Please read the posts on the site. I would merely be repeating what is here, but in short:

1) Rabbi Dunner's credibility and reliability has been shattered because he has contradicted himlsef several times, has himself told different, conflicting versions of his story, and stated as facts thigns that are clearly not true. His testimony cant be believe: even if I wanted to belivee it - which version should I believe?

2) The issue is not Dr Mohan vsersus R. Dunner. It is the entire world vs. Rabbi Dunner. Dozens of priests, hindus, baalei teshuva and geriim all have the same story, even though they dont know each other, and only r. dunner has his version. Included in those who oppose rabbi dunners version are many, many rabbonim who have researched the matter.

3) Rabbi Dunner may have been aware of the self-sacrifice shita beforehand, but what he wasnt aware of is the way it is expressed. He failed to get information form the pilgrims in such a way that would clarify the issue on their part. WHat they told him could be interpreted both ways. Rabbi Dunner was not aware of the language nuances and the ways Hindus express this, although this was well known to others 15 yeras ago. Rabbi Dunner never thought to contact the Rabbonim who spent 9 months of research on this that led to Rav ELyashev's heter. Had he done so, he would have understood what to look for and what to ask. As it is, he blew it.

4) Rabbi Dunner had said many times that he wants to prohibit all human hair shaitels because of Tznius reasons, and in the letter fomr the aida hachareidis it states clearly that there is not a single heter for the shiatels that women are currently wearing, even according to the poskim that permit shaitels in general.

5) The opposition is not "the professor's version". That is one of the falsehoods that was told to Rav Elyashev. It is the verison of countless pilgrims, hindus, and others who have gone to Tirupati.

6) The letter of Rav Wosner and Rav Karelitz's bais din did not pasken that the shaitels are assur, and not that they are even a safek takrovos - for if they would be a safek it owuld be obligatory not to wear them, which is not what they said. They said oyu should try hard to wear differnt ones, and to avoid them in the future. This means htat they are saying they do not know the facts, and they ar not prohibiting, and they are nto even saying that there is an offivcial safek issur here- merely that they do not know, and when one does not know, you should act in the way they described. They are also apparenlty not impressed with Rabbi Dunners story enough to even declare a safek issur.

7) The retraction was mentioned by Rabbi Belsky.

8) Rabbi Dunner did NOT say that "there are many people out there" who ar not following the Orthodox verison of the religion but rather there are NO people out there except those who follow his version of the religion. This is what he told Rav Elyashev. If there would be factions, the issue would be a safek to begin with, which is the opposite of what he said Rav Elyashev stated.

He also told Rabbi Belsky that he is aware that there are differences in the facts and he is not verifying any version, and he recommnded a full investigation, Din-Torah style, if someone wants to get to the facts.

He also says you should try to find out if possible whether the shiatel is a temple shaitel.

Dear Moderator,

I myself don't have Internet access, just a computer (in fact I can't even type) but every evening my chavrusa brings me an updated disk of your site. I have also received a few calls telling me that you are the final word on this issue and asking if what you are saying is really true etc. I penned you an answer which someone heavily edited and sent to you – but you refused to post it.
No, I didnt refuse. You are assuming that because I did not post it as fast as you would want I refused to do so. The truth is, I have a big backlog and things dont get posted right away. You are interpreting on your own, somethign I did, and you have assumed it to be fact, when it is really fiction. Pleas euse that as a lesson and understand that this is exactly what you have done when presenting the "facts" of this entire matter.

I’ll try one more time to present my version of the facts and you'll either post it or not.

Around two months ago a ‘shmuah’ started to circulate that the hair is part of the rites. At that point everyone started to research the issue (Professors, websites, chat-rooms etc.)

After almost a month of scrambling the results were inconclusive. The more outwardly facing websites – who generally present a more humanistic approach to the religion (similar to reform judaism) and even sell it as monotheism – consider it to be a ‘ma’aseh hachno’oh’. Dr. Mohan is among those. Within the more internal communities however (the fanatics or orthodox), the spin was that the hair is given...

At this point there was a dead end at the factual level.

