Avodah Mailing List

Volume 16 : Number 021

Sunday, November 6 2005

• Re: isolation - is it right or wrong?
• Re: isolation
• RE: Ikkare Hashkafa
• Re: Ikkare Hashkafa
• Six Days of Creation and Shabbos
• Re: The Power of Speech
• pas yisrael
• where to drop the chafetz
• isolation (vs. TIDE)
• TIDE
• RE: Avodah V16 #20
• Re: isolation - is it right or wrong?
• RE: isolation - is it right or wrong?
• RE: isolation - is it right or wrong?
• Kabbalah today
• Re: Torah and communal sheleimus

On Thu, Nov 03, 2005 at 03:18:41PM -0600, brent kaufman wrote:
: Of course Judaism is a ghetto religion.

And on Fri, Nov 04, 2005 at 01:18:28AM -0500, S & R Coffer wrote:
: Not everyone agrees with this interpretation of TIDE. There are two camps.
: One holds that RSRH felt that TIDE was the preferable approach whereas the
: second camp maintains that TIDE as a movement was created to address a
: situation, but intrinsically, RSRH would say that ideally, and if possible,
: one should devote his life entirely to Torah without wasting time on
: participation in foreign societies...

The following desciption of TIDE is from the Seridei Eish vol IV,
translated by R' Elyakim Krumbein for a Yeshivat Har Etzion email class on
mussar (available in an improved form as the book "Mussar for Moderns"):

    The Israelite religion does not wish to uproot the Jew from the soil
    of his growth, and transplant him elsewhere. Rather, it wishes to
    influence the whole man, to prepare his whole heart, his thoughts
    and deeds, for his exalted tasks. All that is human is near to it,
    for Judaism is - as Rav Hirsch himself put it - flawless, perfected
    humanity, a Jewish humanity. So it was in ancient Israel, and in the
    time of the Tannaim and Amoraim and Geonim, and partially so in the
    Golden Age experienced by the Jewish people in Spain. Judaism was
    never a source of suffering for Israel. Judaism for Israel was life
    in its fullness. No one dreamed of a possible separation between
    religion and life, as though they were separate or opposing forces.

    But the Jewish people underwent a mighty change during the time of
    the terrible Crusades. The terrible persecutions, the banishment from
    the different areas of life, the deprivation of breathing space and
    limitation of movement, also damaged the religious strength of the
    Jew seriously and weakened it.

    Together with the impoverishment of our life, the scope of our
    religion became increasingly narrower. Broad, important areas
    of life were cruelly wrested from our people and its religion.
    The Hebrew soul was torn to shreds. That joy which results from
    the total correspondence of spirit and life, ceased in Israel.
    Religion no longer had anything to do with life, and consequently,
    life ceased to be a matter of religion. Concrete living lost its
    religious form, and became a secular affair.

    The concept 'secular life,' which is foreign to the spirit of Israel,
    came into being during those dark times. The religious sense no
    longer drew sustenance directly from life... and was sustained only
    by the fear of death, and terror of the severe penalties of the
    World-to-Come. It is true, of course, that belief in divine reward
    and punishment is a basic Jewish principle... but extensive use of
    it, placing it at the center of religious feeling, turning it into
    the solitary propelling force for fulfilling mitzvot - can plunge
    a man into depression and induce spiritual malaise...

    This 'separation from life' resulted in the adoption of a negative
    stance towards life's achievements. The spirit of Israel wore black,
    donning a cloak of asceticism foreign to the spirit of Judaism.
    The ghetto stood for hundreds of years, and brought forth great,
    pious, holy men... who benefited from the splendor of the Torah, and
    whose thoughts, speech and deeds were inspired by its holy Presence.
    But within the ghetto walls lived multitudes who couldn't taste Torah
    or be inspired by it. They thirsted for life, and their spirit was
    crushed by their inability to reach it...

