Avodah Mailing List

Volume 41: Number 12

Sun, 12 Feb 2023

• 1. Re: Keeping Well Away From Sheker - And Another Thing (Zev Sero)
• 2. Re: taker but not giver (Zev Sero)
• 3. Re: taker but not giver (Micha Berger)
• 4. Contextual Factors (Joel Rich)
• 5. Re: taker but not giver (Zev Sero)
• 6. Common Kiddush Questions (Prof. L. Levine)
• 7. The Offer Is No Longer On The Table (Jay F. Shachter)

On 5/2/23 18:12, Rabbi Meir G. Rabi via Avodah wrote:
> It is also important to consider WHY the boss wants his other workers to 
> proclaim their support

His motives are irrelevant.

But now you have moved the goalposts.  If the employees don't really 
trust their employer and don't really have confidence that whatever he 
says is true, then of course it would be sheker for them to say they do. 
  It might be a permitted form of sheker, in order to preserve their 
good relations with him, but it would be sheker.

Your original scenario did not suggest any such thing.  The presumption 
in your original scenario was that they honestly do trust him; if so, 
there's no reason in the world why they should not say so.  There is not 
even a slight smidgen of sheker in that.  So long as they don't say or 
imply that they have personal knowledge confirming his allegations 
against their colleague, they are telling 100% emes, and are as far away 
from sheker as it is possible to be.

The fact that it will harm their colleague and make his case harder to 
argue should not be their concern at all; they have no more duty to him 
than to the employer.  Since they do trust him, they presumably agree 
that justice is on his side, so not only are they practicing emes they 
are also promoting tzedek.  But even in pursuit of tzedek they must not 
pretend to have personal knowledge that they don't.

-- 
Zev Sero            ?Were we directed from Washington when to sow
z...@sero.name       and when to reap, we should soon want bread.?
                    ?Thomas Jefferson: Autobiography, 1821.

On 5/2/23 15:26, Micha Berger via Avodah wrote:
> The halakhah is that we are mechalel Shabbos for darkhei shalom.

No, that is *NOT* the halacha.

> Since
> darkhei shalom means emulating the One Who shehashalom shelo, and
> fulfilling vekhol nesivoseha shalom, then yes, of course, the halakhah
> is saying that having peaceful relations rises to the level of being
> dokheh Shabbos.

If that were so, then it would have applied in equal force before 1800.
Why does the Shulchan Aruch insist there is *no heter*?


On 5/2/23 15:26, Micha Berger wrote:
> So, it seems to me that our being taught as kids that "darkhei shalom"
> was permission to violate Shabbos because otherwise an anti-semite may
> someday kill one of us is simply part of the problem. Chazal's idiom is
> being misinterpreted because the people speaking can't believe Chazal
> would give such value to doing what's right when it comes to nakhriim.

This is simply not true.  Nowhere are we allowed to violate Shabbos 
because of darkei shalom.  And in fact Chazal did NOT permit us to 
violate Shabbos to save a nochri's life.  Nor did any rishon or acharon. 

As of the mid-to-late 18th century, AFAIK, the *undisputed* halacha 
was that it is *not* permitted.

The first heterim came from poskim in the early 19th century, and they 
were explicitly *not* mishum darkei shalom but mishum eiva.  Every 
earlier posek ruled out eiva on the grounds that the metzius, in their 
view, was that keeping shabbos at the expense of nochri lives would not 
lead to eiva.  The metzius changed with the Enlightenment, and in the 
19th century poskim realized that the modern nochrim would not be as 
understanding as their predecessors had been, so the halacha had to 
change.   But it was definitely because it would lead to pikuach nefesh 
for us, and anyone who claims anything else is forging the Torah.


-- 
Zev Sero            "Were we directed from Washington when to sow
z...@sero.name       and when to reap, we should soon want bread."
                     -- Thomas Jefferson: Autobiography, 1821.

On Tue, Feb 07, 2023 at 03:31:45PM -0500, Zev Sero wrote:
> If that were so, then it would have applied in equal force before 1800.

Tosafos on Shabbos 19a "nosenin" hold that mishum eiva permits a shevus.
Similarly the Meiri on Beitzah 21b.

