ללא מחבר No Author

Wearing Techeilet Is About Zionism!

While the overwhelming majority of parshat Shelach (read last week in Israel and this week outside Israel) is about the sin of the spies, the last 5 verses deal with the mitzvah of Tzitzit and the famous blue thread called “Techeilet”: “Speak to the children of Israel… that they shall make for themselves tzitzit on the corners of their garments… and they shall place upon the tzitzit of each corner a thread of Techeilet (blue wool)…”

Believe it or not, I have been wearing Techeilet for over 30 years. In those days, you could count the number of the blue string wearers on one hand, but today – Baruch HaShem! – things are much different. I am currently in New York and am proud to say that this past Shabbat, the Rabbi of the shul we davened in was a member of the blue team! As I looked around the large shul, I was pleasantly surprised that about 25% of the people had Techeilet on their Tallit. Things are moving in the right direction… or so I thought, until I davened in a different shul and found myself the only one with the colorful string.

A quick background is necessary. For about 1,400 years every Jew who wore tzitzit had techeilet as part of his tzitzit. However, at the time of the destruction of the second Temple, the secret formula of making the blue-dye was lost. For 2,000 years our tzitzit became white-only and only recently was the unique snail found from which the blue-dye is produced. Major Talmudic scholars investigated this matter thoroughly and came to the conclusion that the 2,000 year wait was over… techeilet had been found! People like me jumped on the opportunity to fulfill this commandment properly and, slowly but surely, more and more people started purchasing the unique blue woolen string and becoming techeilet wearers – exactly as commanded by HaShem Himself.

However, as stated above, while new people are “joining the blue team” every day, the overwhelming majority of Torah observant Jews are still on “the white team”. Why is that? Don’t they recognize the gift that our Father has given us? For 2,000 years, the greatest Rabbis including the Rambam, Arizal, Rashi, Vilna Gaon, Ba’al Shem Tov, Rav Kook and the Chafetz Chaim didn’t have the opportunity to wear techeilet… but we do… so why hasn’t the Torah world embraced this miracle?

Rabbi Aryeh Lebowitz, in his sefer “Ha’Koneh Olamo” has an entire chapter dedicated to answering this question (chapter 5). To summarize, he writes that the Jewish nation follows the direction of the Gedolim. What they say, we do, and on this issue – for various reasons – they have not been convinced of the authenticity of today’s techeilet and therefore do not wear it themselves. In Rabbi Lebowitz’s words (translated from the Hebrew); “Since Gedolei Yisrael do not wear this techeilet, it is proper for the nation to act as they do.” (page 89)

With all due respect, I couldn’t disagree more. If the Gedolim ruled that one was forbidden to wear today’s techeilet, then there would be a solid reason why not to… but they have not said that. As a matter of fact, Rav Hershel Schachter wears techeilet… what better proof do you need than that?

So what’s the real issue at play over here? My answer may shock you, but I am convinced its 100% true. The debate over today’s techeilet is the same argument as the role of Medinat Yisrael – the modern State of Israel – in the world of Torah ideology. Mask it any way you like but the bottom line is this: Today’s Gedolim do not support the State of Israel. They do not say Hallel on Yom Ha’Atzmaut, do not sing Ha’Tikva and you’ll be hard pressed to find even one Israeli flag in the entire city of Bnei Brak. Their position on “the Medina” is the same as on Techeilet. They are not opposed (excluding Satmar) but certainly don’t endorse. They have representatives in the Knesset whom they meet with regularly but they would never consider themselves Zionists.

To me, and my fellow Religious Zionists, the events of 1948 was the greatest gift our King bestowed upon His people in 2,000 years. Our nation has returned to the very land given to us by HaShem! Yes, it would be difficult – exactly as it was when Joshua entered the land with the 12 Tribes. They had to fight and conquer the land. They had to build, plant and turn swamps into cities. Nothing was ever given to us on “a silver platter” and just like we fought for every inch 3,300 years ago… we have to fight for it now. Then it was the Cana’anim and the Yevusim and today it is Hamas and Iran. Yet, things are not all about war. With this land came unprecedented Torah study – more Torah in today’s Israel than ever before in history! Ancient scrolls were found, the exact boundaries of the Temple Mount were discovered, and secrets such as Techeilet were revealed.

