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1: R’ Avraham Birnbaum’s article regarding moving out of Lakewood, debt and the Gashmius that current Kollel families need vs. Kollel from yesteryear.
2: Rabbi Schonfeld & Bloom’s discussion regarding whom Agudah honors and allows to speak at their dinner (John Doe, you owe me an apology).
Your thoughts?
For those of us who don’t normally read the Yated, can you please summarize the points made in the articles?
Thanks,
The Wolf
I like Rabbi Birnbaum. He’s had a lot of good stuff, out of the bos stuff to say. And out of town is a great place to live and raise a family. Kollelim are booming in our city and frankly, I don’t know where the funding is coming from. It can’t all be coming from the gevirim.
And as for Rabbi Bloom, he is an adom gadol. I am grateful for the clarity he gives us on so many issues. At the risk of inciting all sorts of ire, often I read him and I leave with, now I know what to think on this issue. I haven’t read the current Yated yet but am looking forward. I’m sure that Rabbi Bloom thought long and hard before sharing his thoughts with the olom. (Interesting dovetailing with R’ Avi Shulman’s column of the same week on airing linen.)
Another suggestion to number one is not having so many people learn in kollel. The Gemara in Chagigah says that Hashem cries for those who don’t learn Torah and should, and for those who learn Torah and shouldn’t. Full time kollel is not for most people, it is for the individuals. Too many people use kollel as an excuse for not working, and too many people feel entitled to support from their parents and in-laws. The kavod of Torah has gone down because of the way people abuse kollelim. People need to take life more seriously or else there will be no more money for future generations.
lets get mexicans to sit in kolel for us…but seriously it is a problem. everyone is EXPECTED to sit in kolel. when i was in 12th grade…well in is a bit of a misnomer…i missed the majority of 12th grade…so when teh time came for me to go to beis medrash i just decided not to. instead i got a job and worked. i was criticized by some including my rebbeim…because tehy felt i would gain from going to beis medrash (and tehy ahd a valid claim, there are things im missing because i didnt go, i freely admit it) but most peopel were like :O you didnt go to BM?! omg! not because of any spiritual losses on my part…but because you MUST go or you arent frum!!!
Bombmaniac, the way the system is set up, and with the relative prosperity we have, there is a certain level of literacy that most boys can achieve, which will take having some beis medrash (maybe use another acronym) experience necessary. Sad to say, an experience like yours means a kid’s not with the program. Nothing against such kids, I’m proudly related to some. Just saying that they’re off the beaten track, and the track, to some degree, is good for a good many boys. It’s not being given permission to work that’s an issue. There are so many people who have maximized their learning, by working/learning, from a younger age and ashreihem.
At least the Agudah is openly moida they do it for they gelt, while holding their noses, when honoring these shmutzidika oisvurfs, and it isn’t l’chatchila. It gives credence though to their critics in the Torah community.
Full time kollel is not for most people, it is for the individuals.
Most people don’t go to Kollel. If anything we could use more people in Kollel. What percent of Jews are in Kollel? .00001%? Even what percent of Frum Jews are in Kollel? Not much more than that.
Yasher Koach to Rabbi Birnbaum who has the courage to say what many people think and hesitate to say openly.
Im witness to many post-Kollel couples who want to be independent after their learning years but cant catch up financially and envy other post-Kollel couples who have wealthy or uniquely generous parents and/or inlaws who endlessly offer financial help while the other couples, are always in the red, because when they leave Kollel they arent prepared to pay their bills and the family size increases and expenses soar. Ain Somchin al Hanes.
That is very hypocritical of the Agudah and sets a very poor example.
I didn’t read either article, and don’t intend to. My thought on “kollel” is; everyone should be moser nefesh for torah, it seems though that these days most of the mesiras nefesh is coming from the zevulluns, not the yissachars.
So the Agudah admits it’s for the money. How things have changed! Everyone knows that R’ Gifter zt”l bashed YU in a famous speech, but how many people know exactly what he said? He bemoaned the fact that YU allowed a certain club in one of their graduate schools so they wouldn’t lose funding. R’ Gifter asked, what’s more important? Our values, or money? How dare we sell out our values for a few dollars from the government?!?!
Now, it’s openly said that the Agudah is doing exactly that. They honor these perverts just to get some funding. R’ Gifter, up in Shamayim now, must be horrified.
tzippi, my point wasnt taht beis medrash isnt important. on teh contrary…i KNOW it is. i and one of my friends opted out of beis medrash and another one of our friends is in his 3rd year and i really see a difference between us. i KNOW it makes a difference. my point was simply that people believe in it not necessarily because of its importance but because of belief in the “system” especially with kolel. prime example of this is one of teh first questions posed to girls when they want to get married “do you want a kolel guy or a working boy?” seriously? thats teh first question?
Agree fully with aries.
Rav Schwab, zt”l, who was part of the Agudah, would NEVER have agreed to this. His motto was always that Torah Values cannot be compromised for money. He mentioned this many times. Shame on Agudah to sell our precious Torah for $$$.
bombmaniac if learning after high school makes a big difference as you admit why should it not be the first shidduch question? yes, there are people who work who are better than people who learn but whether or not a boy is learning speaks volumes about him. always? no. most of the time? yes. what else should a boy be guaged by? his parents wealth? whetehr they stack plates?
apu, I didn’t read either article, and don’t intend to. My thought on “kollel” is; everyone should be moser nefesh for torah, it seems though that these days most of the mesiras nefesh is coming from the zevulluns, not the yissachars.
Absolutely brilliant! The Zevuluns are killing themselves to do the right thing, and some are up at 5 am to learn!
