The destroyed cities that were destroyed because by the Emancipation Proclamation. If Lincoln had learned Torah, and especially the books of Ethics [Musar], then the whole issue would have been resolved without war.

 The destroyed cities ruined by the Emancipation Proclamation are proof the South was right.

Besides that I just want to add for the sake of information, there is slavery in Torah. And Jesus also said that every word of Torah is true and will never be nullified right in the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount.

So to say that slavery is evil, one has to repudiate a both the Torah and Jesus.

Portland has shown once and for all that the South was right. The Proclamation of Emancipation was a ticking time bomb and now it has come time to explode.

I might add that the tzars also discovered this truth with freeing the serfs. [It did not take long for them to destroy the Russian Empire after that. ]

Legally anyway, the slaves were never freed because you would need the Southern States to agree to a Constitutional amendment by their own free will.

From a Torah point of view also there are only a few ways that a slave can be freed. But I am not sure that is applicable here since I think a government proclamation can free slaves but only if the proclamation is legally valid. Lincoln's was not.

So today what is possible? I suggest Rav Israel Salanter's idea of learning Musar (Ethics). This is in order to understand the basic principles of Torah. If Lincoln had learned Torah and especially the books of Ethics [Musar] then the whole issue would have been resolved without war.

 x15 E Flat Major

x15 as a nwc file

learning Torah with energy

 I have thought for a long time that Rav Israel Abuchatzeira found a sort of "grace" with God in so far as whenever people came to him to get a blessing, it always [or most always] worked. I do not think he always knew how. He would have bottles of water that people would take home, and usually be saved from whatever problem they were facing. But if he knew how? I doubt it. [He was not all knowing as some people suggest.] 

To me this seems to tie in with the very first lesson in Rav Nahman's LeM Vol I. Chapter 1. That when a person has grace with God his prayers are answered and even his requests --what he asks a favor from people-those are answered too. So how does one gain "grace". In that lesson Rav Nahman says is is by learning Torah with energy. 

This brings the question is there anyone of the Bava Sali family around nowadays that is similar or worthwhile going to for a blessing? Probably. I would venture to say Shimon Buso, [a son of a daughter of Bava Sali] who lives in Jerusalem but learns in Netivot.

[But I ought to add that I think that any descendant of Rav Yaakov Abuchatzeira is worth going to to get advice and a blessing.]

That particular lesson of Rav Nahman says that learning Torah with energy bring together reason with faith. [The ח and נ ] but in the beginning of that section Rav Nahman says learning Torah combines the Nun and the Cheit. In the he says to merit to reason in the first place one needs to learn Torah with energy. 

 There is some cultist aspect to the religious world. This is even though as far as possible to tell, all they are doing is trying to follow Torah. Still there is a definite aspect of the Sitra Achra [Dark Side] that has taken hold of the religious world. It is almost as if there is  a "for the sake of money" or other aspects there. While that is true, still it does not explain the issue. At any rate , in spite of the frum (religious world) making a song and dance of how they alone keep Torah (and so everyone ought to give them money), still there is some reason to avoid them if you value your family and life. For there is a aspect of the Dark Side that has taken hold of the religious world.

The problem is obviously that Torah is positive value and the most positive value. So זה לעומת זה עשה האלהים [the good side and evil side are parallel.] for every positive value there is  a whole circle of negative value surrounding it. So what is going on is that the Dark Side is buried deep inside the religious world.

Kyle Rittenhouse. The second video. [That is the person accused of murder.]

Kyle Rittenhouse. I want to go over the second video. The first thing that happens is is running away and then he is hit on the head with a skateboard. He does not shoot back. Then he is knocked on the ground and kicked in the head. [You can not see who hit him the second time that caused him to fall. That is blocked from view.] Then someone tries to jump on top of him, and that is when the first shot happens. Then again someone attacks him, and he shoots again. Then a person with a pistol [that is hard to see in the video] has turned around  and almost has his pistol ready to shoot Rittenhouse; and that is when Rittenhouse gets off the third shot. Literally an instant before he is almost killed.   

It is hard to see this as anything but self defense in a dire emergency.

The sages in the Gemara say: הקם להרגך, השכם ותהרוג אותו. "If one is coming to kill you, get up early in the morning and kill him."

He should be awarded a a medal for helping to protect his community.

So why arrest him? It is not as if there is no one out there rioting. So the one person that does the right thing--that is whom they arrest?

The first video is hard to see. But the basic train of events is this. Rittenhouse is running away. The person with the red around his head attacks Rittenhouse, and then throws something at  him, and then that is when you hear the shoot. Also self defense. In all these cases, Rittenhouse was the one running from trouble. But when trouble came to get him, he turned around and protected himself.

The South wanted freedom. I can not see that the states had no right to secede. It is like a marriage. If one partner wants out, would you say the other has a right to use force to coerce him or her to stay? Of course not. So why would you say the North could use force on the South to make them stay? What is the difference?

And nowadays there is evidence that the South was right. E.g. Portland, Detroit, Chicago, Newark, etc.  

The importance of Robert E Lee.