Apparently, a lot of my readers misunderstood what’s happening in this scene. I even got an agry e-mail saying: “Interesting, I havent seen swordfight ending with one guy dying because his head was split in half... I think ever”.
My response:
That is not at all what happened!
The short guy didn’t want to kill the tall guy, because the latter would be useful in the war against the Swedish. So, he just tapped him in the head with the sabre (probably bruising the scalp and giving him a light concussion). Didn’t you hear what he said to the fallen guy’s chevra? Something like: “Now he is mine. And don’t worry: we don’t kill the wounded — a king’s custom.”
The clip actually shows how rational thinking and honor of man’s life prevailed over testosterone (of which both had enough). This is what it means to be a real man (not “human”, but davka male) — someone who can be a badass with his sabre, when needed, but then in the critical moment, can control himself to give his opponent a slight tap instead of killing him.
IIRC, samurai got to the level of proficiency with their katana swords to the point that they were able to split a fruit (and some say a rice grain, and some say a watermelon) lying on their assistant’s neck without killing the guy. (Now, how many assistants they went through before achieving this level is not clear from the history.)
The 2nd story involved a family who had a lady clean and cook for them for many years. They loved her as she was part of their family. As years passed and the lady wanted to retire, she bought a house in her native Poland. The family drove their beloved house keeper to the airport.
By the last checkpoint where the family couldn’t follow her any further she stopped and said: “Well now that I'm leaving you are surely going to miss my cooking!” “Oh yes, we definitely will,” the family said warmly.
Smiling she said to them: “You know, whenever I cooked for you, I always added a special ingredient with a special flavor: pork. That’s why you liked my cooking so much!” Their close ‘family friend’ turned around and walked to the plane leaving the family completely and utterly stunned.
But of course, the Chazal were just racist in all their laws and restrictions regarding intermingling of Jews and gentiles, laws about their wine and milk products, kashrus in general, not lending a gentile your dog, etc., etc. Nothing similar to what Chazal were worried about has ever happened since the times of Babylonian exile — for sure not in our times...
(Regarding the article itself: both a Jew and, lehavdil, a non-Jew can steal, r"l. Especially if paid “a few bucks an hour” — which doesn’t excuse anything, of course. But a Jew probably won’t put pork in your soup.)
In the part 1 I described that chassidish yetzer horah sometimes tells us that we will be able to elevate something which we clearly know is forbidden or not advisable for us (on whatever level) as a chassidish excuse to engage in it. E.g., a bochur tells himself that he will do kiddush Hashem or have a mivtzoim opportunity by going to a baseball game, while in truth he just wants to go to the game.
But the opposite perspective is also true. Baal Shem Tov teaches us that anything that the animal soul desires has a spark of G-dliness in it which the G-dly soul could elevate — and that is the ultimate reason why a Jew desires this thing. Sure, at the moment he desires it with his animal soul, but the animal soul would not even pay attention to it, if the G-dly soul did not sense an opportunity for itself there too.
This post contains long quotes, but also summaries of their content right after, so those with brains eaten away by ADD, do not despair, skip the quotes and enjoy the post. Or else...
[Or, for the heretics in the audience, something about evolution and billions of years and millions of miles of genetic material copied and re-copied to produce this.]
A short macro video by Marco Faienza about his father’s little garden. It starts off a bit slow, but after about 1:35 it picks up.
This all looks nice at a distance, but I actually am not a fan of the creatures with exoskeleton getting close and personal. My friends’ home was infested yesterday with black ants, lady bugs and weevils. It’s especially dangerous, since they have a small child who is not averse to picking anything up and putting it in his mouth.
Make sure you don’t keep garbage inside your home.
[Mitteler Rebbe’s] greatness was not just in the abundance of ma’amorim he said or their length, it was also because of the tremendous depth of his explanations.
Commenting on that depth, the Rebbe Rashab said, “My hair fell out from concentrating on the Mitteler Rebbe’s Imrei Binah*.”
As for publicizing Chassidus among the chassidim, the Mitteler Rebbe encouraged his chassidim to constantly discuss Chassidus among themselves. This desire of his became their reality.
