Bava Metzia page 14. You have  a case where a field was stolen and now goes back to the original owner. Rashi asks why the owner does not pay for the improvement? After all he is getting an improved field. Rashi says it is a case where  the thief let it go fallow and it was improved in the hands of the buyer.
What you see here is even though this Rashi disagrees with Tosphot and the Rambam, still the foundation principle is the buyer who improved it gets back the improvement. Just like how Rav Shach explains things on page 15 where the case is the buyer ate fruit, and has to pay back. Rav Shach [Elazar Menachem Shach of the Ponovitch Yeshiva in Bnei Brak.]says that is fruit he did not work on. See the Avi Ezri.



 מציעא בבא 14. יש לך מצב שבו שדה נגנב ונקנה ועכשיו חוזר לבעלים המקורים. רש"י שואל מדוע בעל השדה אינו משלם לשיפור? אחרי כל מה שהוא מקבל שדה שהשתפר. רש"י אומר שזה מקרה שבו הגנב נתן לשדה ללכת בור  והיה שיפור בידיו של הקונה
מה שרואים מפה הוא שאף על פי שרש''י חולק על תוספות והרמב''ם בדין הזה עם כל זה היסוד הוא שמה שהלוקח  שיפר  הוא מקבל. וזה כמו שרב שך פירש הסוגיא בדף ט''ו איפה שיש דיון דומה
שם הלוקח אכל פירות וצריך לשלם על מה שאכל. רב שך מסביר שזה מצה שלא עבד על השבח כגון שהפירות הם פירי אילן

What is bothering me and has bothered me for a long time is that we seem to be letting the thief off the hook because of what the owner of the field pays. This is a question in my mind to the Tosphot Rambam Alliance, and all the more so to Rashi.
What I mean here is this. From the Rambam we have that the owner pays the lesser amount of one of two things, the improvement or the expense. And in the case the expense is less then that is all he pays and the thief pays the rest of the difference. But my question is what would happen if the owner would pay nothing? Then the thief would have to pay the entire improvement--not just the difference between the expense and the improvement.


All the more so to Rashi who puts the major burden of paying to the buyer on the back of the owner. Rashi says if the owner got back his field in a better state than when it was stolen he would have to pay for all the improvement. Then I ask what does the thief pay? Nothing except to give back the money to the buyer?

Music written for the glory of God

e69
corrected again.

This was written in Uman.



l55 mp3 edited

The Talmud says makes says that kissing and hugging an idol would be לאו שבכללות an prohibition that includes lots of things and so can't get lashes.
[That was not the original statement of Rav Avin bar Kahana. At first he had said one does lashes for it. Frankly this makes a lot more sense to me. But I can't go into that right now.]
At any rate Tosphot this is not like on Passover one can't eat Passover sacrifice raw or boiled in which the Prohibition for each  is stated openly. This is fine except that tosphot says the lashes are for "only roasted" "כי אם צלי אש". The problem is raw is one of the 613 commandments. And so is boiled. So why would they not get lashes because of themselves? Why only because of "only roasted" "כי אם צלי אש". I am not asking this as a question as much as just something that means we have to study Pesachim 41 where this comes up. [Lashes are the punishment for a prohibition in the Torah when the punishment is not stated explicitly. It can only be given if there were two witnesses that gave warning beforehand. It is a version of Miranda rights. There is never any punishment unless a warning is issued beforehand that is accepted by the perpetrator.]]

The end of this Tosphot however says something that is at face value really difficult. that don't serve idols is not specific enough while don't do work on the festival is specific.
to me it seems that it is impossible to know what Tosphot could mean by this without first spending time on pesachim pg 41. What could be the difference? I thought perhaps the festival has 39 kinds of work while honoring an idol could have an infinite range of things. But still why is it different? Don't do any work and don't do anything that honors an idol seem to be specific in the same way.

