I was just informed of a major dispute in America concerning a person from an established family of cohanim who wants to marry a giyores.
There are major rabbis on both sides
Rav Moshe wrote a number of tsuvos on the matter
E.H I # 11, E.H, IV #16, OH V #3,EH I #25, EH IV 47, YD I #158
https://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/4045946/jewish/Why-Cant-a-Convert-Marry-a-Kohen.htm
When the Torah forbids a marriage, it is never because one party is not good enough for the other. It is because the parties are not matched to each other. They are simply not soulmates. In the case of the Kohen and the convert, their soul dynamics clash, their spiritual energies contradict, and so they can't marry.
Traditions as old as Feng Shui or Vastu Shastra ensure that the geographical direction in which we sleep affects our health. Is this possible?
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/400504
The gleam in Rav Tzvi Yehuda Kook's eyes sparkled with extra warmth when he met with students from abroad who he hoped would move to Israel. When a Jew lives in Israel, his whole life is a mitzvah. A mitzvah which is equal in weight to all of the mitzvot of the Torah.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c2ld084z8jjo
Lachan is thought to be more conservative than his siblings and would preserve the legacy of his media brands.
From the 1960s, Mr Murdoch built a global media giant with major political and public influence.
His two companies are News Corporation, which owns newspapers including the Times and the Sun in the UK and the Wall Street Journal in the US, and Fox, which broadcasts Fox News.
Berachos (5b) Abba Binyamin would say: All of my life I have taken great pains with regard to two things: That my prayer should be before my bed and that my bed should be placed north to south.
Mishneh Torah (The Chosen Temple 7:9) At all times, a person may not defecate or sleep [with his body positioned] between the east and the west. It is superfluous to state that one should not place a toilet between the east and the west in any place [throughout the world,] for the Temple is in the west. Therefore, one should not defecate to the west nor to the east, for it is opposite the west. Rather, we should always defecate and sleep [with our bodies] to the north and south.
Shulchan Aruch (Orach Chayim 3:6) Likewise, it is forbidden to sleep from west to east, if one's wife is with him. And it is proper to be cautious even when one's wife is not with him.
According to kabbala, it is actually the width of the bed which should be positioned from north to south and the length of the bed which should be positioned from east to west.[12] This arrangement is based on kabbalistic considerations relating to the placements of the "sefirot."[13] Although a number of authorities have attempted to resolve this blatant contradiction,[14] it is simply irreconcilable.[15] Even though as a general rule, whenever there is a dispute between halacha and kabbala we are to follow halacha,[16] a number of authorities feel that in this particular situation the kabbalistic approach should be followed.[17] Some authorities suggest that the whole issue of how one should position one's bed all depends on one's geographical location in the world in relation to Jerusalem.[18]
Rabbi Freifeld told me that for the bed in a room in a house it doesn't matter
Israel’s military entered a demilitarized buffer zone in the Syrian-controlled Golan Heights on Sunday aiming to head off any threat from the insurgency that has toppled Syrian dictator Bashar Assad, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated.
“We will not allow any hostile force to establish itself on our border,” Netanyahu said.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2024/12/09/daniel-penny-trial-verdict-not-guilty/
Penny, a 26-year-old White man, was not immediately charged in the death of Neely, a 30-year-old Black man who had been struggling with drug addiction, mental illness and homelessness. Protesters and lawmakers called for his arrest after a video of him holding Neely in a minutes-long chokehold was widely disseminated. Penny turned himself in 11 days after Neely was killed.
The case sparked discussions on public safety, race relations and New York’s handling of homelessness and mental health problems. Penny’s defense centered on the claim that he acted to protect other subway passengers from Neely, leading him to become a conservative symbol for citizen crime fighting.
Former Marine Daniel Penny was acquitted Monday of a homicide charge for choking a homeless man on a New York City subway in a case that prompted a national debate over the line between self defense and vigilantism.
A Manhattan jury found Penny, 26 years old, not guilty of criminally negligent homicide in the killing of Jordan Neely, a 30-year-old Michael Jackson impersonator with a history of mental illness.
After several days of deliberation last week, jurors were deadlocked on second-degree manslaughter, a more serious charge that would have required they find he acted recklessly—as opposed to with negligence—and caused Neely’s death. A judge granted prosecutors’ request to dismiss that charge so that jurors could move on to deliberations on the lesser offense.