Perhaps this is why the chassidim say that the Mitteler Rebbe’s chassidim felt as if they were living in the days of Moshiach. The Rambam writes that when Moshiach comes, the world will be filled with the knowledge of Hashem. For the Mitteler Rebbe’s chassidim, this was their reality. They were constantly immersed in the study of Chassidus.
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* Incidentally, I was given Imrei Binah as a present for my birthday, so if someone wants to be my chavrusa in learning it, please contact me.
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In other news, this dude looks so Russian! Look at his energy and see the sparks which Chassidus Chabad absorbed.
Founders of the German communities, see what fruit has grown from the tree you have planted. You killed all positive feelings; you caught them like fish in a net. You squeezed out any juice. You exchanged the honor of Torah—of Jewish wisdom—for the games and idols of the non-Jews. The soul of G–d has been ripped from them. Who has wrought this shame? Was it not done in the name of the Torah, stirred together with alien thoughts? Who asked you to do this? What spurred you to do this? It was only the thirst for secular sciences, the wisdom of Jepheth, which has now completely consumed the Torah of Shem.
— Frierdiker Rebbe
It’s very interesting to me that if one reads Mendelsohn’s writings (sometimes quoted in Hirsch Chumash), one doesn’t see anything too problematic. Most of the times he sounds a bit MO; oftentimes, of all the sources quoted (in that particular instance, Ramchal and a few contemporary Jewish philosophers), his thoughts are the most chassidish ones (e.g., he says that fulfillment of a mitzva is more important than understanding of it — yep, the same Mendelsohn).
An exerpt from the letter by the Previous Lubavitcher Rebbe about him and the long-reaching effects of his on German Judaism. As always, both the content and the form are amazing.
The point of the letter is relevant to today’s American Jewry as never before. Don’t tell me that the imagery that the above quote paints is not familiar to you. One doesn’t have to use labels to feel it.
Chassidus binds being religious and being human in a way that nothing else does. Not by compromising religion. And not by compromising humanity. But by saying that humanity is G-dly. And at the core of being a person is G-dliness itself.
Everyone knows that tiferes is a combination of chessed and gevurah. Chessed wants to give infinite amount of goodness; gevurah wants to give nothing. Chessed wants to reward; gevurah wants to punish. Chessed is kindness; gevurah is severity. Convincing a drunk Israeli who is behaving like a beheima that he should go home to his wife (and then walking him home) is chessed. Punching him out and calling his wife to come collect her husband is gevurah.
Now, tiferes is the combination of the two. It’s not red; it’s not white; it’s a garment with stripes of red and white. It is a midda that successfully combines both emotions. That is why on the kabbalistic representation of the spheros, it’s in the middle — it’s a combination of right (chessed) and left (gevurah).
Now, da’as is also in the middle, and in the Chabad’s version of the tree of 10 spheros, it’s preceded by two spheros: chochma and bina. I always wondered whether the same way that tiferes is a combination of chesed and gevurah, da’as is somehow a combination of chochma and bina. Based on their traditional explanation, it’s hard to see how this is the case. Chochma (“the father”) is the beginning of a thought, its pure knowledge without explanation of the details. Bina (“the mother”) is a development of the thought to the point of understanding its details. Da’as (“the child”) is the connection of the thought to emotions, to reality — it’s the “care” about the thought.
Reading Mitteler Rebbe’s biography today, however, I saw the following:
Author’s Note: I read in In di Getzalt fuhn Chabad, written by a son of one of the Tzemach Tzedek’s chassidim, that chassidim say that Alter Rebbe once said: “My brother the Maharil writes exactly as I say it. My son [Mitteler Rebbe] writes it as I mean it, and my grandson [Tzemach Tzedek] writes it as I say it and as I mean it. This, in essence, is Daas; a combination of Chochma and Binah together.”
We learn from today’s — both Wednesday’s and Thursday’s — Tanya (in the Chitas cycle) that love of Hashem is not enough to make a dwelling for Shechinah, Hashem’s Presence. Because when A loves B, there are two elements: A and B. When a Jew (even a tzaddik) loves Hashem, he is still a “someone” who loves Hashem.
And, as we know from earlier chapters (starting with chapter 6), Shechinah rests only on something which is completely nullified to Hashem. So, when a person is in a state of love or fear of G-d, even though it is a great state, he is not completely nullified to G-d.
