1. In listening to a recent shiur on Daas Torah by R. Hershel Schachter, I found a number of noteworthy comments. In this shiur, which has been heard thousands of times, R. Schachter states, “If you have an outlook, if you have what I would consider a crooked, a krum outlook on Yom ha-Atzmaut, then your outlook on eruvin is also crooked. I can’t rely on anything that you say.” I find this difficult to accept, since can’t someone be…
Their publications are not allowed to get out. Their roiling Internet forums are blocked by filters. The articles they publish omit the names of professors considered verboten. A cohort of Haredi scholars challenge the academy and their natural surroundings, unafraid to deal with subjects deemed taboo in the yeshiva world. Few Religious Zionists have penetrated this alternative ivory tower, but one of them—Eitam Henkin, may his blood be avenged—succeeded in breaking down barriers. * “One needs to strengthen oneself with…
I have found a number of statements by mainstream rabbinic figures that, if one didn’t know better, one would think that they were said by liberal Orthodox figures. For example: ומה אעשה ולבי מרחם על אלמנה [ובפרט בימינו] רחמים גדולים, ואולי אפשר לערער אם אני כשר לדון דין אלמנה, אבל מצד הדין אינני רואה פסול לעצמי. If a liberal Orthodox rabbi made this statement, I think many would say that he was not “objective” and thus not suitable to serve…
Please note: The conversation in the comments, while of importance, does not fit the focus of the Seforim Blog. Anyone who wishes to continue can email Dr. Shapiro or the conversation can be continued on a different website. 1. Those who follow Jewish debates on the internet have probably heard of Rabbi Avrohom Gordimer, who has assumed the mantle of defender of the faith. He sees his goal as exposing the non-Orthodox nature of Open Orthodoxy, and has spent many…
Josh Rosenfeld is the Assistant Rabbi at Lincoln Square Synagogue and on the Judaic Studies Faculty at SAR High School. This is his third contribution to the Seforim blog. His first essay, on “The Nazir in New York,” is available here, and his second essay, “The Princess and I: Academic Kabbalists/Kabbalist Academics,“ is available here. ב״ה אור לנר ג׳, חנוכה ה׳תשע״ו Recent years have witnessed a remarkable trend in the widespread study of Hasidic texts within Orthodox communities that themselves…
The readership of the Seforim Blog is invited to a shiur that will be taking place Sunday November 29 at 8:00 PM. The shiur will be given by the noted scholar and author Rav Yechiel Goldhaber of Eretz Yisroel (link). He has authored many wonderful articles and works on a wide range of topics most notably Minhagei Kehilos about customs, and Kunditon (link) about the Titanic, and the Cherem on Spain. The subject of the Shiur is על חרדים ויום…
Professor Marc Shapiro’s latest work, Changing the Immutable, contains considerable interesting and pertinent information for the student of Jewish history. As stated on the cover, the author attempts to reveal how the (Jewish) orthodox ‘establishment’ silences both past and present dissenting voices through “Orthodox Judaism Rewriting Its History.” I don’t intend this to be a review of the entire work (that would take a lot more time and space), however I did want to share some of my frustration here,…
* Comments on Changing the Immutable: How Orthodox Judaism Rewrites its History by Marc B. Shapiro (Oxford – Portland, OR: The Littman Library of Jewish Civilization, 2015). *Rabbi Prof. Aryeh A. Frimer holds the Ethel and David Resnick Chair of Active Oxygen Chemistry at Bar Ilan University, Ramat Gan 5290002, Israel; email: Aryeh.Frimer@biu.ac.il. He has lectured and published widely on various aspects of “Women and Halakha;” see here. His most recent paper is: “Women, Kri’at haTorah and Aliyyot (with an…
I am happy to announce that my new book is now with the printer and should be at the distributor by May 4. Amazon and book stores will have the book not long after that. Changing the Immutable has taken quite a long time and I hope readers find that it was worth the wait. One of the main reasons it has taken so long is that some of my time in recent years has been devoted to my posts…
’s new book, The Living Tree: Studies in Modern Orthodoxy, has just appeared. The Seforim Blog is happy to present this selection from it. Halakhic Pluralism in the Eyes of Rishonim and Aharonim In many of the off-hand remarks of the early commentators, their advocacy of the principle of halakhic pluralism is plain to see, regardless of whether these great authorities stemmed from Ashkenaz, Sepharad, or Provence. They repeatedly express the pluralistic principle of “these and those are the words…
In the Koren Rav siddur, in the minhagim of the Rav, in the section dealing with the halachic rules of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik, זצ”ל it is written: The Rav posited that if one forgot to recite Ya’aleh VeYavo on Rosh Hodesh during Shaharit, one should not repeat the Amida, but should rather rely upon the reference to the holiday that will be made in the Musaf prayer. The Gemara in Shabbat (24a) states that one who forgot to recite…
1. Here is a short piece I wrote a right after the appearance of the Pew Report. (The endnote is not part of the original article.) There has been a great deal of discussion in the wake of the recent release of the Pew Research Center’s “Portrait of Jewish Americans.” Some have focused on the report’s evidence of increasing intermarriage and lack of any Jewish connection of many in the younger generation. Others have zeroed in on some of the…
Christian M. Rutishauser’s The Human Condition in the Thought of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik has just been published by Ktav (having earlier appeared in German). Quite apart from Rutishauser’s scholarship, the book is noteworthy in that Rutishauser is a prominent Jesuit priest (see here; for those who don’t know, the University of Scranton is also Jesuit). The Seforim Blog is happy to present the introduction to the book where Rutishauser explains what led him to the Rav. A Catholic Glimpse…