האמונה באלוהים היא רציונלית. לכל דבר יש סיבה. אם לא הייתה סיבה ראשונה  אז הייתה צריכה להיות רגרסיה אינסופית. ואז שום דבר לא יכול להתקיים. לכן חייבת להיות סיבה ראשונה. לכן יש אלוהים. הסיבה הראשונה, קיימת. אתה יכול להוכיח את הצעד הראשון אַפְּרִיוֹרִי שכל דבר יש סיבה בציינו ששום דבר לא יכול לבוא מצד עצמו. זה עושה את ההוכחה אַפְּרִיוֹרִי, לא רק תצפית אמפירית

גישה מקראית כללית לנשיות A general Biblical approach to womanhood

A general Biblical approach to womanhood would be first of all not like the feminist movement. It would also include the idea of dipping in a natural body of water once a month. It would also include a day of rest, not on Sunday. It would go against socialism, as being opposed to "Thou shalt not covet."

It would  not be liberal with commandments. That is, it would not expand them beyond their actual definitions. But it would not contract them either. And it would assume that what God means to say in the Bible, is what it actually says.

We know that, as a matter of fact, most of the commandments of the Bible were addressed to the Jewish people in the desert. But that does not preclude anyone from joining the club who wants to join. But if you join the club you have to obey the rules. You don't get to change them. Even Jews don't get to change them. The rules stay fixed like the Northern Star.
The idea that anyone can join is based on the Maimonides כל מי שרוצה "anyone who wants." It depends on nothing but ones own desire to keep the commandments of God.
[But you want to keep the laws of God, for God's sake don't ask a anyone. It is not up to them. Sometimes the Dark Side gets so strong that it is able to close the door to holiness completely. And if that would happen, it would not be possible to come to holiness--for anyone. So what does God do? He puts a person that fears G-d in the door so the Dark Side can't close it completely. But this also has the side effect that anyone who want to get into holiness has the problem that the someone who fears G-d will fight him at every turn.


גישה מקראית כללית לנשיות תהיה קודם כל לא אוהבת את התנועה הפמיניסטית. כמו כן, תכלול את הרעיון של טבילה בגוף טבעי של מים פעם בחודש. כמו כן, יכלול יום מנוחה, לא ביום ראשון. זו הייתה הולכת נגד סוציאליזם, שכהתנגד ללאו שבתורה" לא תחמוד ".

זו לא תהיה ליברלי עם מצוות. כלומר, זאת אומרת לא להרחיב אותם מעבר להגדרות שלהם בפועל. אבל זה לא הייתה מצמצמת אותן. וזה יהיה להניח כי מה שאלוהים אומר  בתנ"ך, זה מה שזה אומר בעצם.

אנחנו יודעים את זה, כעניין שבעובדה, רוב המצוות של התנ"ך הופנו לעם היהודי במדבר. אבל זה לא מונע מאף אחד להצטרף למועדון שרוצה להצטרף. אבל אם אתה מצטרף למועדון אתה צריך לציית לכללים. אתה לא יכול לשנות אותם. יהודים אפילו לא יכולים לשנות אותם. הכללים נשארים קבועים כמו כוכב הצפון. הרעיון שכל אחד יכול להצטרף מבוסס על הרמב"ם כל מי שרוצה "כל מי שרוצה לכסות תחת כנפי השכינה יכול". זה לא תלוי בשום דבר חוץ מן הרצון  כדי לשמור את מצוות ה '. [אבל אתה רוצה לשמור על החוקים של אלוהים, למען השם אל תשאלו רב. זה לא תלוי בם. והרבי נחמן אמר שהסיבה לרבנים היא להרחיק אנשים מהתורה. הוא מביא את זה מהזוהר שלפעמים הצד האפל מקבל כל כך כוחות שהוא יכול לסגור את הדלת לקדושה לגמרי. ואם זה היה קורה, זה לא יהיה אפשרי להגיע לקדושה - לאף אחד. אז מה אלוהים עושה? הוא מניח רב בדלת כדי הצד האפל לא יכול לסגור אותו לחלוטין. אבל זה יש גם את תופעת הלוואי שכל מי שרוצה להיכנס לקדושה הבעיה היא שהרבנים יילחמו בו בכל צעד ושעל. בסיכום יש סיבה לרבנים להתקיים. אבל הדבר הטוב ביותר עבור אנשים הוא להתרחק מהם בתכלית הריחוק

That is the best I can do to translate. The truth be told I am not sure how to do this. when I say "to join] the club" in English it sounds a little less formal than the Hebrew "מועדון"  In fact in Hebrew I think it might be better to leave out that metaphor completely. I don't mean to join officially. I mean rather an informal arrangement in which ever person that wants can keep the Holy Torah and in that way be in a sense joining the Jewsih people.

לא תאכלו על הדם Don't eat on the blood. [Leviticus circa 18]
The Talmud in Sanhedrin says this verse refers to the Temple in Jerusalem. There are some sacrifices that are eaten for example the sin offering to priests. The verse then tells us not to eat teh sacrifice while the blood of the animal has not been sprinkled yet on the altar. It tells the Sanhedrin not to eat anything the day they sentence someone to death. It tells us not to eat the blood of a living animal.
Why do the sages of the Talmud tells us this? Because the verse makes no sense otherwise. The context is: "Don't eat the fruit of a tree within the first three years it has been planted. In the fourth year bring it fruits to the Temple in Jerusalem, and don't eat on the blood." What blood? The blood of the fruits? The watermelon? And what is it one is not supposed to eat? It does not say! It just says don't eat on the blood. What should one not eat on the blood?

Music written for the glory of God

e40 in mp3  [e40 in midi]  e40nwc

This is  version in which I changed the string section to individual violins or cellos which seems to be better. And it saves me from having to change the actual score.


  great title in mp3  great title in midi  great title nwc

n17 mp3   n17 [in midi]  n17 nwc  

black hole in mp3

 black hole in midi  

black hole nwc

j94 [in midi] j94 nwc

j6 mp3

j6  in midi

j6nwc

Bava Metzia 101 I was confused about a certain passage in the Talmud until I discovered that Rav Elazar Menachem Shach has a nice explanation for it.
One goes into the field of another and plants crops. Rav says the owner gives the lesser of the improvement or the expense. I have to run but the basic idea come from the law of an abandoned field . If one plants it he has to give trumah [tithes]. So what comes from ones efforts is his.
In our case the field is not abandoned so we say the field did contribute something.
 I would not mention this but in my little booklet on Bava Metzia I left this law of page 101 with a question and it was just now that I realized that Rav Shach answers my question.

On who is involved in one mitzva does not have to do another. This has farther ramifications than most people think. The reason is the Shulchan Aruch puts together the opinions that one does have to stop in order to do another mitzvah along with the opinion one does not have to stop.

It is an argument in Suka 25a. Rashi, Tosphot, and the Baal Hameor all hold the argument there is going according to the opinion one has to stop. But the halacha is like R. Jose HaGalili that one does not have to stop. See the Rif, and the Baal HaMeor in the back.

I would like to suggest a halacha [Jewish Law] session like this.


You could do the Tur, Beit Yoseph, with the Shulchan Aruch also. I can imagine that that is a workable program.
But I must mention that the Shulchan Aruch just does not work with out the Tur. It is not just because the Beit Yoseph wrote that he did not write the Shulchan Aruch to be anything but a reminder of what he wrote in the Tur. But if you look at the Taz you will see he is always fighting with his father in law. There is almost no issue in the Taz that openly or not that he is not dealing with the Bach on the Tur, and disagreeing with him.

I should mention for the general public that halacha is not a made up concept or just because of some power trip of some control freaks.The Talmud itself give guidelines of how to poskin decide halacha from the Mishna and from the Talmud. It says the order of tenaim that the halacha is like against another tana in the mishna. So R Yehuda against R Jose, the halacha is like Rabbi Jose, etc. And in the Gemara also we have similar rules.

But it should be noted that the the insane religious world  and Torah are opposites. They might claim to be keeping Torah. But the facts show the reverse. There is no intersection between Torah and the the insane religious world . Those are two mutually exclusive sets.
Lithuanian Yeshivas do however have some connection with Torah. Also Mizrachi and Benei Akiva and  religious Zionist.

Music links for the glory of God [the First Cause, or the Will]

e51 edited again and again

e69
orchestra edited a third time mp3

e36 mp3

e51 edited again


e69

This should be put into mp3 but I can't seem to manage this. I realize that Midi and MP3 are different but I cant seem to compensate for the difference. So here it is in the original Midi form.


n57
i60

e39

ctl

mathematics

n33

If you look at the Rambam [Maimonides] about the issue of idolatry you can see he uses the second verse לא תעבדם "Don't serve them as a verse that specifically forbids kissing  hugging, sweeping in front or doing an kind of honor to an idol." That is the verse in Exodus 30. And he says one does not get lashes for this because it is not explained in the verse what it is referring to exactly.

So he is not using the idea of the Gemara [Sanhedrin 63a] that it is a לאו שבכללות a prohibition that forbids many things.
Tosphot also asks in the last Tosphot on the page how is it different than Shabat or cooking a the sciatic nerve on the festival, or eating the Passover sacrifice boiled or raw? He says basically the same as the Rambam אלו מיפרשי טפי.

What does all this mean? Is this how the Rambam and Tosphot are explaining the idea of לאו שבכללות a prohibition that forbids many things?

Tosphot  and the Rambam are saying that the prohibition for the rebellious son is don't eat on the blood and that is the prohibition that gets him lashes.  So Tosphot is not looking at this a a לאו שבכללות -- but  Tosphot and the Rambam both say about "don't serve other gods" that the problem is it is not explicit about what the lashes come for.
So what we have is that what I said a few days ago in this blog. That Tosphot and the Rambam simply noticed that Rabbi Yochanan disagrees with the Braita. Dont eat on the blood is not a לאו שבכללות. But לא תעבדם is a  לאו שבכללות







P.S. There are more serious kinds of idolatry, i.e., the four services and accepting  anything or anyone as ones god. But the prohibition for those things comes from a different verse that is found in the Ten Commandments.

Sanhedrin 61b.

I assume this is the basic reason the Gra found good reason to sign his name on the famous  excommunication that deals with this problem.

In any case every moment you spend with God is a a moment in eternity.

It is my opinion that thus we can see how important it is to talk with God at least an hour a day while walking around either in a wilderness or even in the city. This practice is good for the body and the soul.

This clearly started with King David. There was a book written about it by  Lawrence in France (The Presence of God).

So my suggestion is for people to walk to and from work and on the way there and back to talk with God. And if possible on weekends to get out of the city and get into the wilderness and spend time alone with God. And I should add that I think that God answers prayer sometimes. In any case every moment you spend with God is a a moment in eternity.

The sages of the Mishna made an effort to decide what was part of the Torah
There was some questions about the Song of Songs and the book of Ezekiel.
The only reason these two were included was the first Rabbi Akiva said was OK and the other another sage went into his attic and did not leave until he resolved the contradictions.
This is all contained in Bava Batra and in the Talmud Shabat.
Later on the Oral Law was all written down.  So we have today the set of the oral Law.
That is an actual account of the oral tradition. Later on a kind of consensus developed about what would be considered valid Halacha books. So we have a kind of set of Halacha.

There is a point to this. The point is that even if people are going to read books out of the regular set of Torah they still need to know what is part of the regular set and what is not. The Sages of the Mishna could have just said whatever people want to read they will read anyway. And they were not making a list of forbidden books. It is rather people need to know what is the established system.
I suggest a similar process with Musar.

