1. Sefaria is free to use.

   Based off this logic, one cannot use otzar hachochmah since they go against the Gemara מה אני בחנם, אף אתם נמי בחנם (נדים לז.)

   • Kefirah VS your opinion that otzer hachochma is being oiver on ma ani bechinam, did you think before you typed your comment that they aren’t even remotely comparable

     • I was responding to “a sefer Torah that has one letter broken”. Not everything with one wrong thing in it is pasul

   • I was once informed that sefaria was founded and continued to be influenced, by a reform person.
     Ever since then I had nothing to do with it.
     It seems that was the best course BH.

     Every app has a goal, we are wise to understand the intent of the developers before we hop aboard.

     (as an aside, please dont be the one to respond that I accepted Lashon Horah, that would be so wrong as to be laughable)

   • Dont you think that if artscroll gave us an oppurtunity to learn torah, mishna and gemarah for free, we would all use it???
     i am not able to pay $10 to look up a daf of gemarah, and then if i want to look up a different daf in that same mesechta, but its (less than) thirty blatt later, i have to pay another $10… and then go figure when i want to look up a mishna…. and only use their app etc…
     maybe someone frum should make a free sefaria style app??

   • Dont we pay for a Sefer Torah, is that against halacha as well? Ever heard of the chazal that you can sell a sefer torah for hachnasas kallah… why can you sell a sefer torah, it should be free for everyone!?

   • I hav seen on the website stuff from Chovivei Torah “Musmachim”, the site needs to clean up

2. This is the Daf Shevui version of the Talmud translation which is very sketchy. Sefaria hosts all transilations that they can find. It is ran by a Modern Orthodox crowd. They have the Koren/Steinsatlz version which if fine though.

3. This is very disturbing. I use Sefaria all the time (every day). Is there an alternative app?

   • What exactly do you find disturbing?

   • ובלכתך בדרך
     Not as good but it’s ok

4. Why are using the Daf Shevui transilation ?
   The Koren transilation is fine

5. Not sure it’s right to print the quote, even for verification purposes.

6. Sefaria is also full of non-orthodox literature that distorts Chazal and Rishonim to justify all sorts of perversion.

7. This is not “wrongly translated” as the article starts off. It brings a reference regarding the topic brought up in the gemara. In doros harishonim Halevy quotes the new testament extensively. Rabbi Avigdor Miller quoted the new tetsament extensively. Whomever authored this expalanation merely quotes the new testament to show that our holy rabbis and tradition disagreed with Oso Haish, and for good reasons.

8. A few months ago I was in an office with a TAlmid Chochom and we wanted to look up something. I said, lets check Sefaria. He said, they have questionable sources, I don’t use them & you shopuldn’t either.
   I see now, he was right !!

9. Sefaria is a non orthodox organization.
   Use at your own risk

10. So don’t use the translation. They don’t edit the text , and they gave an extensive library of Seforim available on line for free. They also link all the meforshim on pesukim etc. as long as you are using the text, what’s the problem.
    They also have a source sheet builder, which is fantastic and very easy to use.

11. Sefaria = ספר שחלק כתבו מין

    • Vilna shas: edited by the Catholic Church. We still use it today and don’t switch it back to the old girsa. Ironically the exception is the steinsaltz shas which did switch back to the old girsa and that’s what’s on sefaria

      • We us vilna shas because that what the gedolei acharonim wrote their perushim on.
        As such, we are VERY aware of which parts are added, which are correct, and which are questionable. By DESIGN we continue with it.

        Other versions dont have that . Steinzaltz has known issues.

12. It seems like he’s nitpicking and wants to censor how and what people learn. As others mentioned about other Rabbanim, I’ve never met a Ruv that wants to understand the entire picture and/or historical context that didn’t have a copy of The New Testament in his house.

    • “He” isnt nitpicking, “He” is following longstanding halachic precedent to not read and in fact to ban “sefarim” that contain heresy.
      Yes , the same Sanhedrin that studied the Avoda Zara to be familiar with it also enacted Cheirems on their books and literature.

