Musar (Books of Ethics). Reb Israel Salanter's idea of making a movement that would concentrate of learning Books of Ethics.

The curious thing about the disciples of Reb Israel Salanter is not just that they came out with different approaches all based on Musar but that each presented their approach as The Right One. In the newer Musar approach most of the aspects that were unique to the Musar movement all got forgotten.

I can not tell what to think of this. After all Musar represents different points of view.

That is even if you go back to the original set of Medieval books some go more with the Rambam Saadia Gaon approach and others with the Ramban [Nachmanides].  Later when Kabalah got thrown in, all the more so the approaches begin to differ,
Once you get to the great Musar yeshivas, Mir, Slobadka, Navardok, Kelm, it gets even more diverse.

What seems to have happened is people settled on one basic approach that they found was workable--Musar and Gemara. And with that every individual will find in Musar what he or she needs to learn from it. That is about the best I could figure out from what I saw. This Musar and Gemara approach also makes sense to me.

Or at least it is the approach that I hope to stick with. [My own approach is more or less this: Gemara Musar, Rav Shach's Avi Ezri, Physics, Math. That is based on the more rational Rambam Saadia Gaon approach to Torah.]

In a nut shell it is hard to explain why Rav Shach's Avi Ezri is so important but basically it is the need to understand Torah beyond extra forms. One needs to get to the essence of Torah.

 But the place for Torah learning from what I can tell is  in  a Litvak yeshiva where you find the spirit of Torah. Maybe Torah VeDaat or Chaim Berlin or some authentic yeshiva. But no fakes. The fake and phony yeshivas destroy the spirit of Torah and one must run from them.

Muslims- right around the 15% mark that the violence begins

I am not thrilled with Muslims and that is that. I see them as a threat to the very survival of the human race, and perhaps all life on earth. There is, as far as I can see, nothing else to discuss. They can convert to the Law of Moses, or Christianity or anything else. Just not Islam. Period.

From what I remember in history is it is in fact right around the 15% mark that the violence begins. Up until that mark, Muslims are the most exemplary of citizens. Then at the 15% the violence begins with the teenagers and  and children that one is reluctant to blame. Then there is a later mark when they take over, and Christians and Jews are expelled and murdered or convert.

The historical pattern seems to always follow the same model. You can see this in their takeover of Christian Spain and Syria and Byzantium.

I believe in freedom of religion. Muslims can convert to any religion they please. Just not Islam.

I am not thrilled with Muslims and that is that. I see them as a threat to the very survival of the human race, and perhaps all life on earth. There is, as far as I can see, nothing else to discuss. They can convert to the Law of Moses, or Christianity or anything else. Just not Islam. Period.

From what I remember in history is it is in fact right around the 15% mark that the violence begins. Up until that mark, Muslims are the most exemplary of citizens. Then at the 15% the violence begins with the teenagers and  and children that one is reluctant to blame. Then there is a later mark when they take over, and Christians and Jews are expelled and murdered or convert.

The historical pattern seems to always follow the same model. You can see this in their takeover of Christian Spain and Syria and Byzantium. 

See this ytube:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Axyy2RZ7RoA.

She in a powerful way describes this as coming from from the Frankfurt school. The idea was to delete American Values and in a vacuum of values they could impose their own values–i.e. Socialism and communism and one world government. This video seems to me to be the most intellectual rigorous approach to this problem that I have seen.

 I used to think it came from the KGB as mentioned by Bezmenov in his ytube video but it was pointed out to me that the KGB was too limited in resources to accomplish this by itself. Thus there has to have been inside help –as with the Frankfurt school.

A friend of mine who worked for the KGB thought the KGB did not have the ability to accomplish this vast project of deleting American traditional values all by itself. Later, he might have changed his mind. If after all, the KGB devoted a large percent of its budget for this purpose, it might have been possible.

In any case we see why the left coming from the Frankfurt school sides strongly with Islam. All its sins are a nothing to the Left. The reason is simple. To the Left Islam is the greatest ally in the destruction of Jewish and Christian Ethics. The left will side with anything they see as conducive towards the destruction of traditional Jewish Christian values.

