Revisionism and Rav Soloveitchik

In light of the comments to this post, I want to make a few things clear:

Revisionism of the Rav's Life and Legacy comes from both the Right and the Left. Both, in my opinion, are fundamentally wrong. The Rav, as יבלחטו"א Rav Lichtenstein wrote, was sui generis (in our generation, at least). While there is absolutely no question that his primary loyalty was to lehrnen, and that he defined himself primarily as a,תורה מלמד , it is also true that he told people to become למדנים 'in the widest sense of the term,' which included general studies. [ I strongly doubt whether the Rov would have agreed with the Rambam that גדולי תורה who lack a philosophical education earn a lower rank in גן עדן than those who do (cf. Guide III, 51 and Kesef Mishneh ad Hilkhot Yesode HaTorah IV, 13 (end).

It, therefore, behooves us to let him be who he was, in all of his dazzling complexity. The same person who adamently opposed Women's Tefillah Groups (and any liturgical innovation, as made patently clear by the Letters published by Natty Helfgott), also adamently advocation women's study of Talmud. The same person who had magisterial command of כל התורה כולה, possessed an awesome command of Philosophy, Literature, Physics, Higher Mathematics, Psychology, Economics and Philology. As Professor Twersky noted, he brought these to bear ad majorem Dei gloriam, both for their intrinsic value and because he deemed them to be critical in order to teach Torah today to sophisticated Westernized Jew.

It has been said, on more than one occasion, that the Rav's fate is identical to that of the Rambam. Joseph Ibn Kaspi tried to make him a philosopher נטו and the Talmudists summarily ignored his achievements in the sciences, mathematics, medicine and metaphysics. Both were fundamentally wrong.

The same is true of the Rav's revisionists.

Arrested for Praying

Not Sure What To Make of This. I was just telling someone that on the plane to and from Israel I always pray in my seat so as not to cause Hillul HaShem. Evidently, that doesn't cut it.

Canada: Orthodox Jew forced off plane

An Orthodox Jewish man was removed from an Air Canada Jazz flight in Montreal last week for praying, the Canadian Broadcast Corporation reported on Wednesday.
The man was a passenger on a Sept. 1 flight from Montreal to New York City when the incident happened.

The airplane was heading toward the runway at the Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport when eyewitnesses said the Orthodox man began to pray.

"He was clearly a Hasidic Jew," said Yves Faguy, a passenger seated nearby. "He had some sort of cover over his head. He was reading from a book.

"He wasn't exactly praying out loud but he was lurching back and forth," Faguy told the CBC.
The action didn't seem to bother anyone, Faguy said, but a flight attendant approached the man and told him his praying was making other passengers nervous.

"The attendant actually recognized out loud that he wasn't a Muslim and that she was sorry for the situation but they had to ask him to leave," Faguy said.

The man, who spoke neither English nor French, was escorted off the airplane, according to CBC.
According to CBC, Air Canada Jazz, termed the situation "delicate," and said it received more than one complaint about the man's behaviour and that the crew had to act in the interest of the majority of passengers, said Jazz spokeswoman Manon Stewart.

"The passenger did not speak English or French, so we really had no choice but to return to the gate to secure a translator," she told CBC.

Jewish leaders in Montreal criticized the move as insensitive, saying the flight attendants should have explained to the other passengers that the man was simply praying and doing no harm.
Hasidic Rabbi Ronny Fine told CBC he often prays on airplanes, but typically only gets curious stares.

"If it's something that you're praying in your own seat and not taking over the whole plane, I don't think it should be a problem," said Fine.

What an Inspiration!

Every day Yael K. seems to encounter another manifestation of ארץ ישראל נקנית בייסורים. Every day, she displays aplomb, humor, and an increasingly Israeli attitude. She is an inspiration for all those new Nefesh b'Nefesh olim. I think she should publish her blog in book form and give it to every oleh.

הכונו, יום הקדוש ממשמש ובא

(I received this today from Menachem Butler. I haven't seen the book yet, but חזקה על חברים שאינם מוציאים דבר שאינו מתוקן מתחת ידם. )

For decades, Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik delivered his renowned Kinnus Teshuvah shiurim between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur and selections of these shiurim have previously been published by Dr. Arnold Lustiger.

As has recently been announced in Jewish Action, the official publication of the UOJCA, K'hal Publishing in cooperation with the Orthodox Union, and through the efforts of many of the Rav's talmidim, presents "The Kasirer Edition Yom Kippur Machzor," with a complete commentary adapted from the teachings of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik zt"l. This volume is masterfully edited by Dr. Arnold Lustiger, editor of both "Before Hashem You Shall Be Purified: Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik on the Days of Awe" (1988) and "Derashot Harav: Selected Lectures of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik" (2003). The Kasirer Edition Yom Kippur Machzor includes, as well, an introduction by Rabbi Hershel Schachter and Rabbi Menachem Genack.

For the cover and a few sample pages of the Kasirer Edition Yom Kippur Machzor, please see http://www.ravmachzor.com/samplepages.pdf

To order your pre-publication copy of the Kasirer Edition Yom Kippur Machzor (to be delivered in advance of Yom Kippur) at the special discounted price of $24.99 + shipping (list price: $30.99 + shipping), please contact Menachem Butler, order@RavMachzor.com , for further information.

For Yeshiva University students, FREE delivery is available to any student on the Beren (midtown), Wilf (uptown), Resnick (Einstein/Ferkauf) and Brookdale Center (Cardozo) campuses of Yeshiva University for any order.

For orders of more than twenty-five copies, an additional discount and special bulk rates and free shipping are available within the continental United States.Thank you very much and I look forward to hearing from you soon,--Menachem Butler

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How do they write in the הסכמות (though this certainly doesn't require my הסכמה):

גם אני את כופרו עליו וארכשנו לזכר מו"ר זצ"ל ולהתכונן בצורה הטובה ביותר לביאת יום הקדוש,צומא רבה הבעל"ט אמן.

This Government's Got to Go

From today's Haaretz:

ANALYSIS: Israel's response to kidnappings had little effect
By Amos Harel and Avi Issacharoff,
Haaretz Correspondents

According to government spokesmen, Israel's harsh military response to the kidnappings in Lebanon and Gaza has taught our enemies that from now on, there will be a heavy price to pay for kidnappings.

However, this response has not persuaded the Lebanese and Gazans to release the soldiers without getting something in return. In exchange for Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev, in Lebanon, and Gilad Shalit, in the Gaza Strip, Israel will have to release hundreds of prisoners to Lebanon and the territories. Names that mean nothing to the Israeli public may delay progress on the Lebanese channel. Yihyeh Sakaf, a Lebanese citizen, is one of 11 terrorists who took part in the attack on an Egged bus on the coastal road in March 1978, which murdered 35 Israelis. Nine terrorists were killed in the rescue, but only eight bodies were identified. The whereabouts of Sakaf's body are unknown; the security establishment believes that carelessness resulted in it being buried in an unknown location. However, Hezbollah and the terrorist's family have created an imaginary scenario in which Sakaf is still alive and being held secretly in an Israeli jail. The missing body is now one of the obstacles to a deal.

Israel long ago gave up gave up on its public demands for information on the three soldiers missing from the 1982 battle at Sultan Yakoub, Yehuda Katz, Zachary Baumel and Tzvi Feldman. But the current deal, which is expected to include the release of all Lebanese prisoners in Israel in return for Regev and Goldwasser, will greatly diminish the chance of finding out what happened to these three soldiers, or to missing airman Ron Arad. The documentary that will air on Lebanese television on Tuesday about the Ron Arad affair is also not unconnected to the present talks: It signals that the fate of Regev and Goldwasser might become a mystery as well unless Israel gives in.

[NOTE: Arabs, good businessmen that they are, NEVER give something for nothing. Only Jews do that.]

Please! Put Away the Procrustean Beds!

The YUCommentator has undertaken a new series entitled: Perspectives on Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik (obviously trying to continue the sterling tradition of Menachem Butler's YUdaica). The first three articles are by Rabbis Yosef Blau, Menachem Genack and Charles Weinberg, and all are highly recommended.

At the same time, while reading one of the pieces I started having an odd combination of serious heartburn and deja-vu. When will his students stop finding it so incredbly necessary to downplay, or even dismiss, the Rov's commitment to the acuisition of as broad a general education as possible? When will they cease dishonoring our rebbe by claiming, implicitly, that he was less than honest?

What do I mean? It's very simple. The Maimonides School was established in order to provide children with a dual curriculum. The need for that was not ex post facto. It was a priori. (See Seth Farber's study and the additional material here and here.) The Rov said this over and over and over again to the Maimonides parents. (See the remarks here, here and here.) Did Professor Twersky not know what he was talking about when he wrote of the Rov's deep and abiding commitment to as broad an education as possible?

Now, let me make this clear. There is absolutely no question that the Rov's first allegiance was to Torah and Masorah. Indeed, his epistemological assumption that Torah was intellectually self-sufficient and self-validating emancipated Judaism from intellectual dependence upon any system outside of itself. However, as I once argued in a paper (which is in press), the emancipation of Torah from חכמה actually expanded the range of knowledge that could be brought to bear upon the study and interpretation of Torah. And that's what he did. This was, taken all together, a חומרה. in other words, the Rov זצ"ל demanded both of himself and others. Does anyone think it's a coincidence that every single member of the Rov's extended family has a BA (At least) and, more often than not, an MA and/or a PhD?

So, please, fellow disciples. You want to disagree with our rebbe, bitte. You think he was wrong, or that he acted as a שעת הדחק. Fine. Please, however, don't try to fit him into a procrustean bed that suits you. That goes for both those who lean right and those who lean left.

Let the Rov be the Rov, a titan of Torah, a defender of Masorah, an intellectual giant whose cultural vistas were extraordinary, and a complex figure whose like we see only once in a generation.

חבל אל דאבדין ולא משתכחין

[Postscript: Menachem Butler pointed out that my formulation at the end resembles a letter that Rav Aharon Lichtenstein wrote about just this subject. Since I assume I must have seen it at some point, I want to credit him with the formulation. If not, ברוך שכיוונתי לגדולים. This is what he wrote:

[The Rav] sought, as we should, the best of the Torah world and the best of modernity. For decades, sui generis sage that he was, the Rav bestrode American Orthodoxy like a colossus, transcending many of its internal fissures. Let us not now inter him in a Procrustean sarcophagus.]

The Sukkah: In Loving Memory of David Applebaum הי"ד

[Tuesday Night, 13 Elul 5766, marks the third yahrzeit of my friend Rabbi Dr. David Applebaum הי"ד. Hardly a day goes by without my thinking of him or quoting him. In his memory, לעילוי נשמתו, I'd like to share a דבר תורה that I heard from him, and which had a profound impact on my life. He told it to me as we were once walking to the Kotel, through the Jewish Quarter of the Old City. I was telling him about my father ז"ל and how, decades later, I had still not recovered from the blow of his death. David, in typical fashion, told me a vort that he'd heard from Reb Aharon Soloveitchik זצ"ל, which he delivered (as those of you who knew him can guess) in his perfect imitation of his master's voice.]

At the end of the Book of Job, God dramatically appears to Job out of the whirlwind and says: 'Who is this that darkeneth counsel by words without knowledge? Gird up now thy loins like a man; for I will demand of thee, and declare thou unto Me. Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth? Declare, if thou hast the understanding' (Job 37, 2-4).

The Midrash, though, says that God simply showed Job a Sukkah.

Why, asked Reb Ahron, a Sukkah? As we all know, a kosher Sukkah requires two full walls and a bit of a third wall. This, on the face of it, is odd because anyone can tell you that a real building requires four walls. So why should a sukkah require only 2.1? The truth is, though, that the Sukkah really has four walls. The remaining walls exist, in our imagination. The Halakhah is that one must use one's imagination and 'see' the remaining walls.

The same is true of our relationship with our departed loved ones. They are not physically here. However, Halakhah requires us to use our imaginations and to continue our relationship with them based upon what we know they might say or think or feel. That ongoing relationship is very real and very tangible, just like the ostensibly 'missing' walls of the sukkah, which really exist.

As we approached the steps leading down to the Kotel, I remember my eyes welled up with tears. 'You know, David,' I told him, 'this is the first time I've been reaaly consoled since my father died. עקיבא ניחמתנו, עקיבא ניחמתנו!'

And so, ידיד נפשי , that is exactly the way that I keep up our friendship: in my imagination, in the best tradition of בית בריסק.

[Note: I believe that Rav Ahron was referring to Yalqut Shimoni, Iyyov, 927 s.v. יכרו.]

Rehab for the Intellectually Challenged

In 'Man of LaMancha,' Dr. Carasco observes that he can't tolerate madness that masquerades as virtue. I quite agree. In addition, I have no tolerance for ignorance that masquerades as knowledge (and arrogant expertise, at that); for blind prejudice that masquerades as enlightenment; or for dogmatic orthodoxy that masquerades as liberalism.

Which brings me to MJ Rosenberg, who consistently embodies all of the above. Normally, I ignore his cant and pretentiously oh-so civilized rant (even when it comes in the Jerusalem Post). Today, though, at the request of a friend I looked over his column (available here). I then recalled why I've pretty much stopped reading the newspaper on Shabbat. Yes, he was ostensibly attacking the Left's love affair with Islam(ists). However, the piece is studded with observations that vitiated the article.

The following points were especially galling:

Israel is a secular democracy. Yes, it is a Jewish state. But no one is forced to practice the Jewish faith. In fact, Israeli Jews, for the most part, are less religious than their American counterparts (and certainly less so than American Christians).

Who is he kidding? Israeli Jews overwhelmingly believe in God and want a qualitatively Jewish State. Jewish tradition, even today, is far more programmed into the public space than in the US.

You will not, for instance, find many Jews on the beach in New York or Los Angeles during holy days. In Israel, the beaches are packed.

Who is he kidding? Yes, Rosh HaShanah is not as heavily observed in Israel as it once was in the Diaspora. However, Yom Kippur is still the holiest day of the year. 73-77% of Israelis fast. Non-Orthodox Jews build sukkot. 95% attend a Seder and over 75% don't eat Hametz.