      Every puzzle piece has its place, and out of its context is destructive.

13. Just checked my copy of the app and this quote does NOT appear.
    Maybe they took it out of the last update?

14. I too agree, I’ve never been comfortable using it for anything of torah, since they’ve always readily admitted to being very “inclusive” in there stuff.
    I was actually quite surprised when I was at the last siyum hashas, that there were times that the Aguda had put on the massive screens, certain divrei kdusha,(don’t remember exactly what), and the credits on the screen stated that it was from Sefaria!

    Mind you I’m not a “Frummie”, and I readily admit that I go online to hashkofakly questionable sites, but when there I at least know to keep my “defenses” up and not necessarily accept what I find there as emes.

15. That is from a translation by Dr Joshua Kulp, a conservative rosh yeshivah.

16. I was once informed that sefaria was founded and continued to be influenced, by a reform person.
    Ever since then I had nothing to do with it.
    It seems that was the best course BH.

    Every app has a goal, we are wise to understand the intent of the developers before we hop aboard.

    (as an aside, please dont be the one to respond that I accepted Lashon Horah, that would be so wrong as to be laughable)

17. Uninstalled. Thanks.

18. Responding to Rey. Orthodox rabbis do not have a new testament in their house. We don’t need their ” full picture” of lies and heresy

19. Chaval, I’ve been using it for those difficult teich words in Mishna Berurah, been a life saver, also gives some on the money explanations when needed. I haven’t found one mention of anything bad, or anything yoshkedik in all of hilchos tzitzis… Maybe you need to consider they accept some bad apple publications and you should bring light to those. Is this a case of throwing the baby out with the bathwater?

20. A Yid,
    Rabbis who want to understand the historical context and why certain things in Judaism occurred, were paskened a certain way or entered the Jewish consciousness most certainly do reference The New Testament. Do you think Yiddishkeit happens in a vacuum?
    Would you call yourself an expert on Ashkenaz Jewish history if you only read Jewish history books and never read a European history book for understanding and context?

    • I dont know if you are a missionary or just influenced by their lies.

      There is no need to gain “historical context from christian sources” to ascertain veracity of any given halachic ruling.

      One need not remotely be a so-called “expert on jewish history” to follow the guiding principles of Psak L’amito.

      You have other concerns at heart here!

      • One is not ascertaining the veracity by looking at historical context. Rather, one is understanding the chiddush of what Chazal or Tanakh were saying and what they were pushing back against. The same way the Rambam understands our relationship to sacrifices. Or as R Hertz explains “o ben yigach o bas yigach.” Or the context of child sacrifices among other nations which davka we don’t do. Or how karaim practice to understand why something may be mutar on SHabbos. One needs to know the full picture not to understand if something is true, but to understand what is not true as well. This is what this commentary is doing.

21. I don’t know who the first comment author is however, I hereby change my TLS name from Mordechai to M. I don’t want everyone to think I’m C’V okay with Kefira.

22. What is wrong exactly with this? They are not saying yashke’s teachings are Torah. The translator is explaining the chiddush / hava amina of the rabbis, as he continues:
    “J3$u$ believes that Jews shouldn’t have to pay this particualr. tax. In contrast, the rabbis were adamant that paying taxes was a good thing, one which brought the Jews close to GOd. In this sugya in Sukkah, the message is that one should not bring a stolen sacrifice, but the broader picture is that bringing things to God, taxes and sacrifices, is not something that alienates us from God. It brings us closer”

23. How can this be a Jewish app? If you’re quoting Christian literature, you might as well put a cross as the logo, as not to mislead true Torah Jews. Thank you rabbi lankry for pointing this out.

    • Why are you using the internet to access tls. The internet is full of treif (even with a filter). Rather you choose what you see. So too you have to choose what you see on sefaria.

24. Re: Mordechai regarding מה אתה בחינם, see רמב”ם הלכות תלמוד תורה פרק א הלכה ז’. Don’t try to sugar coat serious issues. האמת יורה דרכו!!

