Bnei Brak custom
Greetings and Happy Holidays!
In a lesson a week ago, you mentioned that there are barbershops in Bnei Brak that have an ad in them, which states that when getting a haircut, the client must observe the commandments of “Do not break,” “Do not destroy,” “Do not lie,” and more, a total of about 14 commandments, most of which are commandments. You canceled this custom, and you said that there is no point in the client observing the commandments of “Do not destroy.”
First, I wanted to bring out that already in the chapter of the commandment to shave, the “Shiva” brings about a shikin in the haircut. And the Zel’ot in the introduction: “When one cuts the hair of his head, it is not enough for him that he does not damage the hair, but he must be shikin that he prevents himself from damaging them, in order to fulfill the commandment of his Creator who commanded him to do so. And the Zel’ot in Par’ Kedoshim: When a person cuts his hair, he should shikin that he fulfills two mitzvot in the hair of the head… and five mitzvot in the hair of the beard.” (So this is not a “custom of Bnei Brak”).
In this matter, there is no evidence to suggest that there is a law that “commandments require intention” in the commandments of the 30th. It is possible that what was written for the 10th is for reasons of “worship of God” (Yahuwsh), and not for “halachic” reasons.
But the ‘Derech Pikudach’ wrote in its introduction, (the Shaddai Hamed cites in the system from the principle of the fourth,) that the commandments require intention – the intention is delayed from the Torah, from the verse ‘and keep and do them with all your heart’. And he adds that the fifth is the law regarding the prohibitions of sin. And he brings as a help the words of the Shaar HaMitzvot. (And the Shaddai cites that the Shaar HaMikhesha HaNeshd is divided, and therefore it is easy to say that there is no need for intention in fulfilling the commandments of punishment, which are only warned about in the law).
I brought all of this up as an introduction to the question, why are you certain that the law of commandments does not require intention in a prohibition?
Certainly, the usual nefkuta does not belong in the prohibition of lau. That is, in a positive mitzvot it belongs to say that one who did not intend should return and fulfill the mitzvah, and in a prohibition of lau it does not belong to say that he must put himself in the same situation again and withdraw with the intention of fulfilling the mitzvah. But one must still ask – is there not an ‘act of mitzvah’ here, all that did not intend.
I do not know whether in a law that does not contain an act (such as ‘repentance’) there is any nefkuta whatsoever in what requires intention. (The way you command is to write is like the Sages saying that if a person sits and does not commit an offense, he is given a reward as if he had performed a mitzvah – I only illustrate this by distinguishing the offense from the ‘intention’). My question is: Do you believe that there is no law of intention in a law, or only that there is no nefkuta in intention in a prohibition of a law?
Second question: You wrote in the last post: “The analogy between leaven and the evil inclination can help people in their struggle against the evil inclination or in understanding its modes of operation (it doesn’t really help me, a littoralist like me. But no one is perfect). And yet, at most, there is a valuable activity here, a means to achieve a worthy goal, but not Torah study. Torah study is an attempt to understand the Torah and its contents in a systematic and critical manner. When studying a text, the goal is to learn its content and understand it, and not to be freely impressed by it. Freely impressed is not studying the text but at most personal work and self-discovery. The result of the study must stand the test of reasonableness so that we can assume that we have indeed reached the desired result. It is difficult to regard casually kneading a text in order to extract from it what our hearts desire as Torah study.”
Do you think that someone who only intends to study Aggadah, Hasidic books, and the like today is exempt from the blessings of the Torah? That is, is it possible to recite a blessing for these studies?
Honorable Mention
Y
Happy to be happy.
Now I remembered that someone once showed me these words of the Ari. And I thought they were words of terror. Suppose someone did not transgress against the Law but did not prepare for the sake of a mitzvah. Would he have a transgression? Of course not. Would he not have a mitzvah? This is true even if he did prepare. And after all, there is no such thing as an “act of a mitzvah” in the Law. And as for the matter of not following the Law to prepare, this is present in all his actions regardless of whether he did or did not. One of the eternal mitzvot is to always compare God with my opponent. In short, these are words of terror.
I was debating the issue of blessing the Torah over an Aggadatha. It is customary to bless, and perhaps this is because there is also a blessing over the Torah in Gebra. But if that is the case, then one should also bless when studying a book on Kant’s philosophy or anything that builds, for me, the issue of faith and the correct perception of the world.
And is “these things that have no lesson” a legend or a halacha, since this is what is blessed in the morning of the Torah blessing?
Pela Yoetz (shaving):
“And the sons of the Lord, may God, write that at the time of shaving, he should not allow the hair of his head to be cut or the hair of his beard to be damaged, in order to fulfill the warning of his Creator, and in this it is important that he should fulfill the prohibition in the act of doing good.” etc.
On the other hand, when Pela Yoetz speaks of the intention in the prohibition of eating in a general way (the value of the prohibitions in the second chapter)
“When a person prevents himself from the forbidden things, he should remember in his heart that because of the commandments of God, blessed be He, he refrains from doing his will and doing pleasure before the throne of His glory” etc.
and does not mention here the matter that fulfills the prohibition in the act of doing good.
So it is possible that it is specifically about shaving.
But I do not know why. There may be some connection to the verb "shahat" in the Bible (simply "to destroy").
In my opinion, one should bless what is part of the divine revelation in this world, and the words of a legend are part of the divine revelation in this world. Kant, on the other hand, is not, and therefore there is nothing to bless about.
Let's be more precise. Your claim about the words of a legend can also be made about scholarship and everything that is not halakhic in a practical and direct way. They all express human beliefs, not law. Should we not bless when we study scholarly books? Of course we should, since the blessing is for engaging in the words of Torah as part of the divine revelation. From another perspective, should we bless the blessings of the Torah over a scholarly article by a non-Jewish scholar on a subject in the Talmud (my father told me that he once saw an article by a scholar named Christine and assumed that she was not Jewish)? The answer is no, because it is not part of the divine revelation.
The divine revelation continues here and now through the people of Israel, and therefore when a Jew engages in the Torah, one should bless. On the other hand, when a Gentile engages in Torah, he is not part of the revelation and therefore there is nothing to bless. The weakness of the books of faith, in my opinion, does not stem from their being a study of Torah from God, but from their dependence on contemporary intellectual fashion. A teacher of the confused was written for the confused of his time and therefore necessarily depends on what causes them embarrassment in their time. This does not mean that there is nothing to learn from him, since often the same embarrassment recurs and rolls over to another generation, but for most of us, Aristotle, simply put, will no longer create embarrassment.
And if you ask what the place of sermons is, I will answer that sermons often do not teach us anything new from the Scriptures but something new about ourselves. The parable of the leaven and matzah teaches us something new about ourselves and not about the Scriptures. In this sense, there is more moral teaching here than innovation in connection with divine revelation.
(By the way, my wife gives you her best wishes for your position on the issue of women's minyans)
I have already elaborated on this in other places. I will only note here that you did not answer the question of when this is considered a divine revelation. What is the difference between a Talmudic legend and a story/poem written by one of the Amoraim or rabbis of our time (for example, a play by Ramachal)? Should we also bless that? Is everything that comes out of a Jew's pen Torah? If not, then we are back to the question of what a Jew must engage in for it to be considered Torah. In other words, a systematic definition is required and the ethnic definition is not enough. But as soon as there is a systematic definition, the question immediately arises of what the law will be when a wrongdoer engages in the same content.
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