Long Yisroel's Journey Into Levite

Long Yisroel’s Journey Into Levite

My twenty-year quest to discover the truth of our heritage came to a successful conclusion this summer, a conclusion marked by tragedy to a journey plagued with doubt.

Sufficiently melodramatic? In short, my father, my brother and I recently became Leviim, members of the tribe of Levi.

The Levites (Leviim) served as janitors, choristers, security guards and musicians in the once and future Holy Temple. All modern Jews are descended from the ancient Kingdom of Judea (the Kingdom of Israel having been exiled to Assyria in 726 BCE); thus, almost all contemporary Jews are descended from the tribes of Judah, Manasseh, Benjamin or Levi. Very few non-Levites know whether they descend from Judah, Benjamin or Manasseh, since one’s mitzvah-obligations are the same either way. Levites, and that subset of Levi who are Kohanim, priests, descendents of Aaron, since they each have different customary or legal obligations and privileges, have done better in maintaining their family tribal identity. But without other information, all Jews are considered Yisroel – descended from some other tribe than Levi.

Why is this an issue for us?

22 years ago, in 1985, my father’s parents died, a few months apart. Grandma Beckerman was buried in the wintertime, so the gravestones in the family plot were covered with snow (I remember it being a snowy week). Grandpa Beckerman passed away in the spring, so I got a chance to look at the gravestones, and … what? Uncle Willie’s gravestone says “Zev ben Yitzchak Halevi”. Halevi? He thought he was a Levi? I couldn’t ask my grandparents, since there they were in the ground. I called up Willie’s son Phil, who told me that “Dad always maintained we were Leviim, so I put it on the stone.” On a recent visit, I saw that Phil was gone too, and also had Halevi on his stone.

I started asking around. I asked a couple of cousins at the cemetery about it. One thought his grandmother had mentioned it, others didn’t think so. Later I called my father’s first cousin Sidney Beckerman, and asked him. He thought yes, but later asked his sister, who said no.

At the time, I brought this information to R’ Saul Berman, then at Lincoln Square Synagogue, my home shul. He said that there wasn’t enough data to change, I should stick with my chazaka (presumption) of being a Yisroel, and if more information came to light later, we could look into it again.

And there it sat for 22 years. I would go around telling people I was a “safek Levi”, doubtful-status Levi. Which of course means nothing halachically, but it was good for a laugh. (as I said – plagued with doubt). Since my parents had not given me a Pidyon haBen ceremony, redeeming a firstborn son from the priesthood, I wondered if I should have such a ceremony, since I might be a Levi and not need one. At the time, they had belonged to a Reconstructionist synagogue, which didn’t hold with such old-fashioned claptrap as redemption of the firstborn. Also, as a first-born, since the first-borns had originally been intended to be the Temple servitors (we lost that status when firstborns participated in the sin of the Golden Calf, while the Tribe of Levi stayed away from it), I had washed the Kohanim’s hands about three or four times. Why? If there are no Leviim in synagogue on a day when the priests bless the congregation, the firstborns go to wash the priests’ hands.

During this period, I had an officemate who was, among other adjectives (Sefardi, BT, Chabad, diabetic), a Levi. I had told him about my uncertainty, and he figured that I was probably a Levi, based on

a) our family is musical (Dad was a professional trumpeter, he & I both are amateur chazanim, Dad's whole family is musical - classical on his mother's side [the Philharmonic Fishbergs], klezmer on his father's side);

b) we all like to help out around the shul, cleaning up especially;

c) a migo argument: if someone wanted to pretend to have an ancestry undeserved, he would have gone all the way to Kohen - why bother to pretend just to Levi?

* * *

Last Pesach, my father’s cousin Sidney Beckerman died. He had played at my wedding, he was an old-time klezmer clarinetist, who had learned from his father Shloimke Beckerman, one of the three great klezmer clarinetists in the interwar United States (the other two being Dave Tarras and Naftule Brandwein). Sidney hadn’t been all that religious, and we weren’t that close, so we didn’t hear about it until a couple of weeks later, when someone sent us an obituary. I found a notice of a memorial service set up by his klezmer buddies (colleague Pete Sokolow, student Margot Leverett), and Dad and I went. Dad shared stories of playing with the klezmer greats in his childhood (he had been a bit of a prodigy), and of the family.

There we met Sidney’s son Dr. Bruce, and his sons, who are in college and grad school. After the program was over, I asked the sons, “This may seem like a strange question, but are you Leviim?” The answer: “Yeah, so?” Which I regarded as rather “mesiach lefi tumo” sort of answer – matter-of-fact, not “the answer you’re looking for.”. So I told them about the whole thing, the gravestones, my asking their grandfather Sidney, etc. Bruce’s response: “Dad didn’t know his own Hebrew name”. They belong to a UTJ synagogue in Manalapan, NJ, so they’re clearly at least somewhat religious. Bruce would have known his own grandfather Shloimke, who died in 1973 or so, and presumably knew from him.

Why didn’t Dad know about any of this? He grew up totally non-religious. My grandfather apparently cut off his payess at his bar-mitzvah (1903). Dad never went to shul with his parents, growing up. His grandfather took him to an interview with a rabbi, where he demonstrated he could read a little Hebrew – this was his bar-mitzvah (he learned to lein at age 69). And when Grandma & Grandpa came up from Florida for my bar-mitzvah, he didn’t mention anything. He may have forgotten himself, although he did remember some interesting stuff. One day we were standing around in the pool at their condo colony in Florida (1979, summer), and Grandpa asked what I’d been learning in school. Well, we had started Talmud a year before, so I told him we had done the 2^nd and 3^rd chapters of Bava Metzia. He starts reciting the whole first page of the 2^nd chapter by heart, something he hadn’t looked at or cared about in probably 75 years. After he died, we found his tallis in the house, presumably from their marriage in1912 (they were married 73 years). I used that tallis as the chuppah at my wedding, so we had something of my grandparents present.

So I brought all this evidence to R’ Moshe Sokol, our local Orthodox rabbi, including R’ Berman’s earlier demurral, the ambivalent evidence, etc. He said he’d think about it. He tried passing it up the line, but his higher resources didn’t bother to respond. Finally, at the end of the summer, he said that it was sufficient to decide that we really were Leviim (obviously had always been, even if not knowing, since it’s descent-related). For Kohen (priest) status, there would have to be more definitive evidence, since a Kohen deals in money matters, redeeming firstborn sons, and acts as a divine channel in blessing the congregation – a mistake there would have been much more serious.

Meanwhile, Mom and Dad had brought all this stuff to R’ Saul Robinson, the current rabbi at Lincoln Square (they had buttonholed him on Shavuos). He too thought it convincing, and arranged for Dad to be called to the Torah as a Levi a few weeks later. Dad has since had more Levi aliyot, and will wash his first priestly hands on Shemini Atzeret (they’ll be away without a minyan the first two days of Sukkot).

This week, then, Rosh Hashanah, I washed my first hands as a Levi, and had my first aliyah to the Torah as a Levi. Stu Feldhamer, the president and my study partner, announced this to the congregation as “Now you see what can happen if you donate a lot of money to the shul. (wait for laughter to die down) But seriously, he just found out he was a Levi.”

So all my waffling was vindicated. Not having a pidyon haben, washing hands as a firstborn all foreshadowed the eventual discovery of the Truth – that my father’s family is Levitical.

For reference, here is the relevant subset of my family tree. Uncle Willie was my grandmother’s brother, Uncle Shloimke was my grandfather’s brother, but Grandma’s and Grandpa’s fathers were brothers, so whatever held for the boys in my grandmother’s family, also held for my descent through my grandfather.

