Financial Realities II: The Unwritten Contract

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By “Sam Smith”

In retrospect, I’m not surprised that my first article on “Financial Realities in the Frum World” received such an overwhelming response (currently, 240 responses, plus a direct-offshoot article, “Suggestions to Address the Tuition Crisis” of 61 responses). I knew I was touching a raw nerve, because this topic has touched a raw nerve in me.

In trying to understand the reason for the raw nerve I’ve wavered between righteous indignation and guilt. I am outraged at some of the uncompromising positions the whole tuition business corners us into – as individual tuition-payers and as a community — while at the same time feeling guilty that I am outraged by it. The yeshivos are only trying to collect money for teaching our kids Torah, and paying less-than-ideal salaries to usually dedicated teachers. That’s why I feel guilty, because I love Torah, I love the ideals, I love the idealists in our midst. But I hate… I hate…

What?

I had been having a hard time trying to put my finger on exactly what I hate. What do I hate about this situation and why do I hate it and do I have a right to hate it? Then, the other night, I came upon the answer as I was pondering a contract one of my children’s yeshivos had sent me and asked me to sign. And that answer is the “unwritten contract.”

The Unwritten Contract

When I became a baal teshuva I had certain expectations, whether I was conscious of them or not. These expectations were based on the ideals I was attracted to, and the assumption that if I followed through on the ideals, then the community I was becoming part of would follow through on the ideals too. This, in effect, became an “Unwritten Contract” — in my mind at least. The part I hate, or that at least incenses me, is the perception that the community – or, in this case at least, one specific yeshiva – is not following through on its part.

Let me explain myself.

My side of the “contract” was that if I did my best to raise my kids in Torah and be responsible about making hishtadlus in the world (i.e. doing my best to earn a living), while at the same time living as frugally as I could, then the institutions representing Torah would be understanding. That means they would accept my kids and do their best to teach them even if I simply did not have the money to pay full or partial or even any tuition (if I truly did not have the money).

What I didn’t expect, but what I have experienced, from one institution in particular, is this: We will not accept your child in the doors in the first place if you do not sign a contract to pay what we say you need to pay. We expect you to be grateful that we are giving you a reduction in our outlandishly high tuition and other fees. And thou shalt feel grateful even if that reduction is still more than you can afford, even if it causes you to go into serious debt. We will even send you a letter threatening to expel your kids, if you fall behind or become unable to pay what we said you need to pay.

Now, in all fairness, this describes only one of the yeshivos I send my kids to (two kids to the same institution). Others want their pound of flesh, too, but are not going about it in the same aggressive, and, frankly, highly un-Torah-like (IMO) way. It is quite enough to ruin one’s rosy state of mind. Practically speaking, I can’t switch my kids out of this institution now because they are good students, have friends and are happy. We managed to pay partial tuition in years past by going into outrageous credit card debt, which is now an unacceptable and untenable alternative.

In any event, the brutal truth is that, especially now that I have older kids, I am simply overwhelmed by all the expenses, unable to carry all my accumulated debt, and even the partial tuitions I am paying have pushed me to and over the edge of financial ruin. There is no retirement plan in my life, no hidden stocks, no wealthy parents, in-laws or uncles ready to leave me their fortune and rescue me.

After many years and many tuitions I simply didn’t make it financially, at least in contemporary, North American Orthodox-community terms. I didn’t become a doctor or lawyer or businessman. I didn’t marry into wealth.

In my darkest moments, it’s all a great communal hypocrisy. Some people simply can’t pay… even a portion of the partial tuition. Yet some yeshivos, while teaching kids wonderful, beautiful ideals like living austerely for Torah as did the Chofetz Chaim (including large pictures throughout the halls), make their parents feel like shmattas for not earning more than $100-150,000!

This is my “righteous indignation” side.

But then the guilt kicks in: They are only trying to keep the lights on, pay their rabbeim and teachers, overcome their own financial deficits, etc.

I don’t want to be fighting them, to feel that they are the “enemy.” But that’s the corner this situation paints me – and them – into. Parents and yeshivos become adversaries, rather than advocates. It’s a crime. And the toll – the spiritual toll: on parents, children and generations — is incalculable. There has to be a different way of doing this.

What is the Goal of a BT?

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Should a BT just try to fit in with the rest of the frum velt? Which branch of the frum velt? What does it take to fit in?

When I was dating, a student in the yeshiva I was in decided that he wanted me to date his sister. I spoke to the boy’s mother about it and she said that she didn’t think a baal teshuva (myself) should date an FFB.
“Why?”
“Well, they’re just different.”
“What makes a baal teshuva different?”
“They’re more sincere.”

I still don’t understand.

In a different yeshiva I was in, an FFB student mentioned that he wouldn’t date a baalas teshuva. “Did you know the shadchan doesn’t have to tell you she’s a baalas teshuva?” I asked him.
Agitated, he asked the Rav walking by, “Would you set me up with a baalas teshuva without telling me?”
To which the Rav quipped, “Only if I thought you were worthy.” And kept walking.

Well, I’m not going to get started on the whole dating scene. But the question still remains, what is the baal teshuva’s goal in life.

One guy I knew was young enough and smart enough to enter an FFB yeshiva without a problem. On a visit back to the baal teshuva yeshiva he said, “Yes, you can make it there, but you can’t compete.” I’m not sure why he wanted to “compete” or why that was important to him.

After attaining the level of learning gemara on my own I spent some time in a top notch FFB yeshiva and sat and learned with a few guys. For me, every word and line of tosafos was a struggle. They could whip through a tosafos like water off a duck’s back. I was envious… Until I realized they hadn’t the foggiest idea what tosafos was really after.

I’m not knocking Klal Yisrael.

Klal Yisrael has kedusha. Klal Yisrael has collective ruach hakodesh, and maybe even nevuah. It’s important to feel and be apart of Klal Yisrael. The inner recognition of being part of the 3300 years of tradition is vital to
the identity of a Jew. And we must feel one with the group of Jews hanging on to Torah observance and values for dear life.

A BT should want to feel comfortable with, and have appreciation for, the good things in any branch of frum Jews he/she meets. A BT should have ahavas yisrael for a Satmar chassid, a Mir yeshiva student, a pajama-yalmulke-guitar playing- funky frum vegetarian, and a frum Manhattan woman lawyer with a $4000 sheitel. With a Sefardi, a Litvach, and a Hungarian. Whoever they are and wherever they’re from.

A BT should also think long and hard about the circumstances of his/her upbringing and ponder why HaShem caused him/her to have those experiences and live that lifestyle for those years.

Nothing is an accident.

We are in 5767, in this important time in history before the coming of moshiach for a reason and a purpose. Is it just to fit in? Are we merely reincarnated neshamas whose only task is to make it back to the fold?

Or are we uniquely designed to play an important role, precisely as a BT at this stage of Jewish history?

Rabbi Weiman’s new book: A Simple Guide to Happiness: From a mystical perspective is currently available at Amazon.

Finding the Right Community – Twin Rivers NJ

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Finding the right community is important for everyone, and as, Rabbi Horowitz recently pointed out a BT especially needs a warm and accepting community. In August, Ilanit wrote a great post on her wonderful Houston community. It’s very helpful for people to know what the choices are when it comes to communities, so if you think your community is a good place for BTs (and FFBs), send us a short write up (beyondbt@gmail.com).

Here’s a post from Yisroel about Twin Rivers, NJ.

