Avodah Mailing List

Volume 25: Number 406

Sat, 06 Dec 2008

• 1. R' Akiva (Cantor Wolberg)
• 2. Yaakov and Rochel (Cantor Wolberg)
• 3. Re: Dying al Kiddush Hashem (Zev Sero)
• 4. Re: Dying al Kiddush Hashem (Zev Sero)
• 5. Re: R' Akiva (Micha Berger)
• 6. Re: Dying al Kiddush Hashem (Micha Berger)
• 7. Re: Dying al Kiddush Hashem (Zev Sero)
• 8. Vayigash "Intent Determines the Actual Moral Dimension" (Cantor Wolberg)
• 9. A Dvar Torah for Parshas Yayetze (Yitzchok Levine)
• 10. Re: Dying al Kiddush Hashem (Yitzhak Grossman)
• 11. Re: Dying al Kiddush Hashem (Yitzhak Grossman)

It's brought down that there was a question how to spell Rabbi Akiva?s  
name.
Do you spell it with an aleph at the end or with a hay at the end? In  
the gemara
it is spelled ayin, kuf, yud, veis, aleph.  We are told that it was  
once revealed to
one of the Sages in a dream how to spell the name Akiva from the pasuk  
?or zarua
latzadik ul?yishrei lev simcha? from Psalm 97. The last letter of Or  
ends with a reish
which stands for Rebbe, Zarua (Ayin) Latzaddik (kuf) ul?yishrei (yud)  
lev (veis)
simcha (hay). So this was revealed to him in a dream from heaven that  
Akiva should
be spelled with a hay at the end and not an aleph. So someone asked  
the Rebbe,
how can that be proof when we know ?Lo bashamayim hee?? He responded  
that here
it is not a halacha where there are disagreements, etc. But here it?s  
a m?tzius; it?s a fact.
However, in a case where someone with the name Akiva, has spelled his  
name with an
aleph (at the end) his whole life, then that?s how you would spell it.  
But otherwise it is
spelled with a hay.

Another point to the spelling: Akiva has five letters in Hebrew
(as well as in English, coincidentally). The fifth letter of his name  
which should be hay,
is also the fifth letter of the Hebrew alphabet.

So tonight at kabalah Shabbos, you'll be reminded of this when you  
come to the or zarua.

Kol tuv.
Shabbat shalom.
ri


-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.aishdas.org/pipermail/avod
ah-aishdas.org/attachments/20081205/7a84d6c2/attachment-0001.htm>

What I do not understand is if there was deception involved regarding  
substituting Leah for Rochel, how could it even have been a Kosher  
wedding?
I always thought outright deception would render a marriage invalid.
ri

In this whole debate, I think we have to keep track of three distinct
points of view:

1.  What actually happened: Could the victims have saved themselves by
converting.  This is a question of metzius.

2.  What the victims believed: Did they *believe* that conversion would
save their lives, and deliberately reject that option.  If they did, then
they were kedoshim even if they were mistaken in that belief.  Perhaps,
had they chosen to convert, they would have found themselves "bald on both
sides", losing both this world and the Next; but (as far as we know) they
didn't choose that, so they're kedoshim.

3.  What those who recorded them for history believed:  We regard them as
kedoshim because that's how the authors of the kinnot described them, and
that's how our ancestors handed the story down to us.  If this view was
mistaken, if in fact they didn't have a choice, and didn't even think they
had a choice, then those who canonised them were mistaken; if so, what
grounds do we have for regarding them as kedoshim today?  Perhaps, *if we*
*were to conclude that this is so*, we should stop saying those kinnot and
stop referring to them as kedoshim; or perhaps we should make clear that
we refer only to those (whether all, a majority, or a minority) that did
have a choice, or that thought they had a choice.

And when we analogise from them to other cases, and decide whether to
regard other similarly situated people as kedoshim, which POV should we
take?  It seems to me obvious that we must take the 3rd POV, that of the
ones who canonised these people in the first place.

But now let's step back a bit.  The Crusades are not our first model of
kiddush Hashem.  Our first model, I think, is that of R Akiva and his
colleagues.  More on that in a bit.


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

Our first model of kidush Hashem, I think, is that of R Akiva and his
colleagues.  R Akiva said that he had waited his whole life to fulfil
"and you shall love Hashem with all your life -- even if He takes your
life", and was happy that he finally had this opportunity.

