Avodah Mailing List

Volume 35: Number 121

Sun, 15 Oct 2017

• 1. Re: ?Timtum Ha-Lev? Redux (Micha Berger)
• 2. R. Akiva, Bar Kochba and Zecharya HaNovi (hankman)
• 3. Re: R. Akiva, Bar Kochba and Zecharya HaNovi (Zev Sero)
• 4. Re: R. Akiva, Bar Kochba and Zecharya HaNovi (Micha Berger)
• 5. Questioning Authority (Akiva Miller)
• 6. Re: R. Akiva, Bar Kochba and Zecharya HaNovi (Zev Sero)
• 7. Re: R. Akiva, Bar Kochba and Zecharya HaNovi (Zev Sero)
• 8. Re: R. Akiva, Bar Kochba and Zecharya HaNovi (Micha Berger)
• 9. Re: R. Akiva, Bar Kochba and Zecharya HaNovi (Zev Sero)
• 10. Psak source wanted (Motti Yarchinai)
• 11. Zecher Liytzias Mitzrayim and Shmini Atzeres (Akiva Miller)

On Wed, Sep 27, 2017 at 06:30:33PM +0000, Rich, Joel via Avodah wrote:
: From R' Aviner Dulling of the Heart to Save One's Life
...
:     A: No. Maran Ha-Rav Kook writes in his book "Musar Avicha" (p. 19)
:     that the dulling of one's heart comes from violating a prohibition
:     and not from the food itself (Yoma 39a. And see Meharsha on
:     Shabbat 33a)....

Yay! Finally I have sources to look at. "Vehayisa akh sameiach" just
became a little easier.

Does anyone have "Mussar Avikha", "Uvdos veHanhagos miBeis Brisk" (vol II
p 50) and/or "Orchos Yosheir" (#13)? Do any of them discuss mezuzah and the
consequent shemirah, or any of the other related segulah-like effects
of mitzvos we've tied in to previous iterations?

Look at that list of names: I'm not wrong, just Litvish!

Tangent: The Gra said that "vehayisa akh sameiach" is the hardest mitzvah
in the Torah. "Veyahisa sameiach" is one thing, but "akh sameiach"? To be
nothing but happy, with no other moods ambivalently mixed in for 8 days
(9 in chu"l) straight?

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             The fittingness of your matzos [for the seder]
mi...@aishdas.org        isn't complete with being careful in the laws
http://www.aishdas.org   of Passover. One must also be very careful in
Fax: (270) 514-1507      the laws of business.    - Rav Yisrael Salanter

How could R. Akiva have mistaken Bar Kochba for Moshiach, since non of the
nevuos of Zecharya HaNovi that we read in the recent haftorah (splitting of
Har HaZeitim etc., etc) for the period precedent to Moshiach had yet
occurred?
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On 11/10/17 01:24, hankman via Avodah wrote:
> How could R. Akiva have mistaken Bar Kochba for Moshiach, since non of 
> the nevuos of Zecharya HaNovi that we read in the recent haftorah 
> (splitting of Har HaZeitim etc., etc) for the period precedent to 
> Moshiach had yet occurred?

The Rambam, whose shita is based on R Akiva, explicitly paskens that 
none of these nevuos need to be fulfilled literally.  Any that aren't 
can be interpreted metaphorically to fit whatever political and military 
events actually do take place around the geulah.


-- 
Zev Sero                May 2017, with its *nine* days of Chanukah,
z...@sero.name           be a brilliant year for us all

On Wed, Oct 11, 2017 at 06:30:27AM -0400, Zev Sero via Avodah wrote:
: On 11/10/17 01:24, hankman via Avodah wrote:
:> How could R. Akiva have mistaken Bar Kochba for Moshiach, since
:> non of the nevuos of Zecharya HaNovi that we read in the recent
:> haftorah (splitting of Har HaZeitim etc., etc) for the period
:> precedent to Moshiach had yet occurred?

