[Avodah] R' Angel & Geirus Redux

[Arie Folger]

RMM wrote:
> 3) You make a good point - a C clergyman can be TsN even though he
> knows what TsN is.

I didn't write that. Wanting to avoid any discussion about the specific case 
of the author of said article, I deflected any arguments about him by writing 
that "I don't know much about that author and am hesitant to label him 
without extensive analysis," but I believe that from my writing that "Would 
you call that guy ignorant of what TsN is" in reaction to your suggestion of 
how broad TsN is, one would easily see that:

-> I meant that a R/C clergyman could definitely qualify for being an apikores 
and a 'hoti uma'hti et harabbim.

However, most importantly, what I really tried to put in the foreground was 
that RMF did not label the Sunday school students apikorsim. That much is 
clear, as RMF explicitly condemns "their ra'bbais" and not all R/C.

I can also see - from personal acquaintance - how the level of the R/C 
leadership has dropped to the point that RMF might have condemned them in a 
kinder way. In the words of one former C ra'bbenical student, his 12 year old 
daughter in Prospect Park Yeshivah knew more Judaism than he did at the end 
of the JTS program.

Nonetheless, unquestionably, religious leaders who lead their flock astray, 
even out of ignorance, are in a worse position than those who are privately 
ignorant. Conversely, the leaders' potential in teshuvah is so much greater, 
as they can draw so many other people with them (RMM's story about two C 
clergymen coming to his yeshivah and then, upon their return, wanting to 
install a me'hitzah, resonates).
-- 
Arie Folger
http://www.ariefolger.googlepages.com