Objective morality does not depend on axioms. As Dr Michael Huemer pointed out, there might be no algorithm to figure things out what is moral and what is not.
But even so you do what to have basic starting points so you do not end up with a regress of reasons or reasons that are self contradictory  or have axioms that make no sense.
  

  So I can see why trust in God was thought in Navardok [and in the teachings of Rav Nahman also to some degree] as your starting axiom.And to a great degree this was carried over into the entire Lithuanian yeshiva world--to a lesser degree than it had been in Navardok but still thought to be a major first principle.
  
  [So at the Mir when I was there,  there were few basic assumptions. The actual first one was learning Torah. No surprise there. And that is quite valid. See the Nedesh HaHaim of Rav Haim of Voloshin for details. But also where a few other axioms. Trust in God [that means in that sense -to learn Torah and not worry about making a living. When it comes time to make a living God will help.]; not to speak Lason Hara (that was a big principle); kindness when others need help; being extremely careful about monetary issues--that is to be scrupulous/ careful to the nth degree. In general a major emphasis on good character traits.] [I can not say how much of that wore off on me, but I hope some did.]

[In terms of how I started out, it was Leonard Nelson that was building on axioms trying to develop the intent of David Hilbert of putting Philosophy on axioms--as Hilbert wanted for Mathematics and Physics]

Secular Morality usually starts with highly doubtful axioms. They find some slogan which sounds good and then base everything on that. And those slogans change with the tides.

The Mishna says תעשה ולא מן העשוי ["'Make a thread on the four corners of your garment', do not make from what is already made"]  and the gemara in Menakot [40b] asks on this from R. Zira who said: "If one puts tzitzit on a four cornered garment that already has four blue threads, then it is valid."
Rava said: "He transgresses 'thou shalt not add to these commandments,' and so the act is invalid." Rav Papa said: "The difference between the Mishna and R Zira is if one intends to add or to nullify."

Rava is hard to understand. If you would have only Rav Papa things would seem clear.

Rav Shach in Laws of Tzitzit I:15, brings that the explanation of Rava is an argument between most other Rishonim that say he is agreeing with R Zira. The Rambam says he is disagreeing.

I have some thoughts about this sugia.
But first let me try to make it clear.
First the case is where you have four and then one more is added. Then you take off the forth and leave the fifth.
Mishna: invalid.
R. Zira: Valid.
Rav Papa. Intending to add is the Mishna. Intending to nullify the forth is valid.

If you understand Rava as disagreeing with Rav Zira [that is Rambam] that means he thinks adding a fifth  means even after taking off the forth it is still invalid. That means Rava would be disagreeing with Rav Papa also and saying that it makes no difference what his intention was.

But if Rava is coming to agree with R Zira it seems odd to say that it is valid because the deed of adding was not a "act" and so taking off the forth would be the beginning of putting on the fifth. This seems hard to understand for me.\\\\
There are here so many variables flying around that this is the exact type of thing that it is helpful to have  a learning partner with  high IQ.
You can place Rava (against Rav Papa) as saying the side of transgression is when the garment is OK because the act is not an act [Raavad] ;or with Rav Papa in the opposite sense-- that the side of transgression is when the act is not an act, and so only when he intends to nullify the previous thread is it OK (That is like the Shulchan Aruch of Rav Joseph Karo and the Rambam).
And you still do not know of perhaps the meaning is even to take off the forth thread or the extra fifth that the other is null also because of the same principle, "Make, but not from what is made", since even the forth was null while the 5th was on. So taking off the fifth should not make the 4th valid because it is a case of "make not from what is made".
 In any case, my learning  partner, David Bronson with whom I was learning in Uman was perfect for this kind of thing-- where just off hand I can count at least 20 or more permutations of how to fit this sugia together. But on my own I think this will take a long time to get to any clarity.

A side note here is that it is important to not that adding "extra" makes the whole thing null. This is why you would have in the world of Lithuanian types of yeshivot that "adding extra" of more than what the Law requires is looked at negatively. You see that principle here. The Law requires four tzitziot [blue threads] on a garment with four corners. Putting on a fifth one does not get one extra credit. It nulifies all the other four. So from this one can learn the lesson that what the Law requires it requires, not less and not more. Adding more than that nullifies everything.

"locality". There are time and space, but things just do not take any values in these things until measured.

With Bell's inequality we would have to give up one of two things. Either locality [local action], or that things have values in time and space before measured. We can not give up the first so it is the second that must be given up. [The reason people think that because of Bell that we must give up the first is based on this ambiguity. Bell did show something but not what he thought nor what people think he showed.]  I should add that with Bell there still are time and space, but things just do not take any values in these things until measured.

See lectures by Gell Mann at Caltech and Coleman at Harvard for information about this. On occasion you might find this issue addressed in a QM book. I recall one from the Weitzman Institute in Beer Sheva. But the fact that locality is true is well known in the Physics world. See also the Reference Frame blog on "locality".

The thing that I find curious is the infinite mass and charge of bare particles. When interacting particles are fine it is the bare particle that always has this infinite mass and charge.

Though the way this is dealt with is by re-normalization, still that is a way of dealing with a problem, but which does not make the problem go away. 

So what this looks like to me is somewhat like Kant. Not that space and time are subjective but rather dinge an sich [things in themselves that we do not have access to.] And then mass and charge also. 

[Besides that most things seem to be at the core a kind of thing going back and forth [A WAVE]-a harmonic oscillator --makes me wonder, "what is doing the oscillating?"]

W60 A Major

everything that goes on in the religious world is invalid. So while on one hand, there is a point about Fear of God and Learning Torah and Musar. But you do not want your efforts side tracked.

