In his part one lecture on the Ben Ish Chai for Torah in Motion, Marc Shapiro says: “Anyone over 30 knows how different things are today than when we were growing up… We are accustomed to thinking that this sort of thing, changing long-standing practice, is characteristic of modern times. It is the mysterious haredim who want to keep telling us what we are doing is wrong. Hasidim don’t do this. They follow their minhag going back but the Lithuanians are constantly changing, constantly telling us what we are doing is wrong. People assume that this is a new thing, but it’s not.”
“Rav Ovadiah had his tefillin checked and it turned out that for five years, he was wearing pasul (faulty) tefillin.”
“You don’t need to check your tefillin ever. If you buy tefillin and they are kosher, you do not need to check them again ever.”
“Mezuzahs you check twice every seven years.”
“The Rambam says that the masses can’t handle the truth. You have to lead the masses to the mitzvot.”
