Avodah Mailing List

Volume 25: Number 118

Tue, 01 Apr 2008

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Subjects Discussed In This Issue:
Message: 1
From: "Michael Makovi" <mikewinddale@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 28 Mar 2008 17:36:43 +0300
Subject:
Re: [Avodah] R' Angel & Geirus Redux


>  So far I have avoided getting involved in this discussion, mostly
>  because I have agreed with you as compared with RMM that one cannot say
>  that a tinok shenishba bears no guilt for their actions which violate
>  the Torah.
> R' Chana

>>They are not given a free pass that exempts them from mitzvos.
>> R' Daniel Eidensohn

>  On this I agree.  The language in the teshuvos talks about people's
>  taivos, just like every aveyran. People have taivos to not explore the
>  truth, just as they have taivos in other directions.  The proof of the
>  pudding is that a Reconstructionist Sunday School class can, inter
>  alia, produce an RMM.  If he can do it, why can't the rest of them?
>  And if they do do teshuva, then, so long as we are talking about
>  category b), their past averos are considered obliterated.
> R' Chana

Gevalt, is this what we were arguing?? Oy va voy, I misunderstood what
we were arguing about!

The Gemara in Shabbat perek 7 itself argues whether a TsN is b'shogeg
(R' Akiva, Rav and Shmuel) or ones (Munbaz, R' Yochanan and Reish
Lakish). According to the first, "af TsN" is like someone who forget the
inyan of Shabbat b'klal, and he must bring one korban chatat for all
his Shabbatot. According to the second, a TsN is not even shogeg, and
he is totally blameless; he doesn't even have to bring one single chatat.

So if we are arguing whether a TsN is shogeg or oness, then we may as
well just paste the Gemara into an Avodah email and let that be.

I was deliberately trying to be vague; when I said blameless, I
didn't necessarily mean b'klal like an oness; I just meant that he's
as blameless as any of us are when we wake up at 2 AM on Shabbat and
turn on the light switch before we remember what day of the week it is,
or absent-mindedly do borer like we'd do during the week. As far as our
practice goes, without a Beit haMikdash, there's not much a nakfa mina
AFAIK between TsN being oness and shogeg; either way, we wouldn't treat
him differently than we'd treat any other shogeg sinner, which I'm sure
we've all been at some point.

My argument was not between oness and shogeg; I was arguing against Reb
Moshe's meizid. According to R' Chana's terminology, Reb Moshe argues
(a), and I'm equally happy to argue for (b) or (c).

As an aside, that Gemara has an ambiguity that none of my Gemara teachers
was able to clarify to my satisfaction (this is davka what we are learning
in class; actually, we're now several dapim ahead, but...) - the Gemara
sets up Rav and Shmuel as TsN = shogeg against R' Yochanan and Reish
Lakish as TsN = oness. The Gemara then looks for Tannaitic sources,
and brings R' Akiva and Munbaz in a baraitha, for the two positions
respectively. But then, the Gemara asks what actually is shogeg itself
(forget about TsN), and it brings R' Yochanan as shogeg = shogeg b'karet
(he sinned b'meizid but didn't know he'd get karet for it), Reish
Lakish as shogeg b'lav (didn't know it was a melacha), and Munbaz as
shogeg b'korban were he to have not been shogeg (the guy intentionally
sinned and should get karet, and even knew that he'd get karet/skila,
but he didn't know that had he been shogeg hypothetically, he'd have to
bring a korban; this is a self-fulfilling prophesy and makes him into
a shogeg). Now, Munbaz's approach is (aside from being surprising and
astounding) intrinsically related to what he said about TsN being oness;
he said that a shogeg has (or can have) yediah (even 100% yediah!) (and
thus a shogeg can be meizid but shogeg b'korbano shel shogeg) and thus
a TsN is not even shogeg because he has no yediah. If so, then how can
R' Yochanan and Reish Lakish, who follow Munbaz, have such a different
approach to what shogeg atzmo is? The two are intrinsically connected,
and I don't understand how they can mix-and-match shitot like this. Rav
and Shmuel could have shogeg like R' Yochanan and Reish Lakish since Rav
and Shmuel follow R' Akiva, but since R' Yochanan and Reish Lakish follow
Munbaz, how can they differ on what a shogeg itself is, if they follow
Munbaz that a shogeg can have yediah and thus TsN is not even shogeg?
My Gemara rav suggested R' Yochanan and Reish Lakish changed their
opinions later, but wouldn't the Gemara hint at this? And why doesn't
the Gemara ever tell me what Rav and Shmuel hold on shogeg?