As far as mesiras nefesh yissochor vs zevulun goes, at this stage I am a zevulun. When I was first married, I was a yissochor for 8 years. I would say that to a large extent that is correct. I get up earlier than I ever did before. I have a shiur early in the morning and late at night, plus a chavrusa late afternoon, after 5:00. My son in law starts his day at 7:00.
But I can tell you that although dollars do not come to us easily or plentiful, no expense gives me more pleasure than the monthly check I write to my daughter and son in law. My daughter is raising the cutest baby in the world, and due for her second any week now. My son in law is a masmid of the highest order. He may not be a 16 hour a day masmid, but he is a 60 minute an hour masmid. More focused than I ever was. And I thank Hashem every day for giving me the opportunity to be the zevulun to such a yissochor.
As far as the Rav Gifter reference is concerned, he was speaking about YU actually recognizing a MZ club in the university. The school itself was recognizing the toeva. That is far worse then offering a platform to a frum politician who supports legislation. The Aguda can not be accused of sanctioning the toeva themselves. There is a good chance that Rav Gifter wouldn’t be happy with this either, but it is not at all what he was speaking about in that famous “Gifter slaughters Lamm on Passover” speech on Chol Hamoed Pesach 1986.
Midwesterner, b’shaa tova!
Rabbi Birnbaum brings up an interesting point. Perhaps parental support goes further out of town. Though the parents doing the support still have to deal with the issues of their own current tuition, etc. expenses. (Or if these are their younger children in kollel, possibly they have to deal with helping their parents out. We’ll be seeing a generation coming up that has not saved for retirement, is B”H living longer so have more long-term care need issues, etc.) I’m not sure about more jobs being available, it’s all proportional and depends on what kind of jobs you’re looking for. For someone coming out of kollel, I see such a family as still needing support during the transition time. It’s probably harder to find a decent job with out a serious school time commitment out of town than it is in the east coast tri-state area. I’d love to see him address these kinds of issues.
This is Midwesterner’s wife. Our daughter is going to school so we are supporting her until she graduates and then she will IY”H use her education to support herself in her profession. Our son in law also takes some side jobs to bring in some support while in kollel. Yes we still have tuition for our younger ones, but Hashem helps.
I actually think it’s somewhat easier to find a job out of town since people know you and your competition is less than in the tri-state area.
About putting away money for a nest egg for retirement, yes that is scary but we trust that Hashem won’t let us down. There is some leap of faith we all must take as frum Yidden who have higher tuition, food costs, Shabbos costs, tzniusdik clothing… our expenses are so much greater than those of the outside world. Some of it we do have to leave up to Hashem, yet still do our hishtadlus.
“As far as the Rav Gifter reference is concerned, he was speaking about YU actually recognizing a MZ club in the university. The school itself was recognizing the toeva.”
YU takes government money and is therefore subject to government anti-discrimination regs. YU also “recognizes” Christian clubs.
Think about that the next time you complain about how the government refuses to fund yeshivot.
I am sure that Richard Joel would be quite happy to accept your contribution of ten billion dollars; that would enable YU to turn down future government money.
“The Zevuluns are killing themselves to do the right thing, and some are up at 5 am to learn!”
My Daf Yomi shiur is a little later, at 7:30am. It was particularly good today!
“How dare we sell out our values for a few dollars from the government?”
I will add that it is easy to be righteous on these matters when you aren’t the person who will be responsible for handing out the layoff notices when you’ve turned down the government funding and have to close the institution. The fact is, the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, which is where the Christian and Gay clubs are, is pretty much the only truly frum-friendly medical school in America. Students never have to worry about a class on Shabat or Yom Tov. The cafeteria is kosher. There are multiple minyanim every day, many shiurim, an active beit midrash, several orthodox rabbis on campus, a large Shabat-observant student population that lives on campus, and a few frum faculty members like myself. And we do pretty well in the medical school rankings; I just found out today that yet another of my research proposals is getting funded. Would I prefer that my institution adhere more strictly to halachah? Absolutely!!! But it may not be possible to run a medical school totally according to halachah in the United States. Would it be better to shut it down? I now have a sufficiently strong reputation as a researcher and teacher that I am sure that I could get a job somewhere else that would respect my observance. Junior faculty might face a harder time. And students have no ability to say “no”. The Albert Einstein College of Medicine makes sure that they do not have to be placed in that situation.
“to strengthen the out of town kollels”
The original Shevet Levi also got dispersed.
They were given 48 small towns throughout the other tribes.
Not that anybody cares, but the daughter that I mentioned before had her baby boy last night!!
Also, to Dr. Hall. It would be worth your while to take the time to listen to Rav Gifter’s speech. Among the things that he does there is that he acknowledged the constitutionality issue. He then said that it is the derech haolam to stake out a position that they feel is correct, and then hire a legal team to defend it as best possible. His taana on Rabbi Dr. Lamm was that he did not hire a legal team to defend the university’s right to take money, even with banning the club. He hired a legal team to defend the club’s right to exist! Not the other way around.
If after attempting to defend the Torah position Dr. Lamm still lost, then there could be a difference of opinion. Rav Gifter said he still wouldn’t take the government money under those circumstances, Dr. Lamm would. That is a debate worth having, without public machaos. Rav Gifter’s Macha’ah was against hiring legal help to defend the anti Torah position, and not even attempting to take the high road.
I’d contribute my 2 cents, but last time I checked,I was banned from this thread.
(sorry)
Mazel tov Midwesterner! Lot’s of Nachas from this one and all the other ones!!
GAW: And how do you see that?
gavra_at_work: So I take it you are to the right of the Agudah (ala Eidah HaChareidis, Hisachdus HaRabbonim, Satmar, etc.)?
You’re a Ron Paul fan too?
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