Bava Metzia page 110 in Tosphot concerning Migo and page 80 and Rambam laws of טעון ונטען

 תוספות בבא מציעא ק''י
בבא מציעא ד''פ
A person  rented a חמור to carry goods to a certain place and a condition was set, "Do not take such and such a road because there is there a river that will be hard to cross." He took it on the path he was told not to, and the animal died, and he says that he took the wrong path, but the river had dried up and and so it was not his fault. He is not believed because מיגו במקום עדים לא אומרים. So my question here is then what about רבה who says we do say a מיגו when there are witnesses? And furthermore I want to ask when did the witnesses come? Clearly after he came to the court and made his claim. But if so then that seems to be a case when we do listen to a migo when there are witnesses because it is like מפטור לפטור that the ר''י מיגש says the reason we believe him is because of מיגו. That is, we have a case in which the טוען says you own to me a מנה and the נטען says לא היו דברים מעולם. Now if witnesses comes and say לווה ופרע then he is obligated to pay because כל האומר לא לוויתי כאומר לא פרעתי. But if witnesses have not come and he on his own initiative changes his plea and and לוויתי ופרעתי then he is פטור even if witnesses come and say לווה ופרע. This law is not disputed. But what I think is possible to answer is in the case of לווה ופרע The witnesses support everything he is saying. He said לוויתי ופרעתי and then they come and say לווה ופרע. But in the case of the river they are not supporting what he is saying.

I had a lot more thoughts about this today, but I forgot most of it. Mainly, the idea is in case of a שטר שאינו מקויים and the לווה says לוויתי ופרעתי, and then witnesses come and  are מקיים את השטר, then in fact we do not say מיגו because the witnesses are not supporting what he is saying.

It is possible to suggest that the argument between Rav Yehuda and Ravina  in Bav Metzia 110 depends on this argument between Raba and Abyee in Bava Batra 31  about מיגו במקום עדים
I don't have a Bava Metzia, but if anyone out there does have one, I suggest looking into the possibilities of a connection between the two opinions in Tosphot on Page 110 also. From what I recall it is the Ri [Rabbainu Isaac] that says that Ravina disagrees in total with Rav Yehuda in that he says the borrower is believed.[That means the Ri has to have an answer why in the normal case the other guy i on the land for more than three years we do not believe the borrower because of a migo.]


בבא מציעא ק''י. אדם שכר חמור לשאת סחורה למקום מסוים ותנאי נקבע, "אל תיקח  כביש מסוים, מכיוון שיש שם נהר, יהיה קשה לעבור." הוא לקח את הדרך  האמורה שלא לקחת, ובעל החי מת, והוא אומר שהוא לקח את הנתיב הלא הנכון, אבל הנהר התייבש ולכן לא היה באשמתו. הוא לא נאמן כי מיגו במקום עדים לא אומרים. אז השאלה שלי כאן היא אז מה לגבי רבה שאומר שאנחנו אומרים מיגו כשיש עדים (בבא בתרא לא)? ויתר על כן אני רוצה לשאול, מתי העדים הגיעו? ברור אחרי שהוא הגיע לבית המשפט וטען את טענתו. אבל אם כך אז נראה שזה מקרה שאנחנו צריכים להקשיב למיגו כאשר ישנם עדים, כי זה כמו מפטור לפטור כי הר''י מיגש אומר הסיבה שאנחנו מאמינים לו הוא בגלל מיגו. כלומר, יש לנו מקרה שבו טוען אומר שאתה חייב לי מנה, ואת הנטען אומר לא היו דברים מעולם. עכשיו אם העדים מגיעים ואומרים לווה ופרע, אז הוא מחויב לשלם כי כל האומר לא לוויתי כאומר לא פרעתי. אבל אם עדים לא באו והוא ביוזמתו משנה את הטיעון שלו  ללווה ופרע, אז הוא פטור אפילו אם עדים באים אחר כך ואומרים לווה ופרע. אבל מה שאני חושב שאפשר לענות הוא שבמקרה של לווה ופרע  העדים תומכים  בכל מה שהוא אומר. לדבריו לווה ופרע, ואז הם באים ואומרים לווה ופרע. אבל במקרה של הנהר הם אינם תומכים מה הוא מדבר. וגם יש להעיר שבמקרה של שטר שאינו מקוים והלווה אומר לווה ופרע, ואז עדים באים והם מקיימים את השטר, אז למעשה אנחנו לא אומרים מיגו כי העדים אינם תומכים מה הוא מדבר.




) בבא מציעא דף ק''י.  אני מחויב לעשות הקדמה קצרה. משכנתא דסורא הוא סוג של ערבות להלוואה שנעשה בבבל בעיר הנקראת סורא. בסורא היה מנהג לעשות הלוואה, ובתור משכון המַלְוֶה יקבל שדה לעבוד עליו ולאכול את פירותיו למספר שנים, ובסופו של אותו זמן השדה יחזור לבעלים (ללווה) ללא כל התחייבות נוספת על הלווה. זה שונה מאשר נכייתא שהוא הפחתה של ההלוואה. במקרה של נכייתא השדה חוזר אבל חלק של ההלוואה עדיין נשאר. נניח שיש לנו מַלְוֶה ולווה באחד מהמקרים לעיל והמַלְוֶה אומר ההסכם היה במשך חמש שנים והלווה אומר שלוש שנים. המסמך אבד. ומַלְוֶה כבר היה שם שלוש שנים. רב יהודה אמר המַלְוֶה הוא נאמן כי אחרי שלוש שנים הוא היה יכול לומר "לקוחה היא בידי"  היינו "קניתי את השטח". להיות שהיה שם שלוש שנים הוא יהיה נאמן, אלא אם כן ראיות בניגוד מיוצרות. לדברי רבינו יצחק (הר''י) בתוספות רבינא לא מסכים בכלל עם רב יהודה ואומר הלווה נאמן. הדרך שתוספות מבין את זה היא שרבינא חולק כל הדרך. כלומר גם אם המַלְוֶה אמר שהוא קנה אותו עדיין הלווה נאמן. תוספות שואל על ר''י ממקרה בבבא בתרא כ''ח ע''א, במקרה שיש שדה שאדם אחד היה שם לשלוש שנים או יותר והוא אומר שהוא קנה אותו, והבעל דין אומר שזה נגנב. אנו מאמינים מי שהיה שם שלוש שנים, כי אנחנו אומרים שאם זה נכון שנגנב הבעלים האמיתיים היו אומרים משהו בינתיים ולא היו מחכים שלוש שנים. השאלה מזה להר''י היא זו: אם הר''י נכון, אז במקרה בבבא בתרא שאחד אומר שזה נגנב הוא צריך להיות נאמן כי הוא יכול לומר שזה היה ערובה להלוואה. יש לו מיגו. מאז שהוא היה יכול לומר שזה היה ערובה ולהאמין, ולכן אנחנו צריכים להאמין לו גם כשהוא לא אומר את זה, אבל אומר טיעון חלש. תוספות עונה זה מיגו במקום עדים. (לפי אביי בבא בתרא דף ל'א לא אומרים מיגו במקום עדים, ולרבה כן אומרים את זה.) [היינו המקרה הוא כאשר יש עדים נגדו, ומיגו במקום עדים לא אמרינן.] יש שאלה. בבבא מציעא דף פ' יש לנו מקרה של "מיגו במקום עדים לא אמרינן" שנראה שונה ממקרה זה.  יש  שתי דרכים. אחת עם נהר שצריך להיות חצוי. ואחרת בלי נהר, ואדם שכר חמור לשאת אותו. ואמרו לו לא לקחת את זה על הכביש עם הנהר. הוא לקח את זה ככה והחמור מת. הוא אומר כשהוא היה שם, לא היה שם נהר כיוון שהתייבש. אנחנו לא מאמינים לו, כי אנחנו לא הולכים עם "הוא יכול היה לומר" במקרה שבו יש עדים (לדעת אביי). אז השאלה שלי היא, שעל דף פ' אנחנו לא אומרים ", הוא יכול היה לומר" כי יש עדים נגד המיגו. זה שאנחנו לא יודעים על הנהר, אבל אנחנו יודעים שהוא לקח את  הכביש הלא נכון. זה נראה שונה מהמקרה שלנו בבא בתרא ובבא מציעא דף ק''י בתוספות שבו אין עדים נגד המיגו. אלא שהעדים נגד הטיעון עצמו. אנן סהדי שאם זה נגנב הוא היה אומר כך. אני רוצה להציע שזאת הקושיה היא הסיבה שחלק השני של תוספות  אומר שרבינא אינו חולק על רב יהודה ושכן מאמינים למַלְוֶה. אבל יש אפשרות לתרץ את הקושיה הזאת. שם בדף פ''א הר''י היה מפרש את הענין של לא אומרים מה לו לשקר במקום עדים שפירושו הוא שהעדים הם כנגד הטיעון שלו ישיר, והם אומרים שהנהר לא התיבש.(ראיתי הפירוש הזה בפירוש הנימוקי יוסף.)
There are tons of important points here that need study. But at least two points need to be mentioned. One is the Ketzot HaChoshen's approach to explain why in case one changes his plea from "I never borrowed" to "I borrowed and paid back" is OK even if witnesses come later. The reason he gives is it is before  a final decision of the court. Rav Shach bring a proof that the Rambam has to agree with this approach along with the Ri Migah' answer. But in any case this helps understand Bava Metzia page 101 the case where Rav told the fellow whose land had been planted on "Go pay the lesser amount."  and the next day when he saw him building a fence  said Pay the greater amount.--thi goes along with what I already wrote there that there it was before the final decsion since the fellow had not accepted what Rav had said.