    But one day new winds began to blow in the world. The ghetto walls
    fell. Swirling currents of hope for light and freedom, for the
    prospect of life and productive activity, acquisition of wealth and
    social standing, flooded the furthest corners of the ghetto and its
    disenfranchised residents. The thirst for healthy life, so natural to
    the Jews... awoke once more with storm and fury. These revolutionary
    developments brought a crisis upon the congregation of Israel.
    The one-sided, life-negating religiosity collapsed ...On the one hand
    stood the elders... who defended with all their might the accepted
    form of religion which was based on the negation of life and its
    achievements, and on the other hand raged the newly-liberated from
    the ghetto-prison, intoxicated and giddy with freedom, who destroyed
    without scruple all that was precious and sacred in traditional life.

    At this time of peril appeared Rav Shimshon Raphael Hirsch of blessed
    memory and stood in the breach. He stood and proclaimed the ancient
    truth of Judaism: Religion and life are one and the same...

There are many RSRH quotes that similarly laud TIDE in very poetic
terms, but this is what I have in my handy cut-n-paste collection.
This should lay to rest any modern reinterpretations of TIDE as a hora'as
sha'ah. As well as show that it's far from a given that "Judaism is a
ghetto religion".

:-)BBii!
-mi

-- 
Micha Berger             With the "Echad" of the Shema, the Jew crowns
micha@aishdas.org        G-d as King of the entire cosmos and all four
http://www.aishdas.org   corners of the world, but sometimes he forgets
Fax: (270) 514-1507      to include himself.     - Rav Yisrael Salanter

Gershon Seif <gershonseif@yahoo.com> wrote:
> Let's not forget, that the Rambam himself wrote that his own society
> was such a place. Wouldn't the Rambam agree that his society has some
> virtue together with the bad? And still he wrote that one should isolate
> himself in that society.

> What can I do? Is there a better pshat in this Rambam? I'm not telling
> you what I hold, I'm just trying to learn up this Rambam honestly.

I think one has to define "isolate". What He probably means is that
one should not participate socially with them. That is, one should not
have them as friends, invite them over to your home, go to movies or
restaurants (even kosher ones) with them., or anything else like that.

I believe that he is right on that score. And I also believe that
most of the Frum world behaves that way. But that doesn't mean that
the Jewish people can't extract Mah SheMutar Lahem from the culture.
We can be friendly to non-Jews without making them our friends. We can
enjoy their company at work, participate with them in discusions about
politics or what was on TV last night or the Chicago White Sox World
Series victory. And we can imbibe in that part of the culture that is
not Assur. What we should NOT do is go to a bar after work with them or
invite them over to our homes etc. That is what the Rambam probably means.

HM

On November 3, 2005 
> I'm not quite sure what is meant in the above context by "the halachic
> title of a Jew" but I always thought if one's mother is a Jew, that
> would be the primary "halachic title of a Jew."

R' Micha already answered this question. I just wish to add that not
everyone holds that there are thirteen ikkarim that must be understood
in order to qualify for the title of Jew. The Ikkrim disagrees with
the Rambam on four principles (vis-a-vis considering them amongst the
fundamental principles of Yiddishkeit) and as far as the title Ikkarim
goes, he would only assign it to three items: Metzius Hashem, Torah
Misinai and Schar vaOnesh.

Simcha Coffer

On Fri, Nov 04, 2005 at 01:18:28AM -0500, S & R Coffer wrote:
: R' Micha already answered this question. I just wish to add that not
: everyone holds that there are thirteen ikkarim that must be understood
: in order to qualify for the title of Jew. The Ikkrim disagrees with the
: Rambam on four principles (vis-a-vis considering them amongst the
: fundamental principles of Yiddishkeit) and as far as the title Ikkarim
: goes, he would only assign it to three items: Metzius Hashem, Torah
: Misinai and Schar vaOnesh.

