It may be hard to believe, what with all the fame notoriety high traffic and real time sturm und drang threads but, believe it or not, I actually cut my teeth over at DovBear.blogspot.com.
And it's gratifying to know that although the Baal HaBlog there considered me no more than a troll there were a number of readers and commenter's who actually liked my work.
"Most recently after my banning that is now entering its third week BR opined While I usually found myself agreeing with DB 99% of the time, I appreciated getting Bray's perspective - and liked that he usually did it with a touch of humor, rather than sour puss condemnation (and I say this even though he really got me angry a few times). At least he wrote his arguments in a way that encouraged me to give his side of the argument a chance to be read. He didn't turn me off the way many others from his "side" tend to."
Though I must question his taste as he also wrote
" But . . . I come here first and foremost for the discussion atmosphere that DB has created. Great posts, great bunch of commenters and some very spirited discussion. Bray was a part of it, but he wasn't all of it. The blog's appeal is due to DB's work. He asks some tough questions and gives his frank opinions on things that not everyone in the Orthodox world wants to touch or express - and he does it as an observant Orthodox Jew, not as a naysayer of religion or one who has abandoned Judaism - and one who seeks to balance his rationality with his devotion to G-d and Judaism (rather than using it as an excuse to abandon them).In the end, my identification is more with DB's integrating of an ancient tradition with sometimes problematic and puzzling scriptures and laws with a life as a rational and skeptical human of the 21st century who does not accept apologetics and the "party line," preferring instead to question and debate the issues that trouble him.Which is why I can't come up with a sufficient superlative for DB. I can only say that I'm glad he does this blog."
To which I can only say: עַד-מָתַי אַתֶּם פֹּסְחִים עַל-שְׁתֵּי הַסְּעִפִּים--אִם-יְהוָה הָאֱלֹהִים לְכוּ אַחֲרָיו, וְאִם-הַבַּעַל לְכוּ אַחֲרָיו= "'How long halt ye between two opinions? if the LORD be God, follow Him; but if Baal, follow him.'"
so make the right choice...come over here with hordes of friends and make this the e-salon for thinking Jews.
Qedusah-Havdala...Have you had yours today?
Friday, July 31, 2009
Thursday, July 30, 2009
and yet another
YK- Blood , brought from the courtyard was sprinkled beyond the Parokhes curtain within the confines of the inner sanctum
9Av- Blood spurted from within the inner sanctum "outwards" past the Parokhes curtain
magically cogitated by the Bray of Fundie
9Av- Blood spurted from within the inner sanctum "outwards" past the Parokhes curtain
magically cogitated by the Bray of Fundie
Bewailing a Blow to Havdala
Imagine some historical elegy to 9/11 that included a tidbit about how in 1985 on the 72nd floor of the east tower there had been a busted pipe that flooded 12 offices and that required $650,00 worth of repairs.
In light of the human tragedy of what would eventually happen to and at the Twin Towers such a tidbit could only be deemed as petty, tasteless inconsequential and inappropriate. Yet apparently, much the same thing, occurs in the 9Av kinnos.
In kinnah # 9 in the stitch beginning with דרך קשתו we find these lines: פרצני שלש עשרה פריץ תחת ונתתי שלומ בארץ= "He breached me with 13 breaches instead of the blessing 'And I will make peace in the land'".
The 13 breaches refer to those breached on the Soreg, the latticework fence in the Temple compound breached by the Seleucid Greeks during Galus Yavan=The Greek Exile. The function of the soreg was to prevent those ritually impure through contact with corpses as well as ALL gentiles from proceeding beyond that point. The breaches expressed the Greeks indignant anger over the notion that some innate difference between Jew and non-Jew would deny them access within the soregs boundaries.
Now the Romans did not destroy Herod's Temple until more than a century after this event. If all the Mekonen was bewailing was the ruination of some beautifully wrought fence such a mention would be petty, tasteless inconsequential and inappropriate. But what the Mekonen is in fact bewailing is a blow to havdala bein Yisrael L'Ahmim. Havdala is the flip side of Qedusha. this symbolic erasure of the havdala was all part of the slippery slope chain of events that culminated in voiding the most sacred spot on earth of its Qedusha. And that's certainly worth crying over.
Momma Rivka-she who threw Esav out of his fathers house...cry for us again.
Magically cogitated by the Bray of Fundie.
