I subscribe to Nechumelle Jacobs's email list of inspiring messages, and she forwarded an illuminating dvar Torah by Rabbi Yechiel Spero from the Inspirational Daily subscription.

Why does Hashem command us so strongly to remember what Amalek did for us?

And how do we overcome Amalek? How do we carry out Hashem's parallel command to wipe out the memory of Amalek?

Rabbi Spero quotes Rav Moshe Chaim Luzatto, explaining how Amalek wants us to forget the following:

• everything Hashem did for us
• how special we are
• that we are Hashem's Chosen
• that Hashem loves us so much

(Come to think of it, this also makes sense in terms of the Amalekite Erev Rav, where you have seeming Jews investing everything in making us forget how much Hashem loves us, how special we are with a unique mission in the world no one else can fulfill, and rallying us to fulfill non-Jewish missions in the world rather than our soul-mission, etc.)

Anyway, Rabbi Spero explains how we can combat this by investing in the following:

• Remember how special we are as a Nation.
• Remember how special you are as a unique soul.
• Remember how much Hashem loves you.
• Look for the good in yourself & others.

He emphasizes how the teshuvah of Elul means NOT making yourself feel worthless & sinful.

On the contrary—feel WORTHY. 

Feel hopeful & special as a Jew with a uniquely Jewish neshamah & a uniquely VITAL mission to fulfill in life.

Jews who behave as they should end up bringing the entire world to its rectification.

Due to the overwhelming propaganda swamping us from every side in every form, we sometimes lose sight of our real purpose in this world.
​
Most Jews today (including some frum Jews) believe our mission should be to fulfill the roles of non-Jews in a non-Jewish manner.

And our society lauds non-Jewish roles while denigrating quintessentially Jewish roles (like Torah-based marriage & parenthood or being a talmid chacham).

Especially for women...

How many times do you read about frum women doing amazing things—always stuff within the secular or non-Jewish community (or a frum imitation of them) in traditionally secular/non-Jewish masculine roles?

Why is a woman only considered really awesome when she fills a traditionally masculine role?

Why can't a woman heroically filling a traditional feminine role be considered really awesome too (as exemplified by the title of this section above)?

For example...

​Do you ever read about a frum woman who, say, dealt with colicky twins for 3 months and did not lose her temper or her mind?

SHE should make the front page of the papers!

That's an incredible feat of middot.

I'm being totally serious.

Here's another example:

​I have a friend (who was a stay-at-home mother at the time) with a genuinely helpful husband who is also "a real gem" in her own words.

He worked full time, but strove to dedicate time to serious Torah learning.

The problem was waking up very early to learn Torah wasn't working for him. (He also helped with the baby at night.)

Going out to the Beit Midrash in the late-night hours also proved less than ideal; he was too tired to learn properly.

Together, they realized the best time for him to learn Torah was in the evening hours—davka the time she needed him most.

Unlike some husbands, her husband was fantastic at managing the whole pre-bedtime & bedtime routine with the kids.

She didn't know how she could manage without his genuinely valuable help.

And this needed to be a daily commitment.

But as they discussed it, she realized that giving up her husband's help for those essential hours was the best way to fulfill her own Torah role.

So she did it.
 
​He appealed to her, but did not pressure her. It really was her decision.

Yes, she went into it with trepidation & maybe some dread—but also with a gratifying sense of duty.

And it was hard—especially at the beginning (these things are always REALLY hard at the beginning!)—but she did it.

(This is a great example to both their sons & their daughters, by the way. It also brings a lot of bracha & Heavenly reward.)

In a nutshell: This is a huge mesirut nefesh for a normal person. 

So why isn't she in the media as a "successful frum woman"?

How come HER story & her achievement aren't publicized?

Because she didn't do it while wearing chic suits & a sleek European-hair shaitel down to her forearms? Because she doesn't need a professional make-up artist to help carry out her task?

​Because it didn't take any kind of degree or charisma to accomplish it?

Because that kind of accomplishment isn't valued by the secular non-Jewish world, so we cannot hold her up as a "successful frum woman"?

The truth is, we can't publicize all these unseen yet powerful victories.

​But we also don't need to take so much to heart the publicized accomplishments based on non-Jewish values.

I met a young Jewish woman who grew up in a secular-yet-traditional family.