: The Rambam, whose shita is based on R Akiva, explicitly paskens that
: none of these nevuos need to be fulfilled literally.  Any that
: aren't can be interpreted metaphorically to fit whatever political
: and military events actually do take place around the geulah.

While the Rambam cites R' Aqiva's following Bar Koziba (H Melahim 11:2)
as proof that the melekh hamoshiach doesn't have to do miracles, is his
position really "based on" R Aqiva's? For example, in 11:4 he describes
the moshiach as being "hogeh baTorah ve'oseiq bemitzvos keDavid aviv"
which I don't think fit Bar Kokhva even in his hayday. Nor had "veyakhof
kol Yisrael leileikh bah" yet either -- the Perushim were in the minority.

More clearly is his basing himself on Shemu'el (Sanhedrin 91b) when
he quotes him in 12:2, "Chakhamim said: ein bein ha'olam hazeh liymos
hamoshiach ela shib'ud malkhios bilvad." It's interesting that rather than
repeating the quote beshrim omero -- a funny thing to do when discussing
the ge'ula le'lam that giving the source is supposed to bring -- he
attributes the quote to Chakhamim, as though he knew it was consensus
and Rav's position deprecated. After all, the Rambam himself says that
we can't decide machloqesim in these thingxs.

So it could be that the Rambam did indeed base himself on R Aqiva, but
then we would have to say that the Rambam held that R Aqiva was waiting
for the rest of the nevu'ah to come true.

Or not -- maybe his basic source was Shemu'el, and this one proof doesn't
imply derivation.

And given that the BK Revolt was c. 132-135 CE, it is likely that R'
Aqiva expected the war to go on 7 years, as per statements in the gemara
about chevlei moshiach. This would time the end of the war with 70 years
after the churban, like the return after churban bayis 1.

But whether that conjecture is true or not, the relevant idea that R
Aqiva could be backing BK thinking the rest of the expectations about
the moshiach simply hadn't happened /yet/. Which the Rambam would have
to invoke even for his more mundane list of things the moshiach will
accomplish.

In 12:1 the Rambam denies the literalness of Yeshaiah's and Yirmiyahu's
description of the messianic era in terms of wolves, leopards and lions
going vegetarian. But since the splitting of Har haZeirim need not be
lemaalah min hateva, do we know whether the Rambam would have placed it
in the same rule? If not, the "expected it will happen in the future"
answer could cover that earthquake (?) as much as it can cover BK spending
all his spare time learning and doing mitzvos or his being meqareiv the
vast majority of Kelal Yisrael.


Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             A sick person never rejects a healing procedure
mi...@aishdas.org        as "unbefitting." Why, then, do we care what
http://www.aishdas.org   other people think when dealing with spiritual
Fax: (270) 514-1507      matters?              - Rav Yisrael Salanter

I have no hidden agenda here. This post is my response to the current "OU
paper" thread, and to many other threads we've had over the decades, where
we have wondered how any given posek could hold a certain way on any
particular question. It is also relevant to threads we've had abput
*becoming* a posek, and the importance of shimush in addition to book
knowledge.

This is something I would not have written, or even have thought of, until
about 10 years ago or so. But as I have matured, I have come to see things
in a new perspective. Becoming a parent, and a grandparent, has given me a
tremendous insight into Hashem's relationship with us.

I have always felt that it is (or ought to be) possible and permissible to
*question* authority without challenging or rejecting authority. It is very
natural to want to understand the reasons behind the rules that we must
live by. Wanting to understand those rules is not the same as rejecting
those rules. Wanting to understand the rules, I believe, is a major
component of the Mitzvah of Talmud Torah, and is thus highly commendable.

A chavrusa once challenged me to explain my position on a certain subject.
He said to me, "If you can't explain it to me in simple terms, then you
don't really understand it well enough yourself." I accepted that rule
wholeheartedly, and used it myself for many decades. But recently have I
begun to see the cracks in that rule.

A parent tells the child to do something, or to not do something. The child
asks why, not out of rebellion, but because he sincerely wants to
understand what's going on. Sometimes, the parent cannot give an answer
better than "Because I said so." The child now thinks that the parent is
being arbitrary, and sometimes, the parent might even agree.

