VIENNA IN 1896

 https://x.com/i/status/2051998914908172570

VIENNA IN 1896 Another era, another Austria...

Germany figured something out

 https://x.com/GermanSimply

Germany figured something out that the rest of the world is still pretending it doesn't need to know. 11 things. One thread. Some of these will make you uncomfortable. All of them are true

𝟭. They made university almost free. Not as a charity. As infrastructure. Germany decided that an educated population benefits everyone – so everyone contributes to making it possible.

The result: world-class universities, zero student loan crises, and graduates who enter the workforce without financial trauma as their baseline. The rest of the world calls this radical. Germany calls it common sense.

𝟮. They built a word for work-life balance instead of just talking about it. 𝘍𝘦𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘢𝘣𝘦𝘯𝘥.

The sacred end of the working day.

In Germany, when work ends – it ends.

No emails at 9PM.

No "just checking in" on weekends.

No performance of busyness

to prove you're committed.

Your time after Feierabend is yours.

Legally. Culturally. Completely.

The rest of the world is still in meetings about having fewer meetings.

𝟯. They protected bread 3,000+ types UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage Not technology Not engineering 𝗕𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱 Because Germany understood something most cultures forgot– the things worth protecting aren't always the loudest They can be things on your table every morning.

𝟰. They built an apprenticeship system that the world keeps trying to copy and never quite manages. 𝘋𝘶𝘢𝘭𝘦𝘴 𝘈𝘶𝘴𝘣𝘪𝘭𝘥𝘶𝘯𝘨𝘴𝘴𝘺𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘮. Half classroom. Half workplace. From age 16.

German apprentices graduate with real skills, real experience, and zero condescension from society about not going to university. A plumber in Germany is not looked down upon. A plumber in Germany is someone who knows something you don't.

𝟱. They separated the feeling of being cold from the personality of being cold. 𝘐𝘤𝘩 𝘣𝘪𝘯 𝘬𝘢𝘭𝘵 Literal: I am cold = I am a cold person. Emotionally 𝘔𝘪𝘳 𝘪𝘴𝘵 𝘬𝘢𝘭𝘵 Literal: to me it's cold = I feel cold. Physically. Learners will understand this better

Two different sentences. Two completely different meanings. German decided that what you feel in the moment and what you are as a person should never be confused. Most languages never made this distinction. Most people never make it either.

𝟲. They gave workers a seat in the boardroom. 𝘔𝘪𝘵𝘣𝘦𝘴𝘵𝘪𝘮𝘮𝘶𝘯𝘨. Co-determination. In large German companies, workers elect representatives to the supervisory board. Not to advise. To vote. The rest of the world calls this unusual. German workers call it Tuesday.

𝟳. They kept their town centres alive. Walk through a German town on a Saturday morning. Bakeries open. Markets running. People buying bread from the same baker their parents bought bread from.

Germany resisted the full supermarket takeover that hollowed out town centres across most of the developed world. Not perfectly. But meaningfully. Because Germany understood that a community without a centre isn't really a community.

𝟴. They made recycling a social contract Not a suggestion. A system bins, rules, fines, and a bottle deposit (𝘗𝘧𝘢𝘯𝘥)that makes returning bottles feel like collecting money you were always owed Result: one of the highest recycling rates in the world Systems+ incentives

𝟵. Named the feeling of a Sunday before the week begins. 𝘚𝘰𝘯𝘯𝘵𝘢𝘨𝘴𝘣𝘭𝘶𝘦𝘴. Sunday blues. Germany didn't try to fix it or tell you to be more positive. They named it. Acknowledged it & let it be. A language that doesn't dismiss what you feel – respects you.

Germany is not perfect. No country is. But the way it treats workers, protects culture, and names what others ignore – is worth paying attention to. The best way to pay attention? Learn the language. Everything in this thread lands differently in German.

German pronunciation

 German pronunciation has one rule that nobody puts in the title of their lesson.

