הלכות חנוכה, פורים וחוה”מ – סיכום המ”ב דרך שו”ת
ספר עמודי השלחן
סיכום המשנה ברורה דרך שו”ת והקדמות לסעיפים מתוך הגמרא וראשונים
סימנים תקל-תקמח, תרעא-תרצז
Reprinted with permission.
Year: 2020
The Definitive Treatment of Ronald Reagen
By Murray Rothbard, of course.
A short excerpt:
In the early years of Reagan rule, the press busily checked out Reagan’s beloved anecdotes, and found that almost every one of them was full of holes. But Reagan never veered from his course. Why? God knows there are plenty of correct stories about welfare cheats that he could have clasped to his bosom; why stick to false ones? Evidently, the reason is that Reagan cares little about reality; he lives in his own Hollywood fantasy world, a world of myth, a world in which it is always Morning in America, a world where The Flag is always flying, but where Welfare Cheats mar the contentment of the Land of Oz. So who cares if the actual story is wrong? Let it stand, like a Hollywood story, as a surrogate for the welfare cheats whom everyone knows do exist.
The degree to which Reagan is out of touch with reality was best demonstrated in his concentration camp story. This was not simply a slip of the tongue, a Bushian confusion of December with September. When the Premier of Israel visited Reagan at the White House, the President went on and on for three quarters of an hour explaining why he was pro-Jewish: it was because, being in the Signal Corps in World War II, he visited Buchenwald shortly after the Nazi defeat and helped to take films of that camp. Reagan repeated this story the following day to an Israeli ambassador. But the truth was 180-degrees different; Reagan was not in Europe; he never saw a concentration camp; he spent the entire war in the safety of Hollywood, making films for the armed forces.
Well, what are we to make of this incident? This little saga stayed in the back pages of the press. By that point the media had realized that virtually nothing – no fact, no dark deed – could ever stick to the Teflon President. (Iran-Contra shook things up a bit, but in a few months even that was forgotten.)
There are only two ways to interpret the concentration camp story. Perhaps Reagan engaged in a bald-faced lie. But why? What would he have to gain? Especially after the lie was found out, as it soon would be. The only other way to explain this incident, and a far more plausible one, is that Ronnie lacks the capacity to distinguish fantasy from reality. He would, at least in retrospect, have liked to be filming at Buchenwald. Certainly, it made a better story than the facts. But what are we to call a man who cannot distinguish fantasy from reality?
It is surely frightening to think that the most powerful position in the world has been held for eight years by a man who cannot tell fact from fancy. Even more frightening is the defection of the media, who early lost heart and played the role of a submissive receptacle for photo opportunities and press-release handouts. One reason for this defection was the discovery of Reagan’s Teflon nature. Another likely reason was that journalists who were too feisty and independent would be deprived of their precious access to the Presidential plane or to inside scoops or leaks from the White House. And a third reason was probably the desire not to dwell on the vital and hair-raising fact that the President of the United States, “the leader of the free world” and all that jazz, is nothing more than a demented half-wit.
כיסוי הראש כדין – בלי פרסומי ניסא
פרסומי ניסא
שוכתב (ע”י גב’) מתוך קו לנשים “בראש ובראשונה”, חנוכה תש”פ
מוצא חן לי לעבוד אותך אבא בתוך מנהרה
בלי להתעמת עם מוסכמות ועם חברה
ושיהיה גם לי איזה סביבון דעה נורמלית
לכל הצעה של מבקרת לא פורמלית
מוצא חן לי לעבוד אותך כמו חוני, בתוך מעגל סגור או בחישוק
ואם נדרש בחוץ – אז רק כשכל רגל כבר כלתה מן השוק
מוצא חן לי לעבוד אותך אבא בתוך תיבה, כל שתבקש אעשה, כל שתדרוש
אבל לא כמו נח שהיה צריך גם לענות לשאלות, להסביר ולדרוש
למטפחת לעבור, לפני התיבה
לא מתאים לי כרגע, אולי לקראת שיבה
כי גלויה לפניך הבושה שבלבבי
אז בבקשה בלי לרשום על קרן הצבי
אני מוכנה לעבור לברט, ואפילו מטפחת לקשור
אבל בלי העניין הזה של כתבו לכם על קרן השור
לעובדך במבוא לפנים ממבוא, בקיטון בתוך קיטון
אבל בלי פרסומי ניסא ובלי כתבה בעיתון
מקבלת על עצמי להתלבש בשיא הכשרות
בתוך ד’ אמות של מרפסת השרות
בחוץ רוצה להיות כמו כולם, לא להיות שונה
אחרת עוד תרד קרני למחירים של סוף עונה
אני יכולה לנסות גם בחוץ פה ושם, אך אנא אבא, אל תזמין לי ביזיונות למירוק
גם אז אני מעיזה רק אם יש לי ביד – אישור חתום שהפאה בסרוק
אבל לא לשמחות, לעבודה או לכנס בארנה
שם בנות ציון תצאנה ותראינה
מעדיפה לעבוד אותך שלא על פי תורת הנגלה
אלא על פי סוד, על פי הקבלה והמקובל
עוד מעט עם דמדומים, נר איש וביתו נזכה להדליק, בפרסומי ניסא – לעיני כל זר
בתודה לך אבא שזה נחשב לנורמלי, ולא לקיצוני הזוי ומוזר
—
מוקדש בהערכה
לך המחליפה
שגם אם זה נחשב לשונה ובעייתי
ויתרת במסירות נפש – על המראה ה”פאתי”
עבדת את בוראך כמיעוט בתוך הרוב – לבד!