Her mother occupied herself with world organizations meant to save children in Africa while neglecting her own daughter's needs.

(I think she was physically taken care of by hired help.)

Though usually a warm & upbeat person, she once expressed her pain by noting how her mother seemed to care more about the children halfway across the world in Africa than she did her own daughter right there in her own home.

Yet despite all her mother's efforts toward children in Africa since the 1970s—at the expense of her daughter—you probably noticed that much of Africa continues to be one big heartbreaking mess of human suffering & human rights violations.

Meaning—individual situations aside—you can't really tell there was some very intelligent & devoted Jewish lady sacrificing herself for decades to improve the lot of African children.

It's a terrible tragedy this Jewish woman did not channel her idealism, devotion, and energies into the Torah community in a Torah way.

Fortunately, Hashem blessed her daughter with tremendous compassion, idealism, warmth, and simchat chaim, and this daughter made her way to Torah-true Judaism, where she could utilize her wonderful gifts in the best way possible.

​So the world makes everything confusing.

And the constant swimming against the current drains a lot of emotional & physical stamina.

(Which is why one should seek out a current going in the correct direction. It won't always flow in your particular direction because you need to build yourself by going against it at times—but at least you're not in constant opposition.) 

​But really, if a Jew truly cares about the world, desires world peace, true justice, genuine freedom, robust health & long lives for all...then that Jew will do his or her best to be the absolute best Jew he or she can be.

​Why?

By Am Yisrael carrying out its tasks (especially b'simcha—one of the most powerful mitzvot), this rectifies the world.

Know you are worthy & special with a unique mission of your unique soul & also a National mission together with Am Yisrael.

That's the best way to do teshuvah.

That's the best way to defeat Amalek.

By conforming exactly to halacha—especially combined with feeling GOOD about being a Jew—a Jew sweetens din (Heaven-sent consequences), hastens Mashiach b'rachamim, and thus brings healing & rectification to the world.

This shiur by Rabbi Yechiel Spero can be listened to here:
https://www.freeconferencecall.com/wall/recorded_audio?audioRecordingUrl=https%3A%2F%2Frs0000.freeconferencecall.com%2Fstorage%2FsgetFCC2%2FR2yZa%2Fu%2FpfyAB3pmlZ6Tz8E9tvNEJQ.mp3

Or by calling in here:
Direct Dial: 605-475-3273, 875753968#,1567#
(Ref#: 1567)

In Rav Avigdor Miller's dvar Torah for Parshas Behar-Bechukosai 4 - Tenants in This World, we learn the extent to which we are tenants in This World.

As Judaism emphasizes so strongly & so often, This World is merely a hallway leading to something much bigger and truer.

The Yovel (Jubilee) Year of ancient times kept Am Yisrael on its toes, even though they lived in their own Land within their rightful Tribal portion.

With homes & other acquisitions needing to be restored to their original state & possession, people still experienced movement & uprooting.

Later on & continuing until today, Galut (Exile) keeps us on our toes.

Even within Eretz Yisrael, we still experience Galut.

Missile strikes & policies of the Erev Rav government officials carried out by their lackeys ensure that we don't feel too settled in our homes.

We still need to turn to Hashem for any real stability.

With recent tragedies, for which the deeper reasons remain concealed, we see the Galut in that 3 yeshivah bachurs can be shot at random. Government policies enable this to happen. 

The revolving door of Israeli justice for terrorists embolden terrorism.

We do not yet dwell securely within our own Land.

Likewise, regarding the Meron tragedy, Rav Itamar Schwartz noted (among other profundities): 

Eyewitness accounts bear testimony to this point as we repeatedly hear how police did not intervene to prevent the dangerous crowding.

​Yet people realized on their own.

Ten minutes before the horrific crush, two 22-year-old friends of my son, concerned by the increasingly oppressive crowding, turned to each other and said, "Let's get out of here before we die."

They deliberated which of the 2 exits to take and Hashem guided them to choose the exit which ended up NOT being the deathtrap.

So they made it out alive.

When many other good people on their own decided to relieve the crowding by leaving, the police responded in a way that first caused then exacerbated crushing & falling (with the exception of a couple of policemen who worked to save people).

Look at who took control of that holy place & those holy people.

And so, this is where we are now.

Galut.

Nothing is stable. Nothing is guaranteed.

This isn't our world.