[Email #2. -mi]

> The language in the teshuvos talks about people's
>  taivos, just like every aveyran. People have taivos to not explore the
>  truth, just as they have taivos in other directions.  The proof of the
>  pudding is that a Reconstructionist Sunday School class can, inter
>  alia, produce an RMM.  If he can do it, why can't the rest of them?
>  And if they do do teshuva, then, so long as we are talking about
>  category b), their past averos are considered obliterated.
>  Regards
>  Chana

I disagree. Even if you say that I'm like everyone else there, I'm one
out of many hundreds who are still R/C, and with statistics like that,
you have to say that I'm exceptional and cannot be a paradigm. I'm a
spanner in the works. If 50% did teshuva, and maybe even if 33% did,
I'd agree. But it's got to be more like 0.1% or 0.2%.

It's not a simple matter of teivot not to explore the truth. For these
people, there's no reason to consider Judaism in the first place. The
people I knew, they don't even know how ignorant they are, so they
don't even know there's more to find out; as far as they know, they
already know Judaism! I gave the story about studying Kabbalah when
you're a talmid chacham and have studied everything else, and they
honestly thought this included them. I have another friend finally
did teshuva when has 42 or 43; his mother told him (when he was maybe
15 or 20) that he was Jewish, but this fact was totally irrelevant to
him - he said it was like, "So what?", as if someone had told him some
spectacularly irrelevant fact about his ancestors (I'll make one up:
that his great-great-great-grandfather had been a Buddhist whaler who
also ran a photo-shack). This guy did teshuva because when he needed
a new network password, the first word that popped into his head was
"teshuva", so he looked "teshuva" up on Google to see what it meant.

I also gave the story of the C clergy (JTS I presume) who suddenly became
Orthodox after a year at Machon Meir - obviously Machon Meir taught
something that JTS didn't. And since their C shul is who sent them
to Machon Meir (don't ask me why!!), you cannot answer that they must
have already been on the way to O to have chosen Machon Meir - they were
run-of-the-mill C clergymen from what I know. As an aside, I am reminded
of Rabbi Drachman - from what I remember, his R shul in America sent him
to the R seminary in Germany, but he learned also at the Hildesheimer
yeshiva, and came back O, much to the consternation of his R sponsors.

In any case, I'm not a normal R/C student in terms of upbringing (even
if I were, I'm such an anomaly in the statistics that I shouldn't count;
but the fact is, I'm NOT normal in terms of my upbringing, as I will
show) - my mother didn't raise me to me halachically observant, but the
hashkafot she gave me on the meaning of life and being a Jew, etc., from
my earliest years, were very RSRH-ian (when a rav of mine told me to study
his chumash, I was blown away at how familiar everything he said was).

--


class!) Similarly, the Zionism she raised me on was inexplicably very
Rav Kook/Rav Kahane/Moshe Feiglin-ish (she's thus gotten into arguments
with the leftist/politically-corect congregants at her Reconstructionist
shul) - when I was about 13 or 14, some three to four years before I
became observant, I decided to make aliyah because "G-d gave us the land,
and He's letting us back, so...".

--


Telushkin) for some reason and decided to wear tzitzit, for some
reason. It was quite a many months before I really understood what I
was doing, which is why I actually kept going to the Reconstructionist
school for another year, and got into these arguments with people there
(the Kabbalah story above; at that very moment I gave an impromptu
discourse to the class on the extent of Jewish knowledge to be had).

