Daas Torah - Chazon Ish's concern for an unbiased answer

Guest post

Hi R’ Eidensohn,

I enjoy your blog very much. I wanted to send this to you re: your recent posts about Daas Torah, especially since the Chazon Ish was used as an example…

I attached the relevant positions of Chazon Ish Emunah U’Bitachon for your convenience.

The Chazon Ish defines a Talmid Chacha as someone who is an expert in most of Shas to the point of Halacha Lema'aseh (see 3:23). This already precludes your average shul Rav or Rosh Yeshiva from the mix of Da’as Torah.

Further, the Chazon Ish writes (3:30) that the logic behind Emunas Chachomim is that a Talmid Chochom greatest concern is his own spiritual well-being, and therefore he will not alter the truth for money or for what people think.

He further differentiates between negius - partiality and shochad – bribery. Why is it that a Rov is allowed to rule on his own question of chometz sheovar alav haPesach no matter how valuable the merchandise is, while when judging, even one penny’s worth of bribery disqualifies him?

He explains that this is a gezeiras hakasuv - a chok that we do not understand.

My understanding of this is that when one is seeking advice, his worst enemy is his own bias. Finding someone to seek advice form who is above the bias would be wise and worthwhile. However, someone who is not educated or experienced enough to fully understand the matter at hand will be of no help no matter how little bias he has.

There is a story with R’ Chaim Brisker where his community was seeking a new chazon. They asked R’ Chaim to choose between on who had a good voice but not all the ma’alos listed in Shulchan Aruch and another who didn’t have such a melodious voice but had all the other ma’alos. R’ Chaim selected the one with the good voice because a good voice is essence of a chazzan where the ma’alos are just side benefits. So to, with an advisor. Knowledge and understanding of the matter at hand are the essence of someone who can give good advice.

Of course, hafoch ba vehafoch ba dekulah ba! Those on the level of having knowledge of worldly matters through Torah study can make fine advisors too.

Unfortunately, I have not encountered many people who are completely above being influenced by money. I heard from a Grandson of R’ Avigdor Miller who was close with Reb Moshe z”l who said that R’ Moshe praised R’ Miller as having this quality since he was not beholden to anyone. Any Rabbi who needs to fundraise etc. is beholden to many. Hence, their opinions may not be true da’as Torah.

   Chazon Ish Shochad

Daas Torah and gedolim - the stereotypic Chareidi view.

Guest post by A. Prager -This guest post was written as a response to  Gavriel Cohen's request for information about gedolim and Daas Torah. It represents a sincere - though mistaken - attempt to show the ancient roots of Daas Torah as well as the superiority of gedolim in all areas of knowledge. I originally thought of not publishing it - but then I realized that it in fact is representative of how many Chareidim actually view the matter. So showing the problematic proofs and citations will in fact help clarify the matter.

Basically I think this is a typical chareidi apologetic on the subject - but it is inaccurate. It cherry picks quotes and examples - as if they are representative of the set of all gedolim. It fails to note the common practice of gedolim to recommend the best secular authority - rather than give personal advice. In fact Rav Moshe Feinstein was adamant that when one goes to a doctor to use the best. 

Rav Shlomo Zalman Auerbach did not learn about electricity from the gemora, Rav Moshe Feinstein learned about medical and technical issues from secular experts, The Chazon Ish allegedly learned his medical knowledge from secular medical books. Rav (Sanhedrin 5b) noted, "I spent eighteen months with a shepherd in order to learn which was a permanent and which a passing blemish ?" Pesachim (94b) notes an instance where the scientific view of secular scholars is said to be superior to that of Chazal. There are many other examples.

Even the assertion he brings that all wisdom can be learned from Torah is not relevant. Rabbi Freifeld told me that while the statement is true - it is not known how to obtain the answers. This is similar to the Rambam noting that while Chazal had books of science - they have been lost and that therefore we learn science from secular sources.

update: A Prager responded:

Thanks for your response.

In my defense, I wasn't attempting to provide Gavriel with a balanced approach to the sugyah; I left out most of the relevant material that I have on the subject (8 pages of Mekoros).

All I was trying to prove was that the position that holds that gedolei hador are to be asked on issues other than halacha is most certainly  a valid one, with precedent in Rishonim and Achronim. I made that quite clear to him; he was asking if todays "gedolim culture" was an invention of a tradition that is not our own, an imaginary reality. I proved to him that that is not the case. The dissenting opinion was not of concern in that response.

 ==========================

Dear Gavriel,

The issue is fundamentally important. I have heard many people (choshuve ones too) referring to a lack of cogent and authoritative material that discusses the concept of Daas Torah.

The so-called paucity of sources on the subject has led some to reject the entire concept, as a modern innovation – just about as old as its terminology. I have heard this opinion voiced on a number of occasions and, as I hope you will see, this statement is far from accurate, and fallacy due to lack of knowledge, and also (I sadly suspect) a desire to be liberated from the confines of an imposing Rabbinic authority. It is indeed true that the term daas Torah is a contemporary coinage, but its idea spans back much further:

Let’s start at the beginning. I am presenting you with an argument which I do not feel is enough advanced because there is a lack of awareness of its potency and authenticity. 