    • I don’t understand your point. The rambam specifically says it’s assur to teach Torah shebaal peh for a few even if you yourself had to pay to be taught. So selling digital Torah shebaal peh even if you had to pay to digitize seems frowned upon at best.

      • If you spend money and time to develop something of course yo can charge for its use, even if it is for limud torah.
        Af ata B’chinam is in regards to simply teaching it.

        And besides, the rmbm isnt the end of the story here in that regard either, the Psak in Klal Yisroel has long been like the other numerous Shitos that allow taking compensation even for plain teaching.

        There are many who hold that the RMBM himself was chozer.
        Your argument seems disingenuous.

25. It still on the site as of 10:44 5-7

26. Torah is not a subject like math and if there is anything mixed into the text or the commentary from an impure source it is muktza and we can’t use it.
    Torah if it’s impure it is worse than secular studies like it says zocho naasys lo Sam chaim and if ch”v farkert….
    Thank you Rabbi Lankry for bringing this to the attention of the tzibbur

27. Any one who learned in a yeshiva and was mekabel torah bemesorah from rebeim till Har Sinai is ultra sensitive to anything that smells like this app as Rabbi Lankry points out
    Bh I had Seychel and immediately deleted this app.
    I hope others will follow.
    This is playing with fire and we need to be extra careful

    • In our mesorah there were many great people who used secular sources. Just one example: Ibn Ezra quotes karaite sources, even though he was vehemntly opposed to them. There are many many such examples.

28. Any one who learned in a yeshiva and was mekabel torah bemesorah from rebeim till Har Sinai is ultra sensitive to anything that smells like this app as Rabbi Lankry points out
    Bh I had Seychel and immediately deleted this app.
    I hope others will follow.
    This is playing with fire and we need to be extra careful

29. As I recall their purpose was to bring Torah to the masses… Jewish and non Jewish, male and female, etc. etc. It was improper from its very charter. I seem to also recall when it first came out there was a picture of a grandfather learning gemara with his granddaughter. Both had huge gemaras with the grandfather having a nive cup of coffee with the saucer and cup squarely resting on the page of the gemara and the granddaughter having the same with a cup of hot chocolate. The implications were obvious in terms of how they viewed the content of what they were learning.

30. Stop justifying what is wrong.
    Not sure what your historical facts are but your hashkafos are obviously not bemesorah from rebeim who have a mesorah.
    True daas torah is not based on text books or based on research.
    Kelal Yisroel has a mesorah from our parents and rebeim which goes back mipeh el peh through generations until the acharonim rishonim amoroim tanaim …..neviim.. until moshe rabeinu.
    Kelal yisroel cant be fooled because we were zoche to learn from rebeim and were brought up by parents who gave over the mesora al pi reach Yisroel Saba.

31. Attn Mordechai,
    Stop justifying what is wrong.
    Not sure what your historical facts are but your hashkafos are obviously not bemesorah from rebeim who have a mesorah.
    True daas torah is not based on text books or based on research.
    Kelal Yisroel has a mesorah from our parents and rebeim which goes back mipeh el peh through generations until the acharonim rishonim amoroim tanaim …..neviim.. until moshe rabeinu.
    Kelal yisroel cant be fooled because we were zoche to learn from rebeim and were brought up by parents who gave over the mesora al pi Ruach Yisroel Saba.

    • You say I’m wrong and start explaining something that has nothing to do with anything I said. All I said was just because there is some content I wouldn’t use on sefaria doesn’t make the whole thing assur. There is no historical example exactly like sefaria that one can say our mesorah is against it.

      My hashkafos are from my rabbeim and parents as is our mesorah. There is no mesorah in regards to an app with a lot of content. My rabbeim taught me to use your brain and filter yourself. Just like we use books even though there are treif books (Rav Yehuda Hanasi went against halacha for that because of עת לעשות) and we use email even though there are treif emails and we use websites even though there are treif websites. I would tell people to look at the about this text on sefaria before using a translation but that doesn’t make the Gemara they have treif.

