A Rabbi was talking to a BT and questioned “you’re follow such a big leniency!?†The BT responded, “but you told me I could do that!â€. The Rabbi responded, “but that was 10 years agoâ€.
Parents teach and send their children to schools where they learn about Torah, prayer, and mitzvos. Was it made clear to them that they have to continue learning about Torah, prayer, and mitzvos for their entire lives?
At some point spiritual growth becomes the individual’s responsibility. After 120 (or even after 30), I don’t think blaming our parents or kiruv/high school/beis medresh/shul/ Rebbeim is going to cut it.
Observant Judaism is not about becoming frum, being frum, or staying frum. Observant Judaism is about continual growth. It’s about growing in learning Torah, growing in Prayer, growing in Chesed, growing in our Love of Hashem.
I’m glad somebody told me.
I’m pretty sure Rav Wolbe did not consider growing in your observance of mitzvos “frumkeit”.
In his sefer, Alei Shur, Rav Shlomo Wolbe described “frumkeit” as an external show of observance. Rav Wolbe warned about it. In the process of adding new levels of observance and adding minhagin and chumras, one runs the risk that he might mistake those external actions for internal growth.
I think one should proceed with caution and double one’s inner self before adding on to one’s outer actions.
(Sure, there is still the famous statement from the sefer hachinuch and messilas yesharim that external actions influence out internal feelings. I would safely assume that Rav Wolbe was well aware of those statements when he warned against “frumkeit”.)