1 Solomon BECKERMAN b: WFT Est. 1797-1826 d: WFT Est. 1851-1911
__2 Isaac Beckerman FISHBERG b: 1848 d: 1949._HAS HARP ON GRAVE
___+_MASSIA b: BET. 1858 - 1859 d: 1907
____3 Rebecca FISHBERG b: 1 JAN 1892 d: 29 JAN 1985
_____+ Harry BECKERMAN b: 14 JAN 1890 d: 11 MAY 1985
_____(see below for their descendents, to me)
____3 William FISHBERG b: 15 DEC 1890 d: MAR 1973_HAS HALEVI ON GRAVE
_____+ Eva COHEN b: 21 MAR 1902 d: 8 DEC 1976
______4 Philip FISHER_ HAS HALEVI ON GRAVE
_______+ Living RUDES
__2 Boruch BECKERMAN b: WFT Est. 1827-1869 d WFT Est. 1875-1950
___+ Sarah
____3 Samuel (Shlomke) BECKERMAN b: 1883 d: 1974
______4 Sidney BECKERMAN b: 1919, d: April 2007
_______+ May ?? (still alive)
________5 Bruce Beckerman (cardiologist), b. c. 1950-1955
_________+ ??
__________6 William (grad school, Penn), b. 1985
__________6 Mark (college, NYU), b. 1987
____3 Harry BECKERMAN b: Jan 12, 1889 or 1890 d. May, 1985
_____+ Rebecca FISHBERG b: 1 JAN 1892 d: 29 JAN 1985
______4 Sydney BAKER
_______+ Wendy WISAN
________5 Jonathan BAKER
_________+ Debra KORPUS

My ancestry in male line
My newfound cousins’ ancestry in male line

The Symbol, Not the Act

Simana, la milsa

Gil Student brings a piece from R' Arnie Lustiger's new Machzor Mesoras HaRav for Rosh Hashanah, on the significance of the symbolic foods. The Gemara in Horayos 12a talks about anointing a king at a spring as a portent that his reign should continue as the spring pours out water. This example serves as the basis for the symbolic foods eaten at the seder.

This, to me, sounds like sympathetic magic - do an act in small, so that the Power[s] That Be will yield a similar blessing in large. That does seem to be the basis on which many eat the symbolic foods - that the act of eating the food be linked, through its name in a Yehi Ratzon prayer, to absorbing a blessing from Above with a similar-sounding name. Sympathetic magic, however, is largely an idolatrous practice. We are a people of Words - the Book, the Tannaim, the Amoraim, etc., so our non-causal link is through punning words. But the motive and spirit still seem the same.

The Rav (YB Soloveitchik zt"l) remaps the Gemara into a purely symbolic act. Eating the symbols reminds us of the Divine Judgment by the King of the Universe that takes place on Rosh Hashanah. It is meant to inspire thoughts in us, rather than influences from Above. This mapping seems a bit difficult to me:

1) it takes the king part of the Gemara, rather than the symbolism part, as being the determining factor - if the symbol reminds us of the King of Kings of Kings, it's useful.

2) it removes the specific symbolism of the food pun, which seems an integral part of the ritual. One item should suffice for this (as we personally do - only apple and honey).

I found some explanations in a similar remapping vein, in the new Machzor Avodas Hashem for Rosh Hashanah, an incredible snippet collection on all aspects of the chag. Apparently others among our Acharonim were also uncomfortable with the semi-magical aspect of this ritual, even those who normally wrote in a kabbalistic vein.

The Shelah haKodesh tells us (in Mas. Rosh Hashanah, ch. Ner Mitzvah, sec. 22) that the symbolism isn't in the eating of the food, but in its power to arouse associations in ourselves towards the idea with which it is associated. It is to arouse us to teshuvah in that area, so that we pray for improvement in that area. So it is not an act of sympathetic magic meant to influence the One Above, but an act of pure symbolism meant to arouse us to teshuvah in a variety of areas. This preserves the variety of the foods, but avoids the magickal aspect.

So what about the Yehi Ratzon? Generally, they seem to ask for Divine aid in that which we ourselves do. E.g., the Yehi Ratzon for the sick in the Amidah - we have to make our efforts to heal the sick, but God should help the healing to work. So too here, we're not asking God to do the work of giving us the pun-things, but to help us to succeed in them as we engage in our own hishtadlus. After all, the Torah is the expression of God's Will (Ratzon) in the world. By following Torah we make ourselves into instruments of God's Will. So by asking "Yehi ratzon", may it be Thy Will, we ask that our efforts fit His Will.

This approach agrees with R' SR Hirsch's ideas about symbolism - the symbol is not efficacious in itself, but in how the ideas of the Originator, inform our thinking and actions with those ideas. The originator and the target of the symbol are equally important.

May it be Thy Will that we work on ourselves this and every year, to better fulfill Thy Will.

May all of us be written and sealed for a good and sweet 5768.

Peshat and Derash

There’s an argument on the relative value of Peshat and Derash rolling in a comment thread on the Seforim blog. One commenter has taken a position that

a) Drush is the by far more important, and probably the only correct, form of biblical interpretation.

b) Certain unnamed “Modern Orthodox” scholars, by engaging in “pshat” style interpretation, are, by doing so, demonstrating their favor of the Documentary Hypothesis. By implication, they oppose Orthodox Judaism, which takes the accurate transmission of the Biblical text from Sinai as an underlying truth of its system.

I don't think any of the Orthodox rabbis and other personae (Dr. Nechama Leibowitz, and even her brother, Dr. Isaiah Leibowitz) reject the drashot that engender/support Torah sheb'al Peh (Oral Torah). In fact, as Orthodox personae, by definition they can't reject such interpretive models, because how else do Chazal (our Sages of blessed memory) link the Torah text to the halacha given at Sinai, and the halacha practiced today?

Chazal's interpretive mode was drush (exegesis following hermeneutical rules) - their interpretive works are the Midrashim, even down to the Zohar, which is ultimately a halachic midrash, even if a late one in final redaction - a midrashic-style work with the authority of a Rishon. (high-medieval sage)

But halacha as engendered by drush from pesukim (verses) does not happen any more. The authorized drashot are already authorized, there really can't be any more. So what else is there left open to modern exegetes, but pshat? Maybe one can come up with drashot, which support the predetermined conclusions of Chazal, but they will generally be rejected. Pshat, however, is almost by definition not legally binding, while still bringing out subtleties in the God-given text.

One can always make diyukim (points based on grammatical or morphological subtleties) on mishnayot or gemaras, and find more details of halacha that way, but doing so on verses is not kosher any more, unless it's just in support of existing halachic or ethical values. And that's where contemporary pshat (literal/literary) interpretation comes in.

Not everyone inclines to Talmud, but may have a head that likes to engage in Torah interpretation. For instance, my cousin Dr. Ed Greenstein, wanted to devote his life to Torah, but was not particularly interested in Talmud, so he got a PhD in Bible.

The Rishonim led the way by beginning the enterprise of pshat-style interpretation, finding the literary level of the Torah text as opposed to the legal level. Both should ideally lead to an ethical lesson. Even the so-called "fault-finding school" looks to the Avos for lessons in life; even if they find apparent faults in the lives of the Avos, the way they or we overcame them, gives us chizuk to overcome our own faults, particularly at this time of year.

In the time of the Rishonim, there was still some reliable Oral Torah tradition from Sinai, so drush was still a useful mode of interpretation for creating halachic lessons. Today, we don't really have anything authoritatively from Sinai that has not yet been written down, so what is left for us, but to approach the text on its own terms, and see what lessons it has to bring itself?

Not every commentator, even in history, had equal strengths in Talmud and Bible. So too today. Don't write off the entire enterprise of contemporary Biblical interpretation because you choose to dismiss "ein mikra yotzei miydei peshuto". It still holds (except where the literal level is totally unbelievable; see Meiri in Avos on "megaleh panim shelo kehalacha"); it may not be the level of interpretation that generates halachoth - that's the interpretation of the 13 Middoth, the Midrashim, the Talmud, but it is still a valid, and valued, approach to the text.