In light of the human tragedy of what would eventually happen to and at the Twin Towers such a tidbit could only be deemed as petty, tasteless inconsequential and inappropriate. Yet apparently, much the same thing, occurs in the 9Av kinnos.
In kinnah # 9 in the stitch beginning with דרך קשתו we find these lines: פרצני שלש עשרה פריץ תחת ונתתי שלומ בארץ= "He breached me with 13 breaches instead of the blessing 'And I will make peace in the land'".
The 13 breaches refer to those breached on the Soreg, the latticework fence in the Temple compound breached by the Seleucid Greeks during Galus Yavan=The Greek Exile. The function of the soreg was to prevent those ritually impure through contact with corpses as well as ALL gentiles from proceeding beyond that point. The breaches expressed the Greeks indignant anger over the notion that some innate difference between Jew and non-Jew would deny them access within the soregs boundaries.
Now the Romans did not destroy Herod's Temple until more than a century after this event. If all the Mekonen was bewailing was the ruination of some beautifully wrought fence such a mention would be petty, tasteless inconsequential and inappropriate. But what the Mekonen is in fact bewailing is a blow to havdala bein Yisrael L'Ahmim. Havdala is the flip side of Qedusha. this symbolic erasure of the havdala was all part of the slippery slope chain of events that culminated in voiding the most sacred spot on earth of its Qedusha. And that's certainly worth crying over.
Momma Rivka-she who threw Esav out of his fathers house...cry for us again.
Magically cogitated by the Bray of Fundie.
One more...
addendum to yesterdays post:
There's a difference of emphasis between the 10 martyrs piyut of 9Av (ארזי הלבנון)= "Cedars of Lebanon" and the one said on YK (אלה אזכרה)= "These will I remember"
9Av-Based on "the death of the righteous is a tragedy equal to the burning of our G-d's Home/palace" (Rosh HaShanah 18B)
YK- Based on "the death of the righteous atones for the sins of Israel"(Moed Katan 28A) *
While we're at it there are many things that the X-tian ripped off from us described in the Kinnos. The notion of someone else dying for our sins as recounted above, Deicide as recounted in the Kinnah #16 "Remember what Titus perpetrated in the Temple", Love of the Holy Land as recounted in Kinnah #25.
_________________________________________________________________
* gleaned fromm the footnotes to the Artscroll Askenaz kinnos kinnah # 21 page 248
Magically cogitated by the Bray of Fundie
There's a difference of emphasis between the 10 martyrs piyut of 9Av (ארזי הלבנון)= "Cedars of Lebanon" and the one said on YK (אלה אזכרה)= "These will I remember"
9Av-Based on "the death of the righteous is a tragedy equal to the burning of our G-d's Home/palace" (Rosh HaShanah 18B)
YK- Based on "the death of the righteous atones for the sins of Israel"(Moed Katan 28A) *
While we're at it there are many things that the X-tian ripped off from us described in the Kinnos. The notion of someone else dying for our sins as recounted above, Deicide as recounted in the Kinnah #16 "Remember what Titus perpetrated in the Temple", Love of the Holy Land as recounted in Kinnah #25.
_________________________________________________________________
* gleaned fromm the footnotes to the Artscroll Askenaz kinnos kinnah # 21 page 248
Magically cogitated by the Bray of Fundie
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
A Tale of Two Fast Days
"It was the worst of fasts...it was the best of fasts. "
Yom HaKippurim (henceforth YK) and Tisha B'Av (henceforth 9Av) share much in common and yet are decidedly different from one another. Both fast days are unique and separate from all other Jewish fast days in terms of length (sundown to star-sighting) and all 5 inuyim (ascetic abstinences) vs. only eating and drinking, being prohibited. Both have long, some might say excruciatingly long, prayer services. Both feature a prominent piyut describing the ten holy martyrs. YK is the culmination of a long 40 day period that begins with Rosh Khodesh Elul and 9Av is the nadir of a three week period that begins with the 17th of Tamuz. As such both have dots connecting them to the sin of the Golden Calf. Both are followed by joyous days on the 15th of their respective months. Both concentrate on bein ahdahm l'khaveiro =interpersonal, rather than ritual, sins (YK to apologize and make amends 9Av as a cause for the tragedies). Of more recent vintage, both have had Holocaust passages inserted into the liturgy.
And yet they are sooooooooo different.
YK- standing is prominent. Poskim bring a minhag to stand all of ones waking hours on YK. It's all part of the "be angelic" theme of the day.
