The Talmud excels.

The Talmud rocks!

The separation of milk and meat is in fact based on verses. This is one area in which the Talmud excels. Even if I think the Talmud is not perfect, but it excels in certain areas; and understanding verses is one of those areas. Though I am not holding in that subject matter right now, in working out in a logically rigorous manner the meaning and the laws of different commandments the Gemara [Talmud] does an excellent job, and in fact the only job.



It has been many years since I looked at that subject but so I don't remember the exact idea but just for an example of the way the Gemara looks at verses from a rigorous perceptive look at Bava Metzia at the end of chapter 11 and the many long Tosphot there.

The greatness of stereotypes

The greatness of stereotypes.
I have made a career of not believing stereotypes and giving different groups the benefit of a doubt. I have always been proved wrong and the stereotypes have always proved true.




Observe:

Kirsten Brydum was traveling across the country with an Amtrak pass and an old bicycle. She was meeting with fellow Marxists around the country and campaigning for Obama. Fresh from protesting the RNC National Convention, she arrived in New Orleans by train. While bicycling around New Orleans’ all black 9th ward ghetto to campaign for Obama, she was shot in the head. Residents would not even call the police to notify them that a dead white girl was laying on the sidewalk. Her body laid in the streets for hours until a construction crew drove by and noticed her.

Even the New Orleans police issued a statement saying “robbery does not appear to be the motivation.” All evidence suggests that she was murdered simply because she was white.

That girl would still be alive today, if only she had believed the “racist” stereotypes about black violence.

I quote Pinker: "The Blank Slate has also served as a sacred scripture for political and ethical beliefs. According to the doctrine, any differences we see among races, ethnic groups, sexes, and individuals come not from differences in their innate constitution but from differences in their experiences. Change their experiences—by reforming parenting, education, the media, and social rewards—and you can change the person. Underachievement, poverty, and antisocial behavior can be ameliorated; indeed, it is irresponsible not to do so. [Hence, the social engineering of the Left.] And discrimination on the basis of purportedly inborn traits of a sex or ethnic group is simply irrational.
The doctrine of the Blank Slate became entrenched in intellectual life in a form that has been called the Standard Social Science Model or social constructionism. The model is now second nature to people and few are aware of the history behind it."

There is a curious feature about American politics. A substantial body of political opinion, in the media, academia, and popular culture,and the White House [ simply despises America -- its history, its principles, and its institutions.

A few problems in America that need correcting


[1] The empirical approach of John Locke is not true for these reasons: (1) People have other ways of receiving information than just the five senses. For example I know a piece of paper can't be green and blue at the same time in the same place. I don't know how much this affects the whole John Locke type of Government scheme which eventually became the United States of America. Maybe not much. Clearly Kant was just as liberal as Locke and he was the one who plowed the middle ground between the empiricists like Locke and the Rationalist like Leibniz.
(2) Desire for sex overcomes the desire for self preservation. Desire to protect one's family and children overcomes the desire for self preservation. If self preservation was so absolute no one would cross the street-ever.
(3) People are not born blank slates and can't be social engineered to be what you want them to be. However it is a fundamental tenet of Feminism that people can be socially engineered. This is wrong and they know it because they never admit to this principle in public.


[2] The other problem is that while there are individual black people that are fine outstanding Americans (Allen West is a good examples) the general black population is highly hostile to the U.S.A. except to get as much money they can by welfare, and have contributed highly to its moral and social decay. The problem of a major hostile population in America is something the Constitution was never meant to deal with. It is the same reason you don't want Arabs to be voting for their governments in the Middle East;-- because that will only result in a major Muslim terrorist state that is powerful rich with oil and highly antagonistic towards Western Civilization.

[3] Civil society is like a circle inside a larger circle. It is the area the American government was meant designed to protect. This is the area of private contracts between people that government has no right to interfere with. This is a realm that the government has already entered and controls. But this precious area I hold was intended to be the place for personal observance of the Bible. For civil society needs a holy core to power it. Without that it is empty of meaning.

[4] "Democrat" has come to mean ideas that are wrong. For example while human rights are good, the meaning of rights in the Bill of Rights are negative rights. They refer to things you have that the government can't take away. Rights do not refer to things you can demand from other people, e.g. not to feel insulted. There is no such thing as a right to receive money, goods, or services from anyone else. Social benefits and health care are charities, not rights. The idea of rights has become useless. I claim it is better to go back to the Ten Commandments, and especially the one that goes contrary to all liberal agenda: "Thou shalt not covet anything that is of thy neighbors'."


[5] An example of where this entitlement mentality leads. The family of Thomas Duncan, the person that brought the Ebola Virus to the USA from Africa wants to sue? What is wrong with this family? Duncan lied to get onto his flight to the U.S. and never should have been here to begin with. He exposed hundreds of people to Ebola and infected at least two of the nurses who dedicated themselves to his care and are now fighting for their own lives. Duncan received far better care than he would have in Liberia. It would be appropriate for the Duncan Family to express nothing but gratitude to Texas Health Presbyterian which provided the best care they could for Duncan and did so with compassion and risk to their own lives.

One person wrote: "Since the libertarianism lacks the concept of Common Good ("Lose the 'We'")
This is one thing that bothers me about the John Locke (Libertarian) point of view. But on the other hand the point of view that does into account for the "We" (Rousseau, Hegel, Marx seem to have a problem concerning the "state of nature"). To them the "state of nature is benign." [Which is not true anyway.] And yet the Marx thing is that all higher aspirations can be linked to money. According to him people have a point of view because of what money class they belong to. This seems like contradiction in Marxist thought. I.e. "we" would all be nice if "we" would have the exact same amount of money. But then where is the "we". The we only exists if everyone has exactly the same amount of money. But until then we are raving wolves?

Why I bring this up is that in fact the lack of the "We" does bother me in America. It seems like Allen Bloom said: if you tell everyone that their motives are monetary alone, then eventually you will succeed in creating that type of person.

The "We" that I suggest is based on a common belief in Torah. (The unifying  meme of Western Civilization is the Torah.) That is the Written Torah. And the Oral Torah. The later is any actual laws that were handed down that are considered to be Biblical though they are only hinted at in the actual verses, for example the 39 types of work that are forbidden on the Sabbath day.

Western Civilization has already gone a long way with the unifying belief in the Torah. All I am suggesting here is to continue in this basic approach.

On sugar by yahoo

Eating too much sugar can eat away at your brainpower, according to US scientists who published a study Tuesday showing how a steady diet of high-fructose corn syrup sapped lab rats' memories.
Researchers at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) fed two groups of rats a solution containing high-fructose corn syrup -- a common ingredient in processed foods -- as drinking water for six weeks.
One group of rats was supplemented with brain-boosting omega-3 fatty acids in the form of flaxseed oil and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), while the other group was not.

According to the Torah, a lesbian relationship is not a sin at all. A male homosexual act gets the death penalty if the act is done on purpose in front of two witnesses. You need a court of 23 judges that have the authentic ordination also. (That ordination does not exist anymore.)

A lesbian relationship is not sin. A male homosexual act is a sin. That means if the act is done in front of two witnesses and a warning is given that the act is a sin and receives the death penalty, then the penalty is given.

Situation two: If there are not two kosher witnesses, and the act was done on purpose there is nothing one can do but repent. Repentance means that one accepts upon himself not to repeat the act. This by definition brings Divine forgiveness.

Situation three: If the sin was done by accident [for example a man thought it was his wife in bed with him] then he must bring a sin offering. This can't be brought anywhere except in the Temple in Jerusalem. In fact, bringing a offering anywhere else is a sin on the same level as homosexuality. This is explicit in the Torah (Old Testament) itself. That means that at the time there was a movable Tabernacle, one could only bring offerings there. And to bring one elsewhere is a sin of "cutting off" (which is called karet כרת in Hebrew). Once the Temple was in Jerusalem, it can't be erected else as Nathan the prophet said to King David.

So nowadays we (Jews and Gentiles) can't bring a sin offering anywhere. However repentance is always open to every person and always helps. (Repentance is accepting on oneself not to repeat the sin and confession before God and feeling guilty about the sin.)
No matter what where the circumstance repentance always brings some measure of forgiveness.

[If not for the words of Nathan the prophet to King David, then we would be able to build another Temple anywhere in the world. The problem nowadays is that Nathan said the Temple Mount would be the only place God would rest his presence from then on. So we are kind of stuck.]

Appendix: Repentance is simply accepting on oneself not to do the sin that he did. How do we know this? From the law that if a person does kidushin [marries a woman] on condition that he is a perfect saint even if he is a perfect criminal she is considered married because of a doubt: he might have thought not to repeat his sins ever again at the time he made the marriage. So we learn that if he in fact did think to never repeat his sins he is in fact a perfect saint. That is repentance is that hard and that easy. It is a thought. But a thought with that much power and conviction that in fact one never repeats the sin. It has little to do with what most people think of as repentance. If you want to see proofs in the Torah for this I suggest reading the book Gates of Repentance by Rabanu Yona where he bring Biblical proof.

[But repentance is not enough except for missing a positive command. If one has transgressed a negative command, one needs Yom Kipur. If a negative command that has karet attached to it then also afflictions. If hilul hashem, then only death brings forgiveness. See Rabbainu Yona who brings this from the gemara ]

About Kabalah today

 Isaac Luria  had some amazing revelations, but his revelations weree based on his own perception of the divine realm. This is a different type of perception than the perception that the Torah was written by. This type of perception in most cases has to pass through the Intermediate Zone. This is what gives it its mixed results.

In any case I think Rav Shicks emphasis on unifications is wrong. I did this because I was attached to Rav Shick but today I think this emphasis is wrong. Though I agree learning the Ari [Isaac Luria] is important. However I do not recommend the Zohar. Even if the Ari used it as a jumping board for his revelations still I think it is not from the Rashbi. I admit it is just one word which convinces me of this  עם כל דא "although." This usage for "although" is an invention of the Ibn  Tibon family [עם כל זה]. It is not ancient Aramaic but a medieval invention. So what is it doing all over the Zohar? Answer: The Zohar was written by Moshe DeLeon.
If we would be talking about ancient Hebrew or Aramaic it would say אף על פי.