      • @Mordechai
        I am Being Dan Lekaf Zechus that you are indeed well meaning…
        The very fact that you say “there is no Mesora” about an app is so wrong unfortunately.
        Mesora doesnt mean I heard “those exact words” is means it is “in spirit of”. And the source to that is the very RMBM in hakdama to Yad where he decries the notion that Machlokis in Gemara stemmed from difference in memory of their rebbes actual quotes.

        There is LONG mesorah in what to do if a publication contains heresy and what to do with the rest of it that “may” not contain such.

32. This is a very difficult situation. Sefaria has an enormous amount of perfectly normal and acceptable sefarim, all of which can be used properly and especially for making source sheets. The problem is that it also contains certain works which are not deemed acceptable within the Torah world and other non-Orthodox material in the translations, as well as numerous source sheets which have been uploaded by users and which contain completely unacceptable and actually bizarre material. There are also certain ‘teshuvos’ sefarim which would not be allowed in any makom Torah. The shaala is can the oilam haTorah appeal to Sefaria to create a ‘Bnei Torah mode’ or version of the app/site which will only allow access to sefarim which are deemed normative within ‘oilam haTorah’ ? Obviously, it would need a suitably qualified moderator to vet the site. Would this be a solution?

33. TLS, do you have any rules what you allow to be posted in the comments? A bit of moderation is in order.

    • Wait till I buy Twitter!

34. Rabbi lankry is a Talmud chacham a Rav listen to your leaders I’m sure almost every posek and Rov would agree with him.

35. Mordechai
    These ideas are slanted towards the haskalah of Moses Mendelsohn or Shabsi Tzvi who started with only tainting the pure ideas of the torah hakedosha and ended up with complete shmad. Be careful which waters you tread.
    It may well be behind your name is the face of the proprietors of Sefaria.
    In today’s technology days, one does not identify only through his content.
    …….

36. I enjoy the app and always opened to diversity and other opinions yes be friendly and open instead of trashing other religions.

    • Of course you should be freindly and Kind

      BUT DONT GIVE AN INCH FOR SHEKER!

      What do you mean you enjoy a “DIVERSITY OF OPINIONS”!?

      I am not here to “trash” any person or make fun of them, but you want to argue truth? Get ready to go down if your on the wrong side

      AND TO EQUATE TORAH HAKDOSHA WITH “OTHER OPINIONS”?
      only a Kofer does that.

      Your free to be one in this beautiful and wonderful country, and I will treat you with respect as we should all mankind, but dont expect me to accept your view.

37. We may not agree with everything Sefaria does or features, but there’s a profound lacking of hakaras hatov here. How many dollars and shekels and hours have been spent by the people at Sefaria to make Torah free and available to the oilam?! – many of these learners never opened a gemora let alone a chumash in their lifetimes, and of course, many of whom have and are looking for a Rashba or a ketzos.
    Have we benefited from this Torah and given back to Sefaria? Let’s make our voices heard by giving tzedakah to Sefaria and earmarking it for works befitting of Bnei and Bnos Torah so they can put up more works for the oilam.
    Can we say thank you, there’s what to learn here, AND we can’t agree with everything? Can we be like Rebbe Meir? Are we robots that can’t discern emes from sheker? From the quote above, Sefaria doesn’t hide the sources – it’s all there. Are we such that we can’t even click the side, and say, okay, not for me?
    As I understand it, Sefaria, makes everything publicly available so if anyone wants to create a Bnei Torah Sefaria app using the select texts Sefaria has acquired/digitized/translated vu-chulu, they can and Sefaria willl support them.
    Whatever one thinks of all this, let’s not forget the true mesiras nefesh the people at Sefaria have done to create this app. The least we can do, the very least, is to say thank you, even for those who want to delete the app.

    • The romans built aquaducts, we owe them hakaras hatov! Oh wait, but they murderd us and destroyed the Beis Hamikdash… hmmm

      Yes some people spent money to bring us the wonderful waters of Torah, oops, they poured in a drop of poison, fouling the whole well. Nu nu lets thank them for the water no?