Te other point is about an oath that is not for proof but for the sake that the person will admit in case he is saying something not true. This also is important and comes up in Bava Metzia page 97b, and 100b.

Reb Nachman however was a great tzadik and had some amazing insights. So, in spite of some people making some mistakes, it is still very worthwhile to listen to his great lessons. For example, what he suggested about constant private prayer with God, and his way of learning quickly. And his advice about length of days which come from fear of God, which I understand to refer to learning Musar.
Even when people make mistakes, still the simple belief in a true tzadik has great value in itself. 

 The Evil One never comes and tries to seduce a person by saying, "Come and do a sin".

Rather the Devil comes and asks a person, "Come and do a mitzvah."
[See the Gra at the beginning of Proverbs on the verse "זבחי שלמים עלי"]

The idea is that often  a person tries to convince himself that something he is doing is a mitzvah, when in fact he knows deep inside that it is no such thing.
.
 But this never happens with learning Torah.  The Devil never comes and tells a person, "Come and learn Torah."[The main approach of Navardok, Joseph Yozel a disciple of Reb Israel Salanter was Trust and Torah, i.e. to learn Torah and trust God would take care of everything else.]

It was a well known critique on the group the Gra out into excommunicattion until it became a saying: "Anything but Torah." "Abi nisht Torah." I actually heard people use this expression in Israel when they saw some people doing some kind of "shtick" (games).


What I suggest is two hours a day of Torah for everyone. One hour of in depth learning, and one hour of fast learning. If you have no idea of what Torah is about in the first place, the best thing is just to plow through the whole Old Testament in English and Hebrew and the Mishna  of Yehuda HaNasi.
[When I did the Mishna I used the Rav from Bartenura and that might be the best idea, but also I found the commentary of the Rambam to be short and sweet and I could make more progress that way. I should mention the Tisferet Israel is great but time consuming.] 


The main principle to keep in mind when coming to learn Torah is to avoid cults at all cost. Many groups will present themselves as teaching Torah, but it is only a facade to get you involved in their cult worship of their leader. Events similar to this are repeated ad nauseam in the history of 
Jewish cults"-a charismatic (in the generic sense) leader, claiming a special calling, and extraordinary powers, will, little by little, gain control over people’s hearts, minds, and (significantly) their property and family.

Better to join Hari Krishna's who do not lie about what they are doing. Or the Buddhists for that matter.

[The best way to get a good idea of what Torah is about is to take one Tosphot and to work on it until it becomes clear. By doing this you will have a good idea of what is going on in many other places in the Torah.]


What you ought to notice is that people that you encounter in a movement that have no taste, no trace of good character, and no Torah pretend to be tzadikim in order to get your money. And they use a good sounding motto to make what they are doing sound kosher. 

Breslov as a group is based on Reb Nathan's understanding of Reb Nachman. It tends to have great insanity problems. All the groups under the excommunication of the Gra tend to have a problem with demonic possession for some reason I have not understood. But obviously the Gra saw something that everyone else has missed. 


I have written about this before in some essays, most of which I deleted because I did not want people to think I was critical of Reb Nachman. Reb Nachman was a very great tzadik with a tremendous vision. Reb Natan however made a cult out of him, and wrote innumerable mistakes. For example: there are times he attacks the Rambam for things the Rambam never said. He attacks the ancient Greek philosophers for questions they asked, and then proceeds to use their answers!
A general observation is that Breslov is sex craved and mainly consists of lunatics which seems to indicate some kind of problem that is not readily obvious or observable. All the young breslovers come to Uman for sex while claiming it is for the mitzvah of being by Reb Nachman on Rosh Hashanah. It is an amazing scam. And the sad part is that these types of scams are part and parcel of it. Thus as a rule, I think the best thing is to follow the advice of the Gra. When he put his signature of the document of excommunication that was not the same thing as a שמתא (legal form of rebuke) but rather a חרם (a halachic category of excommunication) which is much more severe. And it applies to the entire world of of the religious today. Maybe in his days it was limited, but today the poison has spread through the entire religious world except for the few Authentic Litvak yeshivas (Ponovitch, Chaim Berlin, Torah VeDaat, Mir in NY.)
[The general tendency of the cult that the Gra put into "Cherem" (excommunication) seems to be to take people away from sanity.]
Still research into the cherem will show that it did not apply to Reb Nachman. I would rather not dwell on this here but the books about the Cherem along with the original documents are available.

And I never saw or heard of any great rosh yeshiva or authentic Torah scholar that had a problem with Reb Nachman. It was always understood that Breslov is a problem, not Reb Nachman.
My own feeling about Reb Nachman is that he dared greatly. His vision of seeing the whole Torah along with the Ari Isaac Luria is as an organic whole and to show how it applies today is inspiring.
But is the exact opposite of Reb Nachman. What ever he said to do they do the opposite. Breslov uses Reb Nachman to trap and bait people's minds but in terms of conduct has nothing to do with Reb Nachman.

The problem is not Reb Nachman but the whole sick , insane religious world that makes a show of rituals to hide their uncleanliness in spirit and body.  Especially the so called teachers of Torah who are in general agents of the Satan. 

t38 F major edited  t38 in midi format

pseudo yeshivas.[The terrible sin of the religious is they make tremendous effort to show they are your friends when they need your money, but when in positions of power they do as much damage as possible to you]

Learning Torah is important but it is something that can not be relegated  to others. The trouble is that the religious world spends most of its time and efforts to try to get money out of Secular Jews because supposedly they are "learning Torah." Most of the time this is impossible to check up on because pseudo yeshivas are generally in Israel, but they do all their collecting in the USA.
In doing this, they do not often mention their own anti-Israel agenda and anti-Secular Jews agenda. They make a song and dance about  how, "We are all brothers." But when a secular Jew needs help, they always act in the most brotherly fashion possible. [That is the terrible sin of the religious is they make tremendous effort to show they are your friends when they need your money, but when in positions of power they do as much damage as possible to you]
The whole business is a terrible scam and all under the pretense of learning Torah. What a joke.
In doing this they blacken the name and reputation of Torah. For after all, the only reason people learn Torah is to learn how to be a "mensch." When they religious act in such disgusting ways, this reflects on the holy Torah.

The best advice is to learn Torah at home on your own, and forget about the pseudo institutions. 

[That is unless the institutions are legit, like Ponovitch, or the three NY yeshivas, Chaim Berlin Mir, Torah VeDaat]. In any case, any institution that is anti Israel, you can cross off your list of places to donate to. If they are against service in the IDF, all the more so. But also anything under the Cherem [excommunication] of the Gra also should be off the list.  And the main thing is, "No Compromise." 


I should mention my own approach to Torah is more or less based on my parents and the Rambam, which can be summed up in one word "balance." That is to try to have a balanced day, learning Gemara, Rashi, Tosphot,  Avi Ezri, Musar, Math, Music, Exercise, Survival Skills. 


We can go far astray often with practically disastrous consequences, (particularly in medicine and agriculture) when we haughtily ignore taxonomy (calling things by their right name), disregard the small but distinctive differences among real species and things, and falsely assume that all  looking basically alike, and coming from the same broad region, must be the "same" animal.

Rambam laws of pleas in court ch 6 law 3 and ch 7 law 8

I wanted to bring here a debate between different Rishonim and Achronim concerning two laws in the Rambam.

[Just for background I should mention the Keztos HaChohen and the Netivot belong to the category of achronim before Reb Chaim Soloveitchik--the class of achronim that I used to learn all the time.
That is my own education was more or less founded on Achronim starting from the Maharsha and Pnei Yehoshua and onward down the line.] (Normal yeshiva education involves this class but also goes on to include Reb Chaim, and Rav Shach.)



I already mentioned the Rambam in in this case: two people come to court. One says you owe me 100. The other says "I never borrowed " Two witnesses comes and say person B borrowed and paid back the sum. The first collects because anyone who says ''I never  borrowed'' implies he never paid back
כל האומר לא לוויתי כאומר לא פרעתי דמי
The issue I wanted to bring out is if person B changed his mind before the two witnesses came, and he says: "I borrowed and paid".--And then the set of witnesses comes.
That is called מפטור לפטור in which case there is no doubt that he does not pay the 100. and the Ri Migash [the teacher of the Rambam and the father of the Rambam] said the reason is מיגו [he could have stuck with the original claim]. The Ketzot HaChoshen [on Chohen Mishpat] asks on the Ri Migash from a woman come to court and says, "I was married and now divorced." Then two witnesses say she was married. We do not believe her that she is divorced,-- until there is proof. He also asks from a document of  a loan that was not ratified by a court, and then the borrower says, "I borrowed but paid back," and the two witnesses come and say, "the document is valid."
In both these later cases the coming of the witnesses take away the strength of the statements of woman and the borrower, so why not in the first case also?


