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The Zealous Religion of Modern Science

16/1/2019

9 Comments

 
It took me an embarrassingly long time to realize the real problem between meshing Torah with modern science is that much of modern science is neither proven nor as objective as asserted.
 
Whether best-selling books written by top scientists for laymen or prestigious science journals, scientists cannot stop using words like the following:
  • “assume”
  • “think”
  • “seems”
  • “probably”
  • “possibility”
  • “may”
  • “suggest”
  • “could have”
  • “perhaps”
  • “likely”
  • "if"
  • “indicate”
  • “believe”

These are not scientific words. These are guesses. And “believe” is a term of a faith.

Boy, Am I Glad Astronomers Don't Perform Surgery!

​In contrast, the science of surgery is very different. I’ve had a few Cesarean births and guess what?
 
Nobody “assumed” the location of my uterus—they knew.
 
They didn’t “suggest” that sterilizing the instruments would “probably” kill germs and “may” prevent infection, they followed certain procedures because research has PROVEN that these procedures and techniques definitely lower the chance of infection.
 
Furthermore, no one thought it was “likely” that there was a baby in there as opposed to, say, a pumpkin—they knew.
 
And that’s science you can pretty much rely on.
 
Why?
 
Because they’re actually able to PROVE things.
 
With regard to germs, scientists can see germs through a microscope and see what sterilization procedures reduce germs and which don’t. Doctors have also researched the effects of their procedures, making Cesarean births not only possible, but safer than previous generations could’ve ever imagined.
 
(Having said all that, there are aspects of medical science subject to baseless theories, personal agendas, ego, and greed—which have harmed or killed people. I just focused on the more proven aspects of medical science.)

The Scientific Ego

​Today, many people think that scientists are highly intelligent and scrupulously objective. Not surprisingly, many scientist WANT you to see them that way. But history (including recent history) has not shown this to ever be true for many scientists.
 
The desire for funding, fame, recognition, and ego-defense affect scientists to a large degree. Scientists can also be a surly defensive lot who don’t hesitate to shoot down and humiliate theories (along with the proponents of those theories) that interfere with their above-mentioned desires.
 
If you’ve ever actually known academics—whether professors, scientists, doctors, or researchers—or listened to people who know them, you’ll know that many (though certainly not all) possess an elitist mindset, which isn’t conducive to objectivity or integrity.
 
Would you want to attend a medical school in which they discussed their personal beliefs about the human body?
 
“We believe the kidney is located over here.”
 
“Computer models indicate that this could be an eyeball.”
 
“We will teach you to perform Cesarean surgery on a woman who is likely to be pregnant because the suggestion of a baby in there is the more intriguing possibility.”

​You can't really learn anything useful from guessing, especially emotionally driven guessing, as shown by phrases like: "more intriguing possibility" -- a phrase that appeared in a prestigious science publication -- or feeling that something is too "remarkable" to be believed, as you'll see below).

Anti-Torah Science Leads to Medical Mistakes

Just as one example: If you believe in evolution and randomness, then body parts that don't have an obvious purpose may be considered flukes or a no-longer-necessary leftover of evolutionary development.

"We don't need these anymore" has been said about tonsils, the appendix, and wisdom teeth.

In my parents' generation, tonsillectomy was a normal part of childhood.

Who needs tonsils? We've evolved beyond that!

Then scientists discovered tonsils play an important part in preventing infection. Yes, some people are indeed better off without their tonsils and need them removed, but it actually harms people to have them removed unnecessarily.

Likewise, the appendix was a big mystery. And I think the only reason why it wasn't removed as regularly as tonsils is because it's much more invasive surgery.

But more recently, scientists began to discover that the appendix also serves a vital function for the immune system. This is accompanied by pompous headlines like: Appendix May Actually Have a Purpose. Nowadays, appendicitis isn't always automatic surgery. If they think it's safe to do so, many doctors try treating it with antibiotics first.

Finally, many pointed to wisdom teeth as evidence of evolution. What do we need those unnecessary and annoying teeth for? They must be primate leftovers!

Then I came across the idea that our diminishing nutrition is causing smaller jaws, which is possibly why crooked teeth are so common today. I don't know if anyone can prove the suggested link between nutrition and jaw-size, but it seems that a smaller jaw might also not have enough room for wisdom teeth--rather than just assuming it's an evolutionary leftover.

But if you're stuck on the evolutionary model, you won't look at the possible causes of the issue. You'll just keep removing teeth.

(And if you're wondering about the difference between me saying "possibly" or "suggested" and scientists saying those words? I'm not using the suggestions in place of proof or twisting your arm to believe that smaller jaws caused by poor nutrition is indeed the only possibility. I didn't entitle the piece: "Case Closed: Wisdom Teeth Removal Caused by Poor Nutrition." And that's the big difference: honesty.)

Heliocentrism! Oh, Wait...

Opposing the Torah narrative also leads to inaccuracies modern science.
 
For example, one of the scientific debates you used to hear in the frum community is the objection to the tradition of a geocentric universe in which everything revolves around Earth—an objection purely based on modern scientific theory (AKA "wishful thinking").

Instead, people insist on the heliocentric universe (in which everything revolves around the Sun), as proposed by Galileo centuries ago.
 
In fact, ever since I can remember, people were taught that we live in a heliocentric universe. And I remember a time in which debates among educated frummies consisted of a struggle to find Torah sources that supported the idea of a heliocentric universe.
 
I also remember reading stuff by educated frummies who expressed serious consternation over the fact that the Lubavitcher Rebbe did not believe in a heliocentric universe and attitudes like: Oh-heavens-to-Betsy-the-Lubavitcher-Rebbe-did-not-believe-that-the-Earth-revolves-around-the-Sun-despite-evidence…
 
(The above isn't a direct quote, by the way; no one ever said "Heavens to Betsy" as far as I remember. Heh-heh.)
 
Heliocentric, heliocentric, heliocentric.
 
Except that no scientist actually believes this.

The Scientific Practice of Inaccurate Terminology

​What they believe today is the theory of a barycentric universe in which all planetary bodies (including the Sun) revolve around a constantly fluctuating center of mass called a barycenter. (And according to this theory, this "center" moves tremendous distances from one point to another; it's not just wobbling around in more or less the same place.)
 
Nothing actually revolves around the Sun.

In fact, no planets revolve around any suns or stars anywhere in the universe.
 
Yet you will always hear about orbits around the Sun and planets orbiting stars even though scientists don’t actually believe this.
 
And people continue to blather on about a heliocentric universe.
 
But even this barycenter is also just a theory.
 
They don’t KNOW. There’s no PROOF.

Furthermore, anyone who believes in an expanding universe (which is standard science today) does not believe in any "center of the universe" at all. (Please remember this every time you read an article written by these same believers that mentions something discovered in “the center of our galaxy” or whatever.)

Anything! As Long as It's Not God...

​A 2008 Science Daily article entitled “Earth Not Center of the Universe” admitted in the first paragraph:
“Although the Copernican principle has become a pillar of modern cosmology, finding conclusive evidence that our neighborhood of the universe really isn’t special has proven difficult.”
Meaning, they believe that Earth is not “special” and is not the center—despite the fact that they can find no proof of their belief.
 
Yet they continue their mythical quest for such “proof” anyway.
 
And they state outright that Earth is NOT “center of the universe”—with absolutely no proof.
 
Why? Because they believe in the Copernican principle, which believes that Earth is not in a central, specially favored position—even though there is NO PROOF of the Copernican principle.
 
Canadian scientists sound very religious. What a dedicated belief system they have!
 
If you read the original article, you’ll see that it is filled with phrases like:
  • “indicated”
  • "they proposed"
  • "put forth the alternate theory that…"
  • "modeling"
  • “it’s really hard to determine if…”
 
They also make unproven statements of personal belief like:
  • “cosmic microwave background radiation—the afterglow of the Big Bang” (The Big Bang is a theory—a very popular theory, but only a theory nonetheless. Therefore, you also cannot make a factual statement that CMB radiation is the afterglow of it.)
 
  • “solidify the conventional view” (“Solidify” is a new weasel word for me. It doesn’t prove anything but is merely another synonym of “indicate.” Also, “conventional view” simply means that a lot of scientists agree, but demonstrates no proof.)
​
  • “Recent advances in data collection have brought us to the era of precision cosmology” (Says who? Where is there any proof “precision”? These guys still rely on models and “indications” and “hard to determine if”. In other words? Not precise at all. But I guess they really need that funding...) 

Faith-Based Science

In space, there is no up or down, no right or left, no north or south or east or west. Things are in motion and there’s no real center.
 
Except that there is: Earth.
 
Furthermore, how do you define the Center of the Universe?

Center of mass? Magnetic pull? Electric attraction? Physical location?
 
The 2005 Sloan Digital Sky Survey of 400,000 galaxies shows that they were all arrayed in concentric circles around...Earth.
 
(Even though this jives with my personal belief of a geocentric universe, I still ask: Does it actually show this or does the survey only indicate such an arrangement? Inquiring minds want to know!)
 
Furthermore, the Cosmic Microwave Background radiation converges on the Earth along its equator and axis.
 
Likewise, astronomers see red shift (galaxies zooming away from you) wherever they look—which is exactly what you would see in a geocentric universe!

In fact, Stephen Hawking (A Brief History of Time) states that the only reason why scientists picked out an alternative and completely baseless theory (that wherever you stand in the universe, you see redshift): ​
“...modesty:  it would be most remarkable if the universe looked the same in every direction around us, but not around other points in the universe.”
Again, no indication or proof whatsoever, simply a desire to believe that Earth is NOT the center of the universe. A geocentric view would simply be too "remarkable."

Try not to hold yourself back, Stephen!

​Anyway, that’s their whole basis. False modesty. Gosh, how scientific!

