[Avodah] Why are beards considered so choshuv?

[Micha Berger]

On Mon, Jan 11, 2010 at 12:52:57PM +0000, Dov Kaiser wrote:
: What is your source for this statement? In all of the
: photographs I have seen of pre-War Litvisher bochurim, they
: have short sideburns...

Rav Dovid's peiyos can be seen here:
<http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/d6/Rav_Dovid_Lifshitz.jpg>
Notice that he did not have long sideburns, although RDL did grow these
blocks of hair at each temple which he swept back above his ears. (Not
the more long and narrow style now in vogue among many yeshivish that
can be wrapped behind the curve of the ear.)

I had always addumed that RDL's blocks-of-hair "lange payos" preceded
his beard, althoug I must confess I never asked.


All that said, we should be well aware of the difference between pre-WWI
Eastern Europe and how Jews behaved inter-war. Along with the simple
march of time, another impact was greater exposure to German Orthodoxy
during WWI. RYL's photo collection is after WWI, and may not represent
what was done in the Litvisher yeshivos eg in Volozhin's day.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             I slept and dreamt that life was joy.
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