This is both untrue and illogical. If the facts were as you interpret them, it would not be "inconclusive" but would mean that there are indeed two factions of hindus, with two different versions of their religion. Not a big chidush - most religionjs have this type of thing. This is not a dead end, but would mean that the tonsure practice is looked at in different ways. Unfortunately, this is nto what was told to rav Elyashev. He was told that therre are no such people who look at the tonsure the first way. He was told that the "professors" hold like that but the worshippers dont. Even according to this information, he was misinformed.

But you have misinterpreted the information anyway. Theree are non two factions - no "fanatical" versus "humanistic" groups. This was your interpretation, but, like you assumed you knoew what I meant when you did not, you assumkend you knew what these Hindus meant and you did not.

These are not 2 factions - they are all plain Hindus. You did not understand the language nuances and the figures of speech that Hindus use. This same thign happened 15 years ago, but then more research was done, and they discovered what was happening.

You should have asked faction A: "Are you disagreeing with faciton B? They said s/t completely differnet." But you didnt. You assumed you knew what they were talking about.

But Hindus were asked that very quesiton, and their asnwer was no, we are not disagreeing but merely expressing it in our way.

This uniformity of thought, if not of expression, is key here, and is also confirmed across the board by dozens of Hindus that were spoken to (the latest was a few hours ago), as well as the "experts."

In addition, your interpretaiton is clearly falsified by the fact that thes ewebsites and so-called humanists (called that by you only) do indeed say thatbHinduism invovles idol worship, and other "interesting" concepts such as putting the god to bed in a cradle and other such practices. There are no Hindus who deny the idolatrous practices of the religion - the issue is merely that tonsure os not one of those practices.

This is one of the biggest blunders that Rabbi Dunner made - assuming the Hindus that explained tonsure the other way are more "humanistic" about Hinduism. They arent - they werent discussing Hinduism but merely this detail of it. Rabbi Dunner should have discussed the religion in general with them to confirm his interpretaiotn, but he did not. He blew it again.

PS - The same thing applies to Dr. Mohan - he admits to sacrificing coconuts and fruits to Visnu, but not hair. I noticed that oyu left out the part about Dr. Mohan in your letter when you sent it the second time. But its not only Dr Mohan that this applies to - but rather all the Hindus.

Let’s stop for a second and point out, based on the Teshuvas HaRosh 55 – 9 (please look at it carefully, it is important) that this issue has to be decided halachikally i.e. no doctor or professor is going to paskin for me whether or not something is Avodah Zaroh. The maximum that can be gleaned from any goy, especially an oved Avodah Zaroh, are some plain unembellished points.

Rabbi Dunner used this Teshuvas Harosh to publicly discredit the testimony of a former Hindu Baal Teshuva who stated that he did not interpret correctly what he heard. He is so wrong it is difficult to fathom what he was thinking of when he said this. The Teshuvos HaRosh says that Torah is decided by Halachic criteria, not secular understanding. Fine. Thats not the issue here - the issue is the facts, not the determination of what is considered avodah zorah. WHen we want to know about another religion, we do indeed find out form people among that othern religion - the way Rabbi Dunner tried to do in Idia. Here we have someone who states not whether the facts halachicly create a status of avodah zorah but rather that Rabbi Dunner misunderstood the facts. The language, the expressions, he is unfamkiliar with and so he got the facts wrong. Rabbi Dunner turns to him and says that Torah is determined by Halachic methods not secular ones.

Hello. We are, as Rav Elyashev instructed, trying to find out from worshippers what exactly they do. This man was a worshipper. He stated what they do, and he stated that they have differnt expresisons of speech to explain that sometimes. None of this has to do withthe Teshuvas Harosh.

On Tuesday 13th Iyar, R’ Nissim convened a meeting at which R’ Wosner was present, but the results were inconclusive. On Thursday of that week, a second meeting took place with R’ Nissim with testimony from a ger / ba’al teshuva whose father works there (or something to that effect). R’ Nissim came out of that meeting shaken up and went straight to R’ Wosner in order to come out with a p’sak l’issur. (It seems that the fact that sometimes only three tufts of hair are taken – whatever the reason they give – bothered him a lot).

R’ Wosner was still mesupak and therefore on Lag Ba’omer they came out with a joint psak encouraging people a) not to buy any new sheitels containing Indian hair and b) one should ‘yishtadel’ to change old sheitels.

