mysticism

My impression is that mixing up mysticism with Musar was not a good idea. [That is almost all post Zohar Musar].
But I do not mean this in the sense of critique on the Ari'zal. Rather the tendency is to get off track.

And after all, there is a very different sense of what Muar means when it comes from the rational schools of thought of Saadia Gaon and the Rambam -as opposed to the mystic schools of thought of the Ramban/ Nahmanides and almost all subsequent Musar.

To me it seems I myself got off track. And that would not have happened if the straight Litvak yeshiva I was in had been straightforward about saying that the Mystics just got too much stuff wrong. Not that they got everything wrong, but enough to make it no worthwhile.

There were great tzadikim like Rav Yaakov Abukazeira who came to great "maddragot" [levels] but that was not from learning mysticism but from simple service towards God.

[I do not want to turn this into a critique on great tzadikim, but rather to emphasize that no one became a tzadik through learning mysticism. They became tzadikim because they served God simply.Straight Torah. No frills.

[Even books that are thought to be relatively free of mysticism like the Mesilat Yesharim open the door to the mystic stuff. It is hard to know what to make out of this.I certainly do not what to be critical of the Ramhal but in point of fact, the mystic stuff sends people on tangents--often not very good ones.

Dr Edward Feser suggested that Aristotle's approach [and Aquinas] solves the Mind body problem.

Some people like Dr Edward Feser have suggested that Aristotle's approach [and Aquinas] solves the Mind body problem. Then I saw on his site a link to here http://faculty.fordham.edu/jaworski/

But based on what I saw in Thomas Reid and Dr Michael Huemer I do not know how this can help.

Here is the link to the book:Hylomorphism-Mind-Body

The reason that I think this can not work is that people are made of atoms. Atoms do not have mental states.

Normally I have a lot of confidence in Medieval thinking. But in this case I am wondering because I am thinking they might be ignoring the point made by Berkeley.

חובות הלבבות שער היחוד פרק ו

In Obligations of the Heart, [1:6] Rav Bahayee Ibn Pakuda says if something has a beginning it must have an end because if something has no beginning it can not have an end.

Here in this diagram I have tried to work this out.

E=End; B=Beginning; NB=No Beginning; NE=No End.

Idealism

F. H. Bradley (1846–1924) (one of the key figures in Idealism) after WWI, repudiated the whole thing.  Brand Blanchard more or less still defended it.



But what people did to try to replace Hegel with something better seems to have been a flop,



Post Modernism, Existentialism linguistic philosophy analytic philosophy. All sand traps.--as noted by recent more sane people like Kelley Ross.

My suggestion is to take a new look at Leonard Nelson and the Kant-Friesian School of thought.

[In fact the whole academic world in the US seems to have become a lot more sane after the vacuous stupid philosophers of the twentieth century.]

One of the greatest mathematicians in history, Gauss, thought of Hegel negatively. But Ernst Kummer had a specifically Hegelian view point from what one can tell from his speeches.
And there is another connection with the world of math in Felix Klein who married Ann Hegel the daughter of Karl Hegel the son of Hegel.

Obligations of the Heart [Hovot Levavot]

I noticed that some things in the Obligations of the Heart [Hovot Levavot] need more study.

In the first section Gate of Unity, chapter 5 he says there is a general form that is the sub-layer of accidental forms and forms that are part of the essence. [The last would be like wetness is an essential form for water] That is a new concept I have never heard of.

There also seems to be problems. If some thing has no beginning it can have no end he says as an axiom. But then he derives if it has no end then it had no beginning. That is a kind of logic used by Rava in the Gemara but then the Gemara itself asks on Rava. I brought this up with David Bronson once and he showed me that Gemara. [If it is raining it is wet outside. But if it is wet outside that does not mean it is raining. Someone might have turned on their sprinklers.]

I also noticed the Obligations of the Heart also mentions Creation Ex Nihilo right there is chapter 5.