Is there such a thing as Gedolim?

Well, the answer is obviously yes. The Gemara is replete with references to Gedolim and Gedolei Olam. Your question pertains more to who they are, and what they can and are expected to know.

If you’re looking for sources though, there are many but see: Pesachim 70b and Kesubos 10b.

What can a Gadol b’Torah Know? Is it Accessible for us?

In three places the Gemara refers to the all-encompassing knowledge of Talmidei Chachomim, and ascribes the sources of their wisdom to Yiras Shomayim: regarding the knowedge of the shiur of time it takes to perform biah (Sotah 4b); a specific knowledge of the pain suffered from a certain ailment (Sotah 10a) and the ability to distinguish between pure and impure blood through the sense of smell (Niddah 20b). See also Berachos 58b that Shmuel knew the patterns and paths of the stars like he knew the streets of Nahardea.

The Chasam Sofer (Bava Basra 21a) writes explicitly that there is no need to study any other discipline other than Torah, since everything can be found in its words. Now, its significant that he wrote that; he’s writing that l’maase just over 150 years ago: that means he held that such knowledge (to the extent that it is required) is discernable and available:

חתם סופר מסכת בבא בתרא דף כא עמוד א

ושארי חכמות שצריך לרקחות ולטבחות לשמש אשת חיל תורת ה' לא יספיקו בילדי נכרי' כי הכל ימצא בתורה ההוגה בה לשמה זוכה לדברי' הרבה וכמ"ש רמב"ן בהקדמה לתורה

You will be familiar, I am sure, with the Mishna in Avos (5,22) “turn it over and over, for all is in it”, how do you understand this? Rabenu Yona there writes that all wisdom that is in the world can be found in the words of the Torah. Read his words in context, he’s explaining the Mishna’s injunction to turn it over (mull it through), in other words, we can get there: 

פירוש רבינו יונה על אבות ה,כב

הפוך בה וכו' – חזור על דברי תורה שכל חכמת העולם כלולה בה

The Mirkeves Hamishneh there has a similar approach:

מרכבת המשנה לר"י אלאשקר על אבות ה,כב

ועל כן אמר הפוך [בה] והפך בה. ואם לכאורה נראה שאין בה כל כך ענינים, אין זה כי אם מצד קוצר המשיג ועומק המושג, וכאמרו כי לא דבר רק הוא מכם (דברים לב, מז), ואם רק הוא מכם הוא (ירושלמי פאה א, א)...וג"כ רמז שאין צריך לאדם לאבד זמנו בשום חכמה חיצונית לפי שכל החכמות הם נכללים בתורה.

Again, the comments made are especially significant because they are made on this Mishnah which implies that we should delve into the Torah, because “all is in it”.

The Paas Hashulchan has a slightly different approach, which is that anything that one could ever need “for Torah” is found in it:

פאת השלחן בהקדמתו בשם רבנו הגר"א ז"ל

"כל החכמות נצרכים לתורתינו הק' וכלולים בה"

You are familiar, no doubt, with the account of the Chazon Ish who provided advice on how to perform a complex brain operation which was completed successfully. Significantly, the Chazon Ish demonstrated erudite knowledge of the anatomical structure of the brain and how to perform an operation thereon. The surgeon at first rejected the Rabbis advice, but reticently followed the patients wishes to perform the operation according to the instruction of the Chazon Ish, which was successfully completed. The procedure is known today in Israel as “the Karelitz procedure”. I enclose the diagram drawn by the Chazon Ish:

What I am trying to demonstrate, is that there is a strong basis to argue that the Gedolei Yisrael, have an ability to know and rule – even in our generation – on matters much wider than halacha. I have not tried to explain why this is the case.

The very same Chazon Ish in Igros writes that the distinction between kodesh and profane in the perception of the gedolim’s abilities was the hallmark difference between the pre-war reform and those that rejected reform. To say that the gedolim only have a right to make statements in the area of halacha is against the entire ethos of Yiddishkeit, he argues. A similar approach is taken by Rav Hutner in a fascinating essay first printed in the Jewish Observer, November 1977.

So is the approach new? No, it’s heavily based in Gemara, Rishonim, Achronim and Poskim. The term “daas Torah”, as you allude to, is new. I don’t know how familiar you are with between-the-wars Continental Jewish politics? I would suggest that it was due to the political tensions that emerged in pre-war Europe between the religious parties and their secular counterpart that was responsible for the coinage of the term. The novel term is the formalisation of a well-established concept, symptomatic of a political struggle, necessary to demonstrate the authenticity of a Politics guided by Gedolei Yisrael; a model we see practiced today in Israel. It became common usage, I think, for political reasons, but it was always there, just was more relevant to the world of philosophical theory than practice.