9Av-sitting , as in sitting shiva, is the order of the day.
I find it interesting that both positions preclude movement.
9Av-we are forlorn, miserable and somewhat dehumanized
YK-we are angelic. something more than human
YK- tears of regret but with an emphasis on the future.
9Av-tears of mourning with an obsession over the past.
9Av-the Temple is destroyed, we are exiled from Israel. We lose access to sanctified space.
YK- The Kohen Gadol=High Priest our שליח צבור= Communal Agent/representative accesses the inner sanctum...the most consecrated place on earth
YK- we are close to G-d לפני ה' תטהרו and to one another (the ketores is ground even finer for YK and is symbolic of a "better mix" of the disparate elements of the Jewish People per Eretz Tzvi)
9Av-we are alienated from one another and expelled from G-d's kavayokhol home.
9Av-We wail, we contemplate our navels we??? What are kinnos anyways? Much more akin to poetry readings (dark depressing poetry, but poetry readings nonetheless) than to conventional prayer.
YK- We pray...and how. Think Ne-ilah. Per the Rambam this may just as easily be called the last of the עשרת ימי תפלה as it is called the last of the עשרת ימי תשובה
YK- The day the שטן=D.A. of the heavenly Court is off duty
9Av- The day the שטן triumphs...totally
9Av -has an overt agenda of mourning but a covert yearning for Teshuva. As megilas eikah concludes: כא הֲשִׁיבֵנוּ יְהוָה אֵלֶיךָ ונשוב (וְנָשׁוּבָה), חַדֵּשׁ יָמֵינוּ כְּקֶדֶם= "Turn Thou us unto Thee, O LORD, and we shall be turned; renew our days as of old". Also per the Rambam in Hilkhos Ta'anis...ALL fast days are Teshuva days
YK- is overtly about Teshuva yet has a strong subtext of mourning, loss and exile e.g. the 10 martyrs, Yizkor ומפני חטאתנו and וקרב פזורנו
I don't know what גידין are. I have seen the word translated variously as sinews, cartilage and nerve endings. Where is Rav Aryeh Kaplan z"l when you need him? In any event It is no accident that our tradition teaches that the human body comprises 365 גידין and that the Solar Year comprises 365 days. Each day thus corresponding to another sinew and per the S'fas Emes...
YK- corresponds to the גיד המילה=the mitzvah of circumcision and it's covenant
9Av- corresponds to the גיד הנשה= Judaisms answer to an Achilles heel
9Av- features the flimsiest of Jewish prayer books. Until very recently when all the goldmine-for-the-publisher annotated editions arrived the 9Av Eikhah -Kinnos were traditionally printed as cover-less paperbacks. I've seen in many seforim that there was a common custom among חסידים ואנשי מעשה to deposit their kinnos in the shaimos bin on their way out of Shul Motzi 9Av.
YK- features the thickest, most venerated and treasured of Jewish prayer books
finally....
9Av- we shed tears of pain and cry over the wages of sin
YK- we shed tears of remorse and cry over our sins themselves which paradoxically brings us back to yet another common root for both the best and worst of fast days. After all as Elbert Hubbard said “We are punished by our sins, not for them.” Or as our sages put it a millennium or so earlier ושכר עבירה...עבירה .
I hope that this will serve both as something to provoke though before and on the fast Day and as a useful primer in Havdala 101. before we can discern subcutaneous differences it is essential to establish many layers of superficial similarity. I wish all of K'lal Yisrael an easy fast.
magically cogitated by The Bray of Fundie
Yom HaKippurim (henceforth YK) and Tisha B'Av (henceforth 9Av) share much in common and yet are decidedly different from one another. Both fast days are unique and separate from all other Jewish fast days in terms of length (sundown to star-sighting) and all 5 inuyim (ascetic abstinences) vs. only eating and drinking, being prohibited. Both have long, some might say excruciatingly long, prayer services. Both feature a prominent piyut describing the ten holy martyrs. YK is the culmination of a long 40 day period that begins with Rosh Khodesh Elul and 9Av is the nadir of a three week period that begins with the 17th of Tamuz. As such both have dots connecting them to the sin of the Golden Calf. Both are followed by joyous days on the 15th of their respective months. Both concentrate on bein ahdahm l'khaveiro =interpersonal, rather than ritual, sins (YK to apologize and make amends 9Av as a cause for the tragedies). Of more recent vintage, both have had Holocaust passages inserted into the liturgy.