Having lived in Kew Garden Hills for many years, and been a student of R”Turk, I found that I had to move to New Jersey in order to find affordable housing. What I discovered was that by moving into a small Orthodox community you gain opportunities you never would have if you remained in Monsey, KGH, Boro Park or Passaic. Small communities, while short on shuls and a minyan at anytime, allow you to lain, daven from the amud, start shirurim, and basically grow by becoming an active member in the community, rather than just absorbing what a large community has already established.

There is much to say about this topic. I would like to make people aware of my community, Twin Rivers, NJ. We have an Eruv, Mikvah, Schools, Kosher Shopping, Shirum, and easy transportation to NYC. While 70 miles from NYC sounds far using the express buses you can be in Port Authority in 70 minutes.

We have four and three bedroom homes (town houses), with full basements. Average price for a home is in the range of $220,000 to $250,000. Twin Rivers is ideal for young couples and families.

For more information, please visit the Congregation Toras Emes website.

The Art of Reframing

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I was talking to a friend over Shabbos and he related the following story:

He went on an admissions interview with one of his children and the questions being asked were upsetting him. By the time it was over he was really angry. What kind of school was this that would have an outlook like that?

When he got home he headed for the book shelf, picked up Rabbi Pliskin’s book on “Anger” and turned to the section on reframing. After quickly reviewing it he kept repeating to himself: “They’re teaching Torah!” “They’re teaching Torah!” “They’re teaching Torah!” After a few minutes he was able to reframe the institution into it’s proper perspective. Yes, he still disagreed with some of the things they said, but he was able to appreciate the good they were doing and eliminate any anger towards them.

Rabbi Pliskin, suggests that the key to a life of joy is to master this art of “reframing” — to change our negative perception of a situation into a more optimistic outlook. There is a free audio from Rabbi Pliskin on reframing available here. Let me leave you with this description of this simple yet powerful tool from Rabbi Pliskin’s book, “Begin Again Now”:

Reframing means perceiving a situation or event differently than you did originally or differently than it is usually viewed. A person who masters the art of reframing will be the master of the emotional quality of his life. While you do not always have control over external factors, you always have the ability to reframe.

Update: My friend Joe points to this great article by Sara Yoheved Rigler which contains a great story of reframing:

I  sat down at the kitchen table and decided to work this through. My feelings of outrage were bubbling up in my heart like a volcano, but the Torah expected me to process and control my thoughts and emotions as well as my actions. I knew that the way to change emotions is to change the thoughts that I was telling myself. By a gigantic act of will, I “changed the tape.” I forced myself to remember good things about my cousin, times she had been loving to me, times she had been vulnerable.

Read the whole thing, it’s an amazing article.

Ba’alei Teshuva Parents – FFB Kids (Part II)

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Last week (click here), we left off discussing the distinctions between a mitzvah, minhag, chumrah, and something that is none of those three categories, but rather a cultural practice.

We gave some examples:

* Putting on tefilin every day is a daily mitzvah (a mandated commandment) incumbent upon all Jewish males above the age of thirteen.
* Wearing long(er) peyos is a minhag (custom).
* Not using an eiruv that has been approved by the vast majority of your city’s rabbonim is a chumrah (stringency) that many accept upon themselves.
* Wearing a black fedora is a cultural practice prevalent in some communities.

It is of utmost importance that you fully understand the difference between these categories of Jewish practice – in your personal life and especially as you guide your children. It may be helpful to think of these categories as spiritual “needs and wants.” Mitzvos are mandatory practices. Chumros need not be observed, especially when one is first beginning Torah observance.

If any of you needed convincing that the lines between mitzvah, minhag, and chumrah often get blurred, kindly read the first post to the previous column (click here), where a reader took me to task for misrepresenting a mitzvah as a chumrah. (As with so many other issues, these are not “ba’al teshuva issues,” these are issues we all face – that are compounded by the fact that many ba’alei teshuva find them all the more challenging.)

As we noted last week, the complexity of these issues only underscores the need to find and maintain contact with a Rov who understands you well and can guide your family with wisdom. (Click here for an article about seeking rabbinic advice.)

Maintain Ties With Your Family

I think it is very important for the stability of your family life and your level of personal menuchas hanefesh (tranquility) to maintain ties with your non-observant parents and in-laws. I am well aware that there are those who advise ba’alei teshuvah parents to sever their ties with non-observant family members for fear of confusing your children with the non-observance of extended family members. However, I think that this thinking is fundamentally flawed in theory and practice.

In theory, what kind of message does it send when you walk away from your parents and siblings once you begin Torah observance? Shouldn’t the Torah teach you an enhanced level of respect for your family members?

In practice, as it relates to your children, I think that severing relationships with your family robs your children unnecessarily of the unconditional love that grandparents have to offer. It will be difficult enough for them to watch their FFB-family friends celebrate their simchos with large extended family members. Why compound the pain by having them feel that they are rootless?

I would like to mention a final point on this subject – one that may not be evident at first glance. When you exhibit tolerance for family members, you are making a profound statement – that family bonds run deep and they override any differences that you may have with each other. Over the years, this unspoken lesson will serve your children well and enhance the respect that they will have for you. For you never know how things will turn out with your children. What if one of them decides to take a different path in life than the one you charted for him or her? If you send clear and consistent messages over the years that ‘family matters,’ that child will, in all likelihood, remain close to your family members. However, if you decided that spiritual matters are grounds for severing ties with parents and siblings, how do you know that this logic will not be used against you in a different context one or two decades down the road?

To be sure, there are many challenges that you will face regarding kashrus (kosher food requirements), tzniyus (modesty), and other matters. But they are very manageable provided that an atmosphere of mutual respect is created and nurtured. Over the years, I have attended hundreds of lifecycle events of ba’alei teshuvah where their non-observant family members were active and respected participants.

Find a Community and Schools for Your Children that are Tolerant and Understanding

It is of utmost importance that you find a community that will accept you with welcoming arms. That means one where you will not cringe with what-will-the-neighbors-think when your non-observant brother comes to visit. If you do feel that way in your community, you may not be in the right one.

As far as selecting schools is concerned, there too, see to it that the school’s educational philosophy is in general sync with yours. Often, I get calls from parents who are put off by certain policies (dress codes, media exposure regulations, etc) that their children’s schools maintain or the culture of the institution (What will the rebbi say about Thanksgiving, and does it match what you feel regarding that subject). And equally often, these guidelines were in place when the parents enrolled their children in the first place. One cannot blame a school for enforcing their stated policies.

Generally speaking, I think that ba’alei teshuvah parents should not enroll their children in Yiddish-teaching yeshivos. I am aware of the cultural reasons that people are inclined to do so, but in the case of ba’a’lei teshuvah, I think that this is simply bad practice – unless you are fluent in Yiddish yourself. It will be difficult enough to do Judaic studies homework with your children as they grow older without compounding matters by adding language barriers that will virtually guarantee that you will not understand what your child is learning, let alone be in a position to help him or her.

To sum up, when raising your FFB children, as with all other areas of life, follow the timeless advice of Shlomo Hamelech (King Solomon) and stay on ‘the golden path’ of moderation.

© 2007 Rabbi Yakov Horowitz, all rights reserved

Inferiority Complex

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I was having a discussion with someone recently and he mentioned that one of the problems in the baalei teshuvah mindset is that BTs are often scared to question things they hear, especially from people who grew up religious because they anticipate that their own knowledge base is lacking in comparison. BTs just assume that because someone grew up in a religious home, with an Orthodox Jewish education, they necessarily know a lot more, and should not be questioned in regards to opinions relating to Jewish topics.