Orthodox Jews make up a sizable segment of the population but they do not run the country and never have. Only a radical fringe would choose to.

Would someone tell me what this means? Is he ignorant of the fact that 30-40% of the members of Knesset are Orthodox? There are three Orthodox Major Generals on the General Staff. What kind of racist paternalism is this? Let me give you a pat on the head, little Ortho, stay in your place and you can live here. Yok! [If he means having an Halakhic State, he should say so.]

Israel does have its share of violent fundamentalist crazies: right-wing settlers who terrorize Palestinian children in Hebron and lynch Arabs, rabbis who pray for the murder of leaders with whom they disagree (successfully in the case of Rabin) and religious fanatics who would, if they could, roll back the last several centuries of social progress and growing equality.

So we are all 'violent fundamentalist crazies'? My late father-in-law would say, 'Wrap it up in plastic so that it shouldn't smell' and throw it away.

But not very many Israelis are of that ilk. The heart of Israel is Tel Aviv, one of the freest and most tolerant cities in the world. The heart of Hezbollah is in Teheran where freethinking modern men and women (the majority of the population by far) live essentially in a giant fundamentalist prison, an American secularist's worst nightmare.

Reality Check....Jerusalem is the largest city in Israel and is still the political and spiritual capital of the Jewish people. I suspect that he's equating it with Teheran.

Congressman Barney Frank points to Israel's acceptance of gays and lesbians as emblematic of the difference between Israel and its Islamic fundamentalist enemies...Again, the issue of gay rights is far from the center of the issues dividing Israel and Hezbollah (and the Iranian government). But in today's world the treatment of gays is often a litmus test.

So it all comes down to gay rights. If you're in favor, you're ok. If you're against, you're a primitive mullah. I don't want to get into a discussion of Gay Rights. However, there are good, principled reasons to oppose the legal enfranchising of homosexuality, without resorting to perscution (or worse). It is mendacious, and demagogic, to make the legitimacy of Israeli society contingent upon that criterion. God save us from such "Directors of Public Policy."

How Have the Once Mighty Fallen...

When I was growing up in the Conservative movement in the 1960's, there were few sobriquets that were worse than 'Ortho.' An 'Ortho' was someone who took his religion and religious observance seriously, even in classic Conservative terms. "Orthos were ridiculed (or treated with bemused condescension), in USY for example, because they prayed, studied and observed Shabbat. I will never forget the way the USY'ers and adult advisers reacted when the regional president became fully observant and transferred to an Orthodox day school. He was treated with a mixture of fear, compassion and concern for his mental health. He wasn't well. How could he be? He went over to the dark side (a few years before Star Wars IV). He became an Ortho. After all, why was there any need for him to do so. Conservative Judaism, it was argued, is the real halakhic Judaism. Orthodoxy is a thing of the past and will atrophy away.

As I underwent my own transition into Orthodoxy (in which the Conservative movement played a positive role), I became increasingly aware of the fact that the putative loyalty of the Conservative movement to Tradition was a facade. As a professor of mine in college (himself an ordained JTS rabbi) noted, the essence of the movement may be summed up as 'Tell me where the crowd is going. I'm it's leader.' Or, put differently, Schechter's 'Catholic Israel' had morphed, with Mordekhai Kaplan's help, into a system that deified the Jew and subjected God and Torah to the whims of man. Whatever the people want, wherever the ideological winds might blow, Jewish tradition could be coerced to reflect the latest fad (or Orthodoxy). After all, Judaism has no integrity of its own. It was created by Jews to serve them.

It, therefore, comes as no surprise that JTS and the United Synagogue will now rip more verses out of the Torah by ordaining practicing gays as rabbis and countenancing same-sex marriages. It was inevitable. They are simply playing out a scenario that was scripted decades ago. They are playing themselves out of Jewish history, and out of Jewry, much as the Hellenized Jews of the late Roman Empire.

It's amazing to me that this socio-religious phenomenon, which numbered 44% of affiliated Jewry in the United States in my youth, has come to this. I'm also sad, though I'm not sure why. This lack of authenticity; this flippant attitude to God, Torah and Mitzvot; their arrogant, consigning of Orthodoxy to the dustbin of Jewish history were critical factors in my leaving Conservatism, already in my middle teens.

Perhaps I'm sad because Conservatism will no longer serve as a path back to Torah, as it was for me and countless others.

On the other hand, the choice will now be clear for anyone who seeks to be part of the Jewish future. Only a life of Faith in God, Study of Torah and acceptance of the Yoke of Mitzvot, evn when inconvenient and at odds with conventional mores, will stand the test of time.

And a Little Child Shall Lead Them

Too cute for Words. [From Maariv]