But frequently, the truth is that the parent has very good reasons for what
he says. It's just that he's unable to put those reasons into clear words.
He can't even explain it to himself in simple terms, because it is simply a
gut feeling that he has, based on experience and intuition, he sees that
this is the action or inaction which must be followed in this particular
situation.

I think this is analogous to Torah leaders and Torah followers. When the
leaders tell the followers what to do, or what to avoid, it is entirely
reasonable for the followers to request explanations from the leaders. This
is especially so, if the explanation will help them comply with the
directive, or teach them how to apply the directive to other situations.
But these requests must be made respectfully, carefully, and only up to a
certain point.

Consider when a parent explains himself to the child, and the child
responds with a dozen reasonable challenges to the parent's logic.
Sometimes the parent will realize that he was in error, and back down.
Sometimes the parent will realize that he was in error, but will stick to
his guns as a show of power (rightly or wrongly). But sometimes, the parent
will understand that - despite the child's persuasive comments - the
directive must still be followed, because ... Well, the parent himself
might not be able to articulate his reasoning, not even to himself. But he
relies on his understanding and his experience and his common sense, and he
knows that this is how it must be.

So too, our leaders adopt certain positions on certain issues, and often
they will attempt to explain themselves to us. Sometimes those explanations
may appear flawed to us, maybe even severely flawed. Like the child who
thinks his parent's explanation is nonsense, the flaws do not necessarily
invalidate the leader's conclusion or his decision.

Of course, none of this suggests that our leaders (or parents) are
infallible. And they can certainly benefit from reviewing their positions
among their peers. The only point I'm trying to make in this long post is
this: Similar to a Chok from the Torah, sometimes our leaders issue
pronouncements that we are not capable of fully understanding, and we
should not let that stand in the way of following them.

Akiva Miller

NB: A critical word in this post is "sometimes". The difficult (sometimes
impossible) task is to figure out which times are which.
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On 11/10/17 10:30, Micha Berger via Avodah wrote:

> While the Rambam cites R' Aqiva's following Bar Koziba (H Melahim 11:2)
> as proof that the melekh hamoshiach doesn't have to do miracles, is his
> position really "based on" R Aqiva's? For example, in 11:4 he describes
> the moshiach as being "hogeh baTorah ve'oseiq bemitzvos keDavid aviv"
> which I don't think fit Bar Kokhva even in his hayday.

What makes you suppose this?  On the contrary, the fact that the Rambam 
says "since BK didn't do any miracles, we know that Moshiach doesn't 
have to", proves that when he says Moshiach *does* have to be a TCh and 
a tzadik he assumes BK *did* fulfil this requirement.   If he didn't, 
that would prove to the Rambam that this isn't necessary.


> Nor had "veyakhof kol Yisrael leileikh bah" yet either -- the
> Perushim were in the minority.
Were they?  Who was in the majority, if not them?  And why would the 
majority even matter?  BK was the king, and he made halacha the law of 
the land, whether the majority liked it or not.

-- 
Zev Sero                May 2017, with its *nine* days of Chanukah,
z...@sero.name           be a brilliant year for us all

On 11/10/17 11:42, Micha Berger wrote:
> 
> The man described in the Y-mi Taanis 24b (4:5) doesn't sound personally
> observant.

The Rambam clearly doesn't hold like the Yerushalmi's version of the 
story, because he holds that the Chachamim stuck with BK until he was 
killed "ba`avonos".  That word is ambiguous (whose sins, his or the 
people's) but later he says a presumptive Moshiach who's killed is 
"kechol malchei beis Dovid hash'leimim vehak'sheirim", so we can assume 
he holds that BK was killed for the generation's sins, not for his own, 
hence "ba`avonos", not "ba`avonosav".


> This is also why in both R' Aqiva's world as well as R' Meir's and R'
> Shim'on's -- before and after BK's revolt -- it is taken for granted
> that most Jews are amei ha'aretz.

