Are Some Seculars on 9 Av Like Some Chareidim on Yom Hazikaron?

26
>>Follow Matzav On Whatsapp!<<

meridorBy Rafi G., Life in Israel
Dan Meridor, a minister in the Israeli government, was spotted on Thursday, Tisha B’Av, eating in a restaurant in Tel Aviv. His response was that he does not think it should be a day of mourning.

Follow my thread and train of thought for a moment as I work this out..

1. Dan Meridor is a minister, and not a specifically private person. Anything he does is representative of the government.

2. Even if he is to be looked at as a private person, he is breaking the spirit of the law, if not the law itself (the law does not allow eateries to be open, but I do not know if people eating there are also breaking the law).

3. Aside from the law about restaurants not being open, there is a law that declares Tisha B’Av as a day of national mourning. Going out to eat in a restaurant with other people is not exactly mourning.

4. When some religious people do not respect the siren and spirit of the day publicly on Yom HaShoah/Yom HaZikaron, the secular go crazy talking incessantly about how wrong they are (and they are wrong).

5. Why is Tisha B’Av any different from Yom HaShoah in this regard? I.e. why is it ok for some secular to open restaurants and eat out on Tisha B’Av, but not ok for some religious to not stand during the siren on Yom HaZikaron/Yom HaShoah?

{Rafi G.}
{Matzav.com Newscenter}


26 COMMENTS

  1. I have never understood the lack of respect of Jews for one another. What is so difficult about standing for one moment, or eating lunch at your desk two days per year? Additionally, as a member of the government, Mr Meridor is expected to follow the laws of the State whether or not he believes they have relevance to his personal life.

    I wish someone had ticketed him and the restaurant owner – the owner for violating the laws and Mr Meridor for making a public nuisance of himself (and maybe creating a public disturbance).

    As a Jew and a person with dual U.S.-Israeli citizenship, I am in tremendous pain when I hear of sinat-chinam in any form.

    It’s time we learned some of the lessons from our past and started showing respect, at least, if not understanding or love, to our fellows.

  2. just thinking ..

    whats worse
    eating on tisha be av
    or
    promoting sinas chinam the day after

    loze op allready

    there is no excuse for bad manners in either direction –

    parenthetically – meridors actions do not constitute a chilul hashem befarhesia – and some others actions do constitute a chilul hashem befarhesia

    move on

  3. For one thing there is a very big difference between yom hashoa and tisha b’av. The latter was set by chazal thousands of years ago where they had the strength to set aside days as holidays or days of mourning. Yom hashoa, though a very significant part of the history of klal yisroel, was created by a secular government. I do believe that chareidim should honor the day by standing silent and not being mezalzel in it since the idea in of itself in not bad but since it was created by a secular group we cannot take part in the festivities.

  4. I can’t believe that you really want to go where this may go. There have to be ways to make the point about the tragedy of a government official who doesn’t feel the connection he should without making equivalencies and drawing the siren into it. (If it were to come up in ensuing discussion, one could deal with it then.)

    Reminds me of the story of the terrorist who knew that Israel was vulnerable when a Jewish prison guard ate pita on Pesach. Now that’s a train of thought to ride.

  5. He didn’t break the law, but he certainly facilitated the restaurant owner’s violation of the law. BTW, he was twice Israel’s minister of justice. They are all the same, except for Menachem Begin. He was a mensch and the only upright politician.

  6. The satmar rov wrote in his hakdama (no, I am not a satmar chossid, before anyone jumps on me for daring to quote the satmar rebbe on something like zionism – it’s not because of the strength of his shitos that I quote him but rather because he wrote an amazing, comprehensive sefer on everything related to zionism – similar to the chofetz chaim did with little resources, the satmar rov created a spectacular sefer with very limited resources) that the radak writes that in the generation of yirmiyah, right before the churban, there was yirmiyah and his minority followers, and there were neviei sheker who said there was nothing to worry about, that there would be no churban – freik the radak, why are the klal yisroel to blame? they were just listening ot the neviei sheker! The terutz is, zogt the radak, that the neviei sheker were ovdei avodah zara – the people should have known from the fact that they were ovdei avodah zara that their message was false – not by virtue of the fact that it was against yirmiah, not because it was allowing them to be peaceful and not do teshuvah, but because the source was ovdei avodah zara.

