Not everyone is equal nor should be treated equally.

The problems with the Enlightenment were noted by Allen Bloom and he also said that the problems that arose were inevitable outcomes. His only stated solution was in regard to university education and it was specifically to get people to read Plato's Republic. That is the only solution that he proposes in his entire book. Needless to say, Plato was thinking about Sparta. [Though Allen Bloom did not mention this.] [See The Closing Of The American Mind.]

[Allen Bloom I think must have walked a middle line between the Kind of Republic in the USA based on Enlightenment principles and respect for Plato and Sparta and Hegel. He must have thought the contradictions were too great to come up with any solution and yet saw good in both systems.
 I grew up in the USA when it was a highly decent and wholesome and moral society. And it was based on the Constitution. So I accepted the basic ideas of the Constitution as being right. Plus I did not like tyranny when I saw it in other places.

It was only recently my learning partner expressed some reservations about the basic principles of the USA that I started to wonder.

In any case I would have to agree that the whole French revolution was a very terrible thing.

My basic approach used to be this: The French Revolution was based on Rousseau and the General Will--no individual rights. Therefore it was bad. The American Revolution was based on John Locke and individual rights, Therefore good.

My idea for London and Germany. Porked Earth Policy. [Instead of Scorched Earth Policy invented by General Sherman] "weaponized lard''

I think pork is a great idea. Someone should come up with creative ways to use it. Have pork spray. And Pork paved streets. Make perhaps pork dust and go up in an airplane and spread it all over Los Angeles [as in crop dusting] . And while you are at it get a Catholic priest up there with you to spread holy water all over LA and California. And especially one should porkify Muslim graveyards with pork dust.
In particular San Bernardino County.



I don't eat pork. The thing about diet is that mainly the problem is with meat products. That is pork is not as serious an issue as regular meat which needs to be slaughtered properly and also the forbidden fats need to be extracted. In any case, pork is fine to use in the above circumstances. If fact, I believe the British used it in exactly that way when they were in the Middle East and were having some trouble with Muslims.  One British captain would take lard and smear it under the grave of any Muslim terrorist and then above it. and then bury a pig with the Muslim, as if to say:  "No more 72 virgins for you"

Answer to me: Well, the commandments in the Pentateuch / Torah are fairly explicit, though, as to what kinds of animals, depending on whether their hooves are cloven, they chew the cud, etc. I forget the specifics, because as a Christian, I am not bound by Jewish dietary law, since the New Testament has indicated that all meats can be lawful, now, for God's people (who include both Jews and Gentiles, the Covenant having been expanded and renewed).

The Brits weren't so wise in dealing with natives and their taboos when they ruled India; you probably are aware of what touched off the Sepoy Rebellion:

My answer: The fats covering the stomach are very very serious. Much more than pork. But as you noted most people are not bound by the dietary laws of the Pentateuch. Right about that. I heard from my learning partner that the Brits at the beginning were very apt in dealing with the natives in India. Maybe later they got sloppy and less careful. I am not sure as I did not get a chance to study the subject in detail.

I should mention here that this is one area that I think people are thinking wrong. The Laws of the Pentateuch are forever. No later revelations can nullify the commandments as Saadia Gaon and the Rambam noted.

I any case I am not sure how easy it would be to convert lard to dust to make crop dusting possible with it.

Socially Extinct 

I imagine the lard would need to be thoroughly dried or desiccated. I imagine the water constitution of lard is pretty high so it would render down to nothing. Not sure how much lard you would need to produce dust in volumes high enough to "weaponize" it.

Porked Earth Policy.


Avraham rosenblum  That sounds about right. They have a lot of lard in the Ukraine. maybe it would make more sense to make a large order and ship it in to the USA instead of producing locally. Then one could do the reduction process in the States.

Also London and Germany are close to the Ukraine. They could make a large order of lard and perhaps even produce weaponized lard in sufficient quantities to spray dust it all over Germany and London and especially all existing Mosques and Muslim grave yards. They could also get a Catholic Priest at the same time to sprinkle holy water over London and Germany as an extra bonus.

Navardok and Trust in God. Start Navardok yeshivas again.

I would like to  apply the dual nature of reality to the idea of trust in God. That is we have going back to the חובות לבבות [Obligations of the Heart by Bachei ben Pekuda] this contradictory thing that we are supposed to have total trust in  God with no measure or limit. Yet we are supposed to do effort.
This was a famous theme in yeshivas. Not just Navardok. This came up all the time in Shar Yashuv and in the Mir in NY in reference to shiduchim [going on dates in order to find a proper marriage partner] and also parnasa (making a living).
This dilemma is also brought up in the מדרגת האדם [The Level of Man] by Joseph Horwitz itself.

What I think is there are two parallel levels of reality, objective and subjective. They are parallel but neither causes the other. Quantum Mechanics  is subjective. Neils Bohr: "Nothing exists until it is measured." If you measure the electron it is a particle with a specific place and time. If you do not measure it, it is a wave.

I think trust works in the same way. If one trusts in God totally then the out reality corresponds to that trust. If one does not, then outer reality corresponds to that level.

Thus what comes out from this is that one can sit and learn Torah and not worry about shiduchim or parnasa and both will come to him. The outer reality will correspond to the inner reality.


