Wednesday, July 29, 2015

Rav Dovid Eidensohn: "Modern Orthodoxy" - Wed night July 29 9:30 telephone conference Shiur #13

call 605-562-3130  enter code 411161#

Jewry in general is filled with failure. “Most people sin with stealing.” “All Jews sin with Loshon Hora.” “Three sins everyone does every day: sinful thoughts, praying and being sure of being answered, and loshon hora.” (Bovo Basro 164b-5a) Our topic, however, is failure that becomes enshrined officially, when people call themselves not Orthodox but something else, Modern Orthodox or like the new apikorsim mamosh who call themselves Open Orthodox even though their leaders say clearly that they don’t believe in the Torah. Yes, we maintain a difference between a Jew who fails and a Jew who hangs up a sign and says “I don’t keep this or that.”

We are going to speak here about Modern Orthodox, but we also mention the trend  for some Orthodox rabbis to violate clear statements in Shulchan Aruch and poskim when it comes to women’s rights to have a GET on demand.  Some husbands can be forced to divorce, but these are rare. We see rabbis who humiliate husbands and coerce in violation of the Shulchan Aruch, and they are not Modern Orthodox. In fact, one  Yeshiva rabbi in Philadelphia went so far as to pronounce a married woman free to remarry, and the Modern Orthodox condemned it. To my knowledge, other than myself, no Orthodox rabbis condemned it publicly, although almost all of them condemn it privately.

7 comments :

  1. Are there recordings of all of R. Eidensohn's shiurim? Where can recordings of previous (and this) shiurum be listened to?

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  2. If it is about terminology, then it is worthwhile noting that the term "orthodox" was something invented in Germany, to combat Reform. Does it appear in any Hebrew texts of the Rishonim for example?
    Next, the Hareidi ideology is also new - and it claims to be the real or "ultra" orthodox. Does that also make them illegitimate?

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  3. Neither the Orthodox nor the Hareidim took those names upon themselves. It was imposed upon them by outsiders, by the non-Orthodox and non-Hareidim. After it entering the lexicon and becoming standard usage they simply accepted the reality of others calling them by those names and then used it themselves.

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  4. MOe, thanks for that. This is correct regarding "orthodox" label, but if it was created by Reform (see http://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/orthodox-judaism/ ) then it still supports my argument, or even more, as to what R' Dovid is saying. Who created the term hareidi? The word hareidi at least is Hebrew an is used in the TeNaCh, to denote "trembling". But the ideology is new -ish, or Rambam had his opposition also to certain groups, and proposed his own view as the truth, which was modern (philosophy) and orthodox (Halacha).

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  5. Check out his blog
    http://torahhalacha.blogspot.com
    There are links there to recordings of the classes.

    Also, on behalf of Rabbi Eidensohn, can I request that you and others comment on some of the posts there?

    Thanks.

    ReplyDelete
  6. My website www.torahtimes.com has auto recordings of some of the telephone shiurim. The website easily accepts audio but not the blogspot that only contains a link to the website audio, but both have some links or audio recording of the shiurim but not all of them.

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  7. Rashbam's pshat is that transgressing in iyun tefillah means praying and thinking you deserve to be answered, whereas Tosfos has the pshat that people daven and lack concentration, i.e. they utter words in vain. Both do seem to be true.

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