[Email #3. -mi]

>  By the way, it seems to me that this is consistent with the section R' Michael Makovi
> quoted from Rav Aryeh Kaplan:

>> However, a person who has been brought up in a
>> nonreligious environment where he never had the
>> opportunity to learn about Judaism, is like a
>> child who was abducted by gentiles, and is not
>> considered to be doing wrong purposely.

>  My experience has been that Rav Kaplan was VERY precise in his wording, especially in
> this work, his "Handbook of Jewish Thought". Please note the last word in that sentence:
> "purposely". Now read it without that word, and it has an entirely different meaning.

>  If Rav Kaplan had left out the word "purposely", then he would have meant what RMM
> claims he meant. But he did not leave it out. He deliberately included it, and with its
> inclusion, he seems to be very consistent with what RDE wrote: Guilty on a shogeg level,
> but guilty nevertheless.

>  Akiva Miller

As I say to R' Chana, I never meant to decide between shogeg and
oness; I was deliberately conflating the two so as to contrast it with
meizid. AFAIK, there is not much of a nakfa mina, except for korban.

But this is fascinating with R' Kaplan's words, and I thank you for it
it - I'll have to read everything else he says similarly closely. I am
reminded of someone who said that many Israelis envy the Americans
when it comes to reading the Yad - the lashon is so simple, that the
Israelis miss the peculiarities (because they can read it so quickly
and easily), whereas the Americans have to go slower and they notice
the subtleties.

[EMail #4. -mi]

> R' Michael Makovi asserts:
>>But in today's non-religious Jew, it is absolutely positively known
>>that they know that Orthodox Jews don't eat pork or drive cars on
>>Shabbat. They also know that Orthodox women don't dress provocatively.

>  Lo Ro'isi Aino Ra'ayo - Because you haven't seen it doesn't prove anything.

>  I can tell you from first hand experience in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and
>  Petach Tikva that your statements are incorrect.

>  It's sad, but true. You simply cannot believe the ignorance of those
>  removed from Yiddishkeit.

>  - Danny

Okay, how about, MANY (even if not all) nonobservant know these
things, but Chazon Ish et. al. nevertheless characterized the majority
of nonobservant as TsN despite many (but not all) having this
knowledge. Surely you'll concede that many Tel-Avivians know pork is
treif - in fact, surely the vast majority know that pork is treif, for
even my gentile friends in America knew that! Will we say that
nonobservant Jews are more ignorant than gentiles? Surely they know
the exact same amount as gentiles if not more, given that you cannot
be more assimilated than the ones into whom you have assimilated!

Mikha'el Makovi



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Message: 2
From: "Michael Makovi" <mikewinddale@gmail.com>
Date: Mon, 31 Mar 2008 14:22:13 +0300
Subject:
[Avodah] Shabbat erev pesach


I'm sure we all have our sources on how to run this Shabbat Erev
Pesach. But my rabbi today gave a shiur in which he gave some novel
points I haven't seen elsewhere (perhaps they're in a modern halachic
sefer I haven't seen).

When it comes to eating lehem on Shabbat, we've of course got a
problem. You can eat in a different corner of the room and/or have an
unset table while you eat (and when you finish the bread, you wrap up the
plastic table covering and bring out the kosher l'pesach dishes and food),
but still, the idea of having chametz on Erev Pesach is discomfiting,
and plus you have to rush in your morning seuda to finish the chametz
on time. And if anyone has a five-year old who will spread the chametz
everywhere....!!!!

What my rabbi said to do is, eat matzah ashira or deep-fried / boiled
(in soup) matzah. It's not fit for the seder night so there's no problem
with having relations with your wife on the day before the wedding
in your father-in-law's house, and it's still halachically lehem for
Shabbat. And since it's not chametz, you can have a chametz-free house,
totally 100% no chametz.

Of course, gebrokts can't eat the boiled matzah, but ashira and fried
ought to be fine.