The Rambam is addressing the question of who is "Yisrael" WRT "kol
Yisrael yeish lahem cheileq". The Ikkarim isn't. He instead is seeking
the minimal list of primary principles that from which you can reason
your way to a complete emunah. They both use the same word "ikkarim",
but to mean different things: necessary belief vs postulate.

As for disagreement, we've discussed this before WRT more extreme cases,
like corporeality. Lehalakhah we hold like the Rambam. Ask any beis
din legiyur.

:-)BBii!
-mi

-- 
Micha Berger             It isn't what you have, or who you are, or where
micha@aishdas.org        you are,  or what you are doing,  that makes you
http://www.aishdas.org   happy or unhappy. It's what you think about.
Fax: (270) 514-1507                        - Dale Carnegie

Hello, this is my first post to this board, so if the topic has already
been discussed, I would appreciate it if you'd refer me to the archive.

In Avodah V16 #18, Micha wrote:
> The point isn't that speech is a real thing, the point is that every real
> thing is in truth just speech! "Vayomer E-lokim...."

I'll take the bait: if you say that about "Vayomer," what do you say
about every non-speech-related transitive verb in the Torah whose
subject is Divine? and is "v'holachta bidrachav" not real because the
"mah hu...af ata"s relate to midos and actions? For me, speech is a
physical actualization of what was spiritual, so if the spiritual world
is the Real World while the physical world (created via Divine amirah)
is just a means, speech isn't as real as the idea which it represents
and which preceded it.

All the best from
 -Michael Poppers via RIM pager

i wondered why the commercial systems to make bishul yisrael possible
arent used for pas.

here is the Ou webbe rebbe's response--
> JS-1465 -Electronic System for Pas Yisroel
> Dear Mr. Newman:
> Thank you for checking with the OU on your Kashruth question.
> The electronic system is used in those companies where the boiler is on
> constantly and on rare occasions, if it shuts off, the remote is used
> to start it up again. Bakeries shut off their boilers when not in use
> and it would not be feasible to have a rabbi available to start it on
> a daily basis

http://www.kehilasyaakov.org/newsletter.html rabbi bess'analysis [ in
the dvar halacha] on where to leave an object if carrying on shabbat.
distinction of NYC/Brooklyn population density per r moshe...

R' S. Coffer wrote:
> There are twocamps. One holds that RSRH felt that TIDE was the preferable
> approach whereas the second camp maintains that TIDE as a movement was
> created to address a situation, but intrinsically, RSRH would say that
> ideally, and if possible, one should devote his life entirely to Torah
> without wasting time on participation in foreign societies. Personally,
> I believe the latter is self evident and is supported by the Rambam
> himself in several places.

Personally, after years of agonizing over this, reading RSRH's own words
in many places, and hearing the arguments of both sides, I have come
to the firm conclusion that RSRH meant exactly what wrote and said as
l'chatchila. After reading R' Elchon's words and Bircas Shmuel at the
end of kidushin, and heard strong words from Litvishe Roshei Yeshiva
I've concluded that many Livuthuanian Roshei Yeshiva consider(ed) his
approach as dead wrong if he meant it as such. But they had respect for
what he had accomplished and who he was. So rather than fight him head on,
they attempt(ed) to make him into their shita. (Just my humble opinion)

If you find a Rambam to the contrary of his approach, so be it. That
doesn't make it RSRH's approach.

> Not everyone agrees with this interpretation of TIDE. There are two
> camps. One holds that RSRH felt that TIDE was the preferable approach
> whereas the second camp maintains that TIDE as a movement was created
> to address a situation, but intrinsically, RSRH would say that ideally,
> and if possible, one should devote his life entirely to Torah without
> wasting time on participation in foreign societies....

Basically the two camps consists of those RSRH and those that didn't.
Rabbis from Eastern Europe justified TIDE as a temporary expedient for
German Jewry. Everyone in the family and community who knew RSRH verify
the first alternative.
Obviously the Rambam himself spent much time leraning Grrek and
Arab philosophy.

