Avodah Mailing List

Volume 33: Number 33

Sun, 01 Mar 2015

• 1. charedi women's political party (Eli Turkel)
• 2. Different Ways of Pronouncing Hebrew (Eli Turkel)
• 3. Re: Meshech Chochmah on Kedushah (Kenneth Miller)
• 4. Subject: majority rule (David Wacholder)
• 5. Re: Meshech Chochmah on Kedushah (Zev Sero)
• 6. Re: Different Ways of Pronouncing Hebrew (Zev Sero)
• 7. Tehiyyas hameisim (David Riceman)
• 8. Re: Different Ways of Pronouncing Hebrew ()
• 9. Re: Different Ways of Pronouncing Hebrew (Zev Sero)
• 10. Re: Different Ways of Pronouncing Hebrew (Kenneth Miller)
• 11. The Basics Of Matanos La'evyonim And Mishloach Manos (Prof. Levine)
• 12. Re: Meshech Chochmah on Kedushah (Marty Bluke)
• 13. Re: Meshech Chochmah on Kedushah (Zev Sero)
• 14. Re: Meshech Chochmah on Kedushah (Marty Bluke)

Rabbi Mordechai Blau, chairman of the Guardians of Sanctity and Education
group, has threatened in public that a woman who dares support a party
which is not led by the Torah sages "will be deprived of a ketubah (Jewish
marriage contract), people will not be permitted to purchase anything from
her, and it will become a mitzvah to remove all her offspring from the
institutions."

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4630596,00.html

Is there any halachic basis to being deprived of a ketubah for undesirable
(according to them) political activities . Of course this assumes the
husband is divorcing her.

-- 
Eli Turkel
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> Yet apparently the people in Canaan spoke the same language that
> Avraham did,

What makes us think so? >>

Obviously all the avot spoke with their neighbors both in Canaan and in Ur
Kasdim, Aram etc.
Of course Avraham might have invented a similar language to speak with his
wives and children, no way of knowing that.

For the period of the first temple we have written records (eg ostraca)
written in the old alphabet that shows the progression of the language from
various caananite languages towards Hebrew.
These typically are short messages between the king's office and various
outside officers.

-- 
Eli Turkel
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R' David Wacholder wrote:

> When Hashem broke the Luchos on the 17 of Tamuz, only
> Moshe Rabeinu?s intercession saved the situation.

Is there a typo here? I thought that it was Moshe Rabenu who broke them. The Torah even says so in black and white: "asher shibarta".

But if there was indeed a typo in the first half, what was the second half supposed to say? If it was Moshe who broke them, then who was it that interceded?

Akiva Miller
____________________________________________________________
Buffett?s Nightmare
Warren Buffett admits this is a ?real threat?
http://thirdpartyoffers.juno.com/TGL3131/54f068e7821df68e72ce2st02vuc

<According to Tosafot the machloket between Bet Shammai and Bet Hillel was a
meta-argument whether one follows the majority of people or the majority of
brainpower.
<By definition this can't be resolved and so there was a need for a "bat
kol".
<One can explain this gemara either according to a pluralistic view or one
that says there is only one truth and both positions exist.

Rav Saadya Gaon and Rav Sherira discuss the pre-Mishnah. The Laws were
passed on father to son, allowing more communication of emotional content.
When the first identified Yeshivoth began to form, the gain in group debate
was offset by some loss in Father to Son genuine commitment.

Shamai and Hillel came with entire cultures and approaches. As long as
their students remembered them vividly - no student of Shamai - aka Shmuwti
- could be overruled.
Thus when discussing pre-Churban Tanna'im - one hears often that a
 follower  of Shamai literally performed his duties.

When the bas Kol came from Heaven, it was after the images of Shamai and
Hillel were memories. No more could a Tanna say that certainly Shamai or
Beis Shamai must rule this way! Rather - there was a formal record of
rulings and debates between the two schools as in Tractate Idiyos. Once
that key step happened, it was finally possible to close the door - Halacha
k'beis Hillel except where enumerated.



