In his fifth lecture on the Steipler for Torah in Motion, professor Marc B. Shapiro says: “Menashe Klein was a genius, and the most extreme and fanatical of anyone writing halacha today.”
“Menashe Klein wants to recreate the way things were done in Hungary.”
“Haredi Judaism is this newfangled thing. You have all this women shiurim. Special classes for women. Menashe Klein writes, whoever heard of women shiurim in the old country? If a woman goes out [to a Torah class], then the man has to stay home to watch the children. Women should be like they were in the past.
“Menashe Klein Judaism is traditional Judaism.”
“The Haredim come up with all these new ideas. We never did this in the old country. Everyone takes their wives to hear parasha Zachor. All the early authorities are clear that women don’t have to hear this.”
“This is an American thing, for women to have to come to shul to hear Parasha Zachor. This is an influence of feminism. In Hungary [and Lithuania], women didn’t come to shul.”
“Yichus (who you descended from) doesn’t matter today. I asked people in Lakewood and they said yichus doesn’t matter now. If you’re a good learner, you’re a good learner.”
“According to Menashe Klein, a convert and a baalei teshuva (penitent) have no yichus. So don’t marry them.”
According to Wikipedia: “Rabbi Menashe Klein (1924-2011) (Hebrew: ר’ מנשה קליין), also known as the Ungvarer Rebbe (Yiddish: אונגווארער רבי), was a Hasidic Rebbe and posek (arbiter of Jewish law)[1] and author of 17 volumes of Mishneh Halachos and other 25 books. Toward the end of his life, he moved from Brooklyn, New York to live in Jerusalem, Israel.
The Ungvarer Rebbe was born in 1924 in a suburb near the town of Ungvar, Hungary (currently located in Ukraine), and studied in the Yeshiva of the rav of Ungvar, Rabbi Yosef Elimelech Kahane.
The Ungvarer Rebbe was active until old age and was considered by many to be a paramount leader of both Israel and the Diaspora Lithuanian-Haredi community. He had thousands of disciples.”