How can we not embrace these events? How can we go through life as if nothing happened? The last 75 years has been a revolution; from the establishment of the modern State to the discovery of a 2,000 year old secret called “Techeilet”. I urge you to recognize these miracles and thank HaShem daily for allowing you to live in such a generation. How can we publicly show us gratitude to our Father and King? My suggestion is by starting with something simple, yet very powerful: Join the Techeilet revolution – get those blue strings on today!

From Am Yisrael Chai!, here.

Walter Block on the Russia-Ukraine War

Hypocrisy, Thy Name Is Wall Street Journal

By 

The Libertarian Institute

June 6, 2023

The Wall Street Journal of March 31, 2023 (page A20, if you must know) featured this headline: “Turkey’s Parliament Ratifies NATO bid.” Here is the first paragraph of this entry:

“The Turkish parliament ratified Finland’s entrance into the NATO on Thursday, removing the last obstacle to a historic expansion of the alliance in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.” [Emphasis Added]

Waitasec. If event B is a response to event A, A must necessarily come first in time, B only afterward. If B occurs first, this event can hardly be considered a response to A.

Let us do a little bit of history here. During the Cold War, NATO and the Warsaw Pact contended with one another. Then, in 1991, the Soviet Union ended. What should have then happened, for a true peace, was both military alliances should have disbanded. Or perhaps, turned into an organization that comprised both of them. But the Warsaw Pact dissolved, and NATO remained.

East and West Germany were combined in 1990. Promises were then made by NATO not to expand in an eastward direction. This agreement was broken upon numerous occasions.

And when, pray tell, did Russia invade Ukraine? Why, it was not until 2022, decades after NATO began its eastward move.

So what was a “response” to what? Obviously, the Russians responsively engaged in a war not so much against Ukraine; rather, in confrontation with all of the NATO countries. NATO instigated this war between Russia and Ukraine by expanding eastward. Russia, for many years, protested and warned against this aggressive activity, but to no avail. Finally, in 2022, this country took responsive action.

Robert D. Kaplan (also writing in The Wall Street Journal, titled “Putin’s Shakespearian Demons”) is having none of this. Suggests this worthy: “Would Europe today be at peace with Mr. Putin’s Russia had NATO not expanded east after the cold war…? Certainly not.”

Does he give any reasons for this contention of his? Certainly not. Instead, he waxes eloquent about alternative history. He offers his thoughts on what he imagines would have occurred in the absence of the NATO eastward march. To summarize: Putin’s Russia would have been a bully, controlling the areas between Germany and his country, and impoverishing them all.

One way to refute this is to consider Russia’s, well, the USSR’s westward march. You say there was no such westward march? You are mistaken. They “marched” into Cuba in 1962 and parked a few weapons of mass destruction there. (To contextualize that initiative, at that time the U.S. had located similar weaponry in several countries surrounding the USSR. Further, these countries had joined NATO; Greece and Turkey in 1952; West Germany in1955.)

How did the United States react to what it regarded as a serious provocation on its very borders? (Cuba is only 90 miles away from Florida.) Uncle Sam organized a naval blockade of the island nation. But a blockade is an act of war! If Ukraine were an island, quite possibly Russia would not have physically invaded it. It might well have followed the example of the U.S. and blockaded that island of Ukraine. Hey, I can also do a bit of alternative history and alternative geography to boot! I have learned from the master of this sort of thing, Robert D. Kaplan.

In other words, the U.S. did in Cuba almost precisely what it is now blaming Russia for doing in Ukraine. There is a word for this sort of thing. Wait, I think I’ve got it…Yes, hypocrisy! Kaplan is also a master of that characteristic. Notice the level of patience between the two super powers. The U.S. waited only a matter of hours before the provocation of Russia to engage in an act of war. Russia? Decades.

