Avodah Mailing List

Volume 25: Number 339

Wed, 24 Sep 2008

• 1. Re: Standing For Qri'at Shma` (Zev Sero)
• 2. Selichos teshuvos (Cantor Wolberg)
• 3. free will and physics (Eli Turkel)
• 4. Re: HaShem as God's Name (Richard Wolpoe)
• 5. Re: Free Will vs. Physics (T6...@aol.com)
• 6. Re: Standing For Qri'at Shma` (Gershon Dubin)
• 7. mi yamut (Dov Kay)
• 8. Praying to angels (Dov Kay)

Jay F Shachter wrote:

> the reason originally given for why one should not
> stand immediately prior to reading the Shma` [...]  This could lead
> to everyone's standing for the Shma`,
> as a xumra if nothing else, and our Sages did not want the community,
> whom they loved, to be subjected to burdensome xumrot.  The primary
> concern was not the kavvana of the individual worshiper, it was the
> comfort of the community.  That this notion fails to appear in the
> above-cited quote may be, as I said, of sociological interest.

That's because it isn't true.  I wonder where you heard it.  The reason
it's assur to stand is that it casts doubt on Chazal's interpretation
of the pasuk.  Beis Hillel said that the word "uv'kumecha" refers to the
time of day, not to ones stance, and therefore there is no reason at all
why one would want to stand up; it's not a chumrah, because sitting
wasn't allowed as a kulah but as the pshat in the pasuk.  By standing up
anyway, even as a chumrah, one indicates that perhaps BH weren't right,
and perhaps the pasuk does require standing; and such defiance of the
halacha is assur.  It has absolutely nothing to do with anybody's comfort.

See SA OC 63:2


-- 
Zev Sero               Something has gone seriously awry with this Court's
z...@sero.name          interpretation of the Constitution.
                                                  - Clarence Thomas

The following are from several different sources and I?d be very  
interested to hear reactions.

THE CHACHMEI HAKABALAH HAVE REVEALED THAT
BEFORE CHATZOS IT IS A TIME OF ?DIN? AND IT
CAN BE EXTREMELY HARMFUL TO RECITE SELICHOS AT THAT TIME.
ONLY AFTER CHATZOS WHEN THE EIS RATZON BEGINS IS IT PROPER
TO SAY SELICHOS. THE MEKUBALIM TREATED THIS ISSUE VERY
SERIOUSLY AND WENT SO FAR AS TO SAY THAT ONE WHO FINDS
HIMSELF IN A SHUL, WHICH HAPPENS TO BE SAYING SELICHOS
BEFORE CHATZOS SHOULD RATHER SIT QUIETLY THAN RESPOND AND
PARTICIPATE IN THE SELICHOS. (SHAREI TESHUVAH, 581).

R? MOSHE FEINSTEIN WHO RULED THAT IN A
SITUATION WHERE THE TZIBUR WOULD OTHERWISE NOT SAY
SELICHOS THEY MAY SAY SELICHOS BEFORE CHATZOS. RAV
MOSHE ADDS THAT THEY SHOULD HOWEVER SEEK TO RECTIFY THE
SITUATION.

The Shulchan Aruch as well as many of the Rishonim and Acahronim  
pasken that to say it before/earlier or later won?t do any harm but it  
might not be so effective?(that is the end of what Rav Moshe says in  
one of his teshuvas).

R'Ovadia Yosef takes this one step further and mentions that if the  
person cannot wait till after Chatzos or get up at Ashmores Haboker? 
then he should say Selichos at MINCHA!!! Because the time frame after  
Shkia thru Chatzos is not only NOT an Eis ratzon but rather you will  
get Hashem ANGRY. This is also based on divrei Kabbalah

The Rambam in Hilchos Teshuva (3:4) writes: ?Umipnei Inyan Zeh Nohagu  
kol beis yisrael leharbos betzedakah????Vnahagu Kulam Lakum  
BalailahUlihispalel bvatei kenesiyos bdivrei tanchumim uvkivushin AD  
SHEYAOR HAYOM.  Get up at night; conclude by daybreak.
  
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.aishdas.org/pipermail/avod
ah-aishdas.org/attachments/20080923/e4ae01e1/attachment-0001.htm>

The issue of free will and physics has been discussed at depth and cannot
be covered in this forum without knowing the serious problems involved.

