Mon, Oct 25, 2010 Lichvod HaRav Aharon Feldman, shlita, Shalom u'vrachah, I hope that this letter finds the Rosh Yeshivah well. I was recently referred to a source that I think the Rosh Yeshivah will find interesting. It is Shevilei David, by the nineteenth-century rav in Hungary, R. David Yehuda Leib Silverstein. He notes that R. Yehudah HaNasi had conceded that the Sages of Israel were mistaken in their view that the sun slips under the firmament at night to pass behind it (and points out that Rashi in several places seems to have followed this incorrect view). R. Silberstein also notes that while R. Yehudah HaNasi was correct to concede to the view of the gentile scholars, his reasons for doing so (regarding bodies of water being heated by the sun passing below the earth) were incorrect and were based on his not knowing about the existence of continents on the other side of the world. He also adds that some of the Talmud’s earlier discussions of the cosmos are also based upon their original, mistaken view of the firmament. (
The Ever-Increasing List
The Ever-Increasing List
The Ever-Increasing List
Mon, Oct 25, 2010 Lichvod HaRav Aharon Feldman, shlita, Shalom u'vrachah, I hope that this letter finds the Rosh Yeshivah well. I was recently referred to a source that I think the Rosh Yeshivah will find interesting. It is Shevilei David, by the nineteenth-century rav in Hungary, R. David Yehuda Leib Silverstein. He notes that R. Yehudah HaNasi had conceded that the Sages of Israel were mistaken in their view that the sun slips under the firmament at night to pass behind it (and points out that Rashi in several places seems to have followed this incorrect view). R. Silberstein also notes that while R. Yehudah HaNasi was correct to concede to the view of the gentile scholars, his reasons for doing so (regarding bodies of water being heated by the sun passing below the earth) were incorrect and were based on his not knowing about the existence of continents on the other side of the world. He also adds that some of the Talmud’s earlier discussions of the cosmos are also based upon their original, mistaken view of the firmament. (