The Hadrianic persecutions had prevented peaceful assembly and large public
Yeshivahs. The friendly Roman officials in the time of Rabi Yehudah Hanasi
contrasted with perhaps two generations of turmoil. Much continuity was
lost, Even in disputes with long histories, most discussion is recorded
among the students of Rabi Akiva.

Among Rabi Akiva's major students, Rabi Yehudah Bar Ilai stands out in the
Mishnah for preserving older traditions. He was the recognized preserver of
MAASEH  historical memory.

The Tanna Rabi Yehudah Bar Ilai received many traditions from his father
Rabi Ilai. Rabi Ilai had pursued Torah far and wide. For example Rabi Ilai
was the only student spent his Chol Hamoeid visiting Rabi Eliezer far from
home. Rabi Eliezer told him he should have stayed home in his own Sukkah as
is proper.  Often Rabi Yehudah backs up a Halacha with Maaseh... even
regarding long lost generations. Halacha and Maaseh are joined. It is
especially noticeable in the Mishnah Sukkah.

Commonly Rabi Yehudah takes a more simple rule. Rabi Shimon follows Kavana
intention more often, while Rabi Yehudah looks more at physical results,
even when unintended. Which will hold Davar She'eino Mithkavein Assur?

This Leshitaso generally works, but I would love to hear exceptions.


David Wacholder
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On 02/27/2015 12:03 AM, David Wacholder via Avodah wrote:
> This ambivalence is expressed by contrasting the pre-Cheit closeness ?
> I carried them on eagles? wings ? with the post-Cheit mixed emotions.
> Thus ? Moshe you provide the stones. The specific text said that
> Hashem was not overly excited to write the Luchos Shniyos, so either
> He wrote it the same as First luchos with Etzba Elokim, or
> demonstratively had Moshe Rabeinu participate in the writing.

The Yalkut Shimoni, which explicitly gives this narrative, specifies that
the king says "You destroyed the old contract, and now you want a new one;
very well, you bring me all the materials, and I will provide my handwriting."
In other words, you broke it, you fix it to the extent that you can, and I
will only do what you can't.

But note that the very same Yalkut then says that in fact Hashem provided
Moshe with the raw material from which he could fashion the new luchos!
The implication, it seems to me, is that the second luchos were also not
physical sapphire but the same "maaseh-Elokim stuff" from which Hashem
made the first ones.  (This would be like the king, after insisting that
the bride provide all the materials for the new ketuba, then giving her
the money with which to buy them, since she has none of her own.  In
other words, as I see it, He's not truly being cold to her, but teaching
her responsibility.)

-- 
Zev Sero               I have a right to stand on my own defence, if you
z...@sero.name          intend to commit felony...if a robber meets me in
                        the street and commands me to surrender my purse,
                        I have a right to kill him without asking questions
                                               -- John Adams

On 02/27/2015 07:09 AM, Eli Turkel via Avodah wrote:
>>> Yet apparently the people in Canaan spoke the same language that
>>> Avraham did,

>> What makes us think so?

> Obviously all the avot spoke with their neighbors both in Canaan and
> in Ur Kasdim, Aram etc.

And what language did they speak in Ur Kasdim and Aram?  Not Hebrew!
Everyone agrees they spoke Aramaic, and Avraham spoke to them in Aramaic.
So why, when he gets to Kenaan, do we suddenly assume that the locals
spoke Hebrew?  The only reason I can think of why people assume this is
because the secular archaeologists have told them so, and that conclusion
is highly suspect.



> Of course Avraham might have invented a similar language to speak
> with his wives and children, no way of knowing that.

Why would we even suppose that?


> For the period of the first temple we have written records (eg
> ostraca) written in the old alphabet that shows the progression of
> the language from various caananite languages towards Hebrew.

What are you talking about?  By Mattan Torah Hebrew was already there!
You can only be quoting people who claim the Torah was written later,
and therefore we can't give their opinions any credence.