He even said that on leil shabbat, you can eat mamash normal ordinary
matzah. The minhag is to refrain from Rosh Chodesh, but the halacha
is merely from the morning of erev pesach. So on leil Shabbat you
can eat ordinary matzah if need be, and then for the day meal you eat
ashira/fried/boiled.

And this way, you can have lehem for shalushudous (shalosh seudot/seudat
shlishit).

There's a bit of a problem with all this for Sefaradim, because for them,
matzah is still mezonot. But if they eat enough matzah with a meal,
the matzah will become ha-motzi.

[Email #2. -mi]

Oh, but he added that on Shabbat day, not only can you not have ordinary
matzah, but also no baked matza-meal products. But ashira/boiled/fried
matzah is still okay.

Anyone know of any sources that speak about any of this pilpul b'ochel?

Mikha'el Makovi




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Message: 3
From: "Shoshana L. Boublil" <toramada@bezeqint.net>
Date: Tue, 1 Apr 2008 09:40:22 +0300
Subject:
Re: [Avodah] RAYK and the end of chol


> From: Micha Berger <micha@aishdas.org>
> Subject: Re: [Avodah] RAYK and the end of chol

> On Thu, Mar 27, 2008 at 10:59:34AM IST, Rt Shoshana L. Boublil wrote:
> :> But the whole zerichas hashemesh model of geulah didn't stand up that 
> well
> :> to subsequent events. He wrote before WWII, after all.
>
> : I'm sorry, but there is a basic misunderstanding of the model.  The 
> model is
> : "Ayelet HaShachar" that is - at first it comes and goes.  In real life 
> there
> : are ups and downs. There are moments of great steps toward Ge'ulah, and
> : there are moments of great falls away from Ge'ulah, into darkness.
>
> Do you have sources from before Oslo that suggest such a thing?

I've never learned it differently, starting with the book "Ayelet HaShachar" 
by Rav Shachor (IIRC) and then later Orot and other books.  I'll try to get 
sources, but when I ran this past my husband he also said that the paradigm 
was Ayelet HaShachar  - that it comes and goes, like a jagged mountain road 
that goes up and down.  Every single lecture I've ever heard on this theme 
in Israel, going back to my teens had the same description - Aliyot and 
Yeridot.

> I think that Yamit and Oslo posed such trouble for the DL community
> specifically because it raised fundamental hashkafic issues. They defied
> R' Kook's (admittedly more RZYK's) excpetations of the ge'ulah.

They didn't have the problem you project - that is R' Kook's paradigm is 
where the community got it's strength, knowing that the road to Ge'ulah was 
not one way towards Ge'ula, but rather like "dawn light coming through the 
mountains, one moment you see it and another you don't" (to quote a 
lecturer).

It was discussed many times during the activities to settle Yehuda and 
Shomron in the 70s.

> : The claim that it is a step ladder going one way is one I've seen, but 
> not
> : in Rav Kook.
>
> Well, it's in Eim haBanim Semeichah, IIRC. But I'm pretty sure this is
> how RAYK's metaphor was understood until recently, when his followers
> were forced into seeing something they hadn't noticed before.

I'm sorry, but as someone who has been studying Rav Kook since her teens, I 
can't agree.  I've NEVER heard of Rav Kook's view as being one way towards 
Ge'ulah.

> :> RAYK thought that the world was in an accelerated path to the geulah.
>
> : Not at all.  What he saw was that the a change has come over the
> : world...
> : Can anyone honestly say, after seeing Israel export fruit and vegetables 
> to
> : the world, when comparing the situation here to what it was 120 years 
> ago -
> : when it was a land of swamps and desert, that something hasn't changed?
>
> (Tangent: Obviously, Agudists can. Anti-Zionists will agree something
> changed, but they will say it's the introduction of a nisayon. But the
> neutral non-Zionist can say that it's not a fundamental change.)

Not a fundamental change????? Next time a friend with that view comes to 
Israel, send them to Chavat Kinneret.  They'll see a picture of the Kinneret 
and the area.  It was DESERT!!! Empty of everything but some few plants left 
over by the bedouin goats who ate everything.  Now look at the place!

