hal

good point!

wow your a holy soul to care so deeply about anothers ruchnius! i mean that. i pray i have a wife one day like that. Shachris is important, i find it a bit funny the reasons you listed are all the reasons that apply for a woman also, for men the main reason to doven with a minyan is for saying the Amidah prayer with a minyan, one’s prayers are m’kabal when we doven with a minyan, when dovening alone our prayers are inspected and only if said with proper cavana are they accepted. ofcourse there is no din of minyan by women.

A600KiloBear – Reb Chaim Banet is really amazing!! how can one person come up with so many amazing niggunim!?!? could you make a list of just the best kumzitz songs from him alone? infact i’d say it deserves its own post, but anyway as i’m just discovering him i’d really appreciate to know which ones you, and others, like the best, especially for singing. thanks! btw Machnisei Rachamim really blows me away, so much soul!

there’s no reward in being ‘frum’, what G-d wants is that we fear him, emulate him, love him, serve him with pure intentions, and keep all his commandments. you’ve been doing that since birth? are you doing that now properly? My point is true service is a life long goal, even if we lived till a million we’d still find ways to improve. Besides for the mussar, alot of ‘frum’ people are sometimes not so ‘frum’. Doing teshuvah in that case could be even greater than doing teshuvah in the case where one is clearly against halacha. for instance doing teshuvah and learning to keep shabbos is amazing, although it should be easy on the side that it’s a clear case of right and wrong. But a person who keeps the mitzvot but they’re not careful about certain things like having kavanah when saying blessings, then to repent then takes a special strength, especially since in that case it’s a private matter with no one to rebuke them. and how could a person even call themselves frum if they speak loshon hara, or embarrass or hurt others, or are not careful about others property, etc… if you learn some good mussar maybe you wont feel so frum and then you can feel good about getting to be a baal teshuvah!

thechoiceismine, what greater reward is their than clarity? how about clarity you discovered on your own, rather than clarity forced upon you by things outside you.

Infact people explain that’s why Torah learning, especially Talmud, is so complicated. they could of just spoon fed us all the halachas and hashkafas and exactly what to do and require no work to get to the answers, that would be instant clarity, and you say, what can be better? Well Chazal knew what was better, working hard and struggling to achieve that clarity! only when one is truly familiar with the dark can he really appreciate the light!

angels wanted to teach the Vilna Gaon, but the Gaon refused on the grounds that he didn’t want to learn without the chance of amal b’Torah, (toiling in Torah), toiling in pursuit of Truth. according to the pain is the reward!

it’s always great mussar to really meditate on one powerful line to let the message sink in.

in the past i focused on the end of Koheles, where after exploring how all the earth is empty and devoid of meaning or anything good and worthwhile, the wisest man who ever lived concludes, (in my own words) ‘the end of the matter, all being heard, fear G-d and keep his laws because that is all of man’.

also if you want to focus on learning, remember ‘Torah is our life and the length of our days’

i often focus on the fact that ‘a moment of olam haba is more pleasurable than all of the life of olam hazeh…’

Rabbi Akiva we know focused on the water dripping on the rock and made a hole, and he said to himself if water can make such an impact on solid rock, than Torah which is likened to fire, can make an impact on me and change what i am into something else like the water changed the rock. (it’s a kal vachomer, water which is weak made an impact on something as hard as rock, than Torah, much more powerful than water, can certainly make an impact on man/flesh, which is softer than rock)

YES coffee addict, according to the Ramchal, read “The Way of G-d”, yes the purpose of life on earth is to earn reward. otherwise why is there suffering? it serves a purpose. and btw, that is what gives HaShem happiness.

coffee addict, this is important Hashkafa to know so please read and try and understand, i’m quoting the book “The Way of G-d”

in “the way of G-d” we learn that G-d created man in order to give to man. G-d is perfect, and there’s nothing man can give to G-d. G-d wanted to give because G-d is giving and merciful so he created a being known as human to receive good, and G-d wants to give man the perfect good, and the only true good that exists is G-d, so the ultimate good is man to attach himself to G-d and be as similar as G-d as he can. however here’s the catch, to be similar to G-d and therefore experience to pleasure G-d wants us to experience, we need to use our own free will and choose to be like G-d, because G-d wasn’t forced by anything to be G-d, so we can’t be like G-d if we are forced and aren’t holy by choice. the idea of what G-d is, and how G-d is necessary are very deep ideas, and contemplating G-d in that way, personally i find it very powerful and inspiring me with awe of G-d. if there was no G-d there would be absolutely nothing, but G-d exists, and really G-d is all that exists, and all that has to exist. it’s not ‘luck’ that G-d exists, it’s part of the idea of G-d.

so anyway, this world is for earning the reward, the world to come is for receiving the reward. basically when we can’t earn reward it’s the same as being dead. and no one prays for that. that’s my question (if Moshiach era means not earning reward).

G-d created to give, there’s nothing for G-d to receive because Gd is perfect. there’s nothing we can give him, all the mitzvot are to purify and improve us.

btw im not saying we should do mitzvot only for the reward, but considering that this reward is closeness to HaShem, and the only true good that exists for us, i don’t believe any intelligent person could ever want to give that up.

and yes a good parent does only make their kids do there chores to get a treat. although the treat is becoming a better more mature person, learning independence and life skills, etc.

(please forgive poor grammar, written late at night quickly)