But what really happened to R Akiva?  What was he really killed for?
I think if we were to do a poll in any MO community, or even on Areivim,
we would find the majority view was that he was executed as a traitor,
for his leading role in the Bar Kochva rebellion.  If this is so, then
the only kiddush Hashem in his death was in his attitude, that he didn't
despair and reject Hashem, or curse Him for what was happening to him;
that even while he was being horribly tortured he proclaimed how much he
still loved Hashem.  Very inspiring, and if true it's a model that could
apply very much to the Holocaust, at least to those who went to their
deaths singing Ani Maamin, etc.

But this isn't at all the traditional Jewish view of R Akiva's story.
The story as recorded in the gemara and as our zeides told it to us has
no mention of Bar Kochva or of rebellion.  Instead it's about Hadrian's
decrees, particularly the one against teaching Torah, and R Akiva's
deliberate public defiance of it.  According to this view, it was that
defiance, knowing very well what would happen to him as a result (it's
not as if he acted in secret, hoping to get away with it), that
constituted his kiddush Hashem.  Once he'd been arrested and sentenced,
could he have escaped death by renouncing his "crime", by promising to
embrace the Roman gods and become a loyal subject of the Emperor?
Perhaps; but if not, then he'd already made his decision and chosen his
fate, and in effect he had already become a kadosh the moment the
legionnaires came to arrest him -- all that remained to him was not to
mess it up, and he didn't.

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

On Fri, Dec 05, 2008 at 07:32:55AM -0500, Cantor Wolberg wrote:
: It's brought down that there was a question how to spell Rabbi Akiva's  
: name. Do you spell it with an aleph at the end or with a hay at the end? In  
: the gemara it is spelled ayin, kuf, yud, veis, aleph....

In the Y-mi the spelling is (usually? always?) with a hei.

However, straight grammar... Aqiva is an Aramaic variant of "Ya'aqov".
Aramaic uses alef for the mater lexionis of a final qamatz. A hei would
be Hebrew.

And straight history.... The Y-mi was closer in date and geography to
Rabbi Aqivah. Their spelling is more likely to reflect the same culture
as R' Aqivah himself.

:-)BBii!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             It isn't what you have, or who you are, or where
mi...@aishdas.org        you are,  or what you are doing,  that makes you
http://www.aishdas.org   happy or unhappy. It's what you think about.
Fax: (270) 514-1507                        - Dale Carnegie

On Fri, Dec 05, 2008 at 09:42am EST, Zev Sero wrote:
: 3.  What those who recorded them for history believed:  We regard them as
: kedoshim because that's how the authors of the kinnot described them, and
: that's how our ancestors handed the story down to us.  If this view was
: mistaken, if in fact they didn't have a choice, and didn't even think they
: had a choice, then those who canonised them were mistaken; if so, what
: grounds do we have for regarding them as kedoshim today?  Perhaps, *if we*
: *were to conclude that this is so*, we should stop saying those kinnot and
: stop referring to them as kedoshim; or perhaps we should make clear that
: we refer only to those (whether all, a majority, or a minority) that did
: have a choice, or that thought they had a choice.

 From this angle, the question we're trying to get to is whether "Av
haRachamim" was written by someone who believed the individuals had
choices or not when he wrote "shemaseru nafsham al qedushas H'".

Since RMP convinced me that it's a description of the qehillos, and I
believe the qehillah as a whole did have a choice, I'm retracting any
attempt to cite this tefillah as a proof.

On Fri, Dec 05, 2008 at 10:01am EST, Zev Sero added:
: But what really happened to R Akiva?  What was he really killed for?
: I think if we were to do a poll in any MO community, or even on Areivim,
: we would find the majority view was that he was executed as a traitor,
: for his leading role in the Bar Kochva rebellion.  If this is so, then
: the only kiddush Hashem in his death was in his attitude, that he didn't
: despair and reject Hashem, or curse Him for what was happening to him;
: that even while he was being horribly tortured he proclaimed how much he
: still loved Hashem.  Very inspiring, and if true it's a model that could
: apply very much to the Holocaust, at least to those who went to their
: deaths singing Ani Maamin, etc.

As I already pointed out, REED did. And I added that there are few that
we shouldn't assume had hirhurei teshuvah at the final moment. After all,
we are concerned about hirhurei teshuvah in a "harei at mequdeshes li
al menas she'ani tzadiq", how much more so when the atheist is in a
foxhole!

To add to what I said before, three quotes from Victor Frankl's "Man's
Search for Meaning". Frankl invented logotherapy our of his experiences
in Auschwitz, Turkheim and Dachau. One of his central conclusions was
that as long as a person had a meaning to life for, he could learn to
adapt to pretty much anything. Psychosis therefore is traced back to
feelings of meaninglessness. He was not zokheh to reach the conclusion
that there is an ultmate Meaning which the soul is thirsting for, but
that's clearly where his evidence points.

