Year: 2022
Help Put the Conversation About Living in Eretz Yisroel Back on the Table
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Sefer Hachinuch on Lending Non-Jews Only with Ribbis
Sefer Hachinuch in our Parsha, Mitzva 573 – מצות הלואה לנכרי ברבית אם יצטרך ללוות מה שאינו כן בישראל:
שנצטוינו לבקש רבית מן האומות כשנלוה להם, ולא נלוה להם בלא רבית, ועל זה נאמר [דברים כ”ג כ”א], לנכרי תשיך. וכמו כן מותר ללוות מהן ברבית, ואמרו בספרי, לנכרי תשיך, מצות עשה, ולאחיך לא תשיך, לא תעשה.
משרשי המצוה שאין ראוי לנו לגמול חסד זולתי אל העם יודעי האל ועובדים לפניו, ובהמנע החסד משאר בני האדם ונעשה אותו לאלו נבחן כי עיקר האהבה והחמלה עליהם מצד החזיקם בתורת אלהים יתברך. והנה עם הכוונה הזאת יהיה לנו שכר במניעת החסד מהם כמו בעשותנו אותו אל בני עמנו.
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Sefaria translation:
To lend to the gentile with interest: That we were commanded to request interest from the [other] peoples when we lend to them and that we not lend to them without interest. And about this is it stated (Deuteronomy 23:21), “Take interest from the foreigner.” And likewise is it permitted to borrow from them with interest. And they said in Sifrei, “‘Take interest from the foreigner’ – that is a positive commandment; ‘and from your brother, do not take interest’ – that is a negative commandment.”
It is from the roots of the commandment that it is fitting for us to do acts of loving-kindness only to the nation that knows God and serves in front of Him. And by refraining from kindness with other people and doing it with these, it becomes clear that the main love and pity on them is [coming] from the angle of their following the Torah of God, may He be blessed. And behold, with this intention, there will be reward for us in our refraining from kindness to them, [just] like [there will be] in our doing it to the children of our nation.
Obviously.
Lost Wisdom About Democracy
“Democracy has nothing to do with freedom. Democracy is a soft variant of communism, and rarely in the history of ideas has it been taken for anything else.”
Hamodia Needs to Fire Someone…
Look at this page (from Tishrei 5780!), if you can stomach it:
Did you catch the hidden obscenity??
Well, you can go work for English Hamodia; their editor didn’t notice either.
The “illustration” photo in “The Daily Newspaper for Torah Jewry” is of a God-fearing Jew who (gasp!) goes against The Gedolim®™ (©) and wears Techeiles. On the Tallis Gadol, no less, Heaven Help Us!