    There is no reason to stand for some contrived siren made up by kofrim – the 6 million kedoshim mean little more to them than ‘anti-semitism’, and ‘oh, if maybe we had the IDF back then, we wouldn’t have had a holocaust’ or other such secular dribble that we regularly hear. Why should charedim, or any religious jew be a part of such organized kefirah and chutzpah? The chazon ish said clearly, followed by every other non-dati-lemumi person, that we have no right to make up days of mourning nowadays – if they didnt do it for the crusades, chimelniki massacres, inquisition, or anything else, we’re not about to start not – tisha bav is the day of mourning for the Jewish people. It does not matter if chilonim would rather be on the beaches; we dont change moruning days to suit taivos and ‘relaxation’.

    Both are NOT wrong. There is nothing wrong with not standing still when yidden are busy serving hashem. There is a halacha pesukta about tisha bav. No two sides about it – no one was against tisha bav, not now, or ever before. To equate them is pure nonsense, and secularism. If I were in eretz yisore, and would not offend anyone by seeing me do it, I would feel a great freedom and joy in not addressing it at all – what right do chilonim who disgrace the 6 million kedoshim with their very lives have to tell us how to remember our fallen?

    Why is it wrong to not stand still? A yid has a life to live; he’s running to bais medrash to learn, or to make his parnosa, why should he stop because some atheists made up a siren ex nihilo?

    Menachem begin was a mensch? Menschen are shomer shabbos, dovid. Upright? Did he master the mesilas yesharim? Honestly, he maybe did some good thihngs, but upright?!!?

    Glatekup, how is yom hashoah, a day that means nothig, has no mesorah, no ‘oros’ as all significant days have in our calendar, significant to klal yisroel? The shoah was significant – yom hashoah is just another day of the week -0 basically, chilonim do something, and we should all follow it for no torah reason whatsoever.

  7. Not only was Menechem Begin upright in addition to supporting the Rav Rafeal Levin’s yeshiva, so was Yitzchak Shamir. Amen, yehi zechron barach.

  8. Don’t forget Harav hatzadik Theodor Herzel. And Hamedakdek Hagadol Rabbi Eliezer Ben Yehudah. Veoso Zaken Harav Hagaon R’ Duvid Ben Gurion. Zecher kol hatzadikim livracha.

  9. Matis is 100% correct. Jews observe holidays decreed either by the Torah or by Chazal thousands of years ago, not by modern atheist Kofrim.

  10. the venom being spewed in comments above makes me wonder if the entire Tisha BeAv experience / message (that Sinas Chinam destroys and Ahavas Chinam Rebuilds) is lost on those that choose to hate rather than respect others that may differ

    more torah and torah institutions exist in Israel today than ever existed in Europe – more bachurim learn in Yerushalayim at any given time today than at any given time in any European city – pre war – thanks to those that chose to build (yes, even .. Herzel … Ben Yehudah .. Ben Gurion included) don’t we owe Hakaraas Hatov to the MEDINA for at least that

    Stop bashing – maybe not yet religious will stop bashing us

    Just imagine the possibilities ….

  11. In the diary of Hertzel, page 14, he writes a way to solve the problem of anti-Semitism was to speak to the head priest of Vienna to get an appointment with the Pope, to make a mass conversion of all the Jews of Austria to Catholicism. He continues: “It should be done on a Sunday, in the middle of the day, with music, and pride, publicly. We are the last generation that held on to the faith of our fore-fathers. The conversion would be in St. Stephen’s Cathedral.”

    Diary, page 16: “Anti-Semitism helps to build this kind of Jew, Education that will bring to assimilation.”

    In the book “Hertzel”, this is a quote: “I bless every Jew that converts to Christianity and my son, the sooner the better, to save him from anti-Semitism.”

    Ben Gurion: “If I could save all the children of Germany by bringing them to England and only half to Israel, I would choose the second.”

    Speaking out against those who are against the Torah is not Loshon Hora and is not Sinas Chinam.

  12. Why do you bring Ben-Gurion and Herzl into the conversation? What’s the connection? We all know who they were and what they stood for.

  13. Matis, I personally know and I bet you all know quite a few ‘shomer shabbos’ individuals who are gazlanim and shakranim. They may even quote you from Mesilas Yesharim or Orchos Tzadikim.

