Avodah Mailing List

Volume 23: Number 174

Thu, 23 Aug 2007

• 1. RYBS and synthesis (Micha Berger)
• 2. standing for chasan and kallah (Prof. Levine)
• 3. Tachanun After a Bris (David Cohen)
• 4. Re: standing for chasan and kallah (Rich, Joel)
• 5. Re: The Custom of Reciting l'Dovid HaShem Ori (Arie Folger)
• 6. Re: The Custom of Reciting l'Dovid HaShem Ori (Moshe Y. Gluck)
• 7. Re: The Custom of Reciting l'Dovid HaShem Ori (Moshe Y. Gluck)
• 8. Re: Tachanun After a Bris (Zev Sero)
• 9. Parsha Questions - Ki Seitzei (SBA)
• 10. Re: Why is Milchemes Reshus allowed? (Micha Berger)
• 11. Re: Intuition - sources (Micha Berger)
• 12. Re: Kaparos? For PETA?s Sake! (Micha Berger)
• 13. Re: Lifnei Iver/Kana'us (Micha Berger)

On Areivim, I wrote that RYBS wasn't interested in synthesis. RHM
replied, and I found my comments to be general enough to appeal to
others of our chevrah who have interest in RYBS's machashavah. I am
therefore writing them here.

RYBS didn't address TuM much. Of his (so far) published work, two
speeches touch on the topic at all.

Back in http://www.aishdas.org/avodah/vol08/v08n049.shtml#08 I posted
an email from R Nechemia Klein, off one of YHE's email shiurim. Here
are the parts I feel define RYBS's version of TuM:
> Contrary to the prevalent opinion among many of the flag bearers of
> the concept "Torah UMaddah", the Rav's focus was to maximize the
> status of Torah through Maddah and not the other way around. He was
> opposed, as is evident through his writings, to the academization of
> Torah. He clearly held that Torah is the "Gvirah" (lady) and "Maddah"
> is the "shifcha" (maid). Torah and science are not equal and certainly
> one should not use Torah just as another feature of one's education,
> an ornament rather than a major feature.
...
> He never felt the need to be apologetic vis-a-vis secular wisdom.
> The Rav did hold that the words "Chillul Hashem" was the dearth of the
> Jewish sages and wise men who were revered even by discerning
> gentiles.
...
> The Rav ... used, in one of his drashot, the name "Ramatayim Tzofim"
> (See Shmuel I 1:1) symbolizing the dichotomy of Torah UMaddah. There
> are twin peaks -- one of Torah, the other of Maddah, which remain
> forever asunder. No synthesis exists. As a proud father, he described
> the schedule of his son Chaim.... One day Chaim deciphered a complex
> Talmudic passage -- on the other he reads Max Weber. Two peaks, two
> days. Rather than "Torah im Derech Eretz" of Rav Hirsch, towering
> Torah which is apart from towering Maddah. Only the separation and the
> intensive care of each achieves excellence in both.

(RNK contrasts this to RSRH's model, which was very Hegelian and very
much synthesis. See the above URL.)


The title Ramasayim Tzofim says it all -- two peaks, not one.

R' Aharon Rakefet puts it similarly, contrasting RSRH's synthesis with
RYBS's peaceful coexistence. The role of halakhah in all of this is to
give us the means to achieve that peace rather than to synthesize.

RYBS's Halachic Man is a synthesis, but not that of Torah uMadda. The
synthesis between homo religiosus and cognitive man is a religion
which invites man to be a creative partner with G-d. It finds itself
in Rav Chaim Brisker and the cognitive processes of lomdus and pesaq
halakhah. Cognition isn't limited to madda in a Litvisher world of an
intellectualized religiosity.

And yet, Halachic Man's synthesis isn't even a resolution of man's
creative cognition and man's emotion need to cleave to the A-lmighty.
Life doesn't begin and end with the creation of halakhah. RYBS still
feels the need to be a cognitive man in other realms, and for the
passionate tefillah he experienced among the chassidim of Chaslovitch.

RYBS was staunchly neo-Kantian. He saw Hegelian synthesis as too
facile to be a basis for meaningful existence. He saw the meaning of
life and the primary role of bechirah chafshis as being in living with
the conflicts of dialectic tension. RYBS therefore describes man and
the communities we enter/build as fraught with dialectics. (In fact,
the essay Community explores the very dialectic implied by my
"enter/build".)

