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(1) There are issues besides Israel; Democrats tend to be much better on economic issues that concern the community.
(2) Obama’s policies towards Israel are pretty much the same as GWB. If you don’t believe me, read the “Road Map” of the latter where he uses the term “End the Occupation” and endorses the Saudi peace plan that includes the 1967 borders. It also included a settlement freeze! Most Republican apologists have not read the Road Map. The major difference between Obama’s and GWB’s policies are that US-Israel military cooperation is now at its highest level in history.
(3) Most Democrats and Republicans in Congress are pro-Israel; there are few on each side of the aisle who aren’t.
(4) The number of really crazy nutty Republicans running this year greatly outnumbers the really crazy nutty Democrats.
Be yourself, and be honest. You can even ask questions to the interviewer.
Is this for a selective college? Most colleges accept almost everyone who is capable of doing college level work, but the competition to slots in selective colleges is very tight and they use non-academic factors to pick their entering classes because they get many times the number of qualified applicants than they have space for. But just because it is prestigious and selective does not necessarily mean it is a good fit. YOU need to be convinced that THEY have the right environment for YOU. Don’t be arrogant about it, but be open and honest about the fact that you are looking for a place that is a good place for a frum Jew in addition to strong academics.
Good luck!
Just discovered this thread so I though I’d share my worst and best dating stories:
The worst was that a co-worker had a friend from out of town he thought might be a match. She was visiting friends in NJ for Shabat (I live in the Bronx) so he suggesed we meet after Shabat. I called her up and suggested several restaurants in Manhattan, all of which she vetoed because they weren’t certified by the local kashrut vaad. My attempts to explain that Manhattan didn’t *have* a local kashrut vaad fell on deaf ears.
So we agreed to meet at a hotel lobby in New Jersey. I warned her that it might take some time for me to drive there because of the likelihood of traffic over the George Washington Bridge. Well, there was no traffic on the bridge so I arrived 40 minutes early! And when I arrived I discovered that the hotel was hosting the annual banquet of the Palestinian-American Solidarity Committee!!! Here I was, cooling my heels in my yarmulke, surrounded by hundreds of Palestinian activists. And my date was almost an hour late. When she finally arrived she apologized but started telling me about the great right wing talk show host she had been listening to on the way. As anyone who is a regular reader of the comment forums here might guess, I would not find myself in agreement with right wing talk show hosts. The date sort of went downhill from there. That was my first and last hotel lobby date.
—
About a year later a different woman from out of town contacted me on frumster.com. She had been attracted by exactly the honest stuff that shadchanim had told me not to tell any prospective partner. We corresponded by email, snail mail, and phone for five weeks before finally meeting. Before meeting, she talked with my rav, and I talked with two of her rabbis. By this point we were certain we were compatible; we just weren’t sure whether there would be chemistry. Her hashkafa is a bit to my right and her politics are a bit to my left, but our differences were not so great as to be incompatible. Well when we finally met we hit it off instantly (fortunately one of her rabbis had given each of us the shomer negiah lecture before we met in person!) and we were engaged the second time we met in person. We were married three months later and are still married 5 1/2 years later. 🙂 We are frumster match #152.
Benedryl is not approved as a sleep medication by the FDA, but many physicians recommend it for that use. It is not addictive (unlike some approved sleep medications) and can be taken safely by most people in the over the counter dose. A partial dose can also be effective. It also is a great allergy drug and is very inexpensive. Consult your primary care physician.
What in the world is wrong with a purse?
so right,
Rabbi Avi Weiss demonstrates against anti-Semites. Yehuda Levin tries to get us to elect them to public office. ‘Nuf said.
Popa,
I have never held that everyone should attend university. I would agree that it is proper under some circumstances, and hope that this position will become the norm in the frum world.
At YU and Touro you can do both! And the learning is as good as at any “all Torah” yeshiva.
That said, I would like to say something as a professor that may surprise some of you. Most college students are insufficiently mature to take full advantage of the university environment. There is no need to rush college. The people who try to pretend that university education is asur ignore the many gedolim over the past mellenium who attended university and even earned advanced degrees — but almost every one spent years in Torah learnong prior to starting university. I would suggest that everyone consult with his/her rabbi to determine when/if university is the right decision.
Is this thread serious????
pascha bchochma,
Do not let family, friends, teachers, or shadchanim bully you into something you don’t want! Your ideals are not unreasonable, and there are plenty of nice guys out there who would be happy to have a stay at home mom taking care of his children. Don’t think you are “settling” for someone who wants what you want. Not everyone can or should be a full time learner.
rebdoniel,
R. Ovadiah Yosef paskens that a gentile may have a therapuetic abortion within the first three months of pregnancy to alleviate a non-fatal illness.
Although some poskim have compared abortion to murder, that analogy just does not fit with our mesorah. For example, Rabbi Shaul Yisraeli, Rabbi Eliezer Waldenberg, Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik, Rabbi Shlomo Aviner, and Rabbi Levy Yitzhak Halperin all have permitted aborting a fetus with a genetic defect. No Christian pro-lifer would ever countenance such a thing! My wife once referred a patient with an ancephalic fetus for an abortion. It was not even a shilah.
