Avodah Mailing List

Volume 06 : Number 119

Monday, February 5 2001

• RE: KADDISH AFTE OLEINU
• RE: Kaddish after Oleinu
• Re: Loshon Hora Alert
• makom p'tur
• Re: Hebrew -- Aramaic
• RE: Loshon Hora Alert
• Re: lashon hara

SBA:
: Kaddish after Oleinu is part of seder hatefilah - and should ALWAYS
: be said - even when there is no chiyuv present.

FWIW:
The Sefardic/Syrian Nusach and the original Frankfort Minhag do NOT say
Kaddish afer Aleinu.

Kol Tuv
Rich Wolpoe

From: "SBA" <sba@blaze.net.au>
> Kaddish after Oleinu is part of seder hatefilah - and should ALWAYS be
> said - even when there is no chiyuv present.

Mordechai <Phyllostac@aol.com>:
> Meikar hadin there are only 7 kaddeishim in the davening of a regular day 
> (kineged the verse in Tehillim 'sheva bayom hilalticha' )...

I heard a dvar Torah as follows:
Tzaddik stands for the following daily routine

90  = Amanim
4   = Kedushos
10  = Kaddeishim
100 = Brachos

This implies that there is one extra kaddish per tefilah - i.e. Aleinu
perhaps?

Kol Tuv
Rich Wolpoe 

From: Noah S. Rothstein <noahrothstein@mindspring.com> [on Areivim]:
: I recall reading in R' Pliskin's 'Guard Your Tongue' an example given
: of someone who reads in a newspaper that a Yid committed a crime (or
: even was indicted) and tells it to someone else. It says that it was
: assur both for the person to have read it and for him to repeat it to
: someone else.

Sefer Shmiras Halashon says that there is a machlokes harishonim whether
repeated something that already has been publicized (i.e., said b'apei
t'las) constitutes lashon hara.  As I recall, the majority view is that it
does not.  The CC recommends being machmir, but I believe that this chumra
causes people to give up entirely on keeping the laws of lashon hara.

I wrote an Avodah post on this issue about a year and a half ago around
shavuos time.  Ayain sham.

[To remind people -- last Shavuos, being between Nissan and Elul '60,
would be in volume 5. Just as volume will iy"h start in 2 months. -mi]

Kol tuv,
Moshe

This is probabaly "Hotzoa 101" for y'all . . . 

Two different books I have say that a makom p'tur is an area that is less
than 4 x 4 tefochim, and that the other defined domains are greater than 4
x 4 tefochim.

Neither book mentions the case of an area that is less than 4 tefochim on
one dimension and greater than 4 tefochim in the other dimension.

So, what's the easy one sentence answer here?

Thanks in advance, and good shabbos everyone.

-- Eric

In Avodah V6 #118, MBerger replied:
> The Mishnah B'rurah cites the Gaon as saying that they should be said in
> Hebrew, as per Yechezkeil's "Hisgadalti viHiskadashti"...
>                                               Perhaps the MB's point is
> that the Gra's telling you to switch to Hebrew to refer to the passuk
> is meaningless if it's with a patach....

Perhaps the MB, b'm'chilas k'vodo, misunderstood.
Most of Kaddish is Aramaic, but the first two words are not, and _they
should be read_ as per "v'hisgadalti," vDUK :-).

All the best (including wishes for a great Shabbos!) from
Michael Poppers * Elizabeth, NJ

Feldman, Moshe:
> Sefer Shmiras Halashon says that there is a machlokes harishonim whether
> repeated something that already has been publicized ...
>            The CC recommends being machmir, but I believe that this chumra
> causes people to give up entirely on keeping the laws of lashon hara.

I wrote an Avodah post on this issue about a year and a half ago around
shavuos time.  Ayain sham.

You can be machmir a bit and still tell the publiczed story.

Illustration

"I have seen reported in the NY Herald the following story, and I am
not certain whether or not this story is true."

While it is a matter of public record that the new media reports story X.
Nevertheless we can maintain a healthy skepticism. After all, how much
lashon hara in contemporary society is really based upon personal,
first-hand knowledge?


Another illustration:

"Did you hear the scandal about rabbi so-and-so?"
"I am familiar with the article in the Jewish paper; however I am
uncertain as to the facts of the case."

Note: telling someone about a publicized story might get into rechilus,
and I don't intend to "pasken" every angle.

While it may be unrealistic to dismiss public allgeations, it is not
necessary to accept them as verified facts.

Shabbat Shalom
Rich Wolpoe

This is what I wrote on 5/24/99 (with some edits):

This is the issue of whether we pasken like the Rambam in Hilchot De'ot
[7:5] who says that when X tells information about Y to A, B, and C, then
the information is now public and therefore there is no possibility of
lashon hara provided that X has no intention of deliberately spreading the
news. As a result, B is now permitted to tell D the information. (I just
gave a shiur on Shavuot night on this issue, but I don't have the sources at
my office, so I am writing from memory.) 

The Rambam is based on the Gemarah [Bava Batra] which says that "b'apei tlat
let ba mishmum lishna bisha." There are two interpretations of this Gemarah:


(1) Tosfot: the issue is whether X is permitted to tell information to A, B,
and C; the Chofetz Chaim in his Be'er Mayim Chaim commentary at the
beginning of Sefer Chofetz Chaim (Ch. 1 paragraph 2 or 3 in the main text)
explains that the case is where X is making a neutral statement that could
have a negative meaning is certain contexts (e.g. X says: " Y always has
food in his house;" this could mean that Y is a glutton or it could mean
that Y is generous in hachnasat orchim); by saying it in front of 3 people,
X knows that word of his statement will get back to Y so it must be that X
intended the more positive meaning of the statement. The position of Tosfot
is agreed to by Rashi and Rabbenu Yona. 

(2) Rambam, Rashbam, Smag (and possibly She'iltot): The case is: if X tells
information about Y to A, B, and C, then the information has become public
and therefore there is no possibility of lashon hara provided that X has no
intention of deliberately spreading the news. As a result, B is now
permitted to tell D the information. 

I would suggest, (based upon the Be'er Mayim Chaim ("BMC") but adding a
little) that the Rambam can be understood as follows: BMC asks on the
Rambam: isn't this similar to a case where there are 9 thieves prepared to
rob an empty house and a potential 10th thief is debating whether to join
them. He rationalizes that all the goods in the house will be stolen, so the
damage will be done anyway; if so, why not join? Of course, the reason is
that he will still be doing an act of g'zeilah. Why isn't the case of the
Rambam similar? I would answer that there are two issues in lashon hara: (a)
the ma'aseh of lo telech rachil and (b) the to'tza'ah (result)--negative
information has been spread. In order to violate (a), one must intend to
spread the information, but (b) can be violated even without intent.
However, in the case of the Rambam, where (b) will occur anyway, there is no
problem to speak lashon hara (provided there is no intent). 

Interestingly, the Chofetz Chaim wishes to be machmir and prefers that one
not accept the Rambam, especially since the CC believes that there is a
safek de'oraita. I question this conclusion. After all, while it is true
that presumably the source of the Rambam is the same gemarah as the source
of Tosfot for a different din, this does not necessarily prove that Tosfot
would disagree with the conclusion of the Rambam (especially since the
s'varah I wrote above seems reasonable). Secondly, if one paskens against
the Rambam, it would be forbidden to read many articles in the newspapers
(and in fact, I was told by Rav Dovid Weinberger of Lawrence that the CC
used to rail against people buying newspapers). This is a g'zeirah she'ein
ha'zibbur yachol la'amod bo and certainly very few people are so machmir.
The end result is that people who read the CC on this issue end up feeling
that they will never be able to keep the laws of Lashon Hara, so they might
as well never try (apropos to this, read the introduction to "Guard Your
Tongue" about the businessman from Warsaw). I prefer to lower the standard
of what is required so that people can believe that they have a realistic
chance of keeping the laws. 

Kol tuv,
Moshe

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


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