I dont think you understand what you are reading.

The issue is #1 whether Rav Elyashev actually said what some people say he did - the fact that Rav Elyashev ever said that is contested by others close to him who say he never said such a thing, as well as the fact that any psak given is only based on the information that the posek has.

So in other words, Rav Shlomo Zalman Aurbach paskened 15 years ago that the shaitlach are permitted - and now people say the circumstances are different than he was made aware of. Will you tell those who now say they went to India and saw that the situation is different than Rav Shlomo Zalman was told, that they are not allowed to say it is assur because Rav Shlomo Zalman permitted?!

Let's say the opposite was true - that Rav ELyashev would have said, as he did 15 years ago, that there is no avodah zorah involved because they do not cut their hair in front of any idol, and then you go to India and see that in fact they do cut their hair in front of an idol! And that whoever told Rav Elyashev that information was misinformed.

Do you think you still have aright to be lenient when you know the facts are other than what the Posek understood them to be?

The same thing goes in the oppsosite direction. If Rav Elyashev heard a story and ruled that according to the circumstances in the story the halach is such and such, and you know that the story was differetn than told to him, his psak does not apply. Its as simple as that.

Besides, Rav Larelitz and Rav Wosner both said clearly in writing that the facts are still unclear to them and that thereofre you do not have to throw away your shaitlach (although you should try to avoid them), and that they are awaiting further information.

So its not as if anybody ever said that they clearly know the facts.

And incidently, Rav Wosner and Rav Karelitz are not aware of all the information that was collected 15 years ago. they were totally uninvovled then. And they have not investigated regarding them. They are totally relying on the new information that has come up last week - that and, at the most, whatever was written in Rav Elyashev's prior Teshuva, which is just a drop in the bucket compared to the entire collection of information.

And Rav Elyashev never wrote anything on his own. You have to rely on those who are quoting him. And those quotes have been contested.

Therefore, the bottom line is, if your Rav is comfortable that he already knows the Hinud practice, which these Rabbonim say they do not know and are trying to find out, or that they were not completely or accurately informed, he is fulyl entitled to be maikel.

And thats not even considering Rav Shlomo Zalman's position on this issue, which is that the accumulation of "maybes" in this case would constitute a sfek sfeika and thus allow leniency.

Your comment proves my point.

I wrote that "statements in the name of Rav Elyashev have been contested". What that means is, it is contested whether Rav Elyashev actually said those statements that are being made in his name.

What you thought it meant, however, was that Rav Elyashev's statements are being contested.

Hence your diatribe.

What you should learn from this is, you can be told something, or read something, perfectly clear, and although it was meant one way you can assume wrongly that the statement means something completely different.

And so, if let's say you were to report to Rav Elyashev about furmteens.com, you would say that you saw with your own eyes
that the Moderator said Rav Elyashev's statements are contestable.

And you would be a reliable eye-witness, first hand.

And you'd be wrong.

When a person looks at something a certain way, especialyl with preconceived notions, they tend to see things not the way they are. And therefore, since Rav Elyashev already paskened that these shaitlach are permitted, in writing, in his own ksav yad, based on 6 - 9 months of research that was done then, and now someone comes to him stating that the information is dofferent than he understood, it is certinaly not a problem is someone says that he knows, based on his own individual knowledge, that the new information that was passed on to Rav ELyashev was incomplete or misunderstood by those who passed it on to him, there is no problem whatsoever.

And Rav Elyashev would be the first to agree with that.

Not to mention we dont have Rav ELyashev's psak first hand.

Dont forget - none of the other Rabbonim that put out anything in writing are convinced that the shaitlach are takrovos avodah zorah. They said - Rav Karelitz and Rav Wosner - that based on the current information that they have receieved, which they are hoping to augment in the coming days, we shoudl treat the shaitlach as a safek - an unknown - and you should NOT throw out the old shaitlach but ratehr try to exchange them if you can, and going forward, avoid the indian ones.

This is a psak based on the Rabbonim not knowing the facts - they are tellign us how to acts when you dont know the facts.

They are not convinced that what was told to Rav Elyashev is enough to prohibit. But they are saying it is enough to make them unsure.

And they are not even swearing that the information that was given over is accurate.