This isn't the real world.

This is all temporary and merely a path on the journey to reach the real world.

Those killed in the crush came from all types of backgrounds.

Many looked like ordinary people.

Yet so many extraordinary stories of the niftarim have come to light.

One astounding verified story by Daniel Braude came from Daniel Braude's 1-Minute Daily Halocha:

A man who eventually survived the crush found a small passage of air that kept him alive as he remained trapped between those fallen beneath him and those fallen on top of him.

He desperately wanted to move up off those under him, but could not.

​From beneath him, this survivor heard a man say Shema Yisrael in the manner of one who realizes he is living out his final moments.

After this Shema, this person's final words were to those unwillingly crushing him:

"Whoever is on top of me—I forgive you completely."

He never spoke again.

​This was a person who understood the purpose of This World.

In his last moments, this suffering Jew thought to consider the terrible guilt experienced by his brothers on top of him, fellow Jews who so desperately wanted to save his life, but who themselves could not move at all.

His last breaths consisted of empathy & judging his fellow Jews favorably.

He understood where he was & where he was going.

And he understood Who the Real Master is.

May Mashiach please usher in the Geula quickly and with compassion.

Reading Going Home...To Yerushalayim's re-post of Rabbi Winston's dvar Torah reminded me of a couple I once knew.

The initially secular husband found himself attracted to the kiruv he encountered. He then delved into frumkeit via a very knowledgeable & caring rav.

The secular Jewish woman he wished to marry at the beginning of his kiruv refused to follow him on this journey, so they broke up and he married someone else who loved him deeply & was fully willing to follow him on his journey into frumkeit—but with whom he never felt fully satisfied.

The woman he ended up marrying was a pretty girl with good middot & a nurturing personality. She came from a wealthy home with a tennis court & a swimming pool, and she only ever wanted to become a little bit more frum than she'd been raised, but she willingly followed him into ultra-Orthodoxy & a kollel life, which meant living in deprivation.

​But though she embraced it all with a good attitude, he never managed to really appreciate her.

Over time, he forced his growing family into a very insulated frum community, including speaking Yiddish at home (which his wife never managed to learn well) and sending them to chassidic Yiddish schools (carefully avoiding telling the school that they weren't FFB—which is never a good sign; if you have to fool the school, you probably don't belong there).  

Observing the appalling way he often spoke to & treated her felt very discomfiting. He seemed to resent her for no reason.

But except for the occasional times she reached her limit in patience, she usually accepted his poor behavior with equanimity & even an understanding smile—as was her nature.

Then the rav passed away & things started to really deteriorate.

The problem was that the husband's connection with the rav acted as the glue that held the husband to frumkeit.

Sure, all the learning also felt good; wonderful ideas exist in our holy books. But the main attraction for him was the rav.

In addition to growing up in a cold society, the husband always lacked a father figure in life too, and this wonderful rav provided warmth, love, and direction.

When the rav passed away, that source of warmth, love, and direction disappeared too.

The husband's treatment of his wife & children worsened and his grip of Yiddishkeit also deteriorated.

Via social media, he found the woman he originally wanted to marry (who was still secular and now married to an equally secular Jew) and he ended up spending tons of money (further depriving his own family) to re-establish a connection with her until her husband put a stop to it by threatening to divorce her & deny her all custody of their children.

Gradually, all the formerly frum husband's children went off the derech while his wife took sedatives to deal with the situation.

Chazal speaks about this, that a man's debauchery will deprive his wife & children of their rightful parnassa, and his unsavory behavior influences them to behave badly too, whether they're consciously aware of his transgressions or not.

The couple divorced and he left the children in her custody with barely any financial resources, not paying child support & allowing only the most occasional visitation with his own children (and not even all of them).

The wife (ex-wife by now) mostly drifted out of frumkeit, except she maintained her Shabbat observance. She struggled for several years to get on her feet financially. (Actually, I don't know if she ever did, or if she continued to live off of sympathetic family & government programs).

He took his cushiony new livelihood and went on to marry a financially independent woman and start a new family.

​And up to here is all I know.

​Some major lessons can be elicited from this dismaying saga, but one is connected to Rabbi Winston's description of the Erev Rav—well, it's actually Chazal's description of the Erev Rav, and Rabbi Winston focuses on this aspect:

They belonged to Moshe Rabbeinu. The Erev Rav are called his—Moshe Rabbeinu's.