But it changes everything. 𝗚𝗲𝗿𝗺𝗮𝗻 𝗶𝘀 𝗽𝗵𝗼𝗻𝗲𝘁𝗶𝗰. What that means: every letter makes the same sound every single time it appears. No exceptions hiding in plain sight the way English hides them. English: 𝘨𝘩𝘰𝘴𝘵, 𝘵𝘩𝘳𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩, 𝘵𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩𝘵, 𝘤𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩. Same four letters. Four different sounds. No rule. No logic. No mercy. German: what you see is what you say. Every time. Here are the sounds that trip beginners – solved in one post: 𝟭. 𝗲𝗶 sounds like English 𝘦𝘺𝘦 𝘦𝘪𝘯 (one) — sounds like "ine" 𝘉𝘦𝘪𝘯 (leg) — sounds like "bine" 𝟮. 𝗶𝗲 sounds like English 𝘦𝘦 𝘴𝘪𝘦 (she/they) — sounds like "zee" 𝘣𝘭𝘪𝘦𝘣 (stayed) — sounds like "bleeb" 𝟯. 𝗮𝘂 sounds like English 𝘰𝘸 𝘒𝘢𝘶𝘧 (purchase) — sounds like "cowf" 𝘣𝘳𝘢𝘶𝘯 (brown) — sounds like "brown" 𝟰. 𝗲𝘂 / 𝗮̈𝘂 sounds like English 𝘰𝘺 𝘏𝘦𝘶𝘵𝘦 (today) — sounds like "hoy-teh" 𝘓𝘢̈𝘶𝘧𝘦𝘳 (runner) — sounds like "loy-fer" 𝟱. 𝘀𝗽 / 𝘀𝘁 at the start of a word, pronounced 𝘴𝘩𝘱 / 𝘴𝘩𝘵 𝘚𝘱𝘳𝘢𝘤𝘩𝘦 (language) — "shpra-kheh" 𝘚𝘵𝘢𝘥𝘵 (city) — "shtat" Five rules. Hundreds of words now readable. This has nothing to do with talent but purr pattern recognition. And patterns can be taught.

https://x.com/GermanSimply_

Article by Judith Bleich

 https://web.stevens.edu/golem/llevine/rsrh/bleich_rsrh.pdf

only as instruments for translating the Torah into living reality

 Israel should be one nation, an entire nation that should have no other foundation for its existence, survival, activity and significance other than this Torah. It is to see the realization and devoted observance of this God-given "fiery Law" as its one contribution in world history for the edifice of human salvation. What the Phoenicians sought to bring about with the keels of their ships, what the ancient Greeks sought to achieve with their chisels and what the ancient Romans sought to attain with their swords, Israel is to accomplish with its Torah. Nay more, Israel is a nation that became a nation only through and for the Torah, a nation that once owned a land and existed as a state only through and for the Torah, and which possessed that land and that statehood only as instruments for translating the Torah into living reality. This is why Israel was a people even before it possessed land and statehood; this, too, is why Israel survived as a people even after its land was destroyed and its statehood lost, and this is why it will survive as a nation as long as it does not lose this only מורשה, this sole foundation for its survival and significance. That is the kind of nation that Israel, that all of us, should be. 

Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch "The Character of the Jewish Community," Collected Writings, Vol. VI, p. 35

2 Giants speak

 https://web.stevens.edu/golem/llevine/rsrh/salanter_two_giants.pdf

I just read this and can relate

Germans don't do small talk.

They don't ask about your weekend

before a meeting.

They don't comment on the weather

to fill silence.

They just start.

One commenter wrote: In Germany we don't even have a real word for Smalltalk

24nd yahrzeit of Rav Avigdor Miller

The 24nd yahrzeit of Rav Avigdor Miller zt'l is the twenty-seventh of Nissan (Tues, April 14th).

Rav Avigdor Miller on Visiting The Grave of A Tzadik

Q: What is the function of going to a kever of a Tzadik?

A: And the function is what we spoke about today. And that is, in order to advertise to the world that the greatest thing in the world is to be a tzadik. And in the zechus of you going there and demonstrating that you appreciate the greatness of a tzadik, Hashem will reward you and listen to your tefilla. But you’re not praying to the tzadik, chas v’shalom.

Hakodosh Boruch Hu says, “If you understand how much I love this man, and not only him, but I even love his body because his body was kadosh. And now you come there, where his body was placed, for that purpose of showing that you appreciate the greatness, the holiness, of his body, then I’m going to reward you by listening to your tefilla.”

