Baal Tshuvah

2008-10-27T18:45:00.006-04:00

A Story From the Yom Tov Table

At my in-laws' house over Sukkos I found myself seated next to a very friendly Israeli young man, married, with two girls. As we got to talking, he and his wife were asking many questions about the area in which I live (which includes many chassidim). He related to me the following story:

I once was visiting America and had to spend a Shabbos in Brooklyn, before I was married. I decided to spend it in Williamsburg. I asked a local where I could find a shul. "What kind?" he asked. "A Jewish one!" I replied. My friend chuckles. He directed me to a large Satmar shul, and I entered to daven kabbalat shabbat. All of the chassidim were dressed exactly the same, in shtreimels! I noticed a group of chassidim looking at me and whispering. My newfound friend is clean-shaven, and wears a kippah s'rugah. A couple of them finally came over to me and asked, "Are you from Israel?" I said yes. It turns out that many of them were also Israeli, and came to America after the 6 day war. They asked, in Hebrew, if I had a place to eat. "Well, I bought some food that's in my hotel room..." I started. One man stepped up and said definitively, "You'll eat with me!" He brought me home after davening to a very small apartment that had hardly any furniture. They were so welcoming to me. I tell you, I think I ate his piece of meat! After the seudah, he insisted that I come back for shabbat day. Those Williamsburgh chassidim are wonderful!

2008-10-27T18:39:00.001-04:00

An article I found highly interesting

2008-10-27T17:47:00.003-04:00

Godol ha-Dor Issues 'Controversial' Psak

No, not the godol of this dor. One of the Gedolim of 700 years ago! Following is my free translation of Peirush ha-Ramban on Parshas Bereshis, 1:3 d.h. vayhi ohr. This having been the Torah reading for last Shabbos, I took the liberty of highlighting a passage:

And know, that the days mentioned in the Creation were, in the creation of the heavens and the earth, 1) actual days 2) composed of hours and minutes 3) and there were six, like the six days of the work week 4) as is the simple understanding of the verse.

L'aniyus da'ti, and I am not claiming that I'm absolutely right, it looks like Rabbeinu is emphasizing 4 separate points. 1) The days were days, not amorphous periods of development classified into days. 2) They lasted the same length that we are familiar with now. 3) It took the same amount of time to create the world as there is from the beginning of this past Saturday night to the beginning of this coming Friday night. No more. 4) This is the plainest, unadulterated understanding of the Torah, and does not need reinterpretation.

And later, verse 4 d.h. vayavdel:

And some of the commentators have explained that this light was created 'before Hashem', meaning in the west, and it immediately sank for the duration of a full night, and afterwards shone for the duration of a full day. And this is why the verse says 'and it was evening and it was morning', because first was night and then was day, and both of them after the creation of light. But this is not correct at all, for they are adding on a short day [the quick light before the first evening] to the six days of creation.

2008-08-28T13:06:00.002-04:00

One small step for shmiras halashon on the net

2008-08-28T12:50:00.005-04:00

Who will fight the loshon hora?

I don't use the internet too often. I'm supposed to be in kollel full time. But bein hazmanim I work in an office and sometimes have to research names of rabbis worldwide on the internet. What freezes my blood is that upon typing in such innocent phrases as "Anycity Beis Din" into Google to find a phone number, I come across websites and blogs devoted to loshon hora as top links. How can we fight it? How can we get the word out: "This is assur" ?? People can mean well, I really believe that many do, but they don't understand that there is no heter for what they're doing. I was just so disturbed by this today that I had to post, although I haven't updated this blog regularly for years.

2005-05-20T16:04:00.000-04:00

Un nouveau livre

Premierement je m'excuse pour la manque des accents sur les lettres - je tape dans une bibliotheque. J'ai trouve un livre formidable, Au nom de la Torah : Une histoire de l'opposition juive au sionisme. Je l'ai commande et je le lis actuellement - un livre comme celui-ci DOIT etre traduit en anglais! Tous les gens qui puissent l'obtenir, achetez-le. Je suis toujours en yeshiva - je prie que je ne doive jamais en sortir.

I realized one thing. It's not worth it. The internet I mean. That's it - no qualifications. It's not worth it. If you're absolutely forced to use it as a tool, to buy a book or a plane ticket or something, that's one thing, but......
It's been so nice being away from it for so long.
A gutten shabbos tzu alle mein leiners. (I don't really speak Yiddish and have no idea if that's gramatically correct)

2004-08-20T10:07:00.000-04:00

שׁינוי בחדשׁות

"Israel is a country noted for its informalities. No stiff upper lip here. When addressing members of the Knesset one does not hear the title “The Honorable” placed before their names. But the shenanigans of National Infrastructure Minister Yosef Paritzky may compel people to place a title before his name. No, not “The Honorable Yosef Paritzky,” but rather “The Dishonorable Yosef Paritzky.” Mr. Paritzky, a tax attorney, conspired with the aid of a private investigator to frame his colleagues in the Shinui Party – a party that ran on a platform of promoting “clean government.” His real sin – he got caught."
-http://www.infoisrael.net/cgi-local/text.pl?source=4/c/120720041
So much for the "anti-corruption" party...

"Despite staunch opposition by chareidi representatives the Knesset Education and Culture Committee, headed by MK Ilan Shalgi (Shinui), reached a decision Monday to require the Education Ministry to carry out the Shenhar Report, which calls for teaching Judaism in a pluralistic spirit by giving expressing to all "streams" of Judaism...

"Rabbi Shmuel Rotner, representing the organization Manof which also participated in the meeting, said it would be better to entirely forego inviting any rabbis to deliver lectures rather than to invite Reform rabbis as well. "Reform is not a legitimate stream of Judaism but a cult. They do not keep mitzvas and do not represent Judaism in any way. Most of the parents at government schools are traditionalists who follow the true Jewish legacy. Therefore inviting Reform or Conservative rabbis represents an act of coercion against parents by educating their children in a manner inconsistent with their wishes."

-http://chareidi.shemayisrael.com/SHM64areform.htm

"In the latest of his inflaming proclamations, Interior Minister Avraham Poraz (Shinui) informed Attorney General Eliakim Rubinstein he supports granting citizenship based solely on the Citizenship Law, a law that allows entry to Israel based on "humanitarian reasons, uniting families, identifying with Zionism or those whose endeavors make a tangible contribution to Israeli society." Poraz told Rubinstein he would like the State to assume this as its official stance in pending High Court appeals filed against the Interior Ministry for its refusal to grant citizenship to goyim who undergo non-Orthodox "conversions," a position that would effectively remove Orthodox conversion as a condition for receiving citizenship.

In his efforts to grab headlines and torment the chareidi, national-religious and traditional sectors, Poraz claims, "The conversion procedure is being taken advantage of for ulterior motives."

-http://chareidi.shemayisrael.com/BMD63aporaz.htm

One of Shinui's platforms is induction of the Chareidim into the military, where they are not needed and not wanted. Even Hesder students, who are supposed to want to go to the army, are having problems in such an immoral environment:

"The national-religious movement's "Torah" community is up in arms over the increasing complaints of hesder yeshiva students, who caution that military service has become intolerable due to severe breaches in halocho and tsnius.

"The attempt by the Mizrachi Movement to combine yeshiva studies with military service, encouraging yeshiva students to perceive army service as a Zionist and idealistic duty, has already encountered numerous problems in the past. National-religious soldiers complained about what takes place in the army and questioned the ability of the young religious man to survive and to maintain his beliefs and religious practice in the framework of the IDF, which is built on secular foundations and serves as the melting pot for Israeli society. Recently these problems have become more pronounced."

-http://chareidi.shemayisrael.com/BLAKvidf.htm

They accomplished the dismantling of the religious affairs department:

"Welfare Minister Zevulun Orlev (NRP), who heads the Interministerial Committee for Religious Services, claims the way decisions were made on the matter of dismantling the Religious Affairs Ministry is "material for an investigative committee. In a Knesset Interior Ministry meeting Orlev said, "The decision to dismantle the Ministry of Religious Affairs was political, with the goal the destruction of religious services."

To be continued.

2004-08-20T09:52:00.000-04:00

Retraction and Addition

I retract the statement in my previous article that Shiuni had moved to ban shechita. Apparently I misunderstood whatever news source I got it from. Instead I will post the following, from "The Jewish Herald":

"Avraham Poraz, named minister of the interior after the last election, has been in the news constantly because of his overt campaign against any religious influence in public life. He announced that persons undergoing Orthodox conversion in Israel would no longer be qualified automatically for citizenship. He has called for abolition of the local religious councils and has denied the right of municipalities to ban nonkosher markets. He is reported to have congratulated the Dutch government on its proposal to ban shechita, Jewish religious slaughter, in that country."

Shinui is the representative party of secularists, and supposedly even Reform and Conservative. I'm not sure why any orthodox Jew would have fuzzy feelings towards them, unless he also hates the Charedim. Please enlighten me.

2004-08-17T11:13:00.000-04:00

בס”ד

Ellul Zman is Coming

Update: BaalTshuvah has just spent over 2 months in yeshiva and is loving it.

I don't really have the time or the interest to update this blog anymore, but once in a while you might get some musings out of me.
I have to say that Monsey is an amazing place. Glad I'm here.