In an October 1995 Scientific American article called Thinking Globally, Acting Universally, cosmologist George Ellis states:
“…we are using philosophical criteria in choosing our models. A lot of cosmology tries to hide that.”
Hmm…
 
I’m not sure what the consequences are for anti-Torah wishful thinking on the part of scientists, but as long as they insist in digging in the wrong places and creating unfounded theories (i.e. myths) instead of following the evidence, I don’t see how we can advance (or safely send humans to Mars or predict astronomical events or describe the Universe accurately)—scientifically speaking, of course.
Related Links:
Rav Avigdor Miller: Where is the Center of the Universe?
Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation
​Several quotes and points were taken from the following article:
Current Science Excludes Geocentrism Through Unproven Assumptions
(Note: This particular link is shomer anayim friendly, but the rest of the site isn’t necessarily.)
How would the World be with No Moon?
Yet Another Stunning Scientific Discovery: Heck, We Haven’t Got a Clue!
The Venus Effect: Lots of Fun Insanity
May this post serve as some kind of tikkun for all the time I believed the wrong thing.
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Thanks ever so much, Hashem!
9 Comments

A Witty Program for Developing True Happiness

10/1/2019

0 Comments

 
This week's dvar Torah from Rav Avigdor Miller ztz"l on Parshat Bo can transform your life.

He goes into the idea of how to be a truly wealthy person, a sameach bachelko--one who is happy with his portion. 

And what is a "portion" anyway? Find out in The Guide to True Happiness: Parshat Bo.

He explains how to build yourself into a very happy person. Rav Miller's innovative take on happiness is that it's a science that needs to be studied and practiced. And he offers a weekly program, starting with appreciating air (including how to instill this in your children).

This reminds me of a story I heard about Rav Miller.

His child or grandchild walked into the kitchen when the venerable rav had his head in the sink with water covering his whole face. When he finally came up for air, the child asked him what he was doing and Rav Miller said something like, "Appreciating air."

People often complain that we aren't really told how great people become great. How can we learn from them? The truth is that real teshuvah & self-improvement is a private process. But here is one tip from Rav Miller: Dunk your whole face in water and stay there until you can't any longer. Then appreciate the great gift of air.

​Rav Miller also declares his program to be a wonderful antidote to depression.

The Correct POV toward Any Holier-Than-Thou Resistance

One of the problems with trying to form authentic Torah habits is the response of other people -- which is why Rav Miller has stated that you shouldn't tell others what you're doing because they'll cool you off. (Of course, like-minded people are fine and will encourage you; it depends.)

​Now, those of us who read Rav Shalom Arush's books and took them to heart, including doing some of the very difficult things he insists are part and parcel of authentic Torah Judaism (they are), know that you must be very careful when discussing this with others because they will say things like, "Avraham Avinu wasn't really b'simcha when he went to Akeidat Yitzchak" (even though Rashi clearly says he was--not because he was cruel, but because it was ratzon Hashem and Avraham Avinu was always happy to conform to Hashem's Will).

Or they'll insist it's "Breslov" -- which it is, but Rebbe Nachman didn't invent the concept; it's in the Torah and every mussar book that predates Rebbe Nachman emphasizes this. It's in the Gemara too.

Or people will insist that such a hike toward emuna is only for "truly great people" or "not realistic for our generation."

And it's disheartening because I'm not Breslov (although I'm a big fan) and I'm discouragingly far from being a "truly great person" and as a firm member of "this generation," it's also discouraging to hear that such core concepts aren't for me.

But guess what? People also tried to discourage Rav Miller! He's not Breslov, nor was he quoting from Breslov, and he was a truly great person who was also in "this generation."

So what is there to say to him?

Here you go: 
Here comes along a frum tzaddik and says to me, “You're teaching people to enjoy life?! The purpose of life is ta'anugim?! To be rodef ta'anugim, run after pleasures?!”

​He was upset at me.
No joke.

It's so bizarre because Rav Miller is always talking about divorcing oneself from the materialistic non-Jewish aspects of This World. Rav Miller possesses a very Slabodka-like perspective on what people should not be doing -- a perspective that often isn't popular and even drove people away (although Rav Miller was right).

Yet he is suddenly accused of encouraging people to be rodef taanugim--a person who pursues pleasures.

How wacky is that?

But as always, Rav Miller demonstrated his incisive perspective on things. For example, he pointed out that his critiquer wore a wristwatch, while Rav Miller did not. His critiquer drove a car to shul while Rav Miller came on foot.

Then Rav Miller tells the "frum tzaddik":
"​Who is running after pleasure, you or I? You're running after it, but you don't have it. I'm not looking for pleasures. They're coming to me. As I walk in the street with my “Rolls Royce” -- my two shoes, that's my Rolls Royce -- and I'm breathing the air of Hakadosh Baruch Hu, I'm enjoying life. I walk past the cemetery on Ocean Parkway, and I'm filled with happiness that I'm on this side of the gate.”

​That kind of kosher ta'anugim is a chiyuv, it's a mitzvah gedolah to enjoy life that way.
You've got to love a person who considers his two shoes as his own personal Rolls Royce.

Then Rav Miller explains the irrationality of denigrating gratitude and appreciation:
I know that if you go to a kollel and you'll tell them these things, they'll laugh at you. That's because they're silly -- they don't begin knowing Torah.

And don't tell me that enjoyment and happiness is not for tzadikim.

​Oh no, you big tzadik, you don't want to enjoy the sun and the wind. He's eating his chocolate cakes and ice cream -- but to be happy with the sun, that's too much.
I admit that I never thought of that dichotomy until I read it in this dvar Torah. Nice point!

(Also, it's important to note that Rav Miller didn't mean all kollels would respond that way. There are some which would really appreciate hearing such things. He was saying this to make a point about how divorced from authentic Jewish hashkafah even scholarly frum Jews can be if they allow the surrounding culture to overwhelm their better instincts.)

Shabbat Shalom & I hope you'll fully enjoy The Guide to True Happiness: Parshat Bo.

(All quotes used with permission from Toras Avigdor.)
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Some Heart-Warming & Mind-Boggling Words from Rabbeinu Bachya

9/1/2019

0 Comments

 
Sometimes, I've got so much to write about that everything bottlenecks & I end up not writing anything at all.

So I'll start clearing up the bottleneck with something short yet powerful.

In Parshat Bo (Shemot 13:2), Rabbeinu Bachya says the following:
And therefore, we find that the Navi [Yeshayahu] likened the Love of the Holy One Blessed Be He for Yisrael to the love of the mother for the child.

As it says (Yeshayahu/Isaiah 49): "Shall a woman forget her suckling child, compassion on the son of her belly?"

And it doesn't say "Shall a father forget his son?"

And my teacher and rebbi, Shlomo of blessed memory [the Rashba], explained that this text which says "Shall a woman forget her suckling child?" comes to inform us of 2 things:

1) One is that there should be no doubt for Am Yisrael that they are the children of the Living God just as there should be no doubt for Reuven that he is the son of his mother...

2) ...And the second is that just as it's impossible for a mother to exchange her child for another, so it is impossible to exchange Yisrael for another nation.
Hashem is with us all the way.

Let's delve into the analogy of Hashem to a nursing mother.

A nursing mother literally cannot forget her suckling child, not only because of her natural love and concern for him, but also because her own body reminds her that her child needs to be fed. In fact, her body actually demands that she feed her child. ("More than the calf wants to suckle, the cow wants to nurse" - Pesachim 112a.)

It implies that not only does Hashem possess a Primal Need to nurture us, but that His Need to nurture us is stronger that our need to receive sustenance from Him -- which is an astounding statement because technically, Hashem has no needs!

But obviously, Hashem sent this nevuah to Yeshayahu so that we would understand in our own terms Hashem's Great Attachment to us.

It's mind-boggling, if you think it over. In fact, I can't quite get my brain around the concept.

But in short: God not only loves us, but He would never & will never give us up or exchange us NO MATTER WHAT.

​And that's a pretty amazing thing.

Thanks, Hashem!
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Squeezing Out Your Greatness: Hashem Doesn't Want "Orthodox"

3/1/2019

2 Comments

 
Here's another gem of Rav Avigdor Miller from Parshat Va'eira: Hashem's Bitter Medicine:
There is a great kindliness that's most paramount, more important than all the chassodim [kindnesses] in the world - more important than parnasah, more important than shalom bayis, and good health.

And that's the kindliness called yiras Hashem.

Yiras Hashem -- which means to be Aware of Hashem -- that's the most important thing in your life.

Now, this might sound queer to the ears of those who live with materialism, but it's a fundamental principle that we must get into our heads.

We are here to gain Awareness of Hashem.

Now, if that's the purpose, then what a tragedy it is when people let their lives go by and fail to utilize the opportunities to recognize Hashem. You forgot about Him?! To forget Hashem is the worst ruination in life! To live without awareness is not a life worth living! 

So Hashem sees that you're wasting your life -- of course you're a frum person -- you're doing mitzvos, you're ultra-ultra-Orthodox.

But that's not enough for Hashem. He doesn't want “Orthodox.”

He wants to squeeze greatness out of you!

​He wants to save you so that your life shouldn't be wasted.

Hakadosh Baruch Hu wants to give you the gift of being Aware of Him.
That dvar Torah also elucidates:
  • why our prayers aren't answered right away
  • why Am Yisrael is so often compared to wine
  • the importance of praying to Hashem before bad things happen 

You can also download/print out/read his other dvar Torah on the parsha here:
Parshat Va'eira: The 10 Makkos: Lessons in Awareness of Hashem
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Avodah Ivrit - Jewish Labor (just so it's clear ;-)
2 Comments

How to Break Out of being "Ordinary"

27/12/2018

5 Comments

 
Guess who recommends the following:
Try thinking about Hakadosh Baruch Hu for one minute straight...Think Hashem loves you. "Ahavti etchem ne'um Hashem" -- "I love you," says Hashem. 

Do you think about that ever? Do you ever stop to think that Hashem loves you?

