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From: gek@ihuxj.UUCP (Glenn Kapetansky)
Newsgroups: net.religion.jewish
Subject: Fence around the Torah
Message-ID: <420@ihuxj.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 29-Feb-84 11:36:30 EST
Article-I.D.: ihuxj.420
Posted: Wed Feb 29 11:36:30 1984
Date-Received: Fri, 2-Mar-84 07:29:02 EST
Organization: AT&T Bell Labs, Naperville, IL
Lines: 42

this was sent to me, and i reproduce it in its entirety
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Date: 29 Feb 84 10:18:06 CST (Wed)
From: ihnp4!linus!mat
To: ihnp4!ihuxj!gek
Subject: doing ALL the laws


	This is in response to your article (sorry, I don't have the title
handy).  Not to flame it , but to praise it.  (A rare thing on Usenet, it
seems).  "A Jew," as my rabbi (Conservative by the way) put it, "is a 
continual process of becoming." No person is expected to be able to follow
all the laws (excluding those he doesn't qualify for, like laws for a
Cohen, when one is not, laws for a woman when one is male, etc.).  One
can merely try.  I dare say not even Hillel was a "perfect" observer of
all the laws that he and his cohorts promulgated (extrapolated is probably
a better word).  One can merely try to be continually better, so in a sense,
you are right, no matter what you observe, there is still more on a "higher
plane" to follow.

	I sort of like your explanation of the existence of all the "picayune"
laws, as mere exerises for the super-pious to remind them of the Torah.  The
important thing to remember, as you do, is not to look at the mountain of 
laws and say, "I can't scale that!", but to say, "I'll take it one step at
a time, and let's see where it leads me."  The former is the approach of
the non-observant.

	I do, however, think you are misrepresenting Andy as having proclaimed
his version of Judaism as "the one true way.".  He did not claim that he was
observant, merely putting forward his present state of observance.

	To paraphrase the quote, "The whole world is like a very narrow bridge,
but the main thing is not to fear" from the Talmud, I say "Jewish Law is like
a very narrow bridge, but the main thing is to KEEP MOVING!"

	Sorry, this was longer than I intended.  If you feel any or all of 
my words are worth printing, posting, or mailing elsewhere, feel free to do so.

             --Mordechai (yeah for Purim!) Aharon Ben Shimon Yaakov (MABSH"Y)
		(Mike Turniansky, linus!mat)

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