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| Ramchal z"l |
The Mekubal Rebbi Moshe Dovid bar Shmuel Volli z"l,from Padua Italy, writes that growing a beard during sefirah has absolutely no basis in halacha and is actually a custom instituted by gentiles!
According to the Mekubal, the Shulchan Aruch only discusses haircuts ...but not facial hair!
This Mekubal was a student of the Ramchal, who wrote numerous sefarim on Kaballah and was also a physician!
It is interesting to note and this will probably come to a shock to my readers. The Ramchal himself did not let his beard grow...some say that was because in those days in Italy the priests would grow their beards so the Rabbonim of Italy to look different than the gentile priests, cut their beards!
But There was an Italian kabbalistic tradition going back to R. Menachem Azariah of Fano to be beardless outside of Israel (this is a complex discussion; it became a major issue in the 19th and 20th century; in truth it seems that he wore a beard, but it was neatly trimmed).
Below is Haham Raphael Meldola, who was rabbi of the Sephardic Jews of London. A native of Leghorn, he was ordained by the Chida and was clean shaven...
בצילום מספרו שהגיע לידי 'בחדרי חרדים' נכתב כי העיקר הוא שלא לגלח את שערות הראש לפי שהם דינים, ואין לחתכם ולבטלם בימי הדין שהוא עת התפשטות הגבורות כידוע.
"אבל המנהג שלא לגלח את הזקן אינו נמשך כי אם מחוקות הגויים שנתערבו ביניהם, שאינם נוהגים לגדל את זקנם ואדרבא חרפה היא להם".
"ומזה נתפשט המנהג שלוקחים גידול הזקן לסימן של צער ושל צרה ושל אבלות, ואנחנו יודעים ששערות הזקן הם צנורות של חסד, לפי שהם מצד הפנים, והשערות של הראש הם צנורות של דין לפי שהם מצד האחור".
"אם כן התספורת שאסרו בגלל האבל בשלושים הם רק בשערות הראש לרמז שהם ימים של צער ודין והוא הדין בימי העומר ולא היתה כוונתם על תספורת הזקן לפי שכבר היו מגדלים אותו כל ימיהם כמו שראוי לעשות".
לסיום כותב המקובל: "ואף על פי כן כיון דדשו ביה רבים שלא לגלח את הזקן בימי העומר ובימי האבל יש להפיס את דעתם ולתת טעם שהוא אדרבא כדי להמתיק הדינים של גידול פרע שער ראשם בגידול שער זקנם שהוא הממתק את הדין".
הרמ"ד וואלי, תלמיד חבר לרמח"ל, שמלבד היותו מקובל עצום אשר חיבר ספרים רבים והותיר אחריו כתבים לאלפים, היה גם רופא.
בחיבוריו מתגלה עולם שלם מופלא, ולעיתים אף שונה תפיסתית מכל המוכר לנו. לרגל יום ההילולא שלו החל השבוע, אנו מביאים בפניכם קטע קטן - אקטואלי ומעניין עבור בחורי ישיבה, מתוך מדברי תורתו. וגם, תפיסתו העקרונית בעניין השמחה, המזכירה במעט את שיטת ברסלב אשר התגלתה דורות אחר כך, על ידי רבי נחמן זיע"א.
Clean shaven Chareidi rabbis with long hair and goyish lavush? Impossible!!!
ReplyDeleteDidn't all rabbis since Moshe Rabbeinu shave their heads bald and grow peyis and beards down to their waists?
Must be that the Tziyonim Photoshopped the portraits 200 years ago!
I didn't know Norelco shavers were made back then. Lack of electricity to charge the shaver would also have been a problem, but I'm sure there are sources that state various Rabbonim knew about electricity before it was actually discovered by the goyim.
ReplyDeleteThat's not the Ramchal. It's Broccardo Malchiostro, the young chancellor of the bishop of Treviso.
ReplyDeletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portrait_of_a_Young_Man_with_a_Lamp
Fred
ReplyDeleteWhen I write "shaving" I don't mean with electricity, It could be done with a powder which was actually common until the 60's ....or with scissors
But I actually did find a sefer printed in the late 1700's, whose author writes that his neighbor, a goy actually, has a windmill and that makes "fire" somehow, and he didn't understand how that worked.... the sefer questions whether that is considered "fire" in reference to shabbos!
10;09
ReplyDeletethere isn't any drawings of the Ramchal, but I would guess this drawing is very close to what he looked like, being that the Ramchal died when he was just 40.... he wrote most of his seforim and plays when he was in his 20's,
he was actually put in Cheirim by the Chareidie gedoilim in his time because he claimed that he was learning with an angel, kabbalah...he also wrote that he was capable of being Moshiach ...
Broccardo Malchiostro did a self portrait that looks nothing like the drawing I posted
ReplyDeletePowder is one option which most Litvishe poskim are mattir.
ReplyDeleteThere also used to be a scissor-clipper-like contraption that left something like a "3" or "4".
The point here is that most mekubolim were against any means of removing facial hair and the Rama miPano was a rare exception.
I'm not sure if there is any mekor for the Satmar method of ripping out beards by hand from Lubavitcher punim.
Also worth noting is that we do have a portrait of the Ramchal's great-grandson the Shadal and he has the same style.
ReplyDeleteNYC Mayor Fiorello la Guardia descends from them through his maternal grandmother.
12:15
ReplyDeleteSatmar taanies that Chabad aren't human, so there is no issur in tearing out their beards....
Brisker- but the shadal was a known Apikores and in his so-called teshuvos he says that its muttar to shave in every way because the only reason it was assur was to not look like Baalei Avoda zara.
ReplyDeleteRabbi Willig from YU and various followers of his like the rav of "O.Z." hold that the Norelco lift & cut shavers assered by everyone else are mutter. Frankly there are very big talmidei chachamim who don't understand where Willig's shaver logic even begins.
ReplyDeleteEven worse, there is a Young Israel rabbi who was once head of the RCA. The guy is shocking ignoramous which you will very quickly learn when he explains his bogus shita to mattir anything, maybe even a razor blade - because he has a "kashya" on Rav Moshe Feinstein. Never mind the arrogance that he places himself on the same level - his "kashya" is not even factual. Maybe he is gilgul of the Shadal.
do you have a picture of the sefer that says it is liek Avodah Zara>??
ReplyDelete