Today is Rosh Chodesh Ellul. K'siva v'chasima toiva, everyone!

p.s. I added a blog to my list, DFME. As a disclaimer, I can't say I agree 100% with all of his views on the state of Israel, but then I don't agree with most people! The force behind DFME is a new friend of mine and one of the most intelligent people I have met.

2004-05-23T02:09:00.000-04:00

By the way... I leave for YESHIVA tomorrow, after doing hashgochoh at a bar mitzvah seudah. That means, most likely, no posting for a week or two or three. Happy Kabbolas haToireh, everyone!

2004-05-23T01:48:00.000-04:00

MOChassid's cousin?

In the restaurant I work at, I had an interesting customer this past week. He was a clean-shaven man in his early 20s with khakis (no tzitzis out), a button-down short sleeve shirt, and a "BU" (Boston University) baseball cap. He told me he had just graduated from BU. He also had HUGE payos that went from his temples all the way around to the back of his head, where they were tied together!!!

2004-05-23T00:42:00.000-04:00

שׁינוי בארץ

The Eirev Rav who call themselves "Shinuy" have decided that shechitah is a cruel form of animal slaughter and should be made illegal. They join the proud ranks of the Nazis, among other Jew hating governments, that have outlawed shechitah.

"It's not that they want a State and therefore shmad the Yidden - it's that they want to shmad the Yidden and therefore need a State." - The Brisker Rav

2004-05-16T23:11:00.000-04:00

Hindu Hair

I think it's worth linking to the Frumteens Moderator's comprehensive summary of the sheitel scandal rocking the frum world.

2004-05-15T21:56:00.000-04:00

Yay! My Blog is Shoimer Shabbos!

Yup, that's right. No one, at least no one linking from another web page, visited my site in the past 24 hours (it's about 9:50pm Saturday night). That means my blog didn't have any shabbos visitors, which is encouraging. This is as opposed to Thursday (16 visits), Wednesday (27 visits), etc. Not huge numbers, but I don't care. It's quality, not quantity.

היה לי שׁבת יפה, ככל השׁבתות. ישׁ לי רק עוד שׁבת אחת בבוסטון לפני שׁאלך לישׁיבת ”קול יעקוב“ במונסי, ניו יארק. בשׁבוע הזה אצטריך להתחיל לשׂים כל נכסי בקופסות ואחר־כך במכונית שׁלי. הרבה עבודה... אבל אני כל־כך שׂמח ללכת לבסוף לישׁיבה! בזמן הקיץ אנחנו לומדים מסכת בבה קמא פרק שׁביעי, ”מרובה“. כל הטוב שׁישׁ בחיי... אין לי מספיק כח להודות את הקדושׁ ברוך הוא. ב״ה יום יום. -מ

2004-05-14T17:29:00.000-04:00

Il m'est venu il y a quelques moments que peut-être (horreurs!) personne n'aime lire mes messages en français. Je suis presque sûr qu'il n'y a pas de lecteurs francophones ici, mais peut-être je n'ai pas raison. Quand même, j'aime pratiquer à écrire dans la langue pour laquelle j'ai suivi 7 années de courses! Je serais encouragé si je recevais des 'comments' des autres francophones lisant ce blog. Vous devez être là! :-) Seulement pour satisfaire ma curiosité j'ai soumit mon ancienne affiche en français à http://babelfish.altavista.com/, une service de traduction automatique en ligne. Ce que j'ai reçu, évidemment, était complètement ridicule. Alors la plupart des gens ne peuvent même avoir une traduction :) La situation devient pire si j'emploie de l'argot-de-net comme 'bcp', '@+', 'tlm', 'mdr', etc.

Ma semaine n'était pas la meilleure, especiellement en roukhniyousse (רוחניות), mais elle se termine bien comme toujours. N'importe quoi qui s'est passé pendant la semaine, la Reine Shabbos est une joie.

Certainment, si je recevrai des réponses en français, je vais considérer écrire quelques essais plus longs pour la bénéfice de mes lecteurs. Et je veux toujours des corrections sur mon usage et ma grammaire, s'il vous plaît!

Souvenez-vous que surtout, vous êtes juifs, le monde est dirigé par le Dieu, et il vous aime. A gut Shabbos.

2004-05-12T13:37:00.000-04:00

DONE

Yup. Fini. Terminé. Nigmara. My end of the semester work is FINISHED. I just sent off my Semantics paper to the Professor. It's a complete, last-ditch, last minute effort at writing something I have no interest in for a class I don't care about. For those who are curious, here is my Semantics Final and Sentence Trees. It's really quite uninteresting.

Now what?

2004-05-10T10:10:00.000-04:00

Improving Links

I didn't know that Tzvi Freeman was a mishichist.

"MaryAnn: Can I ask you a question about the Rebbe? He was the 7th Rebbe... and he had no children, and that title has always been passed down to son or son-in-law, right?

Rabbi Freeman: He is the 7th Rebbe.

MaryAnn: is... sorry

Rabbi Freeman: It's okay."

That makes me think twice about keeping Ask Moses on my links list. Maybe Yehoshua will post a comment that will make me reconsider. Otherwise, it's out. I really have to go searching for more quality links. All of my recent trekking through the so-called Jewish internet has convinced me that a thorough effort is needed to counteract all of the messed up websites out there. *sigh* And especially if I'm going to get a little bit of traffic now, I might as well make the blog better.

On a happy note, Blogger changed its interface. I think it's a big improvement.

2004-05-09T09:06:00.000-04:00

I saw a nice thought recently on http://www.geocities.com/itzik18/PARSHA.html - and I thought I'd share since we're not saying Tachanun today.
I had to take a screenshot because surprise-surprise, Blogger handles cut'n'paste Hebrew text awfully. I took the liberty of making a few minor spelling changes.

À part ça, presque tout va bien dans ma vie. Il y a un 'hachnasas sefer Torah' aujourd'hui pour le shul sefaradi, mais je ne suis pas sûr que j'y irai. Puis je travaille jusqu'à 17h, et après ça j'amène ma mère à une barbeque pour Lag Ba'oimer que fait mon synagogue dans un parc proche. Récemment ce qui vraiment me fait mal au coeur est toute la kefirah que je trouve sur le net... il y a des tas de chequere (שקר) partout! Peut-être c'était meilleur lorsque j'ignorais toutes les stupidités là-bas, comme les karaites et les anti-cabbalistes, les litéralistes et toutes les autres bêtes.
Ok, je m'en sauve. À plus tard!

2004-05-09T02:08:00.000-04:00

Lag someach!

Happy 33 B'oimer, yahrtzeit of Adoinenu Ribi Shimon Bar Yochoi zecher Tzaddik livrocho, author of the Zoihar haKodosh. I had a great shabbos and now I am listening to all of the songs that I've been missing. It's hard on me to cut out music, especially this year when I'm keeping Sefira from rosh choidesh Iyyar until 3 days before Shavuos.

As I was walking back from the Sephardi shul tonight, where there was a Hillula D'Yoma for RaSHB"Y, I got picked up by one of the koillel rabbis who gave me a ride back here. He asked me my name. Now usually I just give a simple answer, but it's not so simple and for some reason I started explaining the whole deal. I don't know if I want to give out my last names here on the internet, but basically the story goes that my father is not Jewish. He's Irish, and his last name is Mc------- - very Irish. I never really thought of changing it until my Rosh Yeshiva suggested it, but he was right - it will be hard on my kids in yeshiva to have a name like that, especially since yeshivas are discreet and "aren't interested in advertising" that a certain bochur has a goyishe grandfather. Not to mention, as unfair as it may sound, that my prospects for shidduchim would not be as good with such a name. The Rosh Yeshiva asked a shaila of both Rav Reuven Feinstein shlit"a and Rav Aharon Shechter shlit"a, who strongly advised my changing my name. So I'm starting to go by my mother's maiden name, at least in yeshiva, and I'm using it more and more in Boston, too. So I said my last name was ....., but legally it was Mc..... because my father was not Jewish. The rabbi looks at me incredulously. "Wow, but you look like you just walked out of Boro Park!" ;-) It's not for lack of trying. I'm also 19, but with my beard people tend to put me at somewhere between 21-26. So I'm a walking false advertisement! Hehe. HaKadosh Boruch Hu also blessed me with a quite good language ability, so I also speak yeshivish too well for someone who's been a baal teshuva for 19 months, and only getting better, plus Hebrew.

So what does my father think about all this? Well, I don't plan on telling him about the name change just yet, maybe I will when I'm ready to get married. And as for me being religious, my grandmother (mother's mother) told me, "Ça ne lui fait rien que tu es religieux, je sais." (It doesn't matter to him that I am religious). Of course, the reason my grandmother had to tell me is because my father just doesn't communicate well. He never has, and this is no exception. It's certainly got to be weird for him, the product of an old-school New England Irish Catholic home to have a (gasp) ultra Orthodox Jewish son. Whenever we talk, it's always just about silly things, small talk. Neither of us can manage to bring up anything serious. Everytime I get the urge to give him a call, I don't end up doing it. I just don't like the uneasiness that comes with it. And he doesn't call me, really ever. My grandmother advised I ask him why he never calls me. It's a good idea.