Amei Haaretz were in the Perushim "denomination".  They kept Perushi 
halacha as well as they understood it, even if they despised the 
Chaverim who taught it.  They made up their own invalid leniencies in 
maasros, and weren't careful all year with taharos, but they were 
careful with terumah and never told lies on Shabbos.  In any case, the 
question isn't what the majority would have done on their own, but 
whether BK forced them to obey halacha, and the Rambam assumes he did.


-- 
Zev Sero                May 2017, with its *nine* days of Chanukah,
z...@sero.name           be a brilliant year for us all

On Wed, Oct 11, 2017 at 12:02:55PM -0400, Zev Sero wrote:
: On 11/10/17 11:42, Micha Berger wrote:
: >The man described in the Y-mi Taanis 24b (4:5) doesn't sound personally
: >observant.
: 
: The Rambam clearly doesn't hold like the Yerushalmi's version of the
: story, because he holds that the Chachamim stuck with BK until he
: was killed "ba`avonos"...

How does this conflict with the Y-mi's picture of a less than ideal
Bar Kokhva?

If anything, it reinforces my suggestion that R' Aqiva was awaiting
the rest of the nevu'ah. And once he is waiting for the things the
Rambam mentions, then it's possible the Rambem would expect Zerkhariah's
nevu'os to happen literally, but also something R' Aqiva was awaiting.

It's possible the Rambam would consider the potentially natural cataclysms
in Zekhariah to be non-allegory, as the examples of non-literal nevu'os
he gives would have been lema'alah min hateva if literal. I don't know
where he's drawing the line; nevi'ah qua nevu'ah is bederekh mashal,
or only the phantastical stories should be dismissed.

(This is a sibling to our discussion of the Rambam on midrashic stories.
I claim he is saying that no medrash was repeated for historical content.
Therefore any medrash can be ahistorical, but the fantastical stories you
should take for granted as being ahistorical. You have been limiting
the Rambam's denial of historicity for the fantastical stories.
s/medrash/nevu'ah/g -- where do you stand?)

:                          That word is ambiguous (whose sins, his or
: the people's) but later he says a presumptive Moshiach who's killed
: is "kechol malchei beis Dovid hash'leimim vehak'sheirim", so we can
: assume he holds that BK was killed for the generation's sins, not
: for his own, hence "ba`avonos", not "ba`avonosav".

But either way -- whether he or the generation was sinful -- it would
show that BK didn't fit the Rambam's descrition of moshiach. For obvious
reasons, I'll add: ... at least not yet. If the generation sinned too
much to merit redemption, BK wasn't too good at bringing the masses
to observance.

Besides, being like a kosher and shaleim member of beis David could mean
"even if", we still know he wasn't the moshiach.

: >This is also why in both R' Aqiva's world as well as R' Meir's and R'
: >Shim'on's -- before and after BK's revolt -- it is taken for granted
: >that most Jews are amei ha'aretz.
: 
: Amei Haaretz were in the Perushim "denomination".  They kept Perushi
: halacha as well as they understood it, even if they despised the
: Chaverim who taught it...

Actually, I thought they were denominationless, as likely to follow
anyone's dictates. A pagan notion of listening to every holy man, rather
than picking sides.

But in any case, if that's your description of the masses, you still
have BK not yet succeeding in that regard at the time of his death.

: in maasros, and weren't careful all year with taharos, but they were
: careful with terumah and never told lies on Shabbos...

They were also careful with maaser, more often than not. Demai is a
gezeira; if tevel were the norm, it would be azlinan basar ruba, or
at best safeiq deOraisa lehachmir.

: the question isn't what the majority would have done on their own,
: but whether BK forced them to obey halacha, and the Rambam assumes
: he did.

The Rambam doesn't say so. That's your deduction. It requires assuming
that the Rambam agrees with R' Aqiva over what the grounds for presuming
(making a chazqah) that someone is moshiach. He doesn't say R' Aqiva is
indeed his source.

