â–Ş Q&A with Rosh Yeshiva of Yeshivat Maharat
â–Ş The Orthodox Jewish senate district in Brooklyn
â–Ş Jewish immigrants are being misled about the benefits of aliyah
â–Ş WSJ: Mormons and Baptism by Proxy
â–Ş YU 2012 Seforim Sale featured in Mishpacha Magazine
â–Ş May Israelis eat grain products products outside of Israel?
â–Ş Near and Apparent: The Next Posek HaDor
â–Ş No Kosher Food at Malta Jewish Conference
â–Ş SALT Friday
â–Ş Prior news & links posts
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Note: This week we are experimenting with daily posts for news & links, in an attempt to allow for easier discussion in the comments section. The most recent post will always be in the featured section. Prior posts will be available in the News section, for which there is a link in the navigation bar on top of the page.
the article about the seforim sale seems to indicate that it’s continually growing in size, I think thats inaccurate
In 2001 it reached around 1.3-1.4million in sales with a 15% markup. Considering my spot check of seforim sale prices (catalog from back then) corresponds to cpi change (30% or so) and they had a 24% markup, it seems they have significantly shrunk in size.
I’d also note that back in the day we would get single publications from authors themselves (I’m thinking specifically of Gil in this case, believe it was his moshiach book, but that seems to have been published in 2002, he might be able to correct me, I certainly remember wondering what type of last name was “student” when I was labeling the book).
Somewhere along the line the mesorah of the sale seems to have been lost. Probably around the time people wanted to turn it into a “real business”.
Excuse me gil,
I have been teaching women who are married with children for over ten years in various frame works. It is difficult, but Once women are getting out of the house for a fluff shiur, they can do it for one with content. I also constantly get feed back from women who really want to go but cant because home responsibilities.
There is nothing inherent in women thatmakes them uninterested in intellectualy challenging learning. The is a lot inherent in much ofthe Orthodox world’s approach to women’s education that discourages this interest.
AIWAC- I told you sexism and lack of capacity of many teachers
Shaul Shapira,
I once e-mailed R. Adlerstein about the lack of comments of on R. shafran’s articles. He said that this was R. shafran’s rule, because he thought that there were to many “inappropriate” comments.
I Told R. Adlerstein that his action only reinforces the wide spread perception in the Jewish (especially MO) community at large that the Agudah and the Chareidi community it is supposed to represent sees itself as beyond criticism and is not open to dialog.
agree with moshe shoshan
my impression is that the lack of serious shiurim or support for for individual learning is due at least small part to the idea that serious learning for women is a feminist agenda
“serious learning for women is a feminist agenda”
Why does this perception exist? I know many women who are seriously learned and are not religious feminists.
Serious learning is seen as a highly masculine endeavor in many sectors of Orthodoxy.
“Serious learning is seen as a highly masculine endeavor in many sectors of Orthodoxy”
Why? How are the two connected?
“Why? How are the two connected?”
Maybe it’s like the chicken and the egg – but they are.
How are the two connected?
Read Daniel Boyarin’s Unheroic Conduct and SA’s Yentle. Lernen is a quintessentialy male act for Jews no less than going into battle is for most goyim.
Indeed. However, I think AIWAC is proposing “learning,” not “lernen.”
Who is SA?
AIWAC
SA = sholom aleichem?
except that yentl is IB Singer
presumably its certainly not shulchan aruch
“Moshe Shoshan on February 26, 2012 at 1:39 am
Shaul Shapira,
I once e-mailed R. Adlerstein about the lack of comments of on R. shafran’s articles. He said that this was R. shafran’s rule, because he thought that there were to many “inappropriate” comments.
I Told R. Adlerstein that his action only reinforces the wide spread perception in the Jewish (especially MO) community at large that the Agudah and the Chareidi community it is supposed to represent sees itself as beyond criticism and is not open to dialog”
And when R Shafran has answered comments he has come off well. Cross Currents will at time spost criticism of their basic beliefs- it has given them credibility.
“Steve: far too many shiruim for women ignore the fact that women in Torah observant communities want serious textually based shiurim in Tanach, Tefilah, Halacha and Jewish history, as opposed to entertainment rooted drashos, musar shpielen, that view women as intellectually brain dead
I know rabbis who have tried and found little interest. You have to give what your customers want. The same goes for men’s shiurim, which are increasingly “dumbed down” and yet to my surprise draw big crowds”
Agreed and BTW for any rteasonably kniowledgeable Rav it is much easierto give a text oriented class.
“Mark on February 25, 2012 at 10:33 pm
Rabbi Shafran used to allow comments on CC just like the other writers. He was terribly troubled, however, by the personal and venomous nature of some of the comments that we lodged at him and therefore chose to discontinue them.
”
CC will not publish comments that are even in ballpark of venomous against a writer.
“Moshe Shoshan on February 25, 2012 at 3:24 pm
This is not a chicken an egg issue. Plenty of these girls are bright and inquisitive and are very interested in learning. I get some of these girls in my class when they come back to study in th eOVerseas school in HU. Even average students shine when challenged and given the opportunity to lean. There is a danger of excessive intellectualism, but the not in current womens educational system.”
An average person 100 IQ will not be attending any division of HU.
I once e-mailed R. Adlerstein about the lack of comments of on R. shafran’s articles. He said that this was R. shafran’s rule, because he thought that there were to many “inappropriate” comments.
I don’t read CC enough to know, but were the comment directed at him any more innapropriate than those directed atsay, R Menken? Personally, I’m lead to believe that as spokesman for the Agudah he can’t risk saying anything that remotely undercuts their policy. (I just started reading Proffesor Kaplan’s article on Daas Torah, and was struck by the almost comical footnote at the beginning.) Now, that’s fair I think- I don’t expect Robert Gibbs to start running his mouth either- but I think it should be made more clear that he’s bound to the party line.