But for deOraisos, you are correct, the first sources I can find are
after the fall of the ghetto walls. But not sure why I am not to take
the word of 2 centuries of posqim just because you assert "This is simply
not true."


The Rashba (Teshuvos 5:250) quotes Abayei as the source of the idea we
attributed to the Rambam, that "kol haTorah nami mipenei Tarchei Shalom hu,
shene'emar 'derakheha..'"

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 "The worst thing that can happen to a
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   person is to remain asleep and untamed."
Author: Widen Your Tent             - Rabbi Simcha Zissel Ziv, Alter of Kelm
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF

From a book re: Dr. Jacob Katz:
He had learned from his training in history and in the sociology of
knowledge that the critical variable involved in an analysis of a legal
holding was not determining whether that decision had a precedent. Katz
knew that the author of such a ruling frequently had a welter of rules and
principles that were capable of providing guidance in a given case. Rather,
the point was to focus on the contextual factors that led an author to
select one precedent over another, or to indicate what the concerns were
that caused that author to reformulate precedents in a novel way. In this
instance, Katz emphasized the innovative argument Hirsch used to combine
precedents and contemporary language to reconfigure the tradition.

Me-this resonated with my thoughts based on empirical observation. Yours?


KT
Joel Rich
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On 7/2/23 20:36, Micha Berger via Avodah wrote:
> On Tue, Feb 07, 2023 at 03:31:45PM -0500, Zev Sero wrote:

>> If that were so, then it would have applied in equal force before 1800.

> Tosafos on Shabbos 19a "nosenin" hold that mishum eiva permits a shevus.
> Similarly the Meiri on Beitzah 21b.

1. That is darkei shalom, not eiva

2. We are talking about healing nochrim on Shabbos, and the Tosfos has 
nothing to do with it.  The Tosfos says that since we are allowed to 
support aniyei nochrim together with aniyei yisrael, because of darkei 
shalom, therefore by a stretch we can consider them our dependents, 
which permits feeding them on Shabbos, just as we can feed our domestic 
animals which depend on us.


> But for deOraisos, you are correct, the first sources I can find are
> after the fall of the ghetto walls. But not sure why I am not to take
> the word of 2 centuries of posqim just because you assert "This is simply
> not true."

Because you are once again writing something that is simply not true. 
Go back and look at your astonishing assertion, to which I replied that 
it was not true.  Nothing you have cited since then even tends to 
support that assertion.  It remains a complete falsehood.

And it's not just that you can't find a source before 1800.  It's that 
every posek from before then holds explicitly the opposite.  And no 
posek since then invokes "darkei shalom"; their rationale is eivah, 
which is exactly what you were taught as a child and that you now claim 
was not true.  Nobody was "misinterpreting Chazal's idiom".


-- 
Zev Sero            ?Were we directed from Washington when to sow
z...@sero.name       and when to reap, we should soon want bread.?
                    ?Thomas Jefferson: Autobiography, 1821.

From the article at

https://ohr.edu/this_week/insights_into_halacha/5477

By Rabbi Yehuda Spitz.

One of, if not the most pivotal event in Jewish history, Mattan Torah, is
prominently featured in this week?s parasha, Parashas Yisro. The fourth of
the Aseres HaDibros, is the exhortation to remember and keep the Shabbos
properly. In fact, the Gemara (Pesachim 106a) teaches us that ? Zachor es
Yom HaShabbos lekadsho?[1]<https://ohr.edu/5477#_edn1> is not
only the basis of our obligation to make Kiddush upon Shabbos?s entrance on
Friday night, but also a support for making Kiddush on Shabbos day.

Yet, it seems that this is one of the most common halachic realms where we
actively see different minhagim manifested. One family stands when making
Kiddush, another sits, while a third does some sort of
combination.[2]<https://ohr.edu/5477#_edn2>
Additionally, another?s ?minhag? preference might just depend on how tired
or hungry one is. However, aside for the proper posturical preferences on
how to make Kiddush, there are actual variations inherent in the words and
actions of the Kiddush itself.

See the above URL for much more.