Here is my idea of the what constitutes the Oral and Written Law Torah. Old Testament. The Two Talmuds and Midrashei Halacah Midrashei Agada,
Rif, Rosh, Rambam, Tur, Beit Yoseph.

Musar I think also needs to be limited in some way.
I am not alone in this. At least we know that Rav Shach made a distinction between books that are meant to be clarify things within the context of the Oral Law and books of "hashkafa" world view issues.  He wrote that the verse "Of making books there is no end and they weariness to the flesh." applies to books of world view.

What is wrong with books about Hashkafa (השקפה world view of Torah)?
1) They are in most often written by authors who do not know the Hashkafa of Torah.
That is to say Saadia Gaon wrote a book for the specific purpose of telling people the world view of Torah. You would think that a book by an authentic Gaon would be popular by people who want to understand about the world view of Torah. I mean who could possible know it more accurately that a real authentic Gaon? But in fact people have scarcely even heard of Saadia Gaon and the name of his books certainly  draws a complete blank. [It is called the Creeds and Doctrines. אמונות ודעות].
The Guide of the Rambam is also written specifically for the sake of explain the world view of Torah. You would think it would the singular most popular book in the Jewish world. Who after all could know the world view of Torah or explain it more clearly that the Rambam himself?

But the truth is people don't read these two books because they say things people don't want to hear.
They would rather read books that feed into their delusions and make them feel good about themselves. They don't want to know or even hear about what the Torah actually holds. And of they do then it will only be about rituals--never about what the Torah holds about major issues.
The problem with the Guide for the Perplexed of the Rambam is not that it is hard to understand. The reason people don't read it is because it is possible to understand. All too possible and all too easy. And then when he says things that fly in the face of what people want to believe it is disturbing.

A link to music that was written for the glory of God

holy spirit in midi [i cannot find a mp3 version]
orchestra in midi  orchestra in mp3
n86 in midi n5 in midi

p120 [in midi]


n3 in midi


n7 in mp3  n7 in midi

n8 in mp3  n8 in midi

i1  [in midi]

l76 in mp3   l76 in midi

I want to write about the Talmud in Sanhedrin two questions and one answer. I want to write a little background about Bava Metiza page 14.

1] But I want to start with Bava Metzia. My whole essay on the other blog [Wine Women and Transcendence is mainly understandable only if you have this first fact that if you have a borrower who has property at the time of the loan his property is משועבד is a lean for the loan. That is the context of the argument between the Maharsha and the Maharshal. The property bought later can also be a lean because of what he writes in the deed of sale. But that is not relevant to the argument. Let's say, for example, over there on page 14 the borrower goes after the second buyer. It will be let's say for argument's sake that we are only going with the idea of what was owned at the time becomes  a lean. So how can the loaner go after the first guy when there was still property owned by the borrower? It would not make any difference if we added an extra variable about the deed of sale.

2] Sanhedrin 63. Tosphot has two questions on the Gemara. And when I sat down to learn it today by the ziun of Reb Nachman it suddenly occurred to me that Rabbi Yochanans hold that לא תאכלו על הדם "Don't eat on the blood" is a prohibition for the rebellious son alone. That is how Tosphot understands the Gemara and in fact also the Rambam. That is Rabbi Yochanan disagrees with the Braita.  So everything I wrote about this subject before is ridiculous. We still have the same question on the Gemara. Why is the redactor of the Gemara inserting Rabbi Yochanan into this discussion.
But Rabbi Yochana in any case makes perfect sense. And the Rambam probably saw that also, and said, "If redactor did not have to insert R Yochanan here, that does not change anything about the halacha. All we have is a question on the Gemara. So what? It does not change anything."
I will have to find what I wrote about all this and erase it.

