The leaders of the religious world tend to come under the category of Torah scholars that are demons that Rav Nahman brings in the LeM in ch 12. [ch.s 28, 61, vol II ch.s 1, 8 and many other places that do not occur to me this minute ] There are exceptions but no fixed rule how to tell. Someone suggested to me that this is the reason so many do not show much interest in keeping the Torah since the Torah scholars that are demons give the Torah a disreputable reputation. 

In the LeM of Rav Nahman you do not really see any clear way of how to avoid the demonic Torah scholars except in the LeM ch 12 where the major difference is the "Shelo Lishma" aspect. [i,e, those that use Torah to gain power and money.]   

In any case you see Rav Nahman was very aware of the problem that the Sitra Achra has taken over much of the religious world. No wonder most people left it when they had the chance. 

So in a practical sense how does one come to learn authentic Torah? To me it seem the answer is clear--to go to any yeshiva based on the Gra. However in that very conversation it came up that many people in Israel have had problems  even in Litvak yeshivas. So while I base my recommendation of Litvak yeshivas based on my experiences in Litvak yeshiva in NY, it could be that in Israel things might be different. So maybe the best thing is to learn at home? 

[The Rambam brings the problem of using Torah to make money in his commentary of Pirkei Avot ch 4 on the Mishna "He that uses the crown passes away". [To find that commentary you have to go to chapter 4, because the same mishna of Hillel occurs in chapter 1 and there the Rambam does not write anything.] ]

 I was thinking about the dialectical approach of Hegel. The idea starts with pure Being which by itself implies Non-Being since Being is without "being things".  And Non-Being implies Being for the reason nothing implies nothing of being things, so there is an implicit recognition that there are being things. The resolution to Hegel is Becoming. But it occurs to me that Becoming requires a third category--time. [Without time there can be no Becoming]. And this model I think provides Hegel with a long series in which every concept implies its opposite, and the solution is by adding a third category. [After all hot and cold are two contradictory things until you add time and/or place.] So Hegel wants to continue this series --adding concept after concept until you get to the Absolute Idea [God] where all contradictions are resolved.[I want to add that Dr Kelley Ross [https://www.friesian.com/origin/chap-4.htm#sect-1][or here https://www.friesian.com/origin/] brings in his PhD thesis that this original idea of Hegel is valid. Just that he disagrees with the long series expansion.

Dr Kelley Ross writes:"The similarity and the connection that Hegel described between Being and Not Being is also very germane, although the motivation and explanation here will be different from his."

 The question that occurred to me at the police station was implicitly asked by Tosphot and answered. Just to give a background let me explain. The Gemara in Avoda Zara [page 23 side b] says when Israel came into the land of Canaan why did they have to burn all the asherot [worshipped trees] of the Canaanites? After all, no one can make forbidden that which belongs to his neighbor, and the land was given to Israel from the time Abraham. So it must be that since Israel worshipped the Golden Calf that makes the worship of the trees [asherot] OK to them, so  the Canaanites were acting as messengers for them.

Now the Gemara in Rosh Hashanah asks. how can it be that Israel brought the Omer [a offering of grain] right away when they came into the land? After all the only produce was grown by the Canaanites, and the verse says to bring the Omer from your produce, not the produce of a gentile.

On this Gemara in Rosh Hashana [page 13], Tosphot asks:  we know from the Gemara in Avoda Zara that the land belongs to Avraham from before Israel came into the land.(So the produce does in fact belong to them) Still the question is valid since the gentiles have ownership in the grain that they grow even if the land belongs to Israel. But if that is so then what is the question in Avoda Zara if after all the land is of Israel then the asherot are forbidden and need to be burnt. But the Gemara's question is from the asherot that were planted before the time of Avraham Avinu [Abraham the Patriarch]] that would be permitted in use by just nullification. [An idol of a gentile becomes permitted by simple nullification, without burning. Only an idol of a Israeli needs to be burnt]

So you see that it is implicit in the answer of Tosphot that trees that were outright owned by the Canaanites would come under the same category that tosphot brings about the trees that were planted before the time of Avraham

 I was in the Breslov place today and they were learning Lesson 52 in the book of Rav Nahman. There is brought the idea that "hitbodadut" [talking with God as one talks with a close friend] helps to correct one's midot [character traits]. But I think that Rav Nahman is depending on a certain amount of knowledge of context. I mean to say that just hitbodadut by itself without knowledge of what is a good character trait and what is not probably can not help much.