Synthesis, at least in the sense of finding a whole which is fully
both of two conflicting poles and yet somehow something new and
greater than either, was not part of RYBS's agenda.

FWIW, in
http://www.aishdas.org/asp/2007/06/synthesis-and-dialectic.shtml I
write more on the subject of synthesis vs dialectic. Beqitzur, I
believe that the ideal of temimus and sheleimus, to truly be betzelem
E-lokim, one must partake of His Unity. And that is only acheivable
through synthesis. However, in the real world, "lo alekha hamlakhah
ligmor" -- we simply can never reach that plane. As such, I believe
the ideal man is in synthesis, but the rigors of life require dealing
with the not-yet-synthesized conflicts that force us to think,
prioritize, and use our bechirah.

This is also the thrust of a quote of R Gershon Rozenburg (Rav
"Shagar", RY of Siach Yitzchaq) in Haaretz 11 Jan 2005:
> Rabbi Kook presents the goal as being harmony among all the various
> values, whereas Rabbi Nachman viewed contradictions as a source of
> religious ecstasy. When you try to live simultaneously in all the
> worlds, there is a danger that you will end up living simplistically
> and superficially, or that you will try to force harmony. I identify
> with harmony as a goal, but in the real world, one must learn to live
> with contradictions.

However, I would state that last sentence more strongly. We are here
in the "real world" for the sake of living with those contradictions
and struggling to resolve them. Not just learning to live with
contradictions, but to realize that we live to reach a goal, not to
statically already be there. The diverse pieces left after sheviras
hakeilim must be healed. But to do so would be an undoing of ma'aseh
Bereishis.

Tir'u baTov!
-mi

-- 
Micha Berger             Spirituality is like a bird: if you tighten
micha@aishdas.org        your grip on it, it chokes; slacken your grip,
http://www.aishdas.org   and it flies away.
Fax: (270) 514-1507                            - Rav Yisrael Salanter

At 11:37 AM 08/22/2007, REMT wrote:
>      Apparently, I was not clear. The minhag Yerushalayim I cited, 
> which required the chasan's presence for not saying tachanun, is 
> not for a chasuna minyan; it is for a minyan in shul (usually 
> Shacharis, since Mincha is generally davened at the wedding) on the 
> day on which the wedding will subsequently take place.
>
>EMT

This is not the same thing, but I once witnessed the following. I was 
davening Shachris at Rav Avigdor Miller's shul one morning. After 
Kedushah, during Chazoras Ha Shatz,  Rav Miller quickly wrote out a 
note and gave it to me. Thinking it was for me, I read it. He pointed 
to the fellow behind me who was a new Chosson, so I handed it to him. 
The note said, "Please leave shul so we can say Tachanun." The 
chosson left and we said Tachanun. :-)

I have been told that it is the custom in KAJ in Washington Heights 
for Chassanim to leave shul so that the Tzebor can say Tachanun.

"It is good to be careful that a chasan not attend shul during the 
wedding week, because he would prevent the people from reciting 
Tachanun ... (Mishnah Berurah 131:26)"  This is from Rabbi Yisroel 
Reisman's Forward to Rabbi R. Slater's book Tachanun.

Yitzchok Levine 
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While we're on the topic of tachanun before/after a wedding, if the
chasan is/isn't there, etc...

How about omitting tachanun at mincha in a shul where a bris took
place earlier that day?

In the U.S., I never recall anybody thinking to omit tachanun for this
reason.  The Rama writes quite clearly in OC 131:4 that tachanun is
not omitted at mincha when there was a bris in the morning.

Yet in my current shul, every time the situation comes up, there is a
"shouting match" (of the friendly sort, of course) about what to do.
About half the time we end up saying tachanun, and about half the time
not.

I'm curious as to where this is coming from.  Is it minhag Eretz
Yisra'el to omit tachanun in this case?  Is it the Sefaradi minhag?
Does it make any difference if one of the "ba`alei bris" is present?

--D.C.

"It is good to be careful that a chasan not attend shul during the
wedding week, because he would prevent the people from reciting Tachanun
... (Mishnah Berurah 131:26)" This is from Rabbi Yisroel Reisman's
Forward to Rabbi R. Slater's book Tachanun. 