This "joint psak" clearly said that there is no vadai issur or even safek issur here - if there were, you would not be allowed to wear your Indian shaitels. Not even a safek issur. Rather, Rav Wosner and Rav Karelitz were telling us how to act since they dont know what the facts are and have not yet been able to determine them.

He was in contact with R’ Dunner and said that he wanted to know four things (Please excuse me, either I was only told two, or I forgot the other two)

1) Is there any hisyachasus to the place where the haircutting is done?

There is not. Tony's baber shop is "kosher" for tonsure, and many hindus do not do tonsure atany temple. Rabbi Dunner misinformed Rav Elyashev about this.

2) Is there any hisyachasus to the hair as it is being cut – either beforehand or afterwards?

No, there is not. The hair is garbage - or chattel to be sold. It has no yichus at all.

By the way, both R’ Belsky and R’ Abadi argue with Rav Elyashiv and hold that even if the answer to these questions is yes then the hair is still not takruves. You moderator, may also hold like that, but you must be honest and say so – this is legitimate halachic discourse.

As I said, people may argue with Rav Elyashev halachicly, but the issue here is that factually he was misinformed.

Anyway, l’halacha this is what Rav Elyashiv held is enough to assur and this was R’ Dunner’s only mandate – to find out the answers to these questions.

and the answers he gave were wrong. In addition, Rav Elyashev told Rav Feivel Cohen that he only considers the shaitels safek assur - maybe takrovos - not vadai.

By the way, R’ Dunner returned in a bad mood and his only comment was ‘Seis bitter shvarts’. He was grilled for over an hour with the results as you know:

Question #1 was decided by Rav Elyashiv lechumra because of a) the barefoot requirement in the barbershop and b) since the worshippers said that the whole mountain is considered to be ‘his house’ (and hence they shave there rather than at home).

Unfortunately, Rabbi Dunner did not ask what they mean by "his house", nor did he mention that not all worhsippers say this, or take off their shoes. There are plenty of worshippers here in AMerica who were there to confirm this. Nor did he find out that when they do tonsure even not near a temple - in Tonys - many also take off theiir shoes. The shoe removeal is due to their performing a rite, not due to any holiness of the barbershop. He should have asked them what does "his house" mean, and they would have told him the whoel wrold is his house, and some other explanations.

The whole issue of the hair being ‘unclean’ is not germane to its halachik status according to Rav Elyashiv.

Thats only because they told him that they bring hair into the temple; in reality the uncleanliness of the hair disqualifies it, in Hindu religion, for being a korbon. Rabbi Efrati mentioned that "not a single one" of the Hindus know that the hair is tamei. And that is what was told to rav ELyashev. That is completely untrue.

Question #2 was partially answered by R’ Nissim’s ger / ba’al teshuva who said that some of those shorn of their hair actually pick it up and place it into the special bin for hair

Like a special garbage pail. so what? This too should have been further investigated, as it was 15 years ago. Then, the conclusion was very different.

R’ Dunner added to this that they told him that the ‘getchka’ loves the hair. When he asked what do you mean ‘loves’ don’t you know they are selling it? they answered great – he needs the money to pay off his debts.

Who is "they"? How many? Its funny how of all the Hindus that we know who went thorugh tonsure - including the baalie teshuva and geirim - not a single one was found to say this. Yet Rabbi Dunner says "they" said it. RabbiDunner also interpreted this to mean that the hair is a gift to the idol, which it is not. Not at all. It means that the tnsure "avodah" ends with the hair being garbage. It is the temple administrators who take it form the garbage and sell it. Yeah, the god gets his money fomr this, but that avodah starts from the garbage - it has nothgin to do withthe tonsure, whose "avodah" ends with the hair as garbage. *Unfortunately this is not what they told rav Elyashev. They gave him the impresison that the reson for the tonsure is so that the god can sell the hair and pay off his debts. Not so. It is two totally differnt thiings. But RabbiDunner did not think to check this out.

Now, any expert whether he practices Hinduism or not, can argue on the proper place that hair plays in the Hindu religion but they are not our deciding Halachik authority.

Nobody said they are - but they do know the metzius. And Rabbi Dunner did not understand it properly.

