Avodah Mailing List

Volume 41: Number 41

Thu, 25 May 2023

• 1. yuhara (Joel Rich)
• 2. Re: yuhara (Micha Berger)
• 3. Re: ai (Micha Berger)
• 4. Re: yuhara (Joshua Meisner)
• 5. Hypercorrection (Jay F. Shachter)
• 6. Barukh Dayan ha Emes - R Seth Mandel z"l (Prof. L. Levine)
• 7. Rabbi Dr Seth Mandel zt"l (Micha Berger)
• 8. CRC Articles Related to Shavuous (Prof. L. Levine)

If something isn't "mkubal" (accepted practice), even though it has
significant mkorot, (sources) when does it become yuhara (arrogance) to do
it? Four recent discussions I've had: saying al naharot bavel before
birchat hamazon during the week, saying kriat shema with trop, putting on
tallit and tfilin outside shul and saying hareini kaparat mishkavo for a
parent in the first year after their death. Any thoughts?

KT
Joel Rich

On Wed, May 24, 2023 at 05:57:50AM +0300, Joel Rich via Avodah wrote:
> If something isn't "mkubal" (accepted practice), even though it has
> significant mkorot, (sources) when does it become yuhara (arrogance) to do
> it? ...

A little scene setting...

Yuhara is someone trying to look "holier than thou". And so the question
as asked would simply be reduced to "it depends on the person's intent for
doing it", and where in that chulent of motives sits the desire to be seen
as really obervant -- and everything we do is out of a mixture of motives.

Simple test: Do you do it when all alone without the urge to work it
into the conversation later?

However, mechzei keyuhara, doing things that "only" look like yuhara
[I assume: to the unbiased observer] is also prohibited. (Rama, OC 17:2,
on the subject of women wearing tzitzis.) Even if one isn't really acting
on yuhara. And that makes this question interesting again.

The AhS (OC 3:2 <https://www.sefaria.org/Arukh_HaShulchan%2C_Orach_Chaim.3.2>)
brings up an example of RJR's question. There is a gemara (Shabbos
60b) that gives a text to be said to ask leave of one's accompanying
mal'akhim when going into the bathroom. RYME explains it in se'if 1,
and then se'if 2 opens "but we aren't nohagim to say it." They, whose
minds were constantly davuq baH', "yosheiv beseiser elyon", they felt
the presence of the mal'akhim.
    ... [H]owever, we can not feel their holiness at all. Our saying
    this would be considered arrogant and egotistical and it is mechzei
    keyuhara as well. Certainly the ish qadosh who is involved with Torah
    in holiness needs to say this, but not us regular people. Vekhein
    iqar, vekakh haminhag.

Seems to me, he is saying that someone on that level would only be veering
from the general custom in private. (And nearly no one is on that level
anyway, but that's tangential to RJR's question.)

And personally, I would generalize that... If one is really convinced
that the textually backed pesaq or minhag is the right one to do, despite
minhag, one would take on doing it -- but only if they can do so without
witnesses. No "mechzei". Besided, if the person wants others to know,
likely their problem is yuharah, not mechzei keyuhara, anyway.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 Today is the 48th day, which is
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   6 weeks and 6 days in/toward the omer.
Author: Widen Your Tent      Yesod sheb'Malchus: What binds different
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF           people together into one cohesive whole?

On Wed, May 17, 2023 at 05:48:11AM +0300, Joel Rich via Avodah wrote:
> There is certainly a permanent spiritual argument that artificial
> intelligence could never becoming a poseik...

Since there are strong arguments for saying a woman can't, lo kol shekein.

>                 However, the arguments of not having shimush or a mesora
> seem to me to be more short-term practical arguments. They seem to be based
> on the fact that AI has no access to this data because it is not part of
> the written corpus....

I think it gets to something else -- the difference between data and
wisdom. Or, as you put it:

> It seems this is a subset of the great debate in the outside world
> concerning creativity, the hard problem of consciousness (and what it's
> like to be a bat), the existence of free will, and can AI have
> consciousness without a body or be sentient. (The creativity issue is an
> interesting one, because from what I understand, alpha go revealed
> strategies which humans hadn't discovered).

