Can you identify these ליטווישער רבנים?

Looks like we're heading back to the great divide of תשמ"ט

I'm no expert on Israeli Haredi politics; I'll be the first one to tell you that I get severe headaches trying to follow it. But the currect matzav is easy enough for a novice like myself to understand. The Chassidishe Moetzes, after a meeting today, says to Stay Home Tomorrow and not vote for anybody in the ירושלים mayoral runoff election between Shas candidate Moshe Leon and the secular Ofer Berkovitz. Reb Chaim Kanievski says vote for Moshe Leon, otherwise you'll be a partner in all the Chilul Shabbos etc. And if you don't you're מחלל שם שמים. The Moetzes says that they're doing it because Degel is supporting a secular candidate in Tzfas. So it's just basically all politics and spite. But why is Degel supporting secularism in Tzfas and crying over קדושת ירושלים? Beats me. All this comes after the disaster of Round 1, where Slonimer chossid Yossi Deitsch lost by a wide margin after the Degel people didn't vote for him. Not only did they not vote for him, they showed the Agudah that they're twice as strong as them, voting in 6 of their own to Agudah's 3 on the city council. The biggest punch in the gut Ger had seen in a very, very long time. And secretly you might say even some chassidim aren't crying...

Which got me thinking: for a while I thought that were there to be open lines of communication between the Lubavitcher Rebbe and some of his Litvishe detractors, things would be quite different. If the Rebbe would live in EY, as silly as that sounds, then people from EY would have a chance to see the Rebbe and not be sucked into the great web of lies and deceit created by the haters. It would make sense, were it not for the events of recent weeks. No member of the Moetzes, some of whom live minutes away from the Roshei Yeshiva, made the effort to go visit Reb Moshe Hillel Hirsh or Reb Gershon Edelstein, or any tier 2 Rosh Yeshiva to try and tell them that it's imperative that we stay home tomorrow. Conversely, no Rosh Yeshiva went to any Rebbe to convince them to change their mind about staying home, since the קדושה of Yerushalayim is on the line. I realize that here the onus was on the Roshei Yeshiva, since the Chassidim are only doing it out of spite, and what kind of case can they make? How will they convince anybody of the righteousness of their decision today? We'll leave Reb Chaim out of this for now, since Yanky Kanievski would probably not let i n to their zeide....

Some would say that it's ironic that it happened to Yossi Deitsch the Slonimer, a chossid of Reb Sholom Noach, who was a close acquaintance of the late Ponovizher Rosh Yeshiva... (and no friend of Chabad, despite having taught there in the early 40s in Tel Aviv.) The real cynics say that all the Rosh Yeshivas need to do is speak about "Shabbos" and B"K, and all (veise) Slonimer will join them en masse.... Lots to hash out here, including "is Reb Chaim really in charge here, or as the Etznikim say, it's all his eynikel Yanky?" Also, did the Satmar Rebbe had a ווייטער בליק, as his supporters say? although he did allow his people to vote in municipal elections... MK Yisroel Eichler, in his Belzer apologist way told an interviewer last week that since Chassidim don't follow sports elections are r their entertainment, but chas vesholom, there's no animosity between Chassidim and Litvishers, just like fans of one team don't HATE fans of the other team... Time will surely tell. 

.....יתומים היינו

Reb Chaim's Letter, below:

Juuust to be sure...

As a young whipper snapper I heard the following from my dear father zg"z: (If I once wrote it here I apologize)

There was once a very frum yiddene who would daven and say tehillim and learn צאינה וראינה all day. She would fast and do chesed and feed the old and sick. She was there in sight doing the right and holy thing. It's just that every day she'd go missing for a few minutes. Maybe even the same time every day. Nobody could find her. So they decided they'll follow her and find out once and for all. At the usual time the old lady descended into a basement where there she had set up - נישט מיר נישט ווייניגער - a tzeylem and all other paraphernalia and proceeded to bow down and do all other services associated with that religion! The people were in shock! So they asked her: סורי נעיני, what are you doing here? You're supposed to be this big tzadekes, and here you're worshiping another Getshke?! Suri Neni had a very simple answer; And what if they're right? I need to make sure and worship their Getshke too! Just in case.

My friends, I'm not c"v comparing our brothers from Lithuania to another religion. I leave that to them to do. But it seems like their once-solid belief in their system alone is beginning to crack, or at least show signs of wear and tear. They're not JUST going to Volozhin and Vilna, they need to go to Lizhensk and Lublin, just to be sure. Like Reb Boruch Mordche going to Lizhensk to sing ואפילו בהסתרה. It's good to see. Maybe all those years in bnei Berak and Yerushalayim had some sort of effect, after all. Maybe the Roshei Yeshiva taking kvitlach had an effect. Maybe they'll believe in G-d after all. 

Maybe.

אמאליגע ליטווישע גדולים

So what did Kamenecki teach us in MOAG? That all the Litvishe Rabbonim were נתפס למינות ולציונות? And that Reb Chaim Brisker trusted none of them? I guess the only non-tziyoni was Reb Yitzchok Elchonon? The NeTZIV partially? Or do we just say that the Mizrochim hijacked the Gedolim like RYES and RNHB. Whatever. It's a nice bit of history any way you טייטש it.