Lessons that Sanhedria Murchevet should learn from Nachlaot about abuse hysteria

Tablet Magazine  In the last few weeks, I have received a startling number of calls and emails regarding an ongoing crisis in Sanhedria Murchevet, a neighborhood in north Jerusalem where many—including some prominent rabbis and communal leaders—believe that an organized ring of criminals have been abusing, raping, and torturing Jewish children and have been doing so for a number of years. There is also widespread belief that the abuse is at least partially religiously motivated—that operating in the community’s midst is a cult, a ring of men and women who are subjecting the children to ritual torture.

Many of the people who have contacted me, however, did so because they believe that this is, at least to some degree, a case of mass hysteria; that a significant percentage (or even all) of the allegations, especially the most fantastic, may be unfounded; that innocent people may have been or will be accused; that an untold number of lives are being ruined; and that cases of actual molestation and/or abuse could potentially be obfuscated.

What is indisputable is that the community is in the grips of a devastating panic. The scope and severity of the allegations are continually increasing: More and more children are claiming (or are claimed) to have been abused; more and more people, including men and women in the neighborhood, are being accused of raping and abusing children. To those in the community, the influence and reach of the perpetrators seems terrifyingly limitless. The police are dismissed as inept at best, corrupt and/or complicit at worst.

I am here because I feel a responsibility to share some of what I learned when I spent more than a year investigating and reporting a similar and related case in a nearby Jerusalem neighborhood in 2012. I want to emphasize, from the outset, that I am not here to report the case; I am not here in any journalistic capacity. I have not conducted interviews. I have not done any significant reporting. I cannot make any firm claims about what is or is not going on in Sanhedria Murchevet—whether this is, in fact, a case of mass hysteria, on whether or not any of the allegations are founded.

But regardless of whether this is or is not a case of mass hysteria, those in the community (and beyond) must not ignore the lessons learned in past similar cases. The stakes cannot be higher. People died in the wake of what happened in Nachlaot. An 80-year-old woman was beaten with a crowbar and hospitalized, because she was believed to be a key member of a Christian missionary cult behind the abduction, torture, and rape of Jewish children. Many lives were destroyed. Children underwent corrective therapy for traumatic events that almost certainly did not happen—therapy that thereby created and reinforced that trauma. All these were needless tragedies born, ultimately, of misinformation. [...]

Schlesinger Twins: Rabbi Zalman Lent of Dublin writes support letter for Beth Alexander

Understanding Modernity and sexuality in the Orthodox community - a book review of "Body and Sexuality in the New Religious Zionist Discourse"

Marginalia   by Dr. Yoel Finkelman

There is no way to understand the fraught relationship between religion, Zionism, and Israeli culture without understanding how Religious Zionists talk and teach about sex and bodies. A book by two scholars with international reputations in philosophy, traditional Jewish sources, and sexuality promises insight into this vexed subject. Yet I put down this volume frustrated since the arguments advanced by the authors seemed to come at the expense of a fair and thorough analysis of representative sources.

The burgeoning subfield of works on sexual politics and discourse about the body has argued compellingly that sex does not occur exclusively between the sheets in the privacy of bedrooms but is tied up with society and politics. Communities form and regulate individuals’ bodies as part of broader attempts to form and regulate the body politic. American debates about abortion and same-sex marriage serve as the most obvious evidence of this. Naturally, then, one would expect Religious Zionism’s relationship with secular Zionism on its left and the non-Zionist ultra-Orthodox on its right to manifest in conversations about body and sexuality.[...]

Englander and Sagi argue that Religious Zionism must shift sharply away from the puritanical and toward openness and permissiveness when it comes to sexual discourse. Religious Zionist rabbis should end an obsession with women’s clothing and allow couples much greater freedom in family planning. Masturbation should be treated as a normal physical and psychological impulse and should be permitted or at least tolerated in Jewish law. They claim that Jewish law can permit homosexual relations, with the exception of full anal intercourse between men. Rabbinic restrictions stem from rabbis who chose puritanical stringencies to shore up their own power, even though, the authors claim, Jewish law contains resources that could permit what Englander and Sagi themselves advocate.[...]

Yet in spite of the appeal of some of its conclusions, Body and Sexuality misrepresents its sources and contains several serious errors. A book that purports to focus on sexual discourse in Religious Zionism during the first decade of the 21st century quotes prooftexts from as early as 1980 and marshals evidence from non-Zionist ultra-Orthodox websites and outreach workers. It offers learned explanations for why a statement of principles about homosexuality by a group of American Orthodox rabbis does not discuss lesbianism, when the text explicitly does. (Full disclosure: I am a signator on that statement.) Body and Sexuality tries to explain why rabbis permit women to go fully dressed to beaches, when some of the texts Englander and Sagi cite actually prohibit women from doing so and others strongly discourage it. The book offers explanations for why a well known moderate rabbi, Yuval Sherlow, rejects the study of Talmud for women, preferring to follow the tradition that views Talmud as a male endeavor. But Sherlow explicitly permits and encourages female Talmud study. Unfortunately, there are too many examples like this to write off as occasional mistakes.[...]

Body and Sexuality’s failure to offer a few points of comparison and contextualize the discussion within alternative visions of religious or secular sexuality sets up a false dichotomy. Either one adopts the ethic of what the authors call “modernity,” according to which virtually any kind of sexual expression is legitimate as part of an individualistically constructed self, or one is confined to the dogmas of rabbinic essentialism. Rabbis in online forums certainly attempt to imagine and police what normal or proper femininity looks like, but so do Cosmopolitan and Good Housekeeping, and their Israeli equivalents, as well as endless online forums for nonreligious, Christian, and Muslim youth. We shouldn’t think of “modernity” as involving a free and unregulated sexual discourse, as Englander and Sagi do. It is better characterized as involving numerous competing discourses and media that regulate sexuality differently and conceptualize their authority differently. In that context, rabbinic online discourse can be understood only as an attempt to carve out a place for Jewish norms in a competitive and crowded media environment. Comparison to these other discourses would offer a richer take on the Religious Zionist discourse, and are even essential to understanding what if anything is unique about these online responsa.[...]

Englander and Sagi do offer a chapter entitled “Real and Imagined Women in Religious Zionist Discourse,” in which they criticize the paternalism of rabbis who imagine what women are supposed to be rather than being sensitive to the experiences of the real women they encounter. Fair enough. But the chapter discusses the experiences of these real women without presenting data systematically gathered from real women. Instead, Englander and Sagi draw inferences from some questions asked by women in online forums, and they quote a few Orthodox feminist ideological leaders. More often they simply assume that real women oppose these rabbinic voices — that real women within the community are interested in Talmudic learning, want a voice in the traditionally male realm of Jewish legal decision making, have sexual drives which they do not want to or cannot subject to religious restrictions, reject the rabbinic voices that talk about them, and challenge rabbinic hegemony. No doubt, such women exist, but so do Religious Zionist women who disagree with all these points. A chapter on the experiences of real women should help us make sense of the whole range of ways in which Religious Zionist women understand their femininity.

Englander and Sagi sometimes quote Religious Zionist women who have internalized the essentialist conversation, view Talmud study as a male endeavor, and encourage their peers to remain in domestic roles. But Body and Sexuality does not use the adjective “real” to describe them. Instead, they suffer from “false self-consciousness” because “victims can sometimes internalize the attitude that is projected upon them and then spread that attitude among others.” Sagi and Englander’s gender imagery depicts women who challenge the patriarchy as real, and those who do not as less real. Ironically, two men write a book in which they criticize male rabbis for dictating to women what they must do and feel in order to be crowned with the title “modest women.” Yet, those same men seem to describe what women must feel and do in order to be considered “real women.” [...]

One could debate the ideal role of gender scholarship in bringing about social and political change, but scholarship must first describe a complex reality with as much accuracy, subtlety, and nuance as possible. Scholarship that presents its subjects as almost wholly negative and backwards cannot succeed at its academic task and weakens its political force as well. By excluding a proper discussion of the contexts where rabbis are more encouraging, where listeners agree with their rabbinic leaders, or where Religious Zionist Jews speak to one another without rabbinic intervention, Englander and Sagi present these rabbis and their female followers as puritanical, backwards, and misogynistic, when in fact the reality is more complex.[...]

The Palestinians of Yarmouk An Arab asks why there is only shameful silence when Israel is not to blame?

The Guardian    by Mehdi Hasan-   the presenter of al-Jazeera ­English's The Café. He was a senior editor at the New Statesman and a news and current affairs editor at Channel 4. He is co-author of Ed: the Milibands and the Making of a Labour Leader

Palestinian refugees are being starved, bombed and gunned down like animals. “If you want to feed your children, you need to take your funeral shroud with you,” one told Israeli news website Ynet. “There are snipers on every street, you are not safe anywhere.” This isn’t happening, however, in southern Lebanon, or even Gaza. And these particular Palestinians aren’t being killed or maimed by Israeli bombs and bullets. This is Yarmouk, a refugee camp on the edge of Damascus, just a few miles from the palace of Bashar al-Assad. Since 1 April, the camp has been overrun by Islamic State militants, who have begun a reign of terror: detentions, shootings, beheadings and the rest. Hundreds of refugees are believed to have been killed in what Ban Ki-moon has called the “deepest circle of hell”.

But this isn’t just about the depravity of Isis. The Palestinians of Yarmouk have been bombarded and besieged by Assad’s security forces since 2012. Water and electricity were cut off long ago, and of the 160,000 Palestinian refugees who once lived in the camp only 18,000 now remain. The Syrian regime has, according to Amnesty International, been “committing war crimes by using starvation of civilians as a weapon”, forcing residents to “resort to eating cats and dogs”. Even as the throat-slitters took control, Assad’s pilots were continuing to drop barrel bombs on the refugees. “The sky of Yarmouk has barrel bombs instead of stars,” said Abdallah al-Khateeb, a political activist living inside the camp.

It is difficult to disagree with the verdict of the Palestinian League for Human Rights that the Palestinians of Syria are “the most untold story in the Syrian conflict”. There are 12 official Palestinian refugee camps in Syria, housing more than half a million people. Ninety per cent, estimates the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (Unrwa), are in continuous need of humanitarian aid. In Yarmouk, throughout 2014, residents were forced to live on around 400 calories of food aid a day – fewer than a fifth of the UN’s recommended daily amount of 2,100 calories for civilians in war zones – because UNRWA aid workers had only limited access to the camp. Today, they have zero access.“To know what it is like in Yarmouk,” one of the camp’s residents is quoted as saying on the UNRWA website, “turn off your electricity, water, heating, eat once a day, live in the dark.”

Their plight should matter to us all – regardless of whether their persecutors happen to be Israelis, Syrians, Egyptians or, for that matter, fellow Palestinians (Palestinian Authority security forces, after all, have been shooting and beating unarmed Palestinian protesters for several years now).[...]

Let’s be honest: how different, how vocal and passionate, would our reaction be if the people besieging Yarmouk were wearing the uniforms of the IDF? Our selective outrage is morally unsustainable. Many of us who have raised our voices in support of the Palestinian cause have inexcusably turned a blind eye to the fact that tens of thousands of Palestinians have been killed by fellow Arabs in recent decades: by the Jordanian military in the Black September conflicts of the early 1970s; by Lebanese militias in the civil war of the mid-1980s; by Kuwaiti vigilantes after the first Gulf war, in the early 1990s. Egypt, the so-called “heart of the Arab world”, has colluded with Israel in the latter’s eight-year blockade of Gaza. [...]

Mendel Epstein Torture for Get trial - Judge Wolfson's final jury instructions

 

 Mendel Epstein Trial - Final Jury Instructions 4-14-15 
 

Rav Dovid Eidensohn - Shiur Wed night 9:30 26 Nisan 5775 Beginning of Even Heozer

Shiur in EH Wed night 9:30 PM to participate call 605-562-3130 then code 411161#

הכנות לשיעור בהוראה על אבן העזר #1 יום רביעי 9:30  בלילה כו' ניסן תשע"ה

1.     שולחן ערוך אבן העזר סימן א' סעיף א' הש"ע והרמ"א. ויש לדייק למה בחר הש"ע להביא גמרא שענינו פרו ורבו ולא מדבר על עצם הנישואין שהוא חשוב. והרמ"א מביא בענין הנושא אשה שזה גורם לו כמה מעלות טובות. דהיינו שהוא משבח  הזיוג ולא הפרו ורבו. והאמת שהמצוה בתורה של פרו ורבו הוא כמו שכתב הבית יוסף. אבל הרמ"א בא להוסיף שגוף הנישואין הוא מהפך האדם מלמטה למעלה על פי גמרות מפורשת. והם ב' ענינים נפרדים.

2.      וע' רע"א שם השיטות בחיובי הנשים בעניני פרו ורבו. והבית שמואל שם ס"ק ב' אם האשה חייבת בשבת דהיינו מי שקיים פרו ורבו שיש לו בן ובת ויש עוד חיוב לאנשים לערב את תנח את ידך שהוא שבת למלאות העולם באנשים ויש שיטות אם האשה חייבת בשבת הגם שאינה חייבת בפרו ורבו.

3.     ע' רמב"ם אישות פרק טו' סעיף טז' חיובי האיש בפרו ורבו להקים בן ובת עוד יש מצוה דרבנן להוסיף עוד ועוד נשמות בהעולם שזה נקרא שבת, עוד יש איסור לישב בלא אשה שמא יבא לידי הירהור. ומסיק הרמב"ם ולא תשב אשה בלא איש שלא תחשד עכ"ל משמע שבאשה אין חיוב פרו ורבו ואין מצוה לשבת ואין איסור הרהור רק שיש חשד אם אין לה בעל שמא היא עושה עבירות. ולכאורה זה ראיה גדולה לשיטת הרמב"ם בזה והבית שמואל ורע"א שעוסקים בזה לא מביאים ראיה זו מן הרמב"ם שאין האשה חייבת בפרו ורבו ובשבת ובאיסור הירהור רק יש לחוש לחשד. וגם זה מוכח ברמב"ם גופא שתלוי באיזה אשה שיש אשה שרוצה אישות והיא חשודה ויש אשה שלא רוצה להנשא ואינה רוצה בכלל בענין זה כה"ג ליכא איסור ע' לקמן בזה.

4.     הרמב"ם שם כתב הטעם לשבת שמוסיף נפש אחת בעולם ומקשה הרמ"ך שבגמרא לא נותן טעם זה אלא הטעם שיש פסוק בבוקר זרע את זרעך ולערב את תנח ידך יבמות סב ע"ב כי לא תדע הזה יכשר דחייש למיתת הראשונים ונמצא שלא קיים מצוה והוא נתן בכאן טעם משום תוספת נפש אחת וצ"ע עכ"ל

