Rabbi Alt – The Way of War

The Way of War

It says מגן אם יראה ורמח בארבעים אלף ישראל, was even a shield or a spear seen among 40,000 in Israel.[1] The Tanna Dvei Eliyahu[2] comments that 40,000 from the Jewish people go out to war and there is amongst them one pair of Torah scholars, it is like they are holding a shield and a double-edged sword. R’ Asher Weiss explains that aמגן , shield is a defensive weapon while a רמח, spear is an offensive weapon. An army invests in offense and defense in order to be victorious. Corresponding to this is the Milchamta Shel Torah. In Torah the one asking the question is the one on the offensive and the one answering is on the defense. In this way the Milchamta Shel Torah provides strength to the soldiers.

 

Milchamta Shel Torah can also remove war. Through engaging in Torah which is like fighting, as in fact it is called Milchamta Shel Torah, other fighting (wars and the like) can be removed, thereby increasing peace in the world. This explains the dictum that Torah scholars increase peace in the world since through the Machlokes of Torah, there can be more peace in the world.[3]

 

[1] Shoftim 5:8.

[2] Chapter 10.

[3] Drashos Chassam Sofer, p. 806.

Rabbi Yehoshua Alt

Writer of the weekly Fascinating Insights Torah sheet in English, עברית ,אידיש and Français.

Author of Six Books including the recently released “Magnificent Marriage Insights: Captivating Torah Essays about Marriage”

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Become a Cynic in One Easy Step!

Are you ready?

OK.

Here goes:

Check the footnotes.

What? That’s it?!

That’s it.

Is that what first made you into a cynic?

Yes. I started doing that with Torah books.

Is this true in other disciplines?

I suspect so. The great Thomas [Just the facts, ma’am!] Sowell says checking footnotes made him into a cynic (minute 16:33-17:26 here).

As he says:

“That will turn you into a cynic in a very short time.”

(Sowell is speaking about Piketty’s book, but it sounds like he means it in a general way.)

Wait, what will I discover?

Try it for yourself!

P.S., Rabbi Reuven Chaim Klein writes in: I can confirm that your עצה works.

סרטון קצר: התפילה בכותל לעת צרה עם תקיעה בחצוצרות

הערת הרב ברנד שליט”א:
סרט של תפילה בכותל לעת צרה עם תקיעה בחצוצרות על פי משנה בתענית וטור ס’ תקפ”ט בתוספת מה שנוגע לצרה של עכשיו בהוספת שש ברכות.
כבר מתפללים בעשרה מתענים כל שני וחמישי, מיום שני של אחרי שמחת תורה חוץ מחנוכה וראש חודש.
הנה הסרטון:

A Non-Smartphone Non-Jew Describes His Life…

Some excerpts from the London Review of Books, 15 FEBRUARY 2024:

If I need to find somewhere new, I look it up on my laptop and draw a map on a scrap of paper, or ask a black cab driver at a red traffic light. They seem increasingly bemused. If I get lost while driving, I pull over to peer at my A to Z through a credit card-sized magnifying glass. My son learned to map-read while I maintained an unpopular holding pattern on a roundabout.

… My heart sinks at a QR code menu. I either ask the hard-pressed waiter (half guilty, half indignant) to root around for a paper menu, or submit to my companion reading it out from their phone as if to a child.

I use a watch, an alarm clock, a camera and a CD player. I listen to a portable analogue radio with headphones, or download radio programmes onto a mini-MP3 player. I have a paper appointments diary and a pocket notebook with a pen. My daily newspaper lands on the mat. On holiday, I rely on guidebooks. When I was last abroad, I walked to a restaurant and made a reservation by writing my name on a napkin.

This one sounds familiar:

When someone wants to show me a photo on their phone, I count in my head how long it takes them to find it. It’s usually about two minutes. The person tries to continue the conversation while they search, but they usually can’t help also reading a message they’ve just received. I used to fill the time by babbling on. Now I sit and wait. When the tiny image is finally located, it rarely adds much. I hate phones, but I also hate the gap they open up between me and the people around me who mean well.

And this:

WhatsApp is the big one. The primary school PTA year group rep wouldn’t put announcements on email and made it clear that if I missed out, it was my problem.

So unfair!

Here’s the scary ending:

The 3G mobile signal is about to be switched off, older digital radios can no longer receive the new DAB+ signal, and landlines will soon be replaced by something called Digital Voice. At some point my refusenik status may become not just eccentric but practically impossible. I only hope a bigger backlash kicks in before then.

Read the rest here…