You can see right away what is bothering me. In our original case in the Rambam, the witnesses actually support everything  the borrower is saying, which they are not doing in the later cases. And this might be what Rav Shach is asking on the Ketzot but I have not had time to take  a close look at what he writes there.

I looked a second time and in short I think  Rav Shach is saying something like this:
We know the reason of the Ri Migash is not enough because of the questions of the Ketzot HaChoshen. That is clear. But what Rav Shach I think wants to do is to join the idea of the Netivot Hamishpat of ''לא דק'' the borrower was "not precise" along with the idea that   from לא היו דברים מעולם to לוויתי ופרעתי  is only a implication of  לא פרעתי but not a direct confession--because if it as a direct confession then we would not say he was not precise.
Rav Shach also requires the idea of the ketzot hachoshen in order for the answer of the ri migash to work. the answer of the ketzot on why does מפטור לפטור work even after witnesses have come was that there it is before גמר דין. The Ketzos is saying those cases when one can not change his plea from Ptur to ptur is after גמר דין. Rav Shach needs this for the Rambam to work because of a question a student in his yeshiva asked --that even if in our case in Bava Batra  the borrower said "i considred it like my father's" he should be believed because of a מיגו that he could have said "My fathers but it from your fathers."





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I already mentioned the רמב''ם in  this case two people come to court. One says you owe me מנה The other says "I never borrowed " Two witnesses comes and say the נטען  borrowed and paid back the sum. The first collects because anyone who says, ''I never  borrowed'' implies he never paid back
כל האומר לא לוויתי כאומר לא פרעתי דמי. The issue I wanted to bring out is if הנטען changed his mind before the two witnesses came, and he says: "I borrowed and paid", and then the set of witnesses comes. That is called מפטור לפטור in which case there is no doubt that he does not pay the מנה. and the ר''י מיגש said the reason is מיגו, he could have stuck with the original claim. The קצוות החושן asks on the ר''י מיגש from a woman come to court and says, "I was married and now divorced." Then two witnesses say she was married. We do not believe her that she is divorced,-- until there is proof. He also asks from a document of  a loan that was not ratified by a court, and then the borrower says, "I borrowed but paid back," and the two witnesses come and say, "the document is valid."
In both these later cases the coming of the witnesses take away the strength of the statements of woman and the borrower, so why not in the first case also? You can see right away what is bothering me. In our original case in the רמב''ם, the witnesses actually support everything  the borrower is saying, which they are not doing in the later cases. And this might be what רב שך is asking on the קצוות but I have not had time to take  a close look at what he writes there.


כבר הזכרתי את רמב''ם במקרה של שני אנשים מגיעים לבית המשפט. אחד אומר "אתה חייב לי מנה". השני אומר, "לא לוויתי". שני עדים מגיעים ואומרים "הנטען לווה ושילם את הסכום בחזרה."   הדין הוא מי שאומר, "לא לוויתי מעולם," שהוא לא שילם בחזרה. כל האומר לא לוויתי כאומר לא פרעתי דמי. בסוגיה הזו רציתי להביא את זה: אם הנטען שינה את דעתו לפני  ששני העדים באו, והוא אומר: "אני לוויתי ושלמתי", ולאחר מכן הסט של עדים מגיע. זה נקרא מפטור לפטור ובמקרה הזה אין ספק כי הנטען  לא  משלם את המנה. הר''י מיגש אמר שהסיבה היא מיגו, הוא יכול היה להחזיק עם הטענה המקורית. קצוות החושן שואל על הר''י מיגש מאישה שבאה לבית המשפט ואומרת, "הייתי נשואה ועכשיו גרושה." ואז שני עדים אומרים שהיא נשואה. אנחנו לא מאמינים לה כי היא גרושה,  עד שלא תהיה הוכחה. הוא גם שואל ממסמך של הלוואה שלא אושר על ידי בית משפט, ולאחר מכן הנטען אומר "לוויתי אבל שלמתי בחזרה," ואת שני העדים באים ואומרים, "המסמך תקף. בשני המקרים האלה ביאת העדים לוקחת את הכוח של טענות של האישה והלווה, אז למה לא במקרה הראשון גם? מה מציק לי? במקרה המקורי שלנו הרמב''ם, העדים למעשה תומכים  את הכל  שהלווה אומר ,מה שהם לא עושים במקרים המאוחרים.

n100 edited [E flat major]

n100 edited [E flat major] [n100 in midi format]   

This was left unfinished and I looked at it and was not sure what to do with it, but I figured the way Bach finished the 3rd Brandenburg was to make a straightforward recapitulation, so I thought maybe that would work here also.
[That is,-- Bach finishes the first movement with the same way he begins it--absolutely no change at all.]

n100 nwc

Is it a small world after all?

I should admit, I also absorbed the "It's a small world after all'' mentality until numerous attacks on me  by Muslims made it clear that they do not need any provocation to hate White Westerners. Their desire to murder White people  is either spontaneous, or just a bad habit that they pick up from  from their native environment. Their desire to rape  white girls, and murder Jews and Christians I think for them has a religious motivation based on the Koran (which certainly encourages these bad habits).  And people without religious motivations can not see or understand how intense religious motivations can be.

History brings the ideas or memes to light. It is the incubator which shows what was inside the original egg. It may have been in doubt what Islam was, but history shows its true essence in a way that book learning can never do.

I just can not see the Negro people are any better off now than they were under slavery. Just the opposite. At least under slavery they had the dignity of working for the living. Now they just live off welfare.Even when they go to school they mainly pass the courses because of Affirmative Action.

My feeling is you can not outsmart the Torah. 

t36 D Minor  [t36 in midi format]  t36 nwc

Probably the most important thing I learned in yeshiva was the idea of trust in God. That is that it is possible, and even desirable, and perhaps even necessary to sit and learn Torah and to trust in God that He will provide. In an amazing way this worked for me very well, until the day I decided that it is better to work for a living. When that simple decision was made, almost instantaneously the whole situation disintegrated. 
But my view of this is slightly different than the Madragat HaAdam. He was simply against all secular learning period. I hold however from the Rambam approach which requires learning the Oral and Written  Law, Physics and Metaphysics.  But not for Parnasah [making a living] but for themselves.
[In any case, the Madragat HaAdam, Joseph Horvitz is misunderstood. His idea was all you need to do is to sit and learn and God will take care of the rest and that message is exactly what his disciples did. The idea was not to create a movement nor lots of yeshivas. The enormous amounts of Navardok Yeshivas were simply a result of people acting on this philosophy. ]




When I learned this idea at the Mir in NY, no one was saying that one can use Torah to make money, as the religious world does. That is,--- it was always clear that there is a distinction between using Torah for money [as is done universally in the religious world when they are constantly asking for charity and yet never giving it to others in need] --and trusting in God, which is specifically never to ask anyone for money. 
Besides this, it is no mitzvah try and bankrupt the State of Israel and the religious try to do with their false kollels which are just private country clubs.

Therefore what I suggest is to create your own space at home for learning Torah.  Do not wait for the rest of the world to fix itself--especially since the problems are too complex. That is to have a space in your own home for Gemara, Rashi, Tosphot, Musar, and the Avi Ezri of Rav Shach. In fact, it is better not to go to any of the religious institutions for Torah because by and large, they use Torah to make money, not visa versa. Better a little Torah lishma [for its own sake], rather than a lot of Torah for money.
I am suggesting the Avi Ezri of Rav Shach, but it is a good idea to get the basic set of books from Gedolei Litva, that is Reb Chaim's חידושי הרמב''ם, and Naphtali Troup חידושי הגרנ''ט.\

What this will do will hopefully change you to be a more moral and more decent human being, more aware of your obligations between yourself and others and yourself and God. That is in short --better at keeping the Ten Commandments and all of the holy Torah.

Yeshiva as an independent institution from the "kahal" was a great idea at the time but it has deteriorated into using Torah to make Money. Therefore the age of the individual learner has begun--the age when it is best not to be connected or go to any institution o learn Torah bu rather to do it on your own at home.
[Even the great institutions like Ponovitch and the three great NY yeshivas Chaim Berlin, Mir, Torah VeDaat are limited to their areas. Unless you are in walking distance there is not much you can do.]

Socialism In Venezuela. 

The religious world is always looking for pseudo enemies

There are lots of bad things out there. But the religious world uses a kind of misdirection approach to make itself seem better and nicer.
It is always looking for pseudo enemies to make people think if they run into the religious group they will be safe.

This however does not apply to all and every religious group. For example I was in two great yeshivas which were seriously involved in the arduous task of learning and keeping Torah  in an authentic way. [Shar Yashuv and the Mir in NY].