See for example


Judaism, Science, and Moral Responsibility (The Orthodox Forum Series)
(Paperback)
edited by Yitzchak Berger and David Shatz

in particular one needs to discuss various experiments that ask questions about
free will.
Of course the question of nekudat habechira also needs to be addressed.

Sitting and philosophizing without knowing the facts on the ground is
meaningless.
In fact most physicists deny free will based on physical grounds.
One can argue (and I do) but it has to based on more than quoting a Rambam

-- 
Eli Turkel

On Thu, Sep 18, 2008 at 6:35 AM, Danny Schoemann <doni...@gmail.com> wrote:

> :..
>
> - My Yekkishe grandparents OB"M used to refer to Him as "Der Lieber
> Gctt" in coversation,
> - Danny


IN genral German's use this phrase.  a popular Gemran interjection or
exclamation is
Ach der [or Du] Lieber Gott

FWIW The Geramn Roedelheim Siddurim translate YKVK as EWIGE [Eibishter more
or less in Yiddish] which means ETERNAL.


-- 
Kesiva vaChasima Tova
Best Wishes for the New Year 5769
RabbiRichWol...@Gmail.com
see: http://nishmablog.blogspot.com/
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.aishdas.org/pipermail/avod
ah-aishdas.org/attachments/20080923/c256b95e/attachment-0001.htm>

 
 
On Tue, Sep 23, 2008, Moshe Y. Gluck wrote:
: First off, believing in  free will doesn't mean believing that physics
: has no effect on a person's  choices, just that there are also choices
: that a person makes independent  of physics...


>>Physics limits free will -- I can't choose to  fly just by flapping my
bare arms. But within the domain of options physics  allows, my choices
are free.<<

-- 
Micha  Berger           




>>>>>
I believe that most of the decisions we make are  actually forced decisions 
and not the product of free will.  Hakol b'yedei  Shomayim chutz miyiras 
Shomayim.  
 
You decide to fly to New York but a million things can happen -- you get  
sick, break a leg, miss your flight, flight is canceled, there's a blizzard in  
NY and your flight is diverted to Washington, yada yada.   You decide  to make 
fish but the fish is spoiled, the stove won't work, the power just went  out, 
an emergency comes up and there's no time to cook, you make peanut butter  
sandwiches for supper instead.....
 
The only sphere where you GENUINELY have bechira is in the sphere of Avodas  
Hashem, choosing to serve Him or not.  This is mostly mental.  A  person can 
be paralyzed and unable to speak -- there is actually a man in my  shul who is 
in that matzav, a brilliant man, a talmid chacham -- but as long as  he can 
still even /think/, he has bechira.  A lot of things happen as a  /result/ of 
your exercising your bechira, for example, you may decide to do a  mitzva and 
then actually do end up doing it.  But it was equally possible  that your 
intentions would not pan out and would never come to fruition.  
 
If you meant to do a mitzva and through no fault of your own you were  unable 
to complete the action, you still get schar, whereas if you meant to do  an 
aveira and it didn't work out, you don't get onesh for your thoughts.   But in 
any case it is only an illusion that walking, talking, doing, are  all 
dependent on your bechira.  Only the thought, the intention, the desire  are 
dependent on your own bechira.  Whether it all comes into actuality is  not up to you. 
 
 
Once I made a kugel for a friend who had just given birth, and on my way to  
her house, my car hit a bump and the kugel fell off the front seat and landed  
splat, upside down on the floor of my car.   That was "physics."   But 
physics is just the way that HKBH "hides" Himself in the  world. Famously, the word 
for world, olam, means "hidden." Physics is  another way of looking at 
Hashgacha.  
 
All this is moot in actual practice, because -- since we are not privy to  
Hashem's intentions -- we have no choice but to proceed through life AS IF we  
have free will in every area, including whether to get up or go to  sleep or 
make a kugel or call a friend or buy this house or take this job  
or......whatever.  The knowledge that ultimately your steps are guided from  Above makes no 
/practical/ difference.
 
I heard a great quote this past weekend from a guest, don't know who said  
it, but here it is:  "We have to believe in free will.  We have no  choice."
 

--Toby  Katz
=============






**************Looking for simple solutions to your real-life financial 
challenges?  Check out WalletPop for the latest news and information, tips and 
calculators.      (http://www.walletpop.com/?NCID=emlcntuswall00000001)
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.aishdas.org/pipermail/avod
ah-aishdas.org/attachments/20080923/823ae09a/attachment-0001.htm>

On Tue, 23 Sep 2008 16:40:07 -0600 (CDT) j...@m5.chicago.il.us (Jay F
Shachter) writes:

<<why was it so important to avoid the appearance that someone was 
 following Beit Shammai, if only as a xumra?  My sense is that it was for
fear
that people would take on the xumrot>>

While your question is a valid one, your answer, besides having no
support
other than "your sense", is insufficient to answer the question.  In
fact, the position
that the chachamim having rachmonus on the people is a basis for their
rulings, is
attributed in the Gemara to Tzedokim.

Gershon
gershon.du...@juno.com
____________________________________________________________
Take a break - you deserve it.  Click here to find a great vacation.
http://thirdpartyoffers.juno.com/TGL2141/fc
/Ioyw6i3nJgyBJXvKUx1XHFtMNg2g1jUJDjgGbbcu9CJuC1jkuBh1ix/

On Areivim, there was discussion about a case where a patient died because
a potential organ donor's posek rejected the brain death criterion and held
that the donor was not dead. R. Yitzhak Grossman wrote: <<I'm not
sure I understand your implication. According to the Posek who does not
accept brain death as death, implementing the transfer of the lung would
have constituted murder of the brain dead youth.>> True, but wasn't
there an alterative?  When may, or should, a posek say that he does not
wish to pasken, but advise the sho'el to ask another posek who will give
the answer that the sho'el the answer he is seeking. For example, R. Boruch
HaLevi Epstein records in his Mekor Boruch that R. Chaim Volozhiner once
refused to pasken whether the sho'el should repeat his tefillah for missing
v'sen tal umatar, because he personally disagreed with the p'sak of the SA,
but felt he could not actually pasken that way in practice.   I also
remember reading somewhere that RSZA was once
  asked by a pregnant woman whether she could abort her foetus because it
  suffered from some abnormality.  He told the woman to go down the road to
  a nice Rabbi called R. Waldenburg (the Tzitiz Eliezer), who would be able
  to answer her question... It is recorded, IIRC, that R. Chaim Brisker
  would also tell sho'alim to ask the dayan their questions, because his
  p'sak would be too burdensome (as with the RSZA incident) or too radical
  (as with the R. Chaim Volozhiner incident). Couldn't the posek in
  question have told the sho'el to ask someone else who would pasken that
  the youth was dead, or would this have been a travesty of halacha?  If
  so, why is it different from the cases cited above?
 
Kol tuv
Dov Kay
_________________________________________________________________
Discover Bird's Eye View now with Multimap from Live Search
http://clk.atdmt.com/UKM/go/111354026/direct/01/
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.aishdas.org/pipermail/avodah-ai
shdas.org/attachments/20080924/cce77901/attachment.htm>

As we get stuck into our Selichos, I was wondering what listmembers do
about the selichos which involve petitioning things/entities other than
G-d, eg machnisei rachamim, the pizmon of the 13 middos, in which we
petition the middas horachamim of HKBH.  This last, in particular, can't
just be silently skipped, because it is read allowed and is, for many, the
highlight of the selichos - I think Satmarers davka do tashlich on the day
on which it is read. I, on the one hand, have R. Toby Katz's accusation of
arrogance ringing in my ears.  On the other hand, I have my Goldschmidt
edition of the selichos, which quotes both the Rambam and Ramban decrying
the practice of davening to angels, with the Ramban openly calling it
avodah zarah.  Does minhag trump theology (assuming that you subscribe to
that particular theological view to start with)?    I would be interested
to hear about listmembers' practices and feelings. Kol tuvDov Kay
_________________________________________________________________
Win New York holidays with Kellogg?s & Live Search
http://clk.atdmt.com/UKM/go/111354033/direct/01/
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.aishdas.org/pipermail/avodah-ai
shdas.org/attachments/20080924/8a390105/attachment.htm>

------------------------------


Avodah mailing list
Avo...@lists.aishdas.org
http://lists.aishdas.org/listinfo.cgi/avodah-aishdas.org


End of Avodah Digest, Vol 25, Issue 339
***************************************

Send Avodah mailing list submissions to
	avodah@lists.aishdas.org

To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit
	http://lists.aishdas.org/listinfo.cgi/avodah-aishdas.org
or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to
	avodah-request@lists.aishdas.org

You can reach the person managing the list at
	avodah-owner@lists.aishdas.org

When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific
than "Re: Contents of Avodah digest..."