[That is an essential aspect of Torah. This is contrary to the religious who try to change the approach of Torah without telling people that that is what they are doing. They claim "Everything is God." That is not Torah-besides being false.

Also it is hard to understand why the Obligations of the Heart would in chapter 4 say Aristotle was wrong about the fifth element and then in chapter 5 claim there is the Iyuli?

I assume there is some background he is building on of Post Aristotelian philosophers.

the difference between the holy and the fake is hardest of all.

The problem with the Sitra Achra [the Dark Side] is not well defined. The reason is that every area of value has an equal and opposite area of value that looks in externals to be the same thing.

It takes a kind of special talent in any given area to be able to tell the real thing from the fake.
That is the reason the Sitra Achra has taken over the Jewish Religious world. The warnings of the Gra and Rav Shach went unheeded.


It is perhaps possible to learn to exercise caution by learning from other areas of value where the difference between right and wrong reasoning can be more clear.

The main trouble seems to be this. If u take areas of value to start with pure form with no content [logic] and work up towards content with little or no form, the difference between the real thing and the fake becomes increasingly difficult to tell.

As it is said about talent: It takes a genius or at least a lot of talent to recognize a genius.

So with Formal Logic where the statements can stand for anything, what determines the  right answer is  only the form. But Math is not reducible to logic. It has more content but less form. The right and wrong can not be reduced to pure form. [Godel] So it is harder to tell a true proof from a false one.

Then you get into areas with more content  like the physical sciences and it gets harder to tell.
Then in music, art , human affairs and justice which are more content and less form the real test of quality is harder. The rules are no longer clear.
Then when you get into areas of holiness, the difference between the holy and the fake is hardest of all.

learning math and Physics

Once you accept the idea of my parents and the Obligations of the Heart and the Rambam about the importance of learning math and Physics for their own sake and not just because of talent or making a living then comes the question of how to go about it. (note 1)

My idea is to first do גירסה --say the words from the beginning of the book until the end. Then review that same book four times in the same way. 

(note 1) You can see this idea hinted to often in the Obligations of the Heart and other Musar books from the Middle Ages. Later musar books however ignore or dismiss this idea entirely. My feeling is that the rishonim [mediaeval authorities] got this right.

 [note 2] That was at the beginning of my taking up Mathematics after forgetting it for years. Also in NY that is what I was doing as I was trying to get into higher math. But then with all the running around and lack of concentration and just plain getting old I decided it was time to just do "saying the words and going on" since that was the only way I could hope to get the big picture.

small remnant of people that in fact strive to uphold the Torah for its own sake

באשר משפטו שם פעלו Where judgment is, there should be also be mentioned his good deeds.
AS I mentioned in a few blog posts the religious world is insane. And the more they make themselves out in externals to look godly and holy in their dress, the more you can be certain that God is far from them.

Still there is a small remnant of people that in fact strive to uphold the Torah for its own sake= the Litvak yeshivas like Ponoviz in Bnei Brak and the great NY Litvak yeshivas.
So while I am busy criticizing the insane religious world, I can not help but praise and support the exceptional people that are in fact doing a great job.

Prophecy is called a "burden" in the Old Testament. Some prophets begin their words with"the burden of the Lord." So when I have tried and failed to pick up that burden by myself and failed, I ought to go and help others to pick up that burden and then maybe together we can manage to raise it up.

Monotheism of the Torah. He made the world from nothing. Not from Divine light. He is not the world, nor is the world God.

Monotheism of the Torah is relatively easy to define. That God made the world but is not the world. This is easy to see in all book of Torah from the Middle Ages. However the religious world have been in the habit of denying this and claiming the world is condensed Divine Light.

They do this in a sneaky way by pretending to follow Torah by means of external rituals. They believe these rituals make them right and righteous about everything they do wrong.


The basic system of Torah is that God is one and He made the world from nothing. Not from Divine light. He is not the world, nor is the world God.
Since the religious deny this, I refuse to have anything to do with them. [Not to mention almost everything the religious do is in direct opposition to the Torah].