That’s the purpose of kivrei tzaddikim.

TAPE # E-8 (May 1995)

Q: How should one pray at the grave of a tzadik?

A: At the grave of a tzadik you're supposed to pray to Hashem in the merit of this tzadik, in the zechus of this tzadik. Suppose he gets on his knees and prays, “Tzadik,” he says, “Tzadik, please save me.” That's wrong. You don't say, “Tzadik save me.” You can say “Tzadik, please pray to Hashem for me. Your zechus should help me.”

TAPE # 689 (June 1988)

close the mouth

 In lion's skin, an ass did hide

and none could know who was inside

Until himself he did betray

by opening his mouth to bray.

Written by Avigdor Miller when he was a boy

1901

 https://x.com/i/status/2042585624985718836

What Paris looked like around 126 years ago.

 What Paris looked like around 126 years ago.

Recording of Kenes

https://yeshivasfrankfurt.org/kenes-chol-hamoed-pesach-5786/

Rav Hamburger's speech and Ashkenaz singing

The Midwest is the place for Yekkes

You can connect to Rav Hirsch in the next world

 

Rabbi YM Morgenstern, Sea of Wisdom 205

Minhag Ashkenaz Kenes in Bnei Brak, Monday

 ביום שני י”ט ניסן

כנס חול המועד

מנחה 6.30

בין מנחה למעריב דרשת החג

מפי מורנו הרב

הרב בנימין שלמה המבורגר

שליט”א

שירים וחזנות אחרי מעריב

לינק הצטרפות לכנס

view online:

https://meet.google.com/hoz-qcuv-oak?pli=1

mincha, drasha, maariv, chazanus

Real Shule

  

Samson Raphael Hirsch's Religious Universalism and the German-Jewish Quest for Emancipation (Jews and Judaism: History and Culture) by Moshe Y. Miller (Author)

Samson Raphael Hirsch's Religious Universalism and the German-Jewish Quest for Emancipation (Jews and Judaism: History and Culture) by Moshe Y. Miller (Author

Our Backs Will Touch: Similarities between Hasidim and German Jewish Hirschians

 

Our Backs Will Touch: Similarities between Hasidim and German Jewish Hirschians  Yisrael Kashkin

 

Four decades ago, I attended a lecture by Stokely Carmichael, the famous civil rights activist and champion of the global pan-African movement. During the Q&A, a young African American college student expressed to Carmichael his feelings of solidarity with and admiration of Carmichael but also his feelings of confusion since on numerous matters he and Carmichael differed. I don’t recall the entirety of Carmichael’s characteristically energetic response, but I remember vividly the words with which he concluded: “You fight your fight, and I will fight my fight. Our backs will touch.” The young man seemed relieved. Carmichael was saying that we don’t have to agree on everything to be comrades in our struggle.

This brings me to Baal Shem Tov and R. Samson Raphael Hirsch. It is commonly thought that Hasidim and German Jews (Yekkes) are worlds apart.[1] R. Yehonasan Gefen tells the story of how Yekke parents were “shocked” to hear that one of their sons wanted to be a Skverer Hasid. To them, Skverer Hasidus seemed like another world. They consulted with R. Yaakov Kamenetsky, who advised them to send him to the Skverer yeshiva.[2]

With Hasidim emerging from Eastern Europe and the Yekkes from Germany, there are cultural differences, often viewed inaccurately by outside groups through a lens that exaggerates them into a cliché. However, Hasidim with their long coats, beards, and sidelocks are visually distinguishable from traditional Yekkes with their short coats (the term Yekke might originate from the word jacket), goatees, and standard halakhic peyot. Hasidim often daven after the zeman and are somewhat casual with time. Yekkes, famously, are punctual.

