7.3.17
The Rambam understands Physics and Metaphysics as the way to fulfill the mitzvas of Love and Fear of God.
Besides the Rambam my own parents saw something important about Physics.
[Though the Rambam's definition of this was a little different than the modern day one. The Rambam openly wrote he was referring to the Physics of the ancient Greeks which means basically Aristotelian Physics. Still the approach and subject matter is that which the Rambam was referring to. The Rambam did also add Metaphysics-which he did also say meant that of the Ancient Greeks.
But in that case he would have been referring to the subject as it was developed later by Plotinus.
But in these cases, he was not just referring to the writings, but to the subject itself. Similarly in his approach to the Oral Law he divides it into two sections. One is the actual learning of the material which he meant in the sense of learning the Mishne Torah (of the Rambam himself) itself. The other is the reasoning it out, which is the kind of process we see Reb Chaim Soloveitchik and Rav Shach engaging in. [This process had its beginnings with Rav Joseph Karo, but really came to its summit in the book of Ideas in the Rambam of Rav Soloveitchik and the Avi Ezri. ]
The Rambam understands Physics and Metaphysics as the way to fulfill the mitzvas of Love and Fear of God. This is hinted in the Mishne Torah, but stated openly in the Guide.
[The way that this makes sense to me is by means of Reb Nachman's ideas about the hidden Torah in the work of Creation. And the Hidden Statement of Creation. At least, that is how it makes sense to me. And it seems to me the Rambam must have been looking at this in a similar fashion, but so far without a copy of the Guide I can't remember a specific place where he might have said this.]
In any case, with the Rambam we get a very elegant way of serving God, that make a lot of sense. It is a balanced approach: The Oral and Written Law of Moses, Physics, Metaphysics. To me this approach has a lot of charm and beauty to it. Besides the fact that it is כיבוד אב ואם honor of my father and mother which is one of the 613, and not a minor one either.
[You can add this this basic structure to some degree but what ever you add has the danger of being bitul Torah. Bitul Torah the sin of not learning Torah when one has the time to do so.]
(note 1) In the original Musar movement there was the idea of spending as much time as possible learning Ethics {Medieval Musar}, but as you can see that idea was not really accepted in its entirety by the Musar Litvak yeshivas because of the law of limited returns. While important it is, adding to it beyond a half hour daily does not seem to add much.
(note 2) On the side of those that think Physics and Metaphysics are forbidden and also all secular subjects would have to say that (1) those that supposedly only learn Torah are jerks. I saw enough of this in Israel. Torah without Derech Eretz is not Torah. סופה בטילה. But I have to agree a lot of secular subjects are in fact bitul Torah.
(note 3) Just for the record when I say Physics I am mainly referring to Quantum Field Theory and the later String Theory. Metaphysics however I think best to confine to Aristotle, Plato, and Plotinus, though I see Hegel and Kant as being pretty important also.
(note 4) The Rambam is not referring to mysticism. Though at the time I was learning Musar and the Arizal, I thought he was. Now this is not to say there is no place for a mystic interpretation of the Guide. We know Rav Avraham Abulafia wrote a mystic commentary on the Guide. Still the Rambam in teh Guide itself says exactly what he meant by Physics and Metaphysics.
[Though the Rambam's definition of this was a little different than the modern day one. The Rambam openly wrote he was referring to the Physics of the ancient Greeks which means basically Aristotelian Physics. Still the approach and subject matter is that which the Rambam was referring to. The Rambam did also add Metaphysics-which he did also say meant that of the Ancient Greeks.
But in that case he would have been referring to the subject as it was developed later by Plotinus.
But in these cases, he was not just referring to the writings, but to the subject itself. Similarly in his approach to the Oral Law he divides it into two sections. One is the actual learning of the material which he meant in the sense of learning the Mishne Torah (of the Rambam himself) itself. The other is the reasoning it out, which is the kind of process we see Reb Chaim Soloveitchik and Rav Shach engaging in. [This process had its beginnings with Rav Joseph Karo, but really came to its summit in the book of Ideas in the Rambam of Rav Soloveitchik and the Avi Ezri. ]
The Rambam understands Physics and Metaphysics as the way to fulfill the mitzvas of Love and Fear of God. This is hinted in the Mishne Torah, but stated openly in the Guide.