The entire question is how to tell the authentic from pretense? [History of a group that follows a certain idea or set of ideas can help to discern, because that history is that idea in itself in motion--coming out from potential into actuality.]

But if one has in fact fallen into a  cult, there is no escape. The only thing one can do and should do is to scream at the top of his or her lungs the real truth. ["All who leave idolatry immediately die." כל הפורש בעבודה זרה מיד מת. That is  a famous statement of the sages. One place I think it is is around Sanhedrin 66. Also the events of the spies that Moses sent show that simple repentance is never a possibility. When they tried to enter Israel in spite of not having God's blessing in order to repent when they refuse to come to Israel with God's blessing--that did not succeed.



Because the religious cults are certainly always seeking for more human sacrifices.   But that is not the top of their Agenda. The top of their agenda is to keep people quite after they have been abuses so that the religious can continue doing what they do best, seduce and subvert the Holy Torah.

Plus it is important to keep on learning and keeping Torah on an individual basis in spite of the bad demons that use Torah as a cover up for their true nature.

[The people that could do the documenting would be Na Nach who are already aware of the problems. The question is how to get rid of the kelipot/shells but to retain the nut. ]

Bava Batra 31

I really did not have a lot to add to this subject but for now I want to introduce it briefly. It relates to a Tosphot in Bava Metzia page 110. But the basic subject is in Bava Batra 31.
Two people come to court. Each one says, ''This land was my father's and I have been on it three years.'' Then two sets of witnesses come to court. One set says it was his father's. The other set says about the other person, "He was on it three years." Raba says , "Why should he have lied? He could have said,  "I bought it from you.  Abyee says, "We do not say 'He could have said' in a place there are witnesses."

[This already brings up the subject of Migo--when do we say "He could have said"? And I tried to deal with that in my little book on Bava Metzia page 98. There it is about  a loan.]

The issue here is that in Tosphot in Bava Metzia one opinion [page 110] is this. If it were so that a person can say that land you have been on for more than three years came to you as a guarantee for a loan, then even without מחאה [protest] within three years, one would always be believed, "that land you are on is mine and you have it because you stole it." For he could have said it is a משכון guarantee and be believed.So believe him now. That is a migo can take out of חזקה [prior possession]

Thus, the argument in תוספות seems to be the connected to the  argument between רבה and אביי. Because in our situation in בבא בתרא, no witness is saying either plaintiff owned the land. Rather, the set of witnesses that said about one plaintiff that he was there for the years of possession. That means he has חזקה. The testimony is that he has a חזקה, not that he has ownership. Thus the argument between רבה and אביי is if there is a מיגו in the place where there are witnesses is connected with case of תוספות.
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תוספות בבא מציעא דף ק''י ע''א But the basic subject is in בבא בתרא דף ל''א.
Two people come to court. Each one says, ''this field was my fathers and I have been on it three years שני חזקה.'' Then two sets of witnesses come to court. One set says it was his father's. The other set says about the other טוען, " he was on it three years. רבה says he could have said, Why should he have lied? He could have said "I bought it from you." אביי says, "We do not say 'He could have said' in a place there are witnesses."

The issue here is that in תוספות בבא מציעא one opinion  is this. If it were so that a person can say that land you have been on for more than three years came to you as a guarantee for a loan, then even without מחאה protest within three years, one would always be believed that land you are on is mine and you have it because you stole it. For he could have said it is a משכון guarantee and be believed. So believe him now. That is a מיגו can take out of חזקה.

Thus, the argument in תוספות seems to be the connected to the  argument between רבה and אביי. Because in our situation in בבא בתרא, no witness is saying either plaintiff owned the land. Rather, the set of witnesses that said about one plaintiff that he was there for the years of possession. That means he has חזקה. The testimony is that he has a חזקה, not that he has ownership. Thus the argument between רבה and אביי is if there is a מיגו in the place where there are witnesses is connected with case of תוספות.
But the difference is this. In בבא בתרא רבה is not saying we believe a מיגו to take of of חזקה. just the opposite.  We believe the person that has the חזקה because he also has a מיגו. It is rather אביי that says we o not even believe him because of his מיגו and also not because of his חזקה.

But w can also see that the person with  the מיגו is in fact taking out of the חזקה מעיקרא  of the other טוען. That is we put his חזקת השתא  and חזקת שלש שנים together with the מיגו to take out of חזקה מעיקרא. I am assuming here that the fact that the land once belonged to his father that at least gives him the standpoint of חזקה מעיקרא
In any case, I think that this argument between רבה and אביי might also depend on the argument in תוספות in נידה whether חזקה מעיקרא וחזקה דהשתא are equal. If that is the case then we can understand רבה that if you add a מיגו to the חזקה דהשתא that can outweigh the חזקה מעיקרא of the other טוען. But if חזקה מעיקרא is stronger then we can understand אביי that does not think putting together a מיגו with חזקה דהשתא can overpower a חזקה מעיקרא. But to him it might be that even so חזקה מעקרא in our case might also not be enough. After all the other טעון was on the land three years
z



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At any rate, the Gemara goes on. "He says,  'I meant I considered  it as my fathers's '" Ula said טוען וחוזר וטוען  he can make  a plea  and then change it. The people in city of Naharda said he can not make a plea and then change it.. But if  he said it was was fathers's who bought it from your fathers" even the people of Naharda agree. If outside of courts he said  one thing he can change his plea since a person is not used to revealing all that he has to say outside of court.

The Rashbam says if he said outside of court ''the land is yours' then he can not change that in court.
but if he said "it never was your father's" [in direct contradiction to the witnesses but not a direct admission.] then he can change that plea.

Rav Akiva Eigger has a doubt about a different subject which is relevant to this,
The law is if one says "I never borrowed " and witnesses said he borrowed and paid back, it is as if he said I never paid back. But is that because I it is like a complete admission or just and implied admission?

The Rambam says about this last case "If he said in court 'I never borrowed' it is admission" thus it is clear he holds it is only implied admission, and therefore if he said it outside of court, he can change his plea. That is it is not straightforward admission. That is like the Rashbam. The Rashba (Rav Shelomo ben Aderet) and Rabbainu Yona said even if he said it outside of court, he can not change his plea in court. Thus they think of it as a explicit admission.

The problems here are so many I could not even begin to count them,but like I said I only wanted to introduce the subject for now.


תוספות בבא מציעא דף ק''י ע''א. הנושא הבסיסי הוא בבבא בתרא דף ל''א. שני אנשים מגיעים לבית המשפט. כל אחד אומר, "השדה זה היה של אבותיי ואני עובד שם שני חזקה, שלוש שנים." ואז שני סטים של עדים באים לבית המשפט. קבוצה אחת אומרת ששדה זה היה לאביו. הסט השני אומר על טוען האחר, "הוא היה על שדה זה שלוש שנים. רבה אמר למה לשני לשקר? הוא היה יכול לומר, "קניתי את השדה הזה ממך."  אביי אמר," אנחנו עושים לא אומרים 'הוא היה יכול לומר' במקום שישנם עדים". כאן הבעיה היא כי תוספות בבא מציעא דעה אחת היא זו. אם זה היה כך שאדם יכול לומר כי הקרקע שיש לך כבר למעלה משלוש שנים בא לך כערובה להלוואה, אז גם בלי מחאת מחאה בתוך שלוש שנים, אחד תמיד יהיה אמין בטענה "הקרקע שאתה עליה היא שלי ויש לך את זו כי אתה גזלת אותה" עבור שהוא היה יכול לומר את זו היא ערובת משכון ושיאמין. אז מאמינים לו עכשיו. זהו מיגו יכול להוציא חזקה. לפיכך, טיעון תוספות נראה את מחובר להוויכוח בין רבה ואביי. כי במצב שלנו בבבא בתרא, לא אף עד אומר שהתובע היה בעל האדמה. במקום זאת, הקבוצה של עדים שאמרו על תובע אחד שהוא היה שם לשלשת השנים. כלומר, יש לו חזקה. העדות היא כי יש לו חזקה, לא כי יש לו בעלות. לכן הוויכוח בין רבה ואביי הוא אם יש מיגו במקום שבו יש עדים קשורים במקרה של תוספות. אבל ההבדל הוא זה. בבבא בתרא רבה הוא לא אומר שאנחנו מאמינים מיגו לקחת של של חזקה. רק להפך. אנו מאמינים האדם שיש לו את החזקה כי יש לו גם מיגו. זה לא לאביי שאומר שאנחנו אפילו לא מאמינים לו בגלל מיגו שלו וגם לא בגלל החזקה שלו. אבל ניתן גם לראות כי האדם עם מיגו הוא למעשה לוקח מתוך חזקה מעיקרא של טוען האחר. כלומר שמיגו שלו עם חזקת השתא, ואת החזקה של שלש שנים יחד יכולים להוציא מחזקת מעיקרא. אני מניח כאן כי העובדה שהקרקע שייכת פעם לאביו שלפחות נותן לו מבחינת החזקה מעיקרא. בכל מקרה, אני חושב כי מחלוקת בין רבה ואביי אולי גם תלוי טיעון בתוספות בנידה ב: אם חזקה מעיקרא וחזקה דהשתא שווות. אם זה נכון אז נוכל להבין רבה שאם תוסיף מיגו אל חזקת השתא שזה יכול להכריע את חזקא מעיקרא של טוען האחר. אבל אם חזקה מעיקרא חזקה, אז נוכל להבין את אביי שלא חושב להרכיב מיגו עם חזקה דהשתא כדי להכניע חזקה מעיקרא. אבל לו  יכול להיות שגם כך חזקה מעקרא בענייננו אולי גם לא יספיק. אחרי שהטוען השני היה שם בשלוש שני חזקה.