You'd be shocked to see who liked PM Yitzchak Shamir and what he said about him!

And we always believed that the Degel HaTorah people didn't like Mr. Shamir and favored Shimon Peres and his liberal stance on peace - and that "no land for peace" was an exclusively Lubavitcher opinion. But now, upon the passing of PM Yitzchak Shamir, we're hearing all kinds of nice things that were said about him by people that we thought were not on the same page politically with him. [From the Chabad sites you'd think that one of the ziknei haChassidim passed on, but that's become normal already, although nobody knows when and how that happened...] One of those people is the late Ponovizher Rosh Yeshiva, who was quoted by former Interior Minister Yitzchak Peretz as saying that he has ".דעת זקנים" Is it the Daas of זקני תלמידי חכמים or זקני עם הארץ? It seems to be a good thing from the article, judging from the fact that they say that he had הערכה towards him, meaning that it's a good thing. the Although there's no direct mention of his admiration of Shamir because of his stance on the peace negotiations in this article, there IS another one that makes mention of it and of the fact that the idea that the PR"Y was for giving land in return for peace is a MYTH. Here's that article.

Of course there are many that disagree, some of them Lubavitchers, and who remember many of the statements he made in regards to the Golan Heights, like "We've lived without the Golan for two thousand years, and we can go another 2,000 years without it," meaning if it's handed over to Syria וועט די וועלט ניט אונטערגיין. In short, a very Baalebatishe look at politics, clearly out of his league. Like most Rosheshives. But I believe that his opinion on this issue especially changed very often, that it was a very flexible opinion, based on the time and place, and based on the needs of the frum Jews at that time, so maybe both opinions are right... The same goes for others like Rav Ovadia. I mean no harm, it's just that some Rebbes have some sort of S'yata D'Shmaya that today's Rosheshives and Rabbonim don't have. Some sort of BaalShem'ske zechus that guides them to make the right decisions... But even that doesn't ALWAYS work...

That's my Daas Baalebatim.

when did this become normal in the Litvishe world?

(Lior Mizrahi/Getty Images)

 I speak of this farkvetshtkeit, the show with the sack cloth, the funny - or weird - faces, almost like severe stomach pain. I don't think you see such expressions of the Litvishe Gedolim of yesteryear. I know that Chassidim like to have this picture of a Litvak in their minds, but I don't believe that's real. [Well, maybe real in the sense that there were SOME people like that - the town Porush, perhaps.] They're referring to American Yeshivishe guys who somehow picked this up from somewhere, but I don't think it was from the Litvaks. And come to think of it, it's not even farkvetshtkeit, it's more of a seriousness mixed with American temimus. Picture a Yid like Reb Berel Povarski, or Reb Baruch Mordche Ezrachi, do they seem farkvetsht to you? You always see them smiling. Reb Chaim Oyzer always seemed to have a smile on his face. OK, I'll grant you the Brisker Rov, and maybe Reb Elchonon too, but they seemed to be the exception to the rule. I would think that the average Litvishe Yiddel was happy, especially if he was a learned man - then he had a real geshmak in life! Today it seems like that in that world they think that in order to be an erlicher Yid you need to walk around as if your stomach is about to explode.

I'm not gonna pass judgement on this young fellow here. Maybe he's 100% earnest about the sackcloth. Maybe the fact that SOME bachurim who did make תורתם אומנתם will have to go work makes him cry out in pain. This is where this photo was taken, by the way. At the pre-dawn demonstration in Yerushalayim last week. Maybe he REALLY feels as if a dear loved one passed on, ח"ו. But I have my doubts... Something tells me he checked himself out in the mirror to make sure he has the look down pat. Meileh the אנשי ישוב הישן, I can see where that came from, although I don't think that it necessarily stems from their Litvishe background. It may be that Hungarian-Litvish hybrid that was created in Yerushalayim that caused the outcome which we see in the typical Yerushalmi. Although the very same conditions that created the sackcloth-wearing guy who yells at passing cars on Shabbos created the letz that laughs at everything that moves.... We may not know where it comes from and how it came about, but we've grown to know, and maybe even love it. But this guy with the kneitsh... מי ברא אלה?

"???וואו זענען זיי ווייטער אזוי פארקרומט געווארען"

דער שטיקל וועלכע האט ביי אונז געהויבן די אויגענברעמען איז דארט - אויף עמ' 2 צום סוף - ווי דער סאטמאר רב רעדט וועגן דעם דרך הלימוד און פרעגט "וואו זענען זיי ווייטער אזוי פארקרומט געווארען,?" מיינענדיג אז די היינטיגע ליטאים, ובתוכם כנראה זיין זון ר' חיים, זענען אוועק פון דעם אמת'ען דרך, דער דרך וואס די בית הלוי אליין איז נאך געגאנגען דעראין. דאס אז ר' חיים האט מחדש געווען א נייעם דרך דאס ווייסען אלע, אבער איך גלייב אז די בריסקער קינדער היינט וואלטען אייך געזאגט אז ס'איז באמת נישט קיין שינוי פונעם דרך אבותינו, און ס'איז מיוסד אויפ'ן אלטען, אויסגעטראטענעם דרך

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