5.     וי"ל שלטעם הגמרא היה אפשר להעלות על הדעת שהעיקר הוא בן או בת ואם ימותו יש ענין לערב אל תנח להשלים ההפסד. ובא הרמב"ם לומר שזה טעות. שבכל נפש יכול להיות עולם מלא ואפשר שהשלישי יהיה טוב מן הראשונים ולא סתם כדמשמע קצת בגמרא שלערב הוא להשלים הראשון אלא צריכים לשמוח בכל לידה כאילו הוא עולם מלא ולא רק שיש תשלומין להראשון. ובודאי הלימוד שצריכים שבת הוא מן הפסוק שצריכים להמשיך. ובודאי אם יתעצל האדם בזה אפשר לומר לו מי יודע אם יתקיימו הילדים שהולדת. אבל העיקר בפרו ורבו לא רק לצאת ידי חובתו בפרו ורבו או שבת אלא העיקר בפרו ורבו לשמוח מזה על כל ילד שמביא להעולם שהוא כעולם מלא. ולא רק שאם ימות הראשון יהיה זה. ונ"מ שידוע שצער גידול בנים ממית האדם ודוקא על ידי מה שכתב הרמב"ם שישמח האדם בילד שהוא עולם מלא אפשר לו לישא העול הכבד של הילד. שלכן מביא הרמב"ם חוץ מן הפסוק שהעיקר לא לשמוח שמא ימות הבן ויהיה זה תשלומין לו אלא צריכים לשמוח שזכה לעולם מלא אפילו אם יתקיים הראשון. ושמחה זו עיקר גדול באמונה בגדלות הנשמה.

6.     והנה פעם ישב ילד על הכסא של הרב של ירושלים הגאון רבי יוסף חיים זאנענפעלד זצ"ל ונכנס הרב ולא רצה להפריע הילד ואמר הלא הילד הזה יכול להשיג מדרגות מדרגות ואילו אני כבר זקנתי ואין לי היכולת של הילד להיות כך וכך. והוא ענוה ועדיין יש בו אמת שעל כל ילד ועל כל צעיר צריכים לחשוב שהעולם לפניו וכל אחד יכול להשיג צדקת משה רבינו וכו'.

7.     וע' ברע"א על הרמב"ם אישות פרק טו' סעיף טז' שמביא קושיא על הרמב"ם מדבריו באיסורי ביאה פרק כא' הלכה כו' ורשות לאשה שלא תנשא לעולם ע"כ ופה  אומר ולא תשב אשה בלא איש שלא תחשד ע"כ והתירוץ מביא רע"א בשם פוסק אחד שמיירי בעיר שכולם נשים או סריסרים. והוא דוחק גדול.

8.     ולענ"ד התירוץ הוא שאם האשה היא כאשה רגילה שפעם היה לה בעל או שהיא משתדלת להנשא בזה יודעים שיש לה חשש חשד אם לא תנשא שהיא רוצה בדברים אלה. אבל אם יש אשה שמואסת בכל הענין מהיזה טעם ויודעים שאפשר לה להנשא ודוקא לא רוצה בזה מאיזה טעם למה מעלים על הדעת חשד עליה שודאי אשה כזאת אין חשד שהכל יודעים שהיא לא רוצה דברים הללו. וכן יכול להיות שהתשמיש קשה להם או הלידה ובפרט אם יודעים מזה שכה"ג אין חשש חשד.

When a Plane Seat Next to a Woman Is Against Orthodox Faith

NY Times   A growing number of airline passengers, particularly on trips between the United States and Israel, are now sharing stories of conflicts between ultra-Orthodox Jewish men trying to follow their faith and women just hoping to sit down. Several flights from New York to Israel over the last year have been delayed or disrupted over the issue, and with social media spreading outrage and debate, the disputes have spawned a protest initiative, an online petition and a spoof safety video from a Jewish magazine suggesting a full-body safety vest (“Yes, it’s kosher!”) to protect ultra-Orthodox men from women seated next to them on airplanes.

Some passengers say they have found the seat-change requests simply surprising or confusing. But in many cases, the issue has exposed and amplified tensions between different strains of Judaism.

Jeremy Newberger, 41, a documentary filmmaker who witnessed such an episode on a Delta flight from New York to Israel, was among several Jewish passengers who were offended.

“I grew up Conservative, and I’m sympathetic to Orthodox Jews,” he said. “But this Hasid came on, looking very uncomfortable, and wouldn’t even talk to the woman, and there was five to eight minutes of ‘What’s going to happen?’ before the woman acquiesced and said, ‘I’ll move.’ It felt like he was being a yutz,” Mr. Newberger added, using a Yiddish word for fool.

“I think that the phenomenon is nowhere near as prevalent as some media reports have made it seem,” said Rabbi Avi Shafran, director of public affairs at Agudath Israel of America, which represents ultra-Orthodox Jews. Rabbi Shafran noted that despite religious laws that prohibit physical contact between Jewish men and women who are not their wives, many ultra-Orthodox men follow the guidance of an eminent Orthodox scholar, Rabbi Moshe Feinstein, who counseled that it was acceptable for a Jewish man to sit next to a woman on a subway or bus so long as there was no intention to seek sexual pleasure from any incidental contact.

“The haredi men I know,” Rabbi Shafran said, using the Hebrew word for the ultra-Orthodox, “have no objection to sitting next to a woman on any flight.”

