickery to Yaakov. As he came to realize, 
giving the Bracha to Yaakov was the correct action, which Rivklah was 
sensitive to before him. When he realized this, he needed to be totally 
honest with Esav and let him know that in fact, Yaakov's ruling over him was 
the correct choice L'chatchila.

Jordan  

Russell Steinthal <rms39@columbia.edu> asked the following to scjm. I'm
including the motivation for his question, but replies about that motivation
are more for Areivim than on Avodah.

It's an interesting question. Can a kofer's get ever be lishmah?

Russell asked to be CC-ed on any replies.

-mi


All:

I'm currently working on a paper for school discussing attempts to use
the American courts to deal with the agunah problem by encouraging
spouses to give (and receive) gittin when they are civilly divorced.  
I've come to the following question, and would appreciate any 
comments (including, in particular, citations):

What intent is necessary when preparing, giving, or receiving a get?  
For example, if a husband appears before the beit din and genuinely 
does not believe that halacha has any authority to dissolve his 
marriage, but agrees to give through the formalities of get to 
satisfy his wife, is that get valid?  (Even though the husband 
believed it to be a meaningless piece of paper.)

(For context, the issue I am discussing is whether appearance before 
the beit din or giving the get are "religious" acts in an American 
legal sense.  My thought is that if one needs the intent to divorce, 
one would need the "religious" recognition of halacha as binding.)

Thanks for any help.

-Russell

-- 
Russell Steinthal		Columbia Law School, Class of 2002
<rms39@columbia.edu>		Columbia College, Class of 1999
<steintr@nj.org>		UNIX System Administrator, nj.org

When Eisav bursts in, at first Yitzchak is unsure as to who might have stolen
the berachos - 'mi aifoh...', but then identifies Ya'akov - 'ba achicha
b'mirma...'. Why is there no issur of l'shon hara in saying in front of
Eisav that Ya'akov is the one who took the beracha?

(In line with what was written previously, perhaps Yitzchak knew Eisav would
discover the truth, and by him breaking the news to Eisav he could soften
the blow, so there was some to'eles involved - I can't recall offhand if
that is a sufficient matir).

-CB

In a message dated 12/1/00 8:23:10am EST, C1A1Brown@aol.com writes:
> When Eisav bursts in, at first Yitzchak is unsure as to who might have stolen
>  the berachos - 'mi aifoh...', but then identifies Ya'akov - 'ba achicha
>  b'mirma...'. Why is there no issur of l'shon hara in saying in front of
>  Eisav that Ya'akov is the one who took the beracha?

LAN"D Yitzchok fiured right away that it was Yaakov, see Rashi 27:36 that the 
Charada of YItzchok (which was before he said "Mi Aifoh") was because he 
blessed the younger before the older, also if he didn't know who it was how 
can "Gam Boruch Yihiyeh" be a Haskama (Rashi 27:33) also he already suspected 
it when he sais "Hakol Kol Yaakov". but in the begining he had no reason to 
identify him to Esov and just said that I gave away the Bracha, it was when 
Esov argued, and said bless me too he had to say that the Bracha was not to a 
stranger but to your brother as a Yoreish hence "Birchosecha" is gone.

Gut Shabbos, v'Kol Tuv, 
Yitzchok Zirkind

> it was when Esov argued, and said bless me too he had to say that
> the Bracha was not to a stranger but to your brother as a Yoreish hence
> "Birchosecha" is gone.

L'mai nafka minah if it would have been a stranger? Are you suggesting
that this works like R' Yochanan ben Broka's shita (B"B 130) that
you can be ma'avir nachala to ben bein habanim but not to an outsider?
Doesn't it sound like the bracha depended on having the status of bechor,
and even RYb"B agrees that you cannot be ma'avir the chelek becorah?

Good Shabbos,
-CB

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


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