You Are Called Man

Discussion rages on Gil's blogs about R' Aharon Feldman's shiur where he rationalizes the Torah's statement that "You [Israel, to the exclusion of non-Jews] are called Man [Adam]":

The message of the Gemara is not that Jews are inherently different from Gentiles. Rather, it is that Jews have the Torah which enables them to more easily fulfill their purpose. Jews, who have received the Torah, have the keys to fulfilling their purpose in life. Therefore they are called "Man". Gentiles, who do not have this tool, have greater difficulty in accepting God's yoke and therefore are not necessarily called "Man".

which commenters on the Reshimu site dismiss as "tired apologetics". I find it lacking in that Gentiles, who may not have the Torah, also do not have as many mitzvot. Is the Torah a universal code, that all Homo sapiens are called upon to fulfill? And non-Jews, not observing Torah, are not thereby living up to their potential?

I thought non-Jews are only obligated in Seven (or 66, according to R' Aharon Lichtenstein, cousin to the one in Israel) Mitzvot. So it's easier, if anything, for them to live up to their potential. Which means R' Feldman's rationale doesn't work, and we're thrust back on this peculiar statement in the Torah.

There are various ways to perceive non-Jews, I think. One is to embrace the racism, as does the first chapter of Tanya, based on the Eitz Chaim of the Arizal (16th century):

מה שאין כן נפשות אומות העולם הן משאר קליפות טמאות שאין בהן טוב כלל

The souls of the nations of the world, however, emanate from the other, unclean kelipot which contain no good whatever,

כמו שכתוב בע׳ חיים שער מ״ט פרק ג׳: וכל טיבו דעבדין האומות לגרמייהו עבדין

as is written in Etz Chayim, Portal 40, ch. 3, that all the good that the nations do, is done out of selfish motives.

[Since their nefesh emanates from kelipot which contain no good, it follows that any good done by them is for selfish motives.]

Which I'm sure made the Alter Rebbe's audience in 18th-century Belarus feel better about being downtrodden by animalistic non-Jews. But why make socioeconomic circumstance into existential claim?

Or, we can take Chazal in the Mishnah in Pirkei Avot:

3:18. Rabbi Akiva used to say: Beloved is the man that he was created in the image of G-d; an extra love is made known to him that he was created in G-d's image, as it says (Genesis 9:6) "for in His own image G-d made humankind". Beloved are the Jews that they are called sons to G-d; an extra love is made known to them that they are called sons to G-d, as it says (Deuteronomy 14:1) "You are children of the Lord your G-d." Beloved are the Jews that there has been given to them the precious instrument; an extra love is made known to them that they were given the precious instrument of the world's creation, as it says (Proverbs 4:2) "For I give you good precepts; do not forsake my teaching."

• So Man is created in God's image. Man is himself beloved because God let him know this.

• Israel is called sons of God; they are beloved because God let them know this.
• Jews were given the Torah; they are beloved because God let them know that this was the instrument of the world's creation.

Somehow this manages to portray all mankind as human, and Jews as extra beloved because of God's relationship with them. The non-Jews are not portrayed as sub-human, but the Jews are portrayed as receivers of extra love, because they are given extra work to do.

Still, that leaves us with the problematic statement in the Gemara in Yevamos 114b, "You are called Man [Adam], and the non-Jews are not called Man." This seems patently untrue, since the Torah often uses Adam for all of humankind, and the Mishnah in Avos above clearly uses it to refer to all humanity, not just Jews.

However, that mishnah gives us a somewhat gentler understanding of the statement than R' Feldman's, which doesn't fall afoul of the 7 Laws of the Sons of Noah. The key can be found in the following Zohar (II, 86a), tr. R' Moshe Miller:

Rabbi Shimon taught: How privileged Israel is that the Holy One calls them "adam" ["man"], as is written, "You are my flock, the flock that I pasture; you are man (in Hebrew, "adam")" (Ez. 34:31); "When a man ("adam") will sacrifice..." (Lev. 1:2). Why does the verse refer to them as "adam"? Since it is written, "And you who cleave to the Lord your G-d..." (Deut. 4:4).

R' Miller comments: The word "adam" is a derivative of the word "domeh", meaning "like" or "similar to." (See Radak, Shorashim s.v. Adam.) Because the Jewish People cleave to G-d they are in His likeness, as in the verse, "We shall make man in Our image in Our likeness" (Gen. 1:26). Note that the word for likeness is "kidmuteinu" - also a derivative of "domeh".

Israel is extra beloved because it has the Torah and knows it, and knows the Torah's place as the blueprint of Creation. Since the Torah is the expression of God's will in and for the world, we who follow the Torah are those who make ourselves most like God. Since Adam was created in the image of God (kidmuteinu), in following the Torah, Jews make themselves most like Adam.

So it's not an inherent higher status (per the Tanya) which makes the others lesser, but an act of will and love. Avraham so loved the Lord that the Lord chose him and obligated his descendents to keep the Torah. We collectively accepted the mission at Sinai and again in the time of Esther and Achashverosh. Non-Jews are addressed as Adam, because they, like us, are descendants of Adam, created in God's Image. But only Jews strive to return to that primordial state, the state most like God, the state of pre-sin Adam. Thus, only the Jews are called Adam in that only they strive to be Adam.

I Knows da Woid

Another quiz. Strangely easy. I never thought I was much of a Nach guy, but even the NT questions were easy or guessable.

You know the Bible 100%!

 

Wow! You are awesome! You are a true Biblical scholar, not just a hearer but a personal reader! The books, the characters, the events, the verses - you know it all! You are fantastic!

Ultimate Bible Quiz
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God the King I

Sanctity and Kingship, Kedushah uMalchus. Thus end Pesukei deZimrah, leading to the first beracha of the Shema. How do they relate? Where is G-d the King before the Shema? Why say a Kedushah?

What is a king in Judaism? First, a king relates to his people. As the famous maxim says, “ein melech b’lo am”, there is no such thing as a king without a nation. The human king rules his people, legislates with a word, and holds power of life and death over them. In return, he protects them from enemies, and leads them in following G-d’s word.

How is G-d a King? The analogy should be fairly obvious. In fact, the two are innately linked. G-d lends his power to human beings (as we say in the beracha for seeing a king); their power reflects His, and their honor reflects on Him. The Bible notes: 4 “Then Solomon sat on the throne of the Lord as king instead of David his father” (Divrei Hayamim I 29:23). Not that the throne was G-d’s, but that the throne, symbolizing kingship, drew from G-d’s power.

Honor and glory flow upward as well. The credit of the nation reflects well or badly on its king, and through the king to G-d, as David says, “The Lord says to my lord:'Sit at My right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool” (Tehillim 110:1). The psalm says of David that he is lord under the Lord. David says similarly, after the conquest “Mi k’amcha Yisrael…– Who is like Your people Israel… And let Your name be magnified for ever, that it may be said: The Lord of hosts is G-d over Israel; and the house of Your servant David shall be established before You” (Shmuel II 7:22-26). David praises Israel, whose glory redounds upon him, and thus also to G-d.1

Kedushos appear in the daily morning services: in the Shema, in the Amidah, and in the conclusion of the service. Each helps to explain the others; today we focus on the Kedushah deYotzer, in the beracha Yotzer Or.

The kedushos are based on the daily angelic choir described in the first chapter of Yechezkel and elsewhere. These choirs daily crown G-d and acclaim Him King, while accepting upon themselves His Kingship.

Why coronation? We say “umamlichim,” the angels make Him King, but it is explicit in the Sephard mussaf kedushah, saying “keter yitnu l’cha – a crown the angels will give to You.” There are many ways of appointing kings. We anoint Israelite kings, and the community proclaims them by praise. The crown is a badge of kingship, of course, but its placement is not a part of our usual ceremony. That is liturgically reserved for G-d.

The coronation of the kedushah is complemented by the angels’ acceptance of the Divine yoke, “umekablim ol malchus shamayim zeh mizeh,” and also by our coronation of G-d, as the mussaf kedushah goes on to say, “malachei hamonei ma’alah, im amcha yisrael kevutzei mata,” or as we say on Yom Kippur, “darei ma’alah im darei mata”; we crown Him along with the angels above, we accept Him along with the angels. There is no King without a nation, and He rules the heavenly hosts along with the physical realm. This compares to melech ha’olam in the basic beracha text, King of the universe, including the he’elam concealed, spiritual universe.