I also know from experience that linguistic mastery goes a long way in making a person sound like they know what they are talking about, and that the use of key Hebrew and Yiddish phrases can make a BT feel inadequate and ignorant. It’s a huge barrier to get over when becoming observant; I specifically had, and still have, a very difficult time hearing a lot of Hebrew or Yiddish and attempting to decipher what is being said. This language barrier alone made me feel very inadequate for a long time, until I got the guts to just insist that those talking to me speak in English or translate any Hebrew or Yiddish being said in order that I fully understand what is being said.

This feeling of inferiority in both language and knowledge is often just that – a feeling, rather than reality. And it often cripples a BT from really asking the important questions and clarifying for themselves queries they may have about specific things they hear. It’s important that a BT feel secure in him or herself, in his or her knowledge base, and in the validity of asking questions and thinking for him or herself. Otherwise, they might never come to feel like a real part of the observant community, and will sideline themselves as outsiders and inferior members, a feeling which they will, in turn, share with their children.

Now, I’m not talking about questioning every single thing one hears from a respected rav on the finer points of halachic decisions. But I am talking about having enough faith in one’s own knowledge to challenge what seems to be contradictory and at least ask for clarification when there is a seeming inconsistency, rather than accepting things that disagree with previous learning. And even when there isn’t a seeming contradiction, and one just wants to know more about where a specific halacha or opinion comes from, to have the guts to ask to be shown the source, rather than just accepting that it’s what “it says.”

BTs need to believe in themselves and the learning they have accumulated, whether that has been through formal yeshiva training, assorted classes or a lot of reading. Having the courage to ask questions leads to a better and more solid knowledge base. It leads to stronger convictions and hold on the lifestyle that has been chosen, because it is based on answers, rather than just acceptance of surface-level statements, with a view of the foundation upon which they have built their new lives.

And remember – there’s no such thing as a stupid question.

Do I need to Reconcile Science and Torah?

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Most people ask “How do they reconcile science and Torah?” I ask, “Do I need to?”

As a BT, I grew up in the secular, science-based world. I even went to Bronx High School of Science and got my undergraduate degree in archaeology.

You would think the question about science and Torah would be a burning issue for me. It isn’t. Why? Good question. I think the answer is that Chazal (our sages) have answers for us. My main focus in this article is the age of the universe.
Out of the two major answers, science jives better with one of them. However, I recognize what science is and what it isn’t. It isn’t perfect, far from it. Second, it consists mainly of theories that change by the day and I will take Rabbi Akiva over any scientist, any day.

One answer is that the universe really is 5767 years old in “real years” and everything that shows differently according to science is either mistaken or made to look that way by G-d to test our faith. Many of our sages held and do hold by this.

The second answer is that the universe is really 15 billion years old. The Jewish calendar only starts from forming of Adam, which is on the 6th day of creation. The previous days are not “our” days. Rather, each one represents thousands of years. This theory is well explained by some of our sages. Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan has an excellent discussion about this in his book entitled “Immortality, Resurrection, and the Age of the Universe”. Professor Schroeder also discusses the issue in his book “The Science of G-d”. Numerous other authors have discussed tgis theory as well.

For me, either answer is valid and assuaging. If you “need” science and Torah to match then you have an answer. If you don’t, you also have a possibility. Yes, I lean a certain way, but if in the end of days I find out the answer was the other one, no big sweat. Hashem existed before anything, designed the world as he saw fit and that is ok by me. G-d is all powerful, so he could definitely make some rocks look older than they really are. G-d help me if I base my emunah (faith) on what scientists tell me.

Let’s remember that Moses received the Torah from G-d and Mr. Scientist received a grant for his research from so and so foundation. I know whom I trust more.

Why was this Shabbos different from all Others?

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By Bayla S. Brenner

As we walk through each day, we carry the history of our lives in memory. We are, after all, living documents of our experiences. Every moment breathed in becomes us. The anticipation we felt at dusk when we heard the chime of the Good Humor truck — so long ago — remains intact, alongside the manifold yearnings born over the years. The streets we’ve walked, the people we’ve affected and the ones who have touched us have all altered, but our encounters with time remain and continue. As each Jew reacts to personal circumstances, he shapes his own life, in turn, shaping the life of the Jewish people. If we choose to share these experiences with each other, we are teaching history.

I learned about the Holocaust by virtue of being the daughter of two who lived the nightmare. I don’t think I could have had a more effective education about that agonizing period of Jewish history. The following story captures a moment in time of three Jews, my parents and I, struggling to move forward while carrying the weight of the unspeakable.

My parents and I are separated by the typical strains. Because of their history, the parental expectations and disappointments affect me more intensely than most. It all resurfaces after every call. I sit with a painful hole on my side of the phone click. But still I try: not to make them happy (I’ve realized that that is an impossibility), but to help them see who I am. Where there is talk, there is hope.

Every winter, I visit my parents in Florida. I make reservations at the last possible minute in an effort to postpone my anxiety about seeing them. I arrive feeling somewhat strong, with my ego intact. It always happens, though. By the third night of my four-day-visit, I am a broken and empty shell lying on the guest couch trying to find my pieces in time for the flight back to New York. It was on a recent trip down there that I decided that this would be the visit, after which I would leave the way I came. I didn’t. I came back better.

I arrived Friday morning. The Florida sun felt oppressive as I made my way through the crowded waiting area. I had no trouble spotting my parents. I could almost hear their waiting. We hugged hello, put my luggage into the car, and we were off. My parents live in a neighborhood where the palm trees bend low like the people who live there. Red-yellow-orange flowers blaze, driveways are lined with sleek pastel cars, and blood-scarred Holocaust survivors parade in Nike sweatsuits, Adidas sneakers and leather faces.

I showered, washing off the travel soot, and I was ready to prepare for a Shabbes meal that I never experienced as a child. My parents watched curiously as I set two candelsticks down. My mother placed two of her own beside mine, something I had never seen her do. I lit the candles, covered my eyes and recited the traditional prayer welcoming in the Sabbath. “I’ll say my own prayer,” my mother said with mock indignation. My father hurried out of the room and returned with a faded blue yarmulke in his hands.

“That’s really something, no?” my father’s eyes glimmered. My father’s eyes rarely glimmered. “This is the first time I’m using it since…” He lifted the yarmulke closer to my face. “Look at the writing inside,” he urged softly. My father’s Polish accent cracks me open every time. I tried to make out the chipped white letters inside the rim. Through squinted eyes, I read: “Jeffrey Kahn’s Bar Mitzvah…”

“I was just a kid when you went to that bar mitzvah,” I said.

“A pipsqueak!” he added. I vaguely remembered the boy. He was the son of one of my father’s childhood friends in Europe. My father sat at the table and carefully placed the frayed cloth on his head. He gave its sides an awkward tug. The shiny cloth bowl seemed to fill with air and rise above his bald spot.

My father was about to make Friday night kiddush for the first time in our lives together. I didn’t trust this moment. I knew that on the other side of the levity crouched pain. “I found some old Manischewitz in the closet. This should be good, no?” My father was trying so hard. It hurt me to watch. He recited “…borei pri hagafen” and drank. I wanted to tell him that there was an introductory prayer, but chose to keep my mouth shut. I didn’t want to rustle the tension between us.

