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How to Handle Insults With Emunah

Insult: It’s All for the Very Best

November 11, 2017

One of the foundation principles of emuna is that Hashem does everything for the very best. There are no exceptions to this rule, whether or not we understand how a given tribulation or difficulty can possibly be for the best or not. As hard as we try, we can’t understand what and why Hashem is doing. But, when the brain kicks out, emuna kicks in.

Minor tribulations frequently spare us from major suffering. Take for example humiliation in public: someone mops the floor with us in such a way that we’re humiliated in front of hundreds of people, like in synagogue on a major holiday. Such an ordeal is more than enough to save a person from a head-on collision, a heart attack, a stroke, or a direct hit from a Katyusha rocket; that is, if we accept the ordeal with emuna. Sure our face is flush with embarrassment, yet we react with emuna and not with rage and clenched fists. A bit of insult is a gift from Hashem, a purification and correction of our souls, and an atonement that eradicates stern judgments. It’s a priceless tribulation that keeps our health and income intact.

We don’t look for insults and humiliation, but once we get them, we should thank Hashem profusely.

True strength is when we have the strength to react forcefully, but we don’t.

We don’t ask Hashem to punish whoever it is that’s tormenting us. Yet, don’t envy such a person; they have chosen the path of negative deeds and that’s why they are negative messengers. Yet, they will have to pay the price of their actions.

In light of the above, don’t envy a journalist who deliberately slanders an entire group of people with the express purpose of perpetrating hatred for his own popularity or monetary gain.

Just remember, the negative messenger is only a stick in Hashem’s hands. But, even if we get hit with the stick, it’s all for the very best. Thank You, Hashem!

From Lazer Beams. [missing]

Shmuel Sackett: The West Is Dead – Return to Israel!

The Wet Head is Dead: By Shmuel Sackett

Nov-06-2017

Back in the 60’s, the popular look for men was to have a greased head of hair. They used Vitalis or Lucky Tiger to keep their hair slicked back and looking good. In the early 70’s, Gillette changed all that with a product called “The Dry Look”. It was a hairspray for men that promised a cool, yet totally dry look. The advertising campaign they ran was tremendously successful and their slogan was quite catchy; “The Wet Head is Dead”. The tv ad was very direct; “You don’t have to use oil, creams or even water on your head… the wet head is dead! Long live the dry look!”

Why do I mention this, all of a sudden? Because 40 years later, I have come to the conclusion that the wet head is alive and well. I discovered this because I am presently in New York where, unlike Israel, men work on Friday. Since Shabbat starts very early these days, I noticed that many men come to shul Friday night with a “wet head”. I don’t blame these men who are forced to work Friday afternoon and race home on the last train before Shabbat. I used to be one of them. I remember the days of running full speed, straight into the shower on Erev Shabbat, then continuing my race to shul with a head still dripping. (I never minded the wet head but feared that I left some shampoo behind…) As I looked around the shul these last two weeks, I noticed many of these “wet heads” and I felt bad.

I felt bad because I know now, what I didn’t know back then, when I too was a “wet head”. I know now that it doesn’t have to be this way. The fighting with the boss to leave early Friday afternoon, the working on Chol Ha’Moed, the davening shacharit in the pitch dark just to make it to work on time, the uncomfortable feelings of eating an “airline kosher meal” at the annual convention, the search for a heter to shave during sefira and the nine days, the internal battle of wearing vs not wearing a kippa at work… All of these struggles – and I sympathize with everyone because they are indeed struggles – can be completely avoided. How? By living in a country where Jews are not the minority.

America is a wonderful country and we need to thank Hashem for the fantastic blessings we have had here but let’s be totally honest; it’s not where we belong. As wonderful as things are, this is a non Jewish country and we will always be foreigners in this land. Yes, we have built Yeshivot here and Jewish communities have thrived but we are – and always will be – the guests and never the hosts. This is why Fiday afternoons in the winter become very uncomfortable for Jewish professionals. It is the same reason why the most religious man feels he must shave during the nine days – or during the “shloshim” for a parent… because a guest must follow the rules.

Things in Israel are much different. As I have written many times, there are many areas that we still need to improve on, but for the Jewish professional working man and woman, you simply cannot beat working in Israel. All major companies work Sunday-Thursday, which means no work on Friday so, like Gillette said; “The Wet Head is Dead!” You come to shul Friday night with a nice, dry head of hair. But there’s more… much more. Most companies are closed the entire Sukkot and Pesach so you can enjoy the holiday the way it was designed to be (and not have the days deducted from your vacation time!). All hotels are kosher so the annual convention, even if held in Eilat, is no problem at all. You can sit and enjoy the food together with your co-workers and not feel isolated. Men will never have a problem with a kippa nor will women have problems with head coverings. There is never any work on Erev Yom Tov and you can take off work on Purim and  Tisha b’Av. Nobody will question your “sefira beard” and by law, should you need to sit shiva, you will be given 7 days off – once again, not deducted from your vacation time.