> I fail to see the gap implied by your "not at all" between my "accelerated
> path to the ge'ulah" and your "a change has come". I think you're saying
> that the change came and it's not a new "straighter" (to speak what little
> I know of RAYK-speak) path to the ge'ulah? Isn't that what "reeishis
> tzemichas ge'ulaseinu", declaring it "atchalta dege'ulasa", means?

An "accelerated path" implies that things are getting faster and faster - 
implying one direction.  That is NOT Rav Kook's view of G'eula.  The Nevi'im 
speak about 2 types of people at the time of Ge'ula - one type comes to 
Israel himself.  The other is brought by Hashem.  Rav Kook, following The 
Ga'on (who sent his students here) sees that a change has come over the 
world, and it is the beginning of G'eula.  Not "accelerated", just an 
opportunity.  Ge'ula can come in its own time, or b/c Zachu. There is 
definitely a side of HitAruta Diletata. So, he comes to Israel.  He doesn't 
believe that G'eula will come without Tza'rot.  The G'mara is full of 
problems concluding "Yeitei veLo YachMinei" - how can anyone reading this 
think that Ge'ula will be some straight path increasing in strength over 
time? It is obvious that it won't at all be easy, that there will be many 
troubles. That's part of the process. I have heard lectures that describe 
the increasing of both - as Ge'ulah becomes greater - the falls in between 
steps will also be greater.

> : Rav Kook's view of learning chol has nothing to do with Zionism.  So, 
> please
> : don't mix the issues.

I view Zionism as the political entity not the people who followed the 
Zionistic view and came to Israel.

> And no real chol in the secular Zionist. Hainu hakh.

As a starting place for learning Rav Kook, I highly recommend the 
introduction to his Siddur Olat Re'aya.

Shoshana L. Boublil





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Message: 4
From: "Michael Makovi" <mikewinddale@gmail.com>
Date: Tue, 1 Apr 2008 15:41:19 +0300
Subject:
Re: [Avodah] Tiqun Olam


>  If "tiqun olam" as an idiom is only used qabbalistically, then other
>  references to how one repairs the world, especially if they don't
>  particularly phrase it in terms of "repair", don't belong in a Wikipedia
>  (or any encyclopedia) article about "tiqun olam". Except perhaps as
>  contrast, not as a different variant of the idea.
>
>
> R' Micha Berger

Aleynu uses tikkun olam to mean when the world knows who G-d is and
everyone subjects himself to His rule. I see nothing Kabbalistic
there. So tikkun olam is not an idiom used exclusively for Kabbalistic
purposes.

Lest there be any doubt, Rav Hirsch there (cited in Artscroll Siddur)
says it means everyone will accept the 7 Noachide laws. So quite
simply, Rav Hirsch sees tikkun olam as meaning when the Jewish people
succeed in convincing the world of the truth of G-d and Torah (via our
educational example of doing mitzvot), and everyone behaves as he is
supposed to.

Now, Rav Hirsch's perush there never mentions tikkun olam. But since
Aleynu itself does, he doesn't need to. It is peshita.

Mikha'el Makovi



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Message: 5
From: "SBA" <sba@sba2.com>
Date: Tue, 1 Apr 2008 23:50:43 +1100
Subject:
Re: [Avodah] Skipping Korbanos


From: Micha Berger <>
, Joshua Meisner wrote:
: What's the connection between saying heicha kedusha and learning all
: day? I recall hearing that the basis of the practice is that chazaras
: ha-shatz is a din of a beis hak'nesses, not of a beis hamedrash (or
: wedding hall, etc.).

If true Toraso Umenaso can bow out of Shema, a deOraisa, or at least
minimize Shema, why not -- by parallel -- allow a kollelnik to get back to
seder faster with a heicher qedushah?
>>

Do you know of anyone who in the past 2000 years bowed out of Shema?

Secondly don't Chazal say "Zman Torah lechud uzman tefilla lechud"?

