Hyehudi.org

Yonasan Rosenblum wrote on December 13, 2009:

One of the members of the Moetzes Gedolei HaTorah of the United States told me recently that the gedolim cannot even discuss questions surrounding poverty because if they did the “street” would just label them fake gedolim.

Find the rest of the article on Cross Currents, here.

In a recent post titled עוד כתב ישן נושן מאוד… we quoted the Taz:

נהירנא כד הוינא טליא ראיתי כתב אחד ישןנושן מאוד ביאור רש”י, כתוב בו שזה המאמר בשם ר’ יצחק שמביא רש”י אינו מוזכר בשום מדרש או תלמוד, אלא שמה שאמר מ”ט פתח בבראשית כו’ הוא מדרש ולא דברי ר’ יצחק אלא שזה ר’ יצחק היה אביו של רש”י ולא היה למדן גדול ורש”י רצה לכבד אביו ולהזכירו בתחילת חבורו ואמר לו שאל איזה קושיא ואכתבנה על שמך…

We then pointed out this “Rabbi Yitzchak” does exist in the Medrash Rabba on “Hachodesh hazeh lachem”, and linked to other examples of made-up “traditions”.

One of our precious readers, zealous for the honor of our sages (and eager to help me become humble), commented the Taz spoke the truth about what he saw. He quotes Otzar Hachochma forums:

No, I didn’t know the Taz wasn’t the first to record this lie. But we never dreamed of denying our teacher the Taz saw what he said he saw! (Why would he want to lie, anyway?!) The Taz himself weakens the claim, see inside. The whole point was that many lies, occasionally as “pious fictions”, are created in Jewish literature, including by some distinguished “Achronim” (but not all!). And many of these lies were already “hallowed by tradition” by antiquity, too.

Yes, some people claim they saw something in an “extremely” old manuscript, because הרוצה לשקר ירחיק עדותו, but this doesn’t mean everyone who uses the phrase in any context whatsoever, is lying. It’s not like the Taz could even get his hands on a manuscript from the time of Rashi himself, over 500 years past. Etcetera.

I waited to see if anyone else would misunderstand what I wrote this way, but no. I think this suffices, and there is no need to explain the original post any further.