Unfortunately, as Rabbi Efrati and Rabbi Dunner said, they told Rav Elyashev that this is a disagreement between "experts" and "worshippers'. That was a complete falsehood. Unfortunately, Rabbi Dunner did not think to check out who were the people telling Rav Elyashev the oppsoing story.

Here is the way it was written up in one article (this is more or less a precise report of Rabbi Efrati's words, as per the transcript that I quoted above:

The other interpretations that had been suggested by experts as mentioned above were explicitly rejected by the pilgrims themselves. Nobody agreed with the suggestion that it is a present or self-denigration or simple fulfillment of an oath. Thus these suggestions had to be dismissed.

Several professors and Internet sites suggest that cutting is done from other reasons, as outlined above. The London party was fully aware of these arguments. They did not claim that the experts were lying. It may well be written and described in the books and rules as the professors said.

But the facts they found "in the field" were otherwise. To them it appeared that the pilgrims were not merely preparing themselves for a later service by cutting their hair -- either to destroy their ego or to have hair which they could give as a donation. Rather it appeared as an act of avodoh itself, similar to the shechitoh of a korbon lehavdil The hair was the pilgrim's korbon to the idol.

Even if the experts were correct about the normative theory and practice of tonsure within the idol worship at Tirupati and similar places, whether their act was in fact an act of avodoh zora hinged upon the intention of those who were actually involved in the cutting rather than upon discourses of theologians who expound the rules of the religion.

This is a completely fictitious description of the situation, but this is what was told to Rav ELyashev.

For the 100th time: Rav Elyashev's original sources were not outside professors telling him the official rules of Hindusim. They were all practicing Hindus who went thourght the tonsure practice themselves. That Includes Dr. Mohan.

AT the very least, even if Rabbi Dunner would have understood what he saw, there are clearly a great number of Hindus who do not see things the way he says they all do. So had he met Dr Mohan or one of the other Hindus that contradicted him, he would have gotten differnt information. Yet he said nobody - none of the hindus - interpret the practice the way "the professors" do.

There are no outside "professors" here - merely Hindus. Some who teach nHindusim, some who program computers, and some who do other thigns, but they all agree that they do not see it the way Rabbi Dunner said ALL Hindus do.

Just to finish by saying against those who wish to portray Rav Elyashiv as an old man who is being manipulated – sorry boys this won't wash.

Nobody said that. Another assumption of the intentions of others which is completely false. Old man? Manipulated? You are twisting what has been said, and trying to portray your opponents as targeting rav Elashev. This is a lie. The issue is simply that Rabbi Dunner told Rav ELyashev the wrong asnwers to the quesitons. Your assumption that the only way Rav Elyashev would believe him is if he is an "old man" is, please forgive the language, disgusting and designed to mislead people. This is a common tactic, used by dishonest people: to misinform a godol and then when caught say "Well if he bleieved me it must be I was telling the truth."

Rav Elyashev already said that he is not verifying Rabbi Dunners story, but merely ruling based on it. Greater people than Rav Elyashev were fooled - perhaps you think the Bias Yosef (see above)was an "old man to be manipulated"?

To quote – or misquote – Rav Shimon Shkop. “Rav Elyashiv was involved here both in the ‘Din Torani’ - the halachic aspect - and in the ‘Din Mishpati - the factual aspect as it reflects on the Halocho – the Jewish one, not lehavdil the Hindu one.

No, he was not. He never claimed to be invovled in the factual aspects. You are once again assuming. The reality is quite different.

(Incidently, you dont understand what Din Mishpati means. It does not mean the metzius, but rather halachic rules based on social customs of doing business. It applies monly to choshen mishpat, not to yoreh deah, and has nothing to do with understandoing facts upon which a shailah is based. Just for the record.)

PROBLEM ONE
it is indeed correct that horav wosner shlito did not forbid sheitels mishuras hadin as you proved - but
a) don't forget that he asked all and sundry to change sheitels - lema'ase.
b) your claim in horav belsky's name that he was choizer is not correct:
His son from Monsey states [available on cs.columbia.edu; search for sheitels] after "speaking with his father several times": [translated from hebrew]

1. "A sheitel whose hair is certainly from the tirupati temple or other a. zoroh places should not be used"
2. one shoud try bechol oiz to change it
[this is a stronger statement than the original one, not a chazoro!]
3/ besha'ash hadechak or if one cannot afford it, one can wear it temporarily. [this point was not adressed in the first letter but is certainly not a departure from his original negative attitude.]
4/ sheitels fro other towns and countries are permitted.
so , dear moderator, where did you, who are generally so well informed, get it from that horav bleky reported that horav s wosener had changed his mind??

the only new kuloh not adressed in his first signed letter is indian hair where it is unknown whether it comes from the temple.