On the other hand, when someone does a mitzva, he is fulfilling the Will of Hashem (which is one with His Essence), being an instrument for the expression of Hashem’s desire. At that moment, he is completely nullified, and as a result can be said to have Shechinah rest on him.
In Friday’s Tanya, Alter Rebbe explains that when a person does a mitzva in speech and thought, he is only using his G-dly soul. When he is doing a mitzva in action, he is also using his animal soul, utilizing its energy and making it a vessel for G-dliness. This is why doing mitzvos in action is the ultimate level of making a dwelling place for Hashem in the lower worlds.
(The same is true regarding a love of a husband to his wife. What use is his love if it’s only in his heart? He has to express it. But if he tells her how much he loves her and brings her roses, but doesn’t take out garbage, does he really love her? As they say, love starts not in the bedroom, but in the [vacuumed] living room.)
This can be translated to our relationship with the Rebbe and Chassidus in general. It is not enough to be a chossid “on paper” — i.e., to learn and understand Chassidus and to love the Rebbe. I cannot say that it is completely useless, G-d forbid, but if a person says that’s all he ever wants to be, it seems to me to be a mockery of what Chassidus is all about. One must also do what the Rebbe wants, in the realm of speech and thought, but especially in the realm of action.
This has to do with both the realm of Chassidus (e.g., mivtzoim) and the realm of nigleh — including fulfillment of Halacha, starting from living according to Shulchan Aruch and ending with following even specific minhogim of Chabad (whose significance one sometimes does not understand, thinking it’s just a “shtick” — which for many people it is, but this does not detract from their value and importance).
“How do I know whether I am fulfilling the Rebbe's will?”
Putting down the bundle of letters, the Rebbe calmly answered, “If you act in accordance with the Shulchan Aruch [Code of Jewish Law], then you know you are acting in accordance with my will. For if not, that means there are doubts about whether I fulfill the Shulchan Aruch.” [...]
“The thoughts that come from the yetzer [inclination] — you have to grab the yetzer by the sleeve and toss him out, and do what you have to do. Do not get into arguments with him; instead, turn your thoughts towards Torah matters, to whatever is necessary. [...]”
From an e-mail sent by Rabbi Kirschenbaum, the author of the above blog (I can't find a post with the same contents):
“Why are you so angry? What is the reason you are not someach (joyful)? I told you that I wanted you to be be'simcha. If you don't do my work with happiness, then you are not fulfilling my will, and you are not performing in the same way that I am.
“Because I can't be everywhere at once. I can't be in Holon, Kfar Chabad, Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Eilat, Paris, Melbourne — and also in Brooklyn! Therefore I send out shluchim. I chose for you to go to Haifa and I want to make you a high commander, a general. I would hope that knowing what I want would be a source of joy that would stay with you — just knowing that the one who is being commanded is doing what his commander wants.” [...]
“It is not enough that you and your wife are Chassidim,” he added. “The children, too, must be my Chassidim and their material needs properly met. I want your whole family to be comfortable, so that they will be the finest Chassidim they can be.”
If Ruven throws Shimon’s laptop from a window (while Shimon is watching*) and Levi catches it — let’s say if Levi can keep it, because the laptop is hefker, does Ruven have to pay Shimon for the laptop? Ruven can tell Shimon: “Why do I have to pay? I didn’t break the laptop.”
Update: I was asked: “Which laptop?” Why, MacBook Air, naturally.
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* Shimon has to be watching, so that he can do yeush on his laptop while it’s flying out of the window and make it hefker.
Please answer the poll on the right. The question (for posterity) is:
If a laptop is thrown out of the window, and before it reaches the ground, I smash it with a baseball bat, I am not liable for it, since I “broke an already broken thing”. What if I catch the laptop? Do I get to keep it, or can I return it?
I don’t know the answer, but one possible reason why I would have to return it is that by catching it, I have retroactively shown that its status was not “broken”. (But didn’t the person do yeush by throwing it out of the window?)
