Tuesday, July 22, 2025

Translating the Igros Moshe or summarizing it

Igros Moshe (YD III #91) Question: Publishing a sefer with translations and final halacha from the Igros Moshe Answer I heard that someone is publishing a sefer in English citing the rulings from my Igros Moshe. It is clearly forbidden even if the translation is accurate.. Today there is no one who is able to publish halachic rulings without a clear explanation and sources. People have previously requested from me for permission to do this. I replied to them that I will not give permission. In addition I am concerned that it my words will not be described properly. There are many ways to err or to cause others to err. Even to translate the entire teshuva, it is obviously problematic to give to the unlearned masses material to make incorrect deductions and comparisons. I therefore strongly protest with the strongest protest against this.

The background to the tshuva. 

Rabbi Aharon Rakefet had written an index to the first 5 volumes which he summarized in English in the Introduction. Rav Moshe found out about it and mistakenly thought he was making a summary of the Igros in English or a new shulchan Aruch based on Rav Moshe's teshuvos. R Rakefet's index was never published except for his introduction in his pamphlet for Russian Jews [Rakafot Aharon page 58-71]. In fact this English introduction briefly summarized the Igros. Later a Sefer on Hilchos Shbbos was published which took the psakim of Rav Moshe summarized in English with those of the Debreciner and it had the written haskoma of Rav Moshe. Rabbi Goldberger wrote Rav Moshe asking him to explain his lenient attitude towards the latter and his extremely harsh attitude to the former (Rav Moshe had stated he was willing to go to court to stop its publication). The resulting tshuva was actually a composite tshuva - according to Tendler. A reply to Rabbi Goldberger's question and a general discussion about psak and in particular his own in the Igros Moshe.

1 comment :

  1. So people shouldn't study teshuvos at all, unless they are doing so under shimush for a poseq.

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