    We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked
    through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of
    bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient
    proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the
    last of the human freedoms -- to choose one's attitude in any given
    set of circumstances, to choose one's own way.

    We can discover this meaning in life in three different ways: (1) by
    creating a work or doing a deed; (2) by experiencing a something or
    encountering someone; and (3) by the attitude we take toward
    unavoidable suffering.

    We have freedom to find meaning in what we do, and what we
    experience, or at least in the stand we take when faced with a
    situation of unchangeable suffering.

Applied to the notion of qedushah, and we can say that Frankl reaffirms
the signifance of the choice of how to accept one's death.

: But this isn't at all the traditional Jewish view of R Akiva's story.
:                                                ... it's about Hadrian's
: decrees, particularly the one against teaching Torah, and R Akiva's
: deliberate public defiance of it.  According to this view, it was that
: defiance, knowing very well what would happen to him as a result (it's
: not as if he acted in secret, hoping to get away with it), that
: constituted his kiddush Hashem....

(I got the following idea from a recent scjm post by Andy Katz which
argued against a discussion whether the terrorists in Mumbai were
motivated by the Paki cause or by a Moslem one. Pakistan exists as
a homeland for Moslems of the Indian peninsula, and the causes are
inextricably intertwined in the Paki mindset.)

I am not sure why RZS assumes the two are distinct. R' Aqiva supported
Bar Kochva because of his belief in the Torah, Hadrian passed those
decrees in order to suppress those rebellious Jews. In both of their
eyes, the rebellion and the resurgance of Yahadus were aspects of a
single thing. Of course a leading figure in the rebellion was a leading
teacher. Neither side would have expected otherwise.

:-)BBii!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Feeling grateful  to or appreciative of  someone
mi...@aishdas.org        or something in your life actually attracts more
http://www.aishdas.org   of the things that you appreciate and value into
Fax: (270) 514-1507      your life.         - Christiane Northrup, M.D.

Micha Berger wrote:

> I am not sure why RZS assumes the two are distinct. R' Aqiva supported
> Bar Kochva because of his belief in the Torah, Hadrian passed those
> decrees in order to suppress those rebellious Jews. In both of their
> eyes, the rebellion and the resurgance of Yahadus were aspects of a
> single thing. Of course a leading figure in the rebellion was a leading
> teacher. Neither side would have expected otherwise.

R Akiva's death is traditionally linked not to the general cause of
Yahadus, but specifically to mitzvas talmud torah.  The rebellion was
surely not about talmud torah, but about restoring Malchus Beis Dovid
and the BHMK.  Two distinct things.  And the point of the story with
Popus ben Yehuda is that R Akiva had the option of saving himself by
complying with the decree -- all he had to do was stop showing up in
the beis hamedrash and teaching borabim -- and he refused that option.



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

One thing has always bothered me.  Joseph tells his brothers that it  
was God's will that things
happened that way and therefore they were only instruments in what  
happened which was all
for the good. He's telling them not to be distressed and not to  
reproach themselves, etc. almost
as if he's praising them for the dastardly act.  Abravanel asks a very  
similar question:
"How come Joseph says: 'So it was not you who sent me here but God'?   
Surely they deliberately
and knowingly sold him to harm him.  The fact that by a fluke the sale  
turned out well, did not mitigate
their offense.  A person is not judged by the accidental results of  
his deeds but by his intent.  The
accidental results are irrelevant to the moral dimension." Another way  
of putting it is that the ends do not
justify the means.  This question that Abravanel asks is probably one  
many have asked but sort of glossed over.

The bottom line is that Joseph has forgiven his brothers (which he has  
the right to do) and in doing so, he is
extremely gracious and tells them not to feel badly as everything  
worked out so well.  The other thing that Joseph
realizes is the mental anguish the brothers went through as a result  
of what they had done.  Though they brought
it on themselves, nevertheless, it accounts for some atonement in  
Joseph's eyes, and he applies it toward forgiving
them for their crime. I would think there also may be an element of  
Joseph realizing that his immature behavior as a
teenager anatagonized his brothers so that he may have felt a small  
amount of culpability.  This, of course, does not
excuse what the brothers did, but it may have affected his dealing  
with them so graciously many years later.

ri
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.aishdas.org/pipermail/avod
ah-aishdas.org/attachments/20081206/af7c55f5/attachment-0001.htm>

In Parshas Vayetze we first are told that after Yaakov left his 
parents home, a home that obviously an oasis of spirituality, he goes 
to sleep and dreams of Malachim going up and down a ladder.