None of which relates to what currently exists and is called AI today.
Today's "AI" programs are artificially producing results we normally
associate with intelligence without trying to produce anything like
a machine with free will or consciousness / first-hand experiences.

Simulated intelligence.

AI in the sense of synthetic intelligence is still Science Fiction,
and may not be possible. People may not be able to understand minds
well enough to make one. Or, while the brain is a "shadow" of the soul
in the physical world, you may need an actual soul to make a brain
that isn't a philophical "zombie". (I.e. something that acts exactly
like a person does, but without an "I", no first-hand experiences.
Assuming such a thing is possible.)

This distinction between simulated and synthetic intelligence is my own.
But this marketing of neural nets, a bunch of linear algebra, as "AI",
requires we re-introduce clarity to the topic somehow.

When computer chess playing stopped being amazing, we stopped calling it
AI. The same may happen here. Or it may not, given how much more central
to the human experience text communication is.

Some of how we assess AI is pareidolia. The human tendency to see a face
in things like a car's headlights and bumper. We are built to overestimate
how human something looks.

But still, it is incredible how intelligent something can seem when
it isn't even built to model the topic under discussion. Chat GPT is a
"language model"; it produces texts that make sense by analyzing texts.

It is closer to the predictive text in a Google search window than
intelligence.

Personally, I don't think one can even get to AGI -- artificial general
intelligence. A perfect simulated intelligence, a philosphical zomie.
(Never mind a synthetic intelligence.) After all, a soul is tzelem
Elokim. There is something not only unique about the human soul, it has
a unique image.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

PS: I use chatGPT backwards. Given that it is designed to produce texts
typical of the internet, I use its results as an indicator of where human
discourse is. For example, without specific prompting, its "devar Torah on
parashas X" will not quote Chazal or Rishonim. It will give self-help advice
or self-evident feel-good material (glurge) directly off the text. I am
guessing that speaks volumes about what it being put on-line about the
parashah. (Although it is likely that most such pages are not from Orthodox
authors.)

-- 
Micha Berger                 Today is the 48th day, which is
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   6 weeks and 6 days in/toward the omer.
Author: Widen Your Tent      Yesod sheb'Malchus: What binds different
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF           people together into one cohesive whole?

> On May 24, 2023, at 11:30 AM, Micha Berger via Avodah <avo...@lists.aishdas.org> wrote:
> 
> The AhS (OC 3:2 <https://www.sefaria.org/Arukh_HaShulchan%2C_Orach_Chaim.3.2>)
> brings up an example of RJR's question. There is a gemara (Shabbos
> 60b) that gives a text to be said to ask leave of one's accompanying
> mal'akhim when going into the bathroom. RYME explains it in se'if 1,
> and then se'if 2 opens "but we aren't nohagim to say it." They, whose
> minds were constantly davuq baH', "yosheiv beseiser elyon", they felt
> the presence of the mal'akhim.
>    ... [H]owever, we can not feel their holiness at all. Our saying
>    this would be considered arrogant and egotistical and it is mechzei
>    keyuhara as well. Certainly the ish qadosh who is involved with Torah
>    in holiness needs to say this, but not us regular people. Vekhein
>    iqar, vekakh 

On the bottom of Sukkah 26b, the Gemara re-teitches a mishnah to state that
a person is allowed to be machmir on himself to eat achilas arai in a
sukkah without a concern of yuhara (I just noticed not mechzei k'yuhara,
but that's not the point that I was originally going to make) and then
brings a ma'aseh from Rabban Yochanan Ben Zakkai and Rabban Gamliel.  Does
this imply that whatever was not yuhara for these Tannaim is automatically
not yuhara for us?  Or is the Mishnah stating 1) that it's not yuhara  and
2) unrelated (uma'aseh nami), two Tannaim were machmir in this way?  The
second way seems possible but a bit non-intuitive if the chiddush is that
les beih mishum yuhara.