-- 
Zev Sero               I have a right to stand on my own defence, if you
z...@sero.name          intend to commit felony...if a robber meets me in
                        the street and commands me to surrender my purse,
                        I have a right to kill him without asking questions
                                               -- John Adams

It looks like I'll be having open heart (valve replacement) surgery next 
month.  According to the people who accept Hazal's criteria of death 
literally, and assuming that I survive the experience, would I have been 
dead during the operation? What halachic effects would that have.  For 
instance, would my son inherit all of my property? Would I and my wife 
have to remarry? Would I owe her her kesuba?

David Riceman

 

From: Zev Sero via Avodah <avo...@lists.aishdas.org>
>  Yet apparently the people in Canaan spoke the same language that
> Avraham  did,[--TK]

What makes us think so?

-- 
Zev  Sero                
z...@sero.name          


>>>>
Lavan and Yakov had different names -- in different languages -- for the  
monument they erected.  When Yosef's brothers went down to Egypt, there was  
an interpreter in court.  In contrast, there is nothing in any of the  
exchanges and conversations between Avraham and anyone else in Canaan to  
indicate that they were speaking different languages.  
 
Avraham came from Aram, where presumably they spoke some early form of  
Aramaic.  If anything, Aramaic may have been his first language and he  learned 
Hebrew when he came to Canaan.
 
All this is speculative, of course.
 
 

--Toby Katz
t6...@aol.com
..
=============


-------------------------------------------------------------------
 


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On 02/27/2015 03:13 PM, via Avodah wrote:
> From: Zev Sero via Avodah <avo...@lists.aishdas.org>

>>> Yet apparently the people in Canaan spoke the same language that
>>> Avraham did,[--TK]
>
>> What makes us think so?


> Lavan and Yakov had different names -- in different languages -- for
> the monument they erected.

This is the greatest proof against your claim.  This shows us that Lavan's
language was Aramaic, and yet this is the *only* hint of this; the Torah
gives us all their conversations in Hebrew, and yet now that we've seen this
pasuk we know that they probably took place in Aramaic.


> When Yosef's brothers went down to Egypt,
> there was an interpreter in court.

Once again, there is no hint of this throughout the story, except in this
one place where the Torah tells us about it because it's relevant.  If not
for this pasuk we would imagine that they were all speaking Hebrew, but now
we know they weren't.   These two examples show that just because the Torah
tells us about an exchange in Hebrew doesn't mean it happened in Hebrew.


> In contrast, there is nothing in
> any of the exchanges and conversations between Avraham and anyone
> else in Canaan to indicate that they were speaking different
> languages.

I'm not suggesting they were, though now that you mention it it's
distinctly possible.  If they were using interpreters the Torah
wouldn't tell us about it, because it wouldn't be relevant to the story.
But my first assumption is that they were speaking Canaanite.  Avraham,
as an immigrant, would have learned the local language and spoken it,
perhaps with an accent.


> Avraham came from Aram, where presumably they spoke some
> early form of Aramaic. If anything, Aramaic may have been his first
> language

Of course it was, just like Lavan.


> and he learned Hebrew when he came to Canaan.

This is the part I'm challenging.  There's no hint of it in the Torah, and
as far as I can tell the only reason anyone thinks it is because secular
archaeologists claim it.  The same archaeologists who insist that there is
no sign of Yehoshua's conquest.  The answer in both cases is that they are
dating the remains too early, or the conquest too late; the Hebrew-speaking
people they are calling Kenaanim were in fact Jews, living post-conquest.


-- 
Zev Sero               I have a right to stand on my own defence, if you
z...@sero.name          intend to commit felony...if a robber meets me in
                        the street and commands me to surrender my purse,
                        I have a right to kill him without asking questions
                                               -- John Adams

R"n Toby Katz wrote:

> Lavan and Yakov had different names -- in different languages --
> for the monument they erected.

R" Zev Sero responded:

> This is the greatest proof against your claim.  This shows us that
> Lavan's language was Aramaic, and yet this is the *only* hint of
> this; the Torah gives us all their conversations in Hebrew, and
> yet now that we've seen this pasuk we know that they probably took
> place in Aramaic.