OK, it's late. I should wind things up for the night. Yeshiva countdown: 13 days!

2004-05-06T22:35:00.000-04:00

A quick break from finishing my Phonology final

I had some random musings that I wanted to set down in blogform. First off, this may be a short-lived reprieve. I feel the pernicious influences of the net really getting to me - the best way to deal may be to just quit it. When I'm in yeshiva, and I get out to the library with internet access once every two weeks or so, I may add a little in digest form about what's going on with me at that point.

I was just randomly thinking the other day that the head of the UN - Kofi Annan - is a cloud-monkey. Ok, wait! I'm not that weird. But "kofi 'anan" קופי ענן in Hebrew does mean "My monkey is a cloud." Just thought I'd share. :-)

Finding Yehoshua's blog has re-plunged me (just a little) into the crazy World of Jewish Bloggers. In an age where every crackpot can say their piece, there is no lack of Jewish voices populating the internet pipelines. From ones that seem like nice, frum people that I can't figure out for the life of me why they feel the need to have a blog (AidelMaidel), to a self-proclaimed "Modern Orthodox Chossid", to a bunch of YU guys bent on dominating the blog world (go figure - Protocols of the Elders.... you get it), people who don't even know who they are anymore (HasidicRebel), jaded victims of the shidduch system (UnbrokenGlass - but a happy ending!), ba'alei teshuva like me and Yehoshua who need some kind of outlet, all the way to outright koifrim (Apikorsus Online, anyone?). I think the best course of action may just be to stay away from it all, rather than have hours sucked up by reading them and getting who knows what kind of strange ideas. I've found most of these things through other blogs that link to them, but I just have trouble linking to things I don't approve of. AidelMaidel writes of her links, "Let me say that while I don't endorse the viewpoints of anyone on the left, I do think that thinking people should be reading them." I'm not sure I agree. As Rabbi Avigdor Miller ZT"L says, "You are what you read." Thinking people should be thinking in the Torah, but I don't know if meditating on questionable musings of questionable people is a useful use of time. Not that I'm claiming to use my time usefully enough as it is. As interesting as HasidicRebel's perspective is, for example, much of the stuff he writes just does not come from a proper hashkofo. The post about modern-day Chassidishe Rebbes not being 'any better than the rest of us' really set me on edge. You might be able to say that about some Rebbes and some courts, but to make a blanket statement like that? We have tzaddikim in this generation, no question. Also his infatuation with secular culture, I think, stems from a lack of exposure and the romance of that which is hard to obtain. Coming from a completely secular background, I can see through a lot of this junk for what it is - shtus. It's the world I left behind. Been there, done that. No contest.

Of course, what's the point of a blog if you're politically correct? My opinion is so stifled and invalidated at Brandeis that I have to let it out somewhere, which is a part of the reason I created this blog. I have a perspective on Israel that people may not hear too often. Let me enlighten you a little... People ask me sometimes what my opinion is on this or that in Israel. The withdrawal. The roadmap. The Palestinians. The medinah in general. I'd like to let some people on in a little secret. Everything in this world, from the dust on my glasses to the war in Iraq, is from Hashem Yisborach. And as you may know, our people does not rest peacefully in its land. We are the victims of some of the strangest warfare phenomena in history - suicide bombings - and Israel is that target of constant international villification. And withdrawal or no withdrawal, Pali state or none, Yassin y"sh dead or alive, chareidi yeshiva students drafted into Tzahal (r"l) or not - they're not going to stop. The makkos suffered by our people in the Eretz haKoydesh will not cease untill the mass dessecration of the holiness of the land ceases. In the chutzois Yerushalayim they play porno movies and sell treyfe and allow homosexual pride marches to go through the streets, Rachmana litzlan. There is massive public chillul shabbos throughout Israel. Prostitution. Israel is the only "country" in the world where there is a party in the government - influential no less - which has as its agenda being ANTI JEWISH. I also want shinuy bamemshala, but not their kind. The only place that dares to raze synagogues and move Jews out of their homes for the crime of being Jews. That has an organization devoted to luring chareidi Jews away from Yiddishkeit. We have to be on a higher level to merit living in this land, and as it is, what nobody seems to want to blame is why we're paying the price. Until the Jews of Israel do tshuvah, and I certainly can't force them, there are going to be major problems. Even the King's children are not allowed to wantonly violate His Palace.

I thought of something interesting as I was finishing up my Psycholinguistics final paper today. Part of the discussion rested on the curious ability of young children to acquire language at an amazing speed. Although adults are far superior to children in their ability to master complex information, children learn languages far more easily than adults. A baby brought up being exposed to 4 or 5 languages at a very young age will end up speaking them all to fluency, but after the age of about 12? Much more difficult. Of course the linguists have no idea why this should happen since they attribute everything to evolution, and one thing that is plainly impossible to explain (among all the others) is the supposed evolution of the language faculty in man. Up until this decade no linguist even wanted to touch the subject, and from the recent literature I've read, it's kind of a joke. The head of my department at Brandeis, Ray Jackendoff, is interested in doing some preliminary work on this, but taking the presupposition that evolution is fact and trying to squeeze in what we know about language is like trying to fit an elephant into a mousehole. My question was, to what can we attribute this interesting contrast that haKadosh Boruch Hu has put into us. We can learn languages fast when we need to, but at the time of maturity it simply drops to a painfully slow rate. I think it perhaps has to do with Hashem's purpose in the differentiation of languages in the first place. When all the world was of one tongue, they planned to get together to establish the ultimate in avoida zoroh, so Hashem confused one's language with the other. I speculate that up until that time our language learning ability may have been commensurate with other adult faculties, highly developed. But in our days, when it's not to our advantage to have everyone learn a lot of languages that quickly, the ability has been choked off as we grow older. Don't think it's a contradiction that they should have had excellent linguistic abilities while there was still one language! According to a theory by Rav Miller ZT"L, there were more languages, developed by different people. It's just that everyone spoke the one basic language from birth, and any others were secondary. When Hashem confused the languages, there was an element of His changing languages themselves, but also of just causing people to forget the common language (now loshon hakoydesh) and solely remember their personal languages.

Ok, I spent way longer on this than I wanted to. Good night, everyone.

2004-05-05T09:28:00.000-04:00

א פרייליכען פסח שׁני

I'm going crazy. It's hard to be a Jew. Harder than anything, but also more rewarding than anything.

"Don't forget to eat matzah on Pesach sheini!"

---Rabbi A. B. Z. Metzger

2004-05-03T10:27:00.000-04:00

I'm famous... kinda

Well, classes finally got out on Friday. I decided that at least if I spend time online doing this blog it will keep me from doing other things online which are not as constructive.
I just got an e-mail from a Yehoshua, who wrote his last weblog entry about me. Hey, I'm famous! Yehoshua is also a "baal teshuva in a secular university" and we are both going to yeshiva this summer. He is a Lubavitcher, something I might have become, were I not whisked away to my Litvish paradise here in Boston by a Mir bochur ;-) . But then again, maybe not. Only Hashem knows. I realized I'm also apparently listed on a blog called Protocols, by some YU students (at least I was as of a month or so ago). It's interesting to see who ends up finding me, since I never publicized this blog to, well, anyone at all. [correction: I did post it on the Frum Jews in College Forum]

I have a paper due Wednesday, a paper due Thursday, and one due Friday (but that one just needs some small revisions). But no more classes, no more books, no more teachers' dirty looks... and no more real finals. I took my Hebrew final on Friday and I think I did well. I even memorized the צה”ל vocabulary! I am ready to go to yeshiva. I hope to be there by Shavuos.

BOO - Is it Orthodox?

First and foremost, a warning to any frum Jew who is considering Brandeis. The "Brandeis Orthodox Organization" is so open-minded that its brain recently fell out. This is evidenced in the latest escapade, the sponsorship of a showing of "Trembling Before G-d". That's right, BOO sponsored a free, public showing of this movie. But that's not the best part. Forget that it's a movie, that it's not tzniusdik, that's it's produced by a homosexual woman conservativerabbi, that it's biased and does not show a true picture of reality... BOO co-sponsored it with the Brandeis homosexual pride organization. That's right. How an organization that pretends to be orthodox can stoop to this is beyond me. Especially right now, at a time when the mishugoim in Massachusetts are going to allow homosexual "marriage", when as Rav Moshe Feinstein ZT"L urges, we should be fighting against this. It's bad enough already that BOO is a part of Hillel - as Rav Shimshon Rephoel Hirsch ZT"L and the Chasam Soifer ZT"L urged, no orthodox group should consider joining together under an "umbrella" with other "Jewish" movements, thus legitimizing them. Add in the offensive signs plastered around campus with a picture of two obviously orthodox young men about to embrace, advertising this movie, with BOO's name right on there! Hashem Yishmereinu. This is why I'm never coming back to Brandeis. At least, I hope I'll never have to.

2004-02-29T11:22:00.000-05:00

La fin

.החלטתי לחזור בתשׁובה משִׁמושׁ־האינטֶרנֶט. הַנֶט הביא אותי לביטול תורה ועוד דברים רעים
.אז מעתה בע”ה אני אפסיק לכתוב פה ־ אולי בעתיד אכתוב
.אינני יודע

I finally decided I've had enough. Web = bad. I'm wasting much too much time. Hopefully I'll be able to stop doing all but that which is absoultely necessary (schoolwork). Any further comments or questions can be e-mailed to charedi@brandeis.edu.