Yup. HaShem is responsible for everything. We just need to open our senses and our minds to the miracles that happen every day of our lives.
Lying on a resume is one of the worst things you can do. You will probably get caught, and lose the job. And it will give the employer pause before considering other Orthodox Jews.
About ten years ago a family in my neighborhood had their home burn to the ground because of a fire started by Chanukah candles; a small child accidentally tipped over the menorah and even though the mother was right there, she was only able to save the children and pets. Fortunately there was no loss of life but the house was totally destroyed. One can not be too careful with open flames!
rebdoniel,
The word rabbi means teacher and carries with it an implication that the person is suitable for leadership. I realize that Levin got semichah from somewhere, but anyone who would try to get Jews to vote for a vile anti-Semite like Buchanan is no rabbi — definitely no leader! No matter how much Shas he may have learned, unless he had done tshuvah for trying to mislead the Jewish community he is not be be followed.
rebdoniel,
The money you make is not yours. It belongs to HaShem.
And is Silver not a frum Jew because he doesn’t wear is tzitzit out? How do you know that he wasn’t told by his rabbi not to wear a yarmulke in public? I’m aware of other Orthodox public figures who are not rabbis that they MUST not wear a yarmulke because people might think that they are a rabbi and that their public statements might mistaken for halachah. Furthermore, in most of Europe, even the most frum Jews don’t wear yarmulkes. Two summers ago I visited two European capitals and the only Jews I ever saw with a yarmulke were tourists from America like myself. In fact, one of my rabbis went out of his way to forbid me from thinking negatively about European Jews who did not wear yarmulkes.
rebdoniel,
You didn’t finish the sugya to which you refer! At the bottom of Sanhedrin 59a there is an unqualified unopposed statement that there is nothing prohibited to Noachides that is permitted to Jews. The difference is that Noachides can have more stringent penalties (for example, Noachides can administer a death penalty for abortion or theft).
I personally will be voting for Andrew Cuomo. He has the character and personality to get along with people, something that has been badly missing in Albany since his father left office. Paladino has clearly demonstrated that the only thing he can do is deliver mean insults. And Paladino has been stupid enough to tie himself to Yehudah Levin who tried to get us to support Patrick Buchanan HaRasha. Cuomo, on the other hand, will be able to work together with the legislature to solve New York’s fiscal problems.
Furthermore, many of Paladino’s policies are stupid. For example, he wants to cut an eight figure amount from NY Medicaid which is the one of the best health insurance programs in America. As a result, lots of poor Jews will no longer have health insurance and about half the hospitals in NYC will close, putting tens of thousands out of work and making it impossible to deal with any kind of epidemic. And he claims to want to cut taxes while creating a very expensive school voucher program that would cost billions. That kind of fuzzy math is what got the state into the fiscal mess it is in in the first place! The only good thing is that should he somehow get elected, he has offended so many people that none of his programs will get enacted.
rebdoniel,
When did motzi shem ra on a Jewish public servant become mutar?
Regarding Paladino’s values, he has a long history of distributing pornographic emails. Do you think that is consistent with Jewish values?
Paladino’s position on abortion is NOT the Torah position, but that of the Catholic Church, which would have women die rather than permit an abortion. At least that is what his campaign web site seems to say.
My LOR is very knowledgeable and when he can’t poskin a shilah he goes to the renowned poskim. There is nothing wrong here with either the process or the terminology.
“One of the greatest issues facing the Jewish nation today is if we have the right to hold on to certain parts of Eretz Israel, even if it will cost Jewish lives.”
Many gedolim, including Rav Soloveitchik z’tz’l and Rav Shach z’tz’l, held just the opposite.
Not a handicap any more in the Medinah Shel Chesed.
My wife wears hats all the time — except when she is wearing headscarves or snoods. None are expensive.
The university could easily order a Talmud by itself; I don’t see what the problem is. It offers a masters degree in “Jewish-Christian Studies”. And on its faculty is Rabbi Dr. Alan Brill, an outstanding scholar who will certainly appreciate the fact that students have access to an Artscroll talmud.
This is not of major practical application since the only countries in which Jews live that permit polygamy are a few Muslim countries.
Are there any rabbis in the Mishnah or Talmud who had more than one wife at a time? I don’t recall any. That should say something.
ANONYM613,
Popa is right; there are rabbis who are meikel for some of the things on your list in the interest of shalom bayit. If you are a posek, you must break your anonymity and identify yourself.
We in the tradition of Rabbinic Judaism say they are all emet, even when they flatly contradict each other.
Yutorah.org is amazing. Thousands of shiurim including essentially the entire semichah program!
” He wants a petite girl. Shoen, it’s his meshugas. But it’s real meshugas.”
I want a crabcake. It is my meshugas. But it is as contrary to Judaism as is objectifying women — or treating prospective marriage partners as bank vaults. You are justifying something that is anti-Torah.
“Since we don’t know which sheivet we belong to, the Arizal said we should daven his nusach.”