Josh

> 
> In Megilas Rus 1:14, Naami successfully dissuaded Orpah ....
>
> .................................
> 
> One might argue that Naami's initial advice ....
>
> .... and that is why I am focusing on 1:15, in which Naami knows ....
>

This spelling appeared several times, so it must have been intentional.

It is a mistake.  It should be No`omi.  The `ayin is vocalized with a
xataf qamatz, so there should be no question about the `ayin; the
second 'a' is inexplicable.  It is true that when native Hebrew
speakers pronounced (and pronounce) a schwa, they tended (tend) to
repeat, in abbreviated form, the previous vowel, hence the
pronunciation "Mordokhai" among people who care about such things, or
who (more frequently) are imitating people who care about such things.
But that vowel elision does not apply to the xataf vowels that
explicitly indicate how they should be pronounced.  So the second 'a'
is clearly wrong, even if the first 'a' is not.

The first 'a' is also wrong.  The nun is vocalized with a qamatz
qatan.  That is less obvious.  I could give you a rule that would
enable you to predict that.  But it is more desirable to speak Hebrew
well enough that your language sense takes over and you know without
thinking that the nun is vocalized with a qamatz qatan, because
obviously No`omi comes from "no`am".  Similarly, "govhei" in the
`Aleinu prayer obviously comes from "govah"; zokhrenu, kothmenu,
xothmenu, obviously come from zokher, kothev, xothem.  Your language
sense will inform you without thinking that each of those initial
vowels is a qamatz qatan.  If it does not, that is a sign that you
must improve your knowledge of Hebrew, because -- as has been
previously stated on this mailing list -- language limits and shapes
thought, and if we only speak the languages of the goyim, we perforce
think like them.

               Jay F. ("Yaakov") Shachter
               6424 North Whipple Street
               Chicago IL  60645-4111
                       (1-773)7613784   landline
                       (1-410)9964737   GoogleVoice
                       j...@m5.chicago.il.us
                       http://m5.chicago.il.us

               When Martin Buber was a schoolboy, it must have been
               no fun at all playing tag with him during recess.

I would like to add that I also feel that Rabbi Dr. Seth Mandel's passing is a great loss.

I never met Rabbi Mandel personally, but I did speak to him at least once.
However, more than that, he was willing to answer questions via email about
kashrus that I had. Indeed, a good deal of my approach to kashrus is based
on his responses to my questions. He always responded in a direct manner.
However, many of his responses to me where with the caveat that I do not
share them with others with his name attached.

He was sharply critical of most Hemisha hashgachos, save for a very few. He
was also very critical of kashrus in EY and wrote to me that when there he
only ate salads and from a couple of falafel stands.  There was much more,
and some of it I have posted in emails on Areivim and in other places.

I have found two presentations by Rabbi Mandel online. You can view them at

https://outorah.org/p/7448

Seeing  him making these clear and interesting presentations in a vibrant manner further heightens my sadness at his passing.

Professor Yitzchok Levine
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I blogged the following hesped.
http://aspaqlaria.aishdas.org/2023/05/24/rsm

-micha

Rabbi Dr Seth Mandel zt"l

There is something I wanted to check today in Chovos haLvavos, Shaar
haBitachon. Related to the machloqes between the prescriptive focus
of Chassidus and Novhardoker Mussar (if you have bitachon, things will
work out well) and the descriptive focus of the Chazon Ish (bitchon is
the knowledge that things are working out well as Hashem Planned it,
even if I personally would have wanted something else).

My question revolved around specific wording.

And this is only a couple of days after losing the rebbe-chaver who would
have explained the original Judeo-Arabic Al Hidayah ila Faraid al-Qulub,
the word Rabbeinu Bachyah ibn Pequdah actually used!

R Dr Seth Mandel not only held a PhS in Linguistics from Harvared,
specializing in Semitic Languages. He is a Rav I am sure pasqened
for you personally. If you ever ate meat with OU shechitah, you
relied on his decision as the OU's Rabbinic Coordinator for all of
Shechitah. (See his article at
<https://oukosher.org/passover/articles/kosher-meat-some-things-you-thought-you-knew/>.)