PROBLEM TWO
regarding horav n. karelitz you can check out yourself that in fact he paskened: tirupati are totally forbidden - mishuras hadin. [i believe he even held that they should be burned but am not enitely sure.]

the letter signed by him and rav wosner was a compromise between them.

PROBLEM THREE
your statement that the bne brak rabonim were not convinced by rav donner's report shows simple ignorance:
the bne brak letter appeared before rav donner came back. rav donner reported and the next day horav efrati's letter appeared, so can check on the accuracy of this. so how on earth could they be convinced by rav donner's report if they wrote their proclamation before he reported!

the fact that the priests and pilgrims claim not to intend it for avodoh was well-known to rav donner - he met a priest and a pilgrim in london before setting out and saw the books.

you failed to answer how both the bne brak and rav eliashiv's shliach came to the same conclusion: that "breaking the ego" was totally denied by pilgrim's in tirupati itself!

i see that you are right that the priest's view etc. cannot possibly be based on sticking up for the kovod of the Hindu religion - the oxford researher now in canada also concurred with this [quoted on your site] and he is a jew! but this is of no decisive importance.
you are still incorrect in claiming that the answers given to rav donner - and i suppose, also to the bne brak shliach, although for some reason you do not mention him - are non-conclusive. the pilgirms said to rav doner: just like the ketores is our korban to the god, so is the hair. the bne brak shliach inquired carefully about whether they mean it as a present or as a korban, and found BOTH options prevalent. please don't say he did not know what to look for, he actually was given a list of about 20 questions by horav weiss of satmar, antwerp [who has written to be matir - yes you read correctly - available on above site]

you theory that rav donner forbade sheitels before leaving is simply factually incorrect. where is the scource of your statement that he did so? your bais seems to be in part that the edoh charedis beth din are highly critical of sheitels. this is true. but here is your mistake [beshogeg,due to not having detailed knowledge]: rav donner is NOT from the edoh charedis and does not agree with this. in fact all his family i repeat all his family and all i repeat all his congregation wear sheitels including also human hair sheitels . he has never come out against them. upon his return i.e. after hearing that horav eliashiv assereed he came out against pritzusdik sheitels [in his london adress to noshim] in a rather mild way - the word 'human hair' was not mentioned. it can only be based on ignorance to suppose that he had an anti-sheitel attitude. i know for a fact that the opposite is true.

i am totally baffled by your claim that rav eliashiv was never told about the pilgrim's [as opposed to the priest's and professor's claim] statement that they do not intend cutting as an avodoh. what on earth was horav morgenstern doing all these weeks with open access to horav eliashiv, long before rav donner ever left on his excursion to india? what on earth was horav feivel cohen doing when he met horav eliashiv? at the end of the day, the bne brak shliach met roughly 200 pilgrim and got a clear denial of "breaking ego". how many pilgrims have come out in favour? and are not two streams posible?

you may be right that indeed the possiblity of diffrent streams amongst pilgrims was not brought up by horav eliashiv [i was not there and it is guessork, perhpas you have information on this] but rav donner himself does not deny such a possibility! how can he or anybody, nobody has questioned all pilgrim s or even a truly represntative sample?

your claim that horav eliashiv told horav feivel cohen that it is only a sofek takroves is, with all due respect, somewhat atonishing:
a] he said at the meeting subsquent to rav donner's report that it is now no longer a matter of doubt.
b] in his publicly available reply to horav belsky he uses the divrei chaim to consider ordering hair by non-jewish shliach a case of kol kovu'ah kemechtzo rather than kol deporush. Were the whole issur to be only a sofek issur, we would perhaps have a sfek sfekoh 1. is it ossur 2.the kemechtzoh sofek whether hair came from forbidden or permitted scource

First, dont forget that Rabbi Dunner's testiomny has already been discredited. He has been caught at misstatements and conradictions, and has been unable to defend them when given the chance. So the fact that he reported a certain fact does not mean that it is so. How in the world can I rely on a witness who has been caught stating things that are not so?