And it also requires assuming R Aqiva was following BK because of a
chazaqah, rather than probability and rov. You haven't addressed my
"maybe" of R Aqiva following BK without BK having yet fulfilled all of
the moshiach's role becuase of an expectation that BK would be getting
there. My added "not yet".

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Between stimulus & response, there is a space.
mi...@aishdas.org        In that space is our power to choose our
http://www.aishdas.org   response. In our response lies our growth
Fax: (270) 514-1507      and our freedom. - Victor Frankl, (MSfM)

On 11/10/17 13:11, Micha Berger wrote:
> On Wed, Oct 11, 2017 at 12:02:55PM -0400, Zev Sero wrote:
> : On 11/10/17 11:42, Micha Berger wrote:
> : >The man described in the Y-mi Taanis 24b (4:5) doesn't sound personally
> : >observant.
> :
> : The Rambam clearly doesn't hold like the Yerushalmi's version of the
> : story, because he holds that the Chachamim stuck with BK until he
> : was killed "ba`avonos"...
> 
> How does this conflict with the Y-mi's picture of a less than ideal
> Bar Kokhva?

It conflicts because the Y'mi's version of the story has the Chachamim 
abandoning BK *before* his fall.   The Rambam clearly does not agree 
with that whole version of the story.  In his version BK was and 
remained a tzadik until his tragic end, which happened not for his own 
sins but for those of others.



> It's possible the Rambam would consider the potentially natural cataclysms
> in Zekhariah to be non-allegory, as the examples of non-literal nevu'os
> he gives would have been lema'alah min hateva if literal. I don't know
> where he's drawing the line; nevi'ah qua nevu'ah is bederekh mashal,
> or only the phantastical stories should be dismissed.

He doesn't draw a line at all.  He carefully doesn't say that Moshiach 
*won't* perform miracles, but merely that he *needn't*, because BK 
didn't and yet was assumed to be Moshiach.    Which further contradicts 
the Y'mi's version, which says he was rejected because he could not 
judge people by smelling whether they're right or wrong, a feat of which 
the True Moshiach(tm) must be capable.


> 
> :                          That word is ambiguous (whose sins, his or
> : the people's) but later he says a presumptive Moshiach who's killed
> : is "kechol malchei beis Dovid hash'leimim vehak'sheirim", so we can
> : assume he holds that BK was killed for the generation's sins, not
> : for his own, hence "ba`avonos", not "ba`avonosav".
> 
> But either way -- whether he or the generation was sinful -- it would
> show that BK didn't fit the Rambam's descrition of moshiach.

How so?   He was righteous, and forced people to keep Torah, but they 
didn't listen, just like Yoshiyahu.


> But in any case, if that's your description of the masses, you still
> have BK not yet succeeding in that regard at the time of his death.

Again, how so?  The requirement is that he forces all Israel to follow 
it and to reinforce its breaches.  Not that he educates them, or makes 
them enthusiastic, but simply that he makes the Shulchan Aruch the law 
of the land, punishing those who break it.   There are always 
lawbreakers; one would not therefore say that the government is not 
forcing people to obey the law.



> : the question isn't what the majority would have done on their own,
> : but whether BK forced them to obey halacha, and the Rambam assumes
> : he did.
> 
> The Rambam doesn't say so. That's your deduction. It requires assuming
> that the Rambam agrees with R' Aqiva over what the grounds for presuming
> (making a chazqah) that someone is moshiach. He doesn't say R' Aqiva is
> indeed his source.

He explicitly uses him as his source that Moshiach needn't perform 
miracles.   How could he do so if his vision of Moshiach's 
qualifications were different from R Akiva's?   If he holds that 
Moshiach must be a tzadik but RA didn't, then how does he know that 
Moshiach needn't perform miracles just because R Akiva thought so?


> And it also requires assuming R Aqiva was following BK because of a
> chazaqah, rather than probability and rov. You haven't addressed my
> "maybe" of R Aqiva following BK without BK having yet fulfilled all of
> the moshiach's role becuase of an expectation that BK would be getting
> there. My added "not yet".

