Divine Right of Kings

Divine Right of Kings

The story of Joan of Arc seems to support this idea. To me at least it seems that Joan of Arc was a legitimate saint and her mission was to crown Charles VII over all France. That seems clear to indicate that there is such a thing as Divine appointment to rule.

France at the time had a king--the King of England but from what we can tell is that he had no right from heaven to rule France.

This seems to have support from the תנ''ך (Old Testament) also. But in the Old Testament the right to rule needs to be confirmed by either a prophet or (when there is no prophet) the Sanhedrin. In any case in the Old Testament there is no concept of the right of the people to choose their leader. [As was pointed out to be by Yehoshua (an acquaintance and one time room-mate at the Mir yeshiva).]

This does not mean Democracy is invalid. We know from דינא דמלכותא דינא (the law of the country is valid) that once any kind of government is established whose coin is accepted- that  is a legitimate government; and its rules are binding according to Jewish Law [except in cases which contradict the Torah directly].

This fact was made clear in the Gemara itself. See חזקת הבתים in Bava Batra.

An modern example is the State of Israel for that Reb Moshe Feinstein and Reb Aaron Kotler both said דינא דמלכותא דינא (The law of the State is the law). [How far this extends is a debate between Rishonim as far as I remember. Certainly the Rambam takes this very far beyond דיני ממונות law about money. 

What Western Civilization lacks is Fear of God.

What Western Civilization lacks is Fear of God. It was on Rosh Hashanah at the Mir Yeshiva in NY that I read the אור ישראל [Light of Israel] by the disciple of Reb Israel Salanter [during Musaf] that made this point in such a powerful way that it has stuck with me even years later.  What that means for Jewish-Christian society is simple. To get the books on Fear of God and to read them every day. There is a known set of primary works of Musar and then a secondary level. And after that  a few more levels. The primary level is חובות לבבות, אורחות צדיקים, מסילת ישרים, שערי תשובה, מעלות המידות ספר הישר המיוחס לרבינו תם and a few other mediaeval books.

[I have no idea what Christians could read. I do not even know if they have an equivalent but I assume they must have.The closest thing I can think of is Aquinas.]

[Physics I should mention is also part of the mitzvah of Fear of God according to the Rambam.]

So at least on Rosh Hashanah I recommend learning as much Musar as possible.

I should mention that one reason I really liked the Mir was the small Musar session they had and after I was married and discovered Isaac Blazer's אור ישראל (Light of Israel)I spent my pare time learning Musar which I think was vey god for me.

Revolution is not a good thing

To try and answer  the Alt Right especially,  Brett Stevens.


Once there is a Constitution in place  which works  and establishes peace and order to some degree, it seems to me to be a mistake to try to overthrow it.

Thucydides made this point in the events surrounding Corcyra in the war between Sparta an Athens.

Revolution is not a good thing. Only in the most extreme circumstance is it justified.

Thucydides outlined the basic problems with revolution and also of alliance with either side in the war between Sparta of and Athens. He did not know it at the time, but his words ring even more profoundly as the ages has gone by-- because now we know that that war is what devastated both Sparta and Athens   --forever. Neither ever again would regain what had been lost. It made no difference that Sparta won or that Sparta treated Athens well and kindly after the war. The effect was the same. both lost everything.

This is relevant to today's issues not just the Alt Right but also to the many movements that are committed to overturning the established order as they claim to insure equality or some kind of justice, but it is always just a power grab.  [Especially the Ultra Religious definitely try to undermine the established order so as to gain power. Religious teachers have found and that their lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging and kicking them into obedience.][


"There will be, in the next generation or so, a pharmacological method of making people love their servitude, and producing dictatorship without tears, so to speak, producing a kind of painless concentration camp for entire societies, so that people will in fact have their liberties taken away from them, but will rather enjoy it, because they will be distracted from any desire to rebel by propaganda or brainwashing, or brainwashing enhanced by pharmacological methods. And this seems to be the final revolution."
Aldous Huxley, Tavistock Group, California Medical School, 1961]

Religious groups are like the Fabian Society or the Freemasons. Though anyone can join, but there are many levels of initiation. That means,- the majority of people involved have no idea of the true agenda and carry out their roles in creating respectable front for the fraud that is at the heart of the organization.


