[Avodah] [Areivim] Stop illegal dumping of religious items in Lakewood

[Harry Maryles]

--- On Thu, 4/22/10, Micha Berger <micha at aishdas.org> wrote:


BTW, R' Pam told R' Matis Blum that me'ikar hadin, Torah periodicals that
are usually not kept for a later re-read, such as parashah sheets, that
don't actually contain sheim Hashem don't require burial. (RMBlum is
the author of Torah Ladaas, and was a talmid at Torah Vadaath under RAP
when he began -- thus the name.) The fact that we generally treat divrei
Torah with more respect than torn taliosos is offset by the fact that it
was never intended to be permanent. (That's an old memory, I might be
off on some details. Confirmation would be helpful.)

RDLifshitz was mesupaq.
-----------------------------
 
As you know I am a big fan of Matis Blum.
 
I wrote about this issue on my blog a few days ago. Here is an excerpt:
 
Shaimos is the Hebrew word for names and specifically refers to the names of God. The Torah prohibits us from erasing or in any way destroying the names of God written in Hebrew. The Gemarah in Shavuos (35a-b) discusses which specific names are considered the names of God such as Yud Keh Vav Keh, Elokah, and a few others that are very familiar to Orthodox Jews.

There are some references to God that are not considered Shaimos such as HaKadosh Baruch Hu. These are not technically forbidden from erasure.

There is voluminous discussion and disagreement among Poskim about what else constitutes Shaimos. But one thing is certain - anything that contains one of the specific names of God must not be erased or destroyed. The Halacha dictates that it must be buried. This is what is meant by Shaimos today. It is material with God’s name printed or written on it ready for proper disposal via burial.

Because the details of this Halacha are not that familiar to most of us - it has become customary to treat all religious literature as Shaimos which increases the volume. That is an erroneous approach. One should ask a competent Posek about whether something they own constitutes Shaimos. But by far the biggest contributing factor that has caused a virtual explosion of Shaimos is the ease of copying and printing today. For example it is not unusual to find multiple copies of the weekly Torah portion - the Parshas HaShavuah printed on a few sheets of paper, stapled together, and distributed to a Shul for a Bar Mitzvah. It is used only that one time and then put into Shaimos to be disposed of properly. Which means burying it.

HM

Want Emes and Emunah in your life? 

Try this: http://haemtza.blogspot.com/




      
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