He loves you a thousand more times than your mother loves you and you never thought about it?! 

You never once thought that Hashem loves you immensely, infinitely?!

That's a wonderful thing to think about in your one-minute excursion into solitude, your minute of being alone with Hashem in your thoughts.

So you're thinking..."Hashem, I know You're right here with me and that you're listening to me. You love me more than I can imagine. You love me more than my mother loves me, more than my father, more than my friends love me. You're taking care of me, everything You do to me is for the best and I love you too!" 
Who recommends all that lovey-dovey hitbodedut?

Rav Shalom Arush? Rebbe Nachman? The Baal Shem Tov? 

Nope! It's all a direct quote from Rav Avigdor Miller.

And there's a lot more where that came from. (Also, this uncompromisingly Litvish rav emphasizes the Baal Shem Tov as an example to follow in this dvar Torah -- Am echad, lev echad, one Nation, one heart.)

If you want to see the above inside, plus read more about hitbodedut & talking to Hashem with a Slabodka Litvish flavor, then please see Rav Miller's dvar Torah on Parshat Shemot: A Life Apart. (All quotes used with permission.)

Rav Miller possessed a unique wit that was dry, wry, and slipped in with brilliantly poker-faced manner. And if you're into that kind of wit and tongue-in-cheek humor, then it makes his mussar much more fun to swallow.

Here's an example of Rav Miller's makes-you-chuckle-out-loud wit from the same dvar Torah:
Ask Hashem that He should help you with everything:

“I am going for a walk, Hashem. Please help me I should succeed in gaining good health, and that I shouldn’t have any difficulties with rude people that bump into me. And while they are 'bumping into me,' they put their hand in my back pocket and take out my wallet." 
See? He's so funny.

​But really, he's giving us mussar about not wasting our time with mundane thoughts or gazing around at things we shouldn't. He's telling us that even a walk needs siyata d'Shmaya (especially if there are pickpockets around). He's reminding us to think about Hashem constantly.

​But he makes us laugh as he does it.

A Woman's Kitchen: On the Level of the Baal Shem Tov's Forest or the Novardoker's Holy Hut - If She Wants It To Be

And this is from a different parsha on Toras Avigdor, but Rav Miller's speaks about how a woman in her kitchen can achieve the same as the Baal Shem Tov doing hitbodedut in his forest or the Novardoker in his hut:​
When a woman is by herself in the kitchen, it’s a glorious opportunity.

Do you know what she’s doing?

She’s practicing one of the biggest virtues, the virtue of hisbodedus, solitude.

​The old nevi’im, the old prophets, used to go out in the wilderness.

Even the gedolei acharonim, the Ba’al Shem Tov, went into a forest for weeks to be away from people.

Rav Yoizel Novardoker had a hut hidden in the forest. He had two huts. One that his wife knew about. He was unlisted. Nobody knew how to get him, but his wife knew. But there was another hut that even his wife didn’t know about. Only his talmid, Rav Yoel Boronsik, knew about that hut, the second one. Even his wife wasn’t told about that one.

He had two degrees of hisbodedus because that makes a man great.

A woman in a kitchen, all day long she’s alone. All day she has an opportunity. She can listen to Torah tapes. She can think noble thoughts.

​It’s a great thing for a woman to be alone if you utilize it properly. 
But maybe you aren't all day long in the kitchen.

​He's taking the extreme example because this is something looked down on in society, something many women want to escape.

Yet Rav Miller sees this as an opportunity for the highest greatness.

Now let's look at something else many people want to escape...

How to Do Hitbodedut amid Raucous Music

Personally, I really dislike the unending blasting music at weddings.

​But Rav Miller has a positive take on it.

He thinks you should use that opportunity to talk to Hashem. Seriously!

He advises you to use that opportunity to ask Hashem to bless the new couple with all sorts of good wishes.

He recommends davening amid the overpowering music in the following way:
You could say it with your mind and nobody's listening.

But even better, you can say it with your mouth - the music is so loud, nobody will hear you.

​They think you're singing along. 
Picture the above scenario in your mind, picture yourself sitting at a fancy table talking out loud to Hashem and looking like you're just singing along -- it's so funny!

I hope I can work up the guts to actually try it...
Also, someone at Toras Avigdor is a genius with titles & subheadings. For example:
  • Would You Choose Uncle Harry to be Your Rebbe?
  • Moshe Rabbeinu Doesn't Need the Movies
  • Getting Your Mind Cleaned at the Dentist
  • Great Men Skip Shul
  • It's Good to be a Hypocrite

So you end up getting some pretty heavy mussar, but it doesn't feel so heavy because you're chuckling through the entire thing.

Hashem Wants More Than Ordinariness

But here's some serious mussar from A Life Apart that is so applicable to our generation (especially against the popular yet erroneous idea that any level just one baby-step above the current one is "only for great tzaddikim," etc.):
Now, I know people will listen to me and they will just dismiss these ideas. They think that it's a middas chassidus, it's something that only very great people should do.

But that's wrong.

Don't think that what we're saying here is going overboard.

Just because ordinary people will often live like they do with hesech hada'as; they daven as ordinary people daven and mostly their minds are occupied with ordinary things, doesn't means that you have to do the same.

Hakodosh Boruch Hu wants more than ordinariness.

He wants you to be close to Him because those who are far away from Him will eventually go lost. And even though you seem to be a shomer mitzvos, but actually you're far away from Him if your mind doesn't concentrate on Him, if you're not living with Him in your mind.

And therefore, as much as possible you spend time talking to Hashem.
You can also read/print out another geshmak dvar Torah for Parshat Shemot here:
​https://torasavigdor.org/parshas-shemos-the-real-test-of-life/

Also, if you wanted to know more about a certain someone, you can see:
Rav Miller on Yoshkeh
May we all merit to spend as much time as possible talking to Hashem.
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5 Comments

What to Do When the World Starts Closing In on You

26/12/2018

6 Comments

 
For a while now, I’ve been feeling like the world is getting narrower and smaller.
 
One of the things that’s happening is many things are losing their seemingly “pareve” or “neutral” status.

For example, it used to be acceptable for even very frum people to go to the professional ball games. It was neutral, it was pareve. 

(In other frum communities in the world, ball games were disdained as a waste of time, but not in America.)

​Yet greater awareness among more yeshivish communities of the prohibition against wasting time has pushed many frum people away from an interest in sports. Furthermore, halftime performances and ads have become completely indecent, ridding ball games of their pareve status. To the minds of many frum people, these games are firmly treif.

Some frum people are still trying to find away to do it ("I'll just close my eyes at half-time..."), but it's getting harder.

The Infiltration of Vulgarity

“Kosher” reading material barely exists anymore.

Even non-fiction books liberally utilize vulgar language, mock traditional values, laud anti-Torah values, and insert raunchiness.

​It doesn’t matter whether you’re talking about the history of seafaring, psychological theories, the art of good writing, politics, or anything else, a lot of treif stuff goes in. Yes, sometimes it’s done subtly, but it’s still done.

And even if it’s written from a very conservative point of view by a religious conservative, it usually still contains foul language. 
 
Newspapers aren’t much better, though many give lip service to keeping a clean mouth. But if I spell “table” as “t@ble” or “t*ble,” do you honestly not hear the entire word in your head? Of course you do.
 
Speaking of foul language, words censored from TV networks in the Eighties are bandied about freely in the new millennium.

​Grandparents who washed their own children’s mouths out for lesser words are now using worse language to those now adult children in casual conversations and emails.
 
There are even frum people (albeit yeshivish people less so) sprinkle their conversations with foul language.

Even Maternity Needs to be "Hip"

Books for pregnant women or mothers of toddlers feature indecently dressed young women on the cover—just to be hip and modern.

​But in front of your husband and children, you can’t read about what age to introduce yogurt without kashering up the cover somehow.

No More Kosher News

Newspapers and TV news portray women as skimpily as possible (including the news anchors themselves) and gory or morbid images are no longer omitted. Long gone is the professional look of Joan Lunden of “Good Morning America,” with her feminine suits and buttoned-up-to-the-neck girly ties and natural make-up. Today’s professional high-ranking women dress like cocktail waitresses while the men still need to wear 3-piece suits and neckties.

​And this is considered "equality," for some reason.
 
Much of frum media freely displays images of reshaim, untsnius images and videos, violent or disturbing images, and articles that don’t really suit a frum readership. Some frum media has also started featuring images of professional women dressed for a beach party.

Death & Raunchiness for Kids

​The Mickey Mouse show went from being a wholesome young show to being a raunchy pop exhibition.
 
Children’s movies portray morbid images and glorify raunchy jokes and impure spirituality.

For example, the re-make of A Little Princess features a split-second cut of a dead solider with his face alight in blue methane flames. Really appropriate viewing for kindergartners, to be sure! [sarc] (And there’s this creepy Eastern mysticism theme throughout.)

It's Not Just Stocked with Paper Towels Anymore...

​A friend of mine entered the ladies room in a mall in a part of the USA known for its traditional and religious values.

At the entrance stood a vending machine packed with offerings that I cannot mention on this blog. (Suffice to say, it wasn’t a food vending machine.)

​“Can you imagine taking your 6-year-old to the potty and having to pass by this?” she said.

No, I really can’t.

But it’s standing there, unprotested.

Flashy Frummies

One day, my son came home from yeshivah excited to have us hear the latest song from a frum singer.

His older brother has a phone bought with his own money and decided to show everyone the video of the song. One minute into the song, I noticed everyone get up and leave, looking a bit discomfited and shy to tell me why.

What could be wrong? This singer’s songs contain a lot about emuna and other beautiful concepts. I took a look and the video and said, “Oh.”

I’m not looking to bash the artist, so I’ll leave out details of the video, but it’s something that normal young men would definitely find alluring, even though other technicalities of tsnius were observed.
 
And there are several music videos out by frum people that contain women who are dressed or behaving in a manner not in line with tsnius.