And yet they are sooooooooo different.
YK- standing is prominent. Poskim bring a minhag to stand all of ones waking hours on YK. It's all part of the "be angelic" theme of the day.
9Av-sitting , as in sitting shiva, is the order of the day.
I find it interesting that both positions preclude movement.
9Av-we are forlorn, miserable and somewhat dehumanized
YK-we are angelic. something more than human
YK- tears of regret but with an emphasis on the future.
9Av-tears of mourning with an obsession over the past.
9Av-the Temple is destroyed, we are exiled from Israel. We lose access to sanctified space.
YK- The Kohen Gadol=High Priest our שליח צבור= Communal Agent/representative accesses the inner sanctum...the most consecrated place on earth
YK- we are close to G-d לפני ה' תטהרו and to one another (the ketores is ground even finer for YK and is symbolic of a "better mix" of the disparate elements of the Jewish People per Eretz Tzvi)
9Av-we are alienated from one another and expelled from G-d's kavayokhol home.
9Av-We wail, we contemplate our navels we??? What are kinnos anyways? Much more akin to poetry readings (dark depressing poetry, but poetry readings nonetheless) than to conventional prayer.
YK- We pray...and how. Think Ne-ilah. Per the Rambam this may just as easily be called the last of the עשרת ימי תפלה as it is called the last of the עשרת ימי תשובה
YK- The day the שטן=D.A. of the heavenly Court is off duty
9Av- The day the שטן triumphs...totally
9Av -has an overt agenda of mourning but a covert yearning for Teshuva. As megilas eikah concludes: כא הֲשִׁיבֵנוּ יְהוָה אֵלֶיךָ ונשוב (וְנָשׁוּבָה), חַדֵּשׁ יָמֵינוּ כְּקֶדֶם= "Turn Thou us unto Thee, O LORD, and we shall be turned; renew our days as of old". Also per the Rambam in Hilkhos Ta'anis...ALL fast days are Teshuva days
YK- is overtly about Teshuva yet has a strong subtext of mourning, loss and exile e.g. the 10 martyrs, Yizkor ומפני חטאתנו and וקרב פזורנו
I don't know what גידין are. I have seen the word translated variously as sinews, cartilage and nerve endings. Where is Rav Aryeh Kaplan z"l when you need him? In any event It is no accident that our tradition teaches that the human body comprises 365 גידין and that the Solar Year comprises 365 days. Each day thus corresponding to another sinew and per the S'fas Emes...
YK- corresponds to the גיד המילה=the mitzvah of circumcision and it's covenant
9Av- corresponds to the גיד הנשה= Judaisms answer to an Achilles heel
9Av- features the flimsiest of Jewish prayer books. Until very recently when all the goldmine-for-the-publisher annotated editions arrived the 9Av Eikhah -Kinnos were traditionally printed as cover-less paperbacks. I've seen in many seforim that there was a common custom among חסידים ואנשי מעשה to deposit their kinnos in the shaimos bin on their way out of Shul Motzi 9Av.
YK- features the thickest, most venerated and treasured of Jewish prayer books
finally....
9Av- we shed tears of pain and cry over the wages of sin
YK- we shed tears of remorse and cry over our sins themselves which paradoxically brings us back to yet another common root for both the best and worst of fast days. After all as Elbert Hubbard said “We are punished by our sins, not for them.” Or as our sages put it a millennium or so earlier ושכר עבירה...עבירה .
I hope that this will serve both as something to provoke though before and on the fast Day and as a useful primer in Havdala 101. before we can discern subcutaneous differences it is essential to establish many layers of superficial similarity. I wish all of K'lal Yisrael an easy fast.
magically cogitated by The Bray of Fundie
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
The Inaugural Post-My Lunch with Rabbi Fink
I am often accused of not being a close reader. Still, I noticed that Rabbi E. Fink, he of the Shul on the Beach, had mentioned something in a recent comment on DovBear about being in Monsey. (Did anyone else???) So to take advantage of this east coast appearance of the “Left Coast” Rabbi I immediately dashed off an email inviting him for a lunchtime meeting.
I was anxious to meet this “onymous” blogger whom I’d come to admire for his kind heart, crisp writing and apparently sound hashqofos but whom I was deeply suspicious of for his uber-tolerance especially as it related to DovBear. כבדהו וחשדהו
Choosing a flaishig restaurant featuring a parve menu in the 9 days was a stroke of genius. The place was so deserted that the counterman of the normally bustling eatery declared “I think that we’ll be closed from tomorrow until after Tisha B’Av”. Sure… there were the requisite retinue of two or three nudniks intermittently distracting us with their nosy questions and inane comments but at least no one there was hailing me by my real name.
