Avodah Mailing List

Volume 07 : Number 072

Monday, July 9 2001

• Re: Schar VeOnesh
• Re: Correct Spelling and Pronunciation of Tzitzis/Tzeetzis
• RE: Correct Spelling and Pronunciation of Tzitzis/Tzeetzis
• Re: Mizmor shir liyom hashabbos and Hashem moloch.... - sitting or standing?
• Agunot
• RE: Mizmor shir liyom hashabbos and Hashem moloch.... - sitting or standing?
• Re: Correct Spelling and Pronunciation of Tzitzis/Tzeetzis
• Re: Correct Spelling and Pronunciation of Tzitzis/Tzeetzis
• Re: Correct Spelling and Pronunciation of Tzitzis/Tzeetzis
• Re: Rambam on Aristotle
• Mother Getting to name the firstborn
• Mizmor shir liyom hashabbos and Hashem moloch.... - sitting or standing?
• agunah
• Re: Correct Spelling and Pronunciation of Tzitzis/Tzeetzis
• Re: value of prayer
• Re: Correct Spelling and Pronunciation of Tzitzis/Tzeetzis/Tzitzees
• Rambam on Christianity
• Re: value of prayer
• Re: Rambam on Christianity

On Thu, Jul 05, 2001 at 08:57:18PM -0700, Harry Maryles wrote:
:> What Acheir saw in the case of that  is the norm, not the exception.

: I see. My point here is that the Torah does indeed speak of Schar
: VeOnesh.

I know of no case where the Torah speaks of sechar va'onesh (SvO) for
individuals where Chazal understand it to refer to olam hazeh.
I argued that guaranteed SvO bi'olam hazeh is only for Klal Yisrael as
a whole. Otherwise, there is sechar in this world only when HKBH would
have given you the tov for other reasons anyway.

Not as you write:
: then implies that ultimate justice is reserved for the world to come and
: that perhaps promises of reward in this world are only generalities and
: not always carried out, for reasons that are beyond our ken...

But rather the carrying out of SvO for the yachid is only when it's
a side effect. Not a generality with exceptions, but itself not even
a rule.

:     I beleive that ultimate justice equals Schar VeOnesh.

I don't see how this is a belief rather than a tautology.

:> I would not quite agree. There would be a reason to follow mitzvos even
:> if there was nothing in it for us.

: And pray tell what would that reason be?

Likach nivreisa. One can work for a goal other than one's own reward.
Lima'aseh, that's not how HKBH set things up -- every goal has a nekudah
of reward. But that's His decision to make, not ours. I am linking morality
to goals, but I would not insist that the goal be a personal one.

The truth is that this is a very hard component to discuss. Because HKBH
did link the two, not just in Torah but in human nature. People enjoy
pursuing their goals, regardless of the goal. To ask about doing mitzvos
without sechar is also asking about the psychology of a being that isn't
exactly human.

I also think we're discussing different questions; you're discussing
ontology, whereas I'm discussing axiology. I said that HKBH links
mitzvos to sechar but we shouldn't. Which isn't about whether or not a
connection needs to exist, but whether or not it is proper behavior for
us to make one.

-mi

-- 
Micha Berger                 The mind is a wonderful organ
micha@aishdas.org            for justifying decisions
http://www.aishdas.org       the heart already reached.
(973) 916-0287               

In a message dated 7/4/01 11:55:03pm EDT, MFeldman@CM-P.COM writes:
> I looked up the Mizrachi and Gur Aryeh.  They don't say that this is a case
> of kri vs ksiv.  Rather, they say that "tzitzis" can be spelled either
> chaser or malei, and either (1) one can make a drasha based on the way it's
> pronounced because of yesh eim l'mikra (-Mizrachi) or (2) Rashi's drasha was
> not based on the Torah spelling but on the spelling of the word "tzitzis" in
> general (-Gur Aryeh).

Lo Zachisi Lhovin what the whole Sharuria is about, my point was that the 
reading of the word is equal across both Tzadis that are in it, (and the same 
in Yichezkel),  I further pointed to the  MG"A O"C 61 S"K 13, where it is 
obvious that the word PTUCHEI is pronounced *PEE*tuchei not *PI*tuchei 
(Chirik vs. Shva), and BTW I have heard people that are Mdayeik in Kriyas 
Shma to say Tzeetzees (I assume to underline that it is a Chirik).

Gut Shabbos, v'Kol Tuv, 
Yitzchok Zirkind

From: Yzkd@aol.com [mailto:Yzkd@aol.com]
> my point was that the reading of the word is equal across both Tzadis that
> are in it, 

Do you mean to say that both chiriks are chirik g'dolim, rather than the
second being a chirik katon?

> (and the same in Yichezkel),  I further pointed to the  MG"A O"C 61 S"K 13, 
> where it is obvious that the word PTUCHEI is pronounced *PEE*tuchei not 
> *PI*tuchei (Chirik vs. Shva), and BTW I have heard people that are 
> Mdayeik in Kriyas Shma to say Tzeetzees (I assume to underline that it
> is a Chirik). 

Some people pronounce a chirik as a cross between an long E and a short I.
Some of those people pronounce a chirik katan that way, but pronounce a
chirik gadol like a long E. Therefore, they pronounce the first chirik
in tzitzis like an E and the second chirik in tzitzis like an E/I.
It sounded from your posting (but perhaps we were miscommunicating)
that you disagreed with this and felt that both are chirik g'dolim and
should be pronounced like an E.

(Of course, this whole issue is moot according to Seth Mandel, who feels
that both chirik gadol and chirik katan should be pronounced the same.)

Kol tuv,
Moshe

In a message dated 7/5/01 12:19:35am EDT, sbechhof@casbah.acns.nwu.edu writes:
> The Chida, I forget where, says to stand, as this is the ikkar Kabbolos 
> Shabbos. V'chein ani noheig.

It is in his Avodas Hakodesh, to stand is also brought in Siddur Shaloh,
while according to the Baeir Heiteiv 262 one should stand the entire
Kabbolas Shabbos, (all this is taken from the Lkutei MaHaRIaCH)

Gut Shabbos, v'Kol Tuv, 
Yitzchok Zirkind

From: "Shinnar, Meir" <Meir.Shinnar@rwjuh.edu>
> R Berkovitz developed a proposal based on kidushin al tnai...
> Furthermore, R Berkovits argued (and the Seride Esh agreed) that this
> proposal was not the same that was rejected in the 1930s.  

> The Seride Esh gave a haskama, asking that it be approved by the gdolim.
> The Seride Esh's main concern was not technical...
> Rather, by making marriage conditional, it fundamentally changed the
> nature of marriage for everyone, and such a fundamental change required
> the consent of the entire community.

> R Berkovits circulated the proposal. R Moshe Feinstein wrote to him
> saying that there was nothing intrinsically wrong with the proposal,
> but that he did not see that there was a need for such a proposal. ...

When I was a student of Dr. Berkovitz back in the 1960's, he had occasion
to mention this episode to his class more than once and in refference
to RMF he stated (I heard him) that RMF was not a Gadol and if RMF was
a Gadol, so was he. He was obviously very upset that his proposal was
categoricly rejected eventhough RMF conceeded that there was nothing wrong
with his proposal. Supposedly RMF stated that even though technically
Dr. Berkovitz was right, since this basically simple solution was never
adopted by Cahazal there must have been good reason and therefore we
could not use it and thus possibly tamper with Mamzerus.

I never saw Dr. Bekovitz's solution spelled out in detail. Does anyone
have a copy of it that they could post on Avodah or at least does anyone
know it well enough to spell it out in detail? Is there a written Teshuvah
to Dr. Berkovitz by RMF?

HM

I think that many people who stand are not standing "b'shita", but merely
remain standing from the end of L'Chah Dodi.  (Since they will stand up
anyway for the kaddish after Hashem moloch, does it really pay to sit down
for the three minutes that it takes to say Mizmor shir and Hashem moloch?)

KT
Aryeh

>R' Michael Poppers recently changed the subject line of my thread from
>"tztizis on Shabbos" to "tzeetzis on Shabbos".
...

                                                                 Bs"d
Years ago, my mashgiach told me and my chavrusa that Reb Moshe addresses 
this (sorry, don't have the address). He said that according to Reb Moshe, 
a yud chirik combo is ee, while a chirik by itself is ih, so according to 
that, tzeetzis would be correct.

Eli

To my question on the correct pronunciation of the word
"Tzitzis/Tzeetzis", R' Herschel Ainspan wrote in Avodah 7:71:
>To quote from R. Seth Mandel's post on the mesorah list on
>Fri, 13 Apr 2001 13:27:30 Re: Hebrew vocalization and the
>notation of silent consonants,

>> Any consonant not at the end of a word is pronounced
>> if and only if it is immediately followed by a vowel
>> sign (which includes a shva).

>Thus the yod in "tzitzis" is silent, and the two chiriq's
>in the word are pronounced the same.

I do not subscribe to Mesorah and don't know how to get to their
archives, but there seems to be some things wrong with what has been
presented here.

(1) This logic would seem to apply to almost every case of a chirik gadol
and tzere gadol, rendering them short vowels. If so, then what is the
point of the yud to begin with?

(2) Would this logic also apply to the "resh" of "Yiru es HaShem
k'doshav", where the resh is not followed by a vowel (not even a shva)
but by a consonant (aleph)?

Thanks,
Akiva Miller

On Sun, Jul 08, 2001 at 05:01:56PM -0400, kennethgmiller@juno.com wrote:
: I do not subscribe to Mesorah and don't know how to get to their
: archives, but there seems to be some things wrong with what has been
: presented here.

Mesorah is an "us", not a them. In either case, I don't archive it.

I wanted to wait for RSM to enter this conversation himself, but since he
isn't...

: (1) This logic would seem to apply to almost every case of a chirik gadol
: and tzere gadol, rendering them short vowels. If so, then what is the
: point of the yud to begin with?

It applies to every case. But it doesn't render them short vowels. Rather,
RSM holds that the tenu'ah gedolah is gedolah even though it is identical
in sound to the tenu'ah ketanah.

I think he would say the same about the yud in the "-av" (his) suffix,
as well as the vav in "hi" (when spelled hv'). Leshitaso, letters without
tenu'os are silent. Ours is just one case.

-mi

-- 
Micha Berger                     Time flies...
micha@aishdas.org                        ... but you're the pilot.
http://www.aishdas.org                           - R' Zelig Pliskin
(973) 916-0287               

At 12:13 AM 7/5/01 -0500, you wrote:
>Date: Sun, 1 Jul 2001 20:11:55 +0300
>From: "S. Goldstein" <goldstin@netvision.net.il>
>Subject:
>
>RGS>According to the Rambam, does Aristotle have a place in olam haba?
> > I know that he held that A was the greatest philosopher, but what about
> > olam haba? Does anyone see anywhere where the Rambam says or implies
> > something relevant to this?
>
>See Hilchos Melachim where chasidei umos haolam require an acknowledgement
>of Toras Moshe.  This is expanded upon by Yaavatz and the Griz in the end of
>his sefer.  Therefore, Aristotle, it seems, is out.
>
>Shlomo Goldstein

                                                         Bs"d
Not according to the Seder HaDoros!

Eli

What is the primary source for this generally accepted minhag? I've found
a Ramban quoting the maharam mrutenberg as saying the father gets first
but not the other way around.

kt
Joel

The excellent article in the new / current issue of Jewish Action states that 
the Brisker Rav (Gri"z) sat for the above mizmorim, as I mentioned in my 
original post. I have no reason to doubt that report. I highly recommend the 
article to all.

I have asked about this, as well as having observed people at this point in 
davening and it seems that in large Ashkenaz Shuls the minhog is to sit. The 
Rav of one Shul I have davened in many times, indeed does that. 

Hassidic people seem to stand. I think the same is generally true for Licha 
dodi (with the exception of boi visholom......).

I am interested in any mikoros on the inyan.

While a citation of the Chid"a, as one poster wrote of, is of course of 
interest, I am particularly interested in Ashkenazic mikoros, being that I am 
of Ashkenazic background.

I think there may be another issue involved here, albeit perhaps only for 
some people and lurking in the background - namely a sense that standing (in 
general) is on a higher level than sitting and is therefore like a chumra and 
more preferable. Perhaps the fact that standing is more difficult physically 
causes people to think along such lines. However, I think this idea is not 
necessarily correct. Being seated has certain advantages and is preferred or 
required at times in halacha and minhog. Sometimes the sitting position is 
the way to go.


Mordechai

Perhaps the following can help solve the agunah problem (at least to a
certain extent).

Before the chosson goes under the chupah, say at the kabolas ponim,
(alternately, it could even be done in private in the presence of 2 kosher
witnesses), the chosson makes a shvuas hatorah (and he is clearly told that
one cannot make Hatoras Neder on a shvuah he makes concerning someone else,
it can only help for Nedarim he makes to and about himself e.g. 'I will eat,
or I will not eat' etc. And for those of you who want to make even a
stronger Shvuah let him make the Shvuah Al Daas HoRabbim)that "If the kallah
(by name) ever receives a legal divorce from me, and I don't give her a GET
then I give up my portion in Olam Haboh"
I based this type of shvuah on Shulchon Aruch Even Hoezer 154:(Seder
HaGet)26.
While some people may wrong others they justify themselves, but here where
they clearly make a Shvuah it takes on a whole different perspective.
I will appreciate feedback, discussion and input on the above.

kol tuv
yosef stern

The idea that tzitzis is merameiz Taryag because of the gematria is 600,
plus 5 knots and 8 strings is in the Medrash Tanchumah. The gematria
assumes the word has two yuds.

One can't judge proper spelling from the pasuk, as the spelling may be
abnormally chaseir for derashah purposes.

-mi

-- 
Micha Berger                     Time flies...
micha@aishdas.org                        ... but you're the pilot.
http://www.aishdas.org                           - R' Zelig Pliskin
(973) 916-0287               

On Thu, Jul 05, 2001 at 09:21:12AM -0400, David Riceman [dtr] wrote:
: R. Chaim Volozhiner is cited in Kether Rosh as saying he would give all
: the tefilloth he'd prayed his whole life for one chiddush.

Which means that either:

1- RCV took the temimus fork, and therefore valued having the da'as
Torah necessary to produce a real chiddush over the deveikus acheived
through tefillah.

2- According to the Rambam's shitah that deveikus is acheived through
one's knowledge of the Borei, perhaps knowing His Torah is the deveikus
that we daven in an attempt to acheive. It depends on the relationship
between His Da'as and Torah.

-mi

-- 
Micha Berger                     Time flies...
micha@aishdas.org                        ... but you're the pilot.
http://www.aishdas.org                           - R' Zelig Pliskin
(973) 916-0287               

Akiva Miller: <R' Michael Poppers recently changed the subject line of
my thread from "tztizis on Shabbos" to "tzeetzis on Shabbos". It seems
to me that both spellings and pronunciations are accepted as correct,
but in different contexts, and I'm hoping someone can bring a Kasuv
Hashlishi which will resolve the contradiction.>

Gil Student: <Rabbi Mandel seems to be busy lately, which is probably why
he did not respond to this. I can't find it now, but he posted not long
ago that there is no difference in pronunciation between a tenuah gedolah
and a tenuah ketanah. He said something like English is one of the few
languages in which every sound has a dipthong, or something linguistic
like that. Can he, or someone who knows what he said, enlighten us?>

Enlighten you, scarcely. Confuse you, certainly.

Yes, I said English is one of the few languages where every LONG vowel is
a diphthong (none of the short vowels are in standard American. Short a,
as in cat, is a diphthong in the South, and the vowel aw (as Americans
pronounce qomatz, and, strictly speaking, is not a short vowel) is a
diphthong in some parts of New Yawuhk. All long vowels are diphthongs
except for the vowel ah as in father.

And it is true that in Ashkenaz there was no difference in pronunciation
between "hiriq gadol" and "hiriq qatan": both were just hiriq. And I
also noted that in the original Tiberian vowel system there was also no
distinction. Teimanim also make no distinction.

R. Michael Popper when he started this clearly had his tongue in his
cheek, but the issue seems to have been taken seriously.

So let me say for the record: in the Tiberian masorah there is
no difference in pronunciation between a hiriq gadol and a hiriq
qatan. Furthermore, as R. Herschel Ainspan correctly says, the presence
or absence of an 'em q'ri'ah, i.e. whether a word is mole or hoser,
NEVER makes a difference in pronunciation.

The issue started with the hiddush of the Qimhi family that all vowels
in Hebrew came in two quantities: t'nu'a g'dola and t'nu'a q'tanna. They
came up with that theory to explain why the Tiberian tradition had both
a qomatz and a pasah, and both a segol and a tzere. In their S'faradi
tradition, both vowels in these pairs were pronounced the same. As I
said in Mesorah, the S'faradi tradition is equally ancient, and there
is another vocalization system (called the Eretz Yisrael niqqud, to
distinguish it from the Tiberian niqqud) that indeed has one vowel sign
for both qomatz and pasah, and one for both segol and tzere. However,
the Tiberian masorah had already in the time of the Qimhi's been accepted
as definitive, and so they faced the problem that their pronunciation
did not match the Tiberian system of niqqud. They came up with the
idea of t'nu'a g'dola and t'nu'a q'tanna, and to make it consistent,
they posited that all vowels have a g'dola and q'tanna pair, even those
like hiriq or shuruq.

This is not to imply that there is no basis for such a distinction in
Hebrew. There is no basis for such a distinction in the Tiberian system
of pronouncing Hebrew, but there certainly were long and short vowels
at one point in Hebrew, as in all Semitic languages. The only area of
uncertainty is whether this historical feature of Hebrew had implications
as far as pronunciation goes in the time of the Qimhi's in Spain, and
therefore their distinction MIGHT have been more than theoretical. No
one knows; the Qimhi's themselves do not discuss pronunciation.

Now: the historical feature of long versus short vowels, although it
disappeared from most, if not all, pronunciation systems of Hebrew by
the time of the rishonim, did have an important influence on the normal
k'tiv of the Torah. Vowels that were historically long and vowels that
came from an original diphthong are USUALLY written mole'. Vowels
that were historically short are almost never written mole' (very
few exceptions). (This system was apparently something of a standard:
although we don't have much evidence from the time of Moshe Rabbenu,
inscriptions in other Semitic languages from the time of the Bayis Rishon
show a similar tendency to use immot q'ri'ah for long vowels.) But there
is another feature of the k'tiv system in the Torah that interferes
somewhat with these "rules": the Torah avoids having two mole' vowels in
one word. IOW, finding two immot q'ri'ah in one word is extremely rare
(unless one was a diphthong).

Take, for example, the form kasuv/katuv (written). In the singular,
always mole' (e.g. D'varim 28:61). But the plural k'tuvim is normally
written without a vav, but with a yod (e.g. Shemot 31:18).

And since today is a ta'anis: the word luah, pl. luhos. The word has
a long vowel, and the 5 times it appears in the singular it is always
mole'. In the plural, it is sometimes written without any vav's at all,
and sometimes with the second vav (eg. D'varim 4:13). But the first
vowel, the -u-, is always a t'nu'a g'dola, regardless of whether it is
written mole' or hoser. Navi is with a yod in the singular, but in the
plural n'vi'im it often is with only the second yod. Similary paqid is
always mole' in the singular, but only one yod (the second) usually in
the plural.

Remember these are tendencies and not strict rules. Adrabba, as R. Y.
Zirkind quite correctly noted, mole and hoser is an area where hazal
can learn out various r'mozim. The spelling of tzitzis with one, two,
or no yod's, although of absolutely no consequence linguistically, can
be of import in these limmudim. After all, the k'tiv of the Torah was
given by HQB'H; anything given directly by God will always have levels
of meaning and secrets hidden in it. HQB'H cannot be compared to people
and His deeds and systems of k'tiv cannot be fathomed fully by mortals.

In sum: a t'nu'a g'dola is usually written mole' but often not. The
Qimhi's knew this very well, and never said that every hiriq gadol has
a yod. The only way to definitively tell whether any specific hiriq or
shuruq/qubbutz is a t'nu'a g'dola or not is by knowing the rules of
Hebrew grammar and the mishqalim. It is an error to assume that when
written haser a hiriq or a qubbutz is a t'nu'a q'tanna.

The mishqal of tzitzis is qiil (tzitz), which has a t'nu'a g'dola, and
to it is added the suffix -it/-is, which also has a t'nu'a g'dola. The
fact that only one yod is written is irrelevant.

The fact that Americans may say tzee-tzihs has nothing to do with the
Hebrew; it is a phenomenon where the native English speakers are trying
to adapt the Hebrew to a more "Anglicized" pronunciation that better
fits their speech patterns. Similarly most Americans read kha-mee-shihm
for the Hebrew hamisshim, fifty, even though the first -i- there is
a SHORT vowel, and the second is a t'nu'a g'dola. I just came from
shul where I heard someone saying in the haftoro "v'see-makh-tihm,"
for which the same comment applies. But back to my first point: this is
only for the S'faradim. In Ashkenaz, at least for the past few hundred
years, there never was a distinction in pronunciation between t'nu'a
g'dola and q'tanna. Listen to the old Europeans, and all of the hiriq's
pronounced by them were the same. In Yiddish and in Ashkenaz Hebrew,
the American differentiation between -ee- and -i- did not exist. "Bean"
and "bin" are pronounced the same by Europeans who have not succeeded
in acquiring American accents. And in the original Tiberian system,
as the masora states, there were seven vowels and only seven. Not ten,
as the Qimhi's and modern grammars have it. They are not wrong; they
are just reflecting a non-Tiberian system.