.השם עמכם

2004-02-24T00:16:00.000-05:00

!זה היום עשה השׁם, נגילה ונשׂמחה בו

Well, I'm up anyways at this ridiculous hour, so I might as well write. I just spend a spectacular week in yeshivah in Monsey, NY, at "Kol Yaakov". I can't even describe how wonderful it was, I felt like I finally "arrived", you know? The Rosh Yeshivah (head rabbi of the yeshivah) has been extremely helpful to me, basically setting everything up so that I can do what I really want with my life. I was taken to NYC to see Rav Aharon Shechter, one of the foremost rabbis in the world, Rosh Yeshiva of Chaim Berlin.
In the yeshiva we were learning גמרא מסכת בבא קמא, and I had 5 different rabbis I studied with. And Monsey's just in a class by itself - a suburbia where driving down the street you will see Chassidim walking on the sidewalk and little boys with peyos and little girls with long skirts playing in the front yard. Where you can drive to the 7-11 and get strictly kosher milk. There's really nothing like it, outside of the land of Israel.

I've decided I want to go to yeshivah, for real. God willing, I start in May.

2004-02-08T09:43:00.002-05:00

Response

I've received several encouraging responses to my post of January 25th. I got some good constructive criticism and I thought I'd post my response here (I originally tried to put it in my Comments but it was too long). The reader was concerned that I was saying that Reform and Conservative don't actually exist as movements. That wasn't my intention.

Just quickly glancing back at my original post, I'd just clarify: what I meant is that intrinsically there are no species of Jews. Obviously reality demands one to recognize that Jews are *all* different and many use certain labels to identify themselves with certain 'movements' (although these labels are rarely useful, most "Reform" Jews for example say "Reform" because they don't really observe anything - they don't actually know much about the 'official doctrine' of the Reform movement, same holds true even for many self-proclaimed orthodox). But there's no cosmic reality that marks someone as "Reform" "Conservative" or even "Orthodox". That was my real point. Whereas, in my world view of course, and as I'm arguing, the world
view of the Torah, there is a cosmic reality that marks one as a Jew in general. Thus we (Jews) don't say that a Jew who converts to Christianity is a Christian. He's still a Jew, because that is reality despite his personal feelings about the matter (evidently in contrast with relativism, but you knew that already). It's a little more complicated than that - Jewish law would apply differently to a Jew so removed that he has 'converted' to a religion, but according to the Torah he is still obligated to stop what he's doing and return to Jewish observance, and that's what makes him a Jew (because non-Jews are NOT obligated to become Jews). I suppose it could sound a little strange, but just as unfortunately many Jews have ended up
converting to some religion, for example Christianity, a fair number have returned to full Torah observance (certainly not even a large minority, but still, it's far from unheard-of, especially there are large numbers of observant Jews who used to be "Jews for Jesus" and then realized what a sham it was).
My larger goal in explaining this point was to try to convince Jews to at least make an informed decision, at least learn the minimum they should know about Jewish history, for example the methodology of the Oral Law, the different ages (the times of the Prophets, of the First and Second Temples, and afterwards), and the writings of Jewish authors from early medieval times to the present. It's just such a rich heritage that no person should be denied it. By proclaiming "I am a Conservative Jew" (as has been proclaimed to me in the past), you are writing yourself a very poor excuse not to think (true, not everyone, but trust me, the vast majority). I
personally think it's a shame that the typical American Jew knows that Jesus's parents were Mary and Joseph but not that Moses's parents were Amram and Yocheved. And that typifies the severe lack of basic Jewish knowledge. Classics like "The Kuzari" and "Duties of the Heart" (Chovos Ha-Lvavos) should not be completely unknown as they are, and those who disdain their 'backwards' ancestors of ages past, without even cracking open a book of Maimonides, Rav Sa'adiah Gaon or Rabbeinu Bachiya (all of whom wrote stunning philosophical masterpieces aimed at those familiar with Aristotelian philosophy) are contented with knowing a caricature of Judaism, comparable to the shadows in Plato's 'Allegory of the Cave'.
It reminds me of the story of an atheist who came up to a great rabbi, and wanted to know what the rabbi had to say to him. The rabbi asked, "Have you read Maimonides, or Yehuda ha-Levi?" He answers, "No." "Well, have you read Plato, Aristotle, or any of the classic philosophers on religion?" "No." The rabbi looks at him incredulously. "You're not an atheist. You're an idiot!"
At least one should let his religious beliefs or feelings, or lack thereof, be based on some knowledge beyond "Idiot's Guide to...". The same metaphor I used in my original post comes to mind, when you're looking to buy a car or anything else important, you test drive a few, you think about financing and how fair the price is, how useful it is, etc. When it comes to religion, which should be one of the most important *considerations* in one's life (even if ultimately one decides NOT to
practice any religion), most are contented with little or no real critical research. Judaism's position is different - blind faith is absolutely not considered the ideal, unless you are just a very simple person and then you should rely on the tradition of your ancestors. But one who posesses a little more intelligent is mechuyav - obligated - to understand the whats and whys of the Torah lifestyle. The obligation to learn throughout life has characterized the Jew throughout history (for example, mandatory public education was instituted sometime in the Temple period [before that children were taught by their parents], and when establishing a new Jewish town the law is that the school and the mikvah are the first things that must be built. Only afterwards should you worry about building a shul).

2004-02-06T14:38:00.000-05:00

Aleinu עלינו

I recently received the following announcement from the Chillul organization at Brandeis:

COME LEARN ABOUT THE PRAYER ALEINU

Come on Saturday afternoon to look at the prayer "Aleinu" in a new way! R. S. will be leading discussion on the history and the reasoning behind why we say what we say - and why other people do it differently. We'll look at prayer books as old as 1872 and as new as 2005. Bring your favorite prayer book and join BaRuCh, R.S., and Rabbi Lehmann for our second discussion in BaRuCh's newest education endeavor, "Intro to Reform Judaism". We will begin Saturday at 1:00 PM in Feldberg Lounge. Come join us for what promises to be an eye-opening discussion.

There can only be one response to such an announcement.

!שהם משתחווים להבל וריק ומתפללים אל אל לא יושיע

2004-01-25T11:16:00.000-05:00

A Plea To Jews Searching For Truth! (Especially @ Brandeis)

This is a plea, a personal plea, stemming from the pitiful scene I encounter every single time I step onto the Brandeis campus. More than it makes me angry, it tears at my heart for the future of this Jewish people. My brothers and my sisters! By birth, Holy members of the Jewish People, in whom has been implanted an exalted and Godly soul [see footnote]* - I urge you to step outside yourself, if even for the first time in your life. Examine your life and your values, where you are going, and what you are doing. Perhaps what you are doing really and truly and completely fulfills you - but you are probably like the majority of people who are constantly searching for that new cause, that new pleasure or adventure, something to fulfill your longing for greatness and accomplishment in this short world.
We all search, most times our whole life, and deep down we all want the Elusive Truth. In modern times, the truth is both very far and very near - the almost hopelessness of the search leading many to unfortunately conclude that it is not to be found, and even in some cases, that it does not exist at all. But if we lived out our entire life, without even looking in our own backyard, we should be ashamed, my brethren.

Rabbi Avigdor Miller begins one of his books in the "Jewish Seeker's Ideology" series thus:

" 'All the labor of a man is for his mouth, but the Soul (the desire of the Soul) is not filled' (Koheles [Ecclesiastes] 6:7). Why is Man never satisfied, despite all that he eats and possesses? This phenomenon is unique in the world and is found only in Man. Give a cow enough grass and water, and a shady spot under a tree, and it will remain contented indefinitely; but even the wealthiest and most fortunate men quickly become restless and dissatisfied. What is the source of this endless restlessness? ...

"Why has the Creator imbued Man, alone among all creatures, with instincts which can never be satisfied? Whereas every instinct in animals has a purpose which is essential to its existence and procreation, why should Man alone possess natural urges which do not facilitate his existence, but even interfere with his physical well-being and which disturb his mind? In a world where every phenomenon of nature, organic and inorganic, demonstrates purposefulness and utility, what purpose or benefit do these... mysterious urges have for mankind?

"Or is this puzzlement due to a misunderstanding of Man's true nature and his true function in life? The child who does not know the origin of honey and the story of pollination is mystified by the bee. Why is its body so hairy, why does it sting, and why is it so endlessly prowling about the flowers Later he learns that the hairy body transports pollen, and the sting protects the hidden hive where the bee brings the honey it gathers all day among the flowers. Those who attempt to understand man as an intelligent social animal whose function is the maintenance of his existence and the perpetuation of his species, shall be eternally bedeviled with questions which cannot be answered. But when they understand that he too has an unknown function, whereby he produces an equivalent of honey, so to speak, in some mysterious hideaway revealed only to his inner consciousness, then they can begin to solve the riddles of Man's nature. MAN YEARNS BECAUSEE THE CREATOR MADE HIM A SEEKER. His perpetual dissatisfaction has the function of inciting him to seek without cessation."