Furthermore, God has no substance nor form. He made substance and form but they do not apply to him. So nothing can have the substance of God since he has no substance. Again this is in direct opposition the the religious. Another reason to stay away from them.

[This point that God has no substance nor form nor even any kind of spiritual substance is a point made by the חובות הללבות Obligations of the Heart in the beginning of his book when proving God is one. That is where he whittles down the number of causes to one First Cause. The step right before that is that God made Form and Substance. The step then that God who made these is not either one but is their cause and thus he is One--not a composite. ]

Creation ex Nihilo [from nothing] is not the same as creation from condensed Divine Light.

I have had a few thoughts about the Obligations of the Heart but have not written down as they occurred to me.
One thing that comes up in the beginning of the book and also in the end in the final prayer  is Creation from nothing.
This is not a major theme there, but in the Guide volume 2 this is a major issue.(note 1)  It is one of the prime tenets of Torah that the world was created from nothing-not  from Divine Light. Not from anything. Just God's will.
However the religious that think they believe in Torah, deny this. That gives just one more reason to avoid the religious.

Another theme I saw  in the very end about bringing merit to many. That idea I recall also in the disciple of Israel Salanter  (Rav. Isaac Blazzer).  Also in Joseph Yozel Horwiz of Navardok. In  Navardok the idea of bringing merit to many people was understood to mean the Musar Movement.
[I recall this was also brought up in the famous אגרת המוסר the Letter of Musar that started the Musar Movement.]


The proof in the beginning of the book seems to ignore the fact that there are different kinds of infinity. [א]

Learning math comes up in שער הרישות in the very end.



(note 1) The Rambam makes this the major theme in volume 2 of the Guide.

Torah is an introduction to the commandments of Reason.

The Obligations of the Heart (by Rav Behaye ibn Pakuda) says the Torah is an introduction to the commandments of Reason. That gives me a lot to think about. He explains commandments of the Torah have  a limit. Commandments of Reason have no limit. [שער  עבודת האלוהים פרק ג]

[This actually reminds me of Michael Huemer's idea that reason recognizes objective moral principles. ]
It also has a connection with Kierkegaard's idea that the Torah has in fact things that are hard to understand. But what is clear and unambiguous one must do immediately.

[I am in a house where there is this book Obligations of the Heart and I am astounded at how many fascinating ideas are in it.]

I see in the USA the effects of socialism are terrible

I think L.T.  Hobhouse has a great set of critiques on the Hegelian State and Hegel's Metaphysics. [Therefore I mentioned Hobhouse to Dr Kelley Ross wondering what he would say about Hobhouse.] 
However even before that I had seen than Brand Blanshard did not think highly of the critique of Hobhouse.

These are delicate points.  I see that the an authoritarian system is very necessary for Russia because of the types of people the Russian czars were ruling over, I see in the USA the effects of socialism are terrible. Still I await the answer of Kelley Ross to hear what he thinks of this debate.

The most serious critique I have seen on Hegel point by point seems to be Hobhouse. But even McTaggert-, Hegel's defender brings up problems. In any case, the attitude of Hobhouse is no where near as dismissive of Hegel as most of his detractors.



I have to admit that I think Hegel's critics can go overboard in being dismissive of Hegel.

Thomas Sowell

debate on Utube

false versions of the Truth. Slight deviations that are only barely perceivable,

There always have to be false versions of the Truth. Slight deviations that are only barely perceivable, but nonetheless cause the result to be the exact opposite of the results of following the Truth.
This is the real reason for the signature of the Gra on the letter of excommunication.
The point you can see in a fighter-craft. It takes only a slight readjustment to make the whole thing simply crash after takeoff. Seemingly slight mistakes in Torah also have led the entire religious world down the path of idolatry and only the Gra saw this before it happened.