The coronation theme emerges from a variety of midrashim, both in the Gemara and later midrashic collections. The basic form is in Chagigah 13b, amplified here by variants from parallel versions in the other midrashim, particularly Pesikta Rabbasi 20, and the late Midrash Konen:

It is taught in a Mishnah (really a braisa) that (the angel) Sandalphon … stands behind the merkavah and binds crowns (made out of the prayers of Israel) for His Master. Indeed? But does Scripture not say “Blessed is the glory of G-d from His place” (Yechezkel 3:12) indicating that nobody [including the angels, who speak this verse] knows His place? Rather, he recites a name on the crown and it goes and seats itself on His head. (When the crowns arrive, there is a moment of silence, punctuated by the roaring of the chayos. Then the legions say, quaking, Kadosh kadosh kadosh… Then He passes by them, and they respond Baruch kevod H’ mimkomo. They all together say (Tehillim 146:10) Yimloch H’ l’olam…)

Our prayers crown G-d. Our words form the core of the angelic coronation ritual. We join their daily crowning and acclamation of G-d the King, and prepare to accept His Sovereignty when we say, Shema … Baruch shem kvod malchuso l’olam va’ed. The Gra comments on es shem hamelech: “this is the Royal Crown” – hinting at the whole trope, of names corresponding to crowns, made from our prayers, ascending to G-d.

Where does the Kedushah fit into the Yotzer Or? We begin the beracha with praise of G-d for creating the physical universe. Then, both on Shabbos (Keil Adon) and on weekdays (Keil Baruch) we get a piyut, that starts with physical creation, concluding with angelic praise. We read, and join in with, the angelic coronation ceremony, return to praise of physical things, concluding with thanks for creating the light sources. Light is of this world, of the physical sun and moon, but light is also a spiritual energy, as the Infinite Light.

These midrashim link us and our prayers with the angelic choirs, and urge us to incorporate them in our daily acceptance of G-d’s Kingship. However, the angels have to praise Him. We choose to praise and crown and accept Him, through free will, and may thus rise higher than the angels.

1 The Temple, by R’ Joshua Berman, Aronson: 1995, pp. 101-103.

(Originally published as Sefasai Tiftach, in the AishDas parsha sheet Mesukim MiDevash, Re’eh, 5764. It was largely based on Dr. Arthur Green’s book Keter, which was deemed an inappropriate source to mention by name for the intended audience of Mesukim MiDevash.)

(This is a prequel to next week’s article on the Coronation Theme on Rosh Hashanah.)

From Germany to Poland - Sim/Shalom/Rav

David Ziants commented on my post on the Retzei bracha in its Eastern (Bavel -> Edot haMizrach) and Western (Eretz Ysrael -> Ashkenaz) variants:

At Shabbat Mincha Nusach Ashkenaz (according to the Gr"a) there is "Sim Shalom" at yet there is no birkat haCohanim. Also we we still say "Sim Shalom" on morning fast days when we don't do Birkat HaCohanim (probably because of being in distress).

Thus I would conclude (according to Nusach Ashkenaz):
a) Sim Shalom always at Shacharit
b) Sim Shalom at other times only if there is k'riat hatora.

I think things are not necessarily as you have them here.

Here we get into another source of variation: Eastern vs. Western Ashkenaz. Germany vs. Poland. While the texts don't vary so much, minhag still does - what to say when. The Siddur Eizor Elyahu, (EE) a Siddur HaGra [of the Vilna Gaon] edited by R' Yehoshua Cohen zt"l and yblcht"a R' Isaiah Winograd, has a truly excellent set of notes documenting, from old printed and manuscript siddurim, what the "original" Nusach Ashkenaz was.

According to the notes in EE, western Ashkenaz said Sim Shalom at Shabbat Mincha, while Poland said Shalom Rav at Mincha. To quote the Rema (R' Moshe Isserles, Cracow, 16th century) in Orach Chaim 127: "We are accustomed to say at Shacharit 'Sim Shalom', and also every time we say 'Elokeinu ...' [the priestly blessing]. Otherwise we say 'Shalom rav'. Some say at Shabbat mincha, 'Sim Shalom', because the paragraph includes 'in the light of Your Face you gave us...', which is the Torah, which is read on Shabbat afternoons."

Old siddurim of the Western Rite have Sim Shalom, old siddurim of the Polish rite have Shalom rav. Testimony from students of the Gra tells us that he himself davened Nusach Poland, whatever the modern siddurim in his name say to do. The editors of EE thus brought both versions at Shabbat Mincha - one as Nusach Germany, one as Nusach Poland.

Many machzorim have Sim Shalom for Shabbat Mincha on Rosh Hashanah/Yom Kippur. I wonder if this is included as a survival of "Old Ashkenaz" as we also say "Oseh hashalom" at the conclusion of the bracha, which is certainly the Old Ashkenaz (and Eretz Yisrael) phraseology, instead of our current "Hamevarech et amo yisrael bashalom". Alternatively, it could be a simple unconscious bias of machzor editors, who often base themselves on German archetypes, since they tend to be better-edited and -annotated than other sources. Also, until the 1700s, Eastern-Ashkenaz machzorim were printed mostly in Western Europe, where the presses were (Furth, Amsterdam).

As for not saying Birchat Kohanim on some fast days (we do say it on the minor fast days, just not on Yom Kippur and Tisha B'Av) - I could equally speculate that for those days, there are special considerations. For Yom Kippur, there's the whole Avodat Yom haKippurim, which confers blessing on the whole nation, and for Tisha B'Av, we avoid anything that might give happy memories of the Temple.

It may even be simpler than that, looking at the notes in the Heidenheim machzor (Roedelheim 1815 3/e, reprinted Feldheim 2005) - birchat kohanim must be undertaken in simcha, a mourner can't say it, so perhaps since we have customs of mourning on Tisha B'Av and Yom Kippur (where it's not so much mourning as nervousness), we can't say Birchat Kohanim out of "distress", as you say.

Milah: Mitzvah on the father or son?

A bitter custody case in Oregon currently engages the issue of circ'n (milah): the father converted to Judaism, and wants to have the son circ'ed, the mother apparently is not Jewish - does the son have the right to decide to be circ'ed?

I don't understand why this is an issue: the son is old enough to make a conscious choice, he should be consulted.

Further, what's going on here? It appears the mother isn't Jewish, so neither is the son. Does the father want to force the son to convert? What beis din (Jewish court) would accept a convert under such circumstances?

Also: is there a mitzvah of circ'n independent of whether the son is Jewish or not? A literal reading (not that anyone seems to accept it) of the first law in the Shulchan Aruch (code of Jewish Law) on circ'n: "The father is commanded to circ his son." - seemingly regardless of whether the son is Jewish or not. Does the father take it this way? What rabbi would agree with him? It seems rabbis are not being consulted in this case, only a Harvard professor of family law.

I'm confused.

P.S. note the abbreviations. There are anti-circ crusaders who troll the Web looking for the full word, so they can come in and drop their propaganda on all and sundry. Hence the elision.

Parents update

My parents were in a major car accident. They're mostly OK - some bruises, cuts, slight concussion. No other cars were involved. They hit a guardrail, sailed over, rolled over and down an embankment. Car smashed. Them, not so much. Why? THEY WERE WEARING SEATBELTS.

For some more detail on what has been going on, Debbie (my wife) keeps a Livejournal:
http://mamadeb.livejournal.com/739932.html
http://mamadeb.livejournal.com/740349.html
http://mamadeb.livejournal.com/741462.html
http://mamadeb.livejournal.com/741876.html
http://mamadeb.livejournal.com/742480.html

They're home, after 4 days in hospital. I think they're going to give up driving, but they're trying to find a way to keep going to their summer home in the Catskills (to which they were enroute when they crashed).

WEAR YOUR SEATBELTS!!!

For those who feel so motivated, their names are Simcha b. Rivka, and Tova Batya bat Tzivia.