Question: how many times in history has Russia invaded the United States? Answer, zero. Question: how many times has the United States invaded Russia? Answer: one. This occurred at the end of the first world war. However, if we ask how many time has Russia been invaded by any and all countries in NATO, the answer is in the dozens. Can we really blame them for being concerned with the possibility of western military equipment, up to and including weapons of mass destruction, being placed in a neighboring country, Ukraine, courtesy of NATO?

Imagine if we all lived in the land now occupied by Russia and they occupied the territory of the 50 states. Moscow and Leningrad are ours, they own New York City and Los Angeles and everything in between. All else remains the same: the history, the language, the culture, the people.

How would we feel about the eastward movement by NATO? (Russia now being the leader and most powerful member of that organization.) Answer: we would not be happy campers. How is it possible that intelligent experts such as Kaplan cannot see matters through the eyes of the other guy? Answer: I don’t know.

This originally appeared on The Libertarian Institute and was reprinted with the author’s permission.

From LRC, here.

In Praise of Soncino (or: ‘The Case for Brevity in Translating Gemara’)

IN PRAISE OF THE SONCINO TALMUD

 

In Praise of the Soncino Talmud

By David S Farkas*

Not long ago one of our local schools hosted a Giveaway day in its library, making many of the older seforim in its considerable collection free to a good home. As expected, the local citizenry plundered and pillaged, carrying off large numbers of books, many still in quite good condition. I was only able to attend towards the end, “after the last of the gleaners had gone.”[1] Only a few scattered Siddurim and Chumashim were left, when I spotted a box in a corner of the room, filled with small red volumes. Close inspection revealed that the books were none other than the Soncino Talmud, a complete set. My heart sank a little to see this classic work, neglected and abandoned. I felt, in a small way, as though I had seen the tongue of Chutzpith the Translator lying in the dust.[2]

The Soncino Press sees no press at all these days, it seems. Its groundbreaking complete English translation of the Talmud has almost entirely been supplanted by Artscroll’s Schottenstein edition. Indeed, studying with the latter presents a very much different type of engagement with the Gemara, and Artscroll has undoubtedly done a master job of it. Yet for all of its depth and analysis, Soncino to this day brings to the table things that Artscroll does not. What follows, then, is not an attempt to sing the praises of one at the expense of the other, but only to point out some of the unique features of the now-neglected Soncino, and to suggest some of its alleged flaws may have been greatly exaggerated.[3]

To begin with, the canard so many of us heard in our yeshiva days – that Soncino was edited by less than fully-religious Jews – is a terrible misimpression that, to the best of my knowledge, seems to be based purely on the evidence that it was edited by a man named Isidore. Yet Rabbi Yechezkel Epstein (as he is in fact identified, in Hebrew, on the opposite front-page of most volumes) was very much an observant Jew, who attended the Pressburg Yeshivah founded by the Chasam Sofer, and was said to know Shas by heart. The project began with Seder Nezikin in 1935 with a heartfelt prayer to Almighty God, capped with the traditional phrase יה”ר מלפני ה’ כשם שעזרתני לסיים סדר נזיקין, כן תעזרני להתחיל סדרים אחרים ולסיימם.  It concluded in 1948, as printed in Seder Kodshim, with a heartfelt תם ונשלם שבח לבורא עולם, and the traditional Hadran written out nearly in full. We can certainly say of Soncino, if we may modify R. Yosi’s summation of Kelim, “Happy art thou, Soncino – thou began in purity, and finished in purity.”[4]

Moreover, a review of the individual contributors to each volume – a list that, to my knowledge, has never before been assembled – reveals that each and every one of them were strictly orthodox, and not identified with any other stream of Judaism.[5]

Continue reading…

From The Seforim Blog, here.

Are Chazal JUST WRONG About Science? NO!

Torah, Chazal, Geonim, Rishonim, Acharonim, Achronei Acharonim, Gedolei Haposkim, Ketanei Haposkim, and Science

HAPPYGOLUCKYPERSONAGE
JUN 11, 2023
To understand this cartoon, see Natan’s post that I link

I find the idea that Chazal “used the science of their times”, although it may be true in some technical sense, is misleading and doesn’t do justice to the scientific questions on Chazal, or to Chazal themselves. I will explain why shortly.