Nice video

Dinesh D'Souza

Obligations of the Heart. [Rav Behaye ben Yoseph Ibn Pakuda]

I am kind of trying to figure out something in the Obligations of the Heart. [Rav Behaye ben Yoseph Ibn Pakuda] He has ten categories of people that learn. The first ones are about learning the Old Testament. He divides them into a few subcategories (of levels of understanding).   Then he gets up to the Mishna. So far everything goes smoothly.
Then he gets to the category of those that learn Talmud, and his first category is those that do it for honor, and not for its own sake.

There is no question that I stumbled on this my first time reading this book in the Mir Yeshiva in NY. And I stumbled on it again today.

But then he gets to the next category of those that learn Gemara for its own sake.

I am pretty sure almost anyone reading that passage is wondering exactly what I am wondering. Why specifically the Talmud? All the other kind of learning one can do also for the sake of honor or cash.

It is confusing.


If you take what he says in his introduction of Metaphysics this might become a bit more understandable.He takes Metaphysics [in the Intro] as important for the sake of Torah-but not being Torah itself. So he must be thinking along the lines of Saadia Gaon about the need for Metaphysics along with Gemara.

[You have to be exacting in his words in the Introduction to see this.]

When I was at the Mir and read the Musar Book of the disciple of the Gra Reb Haim from Voloshin [נפש החיים] I saw he was saying also this same kind of idea.--the need for fear of God along wit learning Gemara.

[Anyone who knows the major book of Reb Nahman from Breslov will already be familiar with this idea that there is a kind of tendency to learn Gemara for the wrong reasons--money, pay, privilege as he brings in Volume I section 12. The idea seems the same--to work on one's fear of God along with learning Gemara so that the learning should be for the right reasons.]

Godel proof of God

I tried once to strengthen the Godel proof of God by the  Compactness Theorem, the finite to the infinite. The simplest use of the Compactness Theorem is to show that if there exist arbitrarily large finite objects of some type, then there must also be an infinite object of this type.] The idea if applied to God means that he has infinite perfections.


This would defend Anselm and Godel from critics.  Also I recall I used an idea from Anscombe about compatibility of positive traits --that is some possible world all positive traits are compatible. [I do not recall the source where I had seen that.]

the simple basic path of the Gra and the Mir Yeshiva

For me leaving the simple basic path of the Gra and the Mir Yeshiva was a disaster, but for some reason I was never able to get back to it. The path of Straight Torah.

But as the מעפילים לעלות [those that dared to go up when God said not to] discovered,- you can not just correct a mistake by doing the opposite.

[The event in the Five Books of Moses was after the decree to be in the desert 40 years, some people decided to attempt to enter Israel anyway. They figured the sin of the spies and the congregation was to refuse to go up into the land, so they would correct that mistake by in fact going up. That ended in disaster.]

Same with Torah. It might be a terrible mistake to leave the world of Straight Torah. [The Gra and the Mir in NY or whatever Litvak yeshiva one is in.] But it can be doubly a mistake to try to get back in once one has left.

The idea then is not to try to get back in, but to learn Torah and Musar at home. In fact, nowadays, it makes sense to avoid the religious world entirely.

discussing Socialism with a Mormon

I was once discussing Socialism with a Mormon whose profession was in economics. This was in regard to the USA during the 1920's and the 1930's.
I was being critical of Roosevelt's policies. [And I had recently been reading Ayn Rand.]
He said that sometimes -like in the case of Roosevelt--the only way to control a crisis is by socialism.

Even though on principle I hold free market is the best thing, still I can see in some cases where strong government control over industry is the only way out of a crisis.

I could see this in the case of Ukraine. All the functioning infrastructure is simply what was left over from the USSR. And though it took time for things to thaw out from the fear people had of the government,-- now all the old criminal tendencies of the Ukraine are rapidly coming to the surface.

It has signs of a country in collapse. Criminals attack people with impunity on the street in broad daylight. The police are nowhere to be found. [With all the problems with the USSR you can see what happens to the Ukraine without it--the criminal come out of the woodwork.]

