Tuesday, May 27, 2014

הגראי"ל שטיינמן: בלתי אפשרי לחכות לביאת המשיח • האזינו


Source

 This may be difficult for some of you to believe; but I didn't post this to make fun or to point fingers. I was not trying to point out that "Litvaks don't believe in Moshiach." It never crossed my mind until one of you who thought you know what's in my mind brought it up. I saw it as a limmud zechus! That he realized that many of us have a hard time with this Ikkar, and he was "defending" that difficulty. It was not an attack on him, nor were we trying to point out any weakening of his abilities because of age, etc. RALS needs nobody's haskomoh.

....ציור פניו של הרה"ק מרוז'ין זצ"ל ׁ























צויר בשנת ת"ר 

 Word on the street is that it was bought now from a Ukrainian non-Jew by a rich Yid names Halpern. It says Rabbi Yisroel Friedman on the original.

Monday, May 26, 2014

Friday, May 23, 2014

Tuesday, May 20, 2014

....לוח פאפא - תש"ג

I was struck by the עולם כמנהגו נוהג aspect of the calendar. שובבי"ם and all... The world is going to h*ll and they're.... never mind that. I wasn't there, I can't point fingers. But what gets an Hungarian like myself is the treyfene names and dates! In the treyfene language! Did not the תקנות of 1866 outlaw such heresy?! And what's with the 43-46 minutes after shkiah צאת הכוכבים?!

Wednesday, May 14, 2014

Hirshel: Satmar Rov wanted mikvaos built in small towns for ho-hum Yidden















A reader writes:

This Teshuva of the Satmar Ruv is a very important teshuva to study... It wavers constantly, many parts of it go against his standard philosophy, but he also derides the people who were against it as Zionist sympathizers... I have so far no idea where this town was; Maybe in the Helmetzer seforim we can figure out more details. It's my assumption that they were some kind of Aguda/Yeshiveshe people that were against it. On the other hand, did he not believe in the הלעיטהו לרשע וימות idea on which the Hungarian Orthodoxy had built their whole existence as of 1866. Somehow if it was not Zionist Klausenburg, Neologen Viznitz --- it seems had no problem and considered them Jews ... between the lines he is saying that the yeshiva velt is full of Bnei Ni**h. This teshuva should be the Constitution of Mikveh USA.


Tuesday, May 13, 2014

My apologies to Reb Peretz Chein - some 7 years in the making...






















I'm not sure Shliach Reb Peretz Chein even remembers; but I know other long-time readers do. I know because one several of you brought it to my attention. Then we criticized him for running a marathon in his shlichus town, something he did to ostensibly show his college students that he too cares about his personal well being. Then he realized that if running a marathon constitutes him breaking his own personal barriers - those that can and should be broken, not those that shouldn't - then imagine what finishing shas would do for him! So four years he set out to do just that, and finished it on the occasion of his son Mendel's Bar Mitzvah. And to top it all off, he made the siyum on an old (Slavitter?) Shas that his zeide brought with him from Russia some 40 years ago. So if we're "brave" enough to criticize him we can surely find the time to congratulate him on the momentous occasions of the siyum haShas and the son's Bar Mitzvah. Retroactively we can also say that his intentions back in '07 were pure and just.

 Mazel Tov!

Our 9th (Hebrew) Birthday!



How it all started back on 13 Iyar, 5765...

Friday, May 9, 2014

Thursday, May 8, 2014

בירושלים נפטר הגה"צ ר' זונדל קרויזר זצ"ל
























אילן היוחסין שמקורו ברבי חיים מוואלוז'ין זצ"ל

I didn't know Reb Zundel. I may have heard about him, but it's not like I learned his seforim or anything. I just mumble some Tanya and Rambam for a few minutes daily to please my handlers. But if you look at what they write about him, (and the fact that he never was part of the whole mass Gedolim branzhe ---- ) you can't help but stand in awe. A life of learning Torah and not much else. Gan Eden! You can imagine what Yidden in the Old Country who had the good fortune and intestinal fortitude to have a Jewish education and zitsfleish, and who were able to learn Torah well into their later years - what they were like. Someone was to have said that RZK had the siyata d'shmaya that he was able to learn Torah מתוך מנוחה, and at the same write wonderful seforim. He didn't have people bothering him with their naarishe questions day and night. As you can see from the link above he was  - as Rav Soloveichik would say - from בית הרב - הרב being Reb Chaim Volozhiner.  That's what I see as unique with RZK. Below we find the words of a relative of his who takes things easy in life who got a "wake-up" call at his levaya.

סוג של דילמה
החיים שלי בגדול זה סביב הפייסבוק, והאוואטסאף , עושה כמעט מה שבא לי , בסלנג זה נקרא חרדי לייט, נהנים זוללים. בקיצור, שמים את אלוקים והדת טיפה בצד. חזרתי עכשיו מהלוויה של דוד שלי רבי זונדל קרויזר, יהודי מהליגה העליונה, ,טוף שבטוף. נתחיל מזה שכל החיים שלו היה קם ב3 לפנות בוקר, לומד ומתפלל נץ, דמות ירושלמי, עניו שקט. תכלית ראיתי בהלוויה אלפי אברכים , אולתרא חרדים, שלוקחים את הדת בשיא הרצינות כל מצווה כל הלכה עם כל הפיטשיפקעס וזה עף לי לפנים, ואמרתי לעצמי לך תדע, אולי הם צודקים ואני טועה? אולי בסוף נצטרך לתת דין וחשבון על כל...בקיצור, דילמה

Tuesday, May 6, 2014

?מי בתמונה

















????משמאל הרב ר' בונים אלתר, מימין הרב מפוניבז'? ובאמצע

Surprise! what RYBS thought of saying Hallel on YH - (1978)

a Litvak bleibt a Litvak. Don't come to him with "Chassidishe" pshetlach why you need to say Hallel....
Box.com link

! דאס הייסט תיקון

















און דוקא פאר ישראל דוכמאנ'ס יארצייט פאסט טאקע אזא תיקון. ממנו יראו וכן יעשו

זאל ער זיין א מליץ יושר פאר זיין משפחה

  מקור


Sunday, May 4, 2014

Friday, May 2, 2014

....היו ימים



Ravitz was b'etzem a nice guy. Gafni had a nice beard going then. I guess they told him that for parnassah he needs to keep it "neat." I think had they kept the anti-Chabad rhetoric out of their platform - and it WAS in there - they'd have had a much easier time breaking away from the Gerrer stranglehold on the Agudah. Now, we just look at it as machlokes.

Thursday, May 1, 2014

א סיגעטער בראסלאווער חסיד


Funny how Mr. Wiesel is so taken by Reb Nachman. Not funny, just interesting. What is funny is how we were so horrified by EW's connection to Rabbonim and Rebbes, and how the zealous ideology had already so taken over by the time I was of age to take note of it in the 80's. As if he was to be excommunicated for speaking of the pain and suffering he endured both during and after the War.

The Rebbe and the Rav

YU Chabad Club special event. A panel featuring Rabbi Moshe Weinberger, Rav Zevulun Charlop, Rabbi Yehuda Krinsky, Rabbi Dr. Jacob J. Schacter, Rabbi Yosef Y. Jacobson and Dr. Lawrence Schiffman, highlighting the relationship between the Lubavitcher Rebbe and Rav Soloveitchik. Audio starts about a minute into the recording.

  Listen Here