My mother stood in the hallway watching us. She crossed her self-imposed barrier only to drop two plates of chicken on the table, then she quickly resumed her huddled position in the dark hallway. Her husband had chosen to tread upon this dangerous territory and seemed to be having too good a time to stop. He bit into his chicken leg and in mid-swallow said, “Mala, come sit with us!” I wasn’t sure I wanted her terrified presence at the table. I was having enough trouble with my father’s unusual amiability.

“No, no, I’m all right,” she said. “You want some gefilte fish maybe?” She retreated to the kitchen, and it was my father and me again. “l’d like to go to the synagogue tomorrow. Are there any around here?” I said to my father in the most matter-of-fact voice that I could manage. “You want synagogue, too? Shabbes is a day of rest. Rest with your parents. You’re only staying five days.”

“Four,” I corrected.

“Okay, four! More reason you should stay with the old folks”.

“Let her go to synagogue!” came a voice from the hallway. My father crossed his arms and held them tightly against his chest. He was containing something more than his arms could hold. “You came to Florida to spend in synagogue? To light candles, to aggravate your mother” — his hands swept the air above the table — “to make…to force on us, this?” The anger took control of his face.

“Please, Michael,” my mother left her refuge to pull him away from the smoke. It was too late. He stood above me and choked on his next word. I couldn’t make out what he said, but the power of his rage shook the room. I had trespassed on forbidden ground. It was a cold, black, scary place, and I was stuck. His finger drilled the air in my direction. “Get out then! You want to leave, so go!” My mother could not stop or slow down my father’s hurricane of emotion. I don’t think she wanted to. He was also speaking for her. She leaned against the front door and wept without tears. My father’s eyes were locked open, dry with fury. I sat behind my plate of cold chicken, 117 pounds of guilt breaking a hole in my chair.

This was no ordinary Shabbes meal. The pretty lace tablecloth, the smell of boiled chicken, the red wine and the yarmulke mirrored a very old vision for my parents, more acute than the one in the dining room. My parents’ memories of Friday nights before the war are buried far away from the light of consciousness, fixed in another time. By creating this scene, had I set my parents up to make them confront these buried feelings?

That night, I forgot how to sleep. The power of pure regret drove through the center of my stomach. I was helpless to free my parents of their pain. I took little comfort in the fact that what had happened that night was, indeed, not the source of their tragedy. I had banged hard on the steel door to a room that only the two of them occupied. A misty room with four trembling eyes, anguished and vulnerable. Why did they yield this time? Maybe they were caught off guard or just succumbed to my pressure, as if to say, “If you really want to see this, then look, but don’t stay long.” Pushing my cheek into my pillow, urging sleep, I heard the sound of my parents’ muffled voices rise and fall down the hallway. We were all trying to resolve something. As a palm leaf shadow on my wall finished its concerto, the realization crept in that I was finding fulfillment in a life-style that my parents felt betrayed by.

The next morning, we said little. Mostly, we shared warm bagels and silence. The silence stood near us, protecting us, drawing us closer. When one understands so completely, there are no words.

The days that followed held dreamlike calm. Our movements and words were careful and deliberate. We were very much in present tense, which was a treat for me and a relief for them. On the day of my departure, we kissed goodbye at the airport and held each other. For the first time, I felt like a grown-up in their arms.

Over a year of Sabbaths have gone by, and my parents continue to walk the streets of their sunny neighborhood. A change had taken place that night. We learned to respect one another. They showed me a part of themselves that the rest of the world would never see. I now understand the need for the soft Floridian blanket with which my parents drape their lives. My father asks me how my holidays are. My mother sends me kosher treats. She writes: “Betty, we miss you.”

My life as an observant Jew has made me aware of the depth and beauty within the moral example that my parents taught their daughter. My mother and father saw beyond their remembered sorrow that night. They saw me.

Bayla is currently working on an article on Baalei Teshuva whose parents were Holocaust survivors. If you fit that description please email Bayla at BrennerBs -at- ou.org or contact us a beyondbt@gmail.com and we will connect you to Bayla.

Links and News

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Our Baalei Teshuva friends from Argentina, Leandro & Matías have created a documentary with testimonies from baalei teshuva called “Para qué sirve ser judío” – “Why is it worth it to be a jew?”. The 38 minute documentary in Spanish or the 3 minute introduction can be viewed here.

Sara Yoheved Rigler on Israel’s Vital First Strike One surefire way to avert a nuclear holocaust.

We are living out a modern-day Purim story. Iran’s developing of a nuclear bomb, coupled with Ahmadinejad’s vociferous threats to destroy Israel, are nothing less than an edict of extermination. Of course we must respond militarily, but our first strike must be spiritual.

Teshuva means changing course. It means doing something different than you’ve done before. It means coming closer to God by accepting on yourself to do God’s will in some area of your life where previously you had resisted.

Jonathon Rosenblum on a Time to Hate

Jews too are instructed to hate the sin and not the sinner. But sometimes the two are inextricably bound, as in Saddam’s case. And often, easy forgiveness of the sinner diminishes the horror of his crimes. As Rabbi David Gottlieb of Baltimore pointed out in the wake of the Amish tragedy, even God Himself does not forgive sins committed against a fellow human being until the victim’s forgiveness has been secured. No one can confer forgiveness on behalf of the victim, and all the more so when no forgiveness was sought.

Ecclesiastes reminds us that there is also “a time to hate.” Would we really wish to live, asks Boston Globe columnist Jeff Jacoby (an observant Jew), in a society in which no one gets angry when children are slaughtered, a society in which there is an instantaneous dispensation for the most horrific acts of cruelty? I would not. And that is why I was glad to see Saddam hanging at the end of a noose.

Off the Derech & Those Who Care

Sunday, January 14, 2007 2:00 – 5:00pm $5 Donation
To all our Jewish Brothers & Sisters, whether you’re “Heimishe”, Modern Orthodox or some where in between:

* Have you lost touch with your Judaism?
* Have you thrown it all away, or wish that you could?
* Has Judaism become for you restrictive & punitive instead of joyous & meaningful?
* Do you have a Loved One struggling with these issues & would like to help?

A symposium will be held at the Carlebach Shul to address these issues and more. A safe place where people can vent, questions can be asked & answers will be given. We aim to provide hope, inspiration & guidance.

Speakers & Panelists:
Rabbi Naftali Citron – The Carlebach Shul N.Y.C. – moderator
Rabbi Shimon Russel – LCSW, Dean of Tikva Seminary
Pesha Cohen – LCSW , Project Takanot Coordinator, Sexual assault & Violence Program, Mt. Sinai Hospital
Yitzchok Schonfeld – organizer of the Thursday night “Chulent” get-together Rabbi Yitzchok Feldheim – Cong. – Yardley Penn.

All Welcome!! Separate Seating!! No one turned away!
For more info please go to www.carlebachshul.org

Ba’alei Teshuva Parents – FFB Kids (Part I)

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The following post is from Rabbi Horowitz’s Chicago Community Kollel Interactive Parenting Column. Rabbi Horowitz recently updated his website, which contains a wealth of material on parenting and other issues facing us.

Rabbi Horowitz,

What is your advice for ba’alei teshuva who are raising frum-from-birth children in terms of making sure that the children are well integrated, healthy and normal frum Jews? As ba’alei teshuva sometimes it is easy to be very strict because of insecurities from our own upbringing and lack of family minhagim. If you can give a few pointers that will obviously need to be explored with our own rabbeim to tailor make it to our own families, it would be helpful.