--
Eli Turkel

From: "S & R Coffer" <rivkyc@sympatico.ca>
|Not everyone agrees with this interpretation of TIDE. There are two
|camps. One holds that RSRH felt that TIDE was the preferable approach
|whereas the second camp maintains that TIDE as a movement was created
|to address a situation, but intrinsically, RSRH would say that ideally,
|and if possible, one should devote his life entirely to Torah without
|wasting time on participation in foreign societies....

Can the second camp point to RSRH's writings for support? Or, as I
personally believe, they are just trying to claim RSRH without any
evidence. I'll reserve final judgment when I see the marei makomos in
RSRH's writings that you'll bring.

KT,
MSS 

In Avodah V16 #20 dated 11/4/2005 Simcha Coffer:
> Not everyone agrees with this interpretation of TIDE.  There are two
> camps. One holds that RSRH felt that TIDE was the preferable  approach
> whereas the second camp maintains that TIDE as a movement was  created
> to address a situation, but intrinsically, RSRH would say that  ideally,
> and if possible, one should devote his life entirely to Torah  without
> wasting time on participation in foreign societies. Personally, I  believe
> the latter is self evident and is supported by the Rambam himself  in
> several places.

You may personally disagree with TIDE, as did many eastern European
gedolim, but RSRH absolutely did not believe that TIDE was a hora'as
sha'ah. He believed that what he was teaching was normative Judaism,
the Judaism of the ages.

I don't mind arguments about TIDE pro and con but please don't take Hirsch
out of his own weltanschauung and pretend that he was somehow *really*
a Lakewood or Ponovezh "Torah only" kind of guy. I understand that
the Torah world does this because they absolutely have to concede that
he was a great tzaddik, and they don't have any other way of fitting a
tzaddik into their own world-view, but it is nevertheless a historical
falsification.

 -Toby  Katz
=============

From: "S & R Coffer" <rivkyc@sympatico.ca>
|Not everyone agrees with this interpretation of TIDE. There are two 
|camps. One holds that RSRH felt that TIDE was the preferable approach 
|whereas the second camp maintains that TIDE as a movement was created 
|to address a situation, but intrinsically, RSRH would say that ideally,
|and if possible, one should devote his life entirely to Torah without 
|wasting time on participation in foreign societies....

Can the second camp point to RSRH's writings for support? Or, as I
personally believe, they are just trying to claim RSRH without any
evidence. I'll reserve final judgment when I see the marei makomos in
RSRH's writings that you'll bring.

KT,
MSS 

On November 5, 2005, Samuel Svarc wrote:
> Can the second camp point to RSRH's writings for support?

I don't know. I don't belong to either camp due to the fact that I haven't
really studied RSRH in any great depth and therefore am not qualified to
make a judgement. However, as I mentioned above, I personally think that
it is self evident that any great Torah leader would eschew involvement
in foreign ideologies and cultures if the time could be spent in a more
constructive fashion such as limud haTorah and asiyas haMitzvos. Besides,
there is a big sakana in involving oneself with gentile surroundings as
the pasuk states "vayisarvu vagoyim vayilmidu ma'aseyhem".

> Or, as I
> personally believe, they are just trying to claim RSRH without any
> evidence.

Actually, that's not what it is. They are trying to put his shita in the
proper perspective due to the fact that, unfortunately, there are some
Jews today that misuse the idea of TIDE to mean Torah im gashmius thereby
justifying all forms of material pursuit in the name of the movement
and ultimately remain with very little, if any, of the Torah part.

[Email #2 -mi]

On November 6, 2005 T613K@aol.com wrote:
> You may personally disagree with TIDE, as did many eastern European gedolim,
> but RSRH  absolutely did not believe that TIDE was a hora'as sha'ah.  He believed
> that what he was teaching was normative Judaism, the Judaism of the ages.