Igros Moshe (Y.D. 1:101): My dear friend you ask how is it possible to rely on new views such as I have expressed, in particular when they are against certain Achronim? Do you think that there is an end and limitation – G‑d forbid! – to Torah? Do you think that contemporary halachic decisors can only express the views that have previously been published? Do you feel that if a question comes up that has not been previously discussed and published in a book - that we should not issue an opinion - even though we understand the issue and are capable of expressing an opinion? In my humble opinion it is prohibited to say such a thing. There is no question that it is still possible for Torah to expand and develop even in our times. Therefore there is an obligation for all those who are competent to make halachic decisions, to rule on all matters that come to them to the best of their ability after solid research in the Talmud and poskim with the use of clear reasoning and proper proof. Even if this results in something new which has not been previously been discussed in the halachic works. Furthermore even if this has been previously been discussed, there is no question that a posek needs to understand it fully and to clarify it in his mind before he issues a ruling. He should not issue a ruling simply because he saw an authoritative source expressing such an opinion. This is the same as poskening mechanically from one’s notes that the gemora (Sotah 22a) condemns: Tanaim who teach halacha from their notes [without paying attention to the reasons behind them] destroy the world (see Rashi). Even if these rulings are occasionally against the views of Achronim - so what? There is no question that we have the right to disagree with Achronim and also sometimes against particular views of certain Rishonim when we have clear-cut analysis and especially also correct reasons. On such matters our Sages (Bava Basra 131a) say, “A judge can only rely on what he sees” [see the gemora with the Rashbam]. This ability to disagree is in those situations where the ruling doesn’t go against the well known decisors of the Shulchan Aruch whose views have been accepted everywhere. On a related matter it is said, “They have left us room to be creative.” This is in fact the approach of the majority of the responsa literature of the Achronim when they decide practical halachic issues. However one should not be arrogant in making halachic rulings and it is necessary to show restraint as much as possible. However in a situation of great need and surely in a situation where a woman is an agunah as in our present case – there is no question that we are obligated to make ruling when it seems that we have the basis for a permissive judgment. Furthermore it is prohibited for us to have humility and cause a Jewish woman to remain an agunah or to cause someone to violate a prohibition or even to cause someone to lose money. Study Gittin (56a) where it says that the humility of R’ Zechariya ben Avkulas caused the Temple to be destroyed. Why does the gemora blame his humility? What does this have to do with his humility? Study the Mahretz Chajes who gives a proper explanation to the matter. This is truly in agreement with what I have said. Therefore we are forced to make halachic rulings in practice when we have convincing proofs and clear understanding and especially in cases of agunah such as this. We need to remove the pitfalls.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-uses-image-of-jill-biden-in-creepy-attempt-to-sell-cologne/
President-elect Donald Trump used an image of himself and first lady Jill Biden attending the reopening of Notre Dame cathedral in Paris over the weekend to hawk the latest line in his seemingly never-ending list of Trump-branded products. Taking to Truth Social on Sunday, Trump announced the launch of his new line of perfumes and colognes, dubbed, “Fight, Fight, Fight,” because, according to Trump, “they represent us WINNING.” The product’s website, states: “This scent is your rallying cry in a bottle.” The photo of Biden and Trump was taken during a ceremony to mark the re-opening of the landmark in central Paris on Dec. 7. The first lady, sitting one seat away from Trump, can be seen talking to him, with what appears to be a smile on her face. In the caption of the Trump post, it reads, “A FRAGRANCE YOUR ENEMIES CAN’T RESIST!” Biden has so far made no comment on Trump’s post, though Trump told the New York Post that the chat between the pair was, “very nice. She couldn’t have been nicer.” He added: “She was very nice and we had a very nice conversation.” Trump’s cologne—or women’s perfume—retails at $199 a bottle.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-vows-to-deport-us-citizens-in-new-immigration-policy/
Trump told Meet the Press‘ Kristen Welker that he wanted to avoid the family separation scandal that plagued his first administration. But to do so, he said, will require mixed-immigration families—those with undocumented immigrants with children who are U.S. citizens—to leave together.
“I don’t want to be breaking up families, so the only way you don’t break up the family is you keep them together and you have to send them all back,” he said.
In a statement reported by The New York Times, Cheney responded to Trump’s claims, describing them as an “assault on the rule of law and the foundations of our republic.”
“Here is the truth: Donald Trump attempted to overturn the 2020 presidential election and seize power,” Cheney said. “He mobilized an angry mob and sent them to the United States Capitol, where they attacked police officers, invaded the building and halted the official counting of electoral votes. Trump watched on television as police officers were brutally beaten and the Capitol was assaulted, refusing for hours to tell the mob to leave.”
“This was the worst breach of our Constitution by any president in our nation’s history,” she continued. “Donald Trump’s suggestion that members of Congress who later investigated his illegal and unconstitutional actions should be jailed is a continuation of his assault on the rule of law and the foundations of our republic.”
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2024/12/06/pete-hegseth-defense-religion-christian-00192117
Hegseth represents an old-school and still powerful soldier archetype: white, masculine and God-fearing. According to 2019 Department of Defense data, approximately 70 percent of active duty service members are Christian. It’s the people who look, talk and pray like Hegseth who are most receptive to his tirades against the military’s elevation of women to combat roles, a fierce and largely unresolved debate thanks to a limited and conflicting tranche of research on the topic. Hegseth frames the issue in extreme and unfounded ways, asserting that integration destroys morale and loses wars, when, in fact, women have been serving in productive military roles for more than 200 years. Hegseth derides DEI and CRT initiatives for similar reasons, calling them discriminatory ideologies that “turn off the young, patriotic, Christian men who have traditionally filled our ranks.”