So if someone does indeed know the real facts, the psak does not apply.

Dayan Donner did find that among women entering the Temple, most thought they were offering their hair as a sacrifice.

In fact, it's not a normal mode of worship for this avodah zarah, but it is in Buddhism -- and it has been argued that the temple at Tirupati was originally Buddhist on that basis. But not that it's not an offering.

The Hindu god is Vishnu, not Budha, and the tonsure practice is NOT avodaso b'kach - it is not the way of Avodah Zorah of Vishnu or the Hindus. What the Temple used to be doesnt matter. The shaitlach are made today.

The idea that The fact that woman consider their hair a "sacrifice" is what caused confusion the first time around, and it seems to be doing so again. Please see above:

<<A lot of confusion happened during the research because when people investigated, there were a lot of Indian clerics talking about how the hair is an “offering” or a “sacrifice”, which sounded scary. But it was later found out that they meant “offering” not as in Korbon but as in something you offer – or give; and “sacrifice” was not meant in the context of Korbon but rather “self sacrifice”. So things were scary when they were investigated but when they were thoroughly investigated, things got better.>>

In the original interviews with the Hindus and their priests, they did say that - that they look at the tnsure as a "sacrifice" or "offering" to their gods, but upon further examination it emerged that they did not mean sacrifice in the Korbon sense but rather that they were sacrificing something - losing something - to ifnd favor with their gods. All the epxerts that were interviewed, when asked to expound on the meaning of the phrases "sacrifice" and "offering" made this distinction explicitly. The hindus use these terms differntly than we do.

Dayan Dunner apparently did not think to make such a distinction, and he did not ask for a clarificaiton of the term because he did not imagine that he would need to. And as I mentioned above, this is where the confusion came in 15 years ago, when various Rabbonim prohibited the shaitlach. Deja vu.

Today I found on the internet that Professor Dr. Diana Eck, who I mentioned above as one of the sources for Rav Elyashev's original heter, was contacted this week, again, for her opinion. This is what she said:

"I responded at length to an inquiry of this sort from a group of rabbis some ten or fifteen years ago. They were concerned then that hair is "offered" to the deity, which is quite untrue. The hair is shaven, whether at Tirupati, Sinhachalam, the Christian shrine at Vailankanni or elsewhere in order that one present oneself to the deity hair-less, so to speak. The hair is not "offered" to the deity, but is a by-product of a religious rite in which hair is left behind. The locution "hair offering center" which is often used for the tonsure centers at the periphery of these shrines, is something of a misnomer and it is this that is most-likely at the root of the present concerns."

Rav Moshe Sterenbuch held that the intent of the woman herself would matter - not that that matters in the end, since "sacrifice" doesnt mean korbon to them - but Rav Elyashev insisted that it would only be the intent of the shochet - the barber - which would count.

At that point in time, Rav Sterenbuch did not see Rav Elyashev's teshuva, where he cites his proofs for this point.

If Rav Elyashev indeed he was made to understand that the woman - and maybe even the barbers and the Priests - are referring to this hair as a "sacrifice" or "offering" to their gods, I can understand what happened here.

In any case, a certain Rosh Yeshiva is currently in the process of independently investigating the veracity of the facts that were presented to Rav Elyashev, as well as the facts of this matter in general - a very, very good idea. I am waiting to see the reults.

But as of now, although I can understand the confusion, nothing so far that has emerged would, based on the criteria that Rav Elyashev himself set, seem to make thse wigs takrovos. Maybe something as-yet unbknown will be revealed, but once again, I say that Rav Elyashev's psak was based on the informaiton provided to him, and if - IF! - you happen to know that the information was faulty, then the psak does not apply to the current situation. I am not saying that the facts were or were not faulty - I have not heard 100% what the facts presented to Rav Elyashev were; I am saying that if a Rav comes and says he does know in fact that the facts that were used were wrong or incomplete, that is a perfectly legitimate reason for him to permit the shaitlach, and that would not be considered disagreeing with Rav Elyashev.