My friends, I propose to you something which reason requires you examine: 1) That people need not blindly follow the modes of behavior and idle philosophies that they've grown up with or come up with on their own, but rather have the right and responsibility to examine these and subject them to logical scrutiny and inquiry, and 2) Your preconceived understanding of your own heritage may be at best flawed, or at worst completely ignored and undeveloped. I will address these two points in order.

My friends! My colleagues, fellow intelligent and critically thinking people, who (if they are at Brandeis) have most likely excelled in general academic studies and have sharp minds! We must recognize one very important thing in ourselves: We are creatures of habit. How many times have I been talking to someone, encouraging a little suggested reading, or a nice shabbos meal with Rabbi and Rebbetzin Chein (hey, I guarantee the food is better than Sherman!)? And what is the answer I often hear? "I was brought up Reform," "I'm a Conservative Jew," "I'm not really concerned with that kind of thing," and my personal favorite, some variation of, "The Orthodox scare me." My brothers and sisters, I would like to make a few points to you. First of all, there is no such thing as a Reform Jew, a Conservative Jew, or a Reconstructionist Jew. There is also no such thing as an Orthodox Jew!!! I beg you, look into the Torah, the Prophets, the Hagiographa, the Talmud and the holy writings of the Geonim. Find me a place where any of these divisions are mentioned! The truth is, a Jew is a Jew, a Jew can be closer to or farther from the Torah, a Jew can be wiser or ignorant. But there are no species of Jews. According to God and the Torah, 'Conservative,' and even 'Orthodox' or 'frum' mean absolutely nothing.

Secondly, if we label ourselves and box ourselves into these categories, saying "It's how I was brought up," we are really accomplishing nothing and only making an excuse for apathy. I, for example, know what it means to be "brought up Conservative." It means - nothing special! I knew I was Jewish, at least I had some sort of Jewish identity. But it has no intrinsic identification with the "Conservative movement". In 99% of cases, it's just the 'shul' you happen to have grown up going to. If I told 99% of Reform Jews to tell me the principal ideologies of their 'movement,' they couldn't give me a straight answer. They just know that they go to a synagogue and the people call it by some name or another. And don't think this disease of apathy doesn't apply to so many self-proclaimed 'Orthodox' Jews as well! The truth is, no matter how we were brought up, at some point we have to think about our path in life, evaluate it, study it. Otherwise we are truly living in ignorance, no matter how many Ph.D.'s you have or how many grandmaster chess championships you've won. The following was written by the great master of Jewish thought, Rabbi Moshe Chayim Luzzatto of Padua, Italy, in 1740 in his classic work, "Path of the Just". His audience was exclusively Jews that completely followed the Torah and all its laws - the idea of "nonreligious Jew" was virtually unknown - yet he writes this in his Chapter II: Concerning the Trait of Watchfulness (B'vei'ur Middath Hazz'hiruth):

"The idea of Watchfulness is for a man to exercise caution in his actions and his undertakings; that is, to deliberate and watch over his actions and his accustomed ways to determine whether or not they are good, so as not to abandon his soul to the danger of destruction, God forbid, and not to walk according to the promptings of habit as a blind man in pitch darkness. This is demanded by one's intelligence. For considering the fact that a man possesses the knowledge and the reasoning ability to save himself and to flee from the destruction of his soul, is it conceivable that he would willingly blind himself to his own rescue? There is certainly no degradation and foolishness worse than this. One who does this is lower than beasts and wild animals, who nature it is to protect themselves, to flee and to run away from anything that seems to endanger them. One who walks this world without considering whether his way of life is good or bad is like a blind man walking along the seashore, who is in very great danger, and whose chances of being lost are far greater than those of his being saved. For there is no difference between natural blindness and self-inflicted blindness, the shutting of one's eyes as an act of will and desire. . . . [Ignoring one's way in life] is precisely the device that the evil inclination employs against man . . . One cannot escape it without great wisdom and a broad outlook. As we are exhorted by the Prophet (Haggai 1:7), "Give heed to your ways." And as Solomon in his wisdom said (Proverbs 6:4), "Give neither sleep to your eyes nor slumber to your eyelids. Rescue yourself as a deer from the hand. . ." And as our Sages of blessed memory said (Sotah 5b), "All who deliberate upon their paths in this world will be worthy to witness the salvation wrought by the Holy One, Blessed be He." "

To address the second point, that we must consider that our own understanding of our Jewish heritage is flawed, the statement of a prominent Israeli television and movie entertainer, Uri Zohar, is brought to mind. After being one of the greatest Israeli actors and comedians in his youth, at the age of 40 he left that career which was ultimately unsatisfying for the study of Torah, and ultimately, rabbinical ordination. The title of one of his books is, "My Friends, We Were Robbed!" We were robbed - in the sense that Judaism, its core beliefs, history, and attitudes, and knowledge of the Torah, has been almost completely denied us or distorted. It's rarely a case that we were intentionally lied to - rather the apathy or ignorance of the previous generation has been passed down to us. Some of us were brought up confused - something that has turned a lot of young people off to Judaism. They saw their parents making a big deal out of something like a bar or bat mitzvah, but it was a big show. Obviously the parents cared nothing about the Torah itself and were content in the belief it was a creative and ancient fairy tale - and this dichotomy and insincerity really strikes impressionable young minds. To paraphrase one friend of mine, "I realized at my bar mitzvah that I didn't believe in any of this stuff, and it was all a sham anyways. I dropped it and never looked back."

Others may not have had such a learning-impoverished experience, but are still confused (whether they know it or not) on core issues such as the nature of God and the Jewish People, our mission in the world, the concept of the Messiah and how we are different from Islam and Christianity, what the Torah is exactly and how it was transmitted throughout the generations, what our beliefs really are, and how they started. Well, I don't blame you for being confused, my friends - I spent 12 years in an after-school Conservative "Hebrew School Program", and I didn't learn any of those things either! I propose that we owe it to ourselves to at least LEARN, after all, knowledge is power! Irrespective of whether we are ready to approach the issue with a completely open mind, or whether you are "pretty sure" that you're not ready to start considering that the Torah might provide you with a valuable spiritual guide, and ultimately the answers that we're looking for in life. It's true that there are many Jews who are successful, even geniuses, who might advise you not to be bothered. But there are also astrophysicists, neurobiologists, and philosophy professors who will candidly tell you that if we are seeking knowledge of Hashem (God), the Torah is the beginning and end of your search.

I'd also like to clarify something that many of us do not understand - By "Torah" I don't mean only the scroll that is chanted every Monday, Thursday and Sabbath. When a Jew who follows the Torah uses the term "Torah," we mean the whole spectrum of classic Jewish sacred writings, expositions, and codes of law, including The Five Books of Moses, the Prophets & Hagiographa, the Midrash (homiletical exegesis on the Torah), the Mishna (outline of the foundations of Jewish Oral Law), the Talmud (the huge compilation of Sages' exposition on Jewish law and world-outlook, written in Aramaic), all of the commentaries and digests and novellae throughout the centuries. The Torah is a living organism, it lives with us and shapes us as we shape it, as the Torah tells us in Parshath Nitzovim (Deuteronomy 30:11):

"For this commandment that I command you today - it is not hidden from you and it is not distant. It is not in heaven, [for you] to say, "Who can ascend to the heaven for us and take it for us, so that we can listen to it and perform it?" Nor is it across the sea, [for you] to say, "Who can cross to the other side of the sea for us and take it for us, so that we can listen to it and perform it?" Rather, the matter is very near to you - in your mouth and in your heart - to perform it."

(As an aside, the whole beginning of Nitzovim is a quite inspiring section of the Torah.) When Rabbi Israel Meir HaKohen wrote his comprehensive commentary to the Code of Jewish Law earlier this century, the Mishna Berurah, it was included in and called "Torah". The Torah lives with the Jewish people as we live with it, as it has in an unbroken chain since we received it. It is your inheritance, you have a right to it! Come and get it.

Search and search and search, search for truth like diamonds. There are many good books in the BOO Beis Midrash, located in the basement of Shapiro dorms in Massell quad, or if you're reading this on the internet try links on my sidebar like "Being Jewish", "Lazer's Talmud Torah", and "Living up to the Truth", all highly recommended for beginners. The point of this essay was not the be an overnight inspiration to a radical change in your lifestyle! That would also go against 'reason and intelligence'. It is an exhortation to learn as much as you can, and make an informed decision rather than an apathetic one. When we are looking to buy a house, we might tour a dozen or so, looking for just the right one that will fit our needs. But when religion - the single most important issue of one's life, pertaining to his soul and eternity - comes up, it's good enough to just do whatever feels right.

