mentalblog.com comments:
To pick on a language is not the point of Yidishkeit and I dont think the Friedicker Rebbe wanted all Lubabs to talk just Yidish.
As the Rebbe pointed out about his Shver ( many Rabonim disagree as does Reb Menashe Klein etc. ) that he was the one who davke wanted all sifrei chisidus translated into english and what more for the public.
How did the above comment get through?
Schneur Zalman is not picking on a language. Lubavitchers have become very modern and are now considered outside the Chasidic camp. As this blog has shown, the outside world has also realized that Chabad has become Modern-Orthodox. About 15 years ago, I went to a Collel Chabad-R'MBH dinner at the Waldorf-Astoria. There was mixed seating and pritzus galore. The answer usually given is that it is muttar for kiruv. Bottom line is that Lubavitch has changed. It is sad to see that Lubavitch has sold out to the American way of life.
TA, The maskilim did not win, the derech of the maskilim was adopted bý the grandchildren of those who fought the maskilim, The fight in those times was necessary because all education and kehilas was in the hand of the govt (like Israel and some European countries today)and the maskilim tried to use the govt to regulate the erliche yeshivas and kehilas.
In societies where governments do not interfere proactively with the lifestyle or education of its citizens the test of yirei hashem is not how they nostalgicaly talk about the fights of yesteryear, but how they act and behave in their daily life and chinuch mosdes and kehilas to seperate themselves from the average goy of any country.
The way to seperate themselves is by firstly is to speak a different language than the loshon hamodina it developes a mental block in a persons mind that he is different than the goy in the street. The dress of the erliche yid and yidena has to be different so the goy should recognize you as a yid and expect your behavior to be yiddish. so the slogan was always men darf zein andersh vi der goy that also means dont read their books and watch TV surf the web(except MENTALBLOG) or listen to sichos of those who are educated from goyishe and apikorsishe books, This is the reason why lubavitch is sliding deeper and deeper into the goyishe velt. No Hafutze will prevent their demise if they dont change their daily behavior and end up where the grandchildren of the maskilim are today.
Moses Mendelson put on tefillin. The reform Rabbi does not.
Alter Chosid makes some good points. The shluchim learn, teach and disseminate chassidus and this will keep them and their future generations from turning out like Mendelson's ("spiritual") einiklach
The Maskilim wanted the governments to decide what and when the Rabbi's do, in short to be Rabbonim MeTa'am. Language and education were only part of the plan. Speaking English doesn't make you a Maskil.
Tzafania, Mendleson wasnt just a tfilin leiger he was more chasidish than the average Chosid YOU know today, he was also busy with hafutza,his BIUR on chumash was a phenomonal pirush and the gedolei yisroel said not to look into his writings because of the poison in Mendelsons head,Its a fact that whatever is in someones head it comes out thru his teachings or writings therefore,if someone [ anyone] does not refrain himself from reading or looking at goishe or apikorsishe stuff he will definitly be influenced to the extent that anything that comes out of his mouth or pen is treif, this was the shita of all gedolai yisroel that disagreed with the maskilim even those who didnt fight them. Like rashi says, KACH ONSHIN SHEL BEDOIN AFILU OMER EMES EIN SHOMIM LO.
Those same gedolim also requested from their followers to dress and talk a different language than the goy in order to preserve the seperation of the goyim and maskilim alike.
Schneur has some good points right, but the shluchim do usually have longer and larger beards than maskilim. There are some shluchim with trimmed beards though - hmmmm....
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Is R Klein an authority vis a vis Lubavitch ? maybe he can be a new Lubavitcher Rebbe - the Ungvar-Lubavitcher Rebbe. He was at the melava malka for the tze'etzoei Admur hazokein a few years ago.
Of all Chassidishe groups Lubavitch dinners, the outreach organizations bifrat, are the most modern. They get more gelt from modern yidden than other Chassidim, have many modern, not-frum guests of honor for all their different organizations. If the dinners looked too frum that might dry up.
Considering the sorry state of the US public education, I would say that Maskilim actually lost and lost big time in both Jewish and non-Jewish sectors of the population. I wouldn't call review of multiplication tables in the 5-6th grade of a private parochial school as a "secular education". Haskola of the old just can't compete with the flood of the modern media and the pop culture. ”Nit andersh” is a state of mind and not so much outward appearance. In that regard it seems that Lubavitchers actually didn’t modernize at all. Whether this process is an improvement over the old haskola – we can debate it…
it is not clear how a protracted Moshiach campaign fits in with the neo-Maskilimization of Chabad
SZ, what you refer to are all externalities, levushim if you like. Inside, you will see they have almost zero understanding of math, science, philosophy, history, dikduk, etc. I don't think the maskilim would be proud, BH.
bde> so whats inside our Penimius, is the tzemach tzedek proud of us
Reb Menashe Klein is Chosid of the Rebbe and is not so well now. May he have a RS
For more on R' Moshe ben Menachem Mendel of Dessau (Mendelssohn), and reactions to his Biur, see http://www.panix.com/~jjbaker/biur.html
B"H
the disciples of the Maggid of Mezritch had a tradition handed down to them about a story that took place in the year 5503 [1743]. It was our master the Baal Shem Tov himself who summoned his elder disciples of the Holy Society and told them the story:
In a certain city in Germany there lived a Torah scribe named Reb Menachem, who was very pious, and an outstanding scholar. G-d had given him a son with great capabilities, and he studied with him the Scriptures, Mishnah, and Gemara. But the father did not believe in Kabbalah, and he would belittle it in his heart. In fact, he often disparaged it verbally, and spoke against the holy Zohar. This attitude had a detrimental effect on his son's religious beliefs.