We met some 44 years ago. R Matis Blum zt"l, the Torah Lodaas and my
"chavrusah" who taught me how to figure out a piece of gemara on my
own, obtained the Science Room at the Yeshiva of Central Queens for his
Bachurei Minyan. I found a seat at one of the tables next to someone
a bit older than the rest of us. And I haven't spoken Hebrew like a
normal Ashkenazi ever since. Attention to where in davening the commas
should go. Which syllable to emphasize. How to pronounce a dageish in a
letter than doesn't make two distinct sounds. Which sheva is pronounced,
and which silent. Long and short qamatz. All things I learned by osmosis
and by asking many small questions back in those years. Back before I
realized I should have been asking him about how halakhah works and can
you articulate the system behind Brisker Lomdus?

I remember one time, the then-future-Rabbi Gil Student and I organized a
Yom Iyun. I asked R Seth Mandel z"l to be one of the speakers. I asked him
for his Hebrew name to put on the fliers. I figured "Rabbi Seth Mandel"
would give the whole program a more Modern Orthodox first impression,
limiting our potential audience. Whereas a Hebrew name would be equally
inviting to any observant Jew. "Well, it's 'Binyamin'. But really I am
'Seth'. I don't go by 'Binyamin'; it would be pretending to be something
I am not." The posters said "Binyamin". Personal misgivings came second
to letting me have what I asked for.

You often hear of a man who authors his own derekh get called a Man
of Truth, an Ish Emes. But that idiom is usually hiding a criticism,
describing someone who values Truth over tact. More rare is the Ish Emes
who emulated Hashem as "Rav Chessed veEmes -- Who has much Lovingkindness
and Truth." Who lived on that tightrope walk of Truth and Personal
Integrity and also of Lovingkindness and Peace.

Rabbi Seth Mandel's pursuit of Truth took his life on a unique trajectory
-- to shemiras hamitzvos, to the Rav (R YB Soloveitchik; he wrote for
Jewish Action about that relationship at
<https://jewishaction.com/the-rav/observing-the-rav/>, to a love of the
Rambam, to becoming the Rav of a Teimani Minyan -- all the while loyal to
his own Novhardoker ancestry, and the attention to Middos he grew up with.

Or when he said, "Pardon me for telling you this story. It feels like
bragging to let you know one of my professors confided something personal
to me. But you really out to know..."

Rabbi Mandel was active on the email lists that I run. There, he
was "RSM", following the convention that everyone was a "Rav" or
"Reb", "Rebbetzin" or a Sephardiah "Rabbanit". Above, I called RSM a
"rebbe-chaver". He couldn't be just an unhyphenated "rebbe", because
despite his brilliance he would never have assumed that kind of air of
authority. And similarly, when Areivim, the chattier side-room to our
Torah discussions on Avodah, needed a moderator, he happened to be out
of work and he offered to do the work. Picture a rav offering to fill
in as secretary. Hakaras hatov to the group for the discussions we had
together was primary. Ego wasn't an issue.

Novhardok and Brisk in harmony.

The last time I saw Rabbi Mandel was a week before his passing. A
combination biqur cholim visit and shiv'ah call, as his son Yisrael had
just passed away when he was only 36. And all RSM spoke about was tzidduq
hadin, accepting the righteousness of Hashem's Justice.. He expressed his
pain at the loss of his son, the loss of the dreams of what that son could
be someday, and how much it hurt. Last week and that week were different
worlds. He didn't pretend all was well. He quoted Yeshaiah, Hashem "makes
Peace and creates Ra." The tragic is indeed ra. And despite that... It
was the right thing to happen because it was Hashem's Will. "Yehi sheim
Hashem mevorakh!"

I opened by lamenting being unable to just email RSM one more time to see
something in the Chovos haLvavos -- did Rabbeinu Bachya really support
the idea that bitachon is a way for Hashem to provide you with a happy
life, or a way to come to terms with the life He provided you. Many
popularizations say the former, but from seeing the Hebrew translations
myself, I still can't judge the wording well enough to know what Rabbeinu
Bachya really meant. But the last lesson Rabbi Mandel taught me was
which he believed.