Whar Ah Bin

Because sometimes, something trivial is all you're up for.

create your own visited states map
or check out these Google Hacks.

Bias in Siddur Editing

What do the editors of siddurim bring to the table?

R' Arnold Lustiger has issued a set of errata for the first edition of his machzor based on the extensive teachings of [The] Rav YB Soloveitchik zt"l. I have a small issue with it, although he does say that the siddur is supposed to represent standard nusach [the prayer recension of] Ashkenaz, while the Rav's modifications to the nusach can be found in footnotes.

One place he corrects is in the introduction to the long Vidui (confession), which was printed with what today is called "nusach sfard". Three phrases describe the Creator's role in atonement, and they are given in different orders in nusach Ashkenaz (pre-Chasidic European text) and nusach Sfard (post-Chasidic European text, modified by some patters from Spanish and Middle Eastern texts).

The order in our siddurim is:

• shetislach lanu al col avonoteinu
• vetimchal lanu al col pesha'einu
• utechaper lanu al col chata'einu

The order that you say is "nusach sfard" turns out to be "old Polish", long before the rise of Chassidism brought Nusach Sfard to the world. See the siddur Eizor Eliyahu (3/e, p. 387), which is nusach haGra, whose notes give a lot of information on what the "original" Ashkenazi nuschaot were.

It seems that a lot of the old Polish and Eastern European siddurim from the 16-17th century have the same order as nusach Sfard (techaper, tislach, timchal), while the order that we mostly use today in nusach Ashkenaz (tislach timchal techaper) is found only in the Western Ashkenaz traditions (i.e.. German). So it seems possible, perhaps likely, that the Rav, following the Gra and early Eastern European (rather than German) traditions, would have said this passage in this order.

I wonder to what extent current Nusach Ashkenaz siddurim are based on Heidenheim's machzor, which reflects a more German-influenced tradition. There were Heidenheim machzorim issued in "Nusach Polin", which are probably the basis of our current text (real German versions differ, a lot on Yom Kippur, less on other days). One's background, as well as one's conscious program, does affect how one edits a siddur text.

For example, in the first bracha before Shma, there is an ambivalent text: this is the praise of Seventh Day, on which rested the Almighty from all His work, the Seventh Day praises and says, "Singing a Song for the Sabbath Day (Ps. 91)". It can either be read as "the praise of the Seventh Day, on which the Creator rested, is that it and we say the Psalm" or with a minor edit, which some Ashkenazi siddurim take, following Heidenheim's emendation as "of the day", "shelayom" instead of "shel yom". That makes it read, "this is the praise of the Seventh Day, that on it rested the Creator; this is the song of praise of the Seventh Day, "Singing a song..." Two separate ideas, rather than one with a bit of elaboration.

The Eastern text, however, disambiguates it differently, making the second phrase say, "this is the song of praise of the Seventh Day, and it says "Singing a song..." Alternatively, Seligmann Baer notes (Siddur Avodat Yisrael) that the Roman and Spanish siddurim say, "This is the song and praise for the Seventh Day, on which the Almighty rested from all His work, this is the praise of the Seventh Day, which says, "Singing a song..."

When R' Dr. David de Sola Pool, the long-time rabbi of the Spanish-Portuguese Synagogue in New York, edited the Siddur for the Rabbinical Council of America, as an Ashkenazi siddur in the 1960s, he recognized the ambiguity in the text, and put in a more Sephardic version to disambiguate it, one which is not, as far as I know, attested in Ashkenazi texts. The second phrase reads "this is the song of praise of the Seventh Day, and it says ..." This text appears in other modern Eastern siddurim.

So Heidenheim had a conscious program of emending texts to make more (to him) grammatical sense. de Sola Pool had a less-conscious tendency to regard his native (Spanish) nusach as normative. To what extent do other contemporary siddur editors adopt Heidenheim's texts, under some possible presumption that "the Germans were medakdek (precise), therefore we accept his version as correct"? Clearly, according to the editor of Eizor Eliyahu, what is precise is not always the most accurate.

Noah, Why Now?

Everyone else has something to say about Dr. Noah Feldman's article Orthodox Paradox, if only to show how we have all taken his trolling bait. I haven't seen this one yet, though:

Something that has been bubbling in the back of my head - if Dr. Feldman was losing his faith while attending Yale Law in the mid-1990s, if he was already dating his wife in 1998*, when the 10th-Reunion incident happened...

Why now? Why, another 9 years after the incident that in theory inspired his anger at Orthodoxy, or 12-15 years after he started losing his faith, did he feel sufficiently angry at the Modern Orthodox community to write this article full of half-truths** and manipulation, which seems designed to make Modern Orthodoxy look bad to the outside world? What made him lash out, after nine years of not responding to the apparent slight?

____
* if he graduated Harvard in 1992, he must have graduated Maimo in 1988.
** talking about Goldstein and Amir, but eliding the paroxysms of self-doubt and self-examination that the Modern Orthodox community went through in the wake of these two terrible incidents, leaving the impression that Modern Orthodoxy somehow approves and/or leads to such behavior.

Transgressive Thinking

My chavrusa, Stu Feldhamer, gave the Pirke Avos shiur this morning in shul, talking about Mishnah 3:15. These are my thoughts on the mishnah, inspired by the discussion that ensued.

"Rabbi Elazar of Modin said, one who desecrates sacred objects, one who scorns the appointed times, one who whitens the face of his fellow in public, one who undoes the circumcision, or one who interprets the Torah not according to Jewish law -- even if he has Torah [study] and good deeds, he has no share in the World to Come." (translation mine)

Note that there are five categories here, unlike the usual three which correspond to (following Maharal and Wessely) the mishna at the beginning of the book "on three things does the world stand - Torah, service and charity", corresponding to the self (one's Torah learning), the Divine (one's divine service), and one's relations with others (charity meaning that we interact with even those beneath us). What ties these five together?

Well, we can group them loosely into the three categories:

Self: interpreting the Torah

Divine: holy things, festivals, circumcision

Others: whitening the face

but that seems a bit forced. Perhaps we should look for a common thread. First off, what is "whitening the face"? It's usually interpreted as "embarrass", but that doesn't gibe with the usual literary readings of emotions. One turns red-faced with embarrassment or shame, but one blanches at a shock. The former is linked to rising blood pressure, the latter to a drop in blood pressure, such as leads to fainting.

It seems to me that the common thread here is "transgressing the boundaries". Judaism is nothing if not a series of distinctions: holy/profane, light/dark, Sabbath/weekday, Jew/non-Jew, I/Thou, man/God.

Each of these categories transgresses against one of these distinctions:

1) disgracing the holy - treating holy objects as if they were profane, mundane. Transgressing against human/divine distinction.

2) scorning the appointed times - making the Sabbath and Festivals no different than any other day. Transgresses the distinctions of time.

3) whitening the face - behaving in a shocking manner, disregarding the boundaries between me and you - transgressing the personal, showing no respect for the sensibilities of the other.

4) undoing the circumcision - removing the only mark of a Jewish man that remains even when naked, as King David said with relief when he realized he still had one mitzva object on him in the bathhouse. Transgresses the distinction between Jew and non-Jew, there is nothing special about being a Jew.

5) interpreting Torah against halacha - permitting the forbidden, transgressing the rule of law, making a law unto oneself.

One gets one's portion in the World to Come unless one violates certain sins, most of which have to do with belief in God and one's relations with one's fellow man (see Rambam Hilchot Teshuvah chapter 3, also Mishnah Sanhedrin chapter 10). These five categories similarly express transgressions of the boundaries which define our lives as Jews.

Stu then read the Tiferes Yisroel's comment on this mishnah, which expresses a similar sentiment, perhaps in part responding to the Reform Judaism that was then in its most radical period (1840s; the volume on Nezikin was published in 1845).

One who desecrates the Holies, does not recognize the existence of God - he regards holy and profane as the same thing.

One who scorns the appointed times, does not recognize God's influence in the world, His continuing (throughout time) sustenance of the world.