I understand that some women feel “deleted” by the lack of females in frum media, and frankly, I like to look at images of women too. (In general, I like to see the photographs of people described in a book or article).

It's a halachic discussion, not a social one, whether images of women should be portrayed in videos and newspapers. But regardless, the behavior and style of the women in these videos isn’t appropriate. And as is usually the case, it seems like the women in these videos honestly do not realize that their behavior and style are inappropriate. (Women often do not understand what men find alluring. That's pretty normal.)

​By the way, I have books about frum women which contain photographs that I can gaze at to my heart’s content. I love seeing how frum women dressed throughout the ages in all different cultures.
 
Anyway, I think it means something when a yeshivah bachur cannot comfortably watch a video put out by frum men. (Who, being men themselves, should know exactly how males feel when seeing young females dress or behave like that. So what is going on with these guys? Seriously, I'm not being sarcastic. I'm honestly perplexed as to what they are thinking.)

And that's in addition to the fact that frum women traditionally maintain their dignity and refinement even when there are no men around.

​Tsnius is not just about male taavah.

After all, we're a Nation of priests and princes and princesses. Men are supposed to dress tsniusly too. And most frum men do.

In fact, chassidish men dress even more tsniusly with more layers than the vast majority of frum women. Where's the equality? 

Yet I know that just for saying that there's a problem with tsnius in the frum media, some frum people are going to get offended and think that I just don’t understand.

Perhaps I am uptight, repressed, controlling, judgmental, and ignorant of “real” halacha!

(For those well-meaning people, I’d just like to make a plea of understanding for myself: Please know that I'm a formerly secular person who, on the path to becoming charedi, was a lot more modern for a few years, so it’s unlikely you will be able to "enlighten" me with something I haven't already heard & didn’t say myself in my younger years. Yup, I probably said it myself at some point.)

Who's on First?

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Traditional values in general are under attack.

​I’m still amazed at how fast society accepted all this gender dysphoria as legit.

​It took a couple of generations for same-gender relationships to gain widespread acceptability. When gender dysphoria as a legitimate lifestyle came out a couple of years ago, I laughed.

Now I’m not laughing.

​Against all rationale, it gained widespread acceptance—along with the predicted crimes as a result.
 
The fact that gender-based pronouns are even an issue is a serious sign of insanity (except for the extremely rare situation in which a person suffers a medically diagnosed chromosomal and physical anomaly in this area—but even they undergo tests and evaluations to choose one gender or the other).

Brainwashing U.

College classes were already propaganda-pits when I was in college in the Nineties, but they’re much worse now. University attendance was always a problem for the frum student, but now it’s much worse—and frum students are being negatively influenced. 

Monkeys against CO2!

​And despite lack of evidence—or even evidence to the contrary—a denial of evolution brands you a dummy.

​A denial of man-made global warming or an opposition to useless carbon taxes brands you a cruel uncaring nitwit—and again, even if you have evidence to support your views, your name is still mud.

Old-Fashioned Jew-Hatred

​Jew-hatred keeps rising.

Jews, especially outside of North America cannot keep a low enough profile, cannot keep their heads down enough.

When you have elderly Jews gunned down in America and pre-teen Jewish girls attacked on a bus or the street in Europe (and that’s just 2 examples), then you know you have a severe problem coming on.

When the world’s most respected newspapers do things like portray authentic Judaism & Torah Jews in the worst light and report the justified shooting of a terrorist running down innocent victims with his car as “Israeli soldiers shoot Palestinian driver,” you know that the world is closing in on you.
 
In American politics, the Democrat Party is openly anti-Israel and openly anti-Torah Judaism. (Jews themselves are still okay though—as long as they toe the Leftist line).

But even on the more conservative Republican side of things, there is a growing number of people who also hate Israel and who solidly believe in anti-Jewish conspiracy theories.

​American Christians are a mixed bag because while there are some who sincerely appreciate Jews and Israel, there are a great many who possess underlying hostility—even if they themselves aren’t aware of it, but you can pick it up in their words and the way they look at you or deal with other Jews. In their heart of hearts, they believe that even the saintliest Jew (who firmly believes in God, by the way) is going to Hell—simply because the Jew refuses to believe in a divine trio.

Where's the Silver Lining?

(There are many more examples of an increasingly narrow world, but this post is long enough as is.)
 
In other words, hardly anything in the gashmius world is "kosher" anymore.
 
And anything you do to increase your spiritual and halachic awareness automatically shrinks your world—the world of gashmius, anyway.
 
But there’s something very good about all this...!

The Refreshing Expanse of Torah

​The Torah's world is as deep & expansive as it ever was.
 
A great many people are seeking to immerse themselves in the light of Torah.

​People are struggling to conquer their worst middot. People are turning to Hashem to speak with Him and build a relationship with Him.
 
Chessed organizations, services that cater to the ill and their families, organizations and individuals who deal with troubled youth. Tehillim groups, and prayer gatherings are not only thriving, but expanding and improving.
 
Recently, I decided to start learning Mishlei/Proverbs with Rashi. I go at a very slow pace. And while I’m immersed in it, I’m in bliss. First of all, the metaphors on their own are very compelling. But Rashi (and other commentaries) expand the metaphors to reveal even deeper meanings. And it’s deliciously geshmak.
 
As another example, Rav Levi Yitzchak Bender’s Words of Faith is a compelling book that’s surprisingly hard to put down once you start reading it.

It feels good to learn Likutei Moharan, to completely focus on a part of Mesillat Yesharim that really speaks to you, to listen to your favorite frum speaker’s words of inspiration…it feels very good to talk to Hashem as you would to the perfect friend who understands and forgives you for everything, and who can always help you and genuinely wants to help you…
 
And yet…do you have any idea how hard it is for me to get myself to sit down and do what I need to do—do what I LOVE to do?
 
What crazy resistance! It’s so illogical!
 
I LIKE learning Mishlei with Rashi. I LIKE talking to Hashem. And yet when I have the time to do it, resistance crowds in. I have to really fight it.
 
In Garden of Emuna, Rav Shalom Arush wrote that there’s always a yetzer hara against speaking to Hashem. He feels it too, he says. And this is from Rav Arush, who has regularly done 6-8 hours of hitbodedut with Hashem.
 
Rav Bender said that even a book's binding can be an obstacle. Just needing to get up and open the sefer can incite the yetzer hara to say, “Oh, it’s too much trouble…I just don’t feel like it…”
 
It’s totally frustrating, yet completely natural.
 
So it’s a funny thing that so much of the Torah world is so enjoyable, yet there’s a resistance that isn’t there about less enjoyable and genuinely meaningless things.
 
And that’s the yetzer hara for you.
 
Anyway, I’m not sure what the original source is, but it has been common knowledge for a while that Hashem is going to force people to stop straddling the fence and decide. Apparently, each person is going reach a type of breaking point where he or she will be forced to pick a side.
 
Some people have picked a side, but haven’t scooted into that side far enough or are still hanging onto stuff from the other side.

​Others have picked the wrong side (but they can always change).

​And others still wobble between both sides. 

The Hate-Filled Lovers

​We see that in general society, picking a side demands a lot of courage.

After investing a ton of research, one feminist shed her feminism. She said that she wants to focus on equal rights equally for both genders--equally. What could possibly be wrong with that? She doesn’t want to emphasize just women’s rights any longer, so she no longer goes by the feminist label.

And even though she still holds by the other depraved liberal ideologies, she has been raked across the coals by the mainstream media and her liberal community—just for refusing to call herself a feminist any longer. She still supports women’s rights, but not exclusively. That’s all! And now she has been under attack.
 
Another man who always considered himself attracted to men only and had indeed immersed himself in that lifestyle since his early teens decided to change.

At one point, he realized that he was actually attracted to women and that his former orientation had been a lie and a response to trauma.

In other words, he’d been repressed.

So he got his act together and married a wonderful woman and he’s really happy in his new (and authentic) orientation.
 
Yet he underwent a massive years-long character assassination because of it.

Especially because he’d never been with a woman before and only men, his “conversion” was considered quite radical and a slap in the face of all the pro-toeva theorists. So this guy, who seems like a real sweetie, was attacked for 8 years by his university faculty, his liberal students, his liberal family members, Leftist activists off-campus, a journalist who represented a civil rights org, and so on.
 
All because he said that being raised by a toeva parent wasn’t so great and because he switched orientations when he was 28.

​That’s it! And he was slaughtered by all the pro-tolerance peace ‘n’ love-niks.
 
Kumbaya, dude.

The Real Thing

So the world is shrinking and closing in on every last shred of decency and Truth.
 
But the real world—the world of Torah—is wonderfully spacious yet cozy, and it’s full of beautiful light and color.
 
We just need to slide into it.
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Will the Real Role Model Please Stand Up?

18/12/2018

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​"Packaging" is part of the reason why it can sometimes be so hard to differentiate between aspects of society that are good and helpful & those that are actually bland or even harmful.
 
We know that Chazal compares Esav to the pig who looks all good and kosher on the outside with his cloven hoof, but is actually completely treif and non-cud-chewing on the inside.

Esav is Edom. And one manifestation of Edom is North America today.

The Inspiring Degenerate

​Take inspirational or motivational videos, speeches, and stories, for example.

They’re usually very well produced and presented. The writer or speaker is often passionate and convincing. They can be interesting and fill you with pleasurable feelings.
 
On the other hand, I’ve never heard of anyone who actually did anything with the motivation and inspiration from these videos. (That's part of the Esavite false-front: You've got tons of motivational videos that don't seem to actually motivate anyone.)

Furthermore, I think some people feel discouraged after hearing about someone else’s awe-inspiring success story.
 
One problem with them is the falsehood innate in many of them.

For example, I remember the disgust I felt when reading the story of a brilliant academic who’d overcome paranoid schizophrenia (with the help and support of a lot of people).

