Turkeyneck

I love all the mussar about being dan l’kaf zechus.

I run a mossod hatorah and I see ALL the time how much dan lekaf chova there is among us, especially among the “gorr frumeh”.

I’ve had parents decide not to enroll their child with us because they “didn’t like the boots they noticed a different girl wore to her interview”!

That’s all it took, a pair of boots!

1) They could have been borrowed.

2) The girl may not have realized what those boots symbolized. (I have six frum sisters and six frum daughters so I know a little about girls clothes, and they weren’t anything geferlach.)

3) Maybe the girl won’t even come to the mossod. (She actually did, was a very fine girl, and married a ben torah who is now learning for his 4th year in EY, in very poor financial ci

rcumstances.)

And this is just one little example I’m choosing because it’s easy to write it down.

We are constantly making judgments about our fellow Yidden, and I agree, in most cases, we don’t give the benefit of the doubt, and we don’t try to explain their behavior in a forgiving sort of way.

But this case?

A couple who went on TV? And lied? Berabbim? With a Yarmulke on his head? And her giving a speech about covering the hair?

Pfui!!!

I don’t envy their lot, I really don’t.

(And don’t tell me the the show is a fake; it’s not and if it would be, it would be a much greater Avlah, because they would then have participated intentionally in perpetuating a massive Chillul Hashem.

I say, don’t accuse them of that. Be dan l’kaf zechus, they didn’t mean to make a chillul hashem, they only meant to steal a little.

The chillul hashem was an accident!