[[I am being a little short in this essay. I really meant to say that QM is radically subjective. But some people have wanted to give up on locality instead. That is they want reality to be only objective and give up on locality. And they choose to give up on locality. But we know locality is true from experiments done daily using predictions of Special Relativity and General Relativity. Therefore only one option is left. Locality is true and nature is radically subjective. Just for one small example: GPS depends on both Special Relativity and General Relativity. It would be off by several miles if not for the fact that both SR and GR are true. I mean to say the satellites are moving faster than the observer because they are above his head going around the earth from his perspective. So their clock goes slower. But they are further out from the source of gravitation so their clock goes faster. Combine both effects and you have to adjust the clock in the satellite to compensate for both effects. If you would not adjust the clocks in the satellite they would show ones position to be miles off target every day.]

Modern Jewish Music is not very impressive to me.  To me it sounds like it based on modern styles which I am not fond of.-I prefer Mozart, Vivaldi Renaissance and Medieval.  This was the basic taste of the daughter of Bava Sali and Rav Isaac Hutner

The Nefesh HaChaim is about service of God in a comprehensive way.

The Nefesh HaChaim is about service of God in a comprehensive way. It is about learning Torah and prayer. To avoid modern day idolatry and Monotheism. I do not know if there is translation. But even if there was it would probably be Politically Correct. [This is the Musar book by a disciple of the Gra]

Monotheism is mainly the idea that God is one, not a composite, and He is not the world, and the world is not him. 

I might mention that I think part of the reason the Rambam went with Aristotle was that people had been wrestling with  neo platonic thought and monotheism for a thousand years. Neo Platonic thought was the default position but it was hard to get it to go along with simple Torah Monotheism. So the Rambam just jettisoned a lot of Neo Platonic thought and went straight with Aristotle.
So God would be defined as the First Cause. It makes everything amazingly simple. Nothing is godliness except God.

This is important because knowledge of this fact can save one from idolatry. And that in itself is  great thing because  כל הכופר בעבודה זרה כאילו מודה בכל התורה כולה anyone that denies idolatry is as if he agrees with the whole Torah. That is the Whole Torah can be more or less condensed into that one command do not do idolatry. And when one has fulfilled this then he need not seek for tikunim {other corrections} for things. For the the Torah is life and the good.

The Path of Bava Sali

I had a session of learning the Eitz Chaim of Isaac Luria with Shimon Buso [the son of the daughter of Bava Sali]

There is a long story involved in this. I met him in a Beit Midrash in Ramot Gimel and he brought me to see his mother and for some reason she was immediately impressed. While there I saw a copy of Shimon Shkop’s book on Yevamot and picked it up out of curiosity and opened up to one essay on Tzarat HaBat.

At any rate that began a long relationship with that family. In Those days I was spending all my time by what is called “Navi Shmuel” which is a beit midrash built over the tomb of the prophet, Samuel. And the daughter of Bava Sali brought her entire family every week there to pray, and then would ask me to give to her and each of her children and grandchildren a blessing.

I did not know what she saw in me. Only after many years that was in NY and then returned to Israel by the Western Wall did she reveal the secret within the hearing of her son, Shimon.

I stayed by Shimon Buso's home for a few months until I moved back to Safed.

I had long involved discussions with Shimon and his mother over a period of several years.

I should mention that she held very strongly about what could be called the basic Lithuanian yeshiva approach.

As for Kabalah, Bava Sali never allowed any “Mekubal” to see him. His Shamash [servant] was under strict instruction when Bava Sali came to Jerusalem not to allow any Mekubal in, under any circumstances.

The grandchildren of the older brother of Bava Sali, David Abuchatzeira עטרת ראשינו, go to a yeshiva in Bnei Brak called Yeshivat Avraham Kalmonovitch. That should already tell you enough. Avraham Kalmonovitch was the founder of the Mir Yeshiva in NY, pure Litvak from head to toe.
And Shimon Buso himself taught Gemara at the branch of Ponovitch in Jerusalem when Rav Shach was the Rosh Yeshiva

The daughter of Bava Sali also mentioned a few books that she recommends by name The Obligations of the Heart [חובות לבבות] the first Musar book and Rav Joseph Karo’s Shulchan Aruch. She was referring to it more along the lines of keeping the laws of Written and Oral Law. She was not referring to learning specifically. Rather it is a shorthand way of saying the law as explained in the Gemara and later Rishonim as brought down in the Tur Beit Yoseph and redacted into the Shulchan Aruch. That is kind of a mouthful. 

Criticism is hard to take but necessary for us to rise above our limitations.

My knowledge of American History is very small. I was in a Advanced preparation American History in High school and did not do very well. The teacher gave me the most seething review of a paper I had every received until then. I found it discouraging. Later I find myself grateful for the very harsh criticism I received from my teachers and Roshei Yeshiva but at the time it was hard to receive and accept. Of course they were right.

In hind sight I realize I gained a lot by my teachers being critical of me. This is a general fact about human development. Criticism is hard to take but necessary for us to rise above our limitations.

I was very used to being the best at anything I would try to do. I can still remember almost every little bit of criticism that anyone gave me because it hurt so much.

The US History teacher wrote a long note in Bold Red Letters a whole two paragraphs that I was not a scholar and that my essay was a poor piece of scholarship. I was comparing the policies of two different presidents in that essay. One was Andrew Jackson.

My first Rosh Yeshiva made it known publically that I did not have gratitude- which of course is true.

   I spoke once to a police officer in my usual arrogant way He said “You have an attitude problem.” I answered "Attitudes change." 

A Police officer in Israel in  told me I have a problem that I don’t treat people with respect.

The director of Star Wars with Anakin Skywalker and Obi Wan Kenobi has this very same theme. And the director of that film mentioned that that was part of his intention in the film to bring out this point --how hard it is to accept criticism from our mentors and yet how necessary it is.

People judge criticism by the intension of the critic. That is not good. Even if the intension of the critic is not positive still we should accept as much possible 

]