When one adds to a commandment that has an amount then the fulfillment commandment  is nullified. That is to everyone. But lets say one takes of the addition? Then does the first one remain valid?
See Rav Shach in the start of Laws of the Blue Thread [Tzitzit]. [That comes from a paragraph in the Book of Numbers].
To Rashi and Tosphot and the Raavad -if one has added another blue thread to his four cornered garment (which transgresses the command, "Do not add nor subtract from these commandments") Then obviously he can not wear the garment. However what happens if he cuts off the extra one? To Rashi and Tosphot it is OK. To the Rambam the adding makes it all invalid.

This shows that pretty much everything that goes on in the religious world is invalid. because of the constant adding to the commandments, the result is that nothing they do is valid. The adding nullifying even what might have otherwise been acceptable. 

So what I do is to avoid the religious completely. I figure I can not tell who really is a Torah scholar that is  a demon as Rav Nahman warned us about. So I simply avoid them all. 

What counts as metaphysics?

What counts as metaphysics that the rishonim [mediaeval authorities] emphasized learning?

At least we can see right on the first page of the important and first book of Musar, The Obligations of the Heart. He is referring to Aristotle and the Muslim commentaries. Al Kindi and Al Farabi. But we can also see his actual system of metaphysics in the first section which is Neo-Platonic. [So he is including the Neo Platonic, Plotinus]

This approach is certainly based on Saadia Gaon.

So the question is what about Kant? After all these same rishonim also emphasis learning Physics. So we would not say everyone ought to learn the Physics of Aristotle. We understand the discipline has made advancement. So can we say the same about philosophy?  Well on one hand  Philosophy has not made linear advancement since Aristotle. And so Aristotle and Plato would still be necessary to learn. But on the other hand there has been some progress. But other issues have come up. So I would add Kant, Leonard Nelson, Hegel, Thomas Reid [the philosopher of common sense]. 

 In Rav Shach's Avi Ezri Laws of Tzitzit chapter 1, law 15 is brought this fact that if one has a garment with four corners and puts in the four blue threads but then adds another then the previous four are also nullified. That is when the Torah gives a commandment that has a certain amount and one adds to that amount then the entire fulfillment of that command is nullified.

[This would tend to show that religious fanaticism does not help in terms of keeping Torah. ]

 There are on the other hand certain commandments that have no upper or lower limit as is brought in the mishna in Peah  אלו דברים שאין להם שיעור הפאה והביכורים וגמילות חסדים וכו' ותלמוד תורה כנגד בולם
These things have no given amount peah, the first fruits, kindness, honor of parents, visiting the sick etc., and learning Torah is equal to all of them together.

That is you can add as much to learning Torah or doing kindness and that is not a sin because the commandment has not given amount. But other commandments that have an amount, if one adds extra, he or she loses the fulfillment.

See Rav Shach there that there is an argument how to explain the Gemara in Menakot [page 40  side b and also page 41 side a] that is the source of this whole issue. But to all the different opinions, putting on another thread makes the whole fulfillment null and void.
The issue there in Menakot is  "to make" not make from "what is already made", and the gemara asks on this from R. Zeira. Then Rava makes an statement that seems hard to understand and that is the source of the difficulty.

pseudo commandments

The issue of adding to the commandments seems to me to be serious. It is just like the Torah says "Do not add and do not subtract to these commandments that I have commanded you this day". You can see what happens when lots of things are added "to make a fence" around the law that then automatically changes the whole structure of the law itself and certainly detracts from the actual fulfillment of real commandments when all people's energy is devoted to keeping pseudo commandments.

This is what it actually says in the commentary on Pirkei Avot by an amora R. Natan. [It is printed in the Vilna Shas after the end of seder Nezikim which is where Pirkei Avot itself is. אבות דר' נתן על פרקי אבות על המשנה לעשות סייג לתורה

 There are examples of being strict about addition stuff results in open violation of actual commandments of the Torah. This is not just in theory. 

Do not add to the commandments [Deuteronomy: "Thou shalt not add nor subtract from these commandments which I command you this day."]

I was wondering about the prohibition in the Torah of not adding to the commandments.
There is obviously a question about a lot of stuff.
One area you see this is with the blue thread on the corner of ones garments.
See Rav Shach on this issue in the Avi Ezri. [The very first law in the laws about the blue thread on the four corners on one's garment]. There he brings this issue concerning putting on a fifth thread which makes all the previous four threads "pasul"[null] . That is putting on an extra thread--just to be extra strict makes the fulfillment of the commandment null and void.

I never really got a satisfying answer to this question. My learning partner brought this idea that if you add;-- but you do not say it is an obligation from the Torah, but rather from your own volition or some decree of the scribes, that makes it OK. (?)The problem with this answer seems to be right here in this law that Rav Shach brings. Here we see that it makes no difference if one says he is adding another thread because of what ever reason there may be. The very fact of adding it makes the entire fulfillment of the commandment null and void.

Rav Shach brings this issue in a few other places in the Avi Ezri, but this is the most recent place that I noticed.]


Not adding to the commandments is a large issue. There are things that are considered a need for the times. Like you would have in norms like when to cross the street. Not to cross on a red light etc.

But to claim these are obligations of the Torah would be a problem. On the other hand there are commandments of the Torah that do not have upper or lower limits--like learning Torah or all the things mentioned in the beginning of tractate Peah. [These are the things that have no size... and learning Torah is equal to all.]

trust in God and learning fast

The way of learning of  just saying the words in order and going on is not directly related to trust in God. Yet it does provide an opportunity to exercise trust in God.
And having a chance to do something positive about acting on trust is a way to help trust in God grow.