Nevertheless:

Problem 1:

The fact that he said that if they cannot afford a new shaitel or cannot change it, they can wear the Temple shaitel shows it is not even safek assur. Tellign people to try to avoid the shaitels, even to try hard, does not constitute a psak that it is assur but rather a statement of caution that since we dont know what is going on we should avoid it if possible. Big difference.

Problem 2:

If he signed the letter with Rav Wosner then we can assume that was his psak - a "compromise" in halachah makes no sense if he thought the Halachah was different. It would be assur for him to do somethign like that - to hold lhalachah that somethgin was assur lgamri and then tell people that it is not. If he once thought it was assur, then obvisouly he changed his mind.

Problem 3:

I am fully aware of when things happened. My opoint is that y now everyone knows of Rabbi Dunners report. Rav Wosner and Rav Karelitz have not changed their position because of it. Hence they are not impressed. Rabbi Dunen himslef said that the reason Rav WOsner was more lenient than him was because Rav Wosner's shliach did not get as good information as he did.

Breaking the ego was not denied by the pilgrims in Tirupati. In fact, Rabbi Dunenr never bothered to ask them "What about the breaking the ego idea?" he just assumed that what they said denied it.

Its like, lhavdil, if someone would claim that Jews believe they can cause G-d fortune and misfortune, which of course is idolatry, they may read in our "textbooks" and talk to rabbis who will tell them that it is ridiculous of course. But then they would ask average Jews in the street what does "boruch ata hashem" mean, and they would get the answer "blessed art thou, G-d", which would clearly imply that we do indeed bless Hashem. Of course, Hashem is neither blessed by us nto "blessed" at all in that sense, as the Meforshim say. Yet the colloquial figures of speech and expression do not explain that well. Nothing a single pilgrim said negated the ego-sacrifice idea, if you understand how Hindus talk, and these shluachim unfortunately did not.

The bigger quesiton here is, if we do know for a fact that many, many Hindus who were in Tirupati do indeed subscribe to the ego-sacrifice idea, such as Dr. Mohan and company, how come their "faction" was not at all represented there according to Rabbi Dunner? Answer: They were, but he couldnt decifer them. That being the case, the quesiton now arises, who says there are any other factions?

If there are indeed "two streams" then Rabbi dunenr misinformed Rav Elyashev, sinc he told him there are NO pilgrims that bleieve in the ego-sacrifice idea.
They did not say that the hair and the ketores are the same thing.

Rav Feivel Cohen told Rav Elyashev that his information was incorrect; Rav Elyashev said that that could be and if someone knows the information is incorrect, then he may definitely pasken differently. He told Rabbi Belsky that in order to decipher the facts you indeed would need a Bais-Din type of investigation. He stated in essence that he was only paskening based on the assumption that Rabbi Dunners information was correct. More than that you cant expect.

Plus the fact that Rav Feivel Cohen was not armed with a lot of information showing that Rabbi Dunenr's facts were untrue. He had a bit - including some material from this site - but not a whole lot. And he was not invovled in the investigation 15 years ago, and never did extensivce research on the matter. And still, Rav Elyashev told him that if someone knows the facts to be different, then he may definitely pasken different.

And we know the facts to be different.
The fact that Rav Elyashev told Rav Feivel it is only safek takrovos is indeed astonighing - since, as you mentioned, Rabbi Dunner said that Rav Elyashev stated it is vadai takrovos. My point is that Rav Feivel says that what Rabb iDunenr stated in the name of Rav Elyashev is not the case. This should not be a surprise. this is not the first not the second fact that Rabbi Dunner would be misstating.

Please note, that Rabbi Dunner, in al etter dated Erev Shabbos behcikosai, states: "After investigations, both as the result of my visit [to Tirupati] as well as that of Gedolei Haposkim in Eretz Yisroel, at the head of them, rav Elyashev shlita, behold you already know that they have all determined that the Temple hairs from India are Takrovos a"z, and not safek".

Of course, this statement is completely false and misrepresentative of what Rav Wosner's Bais Din came out with. It was only Rav Elyashev, if anyone, who he could claim rules that the hair is definite toakrovos.