* * *
As an addendum, I would like to address the point of so-called Orthodoxy. Because I just trashed the use of such labels above (although in truth they are convenient and we do use them in conversation at times), I will refer to this as Torah Judaism, as defined by the great genius and scholar Rabbi Moses ben Maimon, or "Maimonides", in his Thirteen Principles of Judaism. If you examine a so-called "movement" and it adheres to these 13 Principles set down by Maimonides in the late 12th century (available all over the place, for example the Complete Artscroll Siddur p. 179), you can be reasonably sure it fits into standard, mainstream, Torah Judaism. The truth is that Torah Judaism is not a monolith. We recognize that there are many paths to Hashem. Torah Judaism spans hundreds of "sects", all of whom recognize the others, will daven (pray) in their synagogues, intermarry, etc. There are Chassidim, like Lubavitch, Breslov, Bobov, Satmar, Stolin-Karlin, Kloysenberg, Bostoner, and dozens more groups; there are the Sephardim from Morocco, Algeria, Turkey, Egypt; the Syrians and Teimani (Yemenite), the Persian Jews, the Yekkis (German Ashkenazic Jews), Litvak (Lithuanian), Russian. I know what I was taught by my relatives: The "Orthodox" live apart in little shtetls like they did back in Europe. I knew nothing about them or the richness of all the traditions! And truth be told, if you are respectful of their customs when you visit, no proper Jew in the world is going to turn you away with condescension. No matter what your preconceived notion, not the most set apart group of Chassidim in the world would turn you away if you needed a place for Shabbos (the sabbath). But it's much more than that, most Torah-observant Jews would be happy to talk, welcome you into their homes, discuss anything with someone who is really searching for answers. Thank God, we have a wonderful, warm and dedicated couple right here at Brandeis, Rabbi Peretz and Chanie Chein, who extend themselves every single sabbath to have over many guests and provide them all with delicious shabbos meals, for no charge, with no prejudice, no matter what your background and what your current situation. That's what they're here for! To provide a model Jewish home, to get an experience you might have never had, as their website says, a Jewish "home away from home". There's nothing to be scared of or intimidated by - and what I beg of you is that just as they hold no prejudice towards you, you would hold none towards them, because of some a silly label like 'orthodox' or a black fedora. I actually live off campus, in Boston, in a more "Litvak" community, and I would urge anyone interested in spending a wonderful shabbos in Boston please contact me about it. Also, if you have any questions about my essay, feedback, constructive criticism or concerns, feel free to send me an e-mail (charedi@brandeis.edu). Attacks and missionaries not welcome.

Mark "Moyshe" M., 2 Shevat 5764 (January 25, 2004), Boston, MA

* (Before I get any letters, yes, gentiles also have a Godly soul and are made in the image of God, as you can see if you open up any Bible to the beginning of Genesis. However, gentiles are not obligated to follow the Torah and need only be concerned with a few basic and logical duties, such as not stealing and murdering, and not worshipping idols. The Jewish soul is of a different nature and must follow the Torah in order to fulfill its mission in this world.)

2003-12-11T23:45:00.000-05:00

המחשׁב שׁלי לא עובד טוב

אני לא יודע למה ־ עכשׁיו כשׁאני רוצה לפתוח יותר מתוכנית אחת, המחשׁב לא מהר בכלל! וישׁ לי מחשׁב יקר ומהר... אוי. כן, אתם נחונים, לא רציתי באמת לדבר על מחשׁבי, אבל אני צריך להשׁתמשׁ את הלשׁון הזה או אשׁכח את הכל. אחרי השׁבת הבא אני אנסוע לבית אִמִי לבקר אותה, ואחר־כך אנסוע הביתה בבֶרקשִׁירז. אֶשַׁאֵר שׁם בארבעה ימים, ואלך לישׁבת אור שמח במונסי, ניו יורק. עם ירצה השׁם אלמד שׁם בשׁלושׁ שׁבועות

2003-12-10T19:54:00.001-05:00

Those Mean Satmars

בס”ד
I was being driven across campus by a Lubavitcher (L) friend of mine today. At the same time he was driving one of my modern-orthodox (M), zionist friends. I started off a conversation by asking about the car we had see with the Na-Nach bumper sticker.
M: Yeah, crazy Na-nachers. (mischeivous tone) You'd almost think they were worshipping their rebbe, huh?
L (glancing at his photo of the Lubavitcher Rebbe on the dashboard): Hey, let me tell you, there are plenty of crazy things going on in Yiddishkeit nowadays.
M: Like people worshipping their rebbes...
L (softly): Yeah, like some people worship medinas Yisroel (the state of Israel).
M: What was that?
L: Nothing...

I couldn't stop myself from laughing! Then on the way back from dropping off a paper (not my own) in the Judaic Studies building, I got into a conversation with another member of BOO (the Brandeis Orthodox disOrganization). We were talking about all the people leaving this semester, and I mentioned my Lubavitcher friend, so we got on that topic. He said something like "Boy are they crazy! I don't know how they came to dominate chassidus so fast!" I assured him that they were not quite the largest group of chassidim. Satmar certainly outnumbers them. "Even worse!" he exclaimed, "I'd rather it be the Lubavitchers!"
I asked him why, to which he responded that the Satmar are 'mean'. When I inquired further, insisting that most Satmar chassidim are in fact quite nice people, I got the truth out. They're 'mean' because they're anti-Zionists! I pointed out that being anti-Zionist doesn't make one mean (apparently he's unaware of my personal views on zionism!). He said, "well, politically mean." And then he went on a tirade about how if they were against Israel they should stop taking money from them. More on this later, time for me to daven mairiv, the night-time service!

2003-12-07T22:31:00.000-05:00

Finals finally finished

בס”ד
Well, I've tried to write this entry 2 or 3 times and various things have happened to it... ? Anyways, as my title indicates I am finally liberated from the shackles of third semester toil. And to tell you the truth, I don't think it went that badly. True, I did kind of mediocre on my French essay (you can see it if you would like, just email me :) ), pretty badly on my Linear Algebra final and my physics-drop is now pending with the board of academic standing. But hey! It's over. Now I have a week to clean, pack, work a little, and learn. I'm in the fifth chapter of mishnas Eiruvin and I'm just starting a "Partners in Torah" program with a bochur learning at Ner Yisroel yeshiva, in Baltimore. We're going through chumash with Rashi's commentary.

It's snowed horrendously for the past few days... I spent a few hours today digging out my car from the more than 2 feet of snow, surrounded by a sea of other buried cars. I wasn't able to drive my car for safety reasons, thus I didn't make it to work or to the engagement party I was invited to. Oh well; a mentch tracht und Gott lacht, as they say.

I'm looking forward to my stay at Ohr Somayach Yeshiva over the break. It should be a great learning experience. I was there once before to visit, and was very impressed. Hopefully I'll gain Hebrew skills and ability to analyze commentaries, etc. I haven't had to work very hard in Hebrew at all to receive an A, mostly because I use Hebrew so often outside of class (besides my natural language ability, which is pretty good).

עם זה אני אכתוב קצת בעברית! מצאתי חבר שׁאנחנו יכולים לדבר ביחד, וזה טוב מאד. אם אתם יכולים לקרוא את מה שׁאני כותב, אולי אתם רוצים
.לשׁלוח לי דואר אֶלֶקטרוֹנִי

2003-11-12T20:48:00.000-05:00

Why the Internet is Ruining My Life

בס”ד
OK: I'm left with 3 courses at school. I'm doing shakily in ALL of them. It seems I NEVER have time to learn Torah. Why is this? I can trace it to a few reasons:
1) Working at the restaurant too many hours
2) my commute
3) procrastination
4) procrastination via THE INTERNET

This blog, for example, is being written instead of math homework. I check my email, I respond, I check my favorite websites, I chat a little here a little there, and then I find some other non constructive ways to waste my time. In short, I NEED TO QUIT THE INTERNET. Cold turkey. I am resolving not to update this blog until my French project is DONE. Of course I'll still be checking email, but besides that.... *sigh*. Stupid WWW.

I know next semester will be better. It HAS to be. And I'm praying that this is my all time low at school (because it's bad but not TOO bad...).
Arrivederci!

2003-11-10T20:46:00.000-05:00

Watch out, kufar

Not only are there two Islam Awareness Weeks per year here at Brandeis (one per semester), but now there's even an Islam Awareness Month: you guessed it, Ramadan!
As the Muslim Student Association (national chapter)'s website makes known, I.A.W. is a week for dawwah: the Muslim version of evangelism. Watch out, kufars of Brandeis: you are being drawn into the Dar-al-Islam, inshallah.
I got a nice little flyer in my school mailbox about it. I'm used to getting pleasant little surprises, like condoms, nude-dance invitationals and Catholic Student Organization meeting notices.
I've been wondering for a while now: what kind of "Muslims" are the students at Brandeis? I mean, according to the Sunni rhetoric I've heard, Shi'ites aren't really Muslim at all! Rather they are heretics who must be brought to the side of truth. And the Shi'ites consider the Sunni traditions "filthy and disgusting," hoping Sunnis will come to the Pure Faith. Could it be that in Brandeis's spirit of plurality the two sects pray together? What would Allah have to say about that? The Islam Awareness Month activity for Thursday is on "Social Justice Issues in the Progressive Muslim Movement". That implies that the 'Deis Muslims are indeed progressives, and not rent by trivialities like that. Of course, if progressive Muslims are at all analogous to Christian and Jewish 'progressives,' they are probably hardly considered Muslim at all by the mainstream imams.

And of course, in the traditional progressive, open, pluralistic, modern, reformed, new and improved Brandeis "Jewish" attitude, parshas Chayei Sorah will see a "Shabbat Iftar with Hillel". I'm sorry, did I read that correctly? Shabbat - the Jewish sabbath, a day of rest. Iftar - a Muslim breaking of the fast after nightfall in Ramadan. "Shabbat Iftar" - doesn't compute!!! Of course progressives of all stripes are ideological allies. Sorry I'm going to miss that one. Of course, that's the same night as "shidduch shabbat," another brainchild of the genius chillul, er, I mean Hillel board. IY"H more Brandeisians will sign up for the shabbaton we're having in Boston and will be saved from a night of awkward assigned seating and Jewish-Muslim patty-cake games.