In speaking to Moshe Rabbeinu, Hashem calls them "YOUR people that YOU brought up from the land of Egypt (Shemot 32:7)."

He fought for them (Hashem hadn't wanted them). They followed a leader whom they expected to take care of them.

They never fully connected to Hashem & Torah.

Likewise, in the above example, the man looked like a sincere baal teshuvah on the outside, but his real connection to frumkeit was via this special rav—and only for ego reasons.

Any kiruv, any rav or rebbetzin, any shiur is only ever a MEANS to connect to Hashem & Torah.

It's a way to learn.

Most people use them that way. It's obvious.

But some people don't.

And that's a defect in them.

Secondly, there's also the idea of Derech eretz kadmah l'Torah—that common decency precedes Torah.

Meaning that if you're a total jerk, you're not going to be able to follow Torah properly.

You have to WANT for Torah to influence you positively.

​But if you're a jerk, then every time you encounter a situation in which the upper road feels hard & awkward, you simply take the lower road.

That's why the man in the above situation treated his wife & children so badly. Most of the times he needed to hold his tongue, speak nicely, or be considerate, he simply refused and behaved however he felt.

(BTW, people who do this generally feel like they're the victim, which allows them—in their own mind—to abuse others. They honestly think they don't NEED to be nice because they perceive the other person as the one victimizing them!)

His self-indulgence of bad middot led to snarly bouts of depression (being a jerk is pretty depressing) and eventually slid into the terrible sins of disloyalty to his own wife & aishet ish with somebody else's wife, until the final descent into complete secularity.

Because of his lack of derech eretz & his desire to fulfill his emotional needs (rather than his soul needs), he never managed to embrace the essence of Judaism.

So despite his extremely frum-looking external appearance (wearing chassidish clothes) and his external behavior (living a kollel lifestyle & speaking Yiddish), he was always a fake (even though during his phase with the lovely rav, he FELT sincere). 

It's heartbreaking that his wife & children got both duped & dumped in the process.

But that's what happens when derech eretz doesn't precede Torah and also when a person pursues Judaism for ego fulfillment without ever transitioning to soul fulfillment.

Just like the Erev Rav.

We also see from the above why the Erev Rav pack such a devastating punch against the mitzvah-observance of Am Yisrael. They suck all the meaning right out of everything, leaving you with a cloudy, painfully false experience of Torah.

Despite the grueling challenge they present, it's up to us to look behind the smoke-and-mirrors of the Erev Rav. They believe in what they're doing, which makes it harder for us to see behind their façade.

Reading the last part (the section entitled "Melave Malka") of the above-mentioned post sheds the necessary light on why they are so hard to perceive.

But that's a big part of our avodah: seeing the Truth.

(Note: It's routine for baalei teshuvah & converts to enter Torah observance with a combination of motives. That's normal & to be expected. But at some point, inner work needs to occur & at least the beginning of a transition needs to be made into internalizing the Torah's essence & values. For converts, the conversion process really needs to do this, the responsibility of which lies on the rabbi involved. But either way, the transition needs to happen at some point for all Jews.)

​Related posts:

• ​The Erev Rav Strategy: Follow the Biggest "Bully"
• What's the Message of the Erev Rav for Us on 17 Tammuz?

In Rav Avigdor Miller's dvar Torah for Parshas Vaeira 4 – Seeing His Wonders, the rav takes us in for a much deeper look at the 10 Plagues.

Seeing as so much of our liturgy recalls the Exodus from Egypt—even the blessing after eating bread recalls it—it's vital we understand what went on during that torturous yet miraculous time.​

On page 4, Rav Miller makes a shocking observation: 

He prefaces this by noting that while Am Yisrael today consists of many different races from all the different people who converted to Judaism over the millennia...:

This seems like unique way of phrasing the old idea from Chazal that at the End of Days, Erev Rav (Mixed Multitude) will outnumber true Jews.

Very interesting, no?

Rav Miller acknowledges that we lack the ability to trace the lineage to see who descended from Egyptians & who descended from the 12 Tribes. But the original Egyptian descendants certainly exist!

Likewise, he notes that many Bnei Yisrael did NOT leave Egypt.

With these 2 observations, he presents an intriguing twist:
​

• