Rischa D'Araisa Season 4 Episode 10:
Curling up for a Fetal Position?
Should we be on the sidelines in the movement to overturn Roe V Wade?
Rabbi Yosef Gavriel Bechhofer הרב יוסף גבריאל בקהופר
Rabbi Yosef Gavriel Bechhofer הרב יוסף גבריאל בקהופר
I'd welcome more treatment of R' Moshe's attitude on wading into political issues. On nondenominational prayer in public schools, he says "I hear both sides, slightly favor pro-prayer, but as there are two solid sides I say we stay out of it!" But on drafting women (in the US) he advises lobbying against.
ReplyDeleteRav Kiv -- I know you mean well, but *hiazaharu bedivreichem chachamim* when calling the Constitution "just a piece of paper." If we are supposed to be a good example for the nations and they are commanded in *dinim*, let's please not be flippant with regard to the supreme law of the land. (Especially as from a *dina demalchusa dina* perspective, all Americans use the money printed by the Federal Government, ergo Federal Government has supremacy in which government laws we must follow.)
If TIDE Is a dead letter it's because it wass tabbed in the back by those prancing around on the title
ReplyDeleteif you don't consider of import to take a stand based on principles for this
it don't mean nothing at all
Bechhofer's Great grandfather would have virtually stoned him for the attitudes being expressed on this here
First, to clarify, I am not a descendant of RSRH. I am only half Yekke. The other half is Telshe Litvish. MY cousins are descendants on their mother shetichyeh's side.
DeleteSecond, I am a staunch advocate of TIDE and this has nothing to do with TIDE. TIDE relates as to how we present ourselves towards others, how we must raise aloft the banner of a Torah society within Am Yisroel. This has nothing to do with whether we should lobby the American government a hin oder a herr.
ReplyDeleteRE: your background
The Apple has fallen far from the tree . The M a h r i l Bloch told went over to his grandchild, in the crib ,and said: your purpose in this world is to sanctify The Creator. If you're incapable of doing that better for you not to have been born! And standing up FOR
moral precepts precedes that
cf. YirmiaH 2: 13
comm.
Re:
Second
More disingenuous and fraudulent
The author of tIDE Was adamant that the primary aspect of it was our interaction Vis a Vis the outside world. And if we cannot do that, all the other aspects of TIDE were secondary and far in the background.
Were we unable to fill that role better we should go back to the ghetto!
Anyone who has an understanding of his oeuvre cand his teleology
should grasp that
unless they have an agenda – most of those who quote him do – what was primary vs. what was secondary
econd
I think it is somewhat arrogant of you to arrogate for yourself the sole right of judgment of what is considered standing up for moral precepts vs. what is misaber al riv lo lo.
DeleteAgain, you are misrepresenting TIDE. At no time did Rav Breuer zt"l or his predecessors advocate joining battle with outside society. They advocated standing firm in and of ourselves for Torah truth.
it is somewhat arrogant of you to arrogate for yourself:Pot calling the kettle black.
DeleteFirst
yes they did
the whole chronology of our Storied Journey for mankind as personified by the trajectory of yaakov to Yitzhak to avraham expounded as ever expanding capability of ohr lagOyIm and shall we dare say it? Tikun olam
was embodied in their fabric as Essence Personified
Second
That some of them greeted the election of Hindenburg and even at the very beginning with qualms the chancellorship Hitler over the degenerate Weimar Republic should say it all
Finally
R Shimon Schwab was explicit and emphatic about Our obligation to the outside world told people therefore to vote Republican in ’92 ,over the “pro Israel’ Clinton
על כבוד עצמך חס ,כבוד קונו אינו חס
Our representing the morality of Torah never extended to active interference with the legislation of host countries. Especially when the legislation endangered our maintenance of Halachic standards. Today Arizona moved to ban abortions even in cases of genetic defects...
DeleteRav Schwab did not represent TIDE.
DeleteMost normal people in the Torah Community don’t even realize what became
ReplyDeletelaw until years later when we see the results of a law, then we ask how did this happen, without even realizing we helped make it happen
And even those who hold there isn’t a direct obligation when not pragmatic, everyone agrees that’s our ideal role in this world
When R’ Boruch Ber came to New York in 1929 he was greeted by Mayor Walker. The mayor asked him “what can I do for you Rabbi?”
His prompt response [in Yiddish] was ‘Separate the males and females at the beaches.’
He did not ask him for favors for the Jewish community eg “religious liberty” for Jews ..
R Yaakov Kamenetsky was pained and troubled when after Roe v Wade, an abortion clinic was opened near Monsey. He overheard some yidden in shul making a little gelechte over the current events. He exclaimed:
How could they treat this so lightly? We're talking about human life. Any human life.