[The way that this makes sense to me is by means of Reb Nachman's ideas about the hidden Torah in the work of Creation. And the Hidden Statement of Creation. At least, that is how it makes sense to me. And it seems to me the Rambam must have been looking at this in a similar fashion, but so far without a copy of the Guide I can't remember a specific place where he might have said this.]
In any case, with the Rambam we get a very elegant way of serving God, that make a lot of sense. It is a balanced approach: The Oral and Written Law of Moses, Physics, Metaphysics. To me this approach has a lot of charm and beauty to it. Besides the fact that it is כיבוד אב ואם honor of my father and mother which is one of the 613, and not a minor one either.
[You can add this this basic structure to some degree but what ever you add has the danger of being bitul Torah. Bitul Torah the sin of not learning Torah when one has the time to do so.]
(note 1) In the original Musar movement there was the idea of spending as much time as possible learning Ethics {Medieval Musar}, but as you can see that idea was not really accepted in its entirety by the Musar Litvak yeshivas because of the law of limited returns. While important it is, adding to it beyond a half hour daily does not seem to add much.
(note 2) On the side of those that think Physics and Metaphysics are forbidden and also all secular subjects would have to say that (1) those that supposedly only learn Torah are jerks. I saw enough of this in Israel. Torah without Derech Eretz is not Torah. סופה בטילה. But I have to agree a lot of secular subjects are in fact bitul Torah.
(note 3) Just for the record when I say Physics I am mainly referring to Quantum Field Theory and the later String Theory. Metaphysics however I think best to confine to Aristotle, Plato, and Plotinus, though I see Hegel and Kant as being pretty important also.
(note 4) The Rambam is not referring to mysticism. Though at the time I was learning Musar and the Arizal, I thought he was. Now this is not to say there is no place for a mystic interpretation of the Guide. We know Rav Avraham Abulafia wrote a mystic commentary on the Guide. Still the Rambam in teh Guide itself says exactly what he meant by Physics and Metaphysics.
6.3.17
The attempt to crowd out and eliminate the white race does not stop at WASPs. It goes up to and includes white European Jews.
I tend to look at things in terms of religion just like economists tend to evaluate political issues base on economic considerations. But I feel my mode is more accurate because I believe that people's religious motivations are deeper and much more powerful than they even admit to themselves.
Thus WASPs have had a hard time of it in the USA because their preachers have been giving them unrealistic messages. I am not saying this is the only problem. But you have to admit that it fits well with the social justice problem. So if you put Sunday morning compassion for all mankind together with the weekday's social justice professors you get a lethal combination of idiocy.
Thus WASPs have had a hard time of it in the USA because their preachers have been giving them unrealistic messages. I am not saying this is the only problem. But you have to admit that it fits well with the social justice problem. So if you put Sunday morning compassion for all mankind together with the weekday's social justice professors you get a lethal combination of idiocy.
5.3.17
learning Torah
The most attractive thing about learning Torah is that it constitutes a life lived for God. Or that is what it ought be be. It is not supposed to be a choice about how to go about making money. This is at least how the Chazal {חז''ל} sages of the Talmud understood it. The choice is supposed to be along the lines of, "Should I spend my time running after things of this world, or should I devote my life to serving God?"
This aspect of Torah as a holy pursuit is what sparks in me a sense of outrage when I see it being made into a way of making money. When I see the religious people (I use the term "people" loosely. It is true they have human DNA, but so do my fingernails.) being mainly based on scamming of naive secular Jews, I get a sense of outrage that I feel others ought to share with me.
I feel the religious have turned something holy and precious--the Written and Oral Law of Moses, into something disgusting revolting and unholy and unclean.