More significantly, Hasidic thought and even practice is based partially on Kabbalah, which Yekkes are not commonly associated with, although allegations that they are averse to it are likely exaggerated. R. Elie Munk’s commentary on Humash is replete with references to the Zohar,[3] and Kabbalah was important in the lives of Yekkes Ahron Marcus[4] and Moreinu Yaakov Rosenheim among others.[5] Equally significant, Hasidic practice, particularly in the liturgy, constitutes somewhat of a departure from Ashkenazi tradition as it incorporated liturgy and practices of Sephardim as well as those derived from Kabbalah. The Yekkes pride themselves on strict adherence to the customs of historic Ashkenaz. There is no departure, “not even one iota” as they like to say, even though that’s not 100% accurate.[6]

continue:

Our Backs Will Touch: Similarities between Hasidim and German Jewish Hirschians 

America was a Germanic country

 

The wrong message

 Zionists love to reprint American author Mark Twain's depiction of 19th century Palestine as a wasteland because they take that as justification for taking the land. If there's nobody there, are you taking it by force? However, if you read his full travelogue, he does not depict it as being empty. He records all kinds of encounters with local Arabs. But even if you just take literally the one passage that depicts bleakness, Zionists are taking the wrong message. The message should be, if you live in the land and fail to be exemplary Jews who keep the mitzvos then HaShem will drive you from the land and lay it to waste. 

Mark Twain did not say it was all desolate

 "Rather than interpreting The Innocents Abroad through the satirical exaggerated lens which Twain was known for, his account of the Holy Land is taken as an accurate representation of Palestine, one that has been excessively appropriated by the Zionist movement while at the same time rejected by Palestinians." (MarkTwainStudies.com)

It's standard in aliyah literature to print American author Mark Twain's depiction (Innocents Abroad) of a bleak Palestine during his visit here. See for example this manipulative summary at Zionist.org. "Twain’s descriptions directly contradict modern claims that pre-20th-century Palestine was a thriving Arab nation. Instead, he encountered a nearly abandoned landscape, with few inhabitants, little agriculture, and widespread neglect."

His account is so glorious to aliyaniks because it seems to fit in with the idea, that is pushed relentlessly, that geulah has come, and the land that was empty and desolate of everything is now booming. This guilts you into making aliyah which in the Modern Orthodox world is a greater deed than getting the 10 commandments from the Almighty on Har Sinai.

See this example from the JPost. The Post article even claims that Twain's fame as an author came about because of this article. Of course, everything is because of Israel: "At his peak, Mark Twain was probably the most popular American celebrity of his time. What few realize is that it was an unlikely trip to the Holy Land that established his fame as an author."

Is that true? Actually "First Notable Work: Mark Twain gained initial recognition with the publication of 'The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County' in 1865. This humorous short story was published in the New York Saturday Press and brought him national attention." (Wikipedia) "Innocents Abroad" only solidified his fame. So as usual, we are not getting the truth.

And what's the truth about Twain's account? The video posted here talks about it. It tells us that Twain talked sardonically and acerbically about many things and he exaggerated too. His articles were read by an American audience whose egos would be flattered by his disgust for everything that wasn't American. He also didn't completely blast the Holy Land and speak of it as empty of people in his two week visit.

Not that he issues complements to the Arabs he encountered. The culture clash with 19th century (Victorian) St. Louis and San Francisco is too vast for that. But he certainly doesn't talk of a "land with no people..."

For example, read his depiction of Magdala, a village 3 miles North of Tiberias:

"Magdala is not a beautiful place. It is thoroughly Syrian, and that is to say that it is thoroughly ugly, and cramped, squalid, uncomfortable, and filthy--just the style of cities that have adorned the country since Adam's time, as all writers have labored hard to prove, and have succeeded. The streets of Magdala are any where from three to six feet wide, and reeking with uncleanliness. The houses are from five to seven feet high, and all built upon one arbitrary plan--the ungraceful form of a dry-goods box. The sides are daubed with a smooth white plaster, and tastefully frescoed aloft and alow with disks of camel-dung placed there to dry. This gives the edifice the romantic appearance of having been riddled with cannon-balls, and imparts to it a very warlike aspect."

