Month: June 2016 – ח׳ בסיון תשע״ו

You Are Entitled To Your Own Opinions, Not Your Own Facts

Excerpted from here:

What Lithuanian yeshivas do or say makes a difference because they are the gold standard by which everything else is measured. Why do some groups learn? They have to show “we learn Torah too!”  Even Reform and Conservative have to measure themselves by means of the standard set by the Litvaks (Lithuanian Jews). If the Litvaks think something is kosher, that makes it kosher by definition. If they think it is not it makes it not kosher – by definition. Everything has to get past that hurdle. Nothing and no one is exempt, even if they don’t like it. Especially if they don’t like it.

You want to claim something is Jewish? You say the Chazon Ish said it was OK! Or Reb Moshe. Or Reb Aaron Kotler. You don’t say “They learn it in a Breslov yeshiva.” You don’t say some Reform Rabbi says it is OK.

For example when the Na Nach Breslov Chasidim want to show that the “petek” (letter that Reb Odesser thought he received from Reb Nachman) is kosher they go around plastering up copies of the letter of approval (Haskama) that Reb Moshe Feinstein gave to Reb Odesser. Just walk into the synagogue of Reb Nachman in Uman and you will find copies of Reb Moshe’s letter plastered all over the place–and most importantly right in the official notices section. That means if you want to say something is kosher you have to get approval of a Litvak Gadol. Without that nothing can even start.

No one says Reb Moshe is kosher because Breslov learns his books. If you want to say a person in Breslov like Rav Cheshin knows how to learn you say he learns at the Mir yeshiva. You don’t say someone knows how to learn because they learn in Breslov.

Was Rabbi Aaron Kotler a Brisker?

A quote from here:

Reb Aharon and The Brisker Derech

I’m really astonished when I hear certain individuals say that Reb Aharon’sderech in learning was like the Brisker derech. It was not Brisker. Anyone who was in the shiur who has any brains at all cannot say that Reb Aharon was a Brisker. His style was altogether different. His style was binyan, and he told me personally that a svorah, you could say this way or that way, but you never know the truth. If you have a raya, then you know where you’re going. Then you know what the truth is. If you have a cheshbon and it fits together, then you know it’s true. But a svorah you can say any way you want. Svoras don’t mean anything. He was very much against stam sayingsvoras.

The Brisker way is a lot of saying svoras. Saying svoras this way, sayingsvoras that way. He was very much against that style. He wanted people to learn and to know and he just didn’t believe in it.

I once asked him when they were selling Reb Boruch Ber. I was very enamored with the sefer. You couldn’t get it at that time. Seforim were hard to come by. Now there’s a tremendous abundance of seforim.

But with that sefer, there was a shailah that the people who had originally printed it claimed that the new printer had no right to print it. But it was being sold and I asked the Rosh Yeshiva if I was allowed to buy it.

The Rosh Yeshiva said, “Yes, you’re allowed to buy it.” But he also said, “You shouldn’t look at it until after 11:00 at night.”

He held that you have to learn the Gemara, Rashi, the Rishonim, whatever you should learn, and listen to the shiurim, and that’s it. You want it? Look at it 11:00 at night. You want to look at another sefer? Okay. But basically, that’s what he held, and whoever told you otherwise, it’s just a story. No question about it.