I always thought that Brandeis could really benefit from a Jewish Awareness Week. Ok, go ahead, laugh! But just because Brandeis has a slight majority of Jews doesn't mean that anyone there knows even a shtikl Yiddishkeit. Come to think of it, I could clear up all sorts of myths and silliness, like telling them that YES, Judaism DOES believe in an afterlife, a heaven and hell (albeit a different kind of hell than the Christians think of)! No, you AREN'T still considered a "good Jew" if you disbelieve in God, rather knowledge of God's existence is the #1 absolute fundamental that Judaism introduced to the world, called "foundation of all knowledge" by Maimonides (13th-c) and "ראשׁית חכמה" (similar meaning) by Shlomo, or Solomon the King, wisest of men. And YES, we do believe premarital sex is wrong! And all sorts of other things that a Reform, Conservative or Reconstructionist "education" will never get you! I managed to finish 13 years of "Hebrew school" without knowing what the Talmud was, or almost anything important about Jewish history, or why Rashi was important, etc. Then they get to college, where the ones that want to know something about Judaism enroll in Judaic Studies and learn silliness, and the ones that don't just go through life knowing almost nothing of their heritage.

"We don't believe in pluralism... [This is a] very important lesson. We don't believe in unity! ...We dwell alone." -Rav Miller זצ”ל

(Note: now that you've been sufficiently offended, I'll put in my disclaimer. I'm not criticizing Muslims or Islam per se. In fact, I consider Islam to be better than most religions, at least they are God-fearing and adhere to a code of interpersonal and sexual morality. I'm criticizing the stupid Brandeis liberal pluralistic attitude, which is counterproductive to the promulgation of true culture and tradition.)

2003-11-09T23:05:00.000-05:00

Playing catch-up

I work in a glatt kosher restaurant. Sometimes, when I'm bored and I feel like getting mad (or just amused) I pick up one of the numerous "Jewish" newspapers that are dropped off for free in the corner of the store. Today it was the "Jewish Journal". I noted an article of interest: apparently the Conservatives are having a big meeting (in Texas of all places, or was it Arizona?) about whether to ordain open homosexuals as rabbis. Now, this strikes me as a stunning example of the principle explained by the great rabbi Elchonon Wasserman הי”ד זצ”ל in The Era Preceding Mashiach.

"The Prophet Yechezkel prophesied that in the era before the coming of Moshiach, a new doctrine will arise among the Jews whose slogan is, "Let us be like the nations" (20:32)"

Just a few short weeks after the liberal Protestants have decided to start ordaining gay bishops, the conservatives realized "Hey! We're falling behind the goyim! Let's get with the times!" Usually the Conservatives take a few years to catch up with the Reformers, since their doctrine is more about abandoning the Torah slowly instead of quickly, like the Reform. I guess that holds true this time, as the Reformer religion has been 'embracing our other-sexual brothers and sisters in a joyous atmosphere of mutual respect' for decades now! To their credit, there is going to be an arguer on the side of not letting gays become "rabbis," his position stemming from the fact that it does say somewhere in that big scroll they parade around every Saturday that homosexuality is not right. I wonder if the Reform have come up with a more P.C. Torah scroll yet. In any case, they've commissioned as usual the Conservative Association of [Making Up] 'Jewish' Laws and Standards to 'look into the matter'. I wonder how they will get out of this one. Could be the same way they get out of the prohibition against driving on the sabbath (yes, the prohibition against lighting fires IS in there): beats me! But gays will probably become "rabbis" the same way women did: the assimilationist masses of Conservatives will outvote their "rabbis" that actually know something about halacha (Jewish law).
The Conservative religion ignores, de facto if not in theory, about 99% of what the Torah (including the oral law) commands us to do - besides a few poor committed souls left in the Jewish Theological Cemetary and scattered about elsewhere. See my sidebar link, The Conservative Lie. This policy meeting is a farce. And if they start to "ordain" gay "rabbis," they will just alienate even more people than they alienated when they started ordaining women rabbis.
The Torah is our heritage. Come back to it, my precious Yidden - it's waiting for you.

2003-11-08T22:31:00.000-05:00

Vous ai-je dit que je n'aime point Brandeis?

בס”ד

Ah, peut-être je ne vais pas employer mon post aujourd'hui pour maudire Brandeis. Mais Ô, que je ne veux pas faire ces ordures pour ma classe de français, qui s'appelle "Politique et Communauté". Que fais-je? Je dois écrire une dissertation sur les Acadiens/Cajuns, bien que je ne sois pas encore même sûr précisément de ce que je vais écrire. En plus je suis obligé de livrer une présentation orale le 24 Nov en classe. Eh bien de plus je dois écrire une dissertation au sujet du roman "Gargantua", de Rabelais. Quelle stupidité! Celle-ci est la dernière classe de français à Brandeis que je passe. Je n'aime ni la littérature française ni la philosophie française. הכל הבל, comme dit Salomon le roi.

Bien alors, il advint que je veuille écrire en français ce soir. Je n'ai jamais assez de pratique quand même, vu que je n'ai aucune personne avec qui bavarder. J'ai enfin lâché mon cours de physique. Ça n'a pas valu la peine. Actuellement je suis 3 cours, le minimum permis pour être étudiant 'full-time'. Ça ne me dérange pas trop, si je dois suivre un cours pendant l'été pour arriver à terminer mes cours une année en avance je ferai ça joyeusement.

Je dois vraiment aller dormir, mais je ne peux pas... de toute façon je n'ai plus de quoi écrire. Passez une bonne nuit!

(Short English summarry added for Erin's benefit:
I felt like doing an entry in French because I needed the practice and don't write in it often enough. I talked about my stupid French class for which I have to do a project on Acadia/Cajun Louisiana, and an essay on "Gargantua". I finally dropped my physics course, also, but I still hope to finish school a year early. Have a good night!)

2003-11-06T23:12:00.000-05:00

אַי פינישׁט מאַי מאַת מיד־טערם

Yes, the math midterm... well, I don't think I failed! Actually, I'm hoping for about a B+. Oh, and I got an A on my Hebrew midterm. So this semester isn't a total loss... yet.

"Have you ever thanked Hashem for sanity?" -Rav Miller זצ”ל

2003-11-06T03:53:00.000-05:00

The Moral Bankruptcy of the American College Campus

North Quad's own:

Porn `n' Chicken

Saturday, Nov 8
8PM
AB Lounge

Free food.
Friendly atmosphere.
18+ (IDs will be checked)

Gay, straight, and lesbian pornography will be shown, so please come with an open mind.

Cosponsored by: Triskelion, WRC, and SSIS.

Contact joeshmo@yourcollege for further questions.

Something that you once could only get in the seediest of theaters is now being displayed proudly in the freshman dorms. What an education.

My letter to the "Women's Resource Center," one of the co-sponsors of the event:
I just wanted to write in to express my shock that such a disgusting and degrading thing as the "Porn n Chicken" night was co-sponsored by your organization that claims to be promoting women's societal welfare. This kind of thing is both exploitative of women and morally revolting. What you do in your own bedrooms is your business but to publicly give your support to an industry that results in unmeasured abuse and crime against women would seem contrary to your very purposes.
I being an orthodox Jew, we may not agree on every issue, but I would have assumed that we both agreed that women have the right not to be so animalistically objectified in such a manner. Sure, some may even like their "job" but how many women are there just because it's the easiest way to make money? And why should we support this shamefulness, especially in a public space? Shame on the Women's "Resource" Center. The multibillion dollar porn industry certainly doesn't need you to provide these kind of "resources" especially considering that the university just spent plenty of money widening its internet on-campus bandwith for the huge level of traffic, a disgusting percentage of which is used to download pornography, and the on campus filesearch engine's #1 search term has consistently been "porn".

If you consistently sponsor this kind of event, you may want to consider changing the name of your organization.

Sincerely,

Moshe H. McG. '06

I also wrote a letter to SSIS, the Student Sexuality Information Services, that perhaps they should join together with the religious Jewish, Xtian and Muslim groups on campus to co-sponsor an abstinence awareness workshop. As per their web site:
SSIS neither encourages nor discourages people from choosing to have sex. Deciding if and when to have sex is an important issue to think about. No one should ever be pressured to have sex.
I told them it wouldn't be keeping with the above statement to only support sexually provocative activities.

Of course I could really care less what SSIS does, but I just thought I'd get that little drowning anti-immorality voice out there. *shrug*

'What does the Torah mean when it says בתוך העיר? It doesn't mean the nice frum Jews hiding in their shteiblach, living their lives quietly. It means בתוך! In the MIDDLE of the CITY! That we should PROTEST loudly all forms of wickedness!'
-adapted from R' Avigdor Miller ZT"L

2003-11-06T01:36:00.000-05:00

אני שׂוֹנא את המתֶמַתיקה

.אבל יותר, אני שׂוֹנֶה את הכיתה שׁל עברית!!! היום אנחנו ראינו סרט על צלמה (צלמית? מישׁהו שׁמצלמת). היה בו פריצות ועוד שׁתות
?אוי... עד מתי, השׁמ

It's great to be able to type in Hebrew now. Anyways, I just spend soo long studying for my math final tomorrow... and now more! I also have just a few hours to decide whether to drop down to Physics 11 (irreversible, stuck in the class) or to drop physics altogether... on the one hand I will have one more requirement taken care of with physics. On the other, I just may not have the time for it.