Again, this is impossible because if so how does he know R Akiva didn't 
indeed require Moshiach to perform miracles, and was expecting them to 
happen any day now?  How can he say that Moshiach need *never* perform 
miracles, and if he achieves everything he's supposed to without the 
need for miracles we will still have to accept him as Vadai Moshiach? 
Clearly he understands that R Akiva was *not* expecting any miracles, 
and that this didn't bother him, because it isn't a requirement.

None of which rules out the actual Moshiach, when he does come, 
performing miracles.  The Rambam's position on this, unlike the Y'mi's, 
is neutral.  He might perform miracles or he might not.  Some or all of 
the nevuos might turn out literally, but some or all might not.  The 
nevuos he says can't be literal, at least in the initial stage of Yemos 
Hamoshiach, are not ones about miracles but about permanent changes in 
nature.  Chazal said that Ein Bein Olam Hazeh Liymos Hamoshiach Ela... 
so nevuos about a change in nature must either be metaphorical or refer 
to Olam Haba.  But nevuos about miracles may or may not happen 
literally, we won't know until we  get there.


-- 
Zev Sero                May 2017, with its *nine* days of Chanukah,
z...@sero.name           be a brilliant year for us all

Dear Avodah members,

Can anyone help me with a source for this psak:
It is similar to what the Rambam wrote in Hilchot Kiddush Hachodesh, saying
that in all calendric matters, we follow the lead of the chachmei eretz
yisrael, and even though the anshei hagolah know the calculations used by
them, it is not on our own calculations that we rely, we only use those
calculations because we know that they are the same as the calculations
used by the chachmei eretz yisrael, and we must all follow the rulings of
the latter, in all calendric matters.

Another posek (possibly the Tifferet Yisrael in Shvilei Harakia, but I'm
not sure of that), writes something similar but couched in even more
dramatic terms. The following is not a verbatim quote (since the original
is in Hebrew) but something very close to it:
"And even if the residents of eretz yisrael are all ignoramuses and
peasants, and the authorities of chutz la'aretz are great scholars and
knowledgable in Torah and halachah, in calendric matters we follow the
peasants and ignoramuses, not the scholars of chutz la'aretz."
Does anyone recognise this and remember where it's from?
Thank you.Motti

 





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.
What is the Zecher Liytzias Mitzrayim of Shmini Atzeres?We say it in
Kiddush and in the Amidah. There must be something about this chag that
connects to, and/or reminds us about, Yetzias Mitzrayim.

It sounds like such a basic question that I'm surprised that I don't
remember hearing it in the past. If anyone has an answer, please share it.
Meanwhile, here's what I came up with:

Shavuos is about one particular event in the midbar. Sukkos is about the
whole 40 years in the midbar. Pesach and Shmini Atzeres are bookends:
Pesach is about entering the midbar, and Shmini Atzeres is about leaving
the midbar.If Sukkos is about the Ananei Hakavod and all the other nissim
that accompanied us, then Shmini Atzeres is about re-entering the natural
world.

I played "word association" with six random people: When I said "yetzias
mitzrayim," five of them responded, "Pesach". This is not wrong, but it is
a distortion. Yetzias Mitzrayim was not a short event in Nissan; Shavuos
and Sukkos prove that it was a process that took 40 years. My suggestion is
simply that the last day is no less worthy of a chag than the first.

Rashi (B'midbar 29:35) famously tells us that Shmini Atzeres is a special
time, with just Hashem and Bnei Yisrael together, alone, with no other
nations around. I'm merely pointing out that it is not just the nations who
are gone: The lulav is gone. The sukkah is gone. Nothing remains but us and
Hashem, when we left the comfort of the miraculous sukkah, trading it for
being at home in Eretz Yisrael.

Akiva Miller

Postscript: An easy challenge to this post could be that Tishre 22 was NOT
the day that we crossed from the midbar into Eretz Yisrael. I will respond
in advance by pointing out that Shavuos too is not necessarily celebrated
on the same day as the event it reminds us of. The Zecher can be poetic and
emotional, and need not be so mathematically rigorous.
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