Thus the problem of Halaca of using Torah for money is not the kind of focus of attention that I am interested in. Rather there is something about the whole religious world in itself that is perfectly revolting and immoral outside of the few fine and outstanding Litvak yeshivas in NY, or the general world of religious Zionism in Israel that emphases Torah along with Derek Eretz [Human decency]. (This is the same emphasis as you have in NY Litvak yeshivas. It is just in Israel that the religious world is satanic as is obviously to anyone who has had any experience with them. I do not mean to be critical here of places like Ponovitch or the other few authentic Litvak yeshivas in Israel. The best advice I think is to stop funding the religious world which is highly demonic and does not contribute anything to the Jewish world. Great places like Ponovitch don't need the money. They will manage well on their own. And this way, by cutting off the funding, you stop funding the evil in our midst. ]
One thing is studiously ignored in the religious world is the enormous human suffering inflicted on people by Torah scholars that are demons. This is swept under the carpet as if it did not exist.
The Talmud itself refers to this problem in the end of Shabat and it comes up in the Rambam, but Reb Nachman (ליקוטי מוהר''ן חלק א' פרק ח', י''ב, כ''ח ועוד הרבה) was the only person to make this an issue consistently. The trouble is not so much the character of the demonic Torah scholars with whom I have had the sad misfortune to encounter all too often. Rather it is the suffering they cause to others. And then, after all the damage they cause, they have the gall to ask to get paid for their services?
This obviously does not refer to sincere Torah scholars that learn Torah for its own sake, and the difference is all too plain. That is why I am careful to recommend only the authentic Litvak yeshivas that I know are learning Torah for its own sake.
What is happening is think is this: People use Torah to gain money power and then go about using their power in horrible, horrific, ways. Everyone knows Satanic teachers of Torah that make unclean everything they touch. This creates an opposite reaction. People then flee from Torah as if it alone was responsible for this.
This makes it difficult for me to explain the problem is with the demonic teachers that are sent to Earth in order for there to be free will. For if people would only see the Light of the Torah, there would no longer be free will. Everyone would run to learn and keep Torah. Thus there has to be these agents of the Devil in order for there to be free will.
But people should know, demonic scholars do not learn and keep Torah at all. It is all a scam. The real authentic Torah is only found in authentic Litvak yeshivas.
This aspect of Torah as a holy pursuit is what sparks in me a sense of outrage when I see it being made into a way of making money. When I see the religious people (I use the term "people" loosely. It is true they have human DNA, but so do my fingernails.) being mainly based on scamming of naive secular Jews, I get a sense of outrage that I feel others ought to share with me.
I feel the religious have turned something holy and precious--the Written and Oral Law of Moses, into something disgusting revolting and unholy and unclean.
Thus the problem of Halaca of using Torah for money is not the kind of focus of attention that I am interested in. Rather there is something about the whole religious world in itself that is perfectly revolting and immoral outside of the few fine and outstanding Litvak yeshivas in NY, or the general world of religious Zionism in Israel that emphases Torah along with Derek Eretz [Human decency]. (This is the same emphasis as you have in NY Litvak yeshivas. It is just in Israel that the religious world is satanic as is obviously to anyone who has had any experience with them. I do not mean to be critical here of places like Ponovitch or the other few authentic Litvak yeshivas in Israel. The best advice I think is to stop funding the religious world which is highly demonic and does not contribute anything to the Jewish world. Great places like Ponovitch don't need the money. They will manage well on their own. And this way, by cutting off the funding, you stop funding the evil in our midst. ]
One thing is studiously ignored in the religious world is the enormous human suffering inflicted on people by Torah scholars that are demons. This is swept under the carpet as if it did not exist.
The Talmud itself refers to this problem in the end of Shabat and it comes up in the Rambam, but Reb Nachman (ליקוטי מוהר''ן חלק א' פרק ח', י''ב, כ''ח ועוד הרבה) was the only person to make this an issue consistently. The trouble is not so much the character of the demonic Torah scholars with whom I have had the sad misfortune to encounter all too often. Rather it is the suffering they cause to others. And then, after all the damage they cause, they have the gall to ask to get paid for their services?
This obviously does not refer to sincere Torah scholars that learn Torah for its own sake, and the difference is all too plain. That is why I am careful to recommend only the authentic Litvak yeshivas that I know are learning Torah for its own sake.