Thank you!

Rabbi Horowitz Responds

Your excellent question practically answers itself, and leads me to believe that you already have a deep understanding of the opportunities – and challenges – that you face in raising your FFB children. You hit the nail on the head when you noted that you wanted to raise “well integrated, healthy and normal frum Jews.” For that balance is exactly what you ought to be striving to achieve.

If you are a regular reader of these lines, you may know where my suggestions will start – with you and your spouse. One of my mantras is that most of the issues that we face when raising our children are reflections of our own struggles. I maintain that in order to raise “well integrated, healthy and normal frum Jewish children,” you need to start with “well integrated, healthy and normal frum Jewish adult parents.” That means that you adhere to the timeless advice of Shlomo Hamelech (King Solomon) and remain on the ‘golden path’ of moderation. After all, if you don’t want your children to be raised in a “very strict [environment] because of [their parents’] insecurities,” the best way to achieve that goal is not to be “very strict [in your personal lives] due to your own insecurities.”

Here are some practical tips:

Grow Slowly

Many meforshim (commentaries) suggest that the dream of our patriarch Yaakov (see Bereshis 28:12) where he envisioned angels climbing up and down a ladder is a profound analogy to our spiritual pursuits. The Torah describes how the legs of the ladder were placed on the ground while its top reached the very heavens. I think that the correlation is an insightful one for everyone – but is all the more relevant for ba’alei teshuvah. We ought to keep our feet firmly planted on the ground – all the while reaching for profound spiritual heights.

I would like to suggest that the reason that the image of a ladder was used in the dream (as opposed to, say, a road leading to heaven) is that you simply cannot run up a ladder.

So, too, spiritual growth needs to be a sustained and steady process (Click here for a dvar Torah on this subject). Which leads me to …

Find a Rav Who Truly Understands Ba’alei Teshuvah Issues

Not all rabbanim have a deep understanding of the complex mix of halachic and social issues where ba’alei teshuva need individualized direction. Finding a Rav who understands them – and you – will provide your family with an invaluable resource. Similarly, it may be helpful for you to find a ba’al teshuvah couple ten years or so older than you who can mentor you as your family passes mileposts and lifecycle events, such as enrolling children in school, Bar/Bat Mitzvah, high school placements, shidduchim, etc.

Be Yourself

I strongly encourage you to read and re-read a terrific article by my dear chaver Rabbi Bentzion Kokis s’hlita (Click here). Rabbi Kokis is an outstanding talmid chacham and his advice is equally outstanding. If I may sum up his thoughts, it is to refrain from jettisoning your personality, hobbies, interests, education, career – and sense of humor – as you embrace Torah and mitzvos.

Ba’alei teshuva may be concerned that they are poor role models for their children since they are observing their less-than-perfect Torah and mitzvah observance. I think not. You are setting a wonderful example for your children by seeking to grow spiritually throughout your lives. (Click here for a stunning Torah thought by Rabbi Shimon Schwab on this subject.)

Distinguish Between Mitzvah, Minhag, Chumrah, and Culture

In your question, you noted that, “sometimes it is easy to be very strict because of insecurities from our own upbringing and lack of family minhagim.”

Well, in order to gain a better understanding of when to be firm and when to be flexible, you must distinguish between a mitzvah, minhag, chumrah, and something that is none of the three categories, but is rather a cultural practice.

  • Putting on tefilin every day is a daily mitzvah (a mandated commandment) incumbent upon all Jewish males above the age of thirteen.
  • Refraining from dipping matzoh in liquids on Pesach (commonly referred to as “gebrokts”) is a minhag (a custom – one only observed in some communities).
  • Not using an eiruv that has been approved by the vast majority of your city’s rabbonim is a chumrah (stringency) that many accept upon themselves.
  • Wearing a black fedora is a cultural practice prevalent in some communities.

It is of utmost importance that you fully understand the difference between these categories of Jewish practice – in your personal life and as you guide your children.

More on this – and other practical tips – next week.

© 2007 Rabbi Yakov Horowitz, all rights reserved

Two notes to readers:

1) I strongly recommend the BEYOND BT website www.beyondbt.com for ba’alei teshuva men and women. I serve as one of the rabbinic advisors of the website, and it has provided advice, camaraderie, and spiritual guidance for ba’alei teshuva around the world over the past twelve months.

2) In 2001, I wrote an article in The Jewish Observer on the subject of “Lifecycle Support for Ba’alei Teshuva Families” (Click here for link).

3) I also posted an article “Of Eagles and Turkey” on the Beyond BT website one year ago Click here for link) on the important subject of conformity to communal pressure.

I hope that you find these helpful.

YH

The Dilemma of the Talented ex-BT’s

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My friend struggles with Judaism. He grew up in a very frum — let’s say, stifling — environment in a major frum metropolitan community. He had a learning disability, never diagnosed when he was in school. This not only preventing him from succeeding in yeshiva, despite receiving a generous endowment of creativity and intelligence, but the offbeat view of the world it provided to him caused him to focus on the flaws in contemporary orthodox society… maybe in his family and school too… and he was, and is, Off the Derech. Way off.

It’s painful to see. I really love the guy. He reads this blog — the Derech remains stubbornly stuck in his head, though he swears contempt for it. It comes through in the oddest of ways, though. Twice a year he tells me he’s working his way back.

But Hashem gave him some other gifts of which he has made dubious value. He is charming. Too charming. Women flock to him. He’s handsome, yes, if not perhaps for the cover of GQ (too Jewish?); but he has a magnetism that enables him to talk women into almost anything; talk employers into giving him jobs; talk the world into giving him an infinite number of chances. I’m not that charismatic, myself, but I cannot but see an aspect of my own underachieving life in his adventures — I’ve probably talked my way in and out of more trouble than the average bear.

But I have a wall full of degrees hanging on a wall that I pay the rent for, and my disappointment is relative to my ambition. His underachievement is pretty absolute. He must live on that charm, and oxygen and light, perhaps; he’s resolutely going nowhere. Frankly he lives a non-frum lifestyle, largely nocturnal, that is far beyond the pretty square existence I experienced in the first 22 years of my life. Maybe some BT who’s been there and done that can explain to me how bright people don’t get tired of endless “parties” and hanging around in clubs? Or maybe he couldn’t. To my way of thinking, as informed by Jewish sensibility, and my own limited exposure to that lifestyle during my high school and college years, it’s mostly about crowding out the the thoughts in your head that are hurting your mind.

In any event, that’s not my topic.

In any event, he’s not the person in the title of this essay.

The persons in the title are the ones — it could be any number of them — who write the Bitter Ex-BT Blogs.

See, I think my friend has a chance. A chance at life in a black-hat community, a wife with a sheitel, a two-hour-a-day learning seder? Well, we are taught not to ever give up hope, but not to rely on miracles. That would require a miracle. But could he have a healthy, positive, open-minded relationship with the Ribbono shel Olam, with Klal Yisroel, with the Torah, even? I think he could. I think he wants to. He’ll stamp up and down and insist I’m wrong, but the Nile’s big enough for both of us to be monarchs over it — I’m going to stick stubbornly to this belief.

But there’s something in his life now that may be worse for him than everything else that came before. Because he can’t pull himself away from the talented, glib, well-written, sometimes right Bitter Ex-BT Blogs, nor the virtual and real social world they promise him. He absorbs their complaints, their bitterness, their gall, and they put into words for him what he cannot quite express himself. No, more than that. They give him words to express complaints he didn’t even know he had. They feed his pain at the losing hand he feels — this talented, attractive, and thank God healthy person — God has dealt him.