Beforehand, however, I want to comment on how Natan Slifkin takes this concept to absurd lengths. For example, to explain why Chazal thought the Salamander is generated spontaneously in fire, he asserted that this was a universal belief in antiquity. He provided zero evidence for this assertion. When a commenter challenged him, Natan admitted his assertion was hyperbole (if you follow him, you should already know that you can’t take anything he says seriously), but still claimed it was a widespread belief, which alas, he still had no evidence for. Last week, Natan declared that the Baal Tosafos in Eruvin believed centipedes have asymmetric legs, because… back in those days, people just made stuff up without checking. His evidence that this was the epistemology of Tosafos was from Aristotle (who lived 1,500 years earlier in a completely different place and culture, but never mind all that) who wrote that men have more teeth than women. Just like Aristotle made up stuff on the spot or listened to nonsense without checking, so too Tosafos. He really thought this was a reasonable explanation of Tosafos. The problem is that Aristotle wrote that this conclusion was based on actual observations. 1  Whoops. Oh well. I guess Natan should have checked what Aristotle actually said, rather than engaging in typical Natan behavior which is… to make up stuff on the spot without checking.

Rather, when I talk about “the science of their times” I am referring to the normal sense in which this statement is used by our slightly less chareidi-identifying friends and sometimes by us, the idea that Chazal relied on the outdated science of their time, and so could be mistaken in their conclusions. Rabbi Meiselman already wrote a fairly comprehensive book on this topic, which I have read more than once (and I don’t understand many parts of it, ה’ יאיר עיני, but let’s save that for a different time), but I still feel that I have what to add in terms of perspective.

The problem

The reason why “they followed the science of their times” is problematic is that we are not just dealing with a few isolated halachos here and there, or a few a aggados where the actual science wouldn’t necessarily make a difference- there are hundreds if not thousands of halachos that are based on Chazal’s understanding of reality. In fact, their understanding probably has a bearing on most sugyos in Shas.

For example,

  • The time of Krias Shema is based on Chazal’s understanding of the typical time when kings arise in the morning.
  • The details of berachos on food are based on what Chazal determined provides sustenance, in which amounts they do so, and what is considered sitting down for a meal.
  • The laws of muktzeh are based on Chazal’s understanding of those objects people set aside and that which they will use.
  • The quantities to be liable for carrying on Shabbos are determined based on what Chazal understood are significant or useful for each material or object.
  • The laws of chametz are based on what Chazal considered to be the chemical process of leavening.
  • The laws of Yom Tov include concepts such as which foods would taste sufficiently better fresh.
  • The many details of conditional marriage or divorce are determined by Chazal’s understanding of people’s mindsets regarding these issues. The same is with oaths, vows, and sacrifices, and the same is with Choshen Mishpat, interpersonal monetary matters.
  • The many laws about valid and invalid witnesses in certain situations based which parties Chazal considered to be more or less trustworthy
  • All the halachos about salting meat, about meat and milk mixtures, about food and dishes absorbing prohibited taste is based on Chazal’s understanding of how blood, fat, and taste is transferred
  • All the halachos of Niddah are based on Chazal’s understanding of women’s menstrual cycles.

And these halachos, which are just a sample of many, are not some side points that can be stepped around. They are the stuff the Torah sheBaal Peh is made of. Therefore, to assert that Chazal really had no idea what they were talking about, and just followed other people who likewise had no idea what they were talking about, the blind leading the blind, is to completely undermine the foundations of the Torah sheBaal Peh. I don’t think people who blithely give this “answer” fully appreciate how little it answers, and how many more problems it creates.

There are some people seem to be aware of this issue and maintain that, yes, the halacha was based on a mistaken reality, but we still adhere to the halacha because it was “canonized”. They imagine that with this disclaimer, the integrity of the Torah sheBaal Peh is preserved. However, they are mistaken for two reasons.

1.  It turns the Torah sheBaal Peh into a joke. It makes it something that was founded on falsehood, but we still must follow, because the rabbis said so. This reminds me of the orthoprax Modern Orthodox who believe in Biblical Criticism, that our Torah was written by many different authors over centuries rather than being given at Sinai, but they still follow it, or pretend to follow it, for cultural reasons. Obviously, such a path will go nowhere.