Though we spent over two hours together much about Rabbi Fink remains a mystery. How did this Monsey boy who married a home town girl both of whom attended the conventional RW-Ortho/quasi-Kharedi Yeshivas end up as the Rabbi and Rebitzen of the Beach? Like snow-buried coal in the winter E. Fink is essentially black on the inside but decidedly white on the outside. Sans hat and jacket he lacks even the dress slacks+ white shirt look of the typical Yeshiva-mahn lite. He was clad in a patterned shirt and casual pants though not, kholila, jeans.
He told me about the challenges of shepherding his Shul, the best of two worlds arrangement of being a part time Rabbi and how the allure of Los Angeles beckoned him back after a short but strange interlude in another out of town community. חן המקום על יושביה= "Each locale charms it's own inhabitants" hearing about him and his אשת חיל=woman of valor I couldn’t help but envy this energetic and creative young couple who’ve managed to juggle career and education in ways that afford them meaningful work now, more lucrative futures and the ability to still spend meaningful time with those they love the most.
I’ve got to admit that while I knew even before I met him that the Rabbi is young enough to be my son it was a tad harder for me to “take him as seriously” in person as in a bloggish setting. Sometimes the person-less, disembodied words of the haloscan pop-up comment-thread serve as the great equalizer. There can be no “appeals to authority” when the e-printed words speak for themselves. Once you attach a young, eager face to the opinions voiced then an old-geezer like me becomes more skeptical.
In general I feel that his zrizus=alacrity precedes and often trumps his zehirus=caution when, per the Mesilas Yesharim, the order ought to be reversed. I also found his image of the Yeshiva world a generation ago being filled with semi-literate (I mean in Gemara) mediocrities to be gravely distorted. It’s as if he conceded the concept of “yeridas haDoros”=spiritual devolution to all the generations that preceded his but my own!
The golden haired rabbi is a family man in a broader sense. He is intensely proud of his forbears and highly accomplished immediate and extended family. Without revealing details suffice it to say that his family tree bears many fruits who are doers, out-of-the-box-thinkers and k’lal tooehrs=those who improve the commonweal.
Among the tastiest scuttlebutt tidbits of the afternoon (suffice it to say that the counterman was wise to close down until the menu could once again appeal to carnivores) was Rabbi Finks assertion, based on personal conversations, that the Yated's Publisher is "writing to his audience", that the same once out-wise-cracked a contemporary Rosh Yeshiva known primarily for cracking-wise and that a good friend “in the business” confided that girls post-HS seminaries in Eretz Yisrael are just that…businesses.
The greatest encomium that I can offer up to Rabbi E. Fink is that he seems very supportive and fond of me, my personality and my blogging. And I say this only partially tongue-in-cheek because, remarkably, he is at least as fond of DovBear, his personality and ursine blogging. Simply put Rabbi Fink possesses among the rarest of traits…טובת עין=the good eye AKA the generosity of spirit. He is willing to acknowledge and appreciate the good points in others while marginalizing and deemphasizing their clay feet and shortcomings. To me this is the surest symptom of genuine Ahavas Yisrael=love of one’s fellow Jew, something we all so sorely need in these dark days of Khilul HaShem=desecration of G-d’s name and שנאת חנם=baseless hatred. And despite his pride in distancing himself from all things Khasidish IMO it’s to produce Jews like him that the Baal Shem Tov started the movement.
Is this love blind? I suppose…but it is davka these blind spots for zeroing in on and magnifying warts that define those possessed of the “good eye”. In the Israeli Air Force combat pilots need 20/10 vision. Those who would soar to higher heights in the spiritual realm need “good eyes” as well. In closing I’d like to bless the good rabbi that his vision grows neither dim with age nor jaded with cynicism.
ט טוֹב-עַיִן, הוּא יְבֹרָךְ: כִּי-נָתַן מִלַּחְמוֹ לַדָּל He that hath a bountiful eye shall be blessed; for he giveth of his bread to the poor.