I mean to say any good character trait grows in general by how much you exercise that trait. Whether by kindness or telling the truth. But trust in God seems different. How do you exercise it expect by "not doing". So since in any case one is required to learn, this gives a chance to do something positive to help your trust--and faith- in God grow.

[The idea of learning I want to add is not for everything.  Pseudo wisdoms are not in the category of things that it is a commandment to learn. So what is in the category of "teach them to your children and speak of them" is highly limited. To the Rishonim [mediaeval authorities] the command is only on the Oral or Written Torah. Only some Rishonim include Physics and Metaphysics in the command. [Those Rishonim based on Saadia Gaon]]


So my idea of what to study [especially now when you have a chance --finally out of the rat race. Quarantine.] Is the Avi Ezri of Rav Shach and  Physics. As for Metaphysics I am not sure what to recommend.

It is not clear how to reason about time because of Bell's inequality. The idea is that things do not have actual classical values of time or position in space until measured. [That was based on the Einstein Rosen thought experiment about polarization of light that shows either one of two things. Either action at a distance or things have no classical values of time until measured. [The experiment was done in the 1960's.] We know there is no action at a distance from GPS which depends on Relativity, so the second is true.]

Was the connection between the Philosopher Leonard Nelson and David Hilbert deeper that just Hilbert well known kindness and help for people in need? Leonard Nelson could definitely not get anywhere because all the philosopher in Germany were against him. [Not just in the university where David Hilbert was, but even in all Germany.]

But my point is that Hilbert saw a great importance in axioms, and getting to a basic set of axioms that all mathematics depends on. He wanted to expand that to physics. So the fact that Leonard Nelson wanted to expand that to philosophy would fit right in!
[It was not just the beauty aspects of having a small set of axioms, but also to make progress. And even though Godel showed that if you axioms are consistent then the system you derive from them can never be complete still David Hilbert's idea of the importance of the axioms is valid.

Socialism and eating pets.

“You would think that when your economy gets to the point where people are eating their pets, people might have second thoughts about what system they’ve chosen.”
 [Senator Rand Paul, contemplating the quick descent of once-rich Venezuela].

It occurred to me the main problem with socialism is equality. That is the idea that everyone has to be equal in the amount of goods. The problem with that is there is nothing in it to create goods. Only to divide what there already is. And add to that the further problem that there is no motivation for anyone to create anything. The only motivation to go and work is that the police arrest you after three months of you have a blank in your "work book" and send you to a gulag. That is a motivation but not a motivation do do anything constructive. 

Marx himself had noticed the tremendous potential of capitalism to create goods needed and wanted by people. But he thought that the age of the new man, the "idealistic socialist man" had arrived such that people would happily work for others and the state with no thought of their own needs.

w59 G Minor

It was common in the Middle Ages that lots of things in the Torah are allegorical. Maybe they did not use that for the flood, but it was used. You have to say it in lots of cases. King David  wrote in Psalms, "I am a worm, and not a man." That surely has to be an allegory (I think).

There is sometimes an intersection between a law that is from the words of the scribes and a law of the Torah. Usually this is rare and in theory almost impossible. Still it does happen sometimes.

An example is a woman gets married by the testimony of one witness [who says her husband died]. The two witnesses that are not accepted because of a decree of the scribes come, and say he is still alive. She can say married to her new husband. [See Rav Shach law of Divorce.. chapter 22.]

[What i mean is that one witness against two is always nothing. So here you have her getting married on the belief that he husband died in war or somewhere else. But there was only one witness to testify to that. So even if she can get remarried still it is not really valid testimony. Then come two witnesses that are OK from the law of the Torah  [that is they are not women, nor relatives, nor have received money for their testimony]. Yet these last two are not accepted by a decree from the scribes--for example they gamble or play the lottery. So they are not good witnesses from the words of the scribes but are OK from the Torah.  So from the law of the Torah she would have to leave her second "husband" since two witnesses say her real husband is still alive. Yet she is still allowed to remain married to the second one because the later testimony was from two that are not accepted from the words of the scribes.


[The idea is usually a decree from the scribes can forbid something that is permitted from the Torah because of making a "fence" a safeguard around the Law. But they can not permit something the Torah forbids. Yet here for some reason these two witnesses which are OK from the Torah are not accepted even to forbid. (I might add that even the ability to forbid what the Torah allows is subject to a debate. [See the Mishna "To make a fence" in Avot DeR. Natan. There you see the very concept in itself is subject to a debate. After all, why add to what the Torah says? Is it not enough?] Usually the Gemara is interested in what is forbidden or permitted from the Torah.

[When this comes up in money issues the answer is הפקר בית דין הפקר but here there is a different reason.]

Torah scholars that are demons.

Rav Nahman was not the first one to point out the trouble with Torah scholars that are demons.
I only brought this from Rav Nahman's LeM because it was one of the most striking features  of his teaching that I saw when I first started looking at his books. [LeM vol I: 8 I:12, I:28 I:61 II:1 II:8 and many other places I have forgotten off hand.]

The statements of the Gemara itself I forget the page numbers. One is from tractate Shabat.
"All the troubles that come into the world come only because of the religious leaders of Israel as it says in the verse in Isaiah, 'Your judges judge for the sake of getting bribes...'"

So already there was this connection from the start. It was not a new phenomenon in the time of Rav Nahman.

The question is why Rav Nahman would have picked out this particular point among thousands of possible great ideas from the sages he might have chosen to emphasize?

In any case, from the emphasis itself of Rav Nahman it seems these kinds of Torah scholars are not uncommon. Rather if anyone has trouble finding them they probably could not find a snowflake in a blizzard.




Clearly he saw this issue as sine qua non--[without which nothing good can even begin.]