2. More importantly, it is a false approach that is overwhelmingly against the Mesorah. The overwhelming attitude of Rishonim, Acharonim, and Poskim in the vast majority of cases has been to assume that Chazal were correct, and not only must we follow their halachic conclusions, but we must also rule halachically based on their reasoning. A random example would be in the Rambam, when trying to determine upon what grounds a man can demonstrate that his new bride is not a virgin, and there are two criteria and a dispute among the Geonim regarding them, instead of investigating empirically, the very rationalist Rambam rules based on preponderance of manuscripts (Ishus 11:13)

יֵשׁ גְּאוֹנִים שֶׁהוֹרוּ שֶׁהַבּוֹגֶרֶת אֵין לָהּ טַעֲנַת דָּמִים וְיֵשׁ לָהּ טַעֲנַת פֶּתַח פָּתוּחַ. וְאֵין דֶּרֶךְ הַגְּמָרָא מַרְאָה דָּבָר זֶה וְטָעוּת הָיָה בַּנֻּסְחָאוֹת שֶׁלָּהֶם. וּכְבָר בָּדַקְתִּי עַל סְפָרִים רַבִּים וְקַדְמוֹנִים וּמָצָאתִי שֶׁהַדָּבָר כְּמוֹ שֶׁבֵּאַרְנוּ שֶׁאֵין לְבוֹגֶרֶת אֶלָּא טַעֲנַת דָּמִים בִּלְבַד

Wow, look at the very rationalist Rambam, the one who said קבל האמת ממי שאמרו, the one who said סוף דבר אני האיש אשר כשיציקהו העניין ויצר לו הדרך ולא ימצא תחבולה ללמד האמת שבא עליו מופת אלא בשיאות לאחד מעולה ולא יאות לעשרת אלפים סכלים, אני בוחר לאמרו לעצמו, the one who saidואל תבקשני לתאם כל מה שאמרו מעניני התכונה עם המצב כפי שהוא, לפי שהמדעים באותו הזמן היו חסרים, ולא דברו בכך משום שיש להם מסורת באותם הדברים מן הנביאים, אלא מצד שהם ידעני אותם הדורות באותם המקצועות. Look how this giant turns into humble acolyte when faced with the awesome words of Chazal, taking it utterly for granted that they were correct. This is representative of the standard halachic process, which is to rule based on the sugya and by trying to determine what Chazal meant, with a presumption that their statements about reality were correct. To assert that the process is all based on falsehood, but it’s ok, we’ll still be nice and follow halacha, is to utterly discard the entire Mesorah for 2000+ years. It would have been easier for our grandparents just to convert to Christianity and not deal with the fantasies of the rabbis.

Continue reading…

From Irrationalist Modoxism, here.

France Attack: Hey, Pick on Someone Your Own Size!

Diversity Knifes French 3-Year-Olds

Jun 08 2023

Suppressing gun rights doesn’t work. Maybe defending the border to prevent foreign conquest by mass immigration is worth a try. From France:

Several children, all around the age of three, have been stabbed in a lakeside playground attack in France by a man wielding a knife in the French Alps town of Annecy. …

Four young children and an adult were injured, according to police. That number could be subject to change as the situation evolves.

Two of the children suffered life-threatening injuries while the other two are slightly hurt, police said. They added that the adult also suffered life-threatening wounds. …

The alleged attacker is said to be a Syrian national, police sources told local media.

This one didn’t have the body count of prior acts of multicultural outreach by France’s Arab conquerors. In 2015, Muslims killed 17 at the offices of Charlie Hebdo and 130 in the synchronized attacks that included the Bataclan nightclub in Paris. The next year on Bastille Day, Tunisian Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel killed 84 in Nice with a truck. However, the age of the Annecy victims may cause this to stick in people’s minds.

Eventually, even a country as rotted through with leftist ideology as France starts to push back. Either that or it just dies.

On a tip from Bluto.

From Moonbattery, here.