      • Sick, last I checked, Sefaria did not murder anyone. Did they? Your argument does not make any sense. In this case, the commentary is showing the chiddush of Chazal by comparing the statement to contemporary things said by x-ians at the time. Similar to what the rambam did, what Ibn Ezra did, what doros harishonim have done and beyohnd. Where is the poison??

    • So many disturning thoughts to unwind.
      “Cant we be like R’ Meir..?
      No you fool, the gemara SPECIFICALLY states that most people can not be. AS YOU CLEEARLY ARE EXHIBIT A!
      I havent benefited from Sefaria, I deleted it not long after i got it after realizing there is so much Shtusim there, and i didnt even know about the christian stuff!
      You write that it has brought torah to the masses
      Is that a POSITIVE thing?!
      ABsolutely NOT!!! its ASSUR to teach torah to someone who is a rasha! That is different than someone who wants to grow and learn and change, rather than someone who is “intersted” in superficial “knowledge”! On such a person it says better he didnt learn at all!

      And THAT was the goal of sefaria, not L’hagdil torah ul”haadira, but to increase the knowledge of “another subject”, so no, NO HAKARAS “HATOV” REQUIRED HERE.

      • The gemara says talmidei chachamim can be like R Meir. Are we not supposed to strive to be talmidei chachamim?
        Who are the reshaim here? Are you a rasha, and if not, who says? kol haposel bemumo posel. Who is to say Sefaria is not one big kiruv application? If someone who never learned in a blatt in his life now is mekayem the mitzvah or hasheyvas aveydah because they learned the sugya, or they stop saying lashon hara because they saw the. Chofetz Chaim on Sefaria, is that not a great thing?
        If you think Torah to the masses is a bad thing, then you are the one holding back HKBH’s timeless precious gift for yourself and that is not okay. ki lekach tov nasati lachem – I can have Torah you can have Torah, and there is no loss.

38. If you haven’t picked up on the apikorsus of SEFARIA from your first visit, you should not be using the internet.
    This was well knows to me and others by the “Sefarim” they post. “The book of JUDITH”??? Who’s SUSANNA???? This and others are from the NEW TESTAMENT.
    I’m shocked that this come as a surprise to ANYONE.

    • FYI the book of Judith (Yehudis) and Shoshanna is in the book of Megillas Chasmonaim which is where we get our Chanuka story from. It is part of a collection of a sefer called Kesuvim Acharonim. It is obviously not sifrei kodesh but is a reliable source of information you can pick up some of history. The story of Yehudis is famous also brought down in shulchan aruch as well as Ben Sira brought down in the Gemara. They are absolutely not from the new Testament. Just because you don’t know, does not make it apikorsus or Christianity. Yehudis as well as Shoshana were Righteous Jews Nashim Tzidkaniyos

39. For the record and the sake of accuracy, the books of Judith and Susannah are not part of the “New Testament”. They are known as Apocrypha. Some books of the Apocrypha are quoted by traditional sources e.g. The Books of Maccabees and Megillas Antiochus. These have been printed, reprinted and quoted in certain recent sefarim on Chanuka. Other books of the Apocrypha are not quoted in sefarim at all. As they say, don’t judge a book by it’s cover. L’maaseh, whilst hakaras hatov is in order for the huge amount of sefarim they have made available, the quicker someone finds a way to get Sefaria to create a Bnei Torah mode or to obtain permission from them to use their data in more kosher app/site without all the shtusim that’s on it currently, the better.

40. The content is batel b’shishim, not a ma’amid and is nosein ta’am lifgam. Good to go.

41. Midnight,
    You don’t think Poskim decide based on the situation? You think they’re locked in a room in isolation? A Ruv recently gave a Shiur where he explained when training with a Senior Posek he was amazed how the Ruv was asked the same question over and over and gave a different answer almost every time.
    We know Rabbenu Gershom banned polygamy because the Christians didn’t like it and he felt it created a danger for Jews. B”H you weren’t the Posek because you would’ve been Paskening locked in a room with Sefarim unaware of the situation outside.