Chloroquine and Hydro-chloroquine reportedly have been used both in China and South Korea to successfully treat the Wuhan Coronavirus and thus limit deaths. Both drugs have been traditionally used to treat malaria. Quinine is an active ingredient.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vTi-g18ftNZUMRAj2SwRPodtscFio7bJ7GdNgbJAGbdfF67WuRJB3ZsidgpidB2eocFHAVjIL-7deJ7/pub?fbclid=IwAR3HXmAaRvsKQwtD4mT0W6NU4bTJvZnR6f3KLRcsWkXSOGn33dbdR1KyS0Q

Leonard Nelson: A Theory of Philosophical Fallacies

I guess I am surprised that Leonard Nelson was actually published a few years ago and I simply did not take notice.

A Theory of Philosophical Fallacies published by Springer Verlag [the most prestigious publishing house in the world.

[I can not get over the fact that I missed this. It must be that people finally started noticing Leonard Nelson!! How do you like that?] [Dr. Kelley Ross had noticed Nelson all the way in the 1960's, but he was alone. He devotes his whole web site to expand on the ideas of Nelson.]

[I again want to mention I not want to take a side between his more Kantian approach, and John McTaggart's approach to Hegel]. I have learned, and gained a lot by both. I am not trying to be a philosopher. I simply wanted to gain some insight into the world and I found both to be of great benefit.


What I found amazing in Nelson was the idea of non-intuitive immediate knowledge [faith].
[The issue is can you have faith that is justified? It seems it can not be from empirical evidence. But also a priori seems limited as John Locke pointed out. To see what the problem is you might take a look at Descartes and Berkeley. Kant and Hegel come to answer the problems, but Kant's answers have seemed unsatisfying ever since he proposed them. [Fries came up with non-intuitive immediate knowledge, but his approach had problems also --that I forgot about off hand. If I can recall, I will try to put it up on this blog. But I know at least that Nelson was a great improvement on Kant and Fries both.] Nelson seems to have the best modification of Kant that does answer problems. 

[Michael Huemer has an approach different from Nelson. He goes with the idea that Reason tells you more than just how to detect contradictions (as Hume thought). Starting with that he goes further with prima facie the way things seem unless proven otherwise. So what Nelson calls immediate Huemer would also say reason sees things not exactly as immediate, but rather that after you understand the concept then it has prima facie credibility. So to Nelson can a priori knowledge be mistaken? I guess that is the issue. Kelly Ross answered this in connection with non Euclidean Geometry. I forget the whole issue right now.]
[The way I see this is thus: That knowledge and opinion --the question of Plato-is not a difference in kind but a difference of degree. And the whole difference between empirical and a priori is not the issue. As Dr Huemer pointed out there is no such thing as pure empirical knowledge.]



[The odd thing is that Hegel was the exact opposite of Socialism and yet used for that very purpose constantly. The strange thing about that is this. The goal of socialism is to make sure you have nothing more than your neighbor. That is the literal meaning of "equality." That does not mean making more goods. It means taking what there is and making sure that no one has anything more than anyone else. Do you really think that is right?]

Saadia Gaon on some problems in Christianity and some possible answers.

Saadia Gaon dealt with the two basic issues of Christianity of cancellation of the commandments and the Trinity.
But for some reason his book אמונות ודעות [Faiths and World Views] is rarely learned. The reason is that is is not on Gemara nor Musar. Still it sets the stage for all later Musar. [See the Introduction to the Obligations of the Hearts.]

In any case I wanted to mention that certainly he was correct that cancellation of the commandments is wrong. The trouble with this is it is not from Jesus himself but rather from Paul. And Paul was referring to gentiles. So while Saadia Gaon was right to criticize the doctrine, the point is that the doctrine is itself not even in the NT. note 1 [see http://www.anthonyflood.com/bahnsentheonomicposition.htm]
However, I ought to add that there is the point of R Shimon Ben Yochai-- that the commandments have a purpose. And when the purpose does not apply to a situation, the commandment itself is not applicable. For instance: it is not allowed to take a pledge from a rich widow. R. Shimon Ben Yochai said one can take  a pledge from a rich widow. [BM 119] [See Rav Shach where he brings up this argument between R Shimon and the Sages.]

The Trinity is also apparently a difficulty except if one takes into account that all mystics generally held the souls of the patriarchs from from Emanation. [I mean all mystics. See Sefer Yezira, Sefer HaBahir, Rav Avraham Abulafia etc.]


[note 1] "Do not begin to think that I came to abrogate the Law or the Prophets; I came not to abrogate but to fulfill. For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, until all things have happened, not one jot or tittle shall by any means pass away from the law. Therefore, whoever shall break one of these least commandments and teach men so shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven" (Matt. 5:17-19).

Several points about the interpretation of this passage should be rather clear. (1) Christ twice denied that His advent had the purpose of abrogating the Old Testament commandments. (2) Until the expiration of the physical universe, not even a letter or stroke of the law will pass away. And (3) therefore God’s disapprobation rests upon anyone who teaches that even the least of the Old Testament laws may be broken.

Attempts are sometimes made to evade the thrust of this text by editing out its reference to the moral demands of the Old Testament—contrary to what is obvious from its context (5:16, 20, 21-48; 6:1, 10, 33; 7:12, 20-21, 26) and semantics (“the law” in v. 18, “commandment” in v. 19). Other attempts are made to extract an abrogating of the law’s moral demands from the word “fulfill” (v. 17) or the phrase “until all things have happened” (v. 18). This, however, renders the verses self-contradictory in what they assert.