After spending 20 years in Lavan's house, Yaakov again has a dream. 
However, this time he dreams of sheep! Hashem immediately says to 
him, "Now, arise, leave this land and return to the land of your birth."  :-)

Gut Voch,

Yitzchok Levine 
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.aishdas.org/pipermail/avod
ah-aishdas.org/attachments/20081206/092c37dd/attachment-0001.htm>

On Fri, 5 Dec 2008 05:36:36 -0500
Micha Berger <mi...@aishdas.org> wrote:

> On Thu, Dec 04, 2008 at 07:56:41PM -0500, Yitzhak Grossman wrote:
> : > See the hair raising and heartbreaking description in the Kinnah
> : > "Haharishi Mi'Meni Va'Adaberah" of the unknown martyrs' decision to
> : > implement a communal murder / suicide pact:
> : > <Quote>
> : > And they gathered B'Prishus and in purity
> : > to sanctify God's great and awesome name
> : > and each man strengthened his brother with support
> : > to cling [to him] with pure awe
> : > to refrain from bowing to Avodah Zarah
> 
> This was about choosing suicide over forced shemad. Not about being
> given a choice to convert and avoid attack.

The point is that those celebrated as martyrs *chose* death, for
religious reasons.

...

> To further extend RMP's idea, I think the typical version of events,
> emphasizing the choice of avodas Hashem and death over shmad, is a
> confusion of national choice and individual choice. The community, en
> masse, refused. The silent majority were never given a voice. I'm not
> saying they would have chosen otherwise, ch"v to even suggest that!
> I'm saying tht their opinion didn't matter to the course of events.

Even if so, my point still stands; the martyrs of the Crusades were
celebrated for their *decisions*, whether on an individual or communal
level, and not for their mere victim-hood.

> Micha Berger             I slept and dreamt that life was joy.

Yitzhak
--
Bein Din Ledin - http://bdl.freehostia.com
A discussion of Hoshen Mishpat, Even Ha'Ezer and other matters

On Fri, 05 Dec 2008 10:01:54 -0500
Zev Sero <z...@sero.name> wrote:

...

> But what really happened to R Akiva?  What was he really killed for?
> I think if we were to do a poll in any MO community, or even on Areivim,
> we would find the majority view was that he was executed as a traitor,
> for his leading role in the Bar Kochva rebellion.  If this is so, then

...

> But this isn't at all the traditional Jewish view of R Akiva's story.
> The story as recorded in the gemara and as our zeides told it to us has
> no mention of Bar Kochva or of rebellion.  Instead it's about Hadrian's
> decrees, particularly the one against teaching Torah, and R Akiva's
> deliberate public defiance of it.  According to this view, it was that

I cannot answer for what MO or Areivimites may think, but AFAIK, there's
absolutely no basis for the idea that R. Akiva was executed for his
role in Bar Kochva's rebellion.  Indeed, there's apparently no
evidence, outside of the Talmudic and Medrashic traditions, that he
even played any role whatsoever in the revolt, or even that he
supported him at all!

See, e.g., Ben-Zion Rosenfeld's article "The Sages in the Generation of
Bar Kochva and their Relations to the Revolt Based on Tannaitic
Literature" in "Ohev Shalom: Mehkarim Le'Kevodo Shel Yisrael Friedman
Ben-Shalom", who begins by pointing out that the majority of sources
consulted by scholars for information on the relationship of R. Akiva
and his contemporaries to Bar Kochva and his revolt are from the
Talmudic and later Medrashic literature, which are dated generations
after the events, and he then struggles mightily to mine the earlier
Tannaitic literature for more contemporary information. Ultimately, he
has very little success in finding any concrete reference to the
rebellion in those earlier sources (at least according to my fairly
brief perusal of the article); the best he can do is to argue that
given the apparently religious natures of Bar Kochva and his
comrades, and the importance of R. Akiva and his colleagues as
religious authorities, we must assume that those Sages at least
tolerated, if not actually supported him, since otherwise the revolt's
apparent organizational and logistical success would not have been
possible.

So, as far as I know, any assumption that R. Akiva was executed for
treason in connection with the revolt is pure unfounded speculation.
Ha'Peh She'Asar Hu Ha'Peh She'Hetir; Hazal are our only actual source
that R. Akiva was a major supporter of Bar Kochva, and they know
nothing of this theory of his death.

 > Zev Sero               Something has gone seriously awry with this
Court's

Yitzhak
--
Bein Din Ledin - http://bdl.freehostia.com
A discussion of Hoshen Mishpat, Even Ha'Ezer and other matters


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


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


End of Avodah Digest, Vol 25, Issue 406
***************************************

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..."