"We are camped in this place, now, just within the city walls of Tiberias. We went into the town before nightfall and looked at its people--we cared nothing about its houses. Its people are best examined at a distance. They are particularly uncomely Jews, Arabs, and negroes. Squalor and poverty are the pride of Tiberias. The young women wear their dower strung upon a strong wire that curves downward from the top of the head to the jaw--Turkish silver coins which they have raked together or inherited. Most of these maidens were not wealthy, but some few had been very kindly dealt with by fortune. I saw heiresses there worth, in their own right--worth, well, I suppose I might venture to say, as much as nine dollars and a half. But such cases are rare. When you come across one of these, she naturally puts on airs. She will not ask for bucksheesh. She will not even permit of undue familiarity. She assumes a crushing dignity and goes on serenely practicing with her fine-tooth comb and quoting poetry just the same as if you were not present at all. Some people can not stand prosperity. They say that the long-nosed, lanky, dyspeptic-looking body-snatchers, with the indescribable hats on, and a long curl dangling down in front of each ear, are the old, familiar, self-righteous Pharisees we read of in the Scriptures. Verily, they look it. Judging merely by their general style, and without other evidence, one might easily suspect that self-righteousness was their specialty."

He talks of other encounters with people as he continues in his journey:

"As we trotted across the Plain of Jezreel, we met half a dozen Digger Indians (Bedouins) with very long spears in their hands, cavorting around on old crowbait horses, and spearing imaginary enemies; whooping, and fluttering their rags in the wind, and carrying on in every respect like a pack of hopeless lunatics."
"We climbed a high hill to visit the city of Samaria, where the woman may have hailed from who conversed with Christ at Jacob's Well, and from whence, no doubt, came also the celebrated Good Samaritan.... The inhabitants of this camp are particularly vicious, and stoned two parties of our pilgrims a day or two ago who brought about the difficulty by showing their revolvers when they did not intend to use them..."

"Shechem is distinguished as one of the residences of the patriarch Jacob, and as the seat of those tribes that cut themselves loose from their brethren of Israel and propagated doctrines not in conformity with those of the original Jewish creed. For thousands of years this clan have dwelt in Shechem under strict tabu, and having little commerce or fellowship with their fellow men of any religion or nationality. For generations they have not numbered more than one or two hundred, but they still adhere to their ancient faith and maintain their ancient rites and ceremonies."

"We left Jacob's Well and traveled till eight in the evening, but rather slowly, for we had been in the saddle nineteen hours, and the horses were cruelly tired. We got so far ahead of the tents that we had to camp in an Arab village, and sleep on the ground. We could have slept in the largest of the houses; but there were some little drawbacks: it was populous with vermin, it had a dirt floor, it was in no respect cleanly, and there was a family of goats in the only bedroom, and two donkeys in the parlor. Outside there were no inconveniences, except that the dusky, ragged, earnest-eyed villagers of both sexes and all ages grouped themselves on their haunches all around us, and discussed us and criticised us with noisy tongues till midnight. We did not mind the noise, being tired, but, doubtless, the reader is aware that it is almost an impossible thing to go to sleep when you know that people are looking at you. We went to bed at ten, and got up again at two and started once more. Thus are people persecuted by dragomen, whose sole ambition in life is to get ahead of each other."

"The population of Jerusalem is composed of Moslems, Jews, Greeks, Latins, Armenians, Syrians, Copts, Abyssinians, Greek Catholics, and a handful of Protestants. One hundred of the latter sect are all that dwell now in this birthplace of Christianity. The nice shades of nationality comprised in the above list, and the languages spoken by them, are altogether too numerous to mention."

That's not 1867 Boston, but it's not a land devoid of people. Dare we call his account anti-Semitic? We shouldn't because Twain had generous words about Western European Jews as well as his Austrian Jewish son in law but today any hint any discomfort with anything any Jews do is viewed as anti-Semitic, particularly by aliyahniks who will still publish the parts of his essay that serve their purposes.

What else do they leave out? You won't find this depiction of a grove near Little Hermon in the aliyah literature:

"We found here a grove of lemon trees--cool, shady, hung with fruit. One is apt to overestimate beauty when it is rare, but to me this grove seemed very beautiful. It was beautiful. I do not overestimate it. I must always remember Shunem gratefully, as a place which gave to us this leafy shelter after our long, hot ride. We lunched, rested, chatted, smoked our pipes an hour, and then mounted and moved on."

How could that be if the state was not in existence?