In Rav Shach's Avi Ezri Laws of Marriage 22 law 29

Introduction. A wife can have three different kinds of property. Money or property that she brings into the marriage is divided into two types. If it is written in the marriage contract נכסי צאן ברזל then the husband gets the use of it and rent or fruit it produces. But it remains her's and if there is a divorce the property goes back to her and if the value is lessened he has to make up for that. Then there is money that is not written in the Ketubah. [נכסי מלוג] That also he gets the profits and use. But does not make up for the loss if the property is damaged. In any case, the money or property belongs to her.
But money or property that comes to her during the marriage belongs to the husband. That is money she makes in her job, or she finds, or is given to her. However, if given to her on condition that her husband has no part of it, then it belongs to her. But still [as all property that belongs to her], her husband still gets the profits. There is an exception, i.e. if the condition it was given to her stipulated that even all profits would not go to the husband.

[If that sounds confusing, the way to simplify it is to remember the basic difference if whether the money or property was brought into the marriage, then it belongs to the wife. If it was acquired by the wife after they got married, then it automatically belongs to her husband. These are all in Tractate Ketuboth chapters 6 to 9. [These are not well known facts because when people learn Ketuboth it often revolves around the the first parts way before you get to 6-9.]





In Rav Shach's Avi Ezri Laws of Marriage 22 law 29 is brought the idea that there is a difference between when a wife loans money to her husband to when she buys something from him. This comes from the Gemara in Bava Batra chapter 3 [חזקת הבתים] page 51. In the case of buying and selling if the money was known to the husband the deal is valid. The money is thought to belong to the woman. In the case she loans him money the money is considered to really have belonged anyway to him.

The way Rav Shach explains this is that money given in a loan if not anymore thought to be in the possession of the wife since the actual physical money of a  loan is always meant to be spent. It no longer is in the physical possession of the wife. But the money of a deal of buying and selling is thought to have been in the physical possession of the wife. 

In the Gemara itself the difference between buying and  a loan is brought and asked. The Gemara itself answers the husband did not want to be "a borrower is a slave to the lender" [that is a verse in Proverbs.] The idea is that if he could have gotten the money from her with having to arrange that it should be  loan he would have done so. But with buying and selling it is assumed that the deal makes both parties happy. The seller gets more utility from the money and the buyer gets more utility from the field. Rav Shach is just going into the deeper reason why the money in the case of selling in the first place is conspired in fact to have belonged to the wife.

That Rav Shach says is a good reason why her husband did not want to borrow. But what is the underlying difference? He says it is the issue of (חזקה) presumed status.

w58 G Major

I might add besides the debt of gratitude I owe my parents introducing me to classical music, I have to mention Mr Smart in my high school whose love of music and contagious enthusiasm for great music definitely encouraged me. [I should add my thanks to my friends in  high school with which we had a string quartet that met every week that also helped me develop my intuition for music. i.e.  Wendy Wilson [not the famous one but one who later became a lawyer in Michigan], Roland Hutchingson, Paula Finn.]

[Here is a link to a piece that I wrote in those days

Wolfgang Wodarg, a German lung doctor on virus.

interesting doctor that has some knowledge about viruses, not speculation.

To repent is always a good idea. The best idea is to find books on the subject from the Middle Ages before the concepts of faith and repentance got watered down during the Renaissance. Many ideas of the Renaissance are important, but do not take the place that the Middle Ages had on the importance of Faith with Reason. (That was the unique contribution of the Middle Ages.)

The issue is really like that of Hegel that there is a kind of dialectical process going on in history in which truth gets steadily clarified. [So even though the Renaissance was an improvement on many things from the Middle Ages, still that does not mean to throw out teh good that was unique to the Medieval period.]

I thought about repentance for some time while I was in Uman and came up with the idea that surely most of my mistakes I am unaware of. Just learning the Gates of Repentance  and other books of Musar of the Middle Ages and Rav Israel Salanter is a help but there can be even after learning Musar many issue that remain unclear. So it occurred to me that at least some of my mistakes I am aware of. I can tell by subsequent events and stemmed directly. So the idea I got was to repent on at least what I know I did wrong. Then with help from above hopefully I might be able to get further. This seemed certainly an advantage to just picking out of  a hat what happens to occur to me what repentance might be.    

The idea of saying the words and going on has a lot to do with trust in God.  It is mentioned in Rav Nahman but goes back all the way to the Gemara itself and brought in the classical medieval  Musar book אורחות צדיקים Ways of the Righteous.

To me it seems like a way to learn not just Gemara but also Physics--but again only with trusting God that you do a small amount if effort and then God sends the blessing.

[But then you also need faith that such a path of learning is in itself worthy and needed. This was definitely the way of books of Musar based on Saadia Gaon. חובות לבבות for example. [Obligations of the Hearts.] However this was an argument in Musar itself. Certainly the disciples of Rav Israel Salanter saw no value and even negative value in any secular studies. I would myself make a distinction between exactly what type of secular studies we would be talking about. Any subject in a University which has the name "studies" attached to it is clearly pseudo science.

nice video about viruses being manufactured in labs.

People can get psyched up about anything.The Japanese had shown their preference for death rather than surrender already as early as 1942. At first it startled American generals at Saipan until they started seeing that it was no isolated phenomenon, but repeated itself island after island the closer they got to Japan's Islands--not just their conquered territory. This was not Japanese soldiers. It was not even Japanese civilians women and children that threw themselves off cliffs rather than be caught by Americans. That is how much the Japanese soldiers had psyched them up.

So it is in one's interest to have an accurate idea of the "big picture" aka reality.

It is no mystery if a lot of people believe stuff which to you seems ridiculous. That is just the regular ability of humans and other animals to convince themselves of anything. Take pigeons for another example. No other  species is quite as superstitious. Have them step on a bell before they get food a couple of times. They will believe even against all later evidence that that ringing bells is what causes the food to come. And they will not stop stamping on that bell no matter how much or how long it takes--even if never. 