I disagree partially. I agree that the names for the monument show that
Lavan's language was Aramaic, and that Yaakov's was Lashon Hakodesh. But I
do not see any clues about which language(s) they spoke to each other. They
may have both spoken Lashon Hakodesh, or they may both have spoken Aramaic,
or there may have been an interpreter - I see nothing in the psukim to say
one way or another.

In contrast, the presence of the interpreter between Yosef and his brothers
is pretty iron-clad proof that they were using different languages. (I
suppose it is possible that the brothers did know Egyptian but spoke a
different language anyway, but I can't imagine why they would have done
that.)

RTK, about Avraham Avinu:

> and he learned Hebrew when he came to Canaan.

RZS:

> This is the part I'm challenging.  There's no hint of it in the
> Torah, and as far as I can tell the only reason anyone thinks it
> is because secular archaeologists claim it. ...

R' Zev, where do you think that Avraham learned Lashon Hakodesh from? Was
it a masorah from Adam HaRishon that he learned from Shem and Ever? Or did
he get it by nevuah? I'm not arguing with you, I'm just looking for details
of your viewpoint.

Akiva Miller
____________________________________________________________
Forget the iPhone 6
Did Apple Just Show Us the Future?
http://thirdpartyoffers.juno.com/TGL3131/54f25e61cd4b5e607792st04vuc

Please see http://tinyurl.com/mgjnsll

R' Zev Sero wrote:
> whatever was on the first set was on the second set. There is no possible
> doubt or machlokes about that.

There certainly is. It is not at all clear that the 2 luchos had the
same text. The Gemara in Bava Kama (54b-55a) has the following story:
R' Chanina ben Agil asked R' Chiya bar Abba why in the first dibros it
doesn't say tov and in the second dibros it does? R' Chiya answered,
you ask why it says tov, I don't even know if it does say tov and he
sent him to ask R' Tanchum who explained that since the first luchos
were broken they didn't say tov.

Many acharonim ask the obvious question, how could R' Chiya not know if
it says tov in the dibros? A number of Acharonim (Pnei Yehoshua, Rif, on
the Eyn Yaakov and others) explain the Gemara as follows. The discussion
between the 2 was about the luchos (as we see from the Gemaras answer). R'
Chanina assumed that what was written on the first luchos corresponded to
the first dibros and what was written on the second luchos corresponded to
the second dibros. R' Chiya answered him, I don't know what was written
on the luchos, go ask R' Tanchum. R' Tanchum validated R' Chanina's
assumption and explained the difference in the luchos explaining that
since the first luchos were broken gov was not written on them. Now
we can understand R' Chiya, of course he knew the pesukim in Chumash,
but he didn't know what exactly what was written on the luchos.

We see according to these acharonim that the maskana of the Gemara was
that tov was written on the second luchos but not the first.

Additonally, the Radvaz in a teshuva writes that the first luchos were
written in ksav assures while the second luchos were written in ksav
ivri according to R' Yosi (see Sanhedrin 21).


R' Zev Sero wrote:
> The Torah says explicitly that Hashem wrote the second luchos. How can you
> see an implication otherwise? What could possibly make you think the
> subject of "vayichtov" is Moshe, when Hashem said He would write them?

The Medrash Raba (Shemos 47:2
http://hebrewbooks.org/pdfpager.aspx?req=14385&;st=&pgnum=370&hilite=)
states EXPLICITLY that Moshe wrote the second luchos.

"Amar Hakodosh Baruch Hu l'Moshe, haluchos harishonim ani kasavti ... aval
hashnyim k'sov ata "

My translation
"Hashem told Moshe, the first luchos I wrote ... but the second ones you
write"

On 03/01/2015 04:51 AM, Marty Bluke wrote:
> R' Zev Sero wrote:
>> "The Torah says explicitly that Hashem wrote the second luchos. How
>> can you see an implication otherwise? What could possibly make you
>> think the subject of "vayichtov" is Moshe, when Hashem said He would
>> write them?"
  
