I too, when I read his article, realized that he is completely ignoring the prohibition against murder. Being willing to give up your life is not the same as murder.
It seems that some people think that the issue is the loss of life, not the murder. They don't understand the concept, because they didn't learn Tosfos in Yevamos.
And the main thrust of your article, that Hilchos Pikuach Nefashos is not something to be decided on the fly, is totally lost on these people. They accuse others of being cavalier about human life, yet show their own frivolous attitude to Lo Sirtzach with these articles.
Isn't it funny how Slifkin isn't abashed by putting these kinds of pieces out? To me this is an indication of a far worse problem. He knows what *we'll* respond. But he is part of a different world where they respect this kind of thinking.
There apparenty is a world, which Natan is actually a part of which respects this way of thinking. As long as we have something novel and modern which disagrees with our Mesorah, it's highly intellectual and relevant.
Natan, you are part of a different world. Bye bye!
(Though we'll still comment because it's fun... Plus there are those within our fold who are confused by your take.)
At this point I'm not sure what the point of the Torah is. According to "rationalism", we should be bending all issues towards what is rational to us. Any statement made by Chazal, of any kind, can be reinterpreted as them following what was rational to *them*, but we will now follow what is rational to *us*. Originally limited to scientific matters and aggadah, now this ideology is being applied to the halacha! ושערו חרבו מאד
Its interesting that instead of taking the obvious path of defending full irreversible brain death as being actual death - which is what many respected poskim have done, including R Dovid Feinstein and reported by R Tendler in the name of R Moshe - he feels the need to create a new chiddush and shtup it into his rationalism vs mysticism dichotomy. It honestly has nothing to do with it whatsoever and is a halachic shayla like all others.
Perhaps one can say that those with a more rationalistic worldview are more likely to accept the viewpoints of scientists who claim that when the brain has ceased functioning, irreversible death has occurred and the ventilator is merely doing a mechanical process. But even if one accepts that as so, defining whether that is enough is still a halachic shayla! One who doesn't accept the science won't have the shayla in the first place. However, the actual psak certainly has nothing to do with this supposed imaginary dichotomy.
You are misquoting Rav Dovid Feinstein, as he has himself said very clearly
"It depends how you want to word it. If I tell you cessation of breathing, and you say, oh, that’s brain death, is that, I don’t agree with that; I don’t know anything about brain death. Quote me correctly"
This is exaclty what we needed! BH, for years so many of us didn't know how to respond to R Dr Slifkin. Since he had all these years of learning and so many books written, although we could see the hashkafik and halachic flaws, we didn't have the proper tools to counter his claims. For years he has been left unchecked having a website full of leshon hara against Torah Jews and terrible haskafa, and finally we see a great group of kenai lHashem without any goals but the fight for Torah and Truth. Thank you very much for this!
Fantastic. Two questions to academic rationalist types:
1) Name some real nafka minas between the reality you live in and that of your average atheist. Underneath all the lomdus, a lack of fundamental differences should give some pause, to say the least. Really? The Torah happens to support every new academic/liberal idea?
2) What are some things non-Jewish rationalists believe that you do not believe because you don't think it can fit in the Torah, even though your natural inclination is it makes sense and you'd accept?
Perhaps such hyper-rationalist inclinations are actually a nisayon in emuna that some are assigned to struggle with more than others, and isn't just one of the shiv'im panim... the Yetzer haRa is most dangerous when we give him a hechsher...
"What are some things non-Jewish rationalists believe that you do not believe because you don't think it can fit in the Torah, even though your natural inclination is it makes sense and you'd accept?"
I think this article misses the whole point. The issue with his argument is that it’s just some vague effective altruist argument buttressed by some obscure cherry-picked source words that seem to say the same thing as him, as long as it’s appropriately isolated from context. Effective altruists make very distinct philosophical claims about the world and he never bothers to support those claims, choosing to pretend they are obvious, as is common for such type of claims. The reason to stick with our traditional sources is that they have an entirely different philosophy, so to make a claim within the context of Halacha, you must accept the premises of Halacha. Otherwise, you’re just another pompous arrogant effective altruist, sneering with your math equations and “data” how you have the perfect answer to questions that have been bothering humanity forever.
In my defense, I would argue there is also some purpose in occasionally shining a flashlight on specifically how they mangle the sugyos, because people do sometimes get taken by their self assured tone.
Really excellent!! I agree with almost everything. One point about your application of R Yehuda Hachasid - "The case there is where a gentile is vowing to kill one of the two, and there R. Yehuda Hachasid finds it praiseworthy for the am ha’aretz to offer himself as the sacrifice."
In the question of brain death it is the doctor that is committing murder - the donor is only offering himself as the sacrifice, no? (This cannot be said regarding his proof from the 2 men in the desert, which is different not only because it is only shev vaal taaseh, but as you pointed out, because no-one is being murdered.)