I trust I have succeeded in spreading confusion where there was none,
and people will think twice before inviting me into an innocent exchange
in the future!

Seth Mandel

In a few places the Rambam writes that Christianity is avodah zarah
(Peirush HaMishnayos to Avodah Zarah 1:3-4; MT Hilchos Ma'achalos Assuros
11:7; MT Hilchos A"Z 9:4).

However, in the Moreh Nevuchim (1:50) he writes that Christianity has a
mistaken understanding of HKBH, similar to those who assign attributes
to Him. This would imply that Christianity is minus. The Rambam defines
five types of people as a min: 1) someone who does not believe in HKBH, 2)
someone who believes in more than one deity, 3) someone who believes in
one HKBH but that he is corporeal, 4) someone who believes that HKBH was
not first and creator of everything, 5) someone who worships something
else to act as a mediator to HKBH.

I have a few questions.

1) Is the Rambam equating a min with an oved avodah zarah? If so, the
Rambam would consider those great people of whom the Ra'avad famously
speaks not only mistaken but ovdei avodah zarah.

2) Does the Rambam claim that trinitarianism is polytheism, i.e. the
second type of minus?

3) Or does he accept the claim that trinitarianism is monotheism and
group Christianity in the third and/or fifth type of minus?

Gil Student

On Thu, Jul 05, 2001 at 09:21:12AM -0400, David Riceman [dtr] wrote:
>: R. Chaim Volozhiner is cited in Kether Rosh as saying he would give all
>: the tefilloth he'd prayed his whole life for one chiddush.

Micha Berger wrote:
> Which means that either:
> 1- RCV took the temimus fork, and therefore valued having the da'as Torah...
> 2- According to the Rambam's shitah that deveikus is acheived through
> one's knowledge of the Borei...

I had hoped that someone who's reviewed Nefesh HaHaim more recently than
I have would comment on this. Aren't R. Chaim's theories about deveikuth
through formalism in prayer and pshat in gemara (as opposed to sod in
both cases) relevant here?

Given his theories he could have taken the hayei olam vs. hayei shaa
distinction quite literally.

David Riceman

Some background information:

1. Many sects of Christianity flourished in the Islamic world, even though
the Christian world in the Rambam's time only a few were tolerated.
It need not be the case that all Christians are classified the same
(your # 3, for example would depend on one's opinion of Christ's nature,
which was in dispute).

2. The Rambam uses akum both as an ethnic classification (perhaps someone
with a CD can locate my favorite expression of this "akum sheeino oveid
avoda zara") and as a religious classification. My impression (and since
the Vilna Rambam was censored I don't know how accurate my impression is)
is that he reserves the term min for Jews.

3. The machloketh between the Rambam and the Raavad is precisely whether
a mistaken belief in God's corporeality is a form of minuth/avoda zara.
See (IIRC) Hazon Ish ad. loc. for the proper translation of mimenu.
See also the chapter in the Guide on the meaning of "belief" where he
mocks trinitarianism. Incidentally, Aquinas redefined trinitarianism by
borrowing the yodea/daath/yadua formula from the Rambam.

On to your questions:

gil.student@citicorp.com wrote:
> The Rambam defines five types of people as a min: 1) someone who does not
> believe in HKBH, 2) someone who believes in more than one deity, 3) someone
> who believes in one HKBH but that he is corporeal, 4) someone who believes
> that HKBH was not first and creator of everything, 5) someone who worships
> something else to act as a mediator to HKBH.

> I have a few questions.

> 1) Is the Rambam equating a min with an oved avodah zarah?

Yes, except for ethnicity.

> If so, the
> Rambam would consider those great people of whom the Ra'avad famously
> speaks not only mistaken but ovdei avodah zarah.

Yes.

> 2) Does the Rambam claim that trinitarianism is polytheism, i.e. the
> second type of minus?

Yes.

> 3) Or

Exclusive ors are inappropriate here.

> does he accept the claim that trinitarianism is monotheism

no

> and group Christianity in the third

depends on which sect

> and/or fifth type of minus?

yes

David Riceman

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