I know you could argue with all this. I imagine if I was learning with David Bronson he would challenge every single assumption here. He would first attack the idea that because it was on one of the plaintiff' father's that does not necessarily make it  חזקה מעיקרא. Plus plenty of other objections I was thinking of as I was writing this.

He would also wonder about if the fact one person was there three years if that makes it חזקה דהשתא. And probably a few tons of other objections. Anyway there tons of problems here that I just can not imagine right now how to handle.

I generally agree with economists of the Austrian school and the Chicago school in some ways. 
Especially the idea that people respond to incentives. But the kind of incentives they respond to is one point of contention. It is not that people are out to seek their own benefit and thus form a society and trade in order to maximize their benefits. Rather I think people are out looking for an altar to sacrifice themselves and other people on.... some human being or some cause  they have to agree with, and if anyone disagrees they will go to war to make them agree. Religious people that present themselves as loving and kind, are actually out to bring in human sacrifices to their leaders. They use the kindness as bait the same way you put a tasty worm on a fish hook.

It has been said people were born to freedom but everywhere are in chains. As de Masitre  said that is as sensible as saying sheep who are born carnivorous are none the less everywhere eating grass. If you want to know what people are born to, then look as what they do, not what you think they ought to do. 

The Sitra Achra [the realm of Evil] we already know has great power to make itself seem sweet and lovely for the moment,

With Kant all you really have is knowledge based on observation or not based on observation. [a posteriori or a priori].
This comes from Hume. But this to a large degree accepts a very secular idea of the ''self''. The Self that is not a soul is a secular thing. It has no spiritual intuitions, spiritual connections.
This creates a very false self image of what a person is or ought to be for every single individual. It does not automatically deny knowledge based on spiritual intuition but it does so by implication.

This means that people looking into their own lives and trying figure out things tend to miss a significant aspect of their own self being that they can not take into account because they believe it has no relevance nor even reality. Even when they are interested in Torah this makes them incapable of accounting for what they might be doing right or wrong. They also will tend to look at others as selves, but not souls. [Allan Bloom went into this in great depth in his book, The Closing Of The American Mind].

In my own case there were spiritual connections that I had with my parents and Israel and Torah and the Infinite Light  of the Divine Presence, that I ignored because of not being able to take them into account in my mental processing. That led me to ignore the most significant aspects of Torah.  

This is not to minimize the danger of the fact that all intuitions are subject to error. The Sitra Achra [the realm of Evil] we already know has great power to make itself seem sweet and lovely for the moment, though in the end it is bitterness and gall.

I am also quite aware of soul connections that are not at all felt in any sense but are none the less quite real. 

structure of medieval society

Allen Bloom (The Closing of the American Mind) compared the structure of medieval society as a Gothic Cathedral with the vast amounts of pushes and pulls and strains all balancing out. Trying to undo the natural order causes the whole thing to come tumbling down --since we do not know what makes society tick. Thus he saw the Enlightenment as leading to an eventual collapse of the social contract as he thought was happening around 1990.

Our state of understanding how any human society works is on the order of medieval medicine -that all their theories were wrong, and anything any doctor would do would automatically cause more damage than leaving the patient alone. Medicine has advanced a little  since then,- but all our theories of how human society works are clearly  100% wrong; and anything anyone does to improve things just leads to the patient's death all the sooner.

People that claim ordination (סמיכה) nowadays have a halachic category of being liars (הוחזקו כפרנים),

A single person can tell over the law of the Torah. But he does not have the legal status of a Beit Din [court of law בית דין]. That is an argument between R. Abahu with Rava against Rav Acha Bar Rav Ika. As Rav Shach noted, the Rambam does poskin [decide] like R. Abahu that a single person that is expert can judge, but not as a court of law. [The rishonim believed the Rambam decided like Rav Acha bar Rav Ika that a single person can be a beit din and then had to scrounge around for answers about why then three are needed.They were not able to see the difference between deciding a  general law and deciding a specific case.]

[This seems to be one of those cases in which even great rishonim did not see what the Rambam was getting at, and it was only recently in the period from Reb Chaim Solveitchik until Rav Shach that lots of difficult issues about the Rambam came to clarity and light.]

Even a Beit Din [court of law בית דין] without authentic Semicha [ordination] can judge common  cases like loans and admissions, but not most other things that require true ordination. People that claim ordination nowadays have a halachic category of being liars (הוחזקו כפרנים) and when one has the halachic status of a liar then nothing he or she says has any validity. [I hope to get into this issue which comes up in Bava Batra chapter 3.] [This occurs when a person says one thing to one person, and then changes it when he talks to another, which is common with people like that.]

But even things that do not require true semicha--if one gets payment for them, that also has no halachic status. כל דיין שנוטל שכר לדון כל דיניו בטילים. "Anyone who receives payment for judging,--all his judgement are null."

People do take power that is not granted to them. This is common. The Constitution of the USA also limits  power yet it clearly does not work.  The powers granted are Article I. Section 8. That is about 1% of the things the Federal government controls. This started in 1942 in a Supreme Court case about the law farmers must not grow more that X amount of corn. One farmer did so for his pigs on his farm besides what he grew to sell which was under the limit. The Supreme Court said the law was constitutional because of interstate commerce. The farmer was thus not allowed to grow corn to feed his own pigs because of interstate commerce? The reason this was upheld was not because the Supreme Court was from Mars or supremely stupid (don't tempt me), but rather because they could not care less about what the Constitution says. This is a good analogy to what happens in the religious world. The satanic teachers simply do not care what the Torah says as long as they can get away with their scams. The trouble is there is no punishment for them for this fraud. People go along with it because until it hurts them personally they do not care.


The ways to solve these problems are simple. Defund the fraud. [Throw out the satanic teachers]


But furthermore--it should be possible to arrangement things differently in a way that would be more just. Perhaps looking at the USA  and the ways it has gone away from the Constitution might help give us some ideas. I do not spend much time on this but in theory it might be worth the time. Now Reb Chaim from Voloshin in fact came up with this great idea to have the local yeshiva not dependent on the local kahal--which made a lot of sense and still does. But one could go further. Have a negative beit din. A beit din that all they do is to knock down laws that are adding to Torah. 

And that beit din should have power to assign penalties for fraud. Make the fraudsters pay the price of the havoc they have wrought on Klal Israel. [Or just shoot them, and make things easier for everyone.] [At least they could expose the scammers and charlatans,]
I should mention  that the Na Nach group tends to be highly aware of the abuses I have describe here. Good for them. 
What they ought to do is to document every abuse--on film and on paper until people start paying attention. [Get on a video everything so they can not backtrack and change the narrative later to fit their agenda.]
The real problem with people that pretend to teach Torah is not so much that they think they have the authority to do so but rather that they are demons as Reb Nachman pointed out, and their demonic powers are what gives them authority, not the holy Torah. For some reason this aspect of teachers of Torah was left unexplored by most rishonim though it comes up in the Talmud. The Rambam tried very mildly to call them out on this and that was in fact the reason for the first ban on the Rambam.  The best thing in any case is not to bow nor to submit to them and to know that they teach a false Torah.

T35 E Flat Major 3-4 time  t35 midi   t35 nwc

It is possible for teachers of Torah to be satanic as we can can see in the religious community in Los Angeles

It is possible for teachers of Torah to be satanic as we can can see in the religious community in Los Angeles. But there are different levels of evil as brought in the Zohar
The place this really come up in detail is in the writings of Reb Nachman, but it is also mentioned in the Talmud and even the Rambam brings it up.
The mystery is that you would expect them to be better--not worse.
So it is on purpose that I mention the few good and authentic yeshivas in NY and Israel, like Ponovitch, Mir (NY, not the one in Israel), Chaim Berlin, Torah VeDaat, in order to focus on the good and hope that people will understand what is bad. I also should mention the religious Zionist yeshivas which I generally have a good impression of. [That is what is called "Bnei Akiva".]

But the general level of teachers of Torah is so low and so dangerous to regular Jews that I believe they ought to be purged and eliminated so they can no longer entice people into the Dark Side, Sitra Achra. They are incredibly dangerous. And their connection to Torah is all false and just pretense of wearing black clothing and the right kind of hat. But without hatred or malice, it is best to just get rid of them one way or the other before they can do anymore damage on other families like they have done to so many I am sure my readers have already heard about and know from first hand experience.

a later court of law is not obligated to go by a former court of law.