    Menachem Begin kept kashrus and had respect for Yahadus and rabbanim. He was proud to be a Yid and didn’t bend under pressure from Carter and Reagan. He was a mensch.

  14. zalman, please tell me more about 20 Sivan. I am Hungarian. My parents lost everyone and everything. I wasn’t aware of anything like a day of mourning for the Jews of Hungary who perished in the Shoah.

  15. I guess the chazon ish, av ahron, the steipler, and the rest of the gedolei hador ere ‘spineless’. Oy. We should make zalman the gadol hador – he has a spine and is not afraid of doing things like rav ahron was. What a mistake we made, following the malaachei hashares that were our leaders, instead of a yachid who i’ve not heard of, might not even exist, and certainly was not on par with the gedolei hador.

    Tefilos can be added, that’s not the point, the point is that ne days are not added to the calendar. tefilos get added quite frequently, like lecha dodi, and many others. Calling gedolim spineless does not justify your position, it just makes it worse for you and will earn you a nice place in gehinnom chas veshalom – I should hope matzav deletes your post, it’s defaming and total apikorsus(as the gemora says, one who defames a torah scholar is an apikores) – i have never heard of the rabbi you mentioned, tell me, did you make him up?.

    Venom – you can be against something ithout having sinas chinom. You were raised with a certain ideology, that says that if you do a sin in terms of your thughts, it does not matter, we must always love everyting about you, and can never say you’re wrng, or else we have sinas chinam. This is modern orthodox propoganda, and it is because they used to join up with reform and conservative, s they had to justify their disobeying the gedolei hador who warned not to and in fact said it was assur. Hating what hashem hates is a basic idea. Tell me, when the missionaries, who are jewish, try converting kids, and you scream out about it, does that mean you have sinas chinom? Atheism is worse than avodah zara, for one thing, and there is nothing wrong with speaking about it. Sinas chinom is when you hate Jews baselessly – pashtus is that you are allowed to hate apikorsim, like the above zionist ‘heroes’, who built up their medinah to shmad yidden, yemach shemama(as the brisker rov said famously). Hating apikorsus is not having sinas chinom – aderaba, you are supposed to hate what G-d hates. The medina is not what enhanced torah – I suppose we should believe in persian avodah zara since the persians helped us build the bayis sheini, and after all, they also helped us learn, so we shouldn’t chas ceshalom put them down either, since that would be sinas chinam.

    Something good coming from something bad is all over kabalah – it’s an inyan I dont understand much at all, but it’s in our mesorah – many times a great thing will come out of something terrible. Torah can be supported by soething as terrible as the medina, but it does not make the medina ok.

    What makes something good or bad is whether the trah says it is good or bad, not what its results are. This means an atheist kid who dates a shiksa and finds g-d in a church, eventually coming back to torah, does not make the church good – please try to understand this. The medina was a terrible disaster, however good things have come of it; all the torah and such, but that does not make it good.

    Some Jews like the word sinas chinam, since it hasa heavy history(churban, and much more), and it can be used by the ignorant to justify loving and tolerating just about anything. Unite with reform and conservative, since if you dont, you have sinas chinam. Hey, you shouold have a tv since if yu dont, it’s sinas chinam – basically anything that they dont like, they tag on sinas chinam to. Hang a portrait of atheists in your yeshiva, since if you dont, you have sinas chinam – it’s a tired argument, and it makes little sense.

    These are the same people who regularly put down gedolim and kollel-men – odd? I think so too.

    Apikorsus is a worse sin than sinas chinam. It takes away a person’s olam haba, and is the only sin that the gemora syas makes incest look tiny. Ahavas chinam means loving JEWS – not loving what they do. e can have ahavas yisroel for chilonim who are tonokus shenishbu – that is completely irrelevent. Kovod hatorah however demans to stand up to things that are against the torah, even if seculars dont like it.

  16. 8 – tons of people support yeshivos. Famously, barbara streisand, who vilified orthodox Jews in her feminist movie, not to mention other things, tried to give money to the yeshiva of brooklyn – she was denied that zchus – why? because even though if you asked her she’d say she’s proud to be jewish and so on, she was certainly not proud of anything authentically Jewish.