> The Medrash Raba (Shemos 47:2
> http://hebrewbooks.org/pdfpager.aspx?req=14385&;st=&pgnum=370&hilite=)
> states EXPLICITLY that Moshe wrote the second luchos.
>
> "Amar Hakodosh Baruch Hu l'Moshe, haluchos harishonim ani kasavti ...
> aval hashnyim k'sov ata "
>
> My translation "Hashem told Moshe, the first luchos I wrote ... but
> the second ones you write"
>

And what does it say immediately afterwards?   "Ulvai ve'eten bah yadi,
hada hu dichsiv, 'Ve'echtov al haluchos'".  The king tells his wife's
advocate you prepare the document and I will sign it, thus it is written,
"and *I will write* on the luchos".   Hashem clearly says that *He*, not
Moshe, will write.  This seems to contradict the reisha of the medrash,
but that's not my problem.  Perhaps the reisha has an error of some sort,
and "kesov" should read "`asei", or perhaps there's a missing phrase where
Hashem says "I *ought* to let you write it".   In any case, this is only
one of several explanations (one is at the end of the whole discussion at
the bottom of page 371, and some more on page 372); the 1st, 3rd, and 5th
take it for granted that "vayichtov" means Hashem, while the 4th says so
explicitly.   The 6th is ambiguous.  (BTW I'm not clear on the difference
between the 1st and 4th, or the 3rd and 5th.)

But really I don't care what one opinion in the  medrash says, since the
medrash has no authority to contradict explicit pesukim; if you find one
that appears to do so, the question is on the medrash, not on the pasuk.
Both in Shmos and in Devarim Hashem promises explicitly that He will write,
and in Devarim it says clearly that Hashem wrote.  In Shmos it also says
"vayichtov", but the subject is ambiguous; but in the context of three
other explicit pesukim, this ambiguity disappears and it puzzles me how
anyone can still see it.


> R' Zev Sero wrote:
>> "whatever was on the first set was on the second set. There is no
>> possible doubt or machlokes about that."

> There certainly is. It is not at all clear that the 2 luchos had the
> same text. The Gemara in Bava Kama (54b-55a) has the following story:
> [story omitted]

I don't have an explanation for this story, but once again we have
an explicit pasuk that the second luchos were "kamichtav harishon".
And the same Medrash Raba that you just quoted says (on page 371)
"melamed sheharishonim veha'acharonim hayu shavim".

-- 
Zev Sero               I have a right to stand on my own defence, if you
z...@sero.name          intend to commit felony...if a robber meets me in
                        the street and commands me to surrender my purse,
                        I have a right to kill him without asking questions
                                               -- John Adams

R'Zev Sero wrote:

> And what does it say immediately afterwards?   "Ulvai ve'eten bah yadi,
> hada hu dichsiv, 'Ve'echtov al haluchos'".  The king tells his wife's
> advocate you prepare the document and I will sign it, thus it is written,
> "and *I will write* on the luchos".   Hashem clearly says that *He*, not
> Moshe, will write.  This seems to contradict the reisha of the medrash,
> but that's not my problem.
>
The medrash is saying that Hashem will HELP Moshe write it,  not write it
himself.

>
> But really I don't care what one opinion in the  medrash says, since the
> medrash has no authority to contradict explicit pesukim;


That is ridiculous, are we karaim who interpret the Torah literally? The
pasuk says ayin tachas ayin, yet Chazal teach us that we don't take
someone's eye out, but rather pay money. According to you how do Chazal
have the authority to contradict an explicit pasuk?

There are many similar examples in agadda as well, for example, the pasuk
says that Reuven slept with Bilha, yet Chazal say that anyone who says
Reuven sinned is making a mistake. How can Chazal contradict an explicit
pasuk?  The fact is that Chazal reinterpret pesukim all the time, that is
the essence of torah she b'aal peh.

>
>  R' Zev Sero wrote:
>>
>>> "whatever was on the first set was on the second set. There is no
>>> possible doubt or machlokes about that."
>>>
>>
>  There certainly is. It is not at all clear that the 2 luchos had the
>> same text. The Gemara in Bava Kama (54b-55a) has the following story:
>> [story omitted]
>>
>
> I don't have an explanation for this story, but once again we have
> an explicit pasuk that the second luchos were "kamichtav harishon".
>

See above, Chazal reinterpret explicit pesukim all the time.
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