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14.1.22

 Even though "meila" מעילה  does not seem to have wide application because meila is associated with sacrifices. still it is applicable when it comes to nedarim (vows) and herem. (excommunication). [Meila is using a something that has been dedicated to the Temple for personal use.]  

This is the subject of an argument between the sages and R. Meir in the Mishna, but the law is like the sages that meila does apply to nedarim and Herem.

 The herem that the Gra signed is still applicable. And one that transgress it would have the law of meila applied. So what is that law? E.g if one has an animal dedicated to be a sacrifice, and then uses it to plow. He has to bring a guilt offering and pay to the Temple the amount that that animal is worth plus a fourth. [It is called a "fifth" but it means a fourth. That is a fourth of the whole value added to the whole makes five parts.] 

That is to say: there is no benefit that can be derived by ignoring the Gra. Like the Gra noted that he is hinted to in the Torah in the verse אבן שלמה יהיה לך --ראשי תיבות אליהו בן שלמה You must have a perfect measure. The first letters are the same letters as Eliyahy ben Shelomo. [This goes in accord with the idea of the Gra that everything and everyone is hinted to in the Torah.] 

The hint that I noted here is אבן שלמה יהיה לך = אליהו בן שלמה יהיה לך   To follow the path of the Gra.

13.1.22

Religious fanaticism

 Religious fanaticism is probably not the best approach. But neither is secular fanaticism. After all Cambodia under  the communist regime of the Khmer Rouge  was not exactly a shinning example of enlightened leadership.

 This is why one needs the mediaeval approach of synthesizing reason with faith.



Religious fanaticism however is worse than secular since it is decayed holiness and so has more power to cause damage. 

12.1.22

 The Rambam holds the Atlantic ocean and all rivers can not be used for the Red Heifer. [Beginning of Laws of the Red Heifer.] [note 1] The Raavad asks why does the Rambam abandon the Mishna and go to the Tosephta? After all the Mishna only invalidates  four rivers in Israel.(The Tosephta invalidates all rivers.)

Rav Shach explains the Rambam is going with the idea of the Gemara that all rivers receive from the Atlantic. 


This all for me was a bit of a surprise because I thought all rivers are fed from springs. Well that is apparently the argument here.

That means the Tosephta is holding that all rivers have a category of a "collection of rain water" and not a spring.


Bu this still leaves me wondering why the Mishna only invalidates four rivers in Israel. Obviously the Mishna holds that all rivers [besides those four] in fact have a category of a spring. The point of the Raavvad still looks valid.



[note 1] The ashes of the Red Heifer are put onto "living waters" in order to be sprinkled on someone who has touched a dead person. That is a requirement before that person can come into the Temple or eat of the sacrifices.




I was really in great need to learn authentic Torah. So I really had to get to the Mir and Shar Yashuv in New York.

 I was really in great need to learn authentic Torah. So I really had to get to the Mir and Shar Yashuv in New York. But because of that I ignored the other requirement of "Torah with Derech Eretz." [That is to say,- even against the advice of Rav Shelomo Freifeld (of Shar Yashuv), I did nor want to go to university at that stage. I felt, the only way I was going to get to any level of understanding of Torah what so ever, would be by spending every waking minute on it. Only later did I go to the Polytechnic Institute of NYU.]  And even after all that,-even sitting in the classes of Rav Shmuel Berenbaum, [of the Mir] I still never really got the idea until I learned with David Bronson. [To him, getting into the depths of the Gemara comes naturally like a fish in water.] Finally at that point I started getting the idea.



11.1.22

 Rav Nahman was suspicious of the medical profession. See the Conversations of Rav Nahman perek 50. So just based on that, I think it is best to not to take cures or "vaccines" if you are not sick. And even when something is wrong, one needs to be careful. At least I noticed in Uman that doctors were very careful to never try new experimental stuff. But elsewhere, I would refrain from doctors. They just have too many new toys that they are just dying to try out on us.


10.1.22

 The way you count days of nida [seeing blood in normal time] and ziva [seeing blood in not normal time] is a point of disagreement between the Rishonim against the Rambam. The Rishonim hold seven of nida and then if more than seven then ziva. But the Rambam has this sort of approach which seems impossible to stick to. In his approach days of nida start when the girl first sees blood and then continues according to the order 7-11,7-11, 7-11, etc. [So if she see one day and then sees on day 30. Well to the Rambam that is ziva.] So let's say you have a girl 18 years old who clearly has not been keeping track. So any blood she sees could easily be ziva. [And even if she has tried to keep track,- well so what? With five colors of blood that are unclean and five that are clean  who can tell when she actually saw something unclean?

What I think is this: the best thing is to go with the simple approach of the Rishonim (e.g. Ramban/Nahmanides) that when she sees that is the beginning of nida. Then go to a river or sea on the seventh day and then at night she is clean. [Only in the rare case of seeing for more than seven days does the issue of Ziva come into play. Then if she sees for three consecutive days that is a zava. Then she would need to count seven clean days, and find a spring. 



The Third Friesian School

 I think the ideas of Dr. Kelley Ross ought to be thought of as a third Friesian School. Not like the first of Apelt. Not like the second [called the New Friesian School] of Leonard Nelson. For his ideas are based a lot on a synthesis of thinkers from Kant, Fries, Nelson, but also Otto, Popper, and Schopenhauer.  

I mean to say that it only takes a brief look into Fries himself to see his antiquated anti-atomism or Nelson to see his fight against Special Relativity. [And that itself led to Reichenbach and the whole Berlin School going off into other directions which were even more flawed.]

{Not that I can see everything like Dr. Ross. I just can not see the critique on Hegel. Even recently the idea of Hegel's seeing the importance of individualism was brought to my attention in Cunningham's PhD thesis a century ago. {There he brings Hegel' idea that Substance and the State are the Thesis and anti Thesis while the Individualism is the Synthesis.]

And I think that Dr. Ross mainly does not like the fact that Marxists used Hegel to prop up their system. I mean to say that Dr. Ross does not like the fact that the Left are always out to get America. You can see this by the fact that they always find fault in everything that the USA stands for and has ever done. So the fact that they used Hegel implies blame on Hegel. But I think they just misused Hegel. Abusus non tollit usum. Abuse does not cancel use.

[And when it comes to internal strife, there is a sort of calming influence of Communism to get people to give up fighting and settle down to an authoritarian regime. But the trouble begins when they try to take down democratic systems.