...The way the Indian hair is obtained as a rule has some ritual aspect to it; but as I have seen it, the hair is not cut in a temple, not before a murti, and there is no priest present who performs rituals. It is rather a matter of a vow individually made by the devotee, who privately promises the god that s/he will go to a particular temple and have him/herself shaven (either as penance, out of a sense of guilt over something, or as part of a supplication, or as a sign of gratitude after the coming true of a wish). S/he then goes to a kshetra, has a barber shave her/his head, and then s/he goes to the temple to present her/himself before the god. The barber's shop (which in some kshetras can be quite large, for this purpose) can be a street or two away from the temple.

Rav Moshe did nto write a Teshuva on this topic.

I do not know who Rav Nissim is.

Shaye,

Although the person or people presenting the info to Rav Elyashev this time are indeed rabbonim, their torha knowledge is not the issue - it is their understanding of the Hindu practice that is. Their being poskim does not mean they understand the Hindu practices. Last time Rav Elyashev wanted to pasken, he used the accounts of Hindu priests and professors of Indian Studies.

It is clear that Rav Elyashev has heard conflicting information now and then, and the current informers are claiming that his previsou information has changed, or was wrong - one of the two. But their version of what the facts are is also subject to interpretation (for example, the understandign of what a "sacrifice" or "offering" is) and the quesityon is, did they provide the complete and accurate picture? In addition to that, it does not matter whether someone lied of is mistaken or misinterpreted - that is not our business nor our concern at this time - there are indeed different versions of what Rav Elyashev said, and what he instructed to be released in his name.

The bottom line question still remains: Was the information given to Rav Elyshev correct and complete? According to the Hindu experts - the very ones that Rav Elyashev relied on last time - it is not.

Does Rav Elyayshev know that there is another verion to the story he receieved? Was he told - as is being said - that the procedure changed in the past 15 years, in which case the fact that his previsou information contradicts his current information is not a concern, or is he being told that the procedure did not change, but there are two interpretation of what is happening - then and now. Does he know, for instance, that the Hundi religion does NOT have a central authority, and the beliefs and practirces of any given person or priest fdoes not necessarily represent the "way it is done" across the board? And was he told that "offering" and "sacrifice" does NOT mean Korbon but rather self-sacrifice? Apparently the Rabbonm themselves were not aware of that distinction.

Micha, as well as others who spoke to Rav Elyashev's people, report that there were taped interviews with women who said that they understand their hair cutting to be a sacrifice to Vishnu. There are no differing interpretationso f this - there is the proper interpretation and the improper one. When a Hindu says she is offering or sacrificing her hair to Vishnu in the Tonsure practice, she means that she is willing to undergo the loss of her hair for the sake of Vishnu. If that is so, then there is no takrovos here. On the contrary, if the proper interpretation was used, it would not be a reason to be stringent - it would be a reason to be lenient.