Shalom l'kulam
שׁלום לכולם

2003-11-03T20:58:00.000-05:00

!בלוֹג בעברית

.חשבתי שׁאנסה לכתוב בעברית בַבלוג שׁלי. אולי זה לא יהיה כדאי אבל אני רוצה לראות. ישׁ לי גם עוד מחשׁב׃ לשׁון אנגלי כתב באלף־בית! כתב כל־כך כמו יידישׁ׃ תיס איז אן עקסאמפל

Ok, it took me about an hour to figure out how to do that. That was probably a wasted hour :-)

Time for snack & then bed. Tomorrow's my "get things done" day. This is accomplished by skipping the one 1-hr class I have all day tomorrow, Hebrew, and instead doing useful things like getting an oil&filter change, and doing loads of homework. Oh, and laundry. Very important. Mom, didn't you have a big roll-o-quarters lying around that you gave me for my birthday? That could come in handy next time you think to bring it...

לא תלך רָכִיל בְּעַמֶּיךָ
"You shall not go as a peddler of gossip among your people" (Vayikra/Leviticus 19:16)

2003-11-02T21:36:00.000-05:00

Ashrei ho'ish asher loy holach ba'atzas resho'im

Sometimes the whole world all seems like one big joke, or some sort of surrealist dream. In some ways, it's true: ein od milvado - only Hashem has true existence. And of late I get the feeling more and more that my own is quite precarious.

Despite my existentialist fantasies, I have very real physics and math homework to finish. Off I go, then.

"Anyone who thinks he can strengthen the Jewish nation by introducing innovations, such as messianic activism, is mistaken."
-HRH"G E.M.M. Shach ZT"L

"Moshiach is on his way!"
-haRav M. M. Schneerson ZT"L ADMO"R miLyubovitch

p.s. stupid ad at the top of the screen! now it's advertising things having to do with 'messianics'! gevalt!

2003-10-29T23:00:00.000-05:00

Mah rabu ma'asechoh Hashem, kulom b'chochmoh asisoh

Take a caffeine pill and wash it down with Pepsi. Works for me when I want to stay up! Time to do the linear algebra homework I didn't finish on time for today... oy gevalt.

I'm listening to a tape of Rav Avigdor Miller ZT"L. What a genius he was. His words really pierce right to your neshomah. One of the greatest leaders in the battle for truth.

Boruch Hashem, things are going pretty well for me. Still worried about my physics grade, but hey, if worse comes to worst, I'll drop the course. Seems like my "comments" feature has disappered from the site, but I don't have the patience at the moment to fix it. Drop me a line if you feel the inclination.

I'm looking forward to seeing the family at Thanksgiving. As it is, I may not make it home until winter break! Last time I was home was late August.
Have a good night, all!

Ending with a quote:
"Modern Jewish nationalism is essentially idol-worship."
-HaRav HaGaon R' Elchonon Wasserman ZT"L HY"D

2003-10-26T00:11:00.000-04:00

Gut voch, gut choydesh

What an interesting shabbos... I met some nice people, as usual. I was zoiche to eat at the house of a chassid who was the editor of the book "The Holocaust Victims Accuse," a documentary exposé of the Zionist role in the Holocaust. Now, don't get confused - even though the propagandists have done an excellent job of equating Zionism with all Jews - we are talking about a select group of secular zionist organizations who used the Holocaust to further their cause. It is *not* a book blaming the victims (as the title makes clear). The book is such an effective accusation that the editor has already received threats, despite not including his name in the book!

Motzaei shabbos I went to the Rav's house for a meeting about the shabbaton, which our shul is putting on, specifically trying to get kids from my university to come. It will be really great, im yirtzeh Hashem. The planning is done, now I just have to get students interested!

As I was just pulling up Cnn.com, I realized something - I'm afraid to look at the news. Maybe that's subconsciously why I haven't been keeping up with it over the past year. It's a scary world we live in... and bad news sells. Do I really want to know about the latest, disaster, murder, theft, suicide bomber? I guess politics are entertaining, to some degree.

BOGOTA, Colombia (CNN) -- At least 13 people were killed Saturday in Colombia in scattered, nationwide attacks by Marxist rebels determined to sabotage a referendum on what would be sweeping constitutional reform, military and police officials said.

Ah, the Communists, ymshv"z. They are trying to bring Colombia into their godless secular utopia. When, when will people realize??? I guess it's naïve to expect progress. Fukuyama was dead wrong about the End of History. Humans don't change, and if they do it's often for the worse. Or maybe that's what he was trying to say in the first place...

Ok, it's late, and I don't think I can ramble on too much more. I'll end with a quote:
"The instigators of this campaign frequently invoke halachah to justify their position, bun in my opinion their arguments are without foundation." -Rav E. M. M. Shach, zt"l.
Yes, it's purposely left contextless. The statement in itself should be enough to make us think.

2003-10-24T16:06:00.000-04:00

Gut Shabbos

So I did the laundry service, paid like $14 but when I came after work it was worth it... all the clothes nice, clean and folded. Wish I had enough money to do that every week! It's going to be shabbos in a few hours and I have to get ready... boruch Hashem. It's been a long week!

I think I'm going to try to update this most days. I feel like family & friends are drifting father away, so I am glad to have the chance to give them a little window into my life. And you can always leave comments! ;-)

I think I'll end with a quotation:

"A boor cannot know, nor can a fool understand this: when the wicked bloom like grass and all the iniquitous ones blossom - it is to destroy them eternally." Tehillim (Psalms) 92.
Never give up hope! And always know the true fate of those who oppress you while they live in material "prosperity".

2003-10-24T07:42:00.000-04:00

Overslept Again

BS"D

I have work @ 8, and I woke up at 6:45. Minyan started at 6:30, and I skipped a bunch of stuff. Now I have to do laundry before I go to work, hopefully. I also fell asleep last night before I could do any homework. What do I have?
Physics problem sets 7 and 8, plus graphs
French - finish Gargantua (16th century" *thick* French novel); finish Montaigne's Sur la Solitude and one other essay...
Hebrew - do journal entry, study for midterm
Math - big problem set due Wed, study for midterm

Compare this with how much free time I have:
2 hours before shabbos
saturday night after 8:00pm
Sunday after 9:00pm
AAAAAAAAAH!

On a positive note, I just bought a book I've been enjoying, it's called Crossing The Narrow Bridge: A Practical Guide To Rebbe Nachman's Teachings. Rebbe Nachman was a Chassidic Rebbe who live in late 18th-c early 19th-c Eastern Europe. His works are very spiritual and emphasize the service of Hashem with simplicity and love.
"Know! This world is a very narrow bridge. The most important thing is not to be afraid!" (Likutei Moharan II, 48)
Rebbe Nachman's followers, the Breslover (or Bratzlaver) Chassidim (one of the largest groups today) are known for several things:

Being the only Chassidim to have only had one Rebbe who was never succeeded, and for almost 200 years following the teachings of their deceased Rebbe (this earned them the nickname "The Dead Chassidim")

Long hours of isolated meditation out in the woods, sometimes accompanied by screaming out, trying to commune with Hashem and acheive dveikus, attachment. This is called hisbodedus.

Making a pilgrimage every Rosh Hashanah (not all of them do it every year) to the gravesite of Rebbe Nachman in Uman, Ukraine. Not only Breslovers do this, but many thousands of other Jews who appreciate the holiness of Rebbe Nachman and wish to be near him as they pray.

Being joyous

One of the best examples of Breslov on the web is http://www.ilovetorah.com/ . Moshe has created an excellent site there. Breslov, like Lubavitch (but to a lesser extent) engage in Jewish outreach.

Ok, time to go see 'bout that laundry. If you didn't understand half the words in this post, try http://www.dreamerofdreams.net/judaism/glossary.html. It's not updated completely but im yirtzeh Hashem it will be soon! :-D

2003-10-22T20:07:00.001-04:00

B'siyata DiShemaya --

Well, I've decided to create a blog. Sure, I had a What's New feature on my website, but who ever could be bothered to keep re-ftping the html over and over? This is a much easier format.

I was inspired to do this by HasidicRebel... hasidicrebel.blogspot.com , if only because I'm in an ironically opposite situation as him. He is a Chassid who is uncomfortable with some aspects of the Chassidic society in which he lives, although he does not reject Judaism, chas veshalom.

I am a ba'al tshuvah, one who has returned to religious Judaism after being brought up non-observant, going to a secular American university. Which I hate. I'm still waiting for the bumper sticker, "I'd rather be in Yeshivah" to come out.

Now I have to do my physics homework. My seforim are looking at me, begging to be taken out and studied. But I have to succeed in the secular nightmare I attend in order to, and that means delving into the deep mysteries of power and kinetic energy... *sigh*.