    Begin was not a frum person – if you’d like, say he did some good things. It doesn’t make him upright – an upright person follows the torah.

  17. matis and the rest of the angry mob …. chill

    may i humbly suggest you stop judging and passing judgment on those that differ from you .. remember what happens to those who are not maavir al midosav .. you surely dont want to be judged that sternly

    my rebbe used to tell me “who died and appointed you g-ds Cossack on earth”

    as i tell my children – youll grow up, have real daaiges and all of your previous comments will seem frivolous at best

  18. Brilliant, Matis, and courageous too. You remind me of Matisyahu Kohen Gadol. If Matzav wants you to write an editorial, I can’t wait to read it.

  19. Rav Chizkiyahu Mishkovsky was the Rov of Krinik in Lithuania before the Holocaust. He managed to escape to Israel in 1941, where he eventually became a Rov in Kfar Chassidim. Upon the advice of the Chazon Ish, he and his family established a yeshiva in Zichron Yaakov, later moved to Kfar Chassidim (rechasim). The yeshiva, now called Knesses Chizkiyahu still exists, with almost 200 boys and a kollel.

    I suggest a heartfelt apology by the person who besmirched his holy name, even suggesting that he never existed, but that I made him up.

    I don’t know who goes to heaven or gehinom like some other people on this thread, but I would guess that right now Rav Mishkovsky zt”l is not pleased that his actual existence has been questioned.

    Pontificating and vilifying others for their opinions is human nature and can be forgiven. But advertising ignorance doesn’t impress and really should be avoided.

  20. To Dovid,
    As requested by some on this enlightened list, my post was deleted. No matter.
    The Rabbanim of Hungary after the war felt it was necessary to establish a special day of mourning to commemmorate those that perished. They did not feel it was appropriate to establish a new day, and instead chose 20 sivan as the date, mentioning that trains to Aushwitz had left Hungary on this date. This date was originally a yom tzom and selichos for the Chmielniecki massacres in 1648-9, and can be found in most siddurim. The Hungarian Rabbonim in Budapest in 1946 added slichos to those already being said on this day.
    Nowadays I don’t think there are many places that keep 20 Sivan as a fast day, but a friend whose family is from Spinka near Munkatch said he remembers his father fasting on this day.

  21. ‘the rabbonim of hungary’ – I dont think the minchas elozar, or the satmar rov said such a thing for our times – who are these hunagarian rabbonim?

    Apparently, revach.net has some nice information on the 20th of sivan – it was an old fast day made by rabbeinu tam, selichos were said, for a blood libel, and later on by the shach, for gezeras tach vetat(endorsed by the gedolei hador, including the shelah hakadosh, tosfos yom tov, and magen avraham, and the entirevaad arba aratzos – this is a consensus of gedolei achronim who said to do something at that time. Certainly not a yachid. The rov on revach answers bedavka this question about yom hashoah and why we dont accept it, the link it here http://www.revach.net/article.php?id=2369

    The key difference is that gedolei yisroel simply did not accept such a thing for the holocaust, maybe a yachid did, but that does not make the rest of the gedolim wrong, and it does not mean we can force our opinions on those who are following the gedolei hador even if we choose to follow a yachid.

    Assuming a rabbi to have been made up when I have no reason to assume otherwise, when he is used as a source for a yachid-shita, is not ‘besmeerching’. I said nothing about him personally, only that I have no idea who he is, and that since gedolei yisroel were well known, I assume he was not on par with the chazon ish – that’s a reasonable assumption. If someone comes to you and says, hey, there’s a huge masmid in lakewood who knows shas baal peh – I’ll assume he’s a talmid chacham, but I still will not assume he’s bigger than reb moshe, or rav shach – this is just being reasonable.

  22. Listen its OK. everyone has their own opinion. you do not neccisarily have to agree with the other, but you should RESPECT it, especially if its not affecting you.

    about the siren on yom hazikaron- the Rabbis said, if ur in ur home learning torah, you shouldnt stop your mitzva for it! but if your in the street, in the view of other people, then stand still for that moment. Because, yes, the Rabbi’s may not beleive in yom hashoah. BUT- they do beleive in respecting and not offending others!
    kol tuv…

Leave a Reply to AA Cancel reply

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here