Trust in God. "Bitachon"

There is no algorithm for when one should make effort to get his needs and when one should sit back and trust in the Divine decree. But the closest I  ever got to some kind of resolution about this was Rav Nahman of Breslov in the LeM vol II. Chapter 4. that one should make  a vessel in which the blessing can flow into.

Even in open miracles in the Bible there is always some physical action attached in the same way. Some action by which the blessing can come into the world. E.g. Elisha the prophet telling Neeman the Syrian general to immerse himself in the Jordan seven times in order to be cured.

[I have to add that the only time that trust in God was a real possibility for me in terms of restraint from action was at the Mir in NY for the short time I was there as a student and married. It seems to me the fact that the general atmosphere was such that trust in God was a possibility. A kind of group dynamics. When everyone else was trusting in God, it made it a greater reality for me. And in fact it worked. The more I ceased from action and chose to sit and learn Torah and trusted that God would do everything for me that I needed, the more it happened just like that.

Rav Elazar Shach laws of marriage ch 22. law 16 and law 17.

I just wanted to introduce a subject and later go into it in more detail.
The issue is in Rav Elazar Shach laws of marriage ch 22. law 16 and law 17.
What I wanted to say is that there is property the wife brings into  a marriage that is not written in the Ketuba. [That is called נכסי מלוג]. [That property the husband receives the fruit but does not own it.] What if he and she sell it? [That is they sell it together, not one or the other.] The issue is in tractate Ketuboth. Ameimar said a husband and wife that sell the property of the wife, the deal is not valid. The first way the Gemara understands this is one without the other. But when together, it is valid. The second way of the Gemara is even together the deal is not valid.
The Gemara brings the reason for the second way is from the law in the Torah of  "a day or two" of a slave. The law there only applies if the slave has one owner, not two. So the idea is that for a sell to be valid there has to be one owner.
Rav Shach goes into this in detail which I would like to continue later if possible.

Off hand it seems like the issue of דבר שלא בא לעולם that one can not buy or sell something that is not in the world now. For example in Torah law one can not sell fruit that will come from a tree. Either the whole tree. Or a kind of hold on the tree אילן לפירותיו. So in our case the wife owns the property but she can not sell it because the fruit has to go to husband. He can not sell it because he does not own the property, only he receives the fruit.

w57 G Major  w57 midi

w57 nwc format

Two major issues in Christianity

Two major issues in Christianity are Christology and the Commandments. These are the two issues that take up a good deal of thought and room. Christology is "Who was Jesus?". The issue about the commandments is about the point of Paul which seems to be nullification.

The issue of Christology I have mentioned before that I think it is along the lines that you usually think of the Patriarchs--souls of Emanation. [Very common in all works of mystics.] In Particular Kindness in Foundation as brought in Rav Nahman of Uman.

As for the nullification issue --to me it seems wrong. I can not see anything that indicates such an idea in Jesus himself. It seems to be a later addition. [See the Theonomic position in Bahnsen Anthony Flood.] He puts it better that I could.

Here is an extract from Banhsen: Listen to His own testimony:

Do not begin to think that I came to abrogate the Law or the Prophets; I came not to abrogate but to fulfill. For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, until all things have happened, not one jot or tittle shall by any means pass away from the law. Therefore, whoever shall break one of these least commandments and teach men so shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven (Matt. 5:17-19).

Several points about the interpretation of this passage should be rather clear. (1) Christ twice denied that His advent had the purpose of abrogating the Old Testament commandments. (2) Until the expiration of the physical universe, not even a letter or stroke of the law will pass away. And (3) therefore God’s disapprobation rests upon anyone who teaches that even the least of the Old Testament laws may be broken.¹⁶

¹⁶ Attempts are sometimes made to evade the thrust of this text by editing out its reference to the moral demands of the Old Testament—contrary to what is obvious from its context (5:16, 20, 21-48; 6:1, 10, 33; 7:12, 20-21, 26) and semantics (“the law” in v. 18, “commandment” in v. 19). Other attempts are made to extract an abrogating of the law’s moral demands from the word “fulfill” (v. 17) or the phrase “until all things have happened” (v. 18). This, however, renders the verses self-contradictory in what they assert.

century of philosophy that is worthless and vacuous [both so called "analytic" and "continental"].

After a century of philosophy that is worthless and vacuous [both so called analytic and continental] it seems the main issue in philosophy is between Leonard Nelson and Hegel. Or more accurately between Nelson and McTaggart-- since Hegel without McTaggart is almost indecipherable] .

Analytic philosophy is worthless because it is all about analyzing language-- which means analysis of fiction; like a deep study in the physics of Tolkien's Rings. Language is 100% subjective; and has zero independent validity except for when you say "dog" that I understand a dog. There is nothing more. It all about the King's clothes--when he has no clothes.]
[Modern philosophy is elaborating endless variations on existing themes
And as Steven Dutch put it:
"Elaborating endless variations on existing themes is creativity in a sense, but not of the same order as coming up with wholly new classes of ideas. This is not a value judgment, it is simply being true to the accurate usage of words."

I see trust in God [Bitachon] as very important. That was ever since I saw the book Madragat HaAdam [of Navardok] at the Mir in NY. But how to implement trust in God in a practical sense has always been an issue for me. The way it worked at the Mir for other and for me was more or less to devote ourselves to learning Torah and taking it as a given that God would take care of everything else.. And that worked--for as long as I was there. But not so much since I left.

To me the issue seems always to be exactly how much effort do you do and how much do you cease efforts and trust in God. That may not tell you much about the inner heart, but it does relate to the practical aspect of trust.

