Volume 66 Number 73
Produced: Sun, 05 May 24 10:07:10 -0400
Subjects Discussed In This Issue:
Chabad
[Joel Rich]
Kol Nidrei (2)
[Micha Berger Yisrael Medad]
Mixed-gender zimun
[Orrin Tilevitz]
No patronymic on the grave of the Nephesh haChaim
[David Ziants]
Working chareidim
[Joel Rich]
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From: Joel Rich <joelirarich@...>
Date: Tue, Apr 2,2024 at 11:17 PM
Subject: Chabad
>From a Wall Street Journal piece:
> Was the current structure of Chabad intentional?
> Part of Schneerson's brilliance was to ensure that no one would succeed him as
> Chabad's Rebbe, with the result of distributing responsibility for his
> formidable legacy as far and wide as possible. In doing so, he reminded his
> many admirers that true spiritual genius is vanishingly rare, and that
> religious communities, which are bound by belief and sacred obligation,
> can't count on individual greatness alone to sustain them.
Thoughts?
Bsorot Tovot
Joel Rich
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From: Micha Berger <micha@...>
Date: Thu, Mar 14,2024 at 05:17 PM
Subject: Kol Nidrei
Joel Rich wrote (MJ 66#72):
> I wonder how many practices that seem at odds with what the pure would demand
> are due to amcha insisting on them. A delicate dance between the people and
> the gedolim?
The answer would also depend on the gadol. A gadol who doesn't place much weight
in mimeticism, eg the Gra, would find many more examples. In contrast to the
AhS, whose chiddushim are nearly always, if not always, finding ways to justify
a community's accepted practice in the meqoros. Even if it takes a diyuq or new
peshat in a maqor no one had made in print previously.
Tir'u baTov!
Micha
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From: Yisrael Medad <yisrael.medad@...>
Date: Sun, Mar 31,2024 at 11:17 AM
Subject: Kol Nidrei
Joel Rich wrote (MJ 66#72):
> A recent article in Hakirah discussed Kol Nidrei and the initial overwhelming
> rabbibic opposition to it being said. While no one knows for sure, I remember
> learning that it was almost demanded by amcha because of their having made
> coerced commitments to other religions which they wanted to disavow. Anyone
> have a source of any kind?
He might try these resources:
https://www.halakhah.com/pragmatic-kol-nidre.pdf
Stuart Weinberg Gerson, Kol Nidrei: Its Origin, Development and Significance
(New York, 1977)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/3773286 beginning p. 122
and most relevant to his point here:
https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/23601129.pdf p. 186
--
Yisrael Medad
Shiloh
Israel
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From: Orrin Tilevitz <tilevitzo@...>
Date: Wed, Apr 17,2024 at 10:17 AM
Subject: Mixed-gender zimun
I have not seen this subject discussed on this list and, to me in the
comparative backwater in which I live, it is something new. Following are links
to a 2011 article and a 2020 shiur, discussing, and, based on minority opinions
in Rishonim and Poskim and the position of women in modern society as compared
to medieval times, to my surprise not rejecting the possibility of a
mixed-gender zimun, e.g., 2 men and one women, particularly within a nuclear
family but not limited to that situation.
https://etzion.org.il/en/halakha/studies-halakha/women-and-mitzvot/women-and-zimmun-ii
https://library.yctorah.org/files/2016/07/Gershon-et-al-Zimmun-10-5.pdf
The reasoning in these materials strikes me as reminiscent of the Conservative
responsum permitting women to be counted towards a minyan, which relies on
opinion of Rabeinu Simcha, quoted in Mordechai Berachot 173 (the same Rabbeinu
Simcha appears in these materials) and discussion some years ago about giving
women aliyot, a position not, AFIK, adopted by mainstream Orthodox shuls. By
contrast, these materials emanate from Yeshivat Har Etzion, and the names in
these materials, including R. Ya'akov Medan and R. Ezra Bick, do not remotely
suggest "open Orthodox". I am curious what list members think.
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From: David Ziants <dziants@...>
Date: Tue, Apr 2,2024 at 01:17 PM
Subject: No patronymic on the grave of the Nephesh haChaim
Can anyone explain why there is no patronymic on the grave of the Nephesh
haChayim - Rabbainu Chayim mi'Velozin, when it is (almost) a universal custom
that we do inscribe the father's name (and sephardim also inscribe the mothers')?
https://he.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D7%97%D7%99%D7%99%D7%9D_%D7%9E%D7%95%D7%95%D7%9C%D7%95%D7%96'%D7%99%D7%9F
David Ziants
<dziants@...>
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From: Joel Rich <joelirarich@...>
Date: Tue, Apr 2,2024 at 11:17 PM
Subject: Working chareidim
Cross currents post:
> Rav Hirsch spoke via video to a gathering of working charedim in Yerushalayim.
> He told them that they were part of the charedi world, and should continue to
> see themselves as proud charedim, rather than outsiders.
So given the decades of the message, "that working for a living is incompatible
with the appellation charedi", what is the change management plan? At the
granular level who will tell the yeshiva guys (and the community) that kollel is
not for them but not to feel a failure? This is an important statement but
unless there is follow up it is unlikely to change the vision of the community.
Also I think you need more than one gadol to turn an ocean liner around.
Thoughts?
Bsorot Tovot
Joel Rich
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End of Volume 66 Issue 73