>A Head Trip: Indian Hair Finds Parts in Hollywood
>By Julia Angwin
>Wall Street Journal
>August 21, 2003
>
>
>For two months, Pushpa's husband was ill with a high fever. When he
>finally recovered, she traveled 10 hours by bus to a temple here in
>southern India to thank Lord Vishnu in the best way she knew: by shaving
>her head. Pushpa, who declined to give her last name, had her 32-inch
>locks cut off by a temple barber, a gesture intended to thank the deity
>for good fortune. The hair itself headed in a more secular direction: to
>an auction where hair brokers bid for it. Some strands bought at auction
>are made into hair extensions, which are sold to Western women for as
>much as $3,000 for a full head of hair.
>The temple at Tirupati, one of India's busiest, is doing a brisk business
>selling hair. Many of the temple's 20 million visitors each year shave
>their heads in gratitude for some blessing in their life. Last year, the
>temple says it took in $5.6 million through hair auctions -- twice as
>much as the year before.
>Although India is a small part of the global hair business, compared to
>the market leader China, so-called Indian temple hair fetches among the
>highest prices. Indian hair is generally finer than Chinese and more
>similar to much European and American hair, hairdressers say, making it
>the lock of choice for certain clients.
>But few of the benefits of the global market trickle down to the women
>who provide the raw material. Unlike women in other countries who
>knowingly sell their hair for pocket money, those who get their head
>shaved at the temple don't receive payment. Some have no idea that their
>hair is being sold. "It's just waste," says a woman named Sandhya, of her
>26-inch mane shaved to thank the deity for giving her a son.
>The hair certainly looks like waste inside the "tonsuring" room, where
>devotees sit cross-legged on the floor, and bend their head forward to
>let a temple barber shave their scalp with a straight razor blade.
>Attendants mill about, collecting bundles of hair in dustpans and
>depositing it in large bins.
>Temple officials say it's no secret that the hair is sold -- although
>that fact isn't advertised. The hair donation is "basically an indication
>of surrender of the ego," says Ajeya Kallam, executive officer of the
>foundation that runs the temple, one of the world's most visited
>religious sites. Pilgrims donate about $40 million in cash, jewelry and
>other items to the temple each year, he says. One reason for their
>generosity: According to Hindu belief, Lord Vishnu borrowed money to
>celebrate his marriage and promised to pay interest on the debt.
>"Basically, the people are donating so he can pay off his interest," says
>Mr. Kallam.
>The temple is one of the wealthiest religious institutions in India, with
>an annual budget of $120 million, Mr. Kallam says. The temple uses the
>money to provide free food and housing for pilgrims, as well to operate
>five hospitals, 12 colleges and other charitable institutions. In the
>past year and a half, the temple's marketing staff has been trying to
>modernize its hair sales to maximize its revenues. "In the beginning, we
>were ignorant of the international hair market," says Mr. Kallam. "Now we
>grade and classify the hair and get a better price." He says the temple
>is beginning to explore ways to sell hair via the Internet.
>One of the temple's largest hair customers is Mayoor Balsara, a
>goatee-sporting, British-educated resident of Bangalore. Mr. Balsara
>makes the bone-jarring, five-hour drive to Tirupati at least once a month
>to buy hair by the ton. Tirupati hair more than 16 inches long can sell
>for as much as $165 a kilogram (2.2 pounds), he says. Shorter hair goes
>for about $100 a kilogram.
>Mr. Balsara says his biggest problem is supply. When he met a scientist
>at a party recently, he asked her, only half-jokingly, "Can you figure
>out how to grow hair?"
>At Mr. Balsara's factory in Bangalore, the only sound is that of
>bracelets clinking as workers pull the temple hair through the long metal
>teeth of a hackle. With practiced movements, the workers sort the hair
>into piles by the length of each strand. A strand has about 200
>individual pieces of hair. Once the strands are sorted, cleaned and
>fumigated, Mr. Balsara sends them to his sole customer, Great Lengths
>International in Italy.
>Great Lengths founder David Gold buys hair from Mr. Balsara for about 30
>cents a strand. At its factory near Rome, Great Lengths dyes the hair,
>attaches a patented keratin tip to each strand and ships it to
>international distributors who pay about $1.50 a strand. Beauty salons in
>the U.S. generally charge between $1,500 and $3,000 for the
>several-hours-long process of weaving a full head's worth of strands into
>a client's hair. "The salons make more money than we do," Mr. Gold says.
>Still, he's not making bad money. He says his annual revenues are about
>$70 million a year.
>The U.S. imported $47 million of human hair from around the world last
>year, mostly for wigs and hair extensions, according to the U.S. Census
>Bureau's foreign trade division. At the high end of the market, the
>biggest competition to Indian hair is European hair, which is more
>expensive and more difficult to find. Still, it's not perfect for
>everyone. Susan Lipson, who specializes in procuring and inserting hair
>extensions for movies, says "European hair is too slick" for many
>actresses to use. That's why it's important, she says, to be able to
>choose from hair of many different textures.
>Earlier this year, Ms. Lipson spent several months in Prague installing
>and maintaining Indian hair extensions for actors Hugh Jackman and Kate
>Beckinsale during the filming of a forthcoming adventure movie called
>"Van Helsing." At one point, Ms. Lipson slipped away from Prague to meet
>Drew Barrymore in Los Angeles to retouch her Indian hair extensions, dyed
>blonde, while she was shooting the upcoming film "50 First Kisses."
>Mr. Gold, the Italian hair-extension maker, likes catering to the
>celebrity crowd. The day before his daughter's wedding in June, he was
>standing by the swimming pool at his Roman villa talking to the fireworks
>coordinator -- when he says he got an urgent call. Lisa Marie Presley
>needed some hair right away.
>Ms. Presley was in London, promoting her debut album, and she needed a
>fresh batch of 18-inch hair extensions to attach to her own locks, Mr.
>Gold says. Within an hour, he says he had arranged for a bundle of hair
>to be delivered to her hotel room.
>One day, Mr. Gold says, he wants his hair extensions to be a brand-name
>product. "I hope it will be like wearing a Fendi bag or a Gucci bag," he
>says.