	Yitzchok Levine   

	============================================== 

	Which I've never understood especially since many times it seems
minyanim are meikil not to say tachanun at the drop of a hat but even
without that, why should we ask the chatan to give up tfila btzibbur for
our convenience? Why is it differ from the baal habrit etc?  BTW I think
my 1st point may explain R'DC's experience "Yet in my current shul,
every time the situation comes up, there is a "shouting match" (of the
friendly sort, of course) about what to do.", it is the custom however
that the sandek and the baal brit don't say tachanun at mincha, I'm not
sure why it doesn't carry over to the minyan. 

	  

	KT 

	Joel Rich

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RY Levine asked:
> I do not have Rav Yaakov Emden's siddur. Will someone who does,
> please let me know what it says about this topic [of reciting LeDavid HaShem 
ori etc. --AF]

I posted a comment on seforim.blogspot that curiously, his siddur includes it. 
However, I also pointed out that I have the doctored, nussach Sefard version, 
while I do not own the original, nussa'h Ashkenaz version.

-- 
Arie Folger
http://www.ariefolger.googlepages.com

> RY Levine asked:
> > I do not have Rav Yaakov Emden's siddur. Will someone who does,
> > please let me know what it says about this topic [of reciting LeDavid
> HaShem
> ori etc. --AF]
R' Arie Folger: 
> I posted a comment on seforim.blogspot that curiously, his siddur
> includes it.
> However, I also pointed out that I have the doctored, nussach Sefard
> version,
> while I do not own the original, nussa'h Ashkenaz version.


The new edition of RYE's siddur (Yerushalaim 5754) does not include it in
the instruction RYE gives for Elul (or in his instructions after the Shir
Shel Yom). (The fact that it is included in the text, after the Shir Shel
Yom, is no R'ayah - the editors made the Nusach consistent with our own.) I
didn't have the time to check through Tishrei, but I guess that if it isn't
in Elul (where he does mention the minhag to blow Shofar) then it isn't in
Tishrei either. 

KT,
MYG

> RY Levine asked:
> > I do not have Rav Yaakov Emden's siddur. Will someone who does,
> > please let me know what it says about this topic [of reciting LeDavid
> HaShem
> ori etc. --AF]

Another data point: Mor U'ketziah doesn't seem to say anything about it
either (in Siman 581).

KT,
MYG

David Cohen wrote:
> While we're on the topic of tachanun before/after a wedding, if the
> chasan is/isn't there, etc...
> 
> How about omitting tachanun at mincha in a shul where a bris took
> place earlier that day?
> 
> In the U.S., I never recall anybody thinking to omit tachanun for this
> reason.  The Rama writes quite clearly in OC 131:4 that tachanun is
> not omitted at mincha when there was a bris in the morning.

AIUI that is only after the seuda is over.  If the seuda won't be held
until after mincha, or is still going at least in part during mincha,
then tachanun is not said.  At least, that's how I've seen it done.

IIRC I've been told on good authority a maaseh rav indicating that if
someone was sent food from the seudah, and intends to eat it that day
but hasn't done so yet, and he's present during mincha, tachanun is not
said.  But I may not be recalling this correctly - it's based on
something that I was told happened at my brother's bris, but since I
was quite young at the time I may have misunderstood.

-- 
Zev Sero               Something has gone seriously awry with this Court's
zev@sero.name          interpretation of the Constitution.
                       	                          - Clarence Thomas

For those who may be learning this weeks parsha...

23:9. Rashi dh "Banim: "...lomadto shehamachti le'adam kasha 
lo min hahorgoy.."
Thus Amon uMoav who were machti the Bnei Yisroel are assur lavo 
bakohol.

AFAIK, none of the classics seem to mention where/when did
 Amon machti the BY?
(The Shaarei Aharon quotes a Sifri that they were advisors to 
the Bnos Midyon parsha.)

23:10/11. Rashi dh: 'Veyotzo' and 'Lo Yovoy' writes that a 
baal keri who leaves the machneh and doesn't come inside - is
mekayem a Mitzvas Asei and a Lo Sasei.

Isn't it a bit strange that these mitzvos are limited to Baalei Keri ???
(Although I did see mentioned that the same refers to a man and woman
 who had relations. But that would hardly happen in an army camp.)