But don't get me wrong, I agree 100% that NS messed up royally in his analysis, which he has no business even trying to deal with to begin with. I also think a big problem with his piece is why stop at brain death? Why not every vegetative state patient, or terminally ill, or downs syndrome...sound familiar?
If you're asking an independent question of whether it's ever ok to invite someone to murder you, it seems to me unlikely, but hey there's a reason that these questions aren't usually addressed to me. My only point in the article was that Slifkin's tzu shtel is dumb.
No. The chidush is that if the goy is murdering someone, the AH can take the bullet. He does not say that there's ever a heter to proactively instigate a murder in the first place.
In both cases the killer is not engaged in the act of murder when you are inviting him to act. How is inviting a goy to kill one person over the other any different than inviting a doctor to harvest organs from one person rather than waiting for another? The only difference is lifnei iver - not murder. In the case of SC it's not LI because it's chad avra. By organ donation it will almost always be trei avra.
In SC it has nothing to do with lifnei iveir or anything else. If it was your choice he wouldn't be killing anyone at all, the aveira has nothing to do with you. You're just taking the bullet to save the other guy.
Accessory to murder is a legal term, not a Halachic one so I assume you mean lifnei Iver - which has its own qualifications and certainly is not murder.
All true and interesting, but just bear in mind this is a bit of rabbit hole. Whatever the technical designation is, it's not present by the Sefer Chasidim's case, so the citation is irrelevant. Which is the only point.
If someone would like to make the case that lifnei iver d'ritzicha is ok in such scenarios, it's almost certainly not true and we can talk about why. But that wasn't Slifkin's argument anyway.
He is discussing whether it matters if the giver is מצווה on this issur or is it enough if only the receiver is. Surely you are not suggesting that if the giver has to be מצווה that means he has a chelek in the aveira. If that was the case then you have eliminated the construct of אין שליח לדבר עבירה.
I too, when I read his article, realized that he is completely ignoring the prohibition against murder. Being willing to give up your life is not the same as murder.
It seems that some people think that the issue is the loss of life, not the murder. They don't understand the concept, because they didn't learn Tosfos in Yevamos.
And the main thrust of your article, that Hilchos Pikuach Nefashos is not something to be decided on the fly, is totally lost on these people. They accuse others of being cavalier about human life, yet show their own frivolous attitude to Lo Sirtzach with these articles.
Isn't it funny how Slifkin isn't abashed by putting these kinds of pieces out? To me this is an indication of a far worse problem. He knows what *we'll* respond. But he is part of a different world where they respect this kind of thinking.
Just to list two from many:
https://irrationalistmodoxism.substack.com/p/the-limits-of-academic-criticism
https://irrationalistmodoxism.substack.com/p/why-i-changed-my-mind-about-female
There apparenty is a world, which Natan is actually a part of which respects this way of thinking. As long as we have something novel and modern which disagrees with our Mesorah, it's highly intellectual and relevant.
Natan, you are part of a different world. Bye bye!
(Though we'll still comment because it's fun... Plus there are those within our fold who are confused by your take.)
Well done!
At this point I'm not sure what the point of the Torah is. According to "rationalism", we should be bending all issues towards what is rational to us. Any statement made by Chazal, of any kind, can be reinterpreted as them following what was rational to *them*, but we will now follow what is rational to *us*. Originally limited to scientific matters and aggadah, now this ideology is being applied to the halacha! ושערו חרבו מאד
Excellent post.
Its interesting that instead of taking the obvious path of defending full irreversible brain death as being actual death - which is what many respected poskim have done, including R Dovid Feinstein and reported by R Tendler in the name of R Moshe - he feels the need to create a new chiddush and shtup it into his rationalism vs mysticism dichotomy. It honestly has nothing to do with it whatsoever and is a halachic shayla like all others.
Perhaps one can say that those with a more rationalistic worldview are more likely to accept the viewpoints of scientists who claim that when the brain has ceased functioning, irreversible death has occurred and the ventilator is merely doing a mechanical process. But even if one accepts that as so, defining whether that is enough is still a halachic shayla! One who doesn't accept the science won't have the shayla in the first place. However, the actual psak certainly has nothing to do with this supposed imaginary dichotomy.
You are misquoting Rav Dovid Feinstein, as he has himself said very clearly
"It depends how you want to word it. If I tell you cessation of breathing, and you say, oh, that’s brain death, is that, I don’t agree with that; I don’t know anything about brain death. Quote me correctly"
https://hods.org/halachic-issues/videos/video_rdfeinstein/rabbidovidfeinstein/#:~:text=voicing%20that%20opinion.-,Rabbi%20Dovid%20Feinstein%3A,Quote%20me%20correctly.
Fair enough.
This is exaclty what we needed! BH, for years so many of us didn't know how to respond to R Dr Slifkin. Since he had all these years of learning and so many books written, although we could see the hashkafik and halachic flaws, we didn't have the proper tools to counter his claims. For years he has been left unchecked having a website full of leshon hara against Torah Jews and terrible haskafa, and finally we see a great group of kenai lHashem without any goals but the fight for Torah and Truth. Thank you very much for this!