42. I remember a fascinating example of why sometimes you need knowledge of the outside world. My Ruv told me about a case (I forget the answer). Way back when in Spain a Jewish man and woman converted to xtianity. They ended up getting married in a church with a xtian service. The Priest was a former Jew, many guests were former Jews. They never had a Jewish wedding. The wife learned you could live as a Jew in North Africa so she moved there. Meanwhile, the husband became comfortable being a xtian and was going to stay in Spain. There was no way he would give a Get. This question came to a major Posek. What is her status? On the one hand if it qualified as a kosher wedding she (a younger woman) would be an Agudah for life. On the other hand if he paskened it wasn’t a Kosher wedding when it was her future children would be Mamzerim. Don’t you think this Posek had to know the ins and outs of xtianity and xtian wedding ceremonies and the mindset of Conversos whether done for real or to hide, and a million other factors? Now a Posek today wants to use this Psak as precedent for a very complicated case before him, don’t you think he also needs to understand the facts of the original case and the thought process used by the original Ruv?

43. This argument may be similar to whether or not to use Jastrow where some are pro and some against. This does seem way better than Jastrow though since Jastrow is actually written by a non observant jew and the sefarim here are regular sefarim just on a program funded by a non observant organization but has non observant content that you have to look for.

44. Not sure what changed with this finding. Sefaria never claimed to represent orthodoxy, and was always chock full of treif content if one searched for it. It also happens to be the most accessible online platform for basic Torah texts, often with translations.

45. I used to use Sefaria and always wondered if it was a creditable source. how can we be sure that it’s nit a missionary organization behind it that will slowly add more and more Christian ideas into unassuming naive minds. It’s not similar to a library because it’s not that easy to see the source of what your reading or who the translation was written by. Additionally I visit a shul as my library and they definitely don’t have books with Christian sources.
    NEVER AGAIN!!

46. You can drop your basic research and see who is behind it. You can also click on anything and see about this text. You don’t have to read anything that says it’s by Dr Joshua kulp, conservativeyeshiva.org. Not too difficult

47. Is there an alternative app we can use?

48. I am the author of this commentary. I understand why its distressful for those in your community to read verses from books that you usually ban. I would not go into your community and try to detract from the Torah that you are trying to teach. I understand that many of you will probably discount me as a heretic (although as a kid we drove up to Lakewood twice a month to buy kosher meat). I do think that if you find material on the internet to be problematic, you should avoid it. But that’s for you to decide, not me. Meanwhile, I wish us all a lifetime of learning Torah and trying our best to live by God’s will.

    • which crowd are you ideally trying to cater to? If it’s to the Orthodox / Torah crowd, it should not contain material objectionable to all

      • (continuing)
        just as you would not even dream of selling treif in a Kosher grocery, with the claim “If you don’t like it, you don’t have to buy it”

        • Did you only read this comment and nothing else? Sefaria does not specifically cater to the Orthodox crowd. They want to make the Torah accessible to all. Sefaria’s founder used to work for Google and was applying Google’s idea of open information for all to the Torah. If you don’t like the way they run their free website you can either not use it or tell TAG to add sefaria filtering since you’re too afraid you may be very tempted to view things you shouldn’t.

    • Mr Kulp:

      If you believe in the 13 principles of faith, we do not consider you an heretic. I love you as a Jew just like I love every Jew. That said, we all agree that Christianity is an AZ, and thousands of Jews throughout the generations were tortured and killed in the most horrible ways because they refused to bow to the cross. To bring j into a Torah conversation is repulsive. As it says in Esther הגם לכבוש את המלכה עמי בבית? How can one bring j into the בית המדרש!? This is not about banned books, this is about pure Yiddishe feelings. To bring the “nidon betzoah rosachas” into a Torah discussion is beyond reason.

49. חכמה בגויים תאמין
    thats all it is, everything else is fluff

50. Joshua, thanks for clarifying your position. While it is not considered acceptable in the Lakewood/Yeshiva community to do so, no grievous sin has been committed by quoting historical context from a book authored by the disciple of a false messiah of the time period in question, and certainly one is not branded a heretic for doing so. With that said, if a sizable readership of your commentary is sensitive to may reconsider including it.
    Continue teaching Torah.

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