One who whitens the face of his fellow, does not recognize that Man was created in the image of God (see Avot, Mishnah 3:18 - beloved is Man in that he was created in the image of God). He sees no difference between man and animal.

One who undoes the circumcision, sees nothing special about being Jewish, disregards the statements that we were chosen for a special mission in this world, because of our willingness to work with God and accept His Torah.

One who interprets the Torah to rule against accepted Law, does not believe in the existence or authority of the Oral Torah.

Consider the innovations of Reform Judaism in the 1840s, as well as the depredations of assimilation after the Enlightenments:

+ moving worship from Saturday to Sunday (scorning the appointed times);

+ baptizing one's children for social or political gain, such as Disraeli's parents did, or Mendelssohn's children (undoing the circumcision, mark of the covenant with Abraham);

+ eliminating most of the "ceremonial law" and arrogating the right to interpret the Torah to make it compatible with a non-observant lifestyle.

The others may reflect the sins of other periods.

At any rate, an interesting Mishnah, one that leaves itself open to appropriate readings for all ages, unfortunately.

From the Ashes - Review

My shul showed the Aish HaTorah movie "From the Ashes" this Tisha B'Av. I saw most of it, but walked out near the end - I was disgusted.

1) R' Weinberg was inspired by the physical holocaust to counteract the spiritual holocaust. Like the decline of Orthodox Judaism had anything to do with the Holocaust? (Leaving aside the theory that the Holocaust was the punishment for Reform, a theory I find morally difficult).

But the movie was bizarre. Clips of R' Weinberg talking about himself, or other people talking about him and the yeshiva, and how great they are, looking for all the world like an ad for Aish HaTorah - come to our yeshiva - alternating with clips of Holocaust scenes narrated by some guy with a South African accent (some British colony or another). Why the pictures of the Holocaust, except that it's a Tisha B'Av movie, and of course we have to bring up pictures of the Holocaust?

And of course, R' Weinberg implies that he invented kiruv - "bemakom she'ein ish, yishtadel lihyot ish" - implying that nobody else was doing kiruv when he started Aish. Riiight. Aish HaTorah started in 1974. He didn't even start the first kiruv yeshiva in Israel - that was the Diaspora Yeshiva, started in 1964 by my wife's cousin, R' Mordechai Goldstein shlit"a. And where did R' Goldstein learn about kiruv? Working alongside R' Shlomo Carlebach z"l in Chabad in the 1950s. (See "Returning to Tradition" by Dr. M. Herbert Danzger)

The whole thing was very self-serving, and not so interesting in terms of actual kiruv.

2) Discovery Seminars. Someone talks about hearing the guy who invented Discovery, "logical scientific proofs that Torah is Misinai" and wanting to give seminars himself.

That has to be a reference to Torah Codes, which are ever so much garbage. There are two aspects of Torah Codes, both of which are garbage.

1) the coincidences found in letter-skip sequences. That's just data cherry-picked for impressiveness.

2) the minimal skip distances for equidistant letter sequences, that which was published in "Statistical Science". One has to be a professional statistician to really grasp that. I know mathematically sophisticated people who have been taken in by it. I also know frum statisticians who have poked several holes in the argument. Torah is from Sinai - granted, the Rambam says it's a fundamental of our faith. Skip-letter sequences exist, and are cute. But the one doesn't prove the other.

3) R' Weinberg takes his rabbinical students to the death camps to impress upon them that they have to be as scientific, as efficient, as the Nazi killing machine. They tried various methods before coming up with the most efficient gas-and-crematorium method. So too kiruv professionals have to search for the best way. Why? Because he looked around after some years, and realized, that no matter how much success Aish HaTorah had, kiruv was losing the war for Jewish souls - so he needed a new source of inspiration.

That was the point at which I left. If you want to compare efficiency and single-minded devotion for kiruv professionals, you should compare to Chabad, that changed itself from an inner-directed small contemplative sect before WWI into a huge international kiruv machine, under the Sixth and Seventh Rebbes. Chabad has got to be the most successful kiruv operation out there. But of course, to the yeshivishe velt, Chabad is off the radar. So what's left? Nazis.

R' Weinberg tried to walk the fence on this one, calling the Nazis "monsters", but saying that his kiruv professionals have to be as efficient as the monsters. On the other hand, during the segments on the Holocaust, he & the narrator spoke about Nazi deception, to get people to leave their homes, to get them to go into the railroad cars. But here is R' Weinberg, using deceptive tactics (blinding them with the pseudo-science of Torah Codes), in order to bring people into Judaism. Not only does he advise absorbing the efficiency, his program uses their moral failure of deception. Zu Torah vezu sechorah? Isn't the seal of Torah, truth? Or does single-minded devotion to Torah and kiruv justify the means? It doesn't ring true to the Torah with which I was raised.

It bothered me, and I walked out.

Lehavdil

One of my commenters took offense at my use of the word "Lehavdil" to distinguish between yeshivish and the chassidish books that talk about meditation. He seems to have taken it to mean that I put "my" affiliation (misnagdish) as Good, while "his" affiliation (chabad) as Bad. And looking at some posts on the Web, I can see how he took it that way.

However, Lehavdil just means to separate. In its most widely-known context, in the Havdalah prayer, havdalah (hamavdil, in the instance) separates both between equals (light/dark, day/night) and lesser/greater (Shabbat/workweek, Israel/other nations). So the word itself really doesn't denote anything comparative. However, in popular usage, I now see that it does. So I take it out of my post - since I didn't mean to imply anything comparative.

Not Necessarily R' Akiva Eger

All this discussion about the "real" R' Akiva Eger on Hirhurim and OnTheMainLine triggered something for me.

I have the volume in question.

I read and photographed the haskama of R' Akiva Eger to the 1832 Berlin chumash with Mendelssohn's commentary, and it does and doesn't quite mean as much as I think we'd like it to mean. Which is to say, I don't know if Dr. Heinemann sent the full chumash pages to R' Akiva Ginz (Eger). The haskama seems unclear - it says "targumim", which it seems would imply the German as well as the Aramaic, but the haskama seems to be primarily (only?) on Dr. Heinemann's commentary, "Biur LeTalmid".

Here's the title page:

note, RMBMN is R' Moshe ben Menachem Mendel (Mendelssohn).

and the haskamah:

Translation (approximate):

heading: I thought this sufficiently important to give it its own page in this volume.

Peace and blessings to you, perfect in Torah, wise writer my teacher rav Jeremiah Heinemann,

I recently received your nice letter, you should have a palanquin for publishing beautifully the Chumashim, with the translations and Rashi and Tikun Sofrim by R' S.D., and the extra commentary Biur Letalmid, and when you sent me several leaves to show their beauty, and for asking me for a haskamah, what can I do if it is impossible for me to fulfill your request since I never write haskamot on any book, and furthermore, since there is no reason to do so here, if the book is really so good won't everyone see that it is so, and if you're afraid that others will encroach on your borders and reprint the book before your printer sells out, surely one should not suspect any fellow Jew of such "theft of holy things". May God allow you to bring your work into reality. And here I am, one who has subscribed to buy a copy of your book at full price.

I remain, Akiva ben Moshe Ginz Z"L.

This is even more a non-haskamah than the famous one by the Noda beYehuda to R' Naftali Herz Wessely's commentary Yein Levanon on Pirke Avot. That one basically says, "his last book was good, he's a good guy, if he sticks to kosher ideas this book should be good too."

Right-click on the picture, then "View Image" from the menu, to see the high-res version.

Sfas Emes Meditation: Spoke vs Said

R' Sokol (my LOR) often describes the comments of the Sfas Emes on Chumash as "meditations". I hadn't read much of the Sfas Emes inside, but found a nice one to say over at Shaleshudis this week in R' Sokol's absence. (how's that for a bit of modern Judeo-English (inside, say over, Shaleshudis). And it really is a meditation, in the sense of Hisbonenus as used by Chabad, or the Nefesh haChaim (i.e., Misnagdim as well as Chassidim).