Professor Yitzchok Levine





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> 
> Another one not discussed in the classics, as far as I know, is one
> we've been learning just these weeks -- Moshe's continuing pretense
> to Par'oh that all he wanted was a three-day expedition into the
> desert, with the clear implication (though never explicitly stated)
> that then we'd return to work.
> 
> I recently saw someone comment on the time (after `arov) when Par'oh
> proposed that we perform our korbanot in Egypt, and Moshe replied
> that we couldn't do that because the Egyptians would stone us.  This
> person asked why Moshe was afraid of that, when surely they'd been
> cowed by the four makot they'd already got, and if necessary a fifth
> or sixth would take care of it.  He quoted a Chassam Sofer, which he
> had completely misunderstood, in order to make a mussar point; but
> he missed the major flaw in his whole question: the whole thing was
> a ruse!  The real reason Moshe could never agree to such a thing is
> that it would not achieve his real purpose, which was to leave Egypt
> and never return!  His answer to Par'oh had to be consistent with
> his ruse, but it was not true!  The Chassam Sofer merely makes a
> suggestion for why his answer worked for *Par'oh*, but does not
> assert that this was his true thinking.
>
> So this is another example of Midevar Sheker Tirchak taking second
> place to some other value.
>

Don't be so quick to call Moshe a liar.  Moshe made Par`o an offer,
which Par`o either refused, or which he accepted, but he then went
back on his word.  This happened six times.  After it happened even
once, it is perfectly reasonable to say that the original offer was no
longer on the table: "We offered to leave for three days.  You
rejected the offer -- repeatedly -- either in word, or in deed by
promising to let us leave and then breaking your promise.  The offer
does not remain valid forever.  It is withdrawn.  We now insist on
leaving permanently."

What would Moshe have done if Par`o had accepted the initial offer and
not gone back on his word?  I'll tell you what I would have done: I
would have brought the people back to Egypt after three days.  My
obligation is to keep my word.  If keeping my word interferes with
God's plan, that's not my business.  God doesn't need me to lie for
Him, in order to realize His plan.  God will do what God does, and I
will do what I am obliged to do.  (To say otherwise is like saying
that Yosef tortured his brothers, because he had to bring about the
realization of his dreams.  Yosef had no obligation to bring about
the realization of his dreams.)

There are two things that I hope you will not say (you probably will
not say the first thing, because you alluded to it, but other people
might be thinking of it).  Please do not say that Moshe never said
that the people would return after leaving on their three-day
festival.  That is rubbish.  When Moshe said, "let them leave for
three days" he was saying that they would leave for only three days,
and then return.

Please do not say that Moshe made offers that he had no intention of
honoring because he knew that Par`o would reject the offers anyway,
and that the source of his knowledge was the most reliable source
there is, prophecy.  That is also rubbish.  Prophets never know what
their prophecies mean, and moreover, they know that they don't know.
Avraham thought that God had told him to sacrifice his son, but it
turned out that Avraham had misunderstood the prophecy, and he had
only been told to offer him up as a sacrifice but not to kill him, and
Avraham accepted his misunderstanding as completely plausible, because
he needed God to tell him to kill his son, but he only needed an angel
to tell him not to.  In Genesis 32:11 Ya`aqov is afraid that `Esav is
going to kill him and his entire family, despite the complete
incompatibility of that fear with numerous prophecies that Ya`aqov had
received.  Yonah told everyone in Ninveh, in the name of God, that in
40 days Ninveh would be overturned, but it turned out that the
prophesied overturning of Ninveh was reinterpreted to be metaphoric
and not literal, and to refer to a turning away from sin.  And again
Yonah accepted this reinterpretation as completely plausible, he said,
"I knew you were going to do this".  Alternately, you can say in the
case of Yonah that prophesies of Divine punishment are always
conditional on a failure to repent, like the prophecy in 2 Kings 20:1
(to which someone on this mailing list recently referred).  This is
less plausible, because the prophecies in 2 Samuel 12:11 and 12:14
were not conditional on a failure to repent; but if it is plausible,
then it certainly applies to any prophesies that Moshe had received
regarding the intransigence of Par`o, and its consequences.


               Jay F. ("Yaakov") Shachter
               6424 North Whipple Street
               Chicago IL  60645-4111
                       (1-773)7613784   landline
                       (1-410)9964737   GoogleVoice
                       j...@m5.chicago.il.us
                       http://m5.chicago.il.us

               When Martin Buber was a schoolboy, it must have been
               no fun at all playing tag with him during recess.



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