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Welcome to my blog.
I have started this blog to help readers navigate their way back to sanity in Orthodox Judaism.
Have you ever wondered why Mom/Dad and Grandma/Grandpa never checked vegetables and fruits the way your (or anyone else's) Rabbi instructed you?
Did you ever see a shiur announced on the subject of kashering your dental fillings for Pesach and wince at the very thought?
Did anyone ever tell you that you are absolved of responsibility for your actions beyond asking a competent Rav a she'eila and following whatever he tells you?
Did you ever wonder how the Rambam's 13 principles can possibly be the last word on Jewish theology when so many people around you ask the angels to bless them on Friday nights?
Have you ever heard someone say that Halakha never changes and wonder how that same person sends his daughter to a school that teaches chumash ... which is prohibited by the Shulhan Arukh?
The purpose of this blog is to help readers navigate their way through Rabbinic literature and discover things their Rabbi may never have told them.
The author of this blog will rarely take his own positions, but will reference readers to sources they may never otherwise have seen.
Feel free to contact me at chuckblog61@gmail.com if you have a specific issue you'd like addressed.
Chuck
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wow- a real breath of fresh air. keep it up
ReplyDeleteDear Rabbi Chuck,
ReplyDeleteKeep up the good work!
Please do! I am baales teshuva and went into the yeshivish world in the U.S.... after aliyah I found myself in the chareidi community. I left that after the shtuyot was too much to bear.. shtuyot that came at the expense of emmet and before treating your fellow Jews with any amount of dignity and respect. I am now a more machmir modern orthodox and I live by this: I will not allow political, dysfunctional Jews (of any religious/political sect) to turn me away from Torah. Torah isn't owned by the dysfunctional and power hungry to use a weapon against others to dispell their fears, nor to do whatever they want with it. It is studied by them, just as it is studied by other religious Jews. We all have a say in authentic Torah learning and it's meanings. The temple wasn't destroyed because a lady had an inch of hair sticking out of her snood... nor because we didn't properly chase invisible crumbs on Pesach. It was destroyed because of corrupted rabbis and sinat chinam. We can only begin to rebuild the temple by rectifying the problem! Well done for this initiative and I hope top read moe here soon!
ReplyDeleteMuch luck to you and may we enjoy a lot of enlightment and genuine erudition here!
ReplyDeleteGood work!
ReplyDeleteI think this will help those who are confused about a lot of things.
I'd like to see you addressing the problem of last Tishrei where they had (in Me'ah She'arim) woman walking only on one side of the street while men were allowed only on the other side.
Simple answers to your questions:
ReplyDelete1) Have you ever wondered why Mom/Dad and Grandma/Grandpa never checked vegetables and fruits the way your (or anyone else's) Rabbi instructed you?
--> Today's climates are much more prone to insect infestation than yesteryear's
2) Did you ever see a shiur announced on the subject of kashering your dental fillings for Pesach and wince at the very thought?
--> If hot chometz (pizza, spaghetti, etc.) touched the metal fillings, why shouldn't they need to be kashered?
3) Did anyone ever tell you that you are absolved of responsibility for your actions beyond asking a competent Rav a she'eila and following whatever he tells you?
--> Not sure at all what you're refering to
4) Did you ever wonder how the Rambam's 13 principles can possibly be the last word on Jewish theology when so many people around you ask the angels to bless them on Friday nights?
--> Many people following the GRA's minhag don't say the "ברכוני לשלום"
5) Have you ever heard someone say that Halakha never changes and wonder how that same person sends his daughter to a school that teaches chumash ... which is prohibited by the Shulhan Arukh?
--> The halacha is not to teach them the Torah itself, but definitely we have to teach them Emuna u'Bitachon, learned from the Chumash.
To Anonymous' simplistic answers I point out the following:
ReplyDelete1) please cite entomological resarch.
2) Did mom/dad, grandma/grandpa kasher their dental fillings? Do YOU kasher your dental fillings between meat and milk? If you ate heter mechirah produce (heaven forefend ... by accident of course), would you need to kasher your fillings? The answer to your question is to be found in Chaim Perlman's (the Belgian philosopher) book JUSTICE. See p. 9 where he writes, "According to a great many writers, the law draws its authority from the source whence in emanates. The least contested source of moral and jidicial norms is custom." Not frum enough a source? See Professor Rabbi Daniel Sperber's Minhagei Yisrael, vol 2. pg 16. Still not frum enough for you? See Darchei Tshuva 89:11 whose rules that their is no need to kasher fillings because "I've never heard or seen anyone concerned about this." He also adds that there are three factors to support this: the fillings do not absorb food particles (duh), the food you eat is generally from a kli sheni (double duh), the food you eat is not yad soledet bo (triple duh ... three obvious factors and the frummies are out).
3) stay tuned
4) And? ... I guess if so many people don't hold like the GR"A then Rambam's 13 principles are indeed not the final word.
5) Even the "frummest" schools teach chumash. And that's against the Shulkhan Aruch. Period. At any rate, emunah is can not be taught. It can not acquired through a cognitive process. Knowledge can. But that's the subject of another long posting.
Comments to Anonymous - (Why are you anonymous anyway?)
ReplyDeleteIt is of course sad that kashering fillings actually enters your mind on any level. sounds like a perfect chumrah of the month club bad selection.
Thank you Chcuk for your insights. Keep it up.
By the way I do have an answer for why there is a need for mehadrin busses. just ask my daughter who had to move from her seat on a non mehadrin bus because a charedei man sat next to her and started feeling up her leg! she would have made a scene but she somehow found a way to pity him! and who would believe a 22 year old girl over a 60 year old man? busha.
Ruthie