Tuesday, July 17, 2018
Sunday, July 15, 2018
More Analysis of Rabbi Greenblatt's Heter
A core group of people have figured out virtually the entire outline of how the Heter for Tamar Epstein to remarry came about. It took years, finesse, a team of people in America and in Eretz Yisrael to piece it together, and Siyata D'shmaya. I give Hakaras HaTov to all who've contributed to discovering the details in an effort to strengthen the Torah.
Rabbi Greenblatt gave the Heter. To do so, he compared the case involving Aharon Friedman and Tamar Epstein to a theoretical model. Since the Friedman-Epstein case matched the model, in the Rabbi's estimation, then the Heter was issued.
There is a basis to attack the model on multiple fronts. In a previous post I demonstrated that the model leads to absurdity. I'm going to focus here on demonstrating that the model does not seem consistent with requirements for a true Mekach Taus.
Once I show the model is invalid, it follows that the Friedman-Epstein case, even if it follows the model, does not merit the issuing of a Heter to Tamar Epstein to remarry.
Let's first examine the model.
Take the case of a Jewish man and woman who get married with valid Kiddushin.
After the marriage takes place the husband manifests speech and behavior that causes the wife to want a divorce.
Nevertheless, she stays in the marriage.
At some point, her husband has contact on some level with a mental health professional. The professional diagnoses the husband with a mental illness.
The professional determines that
-the husband's condition is incurable
-the wife was unaware that her husband had an incurable mental illness before she married him
-she only became aware of her husband's condition after the marriage
-she leaves immediately after realizing her husband has the condition.
This is a model of Mekach Taus. The wife says that the marriage was based on a mistaken premise. In this case, the presumption she had was that her husband did not have a mental illness as defined by mental health professionals. Had she known her husband had a mental illness as diagnosed by a doctor, then she would not have married the man.
I say that that this model is fundamentally flawed.
Let's examine why.
Mental health professionals generally make mental illness diagnoses through observations of someone's behavior and speech.
Therefore, there is nothing about the husband's behavior and speech that the professional observes that the wife did not also observe. For example, if the husband mumbles incoherently, the doctor notes it. The wife also notes it.
And if the wife happens to miss it, than it can't be a basis for her making a claim of Mekach Taus anyway.
Thus, the entire cluster of symptoms that led to the diagnosis was known to the wife while she continued to live with her husband.
The only thing that the doctor's diagnosis does is give that collection of symptoms a name. The condition, though, is well known to the wife before that.
You might say, though, that the wife was unaware that the condition was considered incurable by mental health professionals.
But it is generally known that mental health professionals use the term "treat mental mental illness", not "cure mental illness". Thus, mental illness, as defined by mental health professionals, is incurable.
To summarize: the wife did not become aware of her husband's condition when she received the diagnosis. The woman was aware she was living with a man with behavior and speech that made her realize she wanted a divorce for quite awhile.
The argument could be made that the wife only knew her husband was "strange", but not "ill". I say that that distinction is irrelevant. The way mental health professionals diagnose people is on a spectrum. According to the mental health profession, virtually everyone suffers from mental illness. "Strangeness" is not far from "illness" and vice-versa within much of the universe of the mental health profession. Anyone requiring proof of this need only research how historical figures are routinely retroactively diagnosed with mental illness by forensic mental health professionals. Even the President is not spared such armchair diagnoses.
Thus, the model fails, I think, because it's difficult to find a case where a wife doesn't stay with her husband for a while after becoming aware that her husband has what mental health professionals describe as an incurable, pre-existing mental illness. The only thing she may have been unaware of was the name that the mental health professionals assign to the behavior and speech she was observing.
Perhaps the model would not be internally inconsistent in a case where a husband spontaneously and with no basis accuses his wife of trying to kill him and she runs out of their home never to return. If a mental health professional diagnosed the man with a pre-existing incurable mental condition that the wife was unaware of until her husband accused her, then the wife might have a case of bona fide Mekach Taus.
Yet Rabbi Greenblatt's position is that most women would not marry a man "L'chatchila" who will eventually be diagnosed by a professional with an incurable pre-existing mental illness. He gives no weight to how the man's speech and behavior actually affects the marriage. Whether the man goes stark raving mad, or whether he acts and speaks in a way where the wife puts up with it for years, it's all the same to Rabbi Greenblatt.
Understanding Personality Disorders with Dr Nachum Andrew Klafter, MD
I am a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst. I specialize in treating adolescents and adults with complex psychological disorders, for whom less intensive treatments have not been successful. Another major aspect of my professional work is providing supervision for psychotherapists who wish to deepen their psychotherapy technique. I have provided supervision to therapists in North America, Israel, and Europe.