I was anxious to meet this “onymous” blogger whom I’d come to admire for his kind heart, crisp writing and apparently sound hashqofos but whom I was deeply suspicious of for his uber-tolerance especially as it related to DovBear. כבדהו וחשדהו
Choosing a flaishig restaurant featuring a parve menu in the 9 days was a stroke of genius. The place was so deserted that the counterman of the normally bustling eatery declared “I think that we’ll be closed from tomorrow until after Tisha B’Av”. Sure… there were the requisite retinue of two or three nudniks intermittently distracting us with their nosy questions and inane comments but at least no one there was hailing me by my real name.
Though we spent over two hours together much about Rabbi Fink remains a mystery. How did this Monsey boy who married a home town girl both of whom attended the conventional RW-Ortho/quasi-Kharedi Yeshivas end up as the Rabbi and Rebitzen of the Beach? Like snow-buried coal in the winter E. Fink is essentially black on the inside but decidedly white on the outside. Sans hat and jacket he lacks even the dress slacks+ white shirt look of the typical Yeshiva-mahn lite. He was clad in a patterned shirt and casual pants though not, kholila, jeans.
He told me about the challenges of shepherding his Shul, the best of two worlds arrangement of being a part time Rabbi and how the allure of Los Angeles beckoned him back after a short but strange interlude in another out of town community. חן המקום על יושביה= "Each locale charms it's own inhabitants" hearing about him and his אשת חיל=woman of valor I couldn’t help but envy this energetic and creative young couple who’ve managed to juggle career and education in ways that afford them meaningful work now, more lucrative futures and the ability to still spend meaningful time with those they love the most.
I’ve got to admit that while I knew even before I met him that the Rabbi is young enough to be my son it was a tad harder for me to “take him as seriously” in person as in a bloggish setting. Sometimes the person-less, disembodied words of the haloscan pop-up comment-thread serve as the great equalizer. There can be no “appeals to authority” when the e-printed words speak for themselves. Once you attach a young, eager face to the opinions voiced then an old-geezer like me becomes more skeptical.
In general I feel that his zrizus=alacrity precedes and often trumps his zehirus=caution when, per the Mesilas Yesharim, the order ought to be reversed. I also found his image of the Yeshiva world a generation ago being filled with semi-literate (I mean in Gemara) mediocrities to be gravely distorted. It’s as if he conceded the concept of “yeridas haDoros”=spiritual devolution to all the generations that preceded his but my own!
The golden haired rabbi is a family man in a broader sense. He is intensely proud of his forbears and highly accomplished immediate and extended family. Without revealing details suffice it to say that his family tree bears many fruits who are doers, out-of-the-box-thinkers and k’lal tooehrs=those who improve the commonweal.
Among the tastiest scuttlebutt tidbits of the afternoon (suffice it to say that the counterman was wise to close down until the menu could once again appeal to carnivores) was Rabbi Finks assertion, based on personal conversations, that the Yated's Publisher is "writing to his audience", that the same once out-wise-cracked a contemporary Rosh Yeshiva known primarily for cracking-wise and that a good friend “in the business” confided that girls post-HS seminaries in Eretz Yisrael are just that…businesses.
The greatest encomium that I can offer up to Rabbi E. Fink is that he seems very supportive and fond of me, my personality and my blogging. And I say this only partially tongue-in-cheek because, remarkably, he is at least as fond of DovBear, his personality and ursine blogging. Simply put Rabbi Fink possesses among the rarest of traits…טובת עין=the good eye AKA the generosity of spirit. He is willing to acknowledge and appreciate the good points in others while marginalizing and deemphasizing their clay feet and shortcomings. To me this is the surest symptom of genuine Ahavas Yisrael=love of one’s fellow Jew, something we all so sorely need in these dark days of Khilul HaShem=desecration of G-d’s name and שנאת חנם=baseless hatred. And despite his pride in distancing himself from all things Khasidish IMO it’s to produce Jews like him that the Baal Shem Tov started the movement.
Is this love blind? I suppose…but it is davka these blind spots for zeroing in on and magnifying warts that define those possessed of the “good eye”. In the Israeli Air Force combat pilots need 20/10 vision. Those who would soar to higher heights in the spiritual realm need “good eyes” as well. In closing I’d like to bless the good rabbi that his vision grows neither dim with age nor jaded with cynicism.
ט טוֹב-עַיִן, הוּא יְבֹרָךְ: כִּי-נָתַן מִלַּחְמוֹ לַדָּל He that hath a bountiful eye shall be blessed; for he giveth of his bread to the poor.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