In previous comment, I meant to put first paragraph from Mycroft in quotes.
“â–Ş Near and Apparent: The Next Posek HaDor”
Baruch Hashem- it appears to have become somewhat less near.
One way to solve this issue is to have co-ed shiurim (mechitzah or not, depending on the audience). That way there will be appropriate shiurim for everyone depending on their level of knowledge and interest rather than their sex. That’s how it’s done in my shul and in certain other MO shuls I know of.
Abba-Believe it or not, IMO, Shemiras Shabbos Kehilcasa and Orchos Shabbos ( 3 volumes) combine both Psak, awarness of contemporary halachic issues, and excellent discussion for a chavrusa , shiur or chabura in the footnotes, on the same page as the text, which are as important, if not more so,than the actual text itself. R Nevenzal also has a two ( soon to be three) volume work on Shabbos ( one volume with Sichos Mussar Chiddushim on Aggadah and the Daf of Masecta Shabbos, and a second volume on Halacha with superb footnotes). When I started learning with one of my chavrusos years ago, the first sefer that we learned cover to cover was SSK, as opposed to R S Eider ZL’s English work on Hilcos Shabbos. My chavrusa offered the following reason for learning SSK, which has been one a guiding rule for many years “Kli Sheni ASino Mvashel.”
STEVE BRIZEL:
your recommendations may be good for hebrew readers, but 39 meloachos has the advantage for many of being in english.
the SSK english ed. lacks the notes (i don’t recall for sure, but isn’t the main text itself abridged?). r. eider is in english, but iirc its pretty machmir too (i have a copy but haven’t opened it in many years)
Abba-Having gone through SSk in the original twice, and having seen the translation, I was loath and remain very reluctant to buy and learn from English Halacha works.I find it hard to believe that the average Baal HaBayis who is at least textually literate in the most rudimentary sense cannot learn “from the real McCoy.”
Abba-let me give you comparable example. I took a look at the much discussed Hamafteach. The author deserves a Yasher Koach for the fine quality of the work, but IMO, it does not have the in depth, albeit incomplete, coverage of any Halachic issue in the ET. I once asked RHS if I should purchase the ET or a set of MHK Ritvas, and RHS very enthusiastically recommended the ET, which I subsequently followed with the purchase of both the MHK Ritvas and a Frankel Rambam.
Former seforim sale runner wrote in part:
” Somewhere along the line the mesorah of the sale seems to have been lost. Probably around the time people wanted to turn it into a “real business”
Like it or not, unless you are in Israel during the week of the annual seforim sale, the prices for the big sets at the sale are simply the best in the US. OTOH, I have been able to buy at stores in the NY area seforim that haven’t made the shelves of the sale. When we were in Israel whhen we visited our kids in seminary and while visiting our daughter SIL and grandchildren at Gruss, I was overwhelmed by the number of excellent seforim stores in the Geulah-Meah Shearmim area, especially Manny’s, Girsa, and Feldheim.
“Joseph Kaplan on February 26, 2012 at 3:21 pm
One way to solve this issue is to have co-ed shiurim (mechitzah or not, depending on the audience). That way there will be appropriate shiurim for everyone depending on their level of knowledge and interest rather than their sex. That’s how it’s done in my shul and in certain other MO shuls I know of.”
The Rav had no problem with women showing up to shiurim-certainly his Saturday night shiurim had women attending and on occasion even his summer shiurim that were basically for YU smicha shiur attendees-there was at least one summer where there was a women attending.
“I was overwhelmed by the number of excellent seforim stores in the Geulah-Meah Shearmim area, especially Manny’s, Girsa, and Feldheim.”
Why be surprised Israelis who know Hebrew can read Sfarim much better than the average American can and much faster.
If you’re still taking comments on the trial system (separate news posts every day) i’m against it. To many posts to check to keep up.
No to mention it pushes other posts off more quickly. Am I correct?
steve, you are probably right for big sets. However, for normal books (say artscroll, did a spot check, Barnes & Noble (!!) is cheaper than the seforim sale for the the stone chumash, both travel and full size).
Just like around 5 percent of men would still be interested in and actively pursue learning even if they weren’t taught that they are _supposed_ to enjoy and excel in it, around 5 percent of women try to pursue serious learning, at least at some point in their lives. Of course, there is much less of a framework for women who want to learn, so they are much less successful than their male counterparts. The rest of women are like what most men would be like if they (the men) didn’t have a chiyuv in talmud Torah.
I think that things might change, but there would need to be a change in the zeitgeist in order for that to happen. If people in general became less apathetic towards “ruchnius,” that would have a big effect on women’s education.
Also — idealizing the “elite” bais yaakovs is a mistake.
Just my 2 cents.
‘former seforim sale runner on February 26, 2012 at 9:07 pm
steve, you are probably right for big sets. However, for normal books (say artscroll, did a spot check, Barnes & Noble (!!) is cheaper than the seforim sale for the the stone chumash, both travel and full size).”
I have often bought Jewish subject books on Amazon.
IBS it is sorry for the mistake.
mycroft,
I meant that they were average for the students there and that the semnaries should be full of girls on their level.
“Also — idealizing the “elite” bais yaakovs is a mistake”
I would change to a more general
Also — idealizing the “elite” is a mistake
“Moshe Shoshan on February 27, 2012 at 2:44 am
mycroft,
I meant that they were average for the students there and that the semnaries should be full of girls on their level”
In that meaning I agree.
“Just like around 5 percent of men would still be interested in and actively pursue learning even if they weren’t taught that they are _supposed_ to enjoy and excel in it, around 5 percent of women try to pursue serious learning, at least at some point in their lives”
We have to be concerned about the other 95%.