[Avodah] preserving minhag

[Eli Turkel]

But I do not think the status quo is a good thing, or how minhag should work.
While I might lament the death of a derekh hachaim that served my family so
well for generations, not every minhag that I was raised with can and should
emerge victorious. IMHO, it is better to see a singular minhag EY than a
survival of minhag Litta or Aram Tzova. (And better to see a geulah than see a
minhag America ever develop.)>>

R. Ovadiah Yosef tried to get all of EY to follow sefardi minhag (or more exact
the psak of R. Yosef Karo). R. Aruso of Kiryat Ono wrote a PhD thesis advocating
a single minhag for EY based on Rambam (he is Yemenite). In real life
whenever mingaim combine it is usually the ashkenzim that win out.

Numerous other poskim bring the analogy of a symphony. The best music is when
each instrument plays its instrument well not when they are all
identical. Hence,
the optimum is each community keeping its own minhag but in togetherness to
form a symphony.

As RMF paskens for NY today there is no longer minhag hamakom and each community
keeps its own minhagim. There are a few EY customs that overrode old
ashkenazi customs but those are the exceptions rather than the rule.

In spite of all this argument the litvak world does tend to insist on
uniformity.
While in Voloshin each bachur was encouraged to keep his family minhagim
in yeshivot there is a force of uniformity within the yeshiva at the expense of
family customs expecially in tefillah.
One lost custom that I mourn is the coloful clothing among sefardim. Today
sefardi rabbis wear the black of ashkenazi rabbis. Only the rishon letzion
wears a colorful uniform.

-- 
Eli Turkel