But multiple travelers, scholars and the airlines themselves say the phenomenon is real. The number of episodes appears to be increasing as ultra-Orthodox communities grow in number and confidence, but also as other passengers, for reasons of comfort as well as politics, push back.

“It’s very common,” said Rabbi Yehudah Mirsky, an associate professor of Judaic studies at Brandeis University. “Multiculturalism creates a moral language where a group can say, ‘You have to respect my values.’ ”[...]
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Update: Moe Ginsburg points out another perspective -  he writes:

Orthodox Jews are not the only people who ask for a seat change when boarding. In fact many people do and Orthodox Jews are a tiny minority of those that seek this accommodation:

NY Times  Airplane Seat Swapping Turns Rough-and-Tumble

For passengers in increasingly stratified plane cabins, the scramble for the right seat has become more intense than ever.

Just asking to switch remains a popular choice, but increasingly, frequent travelers say that fellow passengers are breaching long-established etiquette and simply plopping down in a seat of their choice.

“It’s a little bit of they don’t understand the value,” said Joanna Bloor, a consultant. “It is truly lack of an awareness that this is a transaction.” [...]

Turf wars over the limited real estate in a plane cabin, from the overhead bins to the armrests, have become more acute in recent years. And with airlines packing planes tighter and charging more for exit rows, for seats further up in the economy cabin or for seat selection at the time of booking, requests — or demands — to swap seats have taken on a new tenor.[...]

As a result, travelers who don’t want to pay extra for a preferred seat might need to ask a fellow passenger to swap. But frequent travelers say that there is a definite etiquette to this activity that infrequent travelers often violate.

A request is more likely to be granted if the person who wants to swap is willing to move further back in the cabin, or take a middle seat. Even so, asking is no guarantee.

“The problem is that a lot of these people have paid for these seats, or they’ve booked them far in advance and they don’t want to give them up,” said George Hobica, who runs the website Airfarewatchdog.[...]

Jewish Community Watch Brings an Evening of Awareness on Child Abuse Prevention to the Monsey Community

Jewish Community Watch (JCW) will host Child Abuse Awareness event at the  Crowne Plaza on Sunday, Rosh Chodesh Iyar

April 19th, 7:00 pm sharp at the Crowne Plaza, Suffern-Mahwah, 3 Executive Blvd Suffern, NY 10901

At a JCW awareness and education event this February in Cleveland, noted Askin Mendy Klein addressed the crowd on the topic of child abuse (CSA) “I have one word for it” he said, “It’s a Magaifa, it’s a disease”

JCW was founded over four years ago to fight that Mageifa. Through its educational activities and support for survivors, JCW and our community are turning the tide against abuse. Over the past six months, JCW has organized events in 5 cities drawing large crowd of parents, educators and abuse survivors to raise awareness for child abuse in our community and learn what Jewish Community Watch (JCW) is doing to combat it. In Miami, Brooklyn, Cleveland, Los Angeles and Aventura standing room only crowds have heard from rabbis, survivors and therapists.

Jewish community watch is advised by a group of prestigious rabbis, legal experts and mental health professionals.

At the upcoming JCW event in Monsey, speakers will include, Founder of JCW, Meyer Seewald, Abuse Survivors, Eli Nash, Community Policy Officer, Omar Olayan, Rabbis Ronnie Greenwald and YY Jacobson and Trauma Psychologist Dr. Norman Goldwasser.

Founder and CEO of JCW Meyer Seewald said: “The effects of abuse are devastating, it has the ability to not just scar a child emotionally but to also deeply injure his Neshoma. Abuse has driven too many in our community to severe depression, addictions, leave the Derech, failed marriages and deep emotional trauma which can last a lifetime. Abuse happens in our community just like all other communities – that is not the Chilul Hashem – the Chilul Hashem is when we don’t confront it. This event will be a major Kiddush Hashem. It will demonstrate the exceptionalism of our community which is doing everything to protect our children and support those who were hurt.

The day after a previous event, JCW received the following message from an attendee: “Last night’s event was probably the most important event I’ve ever been to. The honesty, rawness, humanity and bravery that was shown by every single speaker and survivor affected me so deeply I really can’t describe it. Eli, Meyer, and Baruch–who were so courageous in sharing their stories just saved countless lives. I have never been prouder to be Jewish than I was last night, when we all stood together and sent a message to the abusers and cowardly murderers that they will never again be free to lay a hand on anyone with the help of JCW.”

Event Details: 

Sunday, Rosh Chodesh Iyar, April 19th, 7:00 pm sharp at the Crowne Plaza Suffern-Mahwah 3 Executive Blvd Suffern, NY 10901

- See more at: http://www.theyeshivaworld.com/news/headlines-breaking-stories/301078/jewish-community-watch-brings-an-evening-of-awareness-on-child-abuse-prevention-to-the-monsey-community.html#sthash.7LwxUTfP.dpuf

Swiss working on electronic pedophile detector

http://www.sonntagszeitung.ch/read/sz_12_04_2015/nachrichten/DieVermessungdesGehirns32337

Google translation

Researchers at the University-Psychiatric Clinics Basel test a Pedophiles detector of convicted offenders and normal men. The objective is the detection of Child molesters Basel The windowless room in the basement of the Research Institute seems cool, but the walls are black, the lights glaring, are everywhere Equipment and computers. The researchers are working quietly and expertly. They wire the head and two fingers of Roland F. He is in Family an extraordinary experiment. At the end of the preparation put it on his 3-D glasses. Now you're set. Three Hours Experienced F. images on a screen. He sees scenes Children, women, men. Some naked. Measure the apparatus constantly, making him stimulated.