And Rashi's comment that the BK is forbidden to enter Machne Leviyeh and 
Machneh Shechina also could do with some explanation.
Did such Machnos exist in the army camps? 
The Shaarei Aharon mentions that the Aron Hakodesh which went to war 
with them was the Machneh Shechina, which IMHO doesn't really explain.
Also, then what was the Machneh Leviyeh?

In p. 13 dh "Mechutz lamachneh" - Rashi writes Chutz l'anan'. Was there an 
'anan' in the army camps?
I saw one peirush say that although the anan disappeared after the passing 
of Aharon, it came back to them later bizchus Moshe. 

Has anyone any more/better explanation? 

SBA

On Mon, August 20, 2007 8:08 am, RAM <kennethgmiller@juno.com> wrote:
: Yes, an ubar can be a rodef. In such a case, the ubar is responsible
: for the situation. Granted that the ubar has no daas, and it is not an
: intentional threat, but nevertheless, the ubar *is* attacking the
: mother...
: So too, if the foreign country is <<< actually responsible for our
: starvation >>>, then we can defend ourselves by attacking them, even
: if they are not *intentionally* causing our problem, and this would be
: a milchemes mitzva.

Communities need to be able to support "natural growth". Not to get
too political, but even during Oslo's heyday, communities in Yesha
were given the ability to grow to support stability. Whether or not
you think that it was necessary at the time, AFAIK all agree with the
idea in principle; if a community can't grow, it faces a real threat
of failure.

It was this idea that I was thinking of when I wrote about the cost of
economic failure. There is a real -- even if unintentional threat --
posed by countries that remain on Israel's border at a time when the
country needs to undergo such growth.

Being a good neighbor will end up costing lives.

Of course it would require a melekh and a poseiq to determine what is
necessary and natural growth and what is (lehavdil elef alfei
havdalos) Nazi-esque "Lebensraum".

Tir'u baTov!
-mi

-- 
Micha Berger             Spirituality is like a bird: if you tighten
micha@aishdas.org        your grip on it, it chokes; slacken your grip,
http://www.aishdas.org   and it flies away.
Fax: (270) 514-1507                            - Rav Yisrael Salanter

On Sat, August 18, 2007 11:50 pm, Daniel Eidensohn wrote:
: Any source that  "G-d wants the heart" that one should do that which
: seems intutively correct?

The QTYH mitzvos (*Q*edoshim tihyu, ve'asisa ha*T*ov veha*Y*ashar,
ve*H*alakhta biderachav) presume a definition of qedushah, tov, yashar
and derakhav that is accessible without specific instruction. Okay,
maybe one can split-off vehalakhta diderakhav from that list. I'll
stick to QYH.

And, as already discussed here in the past (reference to a 2nd
thread), "man desani lakh" is theoretically intuitive.

But the problem is that one needs the right intuitions. Different
people's intutions will be correct in different situations. I have
even argued that a more authentic definition of da'as Torah (as the
term has been used since RYS's recoinage) would be "Torah shaped
intution" (a third discussion). Which in yet another thread (#4) I
argued was the real basis for banning electricity on Shabbos. There is
more consensus that it simply doesn't intuitively fit the idea of
Shabbos than figuring out the mechanics of the issur.

Along the lines of having a properly developed intuition, so that one
needn't worry about being mislead, we have Nefesh haChaim 1:18 on how
avos kept the Torah before it was given (5th reference to old
discussion). They were able to feel what was missing and thus deduce
what needed doing or needed to be avoided. It would seem that on their
madreiga, one could intuit kol haTorah kulah!

It would seem to me that Rachmana liba ba'i means that Hashem wants
your heart's intuition to match His Will, rather than your suggestion
that He wants you to follow your heart "ba'asher hu sham". (This is
old topic #6, using the leining for Rosh haShanah to argue that din is
not about action, but about the kind of person you have become. Now
I'm adding the role of intuition in defining that "kind of person".)

Tir'u baTov!
-mi

-- 
Micha Berger             Spirituality is like a bird: if you tighten
micha@aishdas.org        your grip on it, it chokes; slacken your grip,
http://www.aishdas.org   and it flies away.
Fax: (270) 514-1507                            - Rav Yisrael Salanter

Continuing on my previous post's final comment, about din being a
consequence of who the person became...