What they also don't tell you is his bleak description even of the Kineret:

"The celebrated Sea of Galilee is not so large a sea as Lake Tahoe--[I measure all lakes by Tahoe, partly because I am far more familiar with it than with any other, and partly because I have such a high admiration for it and such a world of pleasant recollections of it, that it is very nearly impossible for me to speak of lakes and not mention it.]--by a good deal--it is just about two-thirds as large. And when we come to speak of beauty, this sea is no more to be compared to Tahoe than a meridian of longitude is to a rainbow. The dim waters of this pool can not suggest the limpid brilliancy of Tahoe; these low, shaven, yellow hillocks of rocks and sand, so devoid of perspective, can not suggest the grand peaks that compass Tahoe like a wall, and whose ribbed and chasmed fronts are clad with stately pines that seem to grow small and smaller as they climb, till one might fancy them reduced to weeds and shrubs far upward, where they join the everlasting snows. Silence and solitude brood over Tahoe; and silence and solitude brood also over this lake of Genessaret. But the solitude of the one is as cheerful and fascinating as the solitude of the other is dismal and repellant."

You see the way he talks. He grumbles. It makes for entertainment. I bet those aliyah brochures never showed you those words about the Kinneret.

Those also didn't show you these, written by William C. Grimes, American politician and businessman (1857–1931), on his trip to the Holy Land. Twain quotes them in his essay:

"We had taken ship to go over to the other side. The sea was not more than six miles wide. Of the beauty of the scene, however, I can not say enough, nor can I imagine where those travelers carried their eyes who have described the scenery of the lake as tame or uninteresting. The first great characteristic of it is the deep basin in which it lies. This is from three to four hundred feet deep on all sides except at the lower end, and the sharp slope of the banks, which are all of the richest green, is broken and diversified by the wadys and water-courses which work their way down through the sides of the basin, forming dark chasms or light sunny valleys. Near Tiberias these banks are rocky, and ancient
sepulchres open in them, with their doors toward the water. They selected grand spots, as did the Egyptians of old, for burial places, as if they designed that when the voice of God should reach the sleepers, they should walk forth and open their eyes on scenes of glorious beauty. On the east, the wild and desolate mountains contrast finely with the deep blue lake; and toward the north, sublime and majestic, Hermon looks down on the sea, lifting his white crown to heaven with the pride of a hill that has seen the departing footsteps of a hundred generations. On the north-east shore of the sea was a single tree, and this is the only tree of any size visible from the water of the lake, except a few lonely palms in the city of Tiberias, and by its solitary position attracts more attention than would a forest. The whole appearance of the scene is precisely what we would expect and desire the scenery of Genessaret to be, grand beauty, but quiet calm. The very mountains are calm.That speaks of a land of Israel that was just fine long before the arrival of the state." 

Twain writes about Grimes' piece: "It is an ingeniously written description, and well calculated to deceive." The same we can say about selective quoting of Twain's essay.

I was talking today to a friend who argues that the most shameless promoters of aliyah are not secular Israelis who usually are shocked that you would ever leave America but Zionist religious Jews. And so Haaretz, the newspaper that Orthodox Jews love to hate, is more honest about Twain's account. Moshe Gilad writes in his article "Mark Twain's Book on the Holy Land Is Still Controversial - Some Would Say Trumpian" (March 16, 2017):

"The book was published in 1869 and is still quoted widely today in order to prove all sorts of claims. Many use it to prove the land was empty at the time and the Palestinian people is an invention. Others quote it to prove how much Zionism improved the situation, which was horrible and desperate until the Zionists arrived. Many tour guides love to quote Twain because he is funny and highlights the land in a critical and amusing way. Others (myself included) quote him in order to show that very little has changed here over the last 150 years."

Prof. Milette Shamir of the English and American studies department at Tel Aviv University also finds Twain's article to be misused in part because he came at a bad time:

"They tell us Twain describes a desolate land with few people. Such a statement, which of course has political significance, ignores that Twain came to the land in a period in which many of its residents were absent because of serious economic difficulties that forced them to live for a certain time in Egypt or other lands,” she says. “They suffered here from serious drought and plagues of locusts. The entire region also suffered economically because the Civil War in America ended and so the price of cotton in the region plummeted, a central crop in Egypt and [Palestine]. Twain did not see the context and used clichés such as the isolation and wildness of the population. This is far from a complete picture, and it is impossible to consider it documentary evidence."