This is what it means to live in a Jewish state. Is everybody frum all around us? No. But that’s not what I am referring to. My focus here is on a Jewish culture vs a non-Jewish culture. Like it or not, in the coming days, no matter where you are in America, you will hear Christmas songs. There’s no way around it. The newspapers will be filled with Christmas sales, you will see your neighbor’s house light up and you will probably bump into 5-6 Santa Clauses each day as you walk in Manhattan. That’s what happens when you live in New York.

In Israel, even in a secular city like Tel Aviv, you will not see any Santas. Rather, you will trip over stores selling jelly donuts (some may even have some jelly!!) and you will see store after store selling gifts for… Chanukah! Almost every store lights a menorah each night of Chanukah and every person you meet – even the ones most removed from Jewish observance – will wish you a “Chag Sameyach”!

Let’s stop living as guests in someone else’s home. Yes, the host has been very kind to us but we have overstayed our welcome. The time has come to thank the host and move out to our own place, with our own culture and traditions. No more being the weird guy who leaves early on Friday, doesn’t show up for work in September and eats airline food instead of rib steak. And no more coming to shul with hair that’s dripping wet. The wet head is dead! Long live Erev Shabbat in Israel! Come home now.

From Zehut, here.

How Faith Is Gained and Lost

The historical model seems very roughly thus:
  1. For whatever reason, religious leadership mostly stops criticizing their followers for specific sins (including those of statism), stops threatening them with worldly punishment for them and generally stops helping them repent.
  2. The State or other sins’ manifestation subsequently destroys lives, directly and otherwise, more easily than ever before.
  3. The masses lose faith in their religious leaders! If you cannot help us on earth, what are the chances you can help bring us to heaven?
  4. New religious (?) leadership is born.

This is what happened with the Cantonist Decrees. Rabbis\Torah scholars did nothing significant. They didn’t call for emigration or armed revolution against Shmad. They didn’t kill Jewish kidnappers of Jews. And dependant on the wealthy community leaders for their daughters and salaries, the rabbis were virtually silent when these “leaders” would hand over poor orphans to the Czar’s army in place of their own children. Those Torah scholars who offered even token resistance were very few.

Worst of all, literary hints aside, the rabbis had not given a prior warning or suggested alternative behavior. That is, the implication was “We are fine with Hashem and He is fine with us, too”. Chassidim, especially, clearly said things would only get better and better until Mashiach, both physically and spiritually (all except for Rabbi Nachman of Breslov who said a great “darkness” of Emunah was approaching and explicitly validated the talk of upcoming Cantonist decrees).

But the Jews were not actually righteous, as demonstrated incontrovertibly for posterity by the severe events which soon befell them. Whatever it was, (the difficulty actually lies in narrowing the list down!) the rabbis didn’t speak out against it. They didn’t care about (others’?) sins or preferred their positions secure, at least in the short term. In fact, they encouraged many Aveiros.

So, why the surprise “all of a sudden, everyone jumped ship as fast as they could. Anything but Judaism; Zionism, 10 brands of socialism, assimilation, etc.”?

Something similar happened with the Black Death and the Chooch (although Cursedianity is not a real “religion”, see elsewhere).

Historians speak of the economic damage wrought by the plague, but what of the economic situation which rendered it so potent in the first place? The pandemic wouldn’t have caused such harm if not for earlier, heavily destructive taxes, an unseen contributing factor in the later biological destruction.

Rothbard explains – here’s an excerpt (best see it inside for proof):

Originating as a response to wartime “emergency,” the new taxes tended to become permanent: not only because the warfare lasted for over a century, but because the State, always on the lookout for an increase in its income and power, seized upon the golden opportunity to convert wartime taxes into a permanent part of the national heritage.

From the middle to the end of the 14th century, Europe was struck with the devastating pandemic of the Black Death — the bubonic plague — which in the short span of 1348–1350 wiped out fully one-third of the population. The Black Death was largely the consequence of people’s lowered living standards caused by the great depression and the resulting loss of resistance to disease. The plague continued to recur, though not in such virulent form, in every decade of the century.
But the Chooch elite was a part of the state, so they didn’t protest nor prevent the taxes heading to their pockets. The well-to-do Pierceds (read: priests) fled the cities where the plague hit hardest (in contrast to many rabbis neglecting to escape during the Holocaust).
The mainstream Chooch didn’t severely condemn the masses for anything concrete before the plague, so they had no license to speak of ultimate causes when a third of the population perished.
They didn’t have a license to speak of much anything anymore. John Wycliffe became a newly popular “outsider”. Renaissance humanism began spreading. And then, via printing technology, the Protestant “Reformation” exploded. (So I gather from Gary North here.)
Faith is placed in those who unpopularly call for change before disaster strikes. Austrian economists and their followers who condemned the Federal Reserve before the Housing Crisis finally got a hearing by some of those who heard only positive prophecies from others. Ron Paul “got on the map”, as we say.
Next recession/depression this will hopefully happen again, gaining Austrianism even more adherents. And again… Given enough time, who knows what can happen?
(Yes, I’m being sarcastic!)
I hope and trust the same “ישן מפני חדש תוציאו” occurs in our own community!