I know I just closed the circle and therefore could have, and perhaps
should have, just ended this hespeid there. But I want to leave you
with a different take-away. The one thing I recall the most of all the
things he taught me, is how happy he was to discuss just anything. And
how he would make sure you were proud of your thoughts and questions,
to make sure he knew he valued your opinion.

Yehi zikhro barukh

cRc Kashrus Update
Shavuos 5783/2023



May 23, 2023

cRc Kosher is proud to present a collection of articles relating to
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These are just a sampling of articles available on our new website: https://consumer.crckosher.org/<;https://trk.cp20.com/click/g719-2oql44-ckld5x-b36v4zm8/>

Divrei Torah

Rus and the Three Time Rejection Rule<https://trk.cp20.com/click/g719-2oql44-ckld5y-b36v4zm9/>

?    ?by: Rabbi Yonah Reiss

Shavuos ? A Yom Tov that Transcends the Limits of Time<https://trk.cp20.com/click/g719-2oql44-ckld5z-b36v4zm0/>

?    ?by: Rabbi Yonah Reiss


Hilchos Yom Tov

The Laws of Eruv Tavshilin ? Shavuos 2023<https://trk.cp20.com/click/g719-2oql44-ckld60-b36v4zm7/>
?    ?by: Rabbi Akiva Niehaus
Simchas Yom Tov<https://trk.cp20.com/click/g719-2oql44-ckld61-b36v4zm8/>

?    ?by: Rabbi Yisroel Langer

Errors in Yom Tov Tefilah<https://trk.cp20.com/click/g719-2oql44-ckld62-b36v4zm9/>
?    ?by: Rabbi Yisroel Langer
Inviting Non-Jews for a Yom Tov Meal<https://trk.cp20.com/click/g719-2oql44-ckld63-b36v4zm0/>
?    ?by: Rabbi Yisroel Langer
The Beracha of Shehechiyanu on Yom Tov<https://trk.cp20.com/click/g719-2oql44-ckld64-b36v4zm1/>
?    ?by: Rabbi Yisroel Langer

Separating Between Milk and Meat

Meat and Milk at the Same Table<https://trk.cp20.com/click/g719-2oql44-ckld65-b36v4zm2/>

?    ?by: Rabbi Yisroel Langer

Waiting after hard cheese<https://trk.cp20.com/click/g719-2oql44-ckld66-b36v4zm3/>

?    ?by: Rabbi Dovid Cohen

Derech Kitzarah #10 Kashering Between Meat and Dairy<https://trk.cp20.com/click/g719-2oql44-ckld67-b36v4zm4/>
?    ?by: Rabbi Dovid Cohen
Derech Kitzarah #16 Kashering After Kosher Dairy or Meat<https://trk.cp20.com/click/g719-2oql44-ckld68-b36v4zm5/>
?    ?by: Rabbi Dovid Cohen

Kashrus on Cheese & Milk

Dairy Equipment ? Separating Facts from Myths<https://trk.cp20.com/click/g719-2oql44-ckld69-b36v4zm6/>

?    ?by: Rabbi Sholem Fishbane

Cheese<https://trk.cp20.com/click/g719-2oql44-ckld6a-b36v4zm6/>
?    ?by: Rabbi Dovid Cohen
Gevinas Yisroel on Acid Set Cheese<https://trk.cp20.com/click/g719-2oql44-ckld6b-b36v4zm7/>
?    ?by: Rabbi Dovid Cohen
Milk and Honey<https://trk.cp20.com/click/g719-2oql44-ckld6c-b36v4zm8/>
?    ?by: Rabbi Dovid Cohen
Dairy Water<https://trk.cp20.com/click/g719-2oql44-ckld6d-b36v4zm9/>
?    ?by: Rabbi Dovid Cohen
Chalav Yisroel Milk ? An Inside Look<https://trk.cp20.com/click/g719-2oql44-ckld6e-b36v4zm0/>

?    ?by: Rabbi Yosef Landa


Professor Yitzchok Levine

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