So we see how propaganda works. You show them what you want to show them, as a particularly dishonest salesman once said to me. That's how aliyah propaganda works too. To hide the housing shortage you show a photo of a $2 million apartment in Jerusalem but don't mention the price. You show photos of soldiers standing arm in arm. You don't show the ones whose legs have been blown off. You show photos of religious students in the park. You don't show the schools because they are dumps. You also don't show the photos of all the off the derech kids wandering the streets with their phones on Shabbos. 

Mantle on Musial

 "I'm going to tell something that Yankees made me do. When I came up in 1951, a guy from some paper asked me who was my favorite player. I told him Stan Musial. Well, the Yankees didn't like that at all. They said that I had to say that Joe DiMaggio was my favorite player. You know, I had as much ability as Stan Musial, maybe more. Nobody had more power than me. Nobody could run faster than me. But Stan Musial was a better player because he's a better man than me. Because he got everything out of his life and his ability that he could. And he'll never have to live with all the regret that I have to live with."

Mickey Mantle.

Rav Avigdor Miller on Reading Secular Science Books

Rav Avigdor Miller on Reading Secular Science Books

Q: Could or should somebody read secular books that discuss the creation and the science to better appreciate the creation? Let's say a book on topsoil in order to better appreciate Hashem’s creation; should one look in such books?

A: It depends. It depends. I would say that beforehand you should go to a moreh hora’ah and ask him if you are fit to do it. I did that, and I received a psak from a gadol many years ago. But it's not for everybody. 

I'll tell you why. Because these people who wrote the books put poison into the medicine. As you read the books that are supposed to give you a medicine, there's a poison there too. Every page is full of shekar vekazav. So if somebody is capable of sifting out, of being mesanen, and he can strain out the poison from the medicine, then by all means. By all means he can do it. But ask somebody beforehand if he thinks you're fit to do it.

August 1996

agunah

 "The old-time agunah was a woman who her husband went to war and he got lost in battle. We don't have any witnesses to prove that he's dead. If there are no witnesses to prove that he's dead, she can't get married. That's an agunah. But a self-made agunah who kicks her husband out of the house, that's not called an agunah. There are organizations for sympathy but after all it's their own fault. She has to live together with her husband, suffer a little bit until you housebreak him. When you buy a dog it takes time before you teach him how to be civilized. And sooner or later you get used to each other. You fight and sing together too. And you take your children to the chuppah together eventually. But to make a fuss and break up, that's a very big crime." R' Avigdor Miller

The Rebbe on TIDE

With discomfort, I share a link to a letter containing the Lub. Rebbe's criticism of TIDE.

Weekly Moment With the Rebbe

I must touch upon another, and even more delicate, matter concerning the teachings of Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch whom you mentioned in your letter.

There has been a tendency lately to apply his approach in totality, here and now in the United States. While it is understandable that the direct descendants of Rabbi Hirsch or those who were brought up in that philosophy should want to disseminate his teachings, I must say emphatically that to apply his approach to the American scene will not serve the interests of Orthodoxy in America. With all due respect to his philosophy and approach, which were very forceful and effective in his time and in his milieu, Rabbi Hirsch wrote for an audience and youth which was brought up on philosophical studies, and which was permeated with all sorts of doctrines and schools of thought and disciplined in the art of intellectual research etc. Thus it was necessary to enter into long philosophical discussions to point out the fallacy of each and every thought and theory which is incompatible with the Torah and mitzvoth. There was no harm in using this approach, inasmuch as the harm had already been there, and if it could strengthen Jewish thought and practice, it was useful, and to that extent, effective.

Continue

We don't censor here, so if the Rebbe who is a towering figure, comments on TIDE, we'll share it.

I will add that Rav Hirsch's writings do not contain philosophic speculation. As he writes:

What is the use of torturing the youthful mind with “proofs” of the existence of God, with doctrines about the essence of God and His attributes, such as eternity, unity, incorporeality, with metaphysical speculations and demonstrations of why God must be eternal, indivisible and spiritual, and all the rest of what is called rational religion or rational theology? In reality, the maturest mind of a philosopher knows no more about the essence of God than the simple mind of a child; nor is it necessary for the moral behavior of man in this world to know more than the Torah tells us about God. It is not the longing for the world beyond which is the essence of Jewish piety; it is rather the joy of life, of active service of God, in our short or longer span of existence. To enlighten our mind לשם שמים for the sake of God, to ennoble our character for the sake of God, to acquire knowledge and the capacity to earn a living, to found a home and a family, to use all the material and spiritual means at our disposal for the noble and ennobling purpose of the great edifice of mankind which God wants to erect from the generation so the human family, לתקן עולם במלכות שדי—this is the aim, the striving for which make us into pious souls.  

[Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch, “Education according to the Eight Psalm,” in Horeb, Introduction by translator, p. xlii.]

Also, the Rebbe might have confused what he saw at the U of Berlin with TIDE as done in Frankfurt, or maybe he was discussing TIDE as it might be applied in the USA as that would not have R Hirsch supervising it. Secular education at the Realschule was disciplined and practical. So there's Hirsch's TIDE and what would be the American version of it. And the Rebbe would be correct that you are not likely to get a Hirschian, Frankfurtian TIDE in the USA.

Rabbi Yosef Bechhofer's response to the letter.

Read

Archeological evidence for slavery in Egypt

 

Israelitische Religionsgesellschaft

Here's a listing in Adressbuch von Frankfurt for the Israelitische Religionsgesellschaft (IRG) in Frankfurt. Above it is the address for the Israelitische Gemeinde, i.e. the Israelite Community. Israelitische means Israelite. Gemeinde means Community. So I assume this is the general non-secessionist community. It was on Allerheiligenstraße 75. (Thank you to Uwe, the kindly archivist at the museum for finding this.)

You'll see below that a listing for the Israelitische Religionsgesellschaft without an address. Religionsgesellschaft means religious society. I believe that it is pronounced: Israel Etisheh  ReligiOngezelshaft

But I found on the German Wiki that the street of the original IRG is Schützenstraße, which is two blocks from Rav Hirsch's home on Schöne Aussicht. Schützenstraße means protection street or something like that. This address also appears in the Klugman biography. The shul was on the corner of  Schützenstraße and Rechneigrabenstraße.

Artists' rendering:

Rav Hirsch would have walked up this street to get to shul. 

German Wiki

Der erste Synagogenbau der deutschsprachigen Austrittsorthodoxie entstand um 1853 in der Frankfurter Schützenstraße. Der Nachfolgebau Friedberger Anlage 5–6 (1905–1907 erbaut) war einer der geräumigsten jüdischen Sakralbauten Europas. Erst 1928 wurde die Frankfurter Israelitische Religionsgesellschaft eine eigenständige Körperschaft.

The first synagogue built by the German-speaking Orthodox secessionists was erected around 1853 on Schützenstraße in Frankfurt. Its successor, located at Friedberger Anlage 5–6 (built between 1905 and 1907), was one of the most spacious Jewish places of worship in Europe. The Frankfurt Israelite Religious Society did not become an independent corporation until 1928.

Consultation with Rav Hirsch?

A kindly archivist at the Jewish Museum in Frankfurt located Rav Hirsch's address for me:

 Schöne Aussicht 5, Frankfurt   [pr. Shahne Awesecht]. This address also appears in the Klugman biography.

(means beautiful view)

Sprechst.  c.3--4 Uhr Nm. means Consultation hours approx. 3-4 pm.

Imagine meeting with Rav Hirsch during his consultation hours!

I don't know what the p or subscript 2 signifies. Maybe it's an apartment number.

His building was torn down. Today there's this:

https://www.ub.uni-frankfurt.de/wertvoll/adressbuch.html.

It's on this corner:

View of the Main from Rabbiner Hirsch's apartment

More of the family:

Update:

A commenter (Shuster) referred me to his blog that provides some more information on Rav Hirsch's residence. 

See here

He provided a link to another directory that shows this address:

 Hinter Schoenne Aussicht 1 (trans. behind Schoenne Aussicht 1)