This is similar to the case of “proving” that a kohen is not a kohen (e.g., when two people are engaged, then they realize that the guy is a kohen and that the girl is forbidden to him — the rabbis will sometimes use loopholes to look for “evidence” that the guy is not a kohen). Alternatively, it may be similar to the situation with a get, where the latter goes back in time and makes it as if the marriage has never happened. Or with teshuva that likewise goes back in time and erases a sin (or transforms it into a mitzva).
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What does this have to do with babies? Rava, I think, rules that if the same scenario happens with a baby, chv"sh, the person with the bat is still a murderer. Because as long as the baby is still alive, even while it’s flying to its imminent death, one cannot say that its life is so worthless as to make it dead.
Which is a moshol given to the idea that we cannot say that the life of someone who is in coma is worthless, as long as he is alive halachically. Just being alive and lying there, the person already does something good. How? A soul of a person is compared to a candle. Just being in this world, it already introduces light into it, even if only on a spiritual level.
Which is why (besides other reasons) it’s good to have babies.
(Since some people have a problem with the concept of a metaphor, an allegory, an example, an imagined scenario, etc., let me state emphatically that I hope the said scenario never happened and never will, iy"H.)
Update: I just spoke to my rabbi, who told me that almost everything I wrote here is false. I shall investigate further and get back to you.
In the haftorah for parshas Zahor, we read the following exchange between Shmuel the prophet and king Shaul:
13. And Samuel came to Saul, and Saul said to him, “May you be blessed of the Lord; I have fulfilled the word of the Lord.”
14. And Samuel said, “What then is this bleating of the sheep in my ears? And the lowing of the oxen which I hear?”
15. And Saul said, “They brought them from the Amalekites, for the people had pity on the best of the sheep, and the oxen, in order to sacrifice to the Lord your G-d: and the rest we have utterly destroyed.”
16. And Samuel said to Saul, “Desist, and I shall tell you what the Lord spoke to me last night.” And he said to him, “Speak.”
17. And Samuel said, “Even if you are small in your own eyes, are you not the head of the tribes of Israel? And the Lord anointed you as king over Israel.
18. And the Lord sent you on a mission, and said, ‘Go, and you shall utterly destroy the sinners, the Amalekites, and you shall wage war against them until they destroy them.’
19. Now, why did you not hearken to the voice of the Lord, but you flew upon the spoil, and you did what was evil in the eyes of the Lord?”
20. And Saul said to Samuel, “Yes, I did hearken to the voice of the Lord. I did go on the mission on which the Lord sent me, and I brought Agag, the king of Amalek alive, and have utterly destroyed the Amalekites.
21. And the people took from the spoil, sheep and oxen, the best of the ban, to sacrifice to your G-d in Gilgal.”
22. And Samuel said, “Has the Lord [as much] desire in burnt offerings and peace-offerings, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than a peace-offering; to hearken [is better] than the fat of rams.
23. For rebellion is as the sin of divination, and stubbornness is as idolatry and teraphim. Since you rejected the word of the Lord, He has rejected you from being a king.”
There is a concept called “chassidish yetzer horah”, or “a yetzer horah that wears a kapoteh” — a yetzer horah that uses chassidish excuses. For example, when a chossid tells himself that something is wrong for him: some action, some pursuit, some environment, the yetzer horah then answers: “You are right. It’s not such a great thing; it’s not ideal. But we were sent into this world to elevate it — you will interact with this phenomenon which on the surface is wrong for you and will mekarev it to Hashem.”
This can range from going to a baseball game (which every chossid knows is pure evil, but perhaps he tells himself that he will somehow “elevate it”) to being in a relationship (of any kind) that is clearly wrong for one reason or another for a chossid, but he excuses it by telling himself that he will bring the other person in the relationship closer to Hashem, influence the person (even though deep in his heart he knows it’s hardly possible in this situation).
It can also include doing something that the Rebbe clearly said is wrong for a Jew or a chossid. The same excuse is applied: perhaps this situation can be “sacrificed to your G-d in Gilgal”.
Well, yes, it is true that we were sent into this world to elevate it. But we have to do it according to Hashem’s Will and according to the instructions of Moshe Rabbeinu of our generation. We must be very careful when trying to determine whether what we are doing is really appropriate, and whether we are really making a sacrifice that Hashem commanded or are just using this as an excuse to have a barbecue. “To obey is better than a peace-offering; to hearken is better than the fat of rams.”