What is bothering me about this whole issue is not just that 15 years ago there was research done that led Rav Elyashev to respond to the Rabbonim in AMerica who asked him whether we should be worried about the Indian Hair Shaitlach that they need not be worried - never mind that he didnt say then that he still has doubts, or that we shouodl be cautious - he said lmaaseh that because he had the expert testimony of Dr, Mohan in front of him, he is Halachicly relying on that testimony even though he cannot verify it, to permit the shaitlach.

Never mind that.

The problem here is, that for thep ast 15 years, then and now, we have heard account after account and description after description of the tonsure procedure form any numbner of experts - from various Universities, from various Hindus, from various Priests - and every single one of them agrees to the detail regarding what happens there.

Their collective tenstimony all agrees with the version that Rav ELyashev used when he permitted.

The contradictory opinions, the varying versions, we found were all coming from second-hand accounts, or peopel who werent really knowledagable.

But even today when with a few clicks of the mouse you can Google up a slew of information about the tonsure practice --- still, not a single piece of evidence was found to contradict the account that we currently have. The account that Rav Elyashev ruled is permitted.

On the contrary, all the accounts somehow are all the same.

Yet what Rabbi Dunner showed and told Rav Elyashev was different.

So either all the accounts that we have are all wrong - and not only wrong, but their stories all somehow match perfectly, whether we are talking about Hiundu scholars, Priests, encyclopedias, or stories from peoepl who have gone through tonsure -- all of them say the same thing. And that same thing is the exact same thing that 6 months of research by many many rabbonim came up with 15 years ago.

Either thats all wrong and nobody in the world seems to be aware of what is really happenign except the Rabbonim who went to India last week....or those Rabbonim didnt really interpret it correctly.

I dont know what was told to Rav Elyashev, and we only know second hand what Rav ELyashev suppsoedly said - which is contested also - but there is something wrong with this picture.

That is why I say, again, that if your Rav says he knows that the facts in this case are such that Rav Elyashev himslef says is permitted, he is not obligated to prohibit the shaitlach because of what he knows to be a case of misinformation to Rav Elyashev.

They claim that they've changed the location of the haircutting. Why isn't that plausible?

Moderator writes:

"But even today when with a few clicks of the mouse you can Google up a slew of information about the tonsure practice --- still, not a single piece of evidence was found to contradict the account that we currently have. The account that Rav Elyashev ruled is permitted.
On the contrary, all the accounts somehow are all the same.
Yet what Rabbi Dunner showed and told Rav Elyashev was different."

Here is a news account w/ some relevant detail. (The other relevant info in the news account is that the hair itself appears to be kept in special vats, and is somehow considered sacred or desirable to their god(s), and that the women seem to say the god's name while having their hair cut. I don't think either of these necessarily argues against the ritual essentially being a sacrifice of ego, but it might cast some doubt.)

http://www.aishdas.org/avodah/faxes/wig1.jpg
http://www.aishdas.org/avodah/faxes/wig2.jpg
http://www.aishdas.org/avodah/faxes/wig3.jpg

It would appear that some of the facts surrounding the execution of the ritual HAVE changed.
In addition, there may be at least some cause for worry that rav eliyashev was originally misinformed about the significance of the ritual. These are not mutually exclusive.

The outright inapplicability of the original p'sak relates to the facts on the ground, how the ritual is conducted. That leaves rav eliyashev only with a heter based on the meaning of the ritual, and he had expressed some lack of confidence in relying on the academic opinion even in the original psak. The expert opinion about the meaning of the ritual may turn out to be true (I suspect it's accurate), but this wasn't confirmed, and possibly was cast in suspicion. It was never the sole basis for the heter.