But neither the current Nusach Sfard nor the current Nusach Ari is exactly what the Arizal used. The current Nusach Ari is really due to the Baal HaTanya. (Not a bad gedol to follow! But that means it is only 200 years old.)
” Wearing 2 head coverings, a yarmulka and a hat, is mandated in shulchan orech.”
I’ve never seen that in the SA. Please cite the reference.
“Women never said kaddish in a shul.”
Rov Soloveitchik recounted hearing women saying kaddish in the shul of his grandfather, Rav Chaim of Brisk, in Lithuania. Of course they weren’t Chasidic.
“I’ve spoken to 45 year old guys who insist on a beautiful 21 year old girl. “
I was 47 when I married my wife; she was 45. I can’t understand why any 21 year old would have been interested in someone my age.
” But try putting on tefillin in Shaarei Chessed today and you may be shown the back door if you’re lucky. “
I know a rabbi who took his tefillin to a Sefardic synagogue in New York on Chol HaMoed and was firmly asked to leave.
I know another rabbi who took his tefillin to a shul in Jerusalem on Chol HaMoed; he said that the congregation acted like they wanted to kill him.
“Charlie, what is your source?”
The Shulchan Aruch.
“But please don’t say we’ve come to the level of the cesspool.”
That a boy would refuse a date with a girl just because her parents aren’t wealthy or because her height or dress size is unacceptable — no matter how good are her brains or midot — is something that is contrary to everything we are supposed to value. It is PRECISELY the very objectification of women that we claim to decry. We talk the talk but we don’t walk the walk and we adopt the worst of the non-Jewish culture, not the best.
To those who disagreed with my earlier post:
I have never, ever heard of a non-Jew refusing to date someone because her family didn’t have money. Not once. WE are the people who value materialism over midot.
And we are hypocrites when we bemoan the non-Jewish culture’s overemphasis on sex while overly defending sexual attraction when our own children consider marriage partners.
The minhag in E”Y was not to put on tefillin long before the Vilna Gaon.
Mdd,
I was taught that the takana was to prevent another situation like that of Yaakov Avinu who ended up marrying someone other than the person he thought he was marrying.
The emphases in the frum community on physical attraction, and on money, regarding possible marriage partners is worse than among the goyim. We should be ashamed of ourselves.
I know a rosh yeshiva who is old enough to have studied in the Chofetz Chaim’s yeshiva in Poland. He once showed me pictures of bocherim in a different well known yeshiva where he studied in the late 1930s after the Chofetz Chaim had died. Not a single one of the bocherim had any facial hair. I expressed surprise and he said that they all used depilatories.
A few comments:
1) Current practice *is* “an improvement in the treatment of women over what we have been accustomed to in the past generations”. Rav Soloveitchik z’tz’l went even further and was correct to do so.
2) Rav Yedid may have been of the stature to criticize Rav Kook. Nobody who comments here is! Rav Kook was one of the two most brilliant Jewish thinkers of the 20th century. (The other was Rav Soloveitchik.)
mufka,
Once during Chol HaMoed I ran out of white shirts that were fit to wear on Shabat or Yom Tov and called my rav to ask what I should do. He said that I absolutely must not launder the shirts, that it was permissible for me to buy some new shirts, but that I should seriously consider just wearing colored shirts on Shabat and Yom Tov because there was absolutely no reason not to!
SJS,
We *never* serve cholent, and my wife also wears sandals.
There are a few other common Chasidic minhagim; can anyone cite the sources that justify them?
Examples:
“Nusach Sfard” or “Nusach Ari” tefillah.
No tefillin on Chol HaMoed. (Briskers, followers of the Vilna Gaon, and Sefardim also do not wear tefillin on Chol HaMoed.)
No gebrochts the first seven days of Pesach.
Eat only glatt meat. (Sefardim are even more machmir.)
Women don’t say kaddish in shul.
And of course the common Chasidic styles of dress.
“the first step – and this is a big one – is first to be a frum, ehlicher yid”
That should be true of all of us whether we are Chasidic or follow a different derech. Thank you for the informative post.
“Sheker hachen v’hevel hayofi.”
Do all these young men fall asleep right before kiddush every Friday night?
Bronx Zoo and Bronx Botanical Garden. You will see lots of other frum people.
Correction to my earlier post about Rov Soloveitchik z’tz’l: He never stopped learning Torah; he just wasn’t *employed* as a rabbi while in school. While in Berlin he learned with Rabbi Chaim Heller, Rabbi Yitzchak Hutner, and Rabbi Yechiel Yaakov Weinberg. Late in life he told a talmid that he accepted every halachic position of Rav Weinberg except the permission to stun animals prior to shechita (which in any case was never actually implemented).
My wife and I met on frumster.com. I did not lie and I did not hide anything. Neither did she. Shadchanim had actually advised me not to tell the whole truth about myself. I ignored their advice and found the right person.
I frankly can’t understand why anyone would lie in shidduchim. You will not be able to keep the secrets. And I can’t imagine starting out a relationship with dishonesty!
tzippi,
Interesting point about Betty Freidan. She many have earned her share in olam habah because it is the result of her efforts in promoting the feminist movement that so many kollel wives are now able to support their husbands in learning.