From a Torah standpoint also we know דינא דמלכותא דינא the law of the state is the law. The Rambam says this goes even so far as to say that if the king declares one ho transgress any particular law must be sold as a slave that declaration is valid.

I would like to address this issue also from the standpoint of Hegel. Though the left has hijacked Hegel, in fact he provides a good justification for traditional family values. To him, reason can perceive moral principles that are common sense principles. This is somewhat like the intuitionists like Prichard and G.E. Moore, but unlike them Hegel is not a quietist.["We know it because we know it". Instead, Hegel does not ignore Kant but attempts to answer him by means of the triads.]
[Revolution sometimes can be justified. Sometimes an established order is just a cabal a small group that has seized power. When there is an absence of justice, then revolution is in order. ] To some degree then the Russian revolution was justified simply because there was no point to sending Russian soldiers (in WWI) to the front just to get pulverized. If it took a revolution to stop that-well so be it.

My Dad worked at TRW designing a kind of laser communication system for satellites

My Dad worked at TRW designing a kind of laser communication system for satellites that the Soviets could not detect [because it used lasers which go straight unlike radio waves which spread out.] That was right around the time that the KGB had a mole there. This was made into a motion picture, The Falcon and The Snowman. 

TRW was the firm that made the satellites for NASA.


After my Dad finished the project he went on to start his own business. He did not like being under other people's thumbs. In any case it seems to me most of his life was like that. He would work for the USA government for some time [his first invention was night vision.] and then make some invention in his own time and then market it [the copy mate x-ray machine]. Then the USA government would again need him for some other project (e.g. the camera for the U-2 spy plane) so he would join that until that project was over and then he would again make his own inventions and market them again. It went on back and forth like that.

I might have gone on to do the same but at some point a tremendous urge came over me to learn Gemara,[Talmud]. I can not really explain it. A minute away for the holy Talmud  caused me to feel like I was drowning. As time went on I began to see that a more balanced approach is proper based on the Rambam's idea of learning Physics, Metaphysics, the Oral Law, the Written Law.

What I have been saying on my blog is that people ought to make an effort to get through (even if it is just saying the words in order and going on)this basic set: The Old Testament in Hebrew, the Two Talmuds, Rav Shach' Avi Ezri, Quantum Mechanics, Quantum Field Theory, String Theory, Calculus, Topological Algebra, Abstract  Algebra. That seems to me to be the bare minimum for a well rounded education.

Law of Moses and the Alt-Right

A lot of the Alt-Right people concentrate on politics. But politics is downstream from numinous value.
Therefore we have to get that area of value straight. to me this means we need to keep the Law of Moses. But some  people would object to this based on the fact that all of the good we see in western civilization comes directly from listening to Jesus. I would counter this and say Jesus yes; but all Jesus was saying was to keep the Law of Moses with more sincere devotion than what people were doing.


[I can see that Western civilization is synonymous with Christendom. And I appreciate the great things about growing up in the USA when it was a highly moral, wholesome WASP society. However I claim that everything good about Christianity comes straight from the Law of Moses.]


[There is  some degree of ambiguity of how to go about keeping the Law of Moses. However difficult it is to understand, still there is no reason to think that it has been nullified. Paul did think it was null and void, but that was not based on Jesus, but on his own understanding. And this clearly was not what Jesus was saying, that nothing in the law will ever be changed. "Heaven and Earth may pass away but not one jot or tittle of the Law."]

In any case, I would like to make a suggestion on how to keep the Law of Moses. From what I can see, the books of Musar [Medieval Ethics] basically encapsulate the basic approach. [I mean to say that even though some people have been privileged to spend time going through the Oral Law in painstaking detail, this is not available for everyone. Therefore Musar provides and basically simple approach. [The reason Musar is important is it gives a simple balanced approach to keeping the Law of Moses. That is it is more rigorous than if one would try on his on to figure out how to keep it. This is a result of the fact that during the Middle Ages people assumed the law as logically rigorous and had one message, not a different message for every individual  and they spent the time and effort to hammer out the details.]