Maimonides was working for Saladin (as a doctor)

If Maimonides was working for Saladin (as a doctor) the last ten years of his life that would mean he started worked for him about 7 years after Saladin conquered Jerusalem. [ But that would have been in 1191 about three years after Saladin lost to Richard I the Lion Heart [at Arsuf]; and thus Saladin lost control of most of Israel especially the coastal regions, but retained Jerusalem]. That also means that during that time Maimonides wrote the Guide for the Perplexed.



[Saladin was actually not an Arab but a Kurd, but was working for the Seluks in Egypt until he killed his employers and took over. His major rivalry was with the Caliph of Baghdad who was Abassid. [The Abassid's  ruled the Muslim world for about 500 years from 750  A.D. and on until 1254 A.D..]



It does not seem to me that the fact he was working for Saladin changed anything in the Guide. He had it all laid out in his mind from the time he was a teenager as he writes in the Commentary on the Mishna. He says openly he is going to write two more books. One collected all the laws and the other explaining the world view of the Torah.  It is somewhat along the lines of Aristotle and Plotinus (neo Plato). That is also the basic world view of the Hovot LeVavot [Obligations of the Heart as you can see in the very first section of that =the most important of all Musar books.] 

The way of learning when I was in public high school was by reading--not saying the words- and taking tests. That did not really click with me. Especially taking tests.

The way of learning in Shar Yashuv [the first Litvak yeshiva I was in after high school] emphasized review.
Rav Freifeld in fat used to recommend learning through each chapter of Gemara ten times.

But I had also heard about the idea of learning fast by saying the words and not looking back. This I heard of even before I had heard of Rav Nahman of Breslov. This later method of learning is brought in one of the classical books of Musar {Mediaeval Musar/Ethics}.

To me it seems there ought to be a combination of this fact time along with the type of review.


The question is what to apply these two methods to. My approach is to emphasize The Law of Moses. That is to learn the Written Law [the Old Testament], Oral Law  (to get through the two Talmuds at least once with every Tosphot and Maharsha), Physics and Metaphysics.

There is an aspect of Torah that has to do with the group. How do you spend your time learning what no one else cares about and which does not relate to you directly?
I am not saying this ought to be the case, but you are learning about laws of what a wife can sell and the whole vast subject of Ketuboth. Let's say for arguments sake that no one else in the world would care about that?
This gives almost by definition the desire to be respected enough when you learn that so that what you say about it should be at least taken into account. But what if not only you but the laws themselves where no at all cared about?

This gives a certainly motivation to be more interested or at least but the centre of gravity of your learning on what is objectively  the part of God's Law that is in Creation itself. Physics. That is objective and can not be ignored.

However Torah even as it relates to people also in not subjective. It is objective morality. However it makes it hard to be all that interested when it seems your efforts go evaporate into thin air.

The idea that the Law of God is what you see in Creation itself is  a theme that comes up a lot in Rav Nahman of Uman and Breslov.  [This is one area that is a bit hard to figure out what Rav Nahman held. For it is fairly clear he was  against secular learning. What he calls "outer wisdoms". To me it seems that one has to make a difference between man made wisdoms that are not a part of objective reality and between God's wisdom as contained in Creation.



[What I mean by subjective is like languages. If not for the way the person listening to you understands what you mean by saying dog the "d" with the "g" and the "o" in the middle would mean nothing. Language is 100% subjective. Objective is for example the dog itself. It does not care about what people call it.]

w56 Allegro in F major

Do numbers exist?

Dr. Michael Huemer holds that universals [like numbers] exist, but they depend on the existence of particulars. [The regular idea of Aristotle.] [I see he put up an essay "An Argument against Nominalism"] 
This makes sense to me. But it does not seem to conflict with Divine Simplicity since I also hold with Kant at least to the degree that Reason does not comprehend any area that is outside of conditions of experience. [Things in themselves].

As Huemer puts it: "trees exist". Same with "two." There can be two rocks. Two people. Twos of lots of things. But you do not stub your toe running into a "two" lying on the sidewalk.

[Divine simplicity is the idea that God is simple. Not parts, ingredients. Not a composite. But you might add with Kant that there is nothing that pure reason can comprehend about God, because he is not with "conditions of possible experience". That is he is in the realms of "things in themselves".]

[This is one area that Hegel disagreed with Kant in that he held there can be access to dinge an sich. Incidentally that is also the view of Leonard Nelson in saying that we can access the dinge an sich  by means of immediate non intuitive knowledge.. Huemer goes with prima facie probability.

That is to say it would take a lot of evidence to show that trees do not exists.  That places the burden on the "philosopher" to show trees have nothing in common.

bezmenov had a YouTube video about how the KGB used most of its resources on infiltrating the USA and turning it to communism by means of infiltration subversion, Not the usual kind of activity associated with the KGB and Thrush in Man from Uncle. He was a high ranking officer in the KGB but defected. It could be similar activity might have been going on to subvert the Vatican also.


bezmenov U tube


[On the other hand it would have taken a lot more resources than the KGB actually had in order to do that. Probably it was like a chain. Socialism had a lot of professors  that were teaching it.]

If you have ever been part of even the most healthy and straightest and best of religious groups like the Litvak Yeshiva world you might know that even in the best of groups there is an aspect of cultism. And that leaves you wondered were you part of a decent group or part of a cult.

But I say that these categories can overlap.

Just to give an example. Take Adi Da. Clearly a cult. And yet there probably some aspects of legitimate teachings also. Or Scientology. Same thing.
These are clearly cults and yet probably had some aspects of benefit.
So the question is not whether the group is a cult or legitimate. Nor how much of a percent is each one. Rather the question is that of cyanide. You do not care how much cyanide is in your chocolate pudding. If there is any at all --that is already too much.