I have provided forensic evaluations and delivered expert testimony for plaintiffs and defendants in cases involving psychiatric and psychotherapy malpractice, competency and guardianship, and psychological damages associated with personal injuries. I have also provided expert testimony for civil Jewish law proceedings in Jewish religious courts (Batei Dinim).
I have spoken at numerous professional conferences and have delivered psychotherapy training seminars regionally, nationally, and overseas
Specialties: Psychoanalysis, Psychotherapy, Psychopharmacology, Adolescents, Psychotherapy Supervision, and Forensic Consultation
Deadly Choices about vaccination
The year 2011 is starting out rather promisingly, at least from the point of view of science-based medicine. Its beginning coincides with the release of two — count ’em, two! — books taking a skeptical, science-based look at vaccines and, in particular, the anti-vaccine movement. First off the mark is a new book by a man whom the anti-vaccine movement views as the Dark Lord of Vaccination, sitting up in Barad-dûr(apparently the University of pennsylvania and Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia), a man utterly reviled by anti-vaccine quacks everywhere, Dr. Paul Offit. He has been subjected to considerable bile and harassment due to his simply standing up for the science behind vaccines. The book is entitled, appropriately enough, Deadly Choices: How the Anti-vaccine Movement Threatens Us All. Also being released is a new book by Seth Mnookin entitled The Panic Virus: A True Story of Medicine, Science, and Fear. Mnookin is a contributing editor at Vanity Fairand whose work has appeared in numerous publications. Because I got a copy of Deadly Choices before my copy of The Panic Virus arrived, I decided to review Deadly Choices first; after I’ve managed to read The Panic Virus, I’ll write a review of it as well. Both books are arrows shot at the heart of the pseudoscience and fear at the heart of the vaccine manufactroversy, and it might well be useful to compare and contrast the two once I’ve finished The Panic Virus.
In the meantime, let’s take a look at Deadly Choices, an excellent, well-researched book with which I have relatively few disagreements. It is a followup to Dr. Offit’s last book, Autism’s False Prophets: Bad Science, Risky Medicine, and the Search for a Cure, which I reviewed back when it first came out. In contrast to Autism’s False Prophets, which concentrated primarily on the manufactroversy that claims that vaccines are responsible for the “autism epidemic,” Deadly Choices steps back to take a broader look at the anti-vaccine movement. Regular readers of SBM hardly need to be reminded how pervasive and dangerous the modern-day anti-vaccine movement has become. Indeed, it is a frequently discussed theme of this blog, given that the anti-vaccine movement is such a major force among the forces that deny the efficacy of scientific medicine and seek either to replace it with unscientific or pseudoscientific “alternatives” or to “integrate” pseudoscience into science-based medicine. Indeed, anti-vaccine sentiment infuses large swaths of what we refer to as “complementary and alternative medicine” (CAM), be it chiropractic, homeopathy, traditional Chinese medicine, or a wide variety of other modalities and systems.
In examining the modern anti-vaccine movement, Dr. Offit structures his book into three major sections. First, beginning in a chapter entitled The Birth of Fear, Dr. Offit begins with a description of the birth of the modern anti-vaccine movement, which in the U.S. Dr. Offit traces, in large part, to the broadcast of an irresponsible and anecdote-driven news documentary about the diphtheria-pertussis-tetanus (DPT) vaccine in 1982, and in the U.K. to a scare about the DPT triggered by a presentation by Dr. John Wilson to the Royal Society of Medicine about horrific complications thought to be due to the pertussis vaccine in the DPT. Next, Dr. Offit goes back into history to describe the development of the anti-vaccine movement in the 1800s in England and notes parallels with the modern day anti-vaccine movement. Finally, the story shifts back to today, where he describes the situation now, how demands for vaccines turned into fear of vaccines, and what we might do about it.based medicine./
US indicts 12 Russians for hacking DNC emails during the 2016 election
guardian
A dozen Russians were criminally charged on Friday with hacking and leaking the emails of senior Democrats during the 2016 presidential election campaign.
Grand jury indictments against the 12 alleged Russian intelligence officials were announced by Rod Rosenstein, the deputy US attorney general, at a press conference in Washington.
The indictment says Clinton’s personal office was targeted for the first time on 27 July 2016 – hours after Trump called on Russian hacker
US intelligence agencies concluded that the accounts were hacked as part of a wide-ranging operation ordered by Putin to damage Clinton’s bid for the presidency and assist Trump’s campaign.
Trump has consistently tried to cast doubt over the conclusions of the intelligence agencies that he now controls, and highlighted denials from Putin about the election interference. He continued on Friday to dismiss Mueller’s inquiry as a “witch-hunt”.s to find her emails.
The indicted Russians were on Friday also accused of hacking into the computer systems of American state election authorities and of companies that produced software used by states for running elections. Rosenstein said there was no evidence of any vote tallies being affected.
The Russians used techniques including “spearphishing” and spying software, before publishing the emails through well-known online accounts including Guccifer 2.0 and DCLeaks, which purported to be independent American and Romanian hackers. Rosenstein said both personas were in fact operated by the GRU.
In February this year, Mueller’s team filed criminal charges against 13 Russians and three Russian companies for interfering in the presidential campaign, using social media and coordinating with low-level Trump campaign activists.
Curtain GradientTabletTablet THE SCROLL ‘Business Insider’ Columnist Resigns After Publication Pulls Her Piece for Being ‘Culturally Insensitive’
tablet
On Friday, Daniella Greenbaum, a columnist for Business Insider, wrote a column about the recent controversy surrounding the actress Scarlett Johansson’s upcoming role as a transgender man. Some of Twitter’s loudest social justice warriors yelped that a nontransgender actor wasn’t allowed, according to the dogma of the high church of political correctness, to portray a transgender character, and Greenbaum wanted to present the far more reasonable view that an actor’s job is, well, just to act. Pretending to be someone else is literally the job description. It was about as anodyne an argument one could make; a few hours and a few hundred angry tweets later, however, the publication pulled it from print.
The reason, according to a note affixed to the no-longer-available column (you can read it here, courtesy of a different publication), is that the piece did not meet Business Insider‘s editorial standards. Just what those standards may be was confusing to some readers of BI, not an outfit routinely accused of journalistic excellence; to clarify things, the publication’s editor in chief, Nicholas Carlson, issued new guidelines earlier this week, saying that pieces pertaining to “culturally sensitive topics, such as marginalized communities, race, or LGBTQ+ issues,” will be handled with special care by several editors at the publication prior to being approved. “We should be as careful about culturally sensitive pieces as we are legally sensitive pieces,” Carlson wrote, “and this policy reflects that.”
Friday, July 13, 2018
dont learn from an unfit gadol
רמב"ם יד החזקה (כתב יד תימני) - הלכות תלמוד תורה פרק ד
(א) אין מלמדין תורה, אלא לתלמיד הגון, נאה במעשיו, או לתם. אבל אם היה הולך בדרך לא טובה, מחזירין אותו למוטב, ומנהיגין אותו בדרך ישרה, ובודקין אותו; ואחר כך מכניסין אותו לבית המדרש, ומלמדין אותו. אמרו חכמים, כל השונה לתלמיד שאינו הגון, כאילו זרק אבן למרקוליס, שנאמר "כצרור אבן, במרגמה; כן נותן לכסיל, כבוד" (משלי כו, ח), אין כבוד אלא תורה, שנאמר "כבוד, חכמים ינחלו" (משלי ג, לה):
(ב) וכן הרב שאינו הולך בדרך טובה, אף על פי שחכם גדול הוא וכל העם צריכין לו - אין מתלמדין ממנו, עד שיחזור למוטב, שנאמר "כי שפתי כוהן ישמרו דעת, ותורה יבקשו מפיהו - כי מלאך ה' צבאות, הוא" (מלאכי ב, ז), אמרו חכמים, אם הרב דומה למלאך ה' צבאות, תורה יבקשו מפיהו; אם לאו, אל יבקשו תורה מפיהו:
The ‘King’ of Shambhala Buddhism Is Undone by Abuse Report
In a shrine on the sixth floor of a Manhattan office building, a photo of a man in golden robes hangs above an altar. Another photo of him sits upon a throne.
He is the head of one of the largest Buddhist organizations in the West, Shambhala International, a network of more than 200 outposts in over 30 countries where thousands come for training in meditation and mindfulness and some delve into deeper mysteries.
The man is Mipham Rinpoche. He is known as the Sakyong, a Tibetan word that translates roughly as king, and his students take vows to follow him that are binding across lifetimes. These days, they are feeling sad, confused, angry and betrayed.
Late last month, a former Shambhala teacher released a report alleging that the Sakyong had sexually abused and exploited some of his most devoted female followers for years. Women quoted in the report wrote of drunken groping and forcefully extracted sexual favors. The report said that senior leaders at Shambhala — an organization whose motto is “Making Enlightened Society Possible” — knew of the Sakyong’s misconduct and covered it up.
The Sakyong apologized a few days before the report was formally released, admitting to “relationships” with women in the community, some of whom “shared experiences of feeling harmed as a result.” Followers and Shambhala groups around the world demanded more action.