If you use Torah values as your yardstick, this guy was an awful jerk lacking in basic empathy. He had a sadistic streak too, if you judge him by a childhood event in which this young genius created an electric chair and then tried to convince his very sweet sister to sit in it so he could test it out.

​He used women, cheated on his wives, abandoned a son who desperately wanted a relationship with him, and so on.
 
I didn’t find it to be such a tragedy that he thought aliens were recruiting him to save the world in light of the bigger tragedy of his appalling lack of morals.
 
When he was finally cured (mostly) of being a nutter, he went right back to being the same awful despicable jerk he was before. I couldn’t believe it! After all that, what about some gratitude and appreciation? Or teshuvah?
 
Nope.
 
Yet millions of people consider this an inspiring success story.

Why? Because he’s intellectually brilliant—something Hashem doesn’t care about unless it's accompanied by morality.
 
But we now live in a society which places such things on a pedestal and convinces everyone to enthuse over it.

The Overblown Overnight Success

​Sometimes we’re presented with a story of overnight success. But that “overnight” success was actually years in the making and pocked with setbacks.
 
Or we’re presented with a simplistic, seemingly miraculous story whose background is kept hidden so as not to stunt the “WOW!” factor—like a girl wins a massive singing competition and her only experience is singing in her room and dabbling in song composition while sitting on her bed.
 
But then you discover that she’d been taking singing lessons & song composition lessons prior and she’d performed several times in public, plus created and uploaded her own videos. So she actually came to the competition with experience and training—and not straight from her bedroom as presented.

Is such a person talented? Yes, definitely.
 
But not miraculously talented as portrayed.

The Greek Champion

​Other stories and videos of inspiration feature an athlete who grew up in a bad neighborhood and rather than turning to drugs and gangs, he focused on running really fast across a large area with an egg-shaped ball.
 
Now, I’m glad he avoided indulging in drugs and crime. But so many professional football and basketball players lead dissolute lives off the field. Many (if not most) are debauched and their treatment of others leaves a lot to be desired.
 
So why are these types so admired and held up as the ideal? Because they fulfill a certain athletic ideal of strength and prowess. Also, they make tons of money.
 
However, if he’d grown up to be a faithful husband & father with a stable job, then that would be an impressive and inspiring accomplishment for someone from his background.
 
In fact, that would actually be a LOT MORE than playing ball with a bunch of other overpaid ball-runners.

Accomplishment: The Hidden & The Revealed

Why are primarily superstars held up as the ideal?

​There is a book (The Resilient Self: How Survivors of Troubled Families Rise Above Adversity) that idealizes people who grew up in very dysfunctional circumstances and later become normal decent people (as opposed to becoming society's superstars), but it’s an exception.
 
For a time, I felt that nearly every frum story of overcoming difficulties ended with the person forming an organization to help others. Needless to say, if you can do this, this is VERY good.

​But what if you can’t? What if the very thought of starting and running a national or international organization makes you go numb from all the complexities of carrying out that task?
 
Yes, I think the extreme stories in the frum world are very important. I like to read them too. And as far as the organizations and grand accomplishments go, well, I’ve certainly benefited from them and am personally grateful for those who created them.

My point isn't to bash it—on the contrary, they're very necessary! But it’s not something that every single person can do—nor should it be the measure of personal accomplishment and teshuvah.
 
People need to know that if you can transform yourself from a dismal person into a decent person, then that is amazing and very precious in Hashem’s Eyes—even if you don’t end up running an entire organization or becoming famous for it.
 
I once knew a young woman who grew up in nightmarish circumstances. The explosive fights between her parents and their wild acts of revenge against each other broke all boundaries and made the home a frightening place. And this was a daily life!
 
But her parents’ feral behavior caused her to consider the source: a lack of vatranut (giving in). So she decided to become a vatran. She wasn’t a pushover at all because her vatranut emanated from a place of strength and not spinelessness. And looking for a more moral life and a system which also valued vatranut led her to Torah Judaism.
 
Seeing her, you’d never guess that such a nice sweet sensible person was raised in such a savage environment.
 
Her middot are such an amazing accomplishment on their own—even though, to my knowledge, she’s never done anything socially outstanding.

"Hashem Loves Fat, Short People"

​I think this was one of the secrets to Rav Avigdor Miller’s success: He put the average unnoticeable Jew on a pedestal. He noticed them!

The harried-looking frum mother of many children considered pathetic and unattractive in secular society was declared “the most beautiful sight one can imagine” by Rav Miller in his lecture on Parshat Vayetzei. He further exhorted that "there is nothing more beautiful and more perfect than the mothers of our people. ​That’s the genuine beauty!"
 
He takes the image of another regular frum woman seemingly not doing anything special, and presents her in the loftiest light:
Here’s a place, let’s say a waiting room, and everybody is dressed in denim. They have no backbone, so since the high school bums wear blue overalls, so the adults also, they have no backbone so they yield to the environment.

​An elderly man is sitting in the waiting room wearing blue denim!...Ragged artificial patches, splotches on it as if someone poured ink on it or something.
And he mentions the lack of modesty among these people as well.
 
But then we spot...The Frum Lady:
And here is one woman, she's covered up; her hair is covered up. It's hot, she has sleeves down to her knuckles, she has a long dress, and she is proud, she's not self-conscious.

That woman is the eishes chayil! That's the strength that Hashem cares about.

She's a lion, standing tall and proud in the jungle of naked pygmies!

​The people like this woman are the ones carrying aloft the banner of our pride!
 
(Parshas Vayachei: The Fearful Moment—used with permission)
Do you see what Rav Miller did there?

He took that whole cultural ideal of being cool and youthful and turned it on its head by labeling it as a sign of having “no backbone” and yielding to “bums.”

​All of the sudden, the exalted secular society is disdained as a jungle of uncivilly dressed pygmies—and this anonymous average frum lady is the pinnacle of civilization.
 
Just as a side note, I remember how much I liked acid-washed denim as a teenager and I enjoyed Rav Miller’s description of it as “splotches on it as if someone poured ink on it or something.” Yep! Too bad I didn't realize that then...
And what about the short, fat Jew waddling down the street? Also beautiful!

​Here's Rav Miller again:
You see your husband, a fat, old fellow, waddling in the street, short and fat, you have to say, “I love that man.”… Hashem loves fat, short people.

​If they are Jews, shomrei Torah, He loves them intensely, He loves them more than anything in the world.
(This is mentioned in a couple of lectures, one of them being The 10 Commandments of Marriage.)
 
Of course "fat" isn't a good thing; we shouldn’t give into food taavos and overeat—Rav Miller warns against that too.

But he means that the imperfect frum Jew who is either unnoticed or even despised by his non-frum brothers and many non-Jews—that very Jew is greatly loved by the Creator of the Universe...simply because he’s doing his best to keep halacha.
 
And because of Rav Miller’s insistence on their gorgeousness, we start to love these Jews too.
 
And because most of us are regular, imperfect Jews who keep the Torah—even if we’re awkward or messy about it at times—we realize that we are also the kind of Jew Rav Miller declares to be intensely lovable and stunningly beautiful.
 
And that’s the truth.
Related posts:
The Stunning Greatness of a Regular Jew: Gitty
The Stunning Greatness of a Regular Jew: Leah
The Overlooked Prophetess: Chana
Why a Leah Imeinu Can't (and Shouldn't) be a Sara Imeinu
​2 Examples of Unforeseeable Personality Transformation​
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More Tips on How to Recognize a Real Gadol

3/12/2018

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How can we know who the great rabbanim are?

And at a superficial glance, what sets gadolim apart from the rest of us?

In Recognizing a Gadol Hador, Rav Avigdor Miller gives basic pointers:

  • See who other gedolim are calling a gadol.
  • Do great rabbanim from outside his group consider him a gadol?
 
In another lecture (the Q&A of Chanukah: Hyrcanus’s Downfall), Rav Miller adds 3 more:
  • A gadol doesn’t go on TV
  • A gadol doesn’t go by names like “Alfred” or “Norman.”
  • A gadol is better at thinking then speaking.
 
Needless to say, gadolim appear in video clips—the Lubavitcher Rebbe in particular—which can theoretically make their way to TV—or worse. Yet Rav Miller clearly considers the Lubavitcher Rebbe a great talmid chacham and Torah leader. So I guess the answer is that "going on TV” is different than when others film you as you simply go about your business of serving Hashem and tending to Am Yisrael. I think there's also a difference when you pursue the TV shows and when you're just doing your Torah stuff and that gets on TV without you even thinking in that direction or wanting to publicize yourself. Rav Miller made the point that appearing on TV means being squeezed between forbidden programming. People tune in to watch you, but they end up getting all the forbidden stuff too. This is different than if people watch a CD of just you, etc. Rav Miller himself did not allow people to make his lectures available on the Internet and they only became available online after his passing. (Please see Rav Avigdor Miller on the Internet for that source.)
Also, in that same Q&A, Rav Avigdor Miller states:
"S'micha [rabbinical ordination] is very far from being a gadol."
It's really important to know this.

It doesn't mean we start lambasting rabbis (or any other people) and dissecting their character to bits. But people need to know that smicha is about academic ability.

​Spiritual greatness is something else.

Gadolim & Personality Types

​Sometimes, differences in personality types confuse people.
 
Character refinement doesn’t produce clones.
 
Outgoing extroverted talmidei chachamim remain outgoing and extroverted.
 
Introverted talmidei chachamim remain introverted.
 
Yes, they’re able to stretch themselves past their innate nature when necessary, but someone with great physical energy and extroversion (like the Lubavitcher Rebbe) will channel his spiritual greatness through that.

Other great talmidei chachamim possess incredible mental energy. They’re known for their hasmadah and their ability to remain awake for most of the day immersed in a Gemara. But they don’t physically move around much.
 
Rav Shlomo Zalman Auerbach was known for his smile, in addition to his exceptional character and vast Torah knowledge.
 