I don't have a personal opinion of TIDE because I haven't studied it in
depth. My contention is with people who live a primarily materialistic
lifestyle and point to the tenets of TIDE (or its modern day permutation) as
the source material for their behaviour. They are the ones that are giving
TIDE a bad name.

Simcha Coffer

I am working on volume 2 of Daas Torah - dealing with the role the human
intellect, philosophy and Kabbalah play in halacha and hashkofa.

I am trying to clarify a number of assertions made with regard to Kabbalah

1) R' S. R. Hirsch did not accept the validity of post geonic Kabbalah
(Jewish Action Fall 1996 R' Danziger) - and that he viewed Kabbalah as
a type of aggada.

2) Chazon Ish had a dim view of the Kabbalistic understanding of most
accepted mekubbalim and discouraged the study of kabbalah.

3) Gra's statement YD 246 criticizing the understanding of Pardes of the
Rambam & Rema - is a forgery. Similarly his attack on the Rambam in YD
179 is also a forgery. (Rav Shurkin)

4) Rav Y. B. Soloveitchik made no reference to Kabbalah and it plays no
role in Brisker thinking

5) R' Yisroel Salanter asserted that he was not familiar with Kabbalah
and thus it is not relevant for the Mussar Movement

6) Chassidim view the Rambam & Moreh Nevuchim as Kabbala while Kabbalists
believe that he accepted Kabbalah only after completing all his writing -
and mostly everyone else rejects the idea that Rambam ever knew Kabbalah

7) Kabbalah has always been accepted almost unanimously by gedolim
throughout history. The only objection was to teaching it to the masses

8) Christianity is based on a distorted understanding of genuine
kabbalistic ideas (Rabbi Akiva Tatz)

9) Rejection of the validity of Kabbalah is rejection of the validity
of the Oral Torah - and thus constitutes heresy (Shomer Emunim)

10) Kabbala was given on Sinai but it eventually basically disappeared -
to be revived by the Rabad through human intellect and then with ruach
hakodesh and finally with the aid of Eliyahu (Shomer Emunim).

Daniel Eidensohn

Micha Berger <micha@aishdas.org> wrote:
> How do you know that what the hamon am observe really is Torah. I'm not
> talking about whether or not they follow halakhah. As I wrote earlier,
> I'm concerned about opinions like the Vilna Gaon's, that even "shelo
> lishmah" needs to be for the sake of becoming lishmah.

What is Torah if not Halacha? Following Halacha almost by defintion
means doing so L'Shma and not by rote or for social reasons. That being
said though I admit there needs to be room for Mitoch SheLo L'Shma Bah
L'Shma. But I think the GRA's approach needs to be examined. Is there any
Schar for a Mitzva done completely SheLo L'Shma? I think the answer is no.

Here's is an example of what I mean:

If one who normally eats Treif, has in front of him a Kosher Delight
hamburger and a MacDonald's hamburger, he gets no credit for eating
the kosher hamburger if he does so for reasons other than at some level
wanting to keep kosher. If on the other hand one who normally eats Treif
chooses the kosher hamburger because he wants to explore his religion and
see what a kosher hamburger tastes like, he is in a category of Mitoch.

Allow me to ramble a bit:

Generally speaking I think it is not a all or nothing issue. Many who
observe Halacha because of social reasons are not doing so entirely for
that reason although that may be a partial or even primary reason. There
is kind of a scale, I would say, where one can measure where one is on
the L'Shma spectrum. I suppose there is a small number of people that are
observant for completely social reasons and when alone violate Halacha
freely. There are those like the GRA himself whose actions are entirely
L'Shem Shamyim. But I am not talking about either extreme. I believe the
majority of Orthodox Jews are somewhere inbetween those extremes. They are
a combination of rote observors of Halacha, social observors of Halacha,
and L'Shem Shamayim observors of Halacha. Where on that spectrum they
fall is what determines their degree of Sheleimus.