On Friday, it came: The governing council of Shambhala International, which is based in Halifax, Nova Scotia, resigned en masse, “in the interest of beginning a healing
WATCH Trump at NATO 'Like Watching Psychiatrists With a Disturbed Child,' Says Ralph Peters
haaretz
WATCH
WATCH
Trump at NATO 'Like Watching Psychiatrists With a Disturbed Child,' Says Ralph Peters
U.S. President Donald Trump has caused much controversy following his meeting with his allies at the NATO summit in Brussels, discussing the future of NATO and the defense spending of the member states.
Lt. Colonel Ralph Peters, former strategic and military analyst for Fox News, slammed Trump in an interview on the CNN's "Anderson Cooper 360." He strongly criticized Trump's behavior saying that: "We're faced with the real, immediate and perhaps irreparable damage to this greatest of alliances, NATO." Peters continues, saying that "one thing that Trump is indisputably brilliant at is propaganda."
When talking about how the other NATO leaders dealt with Trump, he said, "It was like watching psychiatrists patiently deal with a disturbed child. Trump is not only shaming our nation, he is doing real damage to our security, to our interests and to our allies and Vladimir Putin could not be happier."Peters concluded with saying that Merkel is an "admirable leader, God knows I wish we had a leader like that ourselves, instead we have a fool for a president."Thursday, July 12, 2018
It’s Either A Fraud Or Black Magic – Either Way, It’s Assur By Dovid Tepper
Jewish press
Having followed the articles about energy healing over the last couple of weeks, I feel it is important to inform your readers of some facts that have not yet been discussed.
On Amazon.com, the description of Mr. Blum’s book, Ki Power: Healing Power at Your Fingertips, reads as follows:
“Imagine healing someone in minutes with the stroke of your hand or the touch of your toes. Imagine the warmth of your fingers eliminating bruises overnight. Imagine harnessing a power so great that it can be used to stop that pain and suffering of others. Now imagine that you could acquire such knowledge by training just a few minutes a day. Author Robert Blum, one of the world’s foremost experts on KI Power development, shows you how to cultivate internal power and then use it to instantly heal yourself and others.”
I don’t have to be a sceptic to realize that if I have to “imagine” something medical that my doctor has not heard of, and makes no sense scientifically, then it is probably imaginary. Blum tells us to “[i]magine harnessing a power so great…” What is this power? If it exists, surely it must have been discussed by scientists.
basis that Rav Greenblatt permits adultery by Joe Orlow
This is a follow up to my last email.
Yoni clarified why Rabbi Greenblatt cut off the conversation.
Apparently, Yoni had confronted Rabbi Greenblatt in person in the past. At that time, Yoni brought up that Rabbi Dovid Feinstein ruled against the remarriage. Apparently, Rabbi Greenblatt did not want to discuss the matter then.
Yoni brought up Rabbi Feinstein in this conversation in order to lead up to asking a question about the status of any children Tamar Epstein will have with Adam Fleischer before she receives a Get from Aharon Friedman. In particular, will the child be a Safek Mamzer.
What I think I sensed was the concern Rabbi Greenblatt has that Rabbi Dovid Feinstein ruled against the remarriage.
Rabbi Greeblatt writes in a letter published elsewhere on this blog a statement about mental health. He seems to assume that mental health professionals have an agreed upon list of mental illnesses. I assume he is referring to the contents of the DSM. He writes, if I understand him correctly, that the professionals have agreed upon which of these conditions are curable, and which are incurable.
I do not think that this is the case. I am not going to prove that here. I will say that the burden of proof is on Rabbi Greenblatt to demonstrate that his assertion is true. As far as I can tell, mental health professionals tend to talk in terms of treating mental illness, not curing it. Cf. https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/braintalk/201408/cure-mental-illness%3famp
Rabbi Greenblatt basically told me the following. Say a doctor diagnoses a man with an incurable mental illness, determines the illness pre-existed the man's marriage, and is confident that the man's wife was unaware of the condition at the time of marriage. Those circumstances are the basis for a Heter to annul a marriage.
Taken to a logical extreme, they are also the basis to effectively uproot the laws of Gittin.
Any woman can go to a psychiatrist and manipulate the psychiatrist into diagnosing her with an incurable, pre-existing, mental illness. Then, the woman can go to Rabbi Greenblatt, and ask him to annul her marriage. He will determine that it is unlikely her husband would have wanted to marry her if he had known she had such a mental illness.
For example, the woman could state to a psychiatrist that before she met her husband she was "hearing voices", feeling alternatively "depressed" for several weeks and "maniacal" for several weeks, and had an intense desire to kill herself. She can say she hid all this from her husband and/or all these conditions disappeared when she met her husband only to have them recur after the marriage; that is, she can say she is now back to hearing voices, the cycle of depression and mania, and having suicidal thought
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