I have a soft spot in my heart for learning Torah. Most synagogues that  i attended were more about prayer. But I suggest taking every synagogue and Temple and converting it into a place where Torah is learned.
This was, in fact, the way things were in the time of the Talmud. But regardless of history I think today what people need is a place where they can go and sit down and learn Torah without distractions.

This in fact was the original idea of a yeshiva when Reb Chaim from Voloshin began this idea. Before that there was the local synagogue that was used for prayer, but during the day when people were at work, the younger teenagers would be there and learn Torah from the local rav.

But this too is history. Nowadays yeshivas have morphed into money machines.
This is all bad news. We need simply a place for one thing alone--learning Torah for its own sake--not for the sake of making  money, or any other purposes.


"Learning Torah" in this context means only traditional Torah:  Talmud, Rashi, and Tosphot. Anything after the Mediaeval Rishonim is strictly off limits. For anyone who is not up to Talmud there are plenty of good books of Rishonim that provide  a good instruction to Torah: the Guide for the Perplexed, or the אמונות ודעות by Saadia Gaon. There are great books of Musar from the Middle Ages also.

I should mention  that bringing back people in repentance is a very evil thing to do. What I am suggesting here is rather to have places where people learn Torah and the Torah will teach people what to do. But the whole concept of "Kiruv" is very evil. It first and foremost causes people to ignore the fifth commandment.  all the evil in the people they supposedly bring back to Torah goes into them until they become infinitely more evil that the people they are supposedly helping.
 . And you can see this in fact in every Kiruv organization.

So in spite of what people say, "We don't Poskin (decide) by the Gemara," the truth is the exact opposite. We poskin only by the Gemara. The only thing which determines halacah is דינא דגמרא

I am not a fan of being strict in Jewish Law Halacha. But neither am I in favor of being lenient.

While Reb Chaim from Voloshin  and other people like the Maharshal and Mahrasha go with the idea that דינא דגמרא the law of the Talmud is what is binding [and later halacha authorities are only to make it clear what the Talmud is saying but have no authority on their own.] still my way of looking at Halacha is that I go by Rishonim [Medieaval authorities].

This is a major source of confusion nowadays so I thought it is worth my time to clear up the issue.
In any case the Halacha [Law] is certainly like the law of the Talmud דינא דגמרא but it is just because it is often hard to know what that is that I go by Rishonim [Mediaeval authorities].

Achronim --are for some reason very flaky thinkers with only a few exceptions.

Even Rav Ovadiah Joseph instilled and reinforced deep hatred of Ashkenazim in all Sefaradim. [You just don't find an ashkenazic Jew in a sephardi yeshiva for this reason.] I would  consider that to be characteristic of all achronim. They all have some hidden agenda and under the surface are pushing some kind of political trick.

So in spite of what people say, "We don't Poskin by the Gemara," the truth is the exact opposite. We poskin only by the Gemara. The only thing which determines halacah is דינא דגמרא. It is only because it is hard to know what is the Law of the Talmud that we look at Rishonim.  But we don't look at Achronim to determine what the Gemara is thinking because the achronim are usually flaky and are usually more interested in getting the Gemara to agree with what they want to believe that finding out what the Gemara is holding.

I should mention that to me the Rishonim have enormous validity even beyond Halacha. Also in Philosophy. My feeling about Rishonim--even when they disagree with each other is אלו ואלו דברי אלהים חיים "These and these are the words of the living God." Achronim on the other hand make mistakes--often.

My impression is that Islam is trying to exterminate Christianity. Not so much in the Middle East but rather in Europe and in the USA.

I mean to say that I think killing Christians in the Middle East is small potatoes as far as Islam is concerned. It makes news but it is not their primary objective. Their intention I think is more directed towards making Christianity look ridiculous and to slowly achieve their goals by  a slower legal process.

Also I think that though getting rid of Israel is part of their goal but not in the same way as getting rid of Christianity.
The way they do this is in part by gaining confederates--allies in this goal or people that are not aware of their larger purpose.

But to understand this I think is hard for people that have grown up in the West and are not so aware of group dynamics. People in the USA and in Europe think more as individuals and are a little shocked when they encounter "group think." I know I was. I grew up in California and when I discovered people were deciding issues based on group identity alone--and not on the value of the arguments involved I was shocked.

I know some people think that this is a good goal. They imagine getting rid of Christianity and living under Islamic Rule would be Gan Eden. I know people like that.


And there are other people that are complicit in this goal. They don't actively support the extermination of Christianity but stand by and watch it happen with no concern as if it does not affect them. They are not as dumb as the first group but still not praiseworthy.

The best way to deal with this problem--I suggest is to face it head on and as directly as possible.
 That is to stop hiding in the sand.

And this is a problem not just for Christians, but for Jews also. Surely you must think that Jews would be aware of the problem with Islam. You would be wrong. Most think that Islam is our buddy. Civilization would flourish under Islamic rule. And plenty of books are written with this dangerous delusion in mind.

And I myself have been silent about this because after all by blog is visited by almost no one. So I ask myself why bother? However today I thought to break my silence about this and let people know that they are the target.


Now it might not be the place to discuss the positive aspects of Christianity on a Jewish blog. But let me just say that there are good reasons to defend Christianity.--The major principles of ethics are simply Jewish Principles in the first place. Plus there is some benefit in having a good example to follow. It is a good idea to have some tzadik to follow. Christians I admit might over do that last point a  little, but the basic idea is sound.