Thirdly, (maybe the Lakewooders can answer this),how many davveners of this
mini version of Mincha immediately sit down to learn. And how many simply go
home to eat, nap or do shopping?

I recall once when the local Lakewood Kollel had a Shabaton out of town with
one of the guset speakers being Rabbi C Keller from Chicago. Motzeh Shabbos
after Maariv I noticed that they didn't say "Veyen Lecho". 
I queried this with RK, who explained that it isn't said in (Litvish)
yeshivos for reasons of 'bitul Torah'.
I asked him to show me a single person in this room, who is now learning
Torah?  Teiku.

>>I recall my father saying besheim RYBS that heicher qedushah is only an
option when there is so little time before sheqiah that the sha"tz couldn't
possibly repeat shemoneh esrei before nightfall.
>>

Not RYBS's chiddush at all.
See KSA 69:6 and SA OC 124:2 the Rema and MB sk 6.
BTW, see the Be'er Hetev sk 4 about a different minhak 'HaSfardiim".) 

SBA





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Message: 6
From: Daniel Eidensohn <yadmoshe@012.net.il>
Date: Tue, 01 Apr 2008 18:29:27 +0300
Subject:
Re: [Avodah] R' Angel & Geirus Redux


R' Meir Shinnar wrote:
> The issue is that there is a fundamental difference between a potential
> convert who states up front that he rejects a mitzva - and a potential
> convert who makes no such declaration. The question is the extent
> to which a bet din is supposed to research a potential ger - and
> tfurthermore, what happens if a bet din did not research a ger - who
> ends up being non observant.
>
>
>   
I don't agree that the issue is simply the degree that one needs to 
investigate the nature of commitment to keep mitzvos.

Prof. Zohar and Prof. Sagi present two opposing models of conversion on 
page 213

1) Accepting Jewish identity causes one to have an obligation of mitzvos.
2) The acceptance of the obligation of mitzvos causes one to be Jewish.

According to the first perspective there  is no significance or 
necessity to accepting mitzvos - therefore the candidate for conversion 
needs only convince the beis din that he realy wants to be a member of 
the Jewish people. If he has no intention of keeping mitzvos - he has 
the same problem as  any Jew who doesn't want to keep mitzvos - but he 
is still a valid convert.

This is totally consistent with Rav Ben Tzion Uziel (Piskei Uziel # 65) 
[Prof. Finkelstein's translation page 263] "From all that has been said 
and spoken, the ruling is that it is permitted, and obligatory, to 
accept male and female proselytes, even though we know that they will 
not observe all the commandments, because they will eventually come to 
observe them. We are commanded to open such a door to them, and if they 
will not observe the commandments, they will bear the sin and we will be 
guiltless... And in this generation, the locking of the door before 
converts bears heavy responsibility and is extremely difficult, because 
it opens wide gates and impels men and women of Israel to abandon their 
faith and leave the Jewish community or be [totally] assimilated among 
the non-Jews. This falls under the teaching of our sages:'Always let the 
left hand thrust away, and the right draw near' (Sotah 47a). The 
Israelite who assimilates or is thrust away from Israel will become 
Israel's sworn enemy, as history attests in many instances and many 
generations. And even if we do not fear such an end for him himself, 
nonetheless, we certainly are obligated to draw their children near...I 
fear that if we totally reject them, by not receiving their parents for 
conversion, we will be called to judgment and it will be said of us: 
'you have not brought back the strayed, nor looked for the lost' (Ezek. 
34:4)"

Daniel Eidensohn




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Message: 7
From: Cantor Wolberg <cantorwolberg@cox.net>
Date: Tue, 1 Apr 2008 06:47:56 -0400
Subject:
[Avodah] Driving on Shabbos


Someone wrote that RSZA paskens that if a car stops you on Shabbos to  
ask directions
you should remind him (or her) that it's Shabbos and then give him  
directions to limit the
chillul Shabbos.