When Reb Menachem died, his son was only twelve years old. Having a strong desire to study Torah, the orphaned son left his hometown and traveled to another city in Germany. There, he developed a desire to study other sciences in addition to the Torah. Satan indulged the lad's desires, for he had chosen him as his instrument to subvert Israel with heresy, and to cause damage to the Jewish nation by developing non-believers in G-d and His Torah. But, whoever followed our [chassidic] path managed to save himself, his disciples, and their disciples from the devil's plan.
When - in the year 5536 [1776] - news arrived about the publication of Mendelssohn's translation, the elder disciples of Moreinu the Baal Shem Tov and the disciples of the Maggid voiced their opposition to the study of this translation and its commentary. As a precaution [against this study], they also opposed the study of Hebrew grammar. They carefully supervised their chassidic flocks, to ensure that they studied only Rashi's commentary on the Tanach. This caused a great storm of protest among the Torah scholars who belonged to the camp of the misnagdim.
With each passing year, the number of young folk who traveled to Germany to study at various universities increased. They went to study medicine, rhetoric, vocabulary, musicology, linguistics, etc. Most of them were highly gifted, and they pursued their studies with much diligence. Some of them amassed great knowledge of the natural sciences, and amazed their professors with their proficiency. These were appointed to the faculties of their universities, receiving handsome salaries. The rest, returned to their native countries.
Of the students who returned home with academic degrees in the arts and sciences, only a small minority retained their faith in Torah and mitzvos. As for the majority, their piety had been eroded. They began to be lax in performing the mitzvos, and many of them came to (what was considered in those days) a bad end.
Professors of medicine were appointed to prominent positions in provincial capitals or in rural county seats. Most professors in other disciplines achieved positions in the large cities, and they devoted their whole energy to poisoning the Jewish youth with the seeds of Haskalah. However, to hide their true intentions, they disguised themselves in the robes of piety. Most of them chose to become melamdim, and since they had adopted German manners and conventions, they met with the approval of the pupils and their parents.
http://66.102.7.104/search?q=cac...hn+maggid&
hl=en
Tzemach I know you don't like links and quotations in the comments therefore you are welcome to either delete this or upgrade it to a post (i felt compelled to post it in view of the previous comment).:-)
What the Friderker meant is clear. America is no different, we still have to keep torah, mitzvos, yiddeshkeit, chassidus etc. It has nothing to do with whether you wear a borsalino, casket or some other attire. Or talk a certain langouge.
Kehos was always catering to the english speaking olam (talks & tales). These publications were not only for hafatza purposes but also for the frum velt. The Rebbe's sichos to children at rallies were translated into english immediately after spoken, in the Rebbe's presence. These were children learning in lubavitcher mosdos.
Areil, can you lesd us to any any other sources (before) besides the ficton of the Rayatz
B"H
"Alter Chosid" not all people reading this blog are such "koifrim" as yourself...I post it for them not for you.:-)
Ariel, you assume that the original disputes between the haskalah and the orthodox anticipated how secularization would occur--but mass secularization in Eastern Europe did not come via educated Jews reading German and studying in universities. The vector into modernity came via thoroughly Yiddish-speaking Jews who knew nothing about Mendelssohn, joined the Bund, the Zionists, or simply walked out of the argument and came to America.
I would say that lazer misunderestimates the depth of modernity--you can't look at the popular culture and see what it is doing; you have to look at all the technology around you--all the man-made objects, books, trains, elevators, cities, buildings, eyeglasses--modernity is distributed in the things and processes that surround Jews. But he notes that culture as a whole is an attractor. Most people will not opt for voluntary self-ghettoizatoin after the walls come down.
as an example--my non-observant maternal grandfather, his wife, and his brothers exclusively spoke Yiddish, read Der Forward, and lived with Jewish, Yiddish-speaking neighbors in their Lower East Side apartments--they started out as Bundists and ended up as members of the Garment Workers working in the rag trade. They made their decision to immigrate without benefit of the corrosive skepticism to be imbibed in the great universities of Russia, Berlin, or Paris, to which, unlike the Rebbe, they were never exposed. My paternal non-observant great-grandfather spoke Yiddish and was a baker--there is some dispute as to whether he had a nodding acquaintance with Reform social clubs in NY. He, in turn, took in my grandfather--who was a traditional Jew abandoned by his own father--because my great-grandfather loved his daughter and she loved my grandfather.
I think that thinking about these issues exclusively in TA's dialectical, pedagogically argumentative formulation overlooks what was going down bottom-up on the ground in the Ashkenazi emigration movements to and the immigrant communities in America, and, notwithstanding the governing role of socialism, even in Israel.
B"H
We have no arguement on that , that wasn't the point I was trying to make.
Ariel, you seemed to take off from Mendolsohn to lay the blame for "straying" in general on the maskaliim and their followers. TA seems to say the maskaliim in Russia were faithful reformers whose accommodations were eventually picked up by Chabad. I assume this is meant to be provocative.
The answer to RSZ is quite simple.
The Maskilim were using th eloshon hamedina as a 'bridge' to bring shomrei torah umitzvos over to the side of the balei aveireh.
Those working in kiruv these days are also using it as a bridge - with the traffic going the other way.
To Mr. Mamesh Are you certain of the current traffic patterns and directions ?
Listen to the hourly traffic report !
Can anybody please name some big shluchim that do trim their beards?
Just wonderin', cuz' i personaly havent seen any...
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