[Everyone needs a boggy man--someone to attack. For the Ultra Religious  world this is Christians and secular Jews. The Ultra Religious imagine to themselves as if they are keeping the Law of Moses. Nothing could be further from the truth. The Reform and Conservative are much closer to authentic Torah because of their emphasis on obligations between man and his fellow man and not so much on rituals like the ultra religious. ]

Ideas in Bava Metzia ch8-9  I deleted something that seemed a little am haaretz'dik


I would rather not go into what I deleted but in that deleted note I did make an interesting point. That There is an opinion in our Gemara that Sumchos said his din only in a case of "maybe and maybe." {איני יודע ואיני יודע}. Raba Bar Rav Huna. And we have in Bava Batra that Sumchus said his din only in a case of Drara Demomona. [That is not like our gemara in Bava Metzia page 2b].
In the Chidushim on Bava Metzia I already suggested this argument between Bava Metzia and Bava Batra is dependent on the argument between Rav and Shmuel in another place. But is it possible that Raba Bar Rav Huna understand שמא ושמא to be the very definition of דררא דממונא?  In the note I deleted I ascribed this option to the Rashbam for some reason that eludes me today. To me this minute this idea seems utterly silly. But it came inside a small paragraph where I gave n answer to R. Akiva Eigger about the opinion of the Rashbam so maybe I was thinking of something that I did not write down right?
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There is an opinion in our גמרא that סומכוס said his דין only in a case of שמא ושמא, איני יודע ואיני יודע. That is the opinion of רבה בר רב הונא.  And we have in בבא בתרא that סומכוס  said his דין only in a case of דררא דממונא. That is not like our גמרא in בבא מציעא  page ב ע''ב.
In the  I already suggested this argument between בבא מציעא and בבא בתרא is dependent on the argument between רב  and שמואל in another place. But is it possible that רבה בר רב הונא understand שמא ושמא to be the very definition of דררא דממונא?

ישנה דעה בגמרא שלנו כי סומכוס אמר את הדין שלו רק במקרה של שמא ושמא, איני יודע ואיני יודע. כך דעת של רבה בר רב הונא.  ובבבא בתרא סומכוס אמר את דינו רק במקרה של דררא דממונא. זה לא כמו  גמרא בבבא מציעא דף ב ע''ב..
כבר הצעתי  שהטיעון הזה בין בבא מציעא ובבא בתרא תלויה בויכוח בין רב ואת שמואל במקום אחר. אבל האם זה אפשרי כי רבה בר רב הונא מבין שמא ושמא להיות ההגדרה של דררא דממונא?

the temptation of the Guru is insurmountable.

When I consider Rosh Hashanah coming up and the need to repent --or even during the year when I notice that I have fallen away from God, my thoughts always wander towards Musar [Books of mediaval Ethics]and the basic path of Reb Israel Salanter. My thoughts usually go along the lines that Musar encapsulates the essence of Torah, but  I find it difficult to recommend the straight yeshiva Musar path because it is a path that has been used by people for personal aggrandizement. Still I wish could learn more Musar.
Of course for people with spiritual thirst the temptation of the Guru is insurmountable. But they can't go to Eastern religions from guilt feelings about their Jewishness. So they find some Jewish equivalent of a Guru. That the trouble with this is they somewhat clear since they have nothing to sell. No enlightenment. Still the temptations enormous,
Therefore the Gra put the whole cult into excommunication that wanted to capitalize on peoples' need for a guru. My general impression of Jewish Gurus is that they are from the Sitra Achra/the Dark Side.  The Gra certainly saw this and if I had been smart I would have simply accepted this as fact base on the idea that the Gra probably knew a thing or two about Torah more than me.

Sadly  I fell into this temptation, instead of just sticking with straight Torah. The way this happens is simple. It is not just my on or other's nativity. It is rather because there are organizations that the majority of people involved are not aware of the ultimate purpose of the organization.