How could hitbodadut help one to correct the trait of speaking lashon hara [slander] unless one even knows that lashon hara is wrong, and also knows the specific laws of lashon hara.

Rather my impression is that Rav Nahman's teachings are meant to bring one to a higher level of service of God. But there has to be something to start with. Some basic knowledge of authentic Torah. But authentic Torah nowadays is only found in the Litvak yeshiva world. And the closer to the path of the Gra, the better.

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 I was attacked by Arabs and taken to the local police station to make a statement, and then to the police station in Binyamin for other reasons. Then after the interrogation was over, I was thinking about the Gemara in Avoda Zara page 23 that serves as the source for the previous blog entry [about the Israeli setting up a brick to worship, and then comes a gentile and worships it--in which case the brick is forbidden to be used.]

The Gemara says this: It says in the verse: "their worshipped trees you should burn". [That refers to when the children if Israel entered into the Land of Canaan.] The Gemara asks, 'but a person can not make forbidden that which belongs to another'. The Gemara answers, since Israel served the Golden Calf that shows idolatry is OK to them, so when the Canaanites were worshipping their trees, that is just doing what Israel sent them to do.

My question is this: What about trees they planted in order to be worshiped trees (i.e. tree planted by the Canaanites in order to worship them )? That is the regular case of "ashera" and so when the Torah says to burn those trees, why can it not be talking about the most regular simple case of worshipped trees that in fact belong to the Canaanites? [Not trees that were planted for other reasons or which grow by themselves.]

הגמרא אומרת: הפסוק אומר: "אשירהם תשרפו אש". [הכוונה היא, מתי ישראל נכנס לארץ כנען.] הגמרא שואלת אך אדם אינו יכול לאסור את מה ששייך לאחר. הגמרא עונה מאז שישראל שימשה את עגל הזהב זה מראה שעבודת אלילים זה בסדר מבחינתם, אז כשהכנענים עבדו לעצים שלהם זה מה שישראל שלח להם לעשות

השאלה שלי היא זו: מה עם עצים שהכנענים נטעו על מנת שיעבדו עצים? זהו המקרה הרגיל של "אשרה" ולכן כאשר התורה אומרת לשרוף את העצים האלה מדוע היא לא יכולה לדבר על המקרה הפשוט ביותר של עצים סגודים השייכים למעשה לכנענים? [לא עצים שנשתלו מסיבות אחרות או שגדלים מעצמם

[The police offered to me one of their sandwiches which costs them 26 shekels [around 8 dollars] which was kind of like a combination of pizza doubled over with vegetables and coffee.  I had no money to return home, so the police gave me money from a sort of general purpose collection box they keep there in the station. I still could not get home, until some soldier bought me a ticket to the central bus station in Jerusalem. There is a lot more interesting stuff but that is enough of my personal affairs for now. 

I was attacked by Arabs and then the police were informed that the police at Binyamin wanted me under arrest. I was very afraid this was going to be a many year prison sentence, and prayed hard the whole way, But God turned the heart of the police officer towards me and let me go. 

 In terms of my previous blog entry I just wanted to add that if the gentile would bow down to the brick without the Israeli having set it up to be served, the brick would not be forbidden to derive benefit from (since the gentile does not own the brick). So it is just the setting it up by the Israeli which makes it prepared to receive idolatrous worship which makes it forbidden after the worship was done. So when the Rambam says "the setting it up is an act" he means it causes a "halut" [state of being]. There is no question about what the law is, but rather what does the  Rambam mean by words "setting up the brick is an act''.

[The brick is just an example. Worship of any physical object would be the same thing. And worship means bowing, burning incense, bringing close to an altar, slaughter of an animal before it, or doing a kind of service that is specified for that idol. And example would be throwing a stone at Markulit which is its service. And the physical object does not have to be a statue. It would be anything except for the One First Cause. This I hope might bring clarity to why I say that the religious world is really doing idolatry, and why the Gra signed the letter of excommunication.] [The reason for the Gra might not have been clear at the time, but nowadays it is crystal clear]

I want to mention that Rav Shach answers the obvious question n the Rambam by putting setting up the object is an act by the egg.