Just talked with an individual who attended yeshiva for a number of years who told me "I have reviewed the Chovas Halevavos 50 times and I still don't know what bitachon is!"
When I asked Rav Noach Weinberg about publishing a sefer with diverse views on fundamentals. He said it was very important because of the widespread ignorance in yeshiva circles. But he cautioned. "You need to make a false pretense like I did when I spoke in Lakewood. They are confident they have the answers so I told them they need to know for the sake of kiruv."
Some learners say that argumentation is what learning is all about;
ReplyDeleteOthers say it's gaavah and apikorsus to argue against the books.
I came across this interesting rational explanation of the plague that hit the Israelites after eating the quail in the midbar:
ReplyDelete"The earliest known description of this condition appears in the Old Testament's Book of Numbers that records a plague suffered by the Jews during their exodus from Egypt after consuming large amounts of quail.4 The plague is widely assumed to be a reference to the signs and symptoms of myolysis, a long-observed outcome in the Mediterranean after the intake of quail.5,6 Myolysis seemingly occurs because of the poisonous hemlock that quail consume during the spring migration.7,8 In modern times, one of the first medical descriptions of rhabdomyolysis is in German medical literature from the early 1900s, where it is termed Meyer-Betz disease.9 Bywaters and Beall are often credited with the first account of the pathophysiologic mechanisms of the syndrome and the accurate depiction of the link between rhabdomyolysis and ARF."
The Quail feed on a poisonous plant called Hemlock, and this can cause problems in eating wild quail- very interesting, for those who accept rational eplanations of miracles.
Old story: talmid comes to his rebbe and says "Look, rebbe, I've been learning Torah all this time and I have come to the conclusion that I just can't believe in any of it. I have to become an apikorus."
ReplyDeleteThe rebbe looks at him and asks "How many years have you been studying?"
"Thirteen."
"Only thirteen years and you think you know enough to be an apikorus?"