Pretended Virtue. [Pseudo Virtue]

Nothing is quite as evil as pretended virtue.
I was looking at the Obligations of the Heart section 5. He says there the pretender worse than an idolater of stars. For the idolater worships that which does not disobey God, but the pretender worships human beings who do disobey God.
For that reason I avoid the religious world s much as possible. Ever since the religious world ignored the Gra and Rav Shahk (i.e.  the signature of the Gra on the excommunication], they have all fallen deeply into idolatry of worship of human beings.

I would not be very motivated to bring this up except that I saw also in the Obligations of the Heart in the very end and also in the section before the last section this idea of telling people the truth whether they accept it or not. 

In Shar Yashuv [my first yeshiva in NY, Far Rockaway]

In Shar Yashuv [my first yeshiva in NY, Far Rockaway] and also in the Mir Yeshiva in NY there was a general approach that said if you devote your life to learning Torah and trust in God, He will take care of everything.

 Just last night I was reading the חובות לבבות [Obligations of the Heart] that more or less was saying a similar kind of thing. [The idea of the Obligations of the Heart is when one accepts the yoke of service towards God, then God takes care of things. Certainly not in the way you would expect--but still  in his own way.]

This idea stuck with me. I still think it is true. I see very little reason to devote time toward making money. I still think that the claim is true--trust in God and you will be helped.

But my idea of what constitutes learning Torah has expanded to include Physics and Metaphysics.

That is the Physics thing is stated openly by Maimonides but this approach definitely think this is something that my parents were trying to convene to me without saying so openly.
You can see variations of this in the Gra, and מעלות המדות- Saadia Gaon, and חובות הלבבות


[Not saying the Ramban (Nahmanides- Moshe ben Nahman) would have agreed or many of the other Rishonim.]

The Obligations of the Heart divides wisdom into three parts natural,  applied, and חכמת האלהות.{The author uses the Arabic term for "metaphysics"} Ibn Tibon calls the second division חכמת השימוש. So  this is not what we would usually call the seven wisdoms. That is I think the Obligations of the Heart is creating a new category of wisdoms that use natural science in order to make practical stuff. [He must have been aware of Sancta Sofia.He might also have been thinking about medicine.]


At any rate, I am pretty sure that The Obligations of the Heart and Maimonides are both thinking of Aristotle's Metaphysics.

Christians obviously when they think about serving God are  thinking more along lines of charity. But I think the same principle applies. You do you best to figure out what the service of God is for you in your situation and do it and then leave everything else in your life up to God.


People   in the Mir yeshiva and Far Rockaway were certainly not thinking about Physics and Metaphysics as being a part of learning Torah because the entire approach to Torah really went into two directions. One the more rational Maimonides approach and the mystical approach of Nahmanides. The world of Litvak yeshivas definitely goes in the direction of Nahmanides.

I asked Rav Eliyahu Silverman the rosh yeshiva of Aderet Eliyahu in Old City of Jerusalem (a yeshiva that goes by the Gra) if learning Electrical Engineering is included in the Rambam's idea of learning Physics and he said yes.

סור מרע [turn way from evil] comes before עשה טוב [do good].

סור מרע [turn way from evil] comes before עשה טוב [do good]. The implication is that it is more important to identify actions to avoid, and only then to concentrate on figuring out what actions to hold onto.

I think this is probably not hard if one can think about his or her mistakes in life. If one can figure out what one's mistakes were, and then try to find the common denominator, that already gives a good idea of what kinds of actions one needs to avoid.


In my own life, I have found more or less a set of basic principles some of which came from my parents, some from the Mir in NY and Reb Shmuel Berenbaum. Some from Shar Yashuv. And others from experience. But they are like a ship and rudder and compass and other navigational aids in a stormy sea in which I really have no idea of what is coming.

Time exists.