What about dan l'chaf z'chus?  Assume it's a goy.

ri
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Message: 8
From: "Michael Makovi" <mikewinddale@gmail.com>
Date: Tue, 1 Apr 2008 14:34:18 +0300
Subject:
[Avodah] Beit din shel Matah vs. Maalah


From [Areivim[ Sugihara, about righteous gentiles who have saved Jews

> > Nevertheless i have seen shitot that these people will burn in hell
> > because they worshipped AZ.  AZ is one of the 7 mitzvot of bnei noach
> > while saving Jews is not a mitzvah for them.  I dont agree but again
> > major figures have said this view
> > R' Eli Turkel

>  I don't see any way for a BD shel Mattah to avoid that view; but I've
>  never seen anybody claim that BD shel Maalah is restricted by the narrow
>  confines of halacha.  I thought the point of BD shel Maalah is that it
>  doesn't judge according to "ha'adam yir'eh la'enayim" (or even, like
>  Moshiach, by smell) but by completely different criteria.  Isn't that
>  why "ein ata yodea' matan s'charan shel mitzvot", or the punishment for
>  averot?
>  R' Zev Sero

Indeed - BD shel matah cannot decide that the thief is exempt because
he was poor and desperate or because he wasn't taught growing up that
thievery is wrong; so too BD shel matah cannot accept the purported
teshuva of a criminal. But shel maalah in all these cases can exempt.

In the third perek of Makkot, starting in the beginning of the Gemara,
13a bottom, there is a machloket whether a person can receive both (1)
lashes and (2) karet or death.

There are (of course) a few opinions:
- R' Yishmael says one getting lashed, can indeed get karet or death.
- R' Akiva says one getting lashed can get karet, but not death.
- R' Yitchak says that one getting lashed can get neither karet nor death.

Rabbi Akiva says (in a baraitha), "Hayavei keritot yeshno b'klal
malkut arba'im. She'im asu teshuva, beit din shel maalah mohalin
lahem. Hayavei mitot beit din eino b'klal malkut arba'im she'im asu
teshuva, ein beit din shel matah mohalin lahem."

A few things we see then: BD shel maalah can forgive karet if you do
teshuva. Also, since R' Akiva specifically says BD shel **matah* will
not forgive mita if you do teshuva, apparently shel maalah will
forgive if you do teshuva.

There is a makhloket about exactly what R' Akiva means, beginning at
the middle of 13b. But at the very bottom of 13b onto 14a, Ravina
concludes that R' Akiva means that if a person does teshuva, shel
maalah forgives the karet. As to an objection that was made that maybe
the person hasn't done teshuva, and so he'll be getting both karet and
lashes, which violates the rule of one-crime-one-punishment, Ravina
responds that karet is not definite because one can easily get out of
it via teshuva, and so the person is getting only one definite
punishment, viz. lashes. Only death and lashes are inevitable (because
shel matah cannot forgive), and therefore the one-crime-one-punishment
rule rules out getting both death and lashes.

My rabbi brought a teshuva, maybe from the Noda b'Yehuda (but I don't
know) that expanded on the idea that a beit din shel matah cannot
judge your intentions and thoughts but rather it judges only your
actions and punishes accordingly, while shel maalah judges everything
(such as extenuating circumstances, eg. poor hungry thief) and also
can accept your teshuva.

Mikha'el Makovi



Go to top.

Message: 9
From: "Michael Makovi" <mikewinddale@gmail.com>
Date: Tue, 1 Apr 2008 15:56:17 +0300
Subject:
Re: [Avodah] RAYK and the end of chol


>  I've never learned it differently, starting with the book "Ayelet HaShachar"
>  by Rav Shachor (IIRC) and then later Orot and other books.  I'll try to get
>  sources, but when I ran this past my husband he also said that the paradigm
>  was Ayelet HaShachar  - that it comes and goes, like a jagged mountain road
>  that goes up and down.  Every single lecture I've ever heard on this theme
>  in Israel, going back to my teens had the same description - Aliyot and
>  Yeridot.
>
> R' Boublil

Rabbi Moshe Kaplan at Machon Meir spoke of a deer running around the
mountains, disappearing behind one mountain, seemingly gone for good,
before suddenly appearing on the next mountain. I think he was basing
on a Midrash or something.