Before, my friend ignored his Jewish side while living this dissolute lifestyle of his. He knew the contradiction. There was “being good,” and being not so good. But now he has a new “support group” who tell him what he’s doing is really a kind of “mitzvah” that has its own blog community, its alternative media, its Christmas parties and club dates. And this is something I have no idea how to counter.

We know that the Torah reserves harsh punishment, and even withdraws some of the usual judicial protections, for a meisis — someone who is not satisfied to worship avodah zarah, but who induces others to do so as well. Writing a blog is not avodah zarah, but then, we don’t have avodah zarah any more. In fact R’ Moshe Feinstein, in a responsum, says that anyone who encourages people to move away from doing the will of Hashem is comparable to a meisis ; the Chofetz Chaim compared the anti-religious Jews of his time to such people as well. In the Chofetz Chaim’s time, such people offered an alternative ideology — socialism, the brotherhood of man, an escape from the ghetto — that resonated with thoughtful, idealistic Jews on whom the weight of galus had become unbearable. What today’s anti-frum ideology offers is nihilism and hedonism, but in a time and place dominated by cynicism and narcissism it is enough to demonstrate that these can be found in ample supply on both sides of the frum / non-frum line, so why not enjoy the ride in the handbasket? And what can be more enjoyable than mocking those who don’t get the joke?

But it’s time for that car-and-driver metaphor again. Because ultimately my rather mundane point, of course, is that it is a special bitterness — I cannot say wickedness; we all are tinokos shenishbu (compared to “captured children”) — that makes a talented former BT, man or woman, do this. They do not just walk away from what they think is a car wreck of a spiritual journey but flag everyone else tooling happily along the road and swear that the bridge is out, there are monsters waiting on the next exit and that it was actually much better where they were coming from and you can’t U-turn fast enough to get back there.

What motivates them? My armchair psychology tells me that they would rather believe the journey is an eight-lane disaster than consider whether they themselves forgot to check the oil under their own hoods before setting out. But, you know, “who am I to say”?

A talented rabbinic friend came to me once and told me that after half a century or so of trying, he resolved that there are some cases — and far more of them come across his desk than mine — that he has come to realize he cannot solve, some lives that he cannot make the investment in trying to fix. His words haunt me regarding my friend. He is not asking me to solve anything; far from it. He tolerates my company because, well, maybe I am a little bit of fun myself. But whereas I once thought I offered enough gravity, mixed in with the comedy, to contribute to keeping him in orbit, I can’t compete with the Bitter Ex-BT Blogs. Well, I could; but I can’t. I’m as good an Internet polemicist as anyone; I know enough about frum life, about the Torah, and about life in the BT yeshivas to make quite a good debate of it.

But there’s no natural place for that debate — it won’t be on their blogs, and it won’t be here; and frankly, my anger and hurt cloud my judgment when I make some attempt at it. I fought in the early Internet wars for orthodoxy (largely in the ancient and venerable “Moment Magazine message board debates”) and, frankly, I’m not sure anyone’s listening.

Okay, I know one person.

How Would You Answer an Acquaintance’s “Why Bad Things Happen?” Questions?

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By Charnie

This is the text of an email I received before Chanukah, shortly before I’d be leaving the office Erev Shabbos. For some reason, I didn’t feel it could be put off till the following week, so I rushed out an answer. This morning I received a response. The emails follow, and I sure hope I’ve handled this properly. What we say to another Yid can have a lasting impression. I’ve never met this woman (at least in adulthood), as we “met” several years ago via a Jewish genealogy discussion group, discovered we grew up in the same neighborhood, have mutual friends, went to the same schools, etc. I knew she wasn’t frum, but I shared my understanding of the topics.

How would you have handled it?

From: —–@aol.com
To: Charnie@…….
Subject: Sadly…
Date: Fri., Dec. 15, 2006 12:45 PM

…I do not think that Israel will survive into the century; in fact, I’m wondering if it will last another decade. I have spent a great deal of time considering this and I suspect there’s no hope. Clearly, we’re the sacrificial lamb to oil.

On the other hand, I do think that the Jewish people will survive, at least a “spark” of us. Perhaps this is our curse, to wander continuously through time and place.

As for the Satmars and the other anti-Zionists… well, they are unspeakable. I’ve heard Rabbis who’ve said that the Shoah happened because a single Jew ate a single piece of pork. Do you really think that G-d would punish millions for that?

All of these questions make me doubt the existence of G-d. Surely a loving G-d would not have permitted these things to have happened over the millennia, and to continue to happen.

Here is my response:

From: Charie@———-
To: ——@aol.com
Sent: Fri, 15 Dec 2006 1:16 PM
Subject: Re: Sadly…
Dear —-,

You’ve appropriately used “sadly” as a subject line. None of the points you bring up could in any way induce one to smile.
However, I strongly disagree with you on all points. Israel will survive, as it always has, because we have the best “general” possible, the hand of G-d. Although throughout the millennium the land of Israel has been occupied by others, Jews have always resided there. And as we light the first Chanukah light tonight, we can recall that the Greeks who sought to take us away from our Judaism are no longer in existence. Neither are the Egyptians who enslaved us – the people of modern day Egypt are Arabs, not the advanced culture of biblical times. Nor are the Romans around, they who destroyed the Beis Hamikdash (second Temple) in Jerusalem. And the same is true of each and every people who have ever tried to destroy the Jewish people. In fact, that is why it is believed that the oldest nations on earth are the Jews and the Chinese, because the latter have never sought to do any harm to us. In our own times, Germany is not now what it was 60 years ago. And the same will be true of Iran, which is not the nation of Persia in which Esther and Mordechai defeated Haman from killing all the Jews because Mordechai refused to bow down to him (this being the story of Purim).

Insofar as where was G-d during the Holocaust… that is one of the most frequently asked questions, with just cause. However, the Holocaust did not prove to be the end of us, instead, we have rebounded to heights that no one could have imagined even 50 years ago. Today, more people then ever have Jewish educations. The land of Israel is thriving. This is a very involved subject, one that can be barely touched upon in an email. My husband is very good at explaining these philosophical issues, and if you’d care to join us any Saturday for lunch (the only time I’m up to having guests), please feel free to let me know a few days before, and we’d be delighted to have you as our guest! In the meantime, I’ve attached a few links you might find interesting which touch upon these subjects:
http://www.aish.com/holocaust/issues/Understanding_the_Holocaust.asp
http://www.aish.com/spirituality/philosophy/Why_Harold_Kushner_Is_Wrong.asp
http://www.aish.com/holocaust/people/Rebbetzin_Jungreis_on_the_Holocaust.asp

Before I became aware of what being Jewish really meant, I was obsessed with the Holocaust as being the “main event” in Jewish history – one in which my father’s family perished. However, we are not a people of death, we are a people of life. Only through understanding Judaism can we come to accept that it is beyond our comprehension to understand everything that happens. Imagine a first grader sitting in a college level mathematics class. Could they understand what’s going on? Of course not, we wouldn’t question that. As little children we frequently didn’t understand (or agree) with everything our parents said to do or not do. But as we matured, we could grasp the logic of their intent. We are like those same children in our relationship to G-d.