I thought it was Kant who thought that  time only exists on the level of phenomenon, not dinge an sich? In any case, I recall vaguely that thefact that Nature violates  Bell's inequality shows that either locality is not true, or that things have no classical values until they interact with other things or are measured. Since locality is true as shown by GPS satellites, therefore things have no absolute values in space or time until they interact. But they have probabilistic values. That is the way I tend to look at this. But then if this is true, then time exists. Locality implies causes must come before effects.
I think also Dr Kelley Ross has an essay on time in which he mentions McTaggart.

[This was my thought after I saw an essay by Edward Fesser]


[I ought to mention that not just observation but also simple interaction with other stuff can cause a collapse of the wave function.]

the universe might be a stretched membrane

Just off hand it seems to me that the universe might be  a stretched membrane. It could be that that is what String Theory is saying anyway. But to me it occurred that if the universe is a stretched membrane, that is space time continuum, that would account for the form of some partial differential equations that describe physical phenomenon that have variable coefficients.

This you can see in the stretched membrane over a drum. The PDE's that occur also have variable coefficients. 

Learning what to avoid seems to be just as important as learning what to emphasize.

I think people have a general condition that precedes each  sin. And another kind of precondition that is necessary before they do some good. It is not the same for each person.
This may sound speculative but to a large degree this can be seen in large groups where some particular kind of evil exits.

Thinking in analogies always has a kind of danger.  We see this in Freud who took the analogy of  a steam engine and applied it to people with sublimation of energy and letting off steam etc.

Still this idea of a person having a particular kind of stumbling block seems accurate to me.

We see also  in good and great people that at some point they became aware of what areas they needed to concentrate on and what areas to avoid.


My thoughts on this are based somewhat on Thomas Reid, Hobhouse and also noticing in 2-d waves that every wave has a kind of equation in which there is a single coefficient for each terms.


So how can you tell  what particular areas you need to concentrate on on?

You might have noticed that certain saints concentrated on not speaking slander, or lies, and the Gra concentrated on learning Torah. Navardok on trust. It is hard to know the areas one is weak in and what are one's strong points.

I have tried to develop an approach based somewhat on my parents and on principles I gained from being in the Mir in NY and also experience.

Learning what to avoid seems to be just as important as learning what to emphasize.

I think the best approach to Israel is a combination of learning the Avi Ezri of Rav Shakh along with Physics and Math and a vocation. I mean to say that we can see that Israel is highly connected to the idea of Torah with Derek Ererz.[the way of the earth is the way matter acts by forces acting on it. This is the "hidden Torah" the Torah that is hidden in the world of Creation.]
Israel [as is well known from Rav Moshe ben Nahman [Nahmanides]] is very important. But there is a certain kind of combination of Torah along with the "way of the Earth" that staying in Israel seems to depend on..

[First blog entry in Israel]

I really do not mean just the Avi Ezri. Rather I am thinking of the whole approach starting with Reb Haim Solovietchik. That is basically the Litvak Yeshiva approach. However, I think along with that  one ought to go serve in the IDF and learn a vocation so as not to be using Torah as a mode of making cash which to be forbidden according to the Torah itself.

Still, in terms of learning and understanding Torah ,I think Rav Shakh's Avi Ezri is the best thing out there. [However it does require a certain amount of background in Gemara.]

In Torah, people are not gods nor become gods.

In the religious world there's a confusion of the boundary between the divine and the human that's common.  [For this reason it is important not to go anywhere near religious areas.] It is also  common in pagan religion.  The confusion of the divine and human realm is at the basis of the pagan belief in apotheosis -- humans becoming gods; perhaps after death for example becoming immortal, or very often  to  become gods.


In Torah, people are not gods nor become gods.

This is in itself a good reason to pay heed to the warnings of the Gra.

A second version of what Reb Israel Salanter started.

I suggest starting  Musar Movement 2.01. [Musar means books of Ethics of certain sages of the Middle Ages.] That is a second version of what Reb Israel Salanter had started. Even though in many Litvak Yeshivas, Musar is learned in two short sessions, I feel they are too short and also do not take into account the world view issues that those same sages had written on.

