A hatchet to dig in it
I have seen that many cite this Rambam (Mishnah) as support for the prohibition of accepting support for Torah study, and claim that the ultra-Orthodox demand that the state fund Torah institutions is a desecration of God.
And it seems to me that many people are wrong about this.
Isn’t the intention to make Torah the means and livelihood the main thing?
When support requires learning and learning is the main thing, then there is no prohibition of digging with a spade, right?
And in addition, when there is a budget pie that also originates from the Haredi public and is divided for such and such needs, why doesn’t the Haredi public have the right to demand that its share of the budget be directed to the realization of its values just as it is directed to the realization of the desires of the other public?
Hatred for Jews has always existed in a different form, it doesn’t seem to me that this desecration of God is any different from the desecration of God’s commandments with the blood of Christians.
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I just wanted to be precise about the sources, it's hard to discuss everyone's personal perspective, it's made up of so many details.
And regarding the sources
“Rabbi Zadok says, Do not use a crown to boast about, nor a spade to dig with, and so Hillel would say, and use a spade to boast about, Have you learned that everyone who enjoys the words of Torah takes his life from the world?”
This mishna is a source for the words of the Rambam, the parable of the spade and crown, its meaning being the main and the trivial / reason and the surrounding? The mishna warns against studying for no reason, just as in order to tease, so also the use of studying to obtain other things, honor/money. Using the Torah (the will of God) for one’s personal needs is a desecration of God beyond compare, it is a misappropriation of the most precious thing entrusted to man.
But when one receives a scholarship in order to study and the study is the main thing and not that the study is the reason for the money, then there is no misappropriation at all, and on the contrary, the purpose of studying Torah comes to its realization, and the scholarship also serves the Torah and not the Torah serves the money, and there is no desecration of God at all.
Do you agree about This year?
In the Mishnah, it is certainly possible to interpret it as you say.
You spoke about Maimonides, and his halakha is formulated as follows:
Anyone who sets his heart on studying Torah and not doing any work and making a living from charity has blasphemed the Name and blasphemed the Torah and extinguished the light of religion and has brought evil upon himself and taken his life from the world to come…
There is no difference between the goal and the means. This is about someone who wants to study Torah and make a living from charity.
I will repeat what I have already written, which in my opinion is irrelevant to our generation.
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