True tzadik. Is there is such a thing as a false tzadik?
But what could a false tzadik be? If he is false, then he is not a tzadik. Stay away from fraudulent tzadikim. מפורסמים של שקר [I should mention that  even if you have heard about miracles that is not much help because we know that not just Shabati Tzvi could do miracles but also average people could do miracles in his name. So we see there can be miracles of the Dark Side. That is spiritual powers do not tell us anything. \\

And this seems to apply to Torah also. He openly says there is such a thing as Torah of the Sitra Achra (the Dark Side).

I bring this up because I think it was the search for authenticity which brought me in the first place to the Mirrer Yeshiva in NY. And this is relevant today.  If you want authentic Torah today you pretty much are stuck. Because the kelipa of  "pseudo Torah" is everywhere.
However there are a few places that are left that I think realized this problem and have made it a point of getting back to the real thing-- Gemara, Rashi, Tosphot and Rishonim.


What I mean is that we know there are the general run of the mill Lithuanian yeshivas which have always been learning authentic Torah and emphasizing that. But Achronim were learnt to some degree. And nothing is really wrong with that. But there was always an awareness that Achronim are often flawed. But that was tolerated to some degree. Apparently some people finally got tired of it and decided to get back to learning real Torah. [That is learning any achronim tends to open the door to learning the tons of garbage that poses as real Torah].
I should add that I am not against all achronim. I am just pointing out that some people have decided that enough is enough and  even good achronim they don't want to learn because they are afraid of not being able to tell the difference.

mp3 folder


I am putting this here because my attempts to put other music into mp3 form have failed. I don't know if this is temporary or not. So at least these older files I think I ought to share.

I am gaining some clarity about work and Torah. To me it looks like an argument. Even though in most classical Musar books we have the preference for work with Torah, still you have things that indicate that it is best to just learn and depend on God to provide  a living.
You see this last opinion in the מדרגת האדם. [Navardok] But it is not his opinion alone.[See the Gra on Proverbs 26:3 בטח אל השם בכל לבך]

Depending on charity or when the Torah is made into a means of making money inspires a certain degree of rage in most people that are aware of the scam involved in that. But that does not mean that the second opinion is not valid. It just means that there are bad people out there that misuse the Torah.

What I mean to say is that I think there is a distinction between the opinion of the מדרגת האדם [Navardok] and how this question is approached in kollels.

What we have traditionally is the well known argument between the Duties of the Heart and Navardok which really boils down to the argument between R. Shimon Ben Yochai and R. Ishmael.
It is not clear how the Rambam decided here. As far as I can tell he might have been going  with R Shimon. But all this is simply whether it is best to simply sit and learn Torah and expect a miracle that manna will flow from heaven. Or is it better not to trust in this kind of miracle and learn and get involved in legitimate profession. Both have valid source in Torah thought.

But today kollels while pretending to be following the opinion of R Shimon are in fact using Torah as a means to make money, and at the same time are claiming to be trusting in God. This is not according to either legitimate opinion. If you are trusting in God then you are not coercing the Israeli government to give to you charity. The the insane religious world  considers the Israeli government evil for existing and also for not giving them enough money. It is not a world in which virtue, intelligence or hard work is rewarded. It is a world which is unjust. But so what? You don't have to join it. But if you do then be aware of what you are getting yourself into.
[But I admit they do try to make a show that the Rosh yeshiva is virtuous and hard working and a genius in order to continue this scam. But no Rosh Yeshiva is ever choose because of these virtues. Not nowadays at least.] Clearly in the past there were rosh yeshivas who had all these virtues like Chaim Soloveitchik etc.

My question is that we have according to Kant and area where reason can't go. That is uncondioned realities. And yet we also have knowledge of things that are not empirical.  And we know there is more to a priori knowledge more than definitions. So my question to Dr Kelly Ross in California is how to decide how far reason can go.







I wrote :Kant held that Reason applied to unconditioned realities would produce contradictions..

K.R.: In theoretical Reason, that is.

I wrote: "But that it is valid in the realm of a priori synthetic knowledge.The question is if these are really all that different? How do you tell the difference between unconditioned realities and  just plain regular a priori things?"

KR: " With unconditioned realities, we cannot determine between freedom and determinism.  However, practical Reason does determine, for freedom.

You tell the difference between unconditioned and conditioned realities where the series of applications of the categories (particularly causality and substance) has termination points or does not.  Thus, freedom is the beginning of an unconditioned causal series, and God (or, to an extent, the soul) is an unconditioned substance.  There is a similar idea in Buddhism, where all reality is conditioned but for certain "unconditioned dharmas," such as Nirvana.  This would fit in nicely with Kant.

These principles result in a nice meeting between physics and metaphysics.  Phenomenal space is all conditioned, but the whole of space is unconditioned, which is why physics cannot decide whether the universe if finite or infinite.  This problem is currently dishonestly evaded in discussions of physics.

Best wishes,
Kelley Ross"



After note: Kant really requires  a lot of work. And I admit to have not spent enough time on him.
At any rate we  here a classic example of Kelly Ross writing. It is jam packed with sub-layers, It is like each word requires a few semesters of study.