For example one well known Musar book is the שמנה פרקים of the Rambam on Pirkei Avot. But for some reason his Guide for the Perplexed and the Musar books of his son and grandchildren are not learned--and not considered a part of Musar.

But I am not thinking about what books people want to learn as the big issue. The big issue is this: the original Musar yeshivas were really into it. They really spent a great deal of time and effort on correcting their traits and coming to Fear of God. It was (24/7) 24 hour seven days a week project.


[I do not have an opinion about the different schools of thought however. They all seem worthy of respect. However I had a particular like for the Musar approach of Navardok  which emphasizes trust in God. Maybe the reason is that that is one area I am deficient in. ]

But even the very short time I was involved in learning Musar I must say it gave me encouragement  in great directions. Correcting my own traits, getting to Israel, personal prayer, speaking the truth. I must say the amount that I gained from it in that short time was immeasurable.

[I mean to say it gave me motivation to not make excuses. Thus when I saw the commandment to get to Israel I took it seriously. "Israel or Bust" was the idea. ]

Musar also has a close connection with Rav Joseph Karo. The best way to learn Rav Karo's books on law I have generally found to be to learn the actual Gemara that the law is based on. Without that it is hard to get any clear idea of what he is saying.

A good example comes up in חושן משפט [circa 155] where Rav Karo goes with the opinion of the Ri MiGash and the Rambam and Ramban that placing something that can cause damage to a neighbor's wall can put put on the borer before there is  a wall. But still this does not apply to היזק ריאה In terms of opening a window into a "חורבה" empty broken down building because of "maybe you will fight with me in court" . To see why both decisions are right you need to see the Gemara and Rav Shakh's Avi Ezri. Rav Shakh says that maybe you will fight with me in court is a good plea and a good reason to stop the fellow from opening a window because היזק ראיה already has a category of being a מזיק. But things that you can put next to a boundary when there is no wall do not have a category of being causes of damage until there is a wall built. Rav Shakh is saying that is the opinion of Rav Joseph Karo-. He suggest that Rav Karo derived this from the Ramban [M. Ben Nahman].
From that it looks like that to Rav Karo there would be חזקה for היזק ראיה. This actually came up once in my experience when one neighbor asked  another to put up a wall even though the area had been open for years. . But I guess that the expenses would be shared in that case.


But in any case without learning the Gemara, I think it is impossible to understand what is going on there.[Rav Shakh answers that היזק ראיה is already a היזק before the place is rebuilt.]

Best idea is to avoid spiritual stuff, philosophy, politics.

When people are extra sensitive to spiritual values  that implies an extra ability to absorb wrong energies also. This idea is more or less based on Kelley Ross of the Kant/Fries philosophy.
At any rate, the idea is once one is sensitive to one area of value, that can deteriorate into it opposite area of value.
This shows why Litvak yeshivas like Shar Yashuv or the Mir in NY tend to discourage and over amount of interest in spiritual values.
So people that are aware of the delusions in the spiritual side of things then often go off into Philosophy or Politics to find meaning.  Both of which are dead ends.

Best idea is to avoid spiritual stuff, philosophy, politics.

[In politics I favor free market and freedom as practiced in the USA and Israel. But I also realize the need for the USSR --the kind of Hegelian stat that is needed in extreme cases. After the fall of the USSR all those same problems are beginning to rise again very fast.]

I see in Vietnam they brew the coffee for a few minutes in a sock. See this website: https://freenorthcarolina.blogspot.com/

 However I just put the coffee grains and tea grains directly into the pot. [both coffee and tea together. later in the day to put in green tea also.]

In any case I heard in fact from my mother in law Rita Finn to have to coffee simmer for at least 30 seconds in order to get the strength out it.

I saw the drip idea but that did not make any sense to me.

The main thing about coffee is to get it into the pot itself. None of the drip nonsense.

There are different kinds of diversity.