The רמב''ם in the beginning of משנה תורה and in that  ממרים פ''ב הלכות א-ג is saying roughly the same thing. That in terms of  פסק הלכה a later court of law is not obligated to go by a former court of law. That is הלכה א. But when it comes to תקנות גזירות ומנהגים a later court of law can not disagree with a previous court of law unless it is greater in wisdom and numbers. However a law made as a סייג לתורה a later court of law can not nullify if it has expanded to all Israel. That is the basic law in the רמב''ם and it is also how רב שך understands him. The way you see that this is how רב שך understands the רמב''ם is the fact that in עדויות he says the רמב''ם has to be talking about גזירות ותקנות
In that משנה עדוית א:ה it asks "Why write the minority opinion?" And it gives an answer.   The רמב''ם says there it means a later court of law can decide the law in that way even if it is a minority if it has רוב חכמה ורוב מניין. Why not understand the רמב''ם simply that he means a פסק הלכה? Because the רמב''ם ties it in with the idea that a later  court of law can depend on a minority opinion if it has רוב חכמה ורוב מניין. We already know from משנה תורה the רמב''ם does not require a later court of law to need more numbers and more wisdom when it comes to  פסק הלכה. So in עדויות he must means גזירות ותקנות
רמב''ם בתחילת משנה תורה והן  בממרים פ''ב הלכות א-ג אומר בערך אותו הדבר. זה במונחים של הלכה. פסק בית משפט מאוחר אינו מחויב ללכת לפי בית משפט לשעבר. כלומר זו הלכה א. אבל כשמדובר בתקנות גזירות ומנהגים בית המשפט המאוחר  מחוייב להסכים עם בית משפט הקודם  אלא אם כן הוא גדול בחכמה ומספרים. עם זאת חוק שנעשה בתור סייג לתורה, בית משפט מאוחר לא יכול לבטל אם היא התרחב לכל ישראל. זהו החוק הבסיסי הרמב''ם, וזה גם איך רב שך מבין אותו. הדרך שאתה רואה שכך רב שך מבין את רמב''ם היא העובדה כי בעדויות הוא אומר שהרמב''ם מדבר על גזירות ותקנות. באותה משנה עדוית א: ה' המשנה מבקשת "למה לכתוב דעת המיעוט?" והיא נותנת תשובה. הרמב''ם אומר  שהמשמעות היא שבית המשפט המאוחר יכול להכריע את החוק ככה גם אם הוא מיעוט אם יש לו רוב חכמה ורוב מניין. למה לא מבינים את רמב''ם פשוט כי הוא מתכוון פסק הלכה? בגלל שהרמב''ם קישר אותה משנה עם הרעיון כי בית משפט אחר עשוי  לתלות בדעת המיעוט אם יש לו רוב חכמה ורוב המניין. אנחנו כבר יודעים מתוך משנה תורה שהרמב''ם אינו מחייב בית המשפט המאוחר להיות להם יותר מספרים ויותר חוכמה כשמדובר בפסק הלכה.


I am really tired so I just wrote this fast-but if I could add for the sake of simplicity I would explain how the Rambam is referring to a court of law with the authentic ordination from Sinai, not the phony type in common use today. Also that the Rambam does not mean a court can poskin not like the Gemara. The Gemara is the final pesak as he explains elsewhere.. But I did not have time to go into this because of lack of sleep.

The thing that requires thought here is the way Rav Shach understands that Rambam. It is not as if I never thought abut this. But this way Rav Shach understands the Rambam puts a whole new spin on things.

A legal measure adopted by a later בית דין when the reason for the law is gone is well known to be the subject of a debate between the רמב''ם and ראב''ד. It stems from the כמרא in ביצה דף ה' ע''א.

The interesting thing about it is the רמב''ם in the introduction to the משנה תורה where he deals with a different issue about a local בית דין. There he brings down that no one has the authority to nullify a law of the גמרא. And we have in the  גמרא a set of rules how to decide any הלכה. In any case the רמב''ם had no doubt about that. But among ראשונים there are different opinions on which of those rules takes precedence. The odd thing בהלכות ממרים ב' הלכה ב' does not seem to refer to a בית דין  without the authentic סמיכה from Sinai which no longer exists . In the introduction he seems to refer to the kind of בית דין of three that can judge a very limited  set of things. So in משנה תורה why does he not go into the subject of a בית דין with no true סמיכה. Obviously because  as we can see he felt they had no authority to make  decrees.


 גזירות או תקנות שאומצו על ידי בית דין מאוחר יותר כאשר סיבת החוק היא בטלה, זה נושא לדיון בין רמב''ם וראב''ד. זה נובע מגמרא בביצת דף ה' ע''א . הדבר המעניין הוא הרמב''ם במבוא למשנה התורה, שם הוא עוסק בנושא אחר על בית הדין מקומי . שם הוא אומר כי לאף אחד אין  הסמכות לבטל חוק של הגמרא. ועל שבגמרא יש מערכת הכללים כיצד להחליט  הלכה. בכל מקרה לרמב''ם לא היה ספק בכך. אבל בין הראשונים יש דעות שונות על  כללים אלה. הדבר המוזר בהלכות ממרים ב' הלכה ב' לא נראה שהוא מתייחס לבית דין ללא  סמיכה אותנטי מסיני אשר אינו קיים עוד. בהקדמה למשנה תורה הוא מתייחס לסוג של  בית  דין של שלושה שיכולים לשפוט קבוצה מאוד מוגבלת של דברים.  ברור כי כפי שאנו רואים שהיתה להם סמכות לעשות גזירות רק  בזמן הגמרא

[That is the Rambam was dealing with  the issue of  local beit dins after the Talmud in the Introduction. There is openly refutes the idea of פוסק בתרא saying the later beit din can decide any way it sees. That is a different subject than the subject in Mishne Torah.]


So what you have in the Rambam are three relevant things. The first three Halachot in chapter two of law of ממרים, the introduction to Mishne Torah, the פירוש על המשנה in מסכת עדויות פרק א' משנה ה.
I see Rav Shach has an essay on this subject in the Avi Ezri.

In any case, it seems the main trust of the religious world is to be adding restrictions upon restrictions in such a way that no one can do anything. There is little attention paid to the fact of the Raavad and Tosphot holding that when the reason for the גזירה או תקנה is null then the law itself is null and void.
This applies through wide variety of laws where the reasons are in fact stated as in the case with most decrees.

The problem in the religious world is they relish in making up restrictions (that are neither from the Oral nor Written Law) that limit everyone but themselves. And the restrictions that do apply to them they always manage to find some way out of.
The religious world is really an epi phenomenon  of the Shatz. It is just a different kin of manifestation of the same evil spirit that in infected the Jewish religious world in circa 1668.\
The same spirit in different forms.

The Lechem Mishna asks on the Raavad what about the statement אין בית דין יכול לבטל דברי בית  דין אחר עד שיהיה גדול ממנו בחכמה ובמניין. One beit din can not  nullify the decision of another beit din until it is great in wisdom and numbers. To that Rav Shach answers that the way to understand the Raava is on his explanation  of the Mishna in עדויות א' משנה ה where it says מכיוון שהלכה כדברי המרובין למה כותבים דברי היחיד? Answer: in case a later beit din sees the words of the previous beit din and disagrees. If the later beit din depends on the words of the minority, that is OK.

The Rambam in the beginning of Mishna Torah and in that place in ממרים is saying roughly the same thing. That in terms of  פסק הלכה a later beit din is not obligated to go by a former beit din. That is Halacha 1. But when it comes to תקנות גזירות ומנהגים a later beit din can not disagree with a previous beit din unless it is greater in wisdom and numbers. However a law made as a סייג לתורה a later beit din can not nullify if it has expanded to all Israel. That is the basic law in the Rambam and it is also how Rav Shach understands him.

The way you see that this is how Rav Shach understands the Rambam is the fact that in עדויות he says the Rambam has to be talking about גזירות ותקנות. Why not understand the Rambam simply that he means a פסק הלכה? Because the Rambam ties it in with the idea that a later beit din can depend on a minority opinion if it has רוב חכמה ורוב מניין. We already know from משנה תורה the Rambam does not require a later beit to need more numbers and more wisdom when it comes to  פסק הלכה. So in עדויות he must means גזירות ותקנות
[That is in that Mishna ch 1 mishna 5 it says why write the minority opinion? The Rambam says there it means a later beit din can go with it even if it is a minority if it has רוב חכמה ורוב מניין]

I think Pesach is April 11 --This would be like Tosphot in Sanhedrin page 10b.

I think Pesach is April 11 [starting the night of April 10] since  there is no Beit Din to sanctify the new moon, and Hillel II never set up the present day calendar. It is the calendar of Meton from Athens not from Halacha LeMoshe MiSinai. It was adopted in the middle of the geonic period. Thus it makes sense to go by the Gemara in Sanhedrin  and the Mishna in Rosh Hashanah that when the Beit Din on earth do not sanctify it, the new moon is sanctified from heaven. 
The idea of April 11 is the the new moon was March 28 Universal Time in Greenwich at night time 2:57 AM. That is the night after Monday. That is the new moon was Monday night after midnight. So Tuesday March 28 was Rosh Hodesh. So next Monday night is the 15th of Nisan.