His brother-in-law, in Kovno Ghetto, the greatest thing perturbing him was the Nazis were ruining their OWN tzelem Elokim
The 1984 public Opposition To Immorality letter stating we have to protest with our bodies against New York City Council And Every possible means of influence
Rav Moshe
signed that we have to show the entire world that the nation of God hates the abominations
At minimum
Letter from Rav Shach zatzal printed in שמושה של תורה - משלחנו של רבינו a sefer every liberal law passed in America will find its way to eretz Yisrael
HE similarly instructed Mr.Loebenstein
Councillor of Hackney,London as well that it is incumbent therefore
on all those who are involved to fight at the source
Without getting into each point you bring (mostly irrelevant), they have nothing to do with TIDE.
Delete
DeleteAlso less than relevant.
Going to cover all the bases to avoid some/all sorts of an
end run. Something wrong ?
BY TOBY KATZ · PUBLISHED JULY 28, 2011
ReplyDeleteof that extraordinary man, R’ Nachman Bulman, of blessed memory. He is to this day so longed-for and so deeply missed by so many people, as I well know from many of his students and former congregants.
My father believed passionately in Torah Im Derech Eretz (TIDE), the very ancient Torah understanding that was given more modern and eloquent expression in the 19th century writings of Rav Shamshon Raphael Hirsch. TIDE refers to Torah together with civilization or Torah together with secular pursuits or Torah together with courtesy and humanity. It is hard to define exactly in a short essay but let me talk about one aspect of TIDE.
We who believe in TIDE believe that one of the reasons that Hashem scattered us among the nations, in addition to the obvious fact that this is a punishment for our sins (foretold in the Torah), is that we are meant to be an ohr lagoyim, a Light to the Nations. We are also a blessing to the nations, also foretold in multiple places in the Torah. It was we Jews who introduced monotheism and morality to the world and we have indeed blessed the nations among whom we live in ways too numerous even to begin to detail
..
He was a Polish Jew himself, a Gerrer chossid. He had the warmth, the keen intelligence, the emotion and passion, the love of learning combined with the love of his people, that were so characteristic of the best of the Polish Jews.
Yet philosophically he admired, as I said, the German Jews, and especially their towering giant, Rav Hirsch.
He believed that we Jews are part of civilization, part of humanity, and owe something to the rest of mankind, especially to countries that provide a safe haven and economic opportunities for us to build our shuls, our schools and the whole wonderful infrastructure of Jewish life..
But even more so, we are supposed to be a help and a blessing and a light to the nations. We owe America so much! How dare we just shrug our shoulders and say, “Let them do what they want, the hell with them!” Where is the promise and the obligation we have to say the truth, and to bring G-d’s blessing on the people who have been so good to us?
It is only fair of me to acknowledge that it is not only Jews of Brooklyn, with black hats and sheitels, who have this attitude of indifference to the moral welfare of the goyim among whom they live.
This same attitude is even more widespread, and is given a patina of intellectual respectability, by liberal Modern Orthodox Jews of Teaneck and Manhattan and many other communities. “It’s none of our business what other people do, we can’t impose our will, yada yada.” Or even worse, “Why should homosexuals be denied their chance of happiness, why should the Torah have anything to say about it?”
Here is one argument that is truly evil – and it took the full force of the liberal world fifty years, pushing with all their might in every medium available to them, to brainwash the American people into believing this:
“Religious arguments are illegitimate in the public square. Any reference to G-d, Bible, Judeo-Christian morality or religious tradition is illegal, immoral and unconstitutional. If you can’t think of a completely secular argument for or against a given law, shut your mouth, you have no right to speak.”
...
Why would I talk about something so degraded and so low when I want to speak in my father’s honor? I will tell you. I am not talking about degradation and sin. I am talking about Torah
Because I have compassion on my fellow Jews and on my fellow human beings—very much including () human beings. I don’t want our Creator to be angry with us. What we cannot help, we cannot help. He will not be angry at religious and moral people if they were not able to stand on the seashore and stop the tide from rolling in. However, if we do not even try, if we make no protest and say nothing, then indeed we too may be held accountable, chas vesholom.
I am not daunted by the odds. We are few and we are weak, but Hashem is mighty and powerful
Not the first time I have disagreed with Mrs. Katz. :-)
DeleteI was unaware how far you are into the camp of Centrism with its ever shifting goalpost of TIDE.
ReplyDeleteThe pseudo revisionism always available to conveniently suit whatever agenda is at hand and serves their interest.
My apology