What sounds from a psychological thriller after a scene played out at the moment at the Wilhelm-Klein-Strasse in Basel from. At-University Psychiatric Clinic (UPK) experiment scientists a brain test to deviant sexual impulses of offenders to measure. Specifically, the researchers are hoping to identify pedophiles. If successful, this would be a turning point in the Court of Psychiatry, especially in the assessment of dangerous sex offenders.  Researchers in this area include the world's few pioneers.

The laboratory equipment in the hospital basement draw reactions in the brain of Subjects on. Sensors measure on the fingers when the Skin conductance increases. This happens when a subject is energized. Marc Graf, director of forensic psychiatric clinic in Basel Head of the research project. The Federal Office of Justice funded the two-year trial with half a million francs, the Northwest Swiss Ethics Committee has approved the experiment.

Parallel to the Baslern also prepare Zurich researchers such Brain tests before. Also they want to elicit pedophiles. There forwards Andreas Mokros of the Psychiatric University Hospital of the project. Also tested consumers of child pornography Machines, to recognize pedophiles - why? The engine for this Research was an unease about today's methods Assess dangerousness of offenders, both researchers say. Mokros explains: "It is difficult to ask pedophilic tendencies or measure if the subject is not willing to provide information. "

His colleague Basel Graf adds: "If we are an intelligent person during a course of therapy assured that he had no Children fantasies more, we do not know if that's true. "This support you look very heavily on the testimony of the offender and indirect Conclusions from observations of behavior in the therapeutic daily from. Penal experts know that there are offenders who in years Therapies learn to adjust to their therapists. The falsified reports and is dangerous. "The test we now develop, we hope that the objectivity of a finding significantly to improve. "

So far Graf's team tested 43 men in Basel, 20 convicted offenders and 23 normal citizens. The subjects are divided into three groups: In the first are offenders who consumed the Internet child pornography have. In the second, those convicted of child abuse are. 23 normal men form the third group. [...]

Rabbi Yoshiyahu Pinto Convicted of bribery

Arutz 7

The Tel Aviv District Court convicted Rabbi Yoshiyahu Pinto, head of the Shuvu Yisrael sect, on Tuesday morning, after he confessed to bribery as part of a plea bargain. 

Pinto arrived for his arraignment early Tuesday and signed a confession according to the terms of the plea bargain; he has been convicted on charges of bribery, attempted bribery and the obstruction of justice. 

The conviction follows multiple attempts by Pinto and his legal team to prevent him arriving in Israel for the arraignment, and a heart attack scare on Monday that led him to be taken to Ichilov Hospital in Tel Aviv upon landing. 

Pinto allegedly attempted to bribe senior police officer Ephraim Bracha with $200,000 for information about a pending police investigation into the Hazon Yeshaya charity organization, which Pinto was rumored to be closely involved with. Bracha immediately reported the incident to his superiors, prompting a separate investigation against Rabbi Pinto himself. [...]

Mendel Epstein torture for Get trial: Today - Tuesday - the defense will present closing statements

Asbury Park Press

Experienced in the violent art of coercing divorce decrees out of reluctant Orthodox Jewish husbands, Rabbi Mendel Epstein and his team of heavies knew the value of planning ahead, authorities allege.

Epstein, a resident of Lakewood and Brooklyn, New York, even discussed what to do should the husband suffer a heart attack on the ride back after being punched, kicked and tortured with a cattle prod.

“Take a right turn and let him die,” Epstein can be heard telling an undercover FBI agent.

The recording was one of several that figured prominently in the prosecution’s closing statement Monday here in U.S. District Court, where Epstein, his son, David Epstein, and two other rabbis are being tried on kidnapping-related charges.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Sarah Wolfe also replayed surveillance video showing members of Epstein’s “team” arriving at an Edison warehouse in 2013 wearing dark clothing and disguises, including a Halloween mask. One defendant covered his long whiskers with a plastic bag.

“These people were not here for a religious ceremony. There is nothing religious about this,” Wolfe told the jury of eight men and eight women watching the footage. “This is a kidnapping.”[...]

 

The trial, which has lasted for seven weeks, has included testimony from an alleged victim, Israel Markowitz, who said he was lured to Lakewood and beaten and shocked into submission in 2009.

Markowitz identified David Epstein as one of his attackers and the driver of the van.

The attorneys for Epstein and the other defendants — David Epstein, Rabbi Jay Goldstein and Rabbi Binyamin Stimler —are scheduled to make their closing statements Tuesday.

Rav Eliashiv: Denounces rabbis who force a Get

First  published 4/29/12