There is a kind of satanic element in the religious world

One of the reasons it is hard to come to Torah is that the people that set themselves up as teachers of Torah are extremely stupid and yet wear the religious clothing which is supposed to signify that they are smart and righteous. ["Torah scholars that are demons"  תלמידי חכמים שדיין יהודאיים as mentioned in the Zohar and the Ari.] The further trouble is they give each other credentials as if they are experts in anything but defrauding the public. But the damage they do is really infinite because naive people are taken in by their fraud. And it is almost impossible to be guarded from them because they are sneaky.  [I have learned that people can be stupid but sneaky. People can actually be clinically insane and still be sneaky.]
In normal times  the simple thing to do would be to stick with authentic Lithuanian yeshivas where no funny business is allowed.
But that no longer works because of sneaky people finding out they can use the camouflage of being a legitimate yeshiva.

Yeshivas were made because of the situation of the times by Reb Chaim from Volloshin. [Before that they had no independent status but were simply the local synagogue where the youth gathered to learn during the day until the time they got married.] But what was once made  because of time of need has become a scandal.
And then Reb Israel Salanter invented the idea of kollel, which also was a great thing at the time but now has become a nightmare. The best idea that I can see is to identify the authentic places like Ponovitch and the great NY yeshivas Chaim Berlin Torah VeDaat, Mir and simply throw out all the rest. Separate the good from the bad.
Are there any other authentic places? Maybe. [Los Angeles is a magnet for the worst of the worst. There is nothing of the religious community there that is not from the Satan. People there should stick with Reform or Conservative.
There is a kind of satanic element in the religious world in enticing naive secular Jews in and then  turning them in to human sacrifices on their idolatrous altars. No all are like that but certainly the group the Gra put into excommunication are.

Pigeons, it turns out, are highly superstitious. If you give them a few times food after some type of action they did, they almost immediately they learn to associate the coming of the food with that action. They will dance that same dance over and over again thinking that that is the action that caused the food to come.
To some degree this seems to be in accord with  what Rabbainu Yona says in Shaari Teshuva אין יסורים בלי עוון ''There are no troubles without sin.'' However as this train of thought goes on I will try to show there is a better approach.  But just for now I want to make a note that different people will emphasize one particular action just like the pigeons.
They will choose one particular action they will say that all of one's happiness in this world and the next depends on. שמירת הברית to Reb Nachman. Learning Torah to the Litvaks. Every cult will say it depends on service to their cult.
To some degree, I can agree with the Litvaks that a lot depends on learning Torah.
But the way I see things, a lot of these approaches promise much and deliver little.  Often they are consciousness traps to get one into some Sitra Achra cult.

To me it seems the Torah itself deals with this mentality. It says, "This is the mitzvah I have commanded to you when you enter the land God has promised to you, burn down and destroy all the places the nations have served idols in." In other words, don't worry about everything I have commanded. Just concentrate your focus on this one thing. Destroy the cults at all cost.
Causality while true tends to be too difficult to work with. There are too many factors to deal with. Physicists have found the Hamiltonian to be an easier method. That is to find the total energy of the system and find its minimum. The Lagrangian works better for Quantum Field theory where you look at the difference between the KE and potential energy and look for a maximum or minimum.
You look rather for the right balance of values. This explains a lot. It shows that even though the Litvaks are clearly right about learning Torah, my approach shows why it is of limited effect. While a good amount of exercise every day is good for your heath, that does not mean an insane amount of exercise is insanely good for your health.

Going beyond the point of  balance detracts from the Torah. Just like water is good for you but one can overdose. But I do not mean one can overdose on Torah. Rather I mean that when starts to use Torah for money that immediately turns it to poison.

But I would rather not concentrate on the Litvak world which is at least of the good side. It is highly disappointing to me that the Lithuanian yeshiva world is no where near as great as I would have hoped based on the fact they have most things rights in terms of world view. It is rather the aspect of the cult the Gra put into Cherem that is more of a problem because it apparently has a connection with the Dark Side that causes insanity to anyone that gets near. It is like  a fish hook. To the fish swallowing the worm on the hook, everything is fine. It is getting a free meal. And it is tasty. The trouble begins when it tries to break away. And the harder it tries to get away the worse things get.
That is the same with cults. Getting in is fun and exciting. The trouble is to break away means death.
My basic feeling is that I can not learn Torah and there is some kind of force from the Sitra Achra stopping me. And what makes it hard is internal and external. It is like the Sitra Achra plants its agents in the yeshiva world to make things hard for anyone that wants to learn Torah for ts own sake
I am not saying this is not my own fault. I fully believe if I had been steady to "remain in learning" that things would have worked out as we already know that real trust in God tears down all obstacles.

The basic structure of reality as we know from the Ari is the ten sepherot. But Rav Shalom Sharabi [from Yemen and then Jerusalem] showed how that boils down to five Partzufim [פרצופים] and from there down to three.

I had a few thoughts--but nothing really worked out.

Hegel's triadic (three fold) structure which he acknowledged came from Plato and obviously Kant. To me it is seems certain that to some degree he was inspired by Isaac Luria. [at least we know Hegel quoted the Ari and so he must have known about him to some degree.] 
To some degree it is possible to see the importance of the triads of Hegel by means of the Cantor set. In the Cantor set you keep taking out the middle third and if you go to infinity it turns out that the Lebesque measure intersection of all the subsets is zero. 

Which simply means if you take out the middle term you get no connection between the first and third.

trust in God

I know I have not been clear about trust in God. I am sorry about that but the ambiguity comes from experience. That is,-- the ambiguity of experience creates ambiguity in my thoughts. I am not even sure is there is any lesson that can be learned.
The major events were that I decided to go and learn Torah in NY somehow trusting that God would take care of "parnasa" [making a living]. And that attitude basically paid off with dividends until at some point it stopped (or more accurately I stopped trusting).  One way or the other the whole thing collapsed. So, while I agree in principle, I can also see it is a delicate principle. But it is a terrible mistake to associate trust in God with the religious world which puts on a facade of righteousness to bilk naive secular Jews out of their money. 
While trust in God is  a great thing, it is an error to think it has anything to do with kollel. Most kollel people are enemies of Torah and of Israel. They use Torah as a disguise. I have therefore tried to be very picky about which yeshivas to recommend which I believe learn Torah for its own sake

To get to Torah requires getting through the major obstacle--the pseudo religious world. As soon as one can get over the illusion that thy have anything to do with Torah at all, that is when one can begin to come to true Torah.
In terms of funding, I think it is the best approach to not punish the innocent with the guilty. Thus the vast majority of religious organizations which are scams should be cut off from all funding. Especially those in Israel. And the clearly honest places like Ponovitch  and the great NY yeshivas should continue to get even more funding. But with proper care taken to insure the good institutions, the rest of the 99% of the religiosity parasites and institutions should be cut off from all funding, private and government.
[Even though the pure Litvak Yeshivas that keep out all nonsense are pretty good, there are enough there also that are just playing games. As a rule the religious world has pitted itself against the State of Israel and thus should be thrown out. Getting the massive amounts of funding they get from the state is ridiculous. I never saw such insane hypocrisy in my life as this. And then they go to the USA to beg for charity from rich American Jews that they stab in the back if they dare to come to Israel.
[The good places are not just Ponovitch but also branches of Ponovitch. Same with the great NY yeshivas Mir, Chaim Berlin, Torah VeDaat. Rav Montag's yeshiva in Netivot I think is also very good/

The major issue is to direct funding to the proper places that are doing good work and to cut off all funding to the cults that pretend to be learning Torah. That type of knowledge is hard to come by except by experience. The main guidelines should be whatever comes under the category of the חרם of the Gra should be eliminated. Nowadays appearance counts for ore than substance.  So these cults make a lot of effort to appear Torah'dik [of the Torah] while in fact being agents of the Devil.

You fun these cults in Israel or in the USA, you give them power to seduce ore and more innocent Jews into their insanity.
I should mention also the Merkaz HaRav of Rav Kook at teh general Mizrachi yeshivas which are very good. 

the decline in the Armed forces in the USA.

I have heard about the decline in the Armed forces in the USA. A lot of the trouble seems to be in the kind of people enlisting. But I have seen plenty of cause for optimism. One is the election of Trump. Another is the fact that there still are good people in the armed forces. Not everyone has been affected.

In Israel, also I see good reason to support the armed forces. 

Mainly the idea comes from Hegel-that not every state deserves support. But some do. Those that maximize human freedom.
This is roughly based on Howard Bloom and his book on the super-organism and the social meme.[The Lucifer Principle]
That is Hegel saw the importance of the State, but not every state. Only the ones that are committed towards what he considered to be true justice. And justice in Hegel is not ill defined. It means a maximum of freedom within the limits of responsibility and moral law.