הגם שזה לא מוערך ולא מכובד
בחרת לשאת חן וחסד – בעיניו! גם אם זה יהיה בעיניו בלבד
על כבודך ויתרת – חשבת רק על כבוד שמים
ובאומץ או בפחד – פשוט קפצת למים
כמו אז, כמו המכבים
קידשת את ה’ גם ברבים
על כבודך ויתרת – ביקשת כבוד עליון
ובזכותך ושכמותך – הנה ישוב ה’ ציון –
כה אמר ה’ השמים כסאי והארץ הדם רגלי… ואל זה אביט אל עני ונכה רוח וחרד על דברי
ע”כ
Stop Trusting the Non-Jews’ ‘Innate Morality’!
וישב (ב’)
החטא של הסברה
פרק מ, פסוק יד
כי אם זכרתני אתך כאשר ייטב לך ועשית נא עמדי חסד והזכרתני אל פרעה והוצאתני מן הבית הזה:
רש“י לפסוק כג
… מפני שתלה בו יוסף לזכרו, הוזקק להיות אסור שתי שנים, שנאמר “אשרי הגבר אשר שם ה’ מבטחו ולא פנה אל רהבים” (תהלים מ, ה), ולא בטח על מצרים הקרויים “רהב”:
Q: According to the Midrash, Yosef spent an extra two years in prison because he counted on the Sar Hamashkim to put in a good word to Pharaoh on his behalf.
But what rational person would not have acted exactly as Yosef did? Should he have just hoped that the Sar Hamashkim would do him a favor without his asking for it? Surely Yosef recognized that Hashem had orchestrated this opportunity for salvation, and he would have been foolish not to make the most of it. Even the greatest of tzadikim are supposed to recognize the Yad Hashem in seemingly ordinary events, and to act accordingly. Consequently, Yosef could not have been expected to continue waiting for some sort of miraculous salvation – this was it!
A: Without question Yosef acted correctly by asking the Sar Hamashkim to put in a good word for him, and Yosef never lost sight of Who was running the show. His fault was believing that the Sar Hamashkim, and ultimately Pharaoh, would help him because justice was on his side. Yosef believed that if Pharaoh was made aware of the injustice he had suffered, it was inconceivable that Pharaoh would allow him to remain in prison a moment longer. The morality of the Egyptians, Yosef believed, would play a role in his salvation – all he needed was a chance to tell his story. (This reads very smoothly into Yosef’s words.)
For this trust in the basic morality of rehavim (the haughty), Yosef was punished with an additional two years in prison. Indeed, when the Sar Hamashkim finally deigned to mention Yosef , he did so in a scornful way and surely for his own benefit. And Pharaoh never displayed any interest in Yosef beyond what Yosef had to offer him.
This is an enduring lesson that is of particular relevance in this period of crisis for Israel and Jews all around the world. Most Jews, even talmidei chachamim with emunah in Hashem, believe that if we could just get the facts out, if we could just tell the world our side of the story, they would surely acknowledge that truth and justice are with us.
But this is false, and placing any kind of trust in the morality of our “allies” (and kal vachomer our open enemies, those with Jewish blood on their hands), is not only dangerous but sinful. It is certainly proper for us to tell our side of the story, as we must pursue natural means, but we need not try too hard to convince anyone. The truth is clear for all those who wish to see it, and those who don’t will never be persuaded by our hasbarah.
We must never lose sight of the fact that our only hope is with Hashem , and He is directly responsible for every aspect of our salvation. To put any confidence in rehavim will only prolong our troubles, God forbid.
CONTRA BRISK: Understanding Arrives Long Before the Ability to Explain
Quoting Rabbi R.C. Klein’s Word column:
The Vilna Gaon (to Proverbs 2:2-3, 2:6) differentiates between binah and tevunah by explaining that tevunah refers to the “reflection” that qualifies one’s chochmah or binah. The Vilna Gaon in Chemdah Genuzah (to Proverbs 1:1) writes that binah refers to understanding something on one’s own terms, while tevunah refers to understanding something so thoroughly that one can explain it to others (see also Zohar, Vayakhel 201a). Rabbi Shlomo Brevda (1931-2013) points out in Leil Shimurim (p. 26) that this latter source runs counter to the aphorism often cited in the “Yeshiva World” in the name of Rabbi Chaim Soloveitchik of Brisk (1853-1918): “A deficiency in being able to explain something is a sign of a deficiency in one’s actual understanding.”