Like evrything else in life, it is not an either or sitiuation. And the
degree of Sheleimus of an individual definitely inpacts on his or her
behavior as much as their behavior impacts on their Sheleimus. But as
I said even one who is primarily L'Shma can fall too, if his personality
development is abnormal. And abnormal personality development is not an
either/or situation either. There is a spectrum of normal to abnormal
deveplopmemnt as well. And each impacts on the other.

> I wouldn't raise bechirah chofshi and abnormal psych in the same paragraph
> without dealing with the huge can of worms it implies.

Yes, there is a troubling divide between the idea of abnormal behavior as
a determinant of behavior and the concept of Bechira Chafshis. The very
concept of abnormal personality development implies a lack in Bechira
Chafshis. The Freudian idea that behavior is predetermined by one's early
childhood experiences is contrary to the concept of Bechirah Chafshis. But
the truth (as in most things) lies somewhere inbetween . One's behavior
is somewhat predetermied by how his personality developed. What I mean is
that someone with an abnormal personality will have a stronger inclination
to act inappropriatly than will someone with a normal personality.

The Torah recognizes this. The idea that different people have different
Nisyonos speaks to that issue. The Gamarah speaks of Taavos that certain
Tanaim had to overcome. They did. But not all Tannaim had Taavos like
that to overcome or not to that degree. The Torah does not require
all people to develop the same way. It only demands that we conform to
Halacha. The more abrormal a personality is the more difficult conforming
to Halacha becomes.

A good example of this is the child molestor. Experts tell us that a
child molester cannot be cured of his sexual deviancy. There seems to
be good evidence of that. Yet this flies in the face of the concept of
Bechira Chafshis. The answer is that it really doesn't. Any person in
any situation has a choice to do good or to do bad. The fact that the
Taavah to do bad is so great that it is overwhelming does not diminish
that fact. That is how you reconcile abnormal personality development
as a determinent of behavior with Bechira Chafshis.

> Most shomerei halakhah are not operating from an orientation of
> it being an innobling. If you define Torah as including that orientation,
> then I would assert assert that the tiny difference in crime demographics
> is because that which most shomerei halakhah observe is not really Torah.
> If not, then I would say that the Torah is a tool, and while they're
> firmly grasping the tool, they aren't using it for enoblement.

Here I invoke an element of RYBS's Halakhic Man. IMO if one observes
Halacha completely L'Shma, it automatically enobles him. There is no
"thinking about it" as enobling. It is automatic. The problem is if one
is not a purely Halakhic man. Then enobling does not automatically happen
as there are other considerations for following Halacha. The GRA was a
Halakhic man. I assume that his actions were totally L'Shma (as much as is
humanly possible). In this sense his beahavior was exemplary as there was
never any "giving in" to temptation. Most people are not Halakhic men. I
am also strongly convinced that the GRA's personality development was
more toward the normal side of the development scale. I think it would be
nearly impossible for a grossly abnormal personality to be a Halakhic man.
But somewhere in the spectrum between total L'Shma and total absence of
L'Shma there is a point where one can overcome his abnormal proclivities
(where the level of abnormality does not fall below a ceratin level). I
guess one can say that the more abnormal the personality the harder it
is to be enobled and acheive Sheleimus.

> Both choices seem more reasonable to me than assuming that most
> halakhah observers have abnormal psyches, and are therefore less
> redeemable. Although redemption is defined relative to starting point
> and opportunity...

I never said that. I was trying to postulate that there is a scale
of abnormal to normal personalities and that Nisyonos are handled
accordingly. Furthermore one can overcome adversity with greater
effort. The more abnormal the greater the effort that is needed. Where
most of Klal Yisroel falls on that scale is a matter of speculation but
my guess is that they are somewhere in the middle range.

This rambling of mine begs the question: Are those who would be
raised in a grossly abormal environment truly be responsible for their
actions... even with Bechira Chafshis? Say a Jew was raised by Billam and
knew what the Torah said, would he be responsible for becoming another
Billam, like his father?

HM

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


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