Wishing you a Happy Chanukah!
Charnie

Here is her response back:

From: —–@aol.com
To: Charnie@…….
Sent: : Sun, Dec. 17, 2006 12:28 AM
Subject: Re: more Sadly

Dear Charnie,
Let me start by saying that I thought that you were very sweet to take so much time, to make such an effort to respond to my letter. It is clear that you’ve given my letter quite a bit of thought and gone to great lengths to address my points and to try to assist my understanding.

I did not state, however, that I do not expect the Jewish people to survive into the future, because I do think that we’ll survive, at least some “spark” of us, and I said that explicitly in my letter.

I also think, however, that it is our curse to wander, never having a homeland. And, yes, “sadly,” I do not expect the State of Israel to survive; I’ll be surprised if it lasts another decade. Again, yes, I do realize that earlier civilizations that had attempted to vanquish us as a people have long since been obliterated so, perhaps, this was their punishment. Yet we Jews seem doomed to wander, looking for a place to put down roots.

At the same time, I think that you’re being a bit patronizing, however well-intended you are, by assuming that I am ignorant of all things Jewish. Certainly, I know what Purim is; I attended the Jewish Center’s Hebrew school from Sunday school in kindergarten straight through the high school. Anyway, I think that it is safe to assume that most Jews, especially New York Jews, know the highlights of the Jewish year.

I do disagree with your statement that the land of Israel is thriving.

And I have read, at times, the explications of the learned rabbinim, as to the Shoah and other horrific slaughters. Sorry, I just don’t buy them. To me, these scholarly tracts smack of sophistry and rationalization.

Unlike you, I never saw the Shoah as the be-all and end-all of apocalyptic events regarding the Jews. I view the Shoah as a part of a continuum that goes back to Moses and Esther, continues through the Romans at the time of the early Christians, and on to the auto-da-fe, the pogroms, right through to today’s Muslim hatred. The world, in general, always has hated the Jews; the Jews, in response, have spent millennia seeking safe havens. Mankind, in general, always has had evil among us but this is the first time in history that one evil person can have the power to destroy millions of human beings with a single press of a button that unleashes a nuclear bomb. This is the first moment when evil and technology meet and I am afraid that this union is apocalyptic indeed.

Still, I will say again that I think that you are very sweet to care this much, and to make such an effort on my behalf.

Happy Hanukkah to you and your family.

best,

WordPress Is Good To BTs

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Last week we upgraded to a new version of our WordPress software. Our hosting provider Dreamhost has this great feature called one click installs which enabled us to do the upgrade by pressing a button and waiting about a minute. It worked like a charm, B’ezras Hashem.

One of the major advantage of the new software is its new spam filter Akismet. It seems to be working incrediblt, bli ayin hara, catching over 1300 spam comments in five days (and that included a slow national holiday ). At the same time, it is letting through most of the real comments. We are still looking through what it flags as spam, but we might stop that at some point. So if your comment ever disappears into cyberspace and it’s not in moderation, please email us so we can try to de-spam it.
Wordpress is among the best blogging software products on the market and it’s free. It is part of a software trend called Open Source Software. We are thankful to WordPress, Akismet and their founding developer Matt Mullenweg for providing us with these great tools to help build our Beyond BT community.

Thanks to Matt, WordPress and DreamHost.

Every Today is Another Chance to Get Things Right

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I saw this slogan on a bus while walking to work. Often, you don’t find interesting slogans like this on a bus. Where did the quote come from? You might be surprised if I tell you it’s from a TV show. The TV show is called ‘Daybreak’ and recently premiered on. The premise of the show is that the main character is framed for a murder and his family is in danger. Every morning he wakes up and has to repeat the same day and has to find out who framed him for the murder and he has to keep his family safe. Until he solves the mystery, the day will keep repeating itself.Upon further reflection, this quote is a great way to approach tefilla. After almost 5 years of taking classes at various Jewish outreach groups in the city, I made some breakthroughs this year and decided it was time to take some steps towards becoming more observant than in previous years when I had balked at such an idea (perhaps this will be the subject of a future post). One of the things I did was go to Israel for two weeks in July and learn at She’arim, one of the wonderful womens’ seminaries in Jerusalem. It was a transformative two weeks and the only regret I have was that I wished I had stayed a little longer. After coming back from Israel, I started davening twice a day. Before Israel (BI), I prayed for 15-20 minutes in the morning, semi-rushed because I slept in until 8:00, sometimes 8:15 and I needed to be at work at 9:00. After Israel (AI), I find myself getting up at 7:20-7:30, and davening for 30-40 minutes (my mornings are so much calmer now) and also davening Mincha. Read more Every Today is Another Chance to Get Things Right ›

Judaism in a Blogshell

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This past Rosh Hoshana, I wanted to be able to give over the general framework of Judaism in a short time. So, I wrote this piece. Thanks to David and my brother-in-law Bruce for their editing efforts. Please help me further enhance this piece with your questions and comments below. Thanks.

The Plan (Derech Hashem)
– The nature of one who is good is to give.
– G-d, who is the ultimate goodness, created man in order to give to man pleasure.
– The greatest gift possible for man is to have an awareness of, and a relationship with G-d.
– In order to increase the value and pleasure of this gift, G-d wanted man to develop this awareness and relationship through man’s own free will.

The Environment and Means (Mesillas Yesharim)
– G-d created man with an eternal soul, that is the part of man most G-d like and most capable of goodness.
– G-d also gives us a strong sense of self in the intellectual realm and strong sensory facilities.
– G-d created the physical world as the place in which man would develop the soul.
– The goal is to increase our awareness of G-d and develop our character/soul through our choices and mitzvos.

The Problem (Avos: Three things take us out of this world…)
– Our sense of self and accomplishment often makes us honor ourselves instead of G-d.
– Physical pursuits mask our awareness of G-d and lead us towards a physical existence instead of a spiritual one.
– Self-centeredness makes us envious and possessive and inhibits strong personal relationships by focusing us on ourselves rather than the other person.

The Solution (Avos: The world stands on three things…)
– The Torah and the mitzvos enable us to go beyond physical egocentricity towards a spiritually centered existence.
– Acts of Kindness help us focus on other people thereby reducing our self-centeredness.
– Prayer reduces our self-centeredness by giving us a G-d centered orientation.
– The Jewish people were chosen to implement the solution at its highest level with the 613 mitzvos.
– The rest of the nations have 7 mitzvos to best develop their G-d awareness.

Implementation (Six Constant Mitzvos)
– We must align our thought processes with our emotions, since the emotions are the prime influence on actions.
– We must increase our belief in G-d, not believe in other forces and realize that “good” and “bad” both come from G-d.
– We increase our emotional connection to G-d through love and we increase our respect for His greatness through awe and fear.
– When our emotions are properly aligned, our actions will follow suit and we will fulfill our personal and global missions.

Fundamental Beliefs (Rambam: 13 Principals)
– G-d, the Creator of the universe is: complete, total unity, non-physical, eternal and the object of all prayers.
– G-d communicates with man. Moshe’s prophecy was unique. The entire Torah was given by G-d and is unchangeable.
– G-d knows our thoughts and deeds and will reward and correct us appropriately. The Messiah will come to help bring the world to its completion. The dead will be resurrected in a new world of physical and spiritual perfection.

Focus (Avos: Who is Rich..)
– We should become wise by learning from everybody.
– We should consider ourselves rich by appreciating all the blessings we have.
– We should consider ourselves powerful when we rule over our own desires and not when we control others.
– We should avoid honor and instead look for the greatness in every human being and acknowledge and praise it.