I not only find this in Yishma'el being judged "ba'asher hu sham" but
also in Unsaneh Tokef -- What is Hashem's "seifer hazichronos" that
"umei'alav yiqarei"? Or the seifer of the mishnah's "vekhol ma'asekha
baseifer nichtavim"?

See Derashos haRan (10), the Ikkarim (4:13), who place the "writing of
the sin" as dirt on the outside of the soul, preventing its deveiqus,
and Shaarei Teshuvah 4:1 who places it within, as a disease.

Which means that the current discussion raised by RAM is difficult for
me to explain. Where is the din veDayan?

On Thu, August 9, 2007 4:15 pm, kennethgmiller@juno.com wrote (quoting
in full since 2 weeks is an eternity in email list time):
:> At least according to Rebbi (Yoma 85b), Yom Kippur is mechaper
:> even without Teshuvah. I do not understand how that would work

: R"n Toby Katz answered:
:> The inuyim of Yom Kippur provide atonement, the same as any
:> punishment or consequence or suffering inflicted by a bais din
:> or by Shomayim -- not total atonement, in the absence of teshuva,
:> but at least partial kapara.

: So Yom Kippur can be partially mechaper without teshuva, but not
: without the inuyim. I had not thought of that. Thanks!

My understanding is that itzumo shel yom is mechapeir, but without
inuyim, one isn't connected to that etzem. IOW, someone who eats on YK
doesn't get kapparah, but someone who observes YK gets kapparah from
YK itself, not the zekhus of observance.

And it's clear from R' Elazar ben Azaryah on Yuma 86a that YK is never
effective in and of itself.
- For an asei, teshuvah is effective
- For a regular lav, teshuvah must first achieve selichah (removal of
onesh) before YK can effect kaparah
- For a chayav kareis, one needs teshuvah and YK for selichah, and
onesh brings kaparah
- For chillul Hashem, only misah brings kaparah.

The philosophical problems are
(1) The justice in YK being mechapeir
(2) Given a ba'asher hu sham approach, why would onesh or misah in and
of itself help?

I couldn't make heads or tails of it without stretching the notion,
and saying that YK is mechapeir to the extent that one allows oneself
to experience the soul-changing nature of YK, and thus change the
ba'asher hu sham. Similarly oneshim or misah.

This solution is difficult, as it's a far stretch from the words, to
say that "itzumo shel yom" is the day's ability to effect teshuvah.
Even further is distinguishing teshuvah from YK or oneshim if one
presumes that they only have power because they change the person, and
thus are subclasses of teshuvah.

But the problem is acute. Judaism isn't magick, where people can avoid
justice through empty motions. The aforementioned rishonim explain it
causally in terms of the state of the neshamah -- which implies some
state-change being necessary for REBA's notion to work. And "ba'asehr
hu sham" isn't just a pasuq, it's a critical lesson we intentionally
bring to Rosh haShanah.

Thoughts?

Tir'u baTov!
-mi

-- 
Micha Berger             Spirituality is like a bird: if you tighten
micha@aishdas.org        your grip on it, it chokes; slacken your grip,
http://www.aishdas.org   and it flies away.
Fax: (270) 514-1507                            - Rav Yisrael Salanter

On Sun, August 12, 2007 3:11 pm, R Moshe Y. Gluck wrote:
: There is a discussion on Areivim now about the merits of a Rebbe who
: supposedly ripped an indecent sign off the interior of a bus.... [L]et
: me reformulate the question: Your Jewish neighbor's mail is
: inadvertently delivered to your home, and among the rest of the mail
: is an obscene magazine. The assumption here is that he will never know
: if you don't give it to him. Do you...

Are the cases comparable lehalakhah?

First, the issurim are on a different level. Indecent signs cause
hirhurei aveira, not aveira itself.

Second, the value of tochakhah requires knowing (among many other
things) how it will be received. The otherwise frum neighbor who has a
runaway ta'avah is more reachable than Israeli society at large.

Tir'u baTov!
-mi

-- 
Micha Berger             Spirituality is like a bird: if you tighten
micha@aishdas.org        your grip on it, it chokes; slacken your grip,
http://www.aishdas.org   and it flies away.
Fax: (270) 514-1507                            - Rav Yisrael Salanter



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