Joan of Arch's trial

I have been troubled by Joan of Arch's trial for a number of years. Most of the trial you do not hear what the judges are thinking. Only at the end they state their condemnation but give no support for their conclusions.. In some areas things became more clear to me because other books written at the same time. [Mainly they were thinking of her voices as coming from the Sitra Achra to be a blunt as possible.]




But in the  area of dress I still can not figure out what the big deal was. Christians we know do not as a rule follow the law of Moses. So picking out one rule to condemn someone with makes little sense unless they were thinking like Thomas Aquinas about some laws still being binding because they are Natural Law.
 In any case the dressing thing does not seem to me to be as bad as the problems that arise in Leviticus chapters 18 and 20.

My own take on this is this: Thomas Aquinas was in need of getting the Old Testament and New Testament to not conflict. So he used the idea of Natural Law that Saadia Gaon came up with.

The disparagement of Divine Law has gotten deep within Western thought ever since then. To me Divine Law is on a higher level than Natural Law.
To me it seems you do not need to justify the laws of Moses by means of natural law.  Divine Law can stand by itself.

As for Joan of Arc my basic feeling is הוראת שעה. [A prophet can get a revelation to break a rule for a time for the needs of the hour and also a beit din can do the same thing--according to the needs of the time.]  She got a revelation that she needed to dress like a man and wear battle armor and go into battle and bring all France under the rule of Charles the rightful king of France. Why is that any different that Eliyahu [Elijah] on Mount Carmel or any of the prophets that had a specific prophecy to accomplish some mission and part of the prophecy involved doing things not according to the Law of Moses.

But what are the needs of the time? That is where the idea of Saadia Gaon and Maimonides becomes important. For we know the Mitzvot are given with certain goals in mind. שלום המדינה,להתרחק מעבודה זרה לתקן את המידות וכולי[Peace of the country, to get as far from idolatry as possible, to correct ones character traits etc.]

I am being short here because I did not want to get into the argument between R. Shimon Ben Yochai and the Sages in the end of chapter 10 on Bava Metzia that I dealt with in another blog entry. Mainly I recall that my idea was there is instrumental value and numnious value. To the Sages they are not connected. To R.Shimon they are. But in any case we know the Rambam is a bit ambiguous about this. He poskins in opposite ways in Mishna Torah and see his commentary in Bava Metzia about that Mishna. The commentary משנה למלך in Mishna Torah tries to solve this. [The trouble is in Bava Metzia the Rambam goes like the sages and in Yevamot [seven nations] he goes like R. Shimon.  דורשין טעמה דקרא]
God granted to me to write about this in my little booklet on Shas and the other one on Bava Metzia. But I never started out to answer questions in the Rambam--only questions in Tosphot. Along the way it happened that God granted to me answers in the Rambam also. But to answer this kind of problem I think you would have to look up  the Avi Ezri of Rav Shach or any of the people of the school of thought of Reb Chaim Soloveitchik who make it their business to answer questions of this sort.

I do not think people need my advice about Quantum Mechanics but I just wanted to share this link to what I think is the best book on QM that I have seen. I am not sure what made it so special to me but I think it is how the author goes through the calculations step by step in a way that even I can understand him.

However at the end I found the parts about super conductivity to be way beyond me.

graves of tzadikim [righteous people]

I do not hold much with the idea of graves of tzadikim [righteous people] . I was  thinking along the lines of Reb Nachman for some time that this is  a good thing but now I am thinking that it is a variation of the idea that Reb Chaim of Volsohin says about worship of tzadikim.  I mean to say that he is critical of the idea of worship of tzadikim[]
In the Nefesh HaChaim he says that the intention to attach one's soul to the soul of the tzadik is a form of idolaty. And the fact that a lot of people go to graves of tzadikim for that exact purpose seems to me to be suspicious.
I was hoping in learning the Talmud in Sanhedrin from page 60b to about 64 would help clarify this issue --which it did. But it took a long time for the message to be absorbed.

This should not be taken as disparaging Reb Nachman. Rather the problem seems to be with the people that make him into an idol. He is of course not the only example but just one example that comes to mind. And perhaps the fact that he was  a great tzadik makes it a little easier to discuss this problem in his context.

The trouble seems to be that there is a difference between what the Torah actually says and what religious leaders tell us it says, This has been a problem in the religious world ever since Jeremiah cursed the Jewish people that since we have not listened to true prophets that God will from then on give us false prophets and to them we will listen.