My understanding of Rav Kook has been that bli safek, today is leading
up to geula, as evidenced by the mass aliyah and flowering of the
land. BUT, there are snags and problems along the way. To use R'
Boublil's example, the road definitely IS getting from point A to
point B, but no way said how smooth that route would be.

> >  Rav Kook's view of learning chol has nothing to do with Zionism.  So, please
> >  don't mix the issues.
> >
> > R' Boublil

> On this, I strongly disagree. Both depend heavily on RAYK's ability to
> see the qodesh in everything. The Or Ein Sof that is even in the chol
> (which is merely hidden qedushah, a/k/a a long curvy path).
>
> R' Micha Berger

Rav Kook's general mystical and idealistic hashkafa led separately to
his view of chol, his view of Zionism, and his other views. His
learning chol is not connected to or dependent on, his Zionism;
rather, both his chol and his Zionism are connected to a common
source.

Rav Kook's mysticism and idealism affected all his hashkafot and
penetrated them all; it'd be a general characteristic of his.

Rav Kook wrote on a LOT; in Machon Meir, just as we had a Zionism
class that never mentioned Rav Kook (at all), we had a Rav Kook class
that never mentioned Zionism (at all). We learned at his Haggadah, his
Ein Ayah (on Ein Yaakov), and other works, seeing that his hashkafa
covered far more than just Zionism.

> > Without Torah, all their Zionism had no basis - a Jew removed from
> > Torah is like a flower from water and soil, and while it can live for
> > a while, and perhaps even appear to thrive, it will eventually die.
> > Zionism without Torah has a very fleeting lifespan, before people
> > start crying that the Arabs have equal rights and we have no right to
> > the land and that we all ought to return to Europe since we want to be
> > just like them anyway, etc.
> >
> > Mikha'el Makovi

> Is this your extrapolation? As I have said before, my exposure to RAYK's
> thought slight.

It is what Rabbi Moshe Kaplan at Machon Meir said about Rav Kook,
except put (by me) into the mashal of Rabbi Isidore Epstein in Faith
of Judaism about morality without G-d (I like to conflate hashkafot).
But I am absolutely sure that the tamtzit of what I said is what Rabbi
Kaplan said - viz., Zionism without Torah cannot survive for long. Rav
Kook said (explicitly) that what resurrected our nation today (secular
Zionism) could have killed the healthy 1st/2nd Temple state. And Rav
Kook indeed did say that eventually, post-Zionism would result from
the secularism, and the seculars would cease to be Zionistic, etc.

I'll have to find a source, however. The problem is, Rabbi Kaplan is
very difficult to get a hold of, and so I might not be able to ask him
for some time.

> > However, I myself will say that the Holocaust has nothing to do
> > anything here: Rav Kook is referring to the loss and regain of
> > idealism and Torah by the Jewish people, and the Holocaust is an
> > external event not caused by the Jews. Any objection has to be that
> > the Jews are not returning to Torah as Rav Kook thought they would,
> > not that the Nazis didn't behave according to what Rav Kook said the
> > Jews would do.
> >
> > Mikha'el Makovi

> You mean, like when intermarriage outpaces kiruv by 40:1, even factoring
> in Israel?
> R' Micha

Nu? So the return to religiosity is taking longer than expected.
Surely you don't doubt that we'll all do teshuva eventually! Either
you have to agree with Rav Kook that eventually teshuva etc. will come
to the current state, or you have to say that this current state must
perforce collapse and a new one rise up in its place. But then I'd
ask, why go through all the trouble of having this state fall,
everyone do teshuva in chutz la'aretz, and then build a new state? Why
not just have everyone do teshuva in the current state and save all
the trouble? (Obviously, what will happen will happen. My point is
that the current state collapsing, teshuva in chutz, and a new state
rising up isn't any simpler or more elegant or more conceivable
hashkafically or practically, than everyone doing teshuva in the
current state.)

Mikha'el Makovi


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