[תרנ"א]:

אחז"ל כל הנביאים נתנבאו בכה אמר ה' מוסיף עליהם משה בזה הדבר. ענין הפרש זה כמו החילוק בין עשרה מאמרות לעשרת הדיברות. כי מאמר היא רק לחוץ להודיע הרצון יהי רקיע. יהי מאורות. ודיבור הוא פנימיות עצם הדיבור. כענין שם מדבר שנקרא האדם מדבר. ולא אומר. כי הדיבור הוא בעצם לא במקרה כמו המאמר. ואמת שזה עצמו ענין החילוק בין זה לכה. כי יש כמה מדריגות בנבואה. ועצם הדיבור מתלבש ומתפשט אח"כ למדריגות אמירה ולכן באמירה כתיב כה ובדיבור זה. לכן כ' וידבר ה' כו' לאמר כי מהדיבור בא אח"כ אמירה. וכן הי' מעלת בנ"י בקבלת התורה שנגלה פנימיות דבר ה' בדיברות יותר מעשרה מאמרות. ומעין זה החילוק בין ימי המעשה שהוא כח עשרה מאמרות שבכל יום הי' בריאה מיוחדת יהי אור. רקיע. ובשבת לא הי' בריאה וכ' ויברך כו' את יום השביעי א"כ הוא בחי' עצם הדיבור. ובכל הימים שכ' ברכה כ' ויברך כו' לאמר כו' וכ' ויברך כו' ויאמר להם כו' פרו ורבו. ובש"ק כתיב ויברך סתם והוא עצם הדיבור. ולכן בשבת ניתנה תורה שהם בחי' עשרת הדיברות כנ"ל. וזהו עצמו שכ' בזוה"ק בשבת דלא אשתכח בי' מזוני מה ברכתא אשתכח כו' אלא שהוא שורש הברכה ע"ש. והוא כנ"ל.

He starts from the first verse in the parasha, then almost free-associates, finding similar ideas to the puzzling bit in the verse, explaining the ideas, finding analogies, etc.

The verse tells us that Moshe spoke to Israel, saying "This is the thing..." He brings the Midrash (Rabbah) telling us that this indicates Moshe's prophecy is greater than other prophets, in saying "This is the thing," rather than "Thus said God" - drawing distinctions between "said" (distancing, offhand) and "spoke" (inner essence of a statement, direct communication); and between "this" - this is the thing, direct to you, and "thus" - the thing was that, and this is how I understand it, indirectly.

He then wanders off to comparing "said/spoke" to the 6 days of creation (created through ten Saying (amarot)), vs. Shabbos, which was directly blessed without an "amar" - so Shabbos becomes the Source of blessing for the rest of the week. Again saying vs. direct communication. This then leads back to the ultimate Statements - the Ten Statements, Aseres haDibros, which were communicated directly to all Israel.

I would expand a bit and say that in Creation, the physical world was naturally distant, disassociated from the infinite G-d, necessitating Amirah - at a distance; while at Sinai, G-d was creating a direct communication of His Will to all of us, hence the need for Dibur.

Retaining a meditative experience long enough to write it down is really something, to share in the subjective experience of a great mind.

(note: text pasted from DBS)

More on R' Greenberg's Theology

My second blog-post ever focused on the neo-Reconstructionist theology expressed by R' Irving (Yitz) Greenberg. Having recently subscribed to Tradition, I find that a zealot of the 13 Foundations of Maimonides, R' Dr. David Berger, wrote at the same time, a review expressing a similar position. In this month's issue, he defends his position; unfortunately, both the review and the letter are only available to subscribers.

Some excerpts that address this issue (most of the review addresses the main point of the book, Jewish-Christian relations):

In the wake of the Holocaust, the next stage has arrived, and it is startling in its radicalism. God, says Greenberg, has lost the moral right to command the Jewish people to live in accordance with the high standard required by the covenant. After His failure to protect the covenantal people from the Nazi onslaught, any such demand would be “inherently abusive . . . illegitimate, and therefore null and void, because it [would] only expose the Jews to greater danger” (p. 26). Nonetheless, some Jews so love God that they have voluntarily chosen to maintain the covenantal relationship, which now constitutes the highest level of commitment precisely because it is the product of a free choice. At this mature stage of the covenant, the partnership between God and man is that of equals (p. 188).

One wonders if Greenberg, who is committed to a halakhic way of life, means all of this quite literally. He never descends from the heights of rhetoric to the level of discourse that would actually address the consequences of this position.
...
Whether or not Greenberg is entirely serious, even a rhetorical rejection of the binding authority of the Torah would be understood by any fair-minded observer as a prima facie abandonment of Orthodox Judaism, so that complaints of marginalization by the Orthodox establishment...

R' Alan Yuter offers a different reading of R' Greenberg, in a letter in the current issue:

If however we mean that belief is difficult to sustain after the Holocaust, and the covenant’s brokenness refers to a human inability to measure up to the Divine mandate and we understand R. Greenberg’s prose metaphorically, poetically, and generously, we can quibble with the idiom, but not the intent. He is, after all, an observant Jew. One does not consistently obey commandments out of thoughtless inertia or mindless nostalgia.

R' Berger defends his position with more quotes from R' Greenberg's book describing the spiritual odyssey that led him to his position.

For my part, I have trouble with R' Yuter's alternate explanation, as it, too, appears to be even less Judaic than R' Berger's reading of R' Greenberg. The closest parallel that comes to mind is Galatians 2:16, which I shall not quote here.

* * *

Last year, R' Greenberg wrote an article for Modern Judaism expressing a somewhat different viewpoint, it seems to me somewhat closer to Reform. At some point I'd like to write a post examining the article more closely.

Whatever the conclusion, R' Greenberg explores interesting ideas. As one of the foremost public figures associated with left-wing Modern Orthodoxy, and a prominent advocate of the halachically observant lifestyle, despite his theology, what he says is always important.

Perhaps we laypersons should not try to understand the theology of the Great Minds of the era, but they write, and publish - shall we not read and learn?

Revisionism and the Aruch HaShulchan

A very interesting book review of the new Friedman Edition "Oz Vehadar" of the Aruch HaShulchan (AhS) came to my attention (hat tip, RSBA of Melbourne, via Areivim). While it's always nice to see another major halachic work re-typeset, to avoid the broken and missing letters that always arise from the photo-lithographic reprint process, the accompanying notes and front-matter reflect the interests of the new publisher, often in surprising ways.

The new edition was published about a year ago; the original work appeared in fascicles between 1883 and 1908, commenting on the entire Shulchan Aruch (a few sections are still missing). The famous Mishneh Berurah (MB) was also published in the same time frame, 1884 to 1907, covering only the Orach Chaim section of the Shulchan Aruch. The time was certainly ripe for new compendia of halachic development, as the last major commentary to summarize then-current opinion had been the Ba'er Heitev, which summarized halachic commentators between the time of the Shulchan Aruch (Code of Jewish Law) in the 1550s, and his time in the late 1700s. The socioeconomic shifts caused by the twin challenges of the Enlightenment and Chasidism made a new halachic summary necessary.

Since the AhS covered the entirety of contemporary halacha, and the author was a known city-rabbi, rather than a non-ordained genius in a yeshiva, for many years the AhS was taken to be authoritative, inasmuch as the author was used to dealing with practical halacha. Since the Second World War, however, there has been a concerted, if subtle, effort among many Roshei Yeshiva to promote the MB as the primary halachic work for daily life. There are pictures of prominent Roshei Yeshiva carrying the MB with the title prominently displayed, to convey the impression that the work is endorsed by the Rosh Yeshiva, and therefore should be authoritative for his students.

The Friedman Edition of the Aruch haShulchan takes a clear position in this battle for halachic dominance, according to the unnamed reviewer (the review was published in a journal of the Hesder yeshivah in Kiryat Arba [Chevron], by "the editors") - for the MB and against the AhS.