To me it seems that President Trump is getting things back on track. Not just that but also there is a significant fact that a lots of Americans voted for him. That seems to suggest that Western Civilization is not lost.

"The squabbling is mainly over diversity. Diversity was the catalyst for the creation of leftist thinking - motivation is hatred of the white race." Missey


I think: There are different kinds of diversity. One kind brings everything up. The other kind brings everything down.

Therefore it is impossible to say diversity is good. Everything depends on who is diverse.

Musar would perhaps have been a good idea.]

The way to learn Torah that I was taught in Shar Yashuv [Far Rockaway, NY] was to not spend time on introductions. Rather the approach was to get into Gemara and Tosphot.
That approach apparently helped me a few year later when I was accepted at the Mir in NY.
This went against the grain and desire of most of the new students that were more interested in introductory material.

My impression is that that approach [of Shar Yashuv] was correct. And that is what I think applies to anyone.

The degree this was taken in Shar Yashuv was in fact even more Litvak than most other Litvak places in that they did not learn Musar. And there was a general disapproval of signs of overt devoutness.

[Looking back however I think a drop of Musar would perhaps have been a good idea.]

State of Israel

My original idea of  coming to Israel was based on the Ramban--[Rav Moshe ben Nahman]. He counts settling in the Land of Israel as a positive commandment. That means an obligation.
The importance of settling in Israel is also brought by the Rambam.
The question that was not clear at the time was: how does one look at the State of Israel? I had not really looked at the question at all. There is also the point that many people have made about the establishment of the State is what is called "The beginning of the Redemption." And that seems perfectly valid to me.

[The idea of the "Beginning of the Redemption" has to do with the coming of a new level of consciousness into the world.]
But the political aspect seems to have been needed in order to have a state at all. One can over-do the importance of a state as Hegel does. But you can also under-do its importance.

One can list the abuses of a Hegelian state as was the USSR, but also not notice that without the USSR there were also terrible abuses that the USSR came to correct.
Same with the State of Israel. All human good and flourishing requires a state. Without a strong state, everyone would be easy prey to criminals.

The kind of state that Israel is now is now closer to the USA form of government.
[In any case, I am not in Israel now, but I feel that if God would have mercy on me and help me to get there again, I would like to never leave there again.]

[In one house where Jews were staying in the time of the last czar, they had made a tunnel under their house--a mile long and reinforced with bricks. That is how terrified they were.]


It seems to me that the whole question is can I gain enough appreciation to decide to get to Israel and stay there once and for all and never leave again.

music for the glory of God

U-100 E Flat Major This is a midi file You might notice the quarter and then an eight. I would not use this idea unless I had seen it in the Renaissance. [I saw this idea in two pieces from the Renaissance.]

[Again I have to apologize that I can not turn this to mp3 ]

V-1 a Midi File

V-2

V-3

learning Torah and good deeds

Between Everyman  and Musar there are many of the same points. No one is disagreeing that one's portion in the next world depends on good deeds. However  Everyman does not think knowledge goes with one to the next world.

[What defines good deeds however is all too clear. When people want to know the right thing to do, the answer is usually clear. If not, there is an idea of asking God directly for guidance.]


In Musar however learning Torah [i.e. Gemara in depth and Musar] have a value beyond the grave.
Furthermore you can see in medieval Musar that gaining wisdom all and in itself is part of good deeds. In fact, in the Yerushalmi Gemara it is considered that every single word of Torah is equal to all the commandments.

And wisdom in itself is considered a separate category than learning Torah. You can easily miss this point in most Musar books unless you are looking for it. But in מעלות המידות it is explicit.

Also as is well known in Litvak Yeshivas in NY there is the whole subject of לשון הרע כנגד כולם -that slander nullifies all of one's good deeds.

[However this emphasis on not speaking slander seems to be mainly in Musar Litvak Yeshivas. I mean there are Litvak yeshivas which do not emphasize Musar;- and  not speaking slander is not thought to be a major subject. In fact, that is a good argument all by itself to have Musar in yeshivas.]