Rav Aryeh Levine is one of the most beloved tzaddikim in the past century. Stories of his outreach to Jews on all levels, his profound love and warmth, and his humility often overshadow the tremendous Torah scholarship he also possessed. In conjunction with his dedication to Torah study, Rav Aryeh Levine was tremendously active at the community level.
 
In addition to their vast Torah knowledge and untiring dedication to Am Yisrael, Rav Meir Shapiro and Rav Avigdor Miller were also known for their wit and humor.
 
For many gadolim, their speech is short and to-the-point. Such speech can be softened if the gadol possesses a very warm personality, but others are more serious by nature and can come off with more curtness.
 
So we see that our great rabbis come in a variety of flavors.
 
This is no surprise because our founders—Avraham, Yitzchak, Yaakov, Sara, Rivka, Rachel, and Leah—all possessed different personalities from one another. Some were even opposites and served Hashem in very different ways (like Avraham Avinu and Yitzchak Avinu, for example.)
 
Your personal preference (and soul-needs) pull you toward one type or another, but it doesn’t mean that a contrasting type is a lesser person than the gadol you’re most pulled toward.

Straight-Shootin' Humility

Real gadolim are humble.
 
Certainly, they can also be fiery and strong as iron when necessary—but all for the sake of Hashem, not their ego.

Rabbi Wallerstein offers an amusing example of this when describing his interaction with Rav Shteinman. (Please see Rav Shteinman: My Personal Experience.) Rav Steinman was stern with him at the outset (partway through the clip)—but the reason why became clear later at a follow-up meeting.

And this is in line with what was written in an earlier post, that some great rabbanim behaved in strange or unusually stern ways, but those with ruach hakodesh have good reason for doing so. They choose to do so; it's not coming from bad middot.

When people enthused over Rav Shteinman’s ruach hakodesh after he knew a Jew lacked a kosher brit mila just by looking at his face, Rav Kanievsky commented that you don’t need ruach kodesh to see such a thing on someone’s face—but added that aside from that, Rav Steinman indeed possessed ruach hakodesh. So if Rav Shteinman was unusually stern, he had a good reason for it.

Anyway, back to humility...
Rav Chaim Pinchas Scheinberg used to wash dishes in the evening. In his great compassion for his hard-working wife, he set up an open Gemara near the sink and got to work—and he wasn’t embarrassed to admit it. He also used to credit his long life (he passed away at the age of 101) to the fact that his mother nursed him until he was 2. What about his great mesirut nefesh to Torah? Nope, he doesn’t credit himself at all.

For more on Rav Scheinberg, please see Living for Others.

P.S. I remember seeing Rav Scheinberg when Rebbetzin Scheinberg was sitting in her wheelchair next to him, both of them in their nineties. She was on oxygen or something and she was giggling away like a young kallah while Rav Scheinberg beamed with sheer bliss just being in her presence. It may sound strange to say this about such chashuv people, but I remember thinking they were such a cute couple.
There’s a heartwarming video of Rav Ovadia Yosef and Rav Scheinberg sitting together. Rav Ovadia is hunched over to keep his head lower than Rav Scheinberg’s head. Rav Ovadia is crying and asking Rav Scheinberg what to do about his many sins. Rav Scheinberg thinks this over and then starts crying too. So we have two great rabbanim crying over their “sins.”
 
Compare this to narcissists who, when confronted with even the smallest wrongdoing on their part, go wide-eyed and huff, “I can’t even imagine what you’re talking about! Who, me? How could you even think such a thing about ME?”
When a man reprimanded the Chazon Ish for not saying enough Tehillim (he didn’t realize it was the Chazon Ish), the Chazon Ish simply took it as a sign from Hashem that Hashem wanted him to say more Tehillim without taking any offense.
It used to be that you could go to Bnei Brak and learn with or speak in learning with Rav Shteinman and Rav Kanievsky. My husband used to do this every 3 weeks for a year. He said they were always very nice. Wouldn’t such knowledgeable rabbanim find this annoying? I guess not! Once, my husband witnessed how a tactless young man started needling Rav Kanievsky about something his late father, the Steipler Gaon, had said—the tactless young man thought he’d found a contradiction in the Steipler’s words.
 
But despite the gross insensitivity (and chutzpah), Rav Kanievsky merely responded in a very soft & pained voice, “What do you want from me? My father! My father!” ​
People who went to Rav Bentzion Abba Shaul comment on his warmth and friendliness.
The Lubavitcher Rebbe regularly stood for hours interacting with Jews (and non-Jews) of every stripe, his concern for each Jew obvious. He wore a warm smile and an affectionate twinkle in his eye as he handed out advice, blessings, and dollars. Only a truly humble person could consistently relate to so many different kinds of people with such kindness.
Rav Levi Yitzchak Bender displayed astounding humility throughout his ordeals in life. Here's one example: As he hid in the basement of a wealthy Jew in order to hear borchu, kaddish, and the Torah reading from the minyan upstairs, the wealthy Jew unthinkingly sent of the congregants down to the basement to get the sefer Torah. This exposed Rav Bender, who was one of the KGB's most-wanted at that time. Indeed, the poor Jew freaked out upon seeing Rav Bender and fled the house along with the rest of the minyan.

And what was Rav Bender's description of the calamity?:
"...I understood that I had made a bitter mistake. Why had I not warned the host to come himself and take the sefer Torah, and not send one of his people to do it?"

He blames himself! The host was well-aware of the danger to everyone in hosting Rav Bender—why would anyone think there's any need to remind the host to get the sefer Torah himself?
 
Rav Bender achieved great things and merited amazing miracles. Yet when asked about his greatest accomplishment, he's reputed to have answered: "I lived 30 years in Russia, and I still believe in God!"
Even when Rav Shteinman approached 100, he still feared the judgement of Yom Kippur, he worried he'd overlooked certain middot and deeds that Heaven would judge him for. (For one story of this, please see TSA.)
When Rav Eliezer Papo (author of the Pele Yoetz) agreed to take on the decree of fatal plague to spare his community, he spent his last weeks confessing and doing teshuvah. Confessing to what? Teshuvah on what? He was a tremendous tzaddik! What sins could he have had? And anyway, isn't dying of the plague for the sake of your brothers and sisters atonement enough? No, I guess it wasn't. This is the awesome humility & sincerity of a real gadol.
Rebbetzin Batsheva Kanievsky was also known for her sisterly warmth toward her throngs of admirers and those seeking her blessing. You could see women who’d visited her would be glowing and their faces light up every time they recall their meeting with her. She had the power to make people feel good—no ego on her part.
You can read more about the humility of Rav Shteinman and Rav Finkel in these posts:
  • ​True Greatness is Revealed in the Seemingly Small Stuff
  • The Behavior of Truly Great People​
Rav Avigdor Miller’s words remain with us due to his permission to let his lectures be taped. But to whom does he credit? Mr. Shelby! It was Rav Miller who needed to be there, prepare the lecture, then undergo the strain of answering questions from every direction. But he only ever credits the people who asked for the shiur and who made the recordings.

​(By the way, I’m also personally grateful to Mr. Shelby—and everyone else involved—for organizing the class and the recordings. And I’m grateful to those involved in transcribing his lectures into books and online articles.)
 
Also, when Rav Miller expressed his regret at the Torah he was missing while attending a grandchild’s wedding, another guest asked him if it wasn’t a joyous thing to attend a grandchild’s wedding? Later, Rav Miller thanked the man, revealing that since the man made that comment, Rav Miller was much happier at his grandchildren’s weddings. (It takes a certain humility to accept correction from a regular person and to even thank them for it later.)
 
Here are some samples Rav Miller's straightfoward humility:
​A Random Selection of Short Q&A’s [#2]
Q:
Why did Yosef demand that all the Mitzraim get a bris milah in order to be fed during the famine?
A:
I’m going to leave that unanswered for the time being. That ma’amar has to be studied by me.
                                                         TAPE #E-212
Rav Avigdor Miller: Random Q&As
Q:
How would a bochur today go about acquiring the amount of secular knowledge that you have?

A:
And the answer is that I don’t have much. The little bit that I have, I show off and I make a big fuss, a whole fuss about it. But I don’t have much.
(TAPE # 613)

Q:
Who was wiser, Avraham Avinu or Shlomo Hamelech?
A:
And the answer is, I don’t know. If I ever find out I’ll tell you. Shlomo was definitely wiser than the famous wise men that they knew in history. But Avraham Avinu was something different, I cannot tell you. Avraham was such a pioneer that I’m not able to say if he’s included in that. I just don’t know. If you find out, you’ll tell me.

(TAPE # 403)
The Q&A of Chanukah: Hyrcanus’s Downfall
 
Questioner:
…Now, up until now I personally, outside of perhaps you, Rabbi, I haven't met very many gedolim.
 
Rav Miller:
I'm not a gadol, very far from it.
 
Questioner:
Well, I'm very much impressed with your--
 
Rav Miller:
I'm not a gadol.
 
Questioner:
Well, I'm very impressed with your delivery--

Rav Miller:
A gadol doesn't have any good delivery. A gadol stammers when he talks. A man who has good delivery is not a gadol. He's a public speaker.

Questioner:
Well, I think you understand the subject matter, I think you have some element of gedulah.

Rav Miller:
I'm a speaker. A gadol can't speak. A gadol can think!

​(Just as an aside, the Q&A of Chanukah: Hyrcanus’s Downfall was one of the laugh-aloud funniest things I’ve read in a long time—and very enlightening too. Also, all quotes from Toras Avigdor are used with permission.)
 
Anyway, there are many more “humble gadolim” examples.
 
But that's it for now.
 
Hope this helped.
Related Post:
Which Rabbi Should I Listen To?
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Two Powerful Lessons Revealed by Dinah's Ordeal in Parshat Vayishlach

21/11/2018

4 Comments

 
​In Parshat Vayishlach, Dinah Bat Yaakov undergoes a horrific ordeal.
 