What is happening is think is this: People use Torah to gain money power and then go about using their power in horrible, horrific, ways. Everyone knows Satanic teachers of Torah that make unclean everything they touch. This creates an opposite reaction. People then flee from Torah as if it alone was responsible for this.
This makes it difficult for me to explain the problem is with the demonic teachers that are sent to Earth in order for there to be free will. For if people would only see the Light of the Torah, there would no longer be free will. Everyone would run to learn and keep Torah. Thus there has to be these agents of the Devil in order for there to be free will.
But people should know, demonic scholars do not learn and keep Torah at all. It is all a scam. The real authentic Torah is only found in authentic Litvak yeshivas.
4.3.17
Joseph Yozel Horvitz-- Trust in God
Faith a trust in God without effort on your own part is a debate. Joseph Yozel Horvitz depended on Reb Israel Salanter that the Ramban held one needs no effort. But to find that in the Ramban has proven impossible. No one knows from where Reb Israel Salanter got this, However the Gra definitely held this way --that no effort is necessary. This provided a foundation for Litvak yeshivas in NY. The general approach in NY was to learn Torah and depend on God for a living and shiduch, and not to get the false semicha [ordination] that gives people the ability to use Torah as a shovel, [i.e. to make money]. In the Mir anyone that got Semicha was looked on as if he was a charlatan and could not really learn.
I hope this does not sound like I am claiming trust in God. I definitely lost that and so my entire service towards God is on a different wave length. That is trying make up for losing trust. For once it is lost it does not return. The same with the Divine Light or "shechina".
Trust for me worked as long as I hung onto it.
In any case, in the Litvak kinds of Yeshiva Musar is learned I felt the real presence of God, the Shechina, and this leads to my general recommendation of making places like this or at least in ones home to have a spot dedicated to learning Torah and Musar.
I hope this does not sound like I am claiming trust in God. I definitely lost that and so my entire service towards God is on a different wave length. That is trying make up for losing trust. For once it is lost it does not return. The same with the Divine Light or "shechina".
Trust for me worked as long as I hung onto it.
In any case, in the Litvak kinds of Yeshiva Musar is learned I felt the real presence of God, the Shechina, and this leads to my general recommendation of making places like this or at least in ones home to have a spot dedicated to learning Torah and Musar.
3.3.17
Shabat: carrying in a public domain
Carrying in a public domain on Shabat is one of the 39 kinds of forbidden work.
Tosphot and Rashi say to be a public domain there must be 600,000 people walking through it.
The Rif and Rambam do not require any amount of people. But the road does need to be 16 cubits wide. Thus to the Rif and Rambam no Eruv is valid. So is one stuck? I suggest one can depend on Rashi and Tosphot in a case of need along with not setting down the package in the public domain but just carrying through it and setting it down in private domain. Thus there are two reasons to be lenient. But I find Rashi difficult because in no Gemaras is this 600,000 mentioned and the cities in Persia (where the Gemara is talking about carrying) did not have 600,000.
רש''י and תוספות that say one needs ששים רבוא people walking through the central road to make it a public domain. The reason for doubts about this is the רמב''ם and רי''ף that consider a public domain to be just what it sounds like as long as the road is wide enough.
But the thing that makes this the most curious is that fact that in all the גמרות in שבת and עירובין that deal with carrying in a public domain there never seems to be the slightest consideration of this ששים רבוא. And the Jewish cities in Persia did not have ששים רבוא.
{That however leaves the question of pockets- that does not seem to be the same as carrying in one's hands. The object is not nullified to the garment, but neither is it the same as carrying in one hands. To carry in one's pockets I think would be forbidden because of a separate law -the lifting and setting of one's body is like the lifting and setting of the object and as Rava says in Shabat page 8 that means even carrying on one' head would be liable.
So pockets are out but carrying in a way that you do not set anything down in the public domain along with Rashi and Tosphot could be a decent permission.
שבת: נושאת רשות הרבים. רש''י ותוספות אומרים שצריכים ששים רבוא אנשים הולכים דרך כביש מרכזי כדי להפוך אותה לרשות הציבור. הסיבה לספק לגבי זה היא שהרמב''ם והרי''ף שוקלים רשות הציבור להיות בדיוק מה שזו נשמע אלא שהכביש הוא צריך להיות רחב מספיק. אבל הדבר שעושה את זה ביעתי ביותר הוא העובדה כי בכל הגמרות בשבת ועירובין עם שנושאות בעניין רשות הרבים מעולם לא נראה שיקול של ששים רבוא, ובערים היהודיות בפרס לא היו ששים רבוא
I would like to think about pockets more but at this point the issue seems to be in doubt.
I have lots of areas where I am lenient but I do not write about them because the issues are not 100% clear to me. So I hesitate to tell others though I am lenient for myself. The general things I am lenient about are תקנות דרבנן in which the reason for the decree is bull as per the Raavad and Tosphot and Gemara in Beitza 5 and Gittin end of ch 1
So if you are looking for lenient decisions the general way to do this is to look at the question is the law derabanan and if the reason for it is null. The other common thing I do is simply look for a lenient decision in the rishonim, geonim or in the Beit Yoseph or Rema.
I am not saying one should look to be lenient in law. However at a certain point I began to see that people could be extra strict in Halacha and still be scum. The extra strictness maybe even hurt.
Tosphot and Rashi say to be a public domain there must be 600,000 people walking through it.
The Rif and Rambam do not require any amount of people. But the road does need to be 16 cubits wide. Thus to the Rif and Rambam no Eruv is valid. So is one stuck? I suggest one can depend on Rashi and Tosphot in a case of need along with not setting down the package in the public domain but just carrying through it and setting it down in private domain. Thus there are two reasons to be lenient. But I find Rashi difficult because in no Gemaras is this 600,000 mentioned and the cities in Persia (where the Gemara is talking about carrying) did not have 600,000.
רש''י and תוספות that say one needs ששים רבוא people walking through the central road to make it a public domain. The reason for doubts about this is the רמב''ם and רי''ף that consider a public domain to be just what it sounds like as long as the road is wide enough.
But the thing that makes this the most curious is that fact that in all the גמרות in שבת and עירובין that deal with carrying in a public domain there never seems to be the slightest consideration of this ששים רבוא. And the Jewish cities in Persia did not have ששים רבוא.
{That however leaves the question of pockets- that does not seem to be the same as carrying in one's hands. The object is not nullified to the garment, but neither is it the same as carrying in one hands. To carry in one's pockets I think would be forbidden because of a separate law -the lifting and setting of one's body is like the lifting and setting of the object and as Rava says in Shabat page 8 that means even carrying on one' head would be liable.
So pockets are out but carrying in a way that you do not set anything down in the public domain along with Rashi and Tosphot could be a decent permission.
שבת: נושאת רשות הרבים. רש''י ותוספות אומרים שצריכים ששים רבוא אנשים הולכים דרך כביש מרכזי כדי להפוך אותה לרשות הציבור. הסיבה לספק לגבי זה היא שהרמב''ם והרי''ף שוקלים רשות הציבור להיות בדיוק מה שזו נשמע אלא שהכביש הוא צריך להיות רחב מספיק. אבל הדבר שעושה את זה ביעתי ביותר הוא העובדה כי בכל הגמרות בשבת ועירובין עם שנושאות בעניין רשות הרבים מעולם לא נראה שיקול של ששים רבוא, ובערים היהודיות בפרס לא היו ששים רבוא
I would like to think about pockets more but at this point the issue seems to be in doubt.
I have lots of areas where I am lenient but I do not write about them because the issues are not 100% clear to me. So I hesitate to tell others though I am lenient for myself. The general things I am lenient about are תקנות דרבנן in which the reason for the decree is bull as per the Raavad and Tosphot and Gemara in Beitza 5 and Gittin end of ch 1
So if you are looking for lenient decisions the general way to do this is to look at the question is the law derabanan and if the reason for it is null. The other common thing I do is simply look for a lenient decision in the rishonim, geonim or in the Beit Yoseph or Rema.
I am not saying one should look to be lenient in law. However at a certain point I began to see that people could be extra strict in Halacha and still be scum. The extra strictness maybe even hurt.
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