In republishing the AhS, the editors at Machon Oz VeHadar have subtly attacked the credibility of the work itself. They include a new commentary, "Piskei Mishneh Berurah", at the bottom of each page, pointing out where the MB's rulings disagree with those of the AhS. The editor is quite clear in his introduction, telling us that he included this commentary "so that we should know what the final ruling is" - implying that the AhS does not have the authority to be a final decisor of Halachah.

In fact, the texts of the two works indicate that the author of AhS had seen the MB when he wrote his sections on Orach Chaim, after the MB was published, and explicitly disagreed with the MB on a number of issues. See the review for examples. Usually we follow "halacha kebatrai", the later decisor wins, because he has seen the earlier work and takes it into account. Not so here, according to this editor - the earlier work wins, presumably because of the "righteousness" (as opposed to rightness?) of the author. Other books, e.g. current editions of the MB, include "piskei this and that", other people's rulings on the same issues, but they are generally printed in the back, and are the work of later decisors, who again, saw the MB and took issue. They are not examples of an earlier work, with which the AhS disagrees, being presented as trumping the later work.

The new edition goes further in its revisionism, into plagiarism.

The new AhS includes a 23-page biography of R' Yechiel Michl Halevi Epstein (RYME), the author of AhS. The unnamed biographer cites the Mekor Baruch, R' Baruch Halevi Epstein's biography of his father, RYME. However, much of the material is taken from, nay, copied from, two other books on the sages of the turn of the 20th Century: Sarei haMeiah (Centurions), by R' Yehuda Leib Maimon, a student of RYME, and MiVolozhin Ad Yerushalayim, by R' Meir Bar-Ilan, grandson of RYME.

The reviewer brings five clear examples of plagiarism from these works, and lists eight more. Quoting is not plagiarism, if one cites one's sources, so what overriding moral issue brought this unnamed biographer to engage in plagiarism? Fear of being associated with Zionists. The authors of the two latter works were "Mizrachistim", the antecedent party of today's Religious Zionists in Israel. It's not stated explicitly, but other material in the biography leans that way. For example, while it is known that RYME was anti-Zionist, he wrote one tract against the Zionists. R' Maimon reports that it was only the one tract, and that RYME regretted it afterwards. He was cordial with various known Mizrachists.

The unnamed biographer, however, paints a different picture. He tells us that RYME attended a Zionist conference to rail at the attendees, and that he made his opinion known "at every streetcorner." This does not sound like someone who had cordial, even friendly relations with "all the leaders of the religious Zionist movement," in R' Maimon's words.

Similar elision of Zionist sources occurs in other recent works where the author hopes for a large Chareidi market. The editor of the Frankel Rambam, when asked why he did not include any references to R' Avraham Y. Kook's Shabbat HaAretz, a major early-20th Century work on Shemitta, has allegedly replied that he did not want to alienate the chareidim who might buy his books, while the religious-zionists would buy it regardless. (source: a private email list) The reviewer notes this lacuna in the Frankel Rambam.

As in Lawrence Kaplan's article on Revisionism and the Rav, groups today feel free to change the nature of works and writers of old, to fit a contemporary agenda. In view of the diversity of opinion that has characterized the Torah world for millenia, we are poorer for it.

UPDATE (10 pm): Nachum comments at Seforim that the new edition doesn't include the material on Hilchot Nedarim published as the 9th volume, edited by R' Dr. Simcha Fishbane. Does this imply that the Bar-Ilan family, as well as R' Fishbane, favor the existence of the State of Israel? R' Fishbane has written about both the MB (his dissertation, Method and Meaning in the Mishnah Berurah, Ktav, 1991) and the AhS.

UPDATE 7/15: The author of the review has revealed himself - R' Eitam Henkin, son of H"R YH Henkin.

Independence Day: Who We Were

This post at Wetmachine's Tales of the Sausage Factory (as in "you don't want to know what goes into sausage or legislation"), normally a great blog on telecom policy, is a terrific read for Independence Day.

It's about Asser Levy, one of the first Jews in Pieter Stuyvesant's Nieuw Amsterdam, who created, through lawsuits, the fundamentals of religious freedom in America: that there be no establishment of state religion, that citizens be allowed to freely exercise their religion; and that members of all faiths are equally citizens of this Land.

Asser Levy is today commemorated by a street in Manhattan.

Independence Day: Who We Are

Food for thought, on this 231^st Anniversary of our Nation’s declaration of Independence from the British Empire

* * *

First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

John Wayne, an ultra-conservative, on hearing of JFK’s election in 1960:

“I didn’t vote for him but he’s my president, and I hope he does a good job.”

George Will, conservative pundit, 11 January 2001:

Some presidents' names become adjectives--Lincolnian gravity, Rooseveltian reassurance, Kennedyesque charisma, Nixonian deviousness, Reaganesque leadership. To understand the meaning of ``Clintonian,'' parse this from a 1997 news conference: ``I don't believe you can find any evidence of the fact that I have changed government policy solely because of a contribution.''

It is reasonable to believe he was a rapist 15 years before becoming president, and that as president he launched cruise missiles against Afghanistan (a nearly empty terrorist camp), Sudan (a pharmaceutical factory) and Iraq to distract attention from problems arising from the glandular dimension of his general indiscipline. As president he was fined $90,000 for contempt of court, and there is no reasonable doubt that he committed and suborned perjury, tampered with witnesses and otherwise obstructed justice. In the words of Richard A. Posner, chief judge of the 7th Circuit, Clinton's illegalities ``were felonious, numerous and nontechnical'' and ``constituted a kind of guerrilla warfare against the third branch of the federal government, the federal court system.''

Clinton is not the worst president the republic has had, but he is the worst person ever to have been president.

Keith Olbermann, liberal pundit, 3 July 2007:

This President decides that he, and not the law, must prevail.

I accuse you, Mr. Bush, of lying this country into war.

I accuse you of fabricating in the minds of your own people, a false implied link between Saddam Hussein and 9/11.

I accuse you of firing the generals who told you that the plans for Iraq were disastrously insufficient.

I accuse you of causing in Iraq the needless deaths of 3,586 of our brothers and sons, and sisters and daughters, and friends and neighbors.

I accuse you of subverting the Constitution, not in some misguided but sincerely-motivated struggle to combat terrorists, but instead to stifle dissent.

I accuse you of fomenting fear among your own people, of creating the very terror you claim to have fought.

I accuse you of exploiting that unreasoning fear, the natural fear of your own people who just want to live their lives in peace, as a political tool to slander your critics and libel your opponents.

I accuse you of handing part of this republic over to a Vice President who is without conscience, and letting him run roughshod over it.

Aaron Sorkin, movie writer/director, 1995, in the mouth of his fictional President, Andrew Shepherd:

America isn't easy. America is advanced citizenship. You gotta want it bad, 'cause it's gonna put up a fight. It's gonna say "You want free speech? Let's see you acknowledge a man whose words make your blood boil, who's standing center stage and advocating at the top of his lungs that which you would spend a lifetime opposing at the top of yours. You want to claim this land as the land of the free? Then the symbol of your country can't just be a flag; the symbol also has to be one of its citizens exercising his right to burn that flag in protest. Show me that, defend that, celebrate that in your classrooms. Then, you can stand up and sing about the "land of the free".

Francis Scott Key, “The Star-Spangled Banner”:

Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved homes and the war’s desolation,
Blest with vict’ry and peace, may the Heav’n-rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation!
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: "In God is our Trust"

And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave.

Gratuitous Numerical Post

Thank you, my thirty loyal readers and others, for bringing us to this milestone of Ten Thousand Hits. I'd like to thank the First Time Page Views, the Returning Visitors, and all the other statistical categories. I must thank Blogger (hrrmm, Google) for providing this no-cost server for me to use as my soapbox for esoteric and arcane maunderings. And I must certainly thank the Eibershter, the Chonein HaDaas, for giving us Daas, Binah and Haskel.

Hmm. My old Rosh Yeshiva was a Haskel (R' Lookstein shlit"a). There are Binahs in this world, e.g. my parents' friend Bina Presser. Does anyone know people named Daas?