Other Ideas(Various Sources)
– We should distance ourselves from anger.
– Our focus should be on our individual mission and we should avoid comparisons with others.
– When we meet any person we should ask ourselves two questions: 1. What can I Give to him/her? 2. What can I Learn from him/her?
– Pleasure comes from our appreciation of the unity, completeness and connection of all the things in this world.
– Happiness comes when we work on completing ourselves and help bring the world closer to its perfection and unity.

The Three Seforim That Have Had the most Impact on Me

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I know I’m probably stretching the meaning of ‘seforim’ just a little bit, but I’m taking it to mean any book with Jewish / religious content. It’s a matter of necessity, as the number of ‘traditional’ seforim I’ve read can probably be counted on a couple of hands.

While I love books about Judaism, and I read them voraciously, I just don’t think that my mind is geared towards volumes about measuring what a k’zayos of oreo cookies looks like, or in-depth halachic discussion.

Though I may be stereotyping, I leave that stuff to my husband. And instead, I read books like: Off the Derech and The Science of G-d. These two had a profound affect on me for different reasons.

Off the Derech explores many of the reasons why people leave the faith. It’s a long book, but the main explanation – or at least, my reading of it – is that most people stop being observant because of emotional reasons. Yes, there are a small minority who have difficulties with ‘accepting’ the validity of the Torah, but most leavers come off the derech because they weren’t treated very nicely by people who claimed to be observant.

This really made me sit up and think, particularly in relation to my kids. And it sparked off a real effort in our house to explain the clear separation between ‘looking religious’ and ‘acting religious’ to my five and three year old.

If Off the Derech had a big impact on my parenting, The Science of G-d had an enormous impact, intellectually. Hard as we try to stay above the debate about ‘Creationism’ vs ‘Evolution’, it can be very difficult for a secularly educated, torah-observant Jew to be comfortable about the apparent and fundamental disagreement between science and theology about how our universe began, and then continued.

In ‘educated’ circles, I’d feel ridiculous claiming the world really was created in seven days, for example. In ‘religious’ circles, I’d feel like a semi-apostate for thinking anything else. Then along came Gerald Schroeder, and in a neat, little black volume he happily resolved all these dilemmas. Not everyone agrees with his findings – but then, not everyone has to.

He has a number of incredibly lucid and well-researched arguments which means that if I want to believe in the Genesis version of creation – and I really do – then I no longer have to check my rationality at the door. Schroeder’s book demonstrated that there is no contradiction between science’s account of creation, and our torah.

As well as resolving my personal doubts about the story of creation, it also taught me a very important lesson: if there is a disagreement between what science says and what the torah says, you can bet your bottom dollar that the torah is right.

For millennia, received wisdom was that the universe has always just been here. Jews had to wait 3,250 years for the Big Bang theory to come along and prove that they actually knew what they were talking about.

There are still many, many areas where science disagrees with Jewish theology, but they no longer worry me. Sooner or later the full facts will come out, and there will be more ‘told you so’ moments.

The last sefer is a proper one: Michtav M’Eliyahu, by Rabbi Dessler. The book contains so much that it’s hard to know which parts to highlight. Certainly, the sections on understanding that everything comes from Hashem had a big impact on me. It’s hard to properly motivate yourself when you really grasp that everything does indeed come from Hashem, regardless of our efforts. Finding the right balance between hishtadlut and hisbodedut has been an ongoing effort ever since.

Also, just understanding the level of middot we have to strive to hold ourselves to made me stop being so complacent.

It’s often said that it’s a sign of a good book when you can’t put it down. For me, these three books achieved even more than that: they fundamentally changed my understanding and appreciation of yiddishkeit, and along they way, they also inspired me to try and shorten the gap between what the Torah says, and what I often do.

Looking for Yeshiva Suggestions for a Mature BT With a Passionate Approach to Yiddishkeit

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We recently received the followed request for suggestions for an American Yeshiva for a mature BT.

I’ve been shomer mitzvos for about 5 years, and am still struggling to get a foundation in learning. I’m exploring opportunities to step back from full time work and learn in yeshiva. Israel is a possibility that I’m exploring. But it might be best to do it in the States for a variety of reasons. I’m looking for any suggestions you might have about U.S. yeshivot that are appropriate for mature BTs. I’m aware of three possibilities and plan to explore them in the coming months: Ohr Sameach and Kol Yaakov in Monsey, and the Lubovitch Yeshiva in Morristown.

I clearly want a solid foundation of gemara skills, but don’t want to neglect Tanach and m’farshim. And while I have a strong intellectual background (engineering followed by medical school) I gravitate toward chassidus and a passionate mode of prayer and joyous avodas Hashem.

Any suggestions?

Steve Brizel’s Eretz Yisroel Travel-blog

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Steve Brizel is in Eretz Yisroel and he has been blogging his trip in the comments to this post. We’ve collected some of the comments here, but read the whole thread for the commenting back and forth.

For many of us in Chuz L’aretz, one of the best ways of cultivating and maintaining a love of EY in a physical sense is visiting our children who are learning in yeshivos and seminaries. We visited our older daughter back in 2004 and we are leaving for EY Bezras HaShem for two weeks, this Wednesday night.

Here are a few suggestions for any first time or returning visitor who is visiting a child. First of all, if your son or daughter invites you to sit in on a shiur or chavrusa or chaburah, do so and don’t pull them out of valuable time that could be devoted to Torah learning.You will be inspired by so many young men or women devoting their time to learning Torah.

Read more Steve Brizel’s Eretz Yisroel Travel-blog ›

You’ve Got To Give A Little

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By Sarah Rochel Hewitt
Originally published in the National Jewish Outreach Program’s Bereshith Newsletter.

When I was five or six years old, my parents gave me a scarf for the eighth night of Chanukah. I can picture all of the candles alight on the kitchen table as my dad and brother went to the basement to shoot a game of pool and my mom followed shortly thereafter. Left alone in the kitchen, I sulked over the lousy final present. After all, shouldn’t the last night of Chanukah be the night reserved for the best present? I can honestly say, I don’t know exactly what I was thinking, but I do know that when my mom came upstairs a few minutes later she found me holding the box over the flames. Thank G-d, no damage was done to anything but the box (not even to the ugly scarf).

In our family, Chanukah was definitely about the presents. Blessed with generous parents, my brother and I received something on all eight nights. We waited anxiously for my father to return home from work so we could quickly eat dinner and begin our “Hot and Cold” search. In hindsight, perhaps the best part of the Chanukah gift giving custom was the many lessons I learned from it.

Anticipation is often the best part of exchanging gifts — something I discovered the hard way when I was probably around 10 years old. A few weeks before Chanukah, I stumbled across the place in the basement where my mother would stash the gifts. I knew what I had asked for and was delighted to see a wrapped box of just about the right size. Lo and behold, just my luck, a corner of the wrapping had come loose. Now what would you do? Of course I peeked. It was the Barbie Dream Van for which I had so fervently hoped. I was so happy, but I had no one with whom to share my excitement because no one could know that I knew. I certainly had great expectations of playing with it, but when I brought the large box to the table from its hiding spot that Chanukah, I felt something missing inside. There was no curiosity, no anticipation, no need to shake it to try and guess what was inside. I had spent my excitement before I even had the gift, and I am certain that my parents were well aware of my dampened level of excitement. I can honestly say that never again did I wish to peek at the presents ahead of time. Read more You’ve Got To Give A Little ›