Search Results for: mussar

Once Psychology comes up, he starts asking me all sorts of questions about what I’m planning to do with my degree once I’m done. I inform him that God willing I am going to work within the Jewish community. He snorts in derision. “Come on, how many frum people go to psychologists?” he asks me.

I reply that while there are a lot more people than he probably thinks, there’s still more who can benefit from having someone to talk to, and how Judaism places emphasis on having someone to confide in. He waves me off: “Yeah, but you’re probably learning all sorts of kefirah and apikorsus (heresy and blasphemy) anyway.” I patiently try to explain to him that while I do encounter blatant instances of concepts and beliefs that are incompatible with Judaism, I tend to let those things slide, because they are not important. For all intents and purposes, I assure him, I am trying to learn the techniques that can be utilized in therapy and in determining how to respond and identify certain emotional issues. But the core understanding of what makes a human being tick, I hope to get from Torah sources.

He looks at me, confused. What do I mean?

I try to explain that my insights into human nature is not coming from the secular sources, but rather from classic and contemporary Jewish sources.

“Which sources?” he wants to know.

Alei Shur, Chovot HaLevavot, the writings of the RamBaN, etc. I list off a few more works to make sure he understands.

“Mussar?”

Yes, Mussar, chassidus, Chumash. All of the above.

He shakes his head: “But mussar doesn’t work!” he protests.

I look him in the eye and gently tell him “I can tell by your response that you’ve never learned mussar properly. If you had, you wouldn’t be so shocked.”

“But mussar is hard!” he insists.

Of course it’s hard – in the sense that it takes a tremendous amount of intellectual honesty, bravery, and effort to implement and maintain the strategies toward refinement that the tzaddikim have prescribed. And therapy is also hard and time consuming, and involves similar ideas. A synthesis of the two isn’t so far fetched, after all.

The conversation came to an end at that point; I think I left him in a daze…

Guest post by a member of the Philadelphia community. She has recently been posting here under the name of Phillywoman. I asked her to write a post about  about how the Kaminetsky-Greenblatt heter has impacted her and her community. She is a product of the Beis Yaakov system and is married to a talmid chachom.

I will open up by saying that I have a tremendous love and admiration for both the Epstein and Kamanetzkys families. Both in different ways have helped me through difficult periods of my life, and helped shape me into a person I am proud of. And it is precisely because of my respect for the two prominent families of my community, that I have taken the time to compose this.

Like most of my peers I initially sided with “my family.” I sided with the Epstein because they are an outstanding and prominent family in our city. They were the pioneers, that helped this little town grow into a makom Torah. Like the people around me I never once questioned their desire to do the right thing. And even as I write this, I still don’t. I know they are good people who desire to do the right thing.

That preface brings me to my most crucial and main concern:

The poskim of our town.

As I have previously stated, I have a tremendous respect for the Kamanetzkys.

Like most people here, I was happy to hear he was involved in the situation. I trusted him. Most of the world trusted him.

I, like everyone around me supported the “free Tamar” propaganda. I rejoiced when heard she “was freed.”

I had unadulterated faith and trust in my leaders.

When the recent tension and controversy surrounding the heter broke out, I defended my leaders like all those around me.

When I heard about this blog, “run by some guy who was out to make the Epsteins’ life miserable, and with a personal vendetta against Rav Kamanetzky,” I came here just to snoop. Maybe even troll a little. I’m not too entirely sure.

But it’s irrelevant now, since what I saw here shocked me. I was shaken out of my slumber. I saw that there was so much more to this picture. For the first time, I realized what “the other side” and hetter issues were all about.

That’s when my emunas chachamim was fractured.

But it is the continuous silence from those I trusted that has shattered my world.

The world in which my leaders are perfect and do not error.

I looked up to the Kamanetzkys so much – that I have set them on a pedestal. I expect a Rav to be a person who takes responsibility, has credibility and makes his public wrongs right…

It is human to be misinformed, mistaken, and make bad decisions. I understand that my leaders are flesh and blood like me, and I know that they are not immune to mistakes.

What bothers me most is their silence. The lack of backing, the lack of clarity, and lack of answers.

Their silence fills me with a sense of betrayal, despondence, disappointment, frustration, and most of all hopelessness.

These are not easy emotions to battle. It forces one to introspect and question everything around them.

No wonder people rather blast out those who question their leaders. Now, I understand why people are so quick to point fingers at “the other side.”

It is so much easier to stay ignorant then to face the reality that our leaders have errored. Our beloved leaders have made the assur mutar. G-d’s holy Torah has been perverted by its entrusted keepers.

Facts have been obscured by a misplaced sense of hakares hatov, perhaps by what some may even call shochad.

It pains me greatly to write this, but I know that silence is even worse.

They say the greatness of the leaders mirrors the generation. What have we as a nation come to?

How much longer will we turn away and stay silent?

I am battling conflicting emotions and have no one to turn to, since everyone is too afraid to acknowledge my questions.

I am immediately deemed wrong for questioning, labeled ignorant, and told I am incapable of understanding.

“This is for the rabbis” they say. “Stay out of it. We don’t know enough”

And this is where I’m stuck. What was my Torah education worth, if not to discern between right and wrong? The halacha, Navi, Chumash, parsha, and mussar classes were for what then?

We were taught to think, question, and sharpen our minds. We are not blind sheep, we were taught. We have basic principles and fundamentals that guide us. We were told that asking questions is encouraged as long as we are interested in seeking the truth.

So what changed now?

Why the lack answers? Why am I suddenly unable to understand?

This matter is no longer private.

This matter has become public from the day the public donated money for the buses to traveled to MD to protest.

And now, when the rabbanim in Eretz Yisrael have stood up against my leaders, I want answers. I want to see my rabbis defend themselves.

Yes, I admit I want my community to give answers because I want them to be correct. I’d be lying if I said anything else.

But my Rabbis are silent. Their actions (or lack thereof) is what’s driving me away.

I can’t dispute black and white with the possibilities of maybes.

I await the day my leaders will step up to the plate.

I await the day when truth will prevail.

I await the day mishpat will no longer be perverted.

May we all merit to see the geula bimhaira biyameinu.

From Daas Torah, here.