Many layers of insights and deeper meanings (including rectifications and gilgulim) are revealed within this episode, but we’re just going to focus on gleaning 2 lessons from one aspect of it: Dinah’s behavior & dress.
 
Chazal point out that Dinah left her family’s secure area to go out to see the Canaanite females, which is how Shechem saw her and managed to abduct her in the first place. Also, her sleeve accidentally went up, exposing her elbow.
 
If you, like me, grew up with feminist brainwashing, you initially find this insight offensive.

​Blaming the victim! How dare they?!
 
But that’s not what Chazal is doing.

Lesson #1: Please Protect Your Precious Self

​First of all, Dinah inherited her mother’s yatzanit trait; Leah Imeinu was otherwise exceptionally modest and saintly. But nobody’s perfect. Either way, an inherited trait is not Dinah’s fault.
 
Secondly, Dinah and Yosef Hatzaddik switched souls, which is why he possessed certain feminine attributes and Dinah possessed certain masculine attributes.

​(Initially, Leah Imeinu was going to birth Yosef Hatzaddik, but in her great compassion and righteousness, she prayed for a girl so that her sister Rachel Imeinu would be equal to Zilpah & Bilha in the number of Tribes produced.)
 
So the fact that Dinah possessed certain masculine tendencies that led her to take this risk is definitely not Dinah’s fault.
 
So this is the first lesson: Ladies, you need to protect yourselves.

This is the opposite of feminist ideology, which insists that you have the right NOT to protect yourself.

But here's your real right: You have the RIGHT to protect yourself.

In fact, it's even an obligation to protect yourself.

​That's from the Torah, not from me.

Yet as we all know, protective measures like modest behavior and modest dress are not full-proof.
 
Nothing is fool-proof.
 
Bomb shelters can be bombed. Locks can be picked.
 
But we enter bomb shelters anyway. We lock our doors anyway.
 
Why? Because it’s good hishtadlut.
 
And because Judaism loves women, it encourages women to at least make efforts toward self-protection.
 
Because of the feminist propaganda, women and girls in America are discouraged from taking proper measures to protect themselves. This dumbing-down of the American female has reaped terrible consequences for girls and women.
 
In response to the growing number of assaults and harassment against young women, some caring tough guys formed an website (No-Nonsense Self-Defense) to give females—particularly college-aged women—sensible advice for self-protection.

They discovered that despite feminist blather about female "rights!" to behave however and go wherever they want, such conduct usually ignited or escalated a threatening encounter, resulting in a full assault against the woman.

While feminist snarkiness and "grrrrl" characters in books and movies display female feistiness as the desirable and victorious trait, studies reveal that this same feistiness often precedes a violent encounter.

Meaning, 80% of violent encounters were preceded by the young woman using INEFFECTIVE violence when striking out against her potential assailant.

In other words, despite media brainwashing, real-life feisty girls are more likely to lose when faced with a predatory male.

So No-Nonsense Self-Defense stepped in to help women avoid encounters and when faced with such an unwanted encounter, No-Nonsense Self-Defense teaches women how to avoid escalation.

(Sort of like what Dinah's episode comes to teach us.)
 
Yet despite their motto (“We don't object to the fact that the woman threw the first strike; what we object to is that she didn't break his jaw!”), No-Nonsense Self-Defense is regularly accused of chauvinism and misogyny by Liberal extremists who simply cannot accept the following truths:
  • Women are often smaller and weaker than men.
  • Women have less experience & skill in physical confrontations. (Boys grow up rough-housing and engage in high-contact sports, like tackle football and the like.)
  • Women are either not willing or not capable of deterring a violent encounter with the amount of violence necessary for deterrence.

Yet because No-Nonsense Self-Defense actually cares about women, it continues to propagate pretty much the same lesson presented by the Chumash:

Protect yourself by avoiding encounters & avoiding escalation.
​Furthermore, Rebbetzin Tziporah Heller has observed that some men act like predators while some women act like prey.
 
So let’s take the example of wild bears.
 
People and bears have lived together in America since time immemorial. Not literally together, but in the same forest.
 
And most of the time, despite bears being carnivorous predators, people weren’t attacked.
 
Even today, people go camping in bear country, but take precautions because while most bears will leave you alone, they are still predatory animals who can mess up your campsite if you leave attractive stuff accessible.

​Actually, bears can do a lot worse than just mess up your campsite, but you get my drift.
 
So what are some precautions campers should take against bears?

Avoid encounters with bears.
This means the following:
  • Watch out for signs of bears in the area: fresh tracks, torn logs, clawed trees, flipped rocks, scat. (Drunken frat boys often leave similar signs.)
  • Only travel through bear country in a group.
  • Avoid late evening trips or returning to camp in the dark.
  • Avoid being near food sources that attract predators.

Upon encountering a bear, avoid escalation.
This means the following:
  • Stay calm—look apathetic, if possible—yet wary.
  • Protect any small children in the group (i.e., pick them up).
  • Stay in a group.
  • Move away (slowly and sideways, if the bear is stationary)
  • Do not let the bear access your edibles.
  • Don’t drop your pack.
  • Leave the area & detour to a non-bear location.
  • Carry bear spray.
 
Likewise, the above contains good guidelines for girls and women when around men (i.e., potential predators) who aren’t their father or husband.
 
To take this mashal even further:

​People who work in America’s National Parks tell of some of the horrifyingly stupid things people have done around bears.
 
For example, some brutally stupid parents think it’s cute to paint their children’s hands with honey and have them hang those hands out the car window to be gently licked by the charming bear approaching their car. A real Kodak moment!
 
Except the bear did a lot more than lap up the honey.
 
The person telling the story didn’t want to go into details, but I think we can all imagine.
 
Yet disturbingly, as Rebbetzin Heller pointed out, some women do just this:
They paint themselves with honey when they’re out in bear country (like if they're on a college campus or in a night club or something).

In other words, they transform themselves into something a predator wants to devour: prey.
 
And certainly, there are parents who paint their children with honey and expose them to predators.

Even without the honey, you should NEVER roll down your car window and expose your children to a potential predator!

And I mean that metaphorically as well as literally.
 
Is it their fault? And is being mangled or killed a fair consequence for lack of brains? I mean, heck, the children weren’t at fault at all; it was their parents!
 
Yet it still happened because this is the physics of the world in which we live. There are predators. This is nature, like it or not.
 
Of course, you can always hope for a miracle and miracles happen a lot more than we like to acknowledge (Hashem shomer peta’im), but a thinking & caring person takes normal measures of protection against the natural way of the world—and the natural way of the world includes predators (bears, Canaanites, etc.).
 
So that’s Lesson #1.

Lesson #2: What's Wrong is WRONG

​If you look at the consequences for Shechem, things didn’t work out for them.
 
They got slaughtered—literally.
 
So this is a very interesting lesson:

  • Dinah unwittingly endangers herself by leaving her family compound.
  • She innocently goes out to positively influence the females of a culture whom she knows consists of immoral reprobates (but she also knows she can improve the females -- yet she is kidnapped before she gets the chance).
  • She’s not careful enough with the modesty of her clothing.
  • And all this leads her right into the clutches of Shechem who violates her, then doesn’t want to release her.
 
Yet despite all this, SHECHEM is blamed.
 
And SHECHEM is punished.
 
Not Dinah. Not at all.
 
Yet real misogynists would describe Dinah’s behavior as “asking for it.”

Historically, most (maybe all?) non-Jewish societies took the "she was asking for it" attitude whenever girls or women were violated (unless she was a nun or something). They nitpicked over her behavior and the way she was dressed. Only if they found her character, behavior, and dress impeccable could they proceed with a guilty verdict for the abuser. Maybe.
 
And even today, Yishmaelite culture punishes the victim. Even a preteen girl will be murdered by her Yishmaelite family members for this act she couldn’t have possibly wanted and on the contrary, experienced as profoundly traumatic.

Several years ago, Israeli newspapers reported on a Bedouin mother from Israel’s South who made it to the Beer Sheva police to deliver her traumatized 12-year-old girl into their prison to protect this girl from her own father and brothers who wanted to murder her for having been violated! I can only imagine what it must have been like for such a young girl to have undergone such a horrific ordeal and then need to run for her life, knowing that her closest family members wanted to murder her.

Actually, I can’t imagine. It’s just terrifying.
 
But other cultures around the world are not much different. No matter how obviously innocent the female victim and how obviously guilty the offender, many cultures still treat the female victim with little or no compassion.
 
But the point is: The family of our Avot and Imahot were NOT like this.
 
And the truth is: Chazal needs to mention Dinah’s unintentional lack of modesty in behavior and dress in order to impart this all-important message:

Even if her behavior or dress makes her look like she’s “asking for it,” VIOLATING HER IS NOT ALLOWED.
 
Despite Dinah inadvertently "doing like this" and "doing like that," everyone dies.
 
All the bad people die, I mean.
 
Interestingly, the brother (Shimon) who (along with Levi) helped carry out the strict din against Shechem was also the brother who took Dinah under his wing.

​Rather than killing his victimized sister, Shimon comforted and protected her.

This shows how the uncompromising Jewish adherence to justice runs parallel to the Jewish ability for equally uncompromising compassion and love. 
 
So this is a very powerful lesson to be gleaned from the Chumash, but you need to scour the secular agendas out of your brain in order to glean it.
 
Having grown up amid secular Liberal culture myself, I can sympathize with how difficult this scouring can be.

​But don’t give up! Hashem helps.
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DON'T believe him, ladies! He's not as sweet and harmless as he looks!
4 Comments

Which Rabbi Should I Listen To?

15/11/2018

2 Comments

 
UPDATE: It's very helpful to read this link too:
Rav Avigdor Miller on The Man who Dresses like a Rabbi​
I’d like to start off by talking about a negative experience with a rabbi who seemed very big.
 
But first, I need to give a bit of background:

​We all have some kind of sore spot on our nefesh. It’s a place that’s vulnerable to pain, like a severely sunburned patch of skin.