3]The Gemara thinks the prohibition of hugging and kissing an idol and sweeping up in front of it are all  לאו שבכללות a prohibition which prohibits different things and therefore gets no lashes. David asked. "Why?" This is not the usual case of לאו שבכללות a prohibition which prohibits different things
The usual case is one verse that forbids wildly different things. Hugging and kissing an idol are just subcategories of the same thing.

4] Why are hugging and kissing an idol and sweeping up in front of it forbidden? Rashi says in the Mishna page 61b from the extra don't serve them in parshat Mishpatim if these things have a special verse forbidding them and the verse if calling them serve then they are service not according to it way and they should be liable a sin offering. We have already that the first "Don't serve them" in the Ten Commandments means serve according to their way. And we say the four services also are included because of a גילו מילתא. But here we have the same expression used for these minor services. Why should they not be included in the general category?




סנהדרין סג.יש לתוספות שתי שאלות על הגמרא.  הגמרא מביאה ברייתא שפורטת כמה דברים שעוברים עליהם משום לא תאכלו על הדם. ואז היא מביאה רבי יוחנן שאומר שהלאו של בן סורר ומורה בוא הפסוק לא תאכלו על הדם. ואב היא מביאה רב אבין שאומר על כולם אינו לוקה משום לאו שבכללות. שאלה אחת היא שבן סורר ומורה הוא לאו הניתן לאזהרת מיתת בית דין ולכן ממילא אין מלקות. שאלה שנייה שבן סורר ומורה כן לוקה. ישבתי ללמוד ליד ציון ר' נחמן ופתאום הבנתי שרבי יוחנן סובר שלא תאכלו על הדם הוא לאו לבן סורר ומורה לבד. הוא אינו מסכים עם הברייתא. אצל ר' יוחנן כן לוקים על הלאו הזה ואנו לאו שבכללות. ככה התוספות מבינים רבי יוחנן שהם אומרים שבאמת זה הלאו שבגללו הבן סורר ומורה לוקה, וכן סובר הרמב''ם שמביא את הפסוק הזה ללאו הזה.) סנהדרין סג. הגמרא אומרת שלא תעבדם הוא אוסר גיפוף ונישוק ומכבד לפני עבודה זרה וגם היא אומרת שזה לאו שבכללות. החברותא שלי שאל איך זה יכול להיות? לאו שבכללות אומרים על לאו אחד שאוסר דברים שונים לגמרי. אבל כאן הדברים האלו הם ציורים שונים של כבוד לעבודה זרה שלא כדרכה. עוד קושיא רש''י במשנה כתב שגיפוף ונישוק אסורים משום "לא תעבדם" יתירה שנכתבה בפרשת משפטים לא תשתחווה לאלהיהם ולא תעבדם כי מוקש הוא לך, אם  הפסוק בעצמו אומרת שאלו הדברים הם עבודה למה לא חייבים עליהם קרבן חטאת

My story is I started a little above average. I mean my family was wonderful. But I had some kind of internal need to discover the meaning of Life the Universe, and Everything Else. And that is bound to not end well. Almost by definition. With the amount gurus and scam artists that grow like mushrooms it is hard to imagine how such a search could end well. But my some quirk of fate  I did end up in two remarkable yeshivas in NY [Shar Yashuv in Far Rockaway and Mirrer in Brooklyn.] But the hammer hit the anvil and after all what is a good story without conflict? And mine is no different. Instead of getting the girl as every good story has, in mine I lost the girl and fell to the bottom of the well.
 So this is more about life in the bottom of the well. and when one is in the bottom of the well that is  interesting. The hobos and vagabonds like me love . Down here in foggy bottom. No one loves a loser. And so it is lonely down here. And yet in our misery we find encouragement

here are links to some music which I wrote for the glory of God.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B71pces179i2cGRZZVhRZERJOW8/view?usp=sharing

This needs editing towards the end



b99



b100

This needs some editing.
But I can't convert anything to Midi. So I hope this version is OK.

Midi Files


e33



Mathematics




n83

l76I just found a way to put this here in Midi. [I pressed "export."]