So even if you are part of a good group there still can be plenty of things to be wary of.  The Dark Side can get into everything. Especially in the religious world.

The way I see marriage nowadays is in this way. If you would know that after ten years she will take everything from you and poison your children against you would you still go into it?
For some people the answer is yes. It is that important to have children. But many others would say no.
That is why I just do not see marriage as the best idea. It makes no difference how determined you are to make it work since there is another person involved who learned the right words to convince you.

And what about the simple option of פילגש? If it is good enough for Jacob our forefather why should it not be good enough for me? In any case, it is a argument among the rishonim but I see it nowadays as the best approach. To the Ramban [Nachmanides], Raavad and most other rishonim it is perfectly allowed.

I noticed the idea of divorce has come up. I wanted to mention to women that feel they can not get out of marriages that seem to be too problematic to them. The cure to this situation is to cure the fact that they never just want out of marriage. They want out of the marriage along with all the children and all husband's assets, and make him work for them.

Even if this does not apply to any particular wife, still the approach is so widespread that many men feel the only thing left to them is to refuse the divorce. [Which they can do by law. A forced divorce is not valid.]

Leonard Nelson

History has a way of by passing some philosophers which are only discovered long after they are gone. Leonard Nelson [influenced by Kant and Fries] has just begun to be noticed. [Except Kelley Ross was trying for  along time to bring his teachings to the public on his web site on the Friesian School].

One reason is I think that he was in bitter conflict with the Neo Kant school in Marburg.
There are probably other reasons like the fact that WWI made philosophy based in Germany unpopular--to say the least. WWII did nothing to add to the popularity of German philosophy.

I wanted to mention that though he was based to some degree on Fries, he corrected some mistakes in that approach. [Though I forgot what they were off hand.] 


[However I have to add that that I think that Leonard Nelson and Hegel are simply addressing different issues.  After all both hold we have access to the "thing in itself" and Hegel is  building a kind of Metaphysics that is built on Reason. It is not as incompatible with Nelson.]

path of balance

I am mainly looking for the path of balance and being a "mensch" a decent human being that was the path of my parents. So the way I think of this is שואף לאמצע [desire the middle] like you say in calculus that epsilon is שואף לאפס [epsilon goes to zero. But in Hebrew you say "epsilon desires to go to zero"].

However I realize that there are times one needs to concentrate on one thing alone. But while doing so I think it is important not to lose the big picture.

But one thing I think is is good to be a fanatic about. To be fanatic about being balanced and having good traits [Midot tovot] as you see well defined in books of Musar [Mediaeval books of ethics and also later the books of the disciples of Rav Israel Salanter.

w55    w55 in midi format    w55 in nwc format [in which it was written].

Megilah of Esther

The Megilah of Esther has a comment at the very end. That I have found hard to understand for a long time and still have a hard time understanding. "All the rest of the acts of Achashverosh are written in the annals of the kings of Media and Persia".
The name Achashverosh is the way you pronounce "Xerxes" in Farsi. So we are talking about the same person  whose army of about a  million or more soldiers that was almost defeated by three hundred Spartans if not that someone betrayed them by finding a path that came up from their rear. Will you find that in the chronicles of the kings of Persia? It seems unlikely.

The Megilah ends before that misadventure, but from the Megilah itself it sounds like everything was peachy. 

Trinity seems to have many difficulties among Christians.

The Trinity seems to have many difficulties among Christians. Many see that it has logical difficulties

In Plato there is an idea of the One Emanating the lower worlds. So you could have souls that flow from God's light but are not God. But also are not exactly separate from Him either. [That is they would not be said to have been created but having flowed from God's infinite light.] In that sense, the Trinity can make sense. You say Jesus in one with God in the sense that his soul flowed from God with no division in between.

[What some do instead of this option is a kind of Kantian approach that Kierkegaard took. It was Christians were saying all the time anyway. "It is a mystery". Few took Hegel's approach. Which is somewhat like the Reshash [Sar Shalom Sharabi].

USA Constitution does not seem to have some deep philosophical analysis behind it.

Politics is odd. On one hand I can see the system of the USA [the USA Constitution] as making sense. But the thing that is puzzling about it is that it does not seem to have come about by any kind of logical analysis. [Though I used to think that John Locke had a lot to do with it, but that no longer seems to be the case.] Rather it is a basic development of English Law. Mainly the Magna Carta and the issues that came up in England with James II. [The Glorious Revolution]. The way it looks to me is that the English simply saw the problems with pure Parliamentary power, not some super intuition about the value of King and Parliament. Same with the house of Lords and Commons. It does not seem to have some deep philosophical analysis behind it.
 To me it might make sense to understand why the USA Constitution has worked so well until now, and why things seem to be going haywire.

To see how the English System developed, you need to learn about Edward I, the struggles of the later kings, [John I, Henry II][See the provisions of Oxford.], not the slightest bit of philosophic analysis. Zilch. Then you want to get to the American Constitution, you simply transplant the English System onto American soil, then change a few minor details.  

Yet the result is the most astounding system and balance or freedom with responsibility that the world has ever seen. Compare that with the logical rigorous analysis of Das Capital which results in gulags and mass starvation. You can not help and see that fundamental law of Physics: no matter how logical and rigorous a system is, if it does not agree with experiment, then t is wrong.

Socialism is theft. People agreeing to the Constitution agreed to Congress having powers to tax for the common welfare, not interest groups. So Socialism is simply advocating to steal which is clearly a problem as well defined in the Ten Commandments.

So the question is not that if socialism a practical way to prosperity. [Which in any case Venezuela makes a joke of.] But the question is moral. Just because you can get together enough people to take way from others what they own does not make it right.

w54 F major  w54 in midi   w54 nwc