This is more or less of what Richard Epstein (in law at NYU) means with his limited kind of government. [Though he would not put it in terms of Hegel. And he is in any case not looking for philosophical justification for his limited government approach anyway. But that ignoring of the philosophical issue seems to  me to be  a weakness in his thought rather than a strength

Beginning of Bava Metzia

Someone sent to  two volumes of Rav Shach's Avi Ezri. One is gone. But in the one I still can read, he brings an amazing idea that the Rambam's idea of  דררא דממונא is when each one is saying a טענת ספק. He brings this from a book called אבן האזל.

Rav Shach himself uses this idea to answer some questions in laws of פקדון. but without actually seeing the arguments in  אבן האזל I can already see what the Rambam must have been thinking.

He must have seen that there are two opposing approaches to דררא דממונא in the Gemara. One is is Bava Batra that סומכוס Sumchos said his law {ממון  המוטל בספק חולקים בלי שבוע, money in doubt is divided with no oath} only in a case of דררא דממונא. The other is in the beginning  of Bava Metzia, that if Sumchos said his law in a case of דררא דממונא, then all the more so in a case that is not דררא דממונא. And I already mentioned in my little booklet on Bava Metzia that some of the Mishnas that the Gemara says are Sumchos do not seem to conform to the definition of Tosphot ספק לבית דין בלא טענותיהם.

So it is amazingly clear what the Rambam thought. He looked at the Gemara on page 100 and saw that there is an argument between two Amoraim about when Sumchos said his law. One said only when both say טענת שמא and the other opinion is even when both say טענת ברי. So the Rambam simply decided that that is the definition of דררא דממונא and that accounts for the difference between the two Gemaras in Bava Metzia and Bava Batra. That is the Gemara in the beginning of Bava Metzia is like the opinion Sumchos said his law in both cases (certainty and certainty) and the Gemara in Bava Batra is like the opinion Sumchos said his law only in the case of doubt and doubt.


The place to begin work on this would be to look at the those Mishnas that the Gemara says are Sumchos and to see how they fit with Tosphot and/or the Rambam. But I will have to leave that work for others since I have no Gemara.

I mentioned in my notes about the Maharam from Lublin conserning the fact that Tosphot's version of the Gemara in th beginning of Bava Metzia does not have דררא דממונא לזה ודררא דממונא לזה. That fact I used to help explain Tosphot on page 100b but it might help us here also to understand why Tosphot was not able to use the pshat/explanation that the Rambam uses. 



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  בספר של רב שך האבי עזרי he brings an amazing idea that the  idea of the רמב''ם that דררא דממונא is when each one is saying a טענת ספק. He brings this from a book called אבן האזל.

רב שך himself uses this idea to answer some questions in laws of פקדון. but without actually seeing the arguments in  אבן האזל I can already see what the רמב''ם must have been thinking.

He must have seen the there are two opposing approaches to דררא דממונא in the גמרא. One is is בבא בתרא that סומכוס  said his law ממון  המוטל בספק חולקים בלי שבוע only in a case of דררא דממונא. The other is in the beginning  of  בבא מציעא that is סומכוס  said his law in a case of דררא דממונא then all the more so in a case that is not דררא דממונא. And I already mentioned that some of the משניות that the גמרא says are סומכוס  do not seem to conform to the definition of תוספות ספק לבית דין בלא טענותיהם.

So it is amazingly clear what the רמב''ם thought. He looked at the גמרא on page דף ק' ע''א and saw that there is an argument between two אמוראים about when סומכוס  said his law. One said only when both say טענת שמא and the other opinion is even when both say טענת ברי. So the רמב''ם simply decided that that is the definition of דררא דממונא and that accounts for the difference between the two גמרות in  בבא מציעא and בבא בתרא. That is the גמרא in the beginning of  בבא מציעא is like the opinion סומכוס  said his law in both cases (certainty and certainty) and the גמרא in בבא בתרא is like the opinion סומכוס  said his law only in the case of doubt and doubt. 

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 ב''מ ק. בספר של רב שך האבי עזרי הוא מביא רעיון מדהים שהרעיון של הרמב''ם כי דררא דממונא היא כאשר כל אחד אומר טענת ספק. הוא מביא את זה מתוך ספר אבן האזל. רב שך עצמו משתמש ברעיון זה לענות על כמה שאלות בדיני פקדון. אבל מבלי לראות טיעוני האבן האזל אני כבר רואה מה רמב''ם חשב ודאי. הוא בוודאי ראה  שישנן שתי גישות מנוגדות בדררא דממונא בגמרא. אחת היא היא בבבא בתרא כי סומכוס אמר את החוק שלו ממון המוטל בספק חולקים בלי שבוע רק במקרה של דררא דממונא. השניה היא בתחילת בבא מציעא כי אם סומכוס אמר את החוק שלו במקרה של דררא דממונא, אז על אחת כמה וכמה במקרה שאינו דררא דממונא. וכבר הזכרתי שחלק של המשניות שהגמרא אומרת הן של סומכוס לא נראות עונות להגדרה של תוספות, ספק לבית דין בלא טענותיהם. אז זה ברור מה הרמב''ם חשב. הוא ראה בגמרא בעמוד דף ק' ע''א שיש ויכוח בין שני אמוראים לגבי מתי סומכוס אמר את החוק שלו. אחד אמר רק כאשר שניהם (הבעלי דין) אומרים טענת שמא ואת חוות הדעת האחרת היא גם כאשר שניהם אומרים טענת ברי. אז הרמב''ם פשוט החליט כי זו ההגדרה של דררא דממונא, וזה מסביר את ההבדלים בין שתי גמרות בבבא מציעא ובבא בתרא. זוהי הגמרא בתחילת בבא מציעא היא כדעת שסומכוס אמר את החוק שלו בשני המקרים (ודאות ודאות, ושמא ושמא) ואת הגמרא בבבא בתרא הוא כדעת שסומכוס אמר את החוק שלו רק במקרה של ספק וספק כשיטת רבא בבבא מציעא.

To me it seems that the left has lost the intellectual and moral high ground.

I see the problem was simply that the left had the power because it had what seemed to be true. Socialism seemed to be the wave of the future. To me it seems that the left has lost the intellectual and moral high ground. It will just take time until people see this. Sure in universities  Left wing drivel is still taught, but that is changing. And even the philosophy departments are changing for the better.
John Searle, Kelley Ross, Richard Epstein, Michael Huemer, etc. 


But that is not to imply the religious world is very good. Anyone who has ever been in a religious neighborhood knows  one immutable fact about the religious world שכן רע. They are evil neighbors.  Not just that they do not mind their own business but insist on poking their noses into everyone else's business and then go looking for even the slightest fault and then exploiting that to make some crusade against anyone they do not like.  Living anywhere near a religious person is an experience like no other of Hell on Earth.  

Some people seem to equate being religious with being righteous, moral and decent but from long experience I can say that is not true. In fact as a rule, the relationship is inverse. Righteous=1/ religious.
Clearly Reb Israel Salanter was aware of this and tried to correct it to by means of the emphasis on Musar thinking that people would see the main emphasis of Torah is on בין אדם לחבירו [human decency]- but the only people to have gotten that message are Reform and Conservative Jews.

Without the actual Talmud in front of me, it is hard to speculate. But I think that you have to say that Rav Shach has some way of understanding R. Yehuda (of the Mishna) in a different way than he is usually understood. R. Yehuda says ביעור חמץ the destruction of leaven is by fire. The way this is usually understood is based on a statement במה דברים אמורים קודם זמן איסורו אבל אחר זמן איסורו השבתתו בכל דבר. [When do we say this? Before the time it is forbidden. But after that time one can get rid of the leaven in any shape or form.]  Now based on a later on sugia [treatment of this subject] around page 93-95 in Pesachim it says leaven shall not be found is a prohibition that is transferred to a positive command. {לאו הניתק לעשה/a negative command that even if one transgress it he does not get lashes because it can be rectified by a positive command }That can only work if ביעור חמץ is only at the time of the prohibition. So to whom is that Gemara referring to? Apparently R. Yehuda.
This would at least help to understand the Rambam who does hold that ביעור is only at the time of the prohibition  and yet he gets lashes [because obviously he is going like the sages against R Yehuda] But the thing you see in the Rambam is the way he understood the argument between the sages and R. Yehuda--is what is the destruction of leaven? Anyway possible or only by fire? But both hold it is at the time of the prohibition. So this is how Rav Shach understands the Rambam and I think he must be basing it on that later Gemara.
Of course, none of this is like Rashi or Tosphot. And that leaves us with the obvious question what do Rashi and Tosphot do with that Gemara on page 93-95?

In any case there is clearly a lot of work that needs to be done here. Reb Chaim Soloveitchik also deals with this same question but I do not have his book nor the Gemara. At any rate his answer, is that לא יראה ולא ימצא is a positive and negative command--so that is how he answers for the Rambam which does not help us about the Gemara on 95.

In case it is unclear what I am saying here it is this. You can not have  לאו הניתק לעשה when the עשה starts before the לאו. They have to start and end at the same time for this law to apply.