And from the letter it is clear that he says this psak applies to all Indian shaitels. He does not conside that there are Indian shaitels that do not come from Temples.

Interesting: A different letter, dated the same day, put out by the Gateshead Hebrew Congregation, signed by Rabbi Eliezer Lieberman and Rabbi Pesach Falk (who is Rabbi Dunner's brother-in-law), which was based on those rabbonim's talks with Rabb Dunner, states:

"According to the opinon of Rav Elyashev shlita, sheitels that definitely come from India are subject to a possibility of takrovos avodah zorah" (chashash takrovos)
Your quesiton about the Divrei chaim is a good one: Rab Elyashev said that the temple hair are only safek takrovos, and there is a safek whether any given hair is indeed from the temples. That would make a sfek sfeika.
This was Rav Shlomo Zalman Aurbach's heter, 15 years ago. That indeed could still apply today.

Several Rabbonim have asked me this question. The answer is, that such a sfek-sfeka is subject to a controversy in the poskim. See Yoreh Deah 110:9 - we do not allow a sfek sfeika which is "safek echad bgufo safek echad btaaruvos" - one safek based on a questionable issur together with another one based on a mixture with permitted items. This sfek sfeka, too, is safek echad bgufo safek echad btaaruvos.
About their god loving the hair, again, you tell me that Rabb Dunner applied his own interpretation to the statements of the Hindus ratehr than clarifying them.

<<if they answer that their god loves their hair it does not sound as a mere present enriching their god [in the monetary sense like, lehavil, a donation to a worthy cause. it much rather sounds like an act of "pleasing" their god with something he "loves".>>

Sounds like? Sigh. This is not testimony, this is interpretation. Rabbi Dunner hsould have asked them, hello, is this what you mean? Maybe the god loves the hair because by having the hair, which is garbage, he can get out of his chovos!

If a millionaire said he loves his fortune would that be so weird? And this is a perfect example of Rabbi Dunner's complete disregard for and ignorance of the differnces in expression between Westerners and Hindus who do not speak ENglish the way we do.

And it was this fact - that he did not understand their expressions - that Rabb iDunenr publicly declared to be unacceptable because the Teshuvas HaRosh states that Torah has to be paskened based on Torah not secular knowledge.

So he clearly refuses to accept that fact, which he should. When he does, perhaps he will see thigns differently.

Rabbi Dunner's entire behavior here, especially his insisting on knowing the meaning behind the expressions of foreigners with a totalyl differnt culture and language, reminds me indeed of a Gemora in Avodah Zorah. A idol worshipper wants to buy a white chicken from a goy and states explicitly that he wants it for a"z purposes. You cannot sell it to him, the Mishna says. the Gemora asks: but even if he does not specify that he needs it for a"z you still cannot sell it to him, so what is the chidush? The gemora answers: kaivan d'abik bei tuva savar dkulei almah abik bei - this person is an idol worshipper, and people have a tendency to he think that the whoel worls is like them. so this idol worshipper thinks the jew is also an idol worhsipper - and maybe he specified that he wants the chicken for a"z purposes, not really because he wants it for a"z purposes but because he thinks the jew, who he thinks is also an idol worhsipper, will give it to him cheaper if its for a"z!

Just because Rabbi Dunner maybe would have meant that had he said "Hashem loves the hair" does not mean the Hindus mean that. His assuptions are what killed him here.

One last lol: I remember being told about a Rabbi Amnon Yiztchok video by one of his big chasidim and baalei teshuva. The video showed these people actually coming up on stage and cutting off their pony tails as part of their becoming frum. The baal teshuva turns to me and remarks about the pile of discarded pony tails that he saw laying there. He said, "I can just imagine how much Hashem loves that pile of hair!"

When a baal teshuva told him he didnt understand the expresisons he heard, he publicly invoked the Teshuvso HaRosh that says Torah is determined based on Torah principles not secular principles so the man has no right to tell him that he did not understand the phrses.

Either Rabbi DUnenr did not understand what the Baal Teshuva meant or he does not understand the Teshuvos HaRosh. But one thing is certina - he surely did not understand the expressions and the intent of the Hindus he interviewed.