So mine is being treated like I don’t exist.

Also, my husband and I served as rabbi and rebbetzin for a small shul in the US and also as part of a kiruv group in another place, so I saw a lot from the inside as far as rabbis go. 

Is That You Talkin' or a Bumble Bee Walkin'?

Anyway, at the beginning of our marriage, my husband and I went to visit a rabbi (with the rabbi’s agreement) and at my husband’s prompting, I asked the rabbi directly, “What nusach should I daven?”

That question was part of the reason why we were there.

I’m Ashkenazi, my husband is Sephardi, and another rabbi told me that some poskim say the wife should take on her husband’s nusach while some say she should stick to her own familiar nusach.

So we went my husband’s rabbi to get a decisive answer.
 
And the rabbi acted like I hadn’t said anything. He just looked away and didn’t say a word -- not even a grunt.
 
I felt very embarrassed and confused. Had I said something wrong? Or was he thinking it over? Perhaps he hadn’t understood me with my heavy American accent?
 
I glanced at my husband, who also seemed taken aback, but after a long and uncomfortable silence, the rabbi started talking to my husband about something else.
 
I was really confused.

​Also, just for knowing, the rabbi would look at me directly (in a modest manner) and address me directly at other times. So it wasn't that he refused to talk to or look me in the face by custom.
 
At a pause in the conversation, I waited a moment and then politely said something like, “Excuse me, kavod harav, um…I was just interested in knowing what nusach I should daven now?”

He looked at me in an odd way, then turned away and made no response.

​So I said, “Um, the thing is I davened Ashkenazi until now, but now I’m supposed to take on Sephardi minhagim…” I faltered because he still made no reply. “So, uh, I heard that some poskim say one way and some say another and, uh, I was just wondering which nusach I should daven?”
 
He frowned and looked away from me.
 
Now, instead of feeling mildly confused or a bit taken aback like a normal person might, I felt devastated—because this is my sore spot. I’m way too oversensitive in this area.
 
At this point, my husband got up the guts to politely re-ask my question and the rav looked at him, frowned, and made this irritated motion with his hands and shoulders.
 
And my husband immediately raised his palms in surrender, “Okay, sorry, sorry! Never mind. Ah…” And my husband changed the subject.
 
When we got home, I burst into tears as I asked why the rabbi treated me so. My husband tried to make a joke out of it and quipped that apparently the rabbi wanted to rely on my husband.
 
“So why didn’t he SAY that?” I cried. "Why did he act like I don't even exist?"
 
My husband shrugged apologetically. He grew up in a traditional immigrant Moroccan neighborhood in Eretz Yisrael, where respect for people who learned Torah was sacrosanct and he couldn’t bring himself to speak about his rabbi any further.
 
To compound things (and I'm revealing this with my husband's consent), my husband’s father died very suddenly when my husband was a teenager, and he always missed the closeness they’d shared. So he instinctively sought a father figure in his rabbi.

​And this rabbi could be very warm and friendly when they learned or spoke together, and such paternal warmth is what my husband understandably craved—but the rabbi could also be irritable and sharp and prone to short bursts of frightening temper. (I saw it once and it froze me speechless—and all because his wife brought the wrong coffee. Cripes.)
 
What I didn’t know at the time was that this rabbi has a lion-like temper (which was why my husband got nervous when the rabbi got irritable and why my husband was hesitant to push the rabbi to answer the innocent—and very simple!—shaila).
 
And as I also saw several times, this rabbi can be very friendly and warm toward people, then treat them with disdain or hostility. (And he did this to me, sometimes acting like I didn’t exist as he did above, or being really nice and then with a paternal smile, plunge his verbal dagger into my nefesh.)
 
Eventually, we drifted off from him and much to his credit, my husband eventually managed to overcome the very understandable desire for some kind of father figure.
 
In other words, despite his hasmadah in learning and the tremendous intellectual knowledge he possessed, this rabbi's Torah learning remained stuck in his head only and never managed to fully flow down to his heart.

You could definitely see the influence of Torah on him, but there was still a lot missing.
 
And some people are like that.

Derech Eretz Kadma L'Torah

​For whatever the reason, some people learn tremendous amounts of Torah (sort of like academics like to learn their own weighty tomes and philosophies), but such people never manage to actually INTERNALIZE the Torah they learn. (Or they only internalize a very small percentage of the vast amount of Torah they’ve learned.)
 
Of course, we’re all flawed and even someone who learns Torah for years can still exhibit flawed middot at times.

Only Hashem is perfect.
 
But this rabbi's extreme behavior exhibited itself regularly.
 
And we need to use caution when choosing a rav. Just because someone has a lot of Torah-learning in his background doesn’t mean he is a Torah personality.
 
For example, when a regular frum Jew asked Rav Avigdor Miller how to deal with a learned rabbi’s lack of derech eretz, Rav Avigdor DIDN’T say, “Gevald! Why aren’t you giving him the benefit of the doubt? Who are you, a lowly regular Yid, to judge such a big talmid chacham?!”
 
No.
​
Rav Avigdor knew that rabbis can lack derech eretz. So he recommended that the regular Jew write the rabbi a polite anonymous letter.
 
Here’s the original Q&A:
Q:
Is it permissible to rebuke a talmid chochom or Rav who doesn’t greet me with a seiver panim yafos and even ignores me when I greet him? 
A:
Can you rebuke somebody who is more learned than you, if he has a certain fault?
Yes.
But what you should do is write him an anonymous letter. A polite anonymous letter.
That’s the best way.
​And I’ll tell you, that this is a method which, if used properly, can be a very big toi’eles, a very big help, in other situations as well.
​
TAPE # E-244 (August 2000)

How Can We Know which Rabbi to Follow?

In Going Home…to Yerushalayim, a commenter asks how can we know who to listen to and who not?
 
It’s an excellent and vitally important question.
 
So first of all, it’s important to pray for this.
 
Both Rav Levi Yitzchak Bender (Words of Faith) and Rav Michel Dorfman recommended saying “Utaknenu b’aitzah tovah milfanecha” (said in Maariv and Bedtime Shema) with as much kavanah as you can regarding this issue.
Another thing: If you learn halacha and mussar, it helps a lot in recognizing who you should listen to.
 
Then you can see whether the rabbi behaves more or less according to, say, Orchot Tzaddikim or not.
 
In the above example, I’d already learned a bit about the Torah ways of derech eretz and treating people with courtesy and compassion—even if those people aren’t really cool hotshots like yourself [sarc].
 
So the rabbi's very obvious lack of derech eretz (which I saw on several occasions) combined with the fact that he obviously knew how to behave with derech eretz (as he did so when he wanted to at other times) could have told me that he wasn’t the real deal.
 
And regarding his bizarre flares of rage?

​Well, I’d already learned that Shlomo Hamelech declared in Mishlei that anger rests in the bosom of fools.

And I’d already learned that the Gemara states that anger is like worshiping an idol.

​And here’s the Rambam’s Yad Hachazakah, Chapter2, Halacha 3:
“Anger is also an exceptionally bad quality. It is fitting and proper that one move away from it and adopt the opposite extreme.”
So when I saw the rabbi erupt into bursts of short but very intense anger (over nonsense), I could have realized he wasn’t the real deal.
 
It was confusing at the time because in those days, there was tremendous pressure on baalei teshuvah to find a rav (any rav!) and many stories showcased how blind obedience to a rav reaped a satisfyingly happy ending.

There are also many stories showing rabbis acting oddly and later revealing profound and legitimate reasons for such behavior.

But they were tzaddikim with ruach hakodesh—which is very different than the vast majority of rabbis who most certainly do NOT possess ruach hakodesh or tzidkus. So you needn’t assume your rabbi’s unhalachic behavior is the result of profound holiness.
 
Anyway, I thought the problem was me and that if I only had enough emunat chachamim, everything would be fine.
 
(But things didn’t work out and I learned a big lesson: Intellect is NOT the same as wisdom. And we shouldn’t place our emuna on a “walking encyclopedia,” but only on a real true chacham.)
 
So it’s not easy and it takes some time, but that’s one way to go.
The following pertains specifically ​to gedolei hador, but it's still good general advice.

This is what Rav Avigdor Miller suggests in Recognizing a Gadol Hador:

  • See who other gedolim are calling a gadol.
  • Do great rabbanim from outside his group consider him a gadol?

Courtesy, Not Crony

​By the way, we can and certainly should respect all people for the good middot and authentic Torah knowledge they DO possess. Some people are experts on the halachos of tevilat keilim or lashon hara, but lack sensitivity or expertise in other areas.
 
We should not start gossiping about a rabbi’s—or any person’s—bad traits unless there is a halachically mandated benefit in doing so.
 
We must always find a good point in every Jew—the more good points, the merrier.
 
However, on the subject of rabbis, you don’t need FOLLOW them if they aren’t up to par.

​If their views conflict with those mentioned in STANDARD halacha and mussar, you DON’T need to follow them.
 
Yes, you treat them with same courtesy and respect as you do any human being.

But you don't need to follow them.
 
Their opinions and hashkafahs aren’t kodesh kedoshim—unless that rabbi truly embodies Torah haskafah.
 
So if they aren’t representing Torah truth (and long gray or white beards with impressive rabbinical attire and rabbinical degrees don’t AUTOMATICALLY determine their level of Torah truth), you don’t need to (and shouldn’t) follow them.
Frum media isn’t perfect either.

​Please see:
Rav Avigdor Miller on the Yeshivah & the Sane Asylum
And this connects to what’s happening in both Eretz Yisrael & Chutz L’Aretz today:
Are the Reshaim Endangering Us?​
P.S. This post started off with mentioning the problem of a sore oversensitive point. I want to continue discussing how to deal with any point of oversensitiveness. When ignored, it interferes with having a good life and good middot. So more on how to deal with that in an upcoming post…
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