Fantastic. Two questions to academic rationalist types:
1) Name some real nafka minas between the reality you live in and that of your average atheist. Underneath all the lomdus, a lack of fundamental differences should give some pause, to say the least. Really? The Torah happens to support every new academic/liberal idea?
2) What are some things non-Jewish rationalists believe that you do not believe because you don't think it can fit in the Torah, even though your natural inclination is it makes sense and you'd accept?
Perhaps such hyper-rationalist inclinations are actually a nisayon in emuna that some are assigned to struggle with more than others, and isn't just one of the shiv'im panim... the Yetzer haRa is most dangerous when we give him a hechsher...
"What are some things non-Jewish rationalists believe that you do not believe because you don't think it can fit in the Torah, even though your natural inclination is it makes sense and you'd accept?"
Not doing mitzvos is the obvious one.
Point taken. Though by 'believe' I meant hashkafic areas; doing mitzvot can also just be orthopraxy unfortunately
I think this article misses the whole point. The issue with his argument is that it’s just some vague effective altruist argument buttressed by some obscure cherry-picked source words that seem to say the same thing as him, as long as it’s appropriately isolated from context. Effective altruists make very distinct philosophical claims about the world and he never bothers to support those claims, choosing to pretend they are obvious, as is common for such type of claims. The reason to stick with our traditional sources is that they have an entirely different philosophy, so to make a claim within the context of Halacha, you must accept the premises of Halacha. Otherwise, you’re just another pompous arrogant effective altruist, sneering with your math equations and “data” how you have the perfect answer to questions that have been bothering humanity forever.
Well said.
In my defense, I would argue there is also some purpose in occasionally shining a flashlight on specifically how they mangle the sugyos, because people do sometimes get taken by their self assured tone.
See the last footnote.
Please keep writing articles like this
Footnote 12 - took me a minute to get it! Well done.
Really excellent!! I agree with almost everything. One point about your application of R Yehuda Hachasid - "The case there is where a gentile is vowing to kill one of the two, and there R. Yehuda Hachasid finds it praiseworthy for the am ha’aretz to offer himself as the sacrifice."
In the question of brain death it is the doctor that is committing murder - the donor is only offering himself as the sacrifice, no? (This cannot be said regarding his proof from the 2 men in the desert, which is different not only because it is only shev vaal taaseh, but as you pointed out, because no-one is being murdered.)
But don't get me wrong, I agree 100% that NS messed up royally in his analysis, which he has no business even trying to deal with to begin with. I also think a big problem with his piece is why stop at brain death? Why not every vegetative state patient, or terminally ill, or downs syndrome...sound familiar?
The donor would be an accessory to murder, unlike the case of Rav Yehuda Hachasid. His consent is what is enabling the murder.
Exactly. The analogy is irrelevant.
If you're asking an independent question of whether it's ever ok to invite someone to murder you, it seems to me unlikely, but hey there's a reason that these questions aren't usually addressed to me. My only point in the article was that Slifkin's tzu shtel is dumb.
Huh? Isn't that the chidush of Sefer Chasidim?
No. The chidush is that if the goy is murdering someone, the AH can take the bullet. He does not say that there's ever a heter to proactively instigate a murder in the first place.
In both cases the killer is not engaged in the act of murder when you are inviting him to act. How is inviting a goy to kill one person over the other any different than inviting a doctor to harvest organs from one person rather than waiting for another? The only difference is lifnei iver - not murder. In the case of SC it's not LI because it's chad avra. By organ donation it will almost always be trei avra.
In SC it has nothing to do with lifnei iveir or anything else. If it was your choice he wouldn't be killing anyone at all, the aveira has nothing to do with you. You're just taking the bullet to save the other guy.
Also I just realized - I'm pretty sure he is advocating that it's ok for everyone including the doctor...
Exactly. Doctors are not allowed to murder either...
Accessory to murder is a legal term, not a Halachic one so I assume you mean lifnei Iver - which has its own qualifications and certainly is not murder.
“and certainly is not murder“
This is taluy in the chakira if lifnei iver is a chelek of the prohibition being transgressed.
Sources please.
All true and interesting, but just bear in mind this is a bit of rabbit hole. Whatever the technical designation is, it's not present by the Sefer Chasidim's case, so the citation is irrelevant. Which is the only point.
If someone would like to make the case that lifnei iver d'ritzicha is ok in such scenarios, it's almost certainly not true and we can talk about why. But that wasn't Slifkin's argument anyway.
I wasn't saying it is ok. I was saying it is not murder - which is what you were calling it throughout.
שו״ת אמונת שמואל סימן י״ד
He is discussing whether it matters if the giver is מצווה on this issur or is it enough if only the receiver is. Surely you are not suggesting that if the giver has to be מצווה that means he has a chelek in the aveira. If that was the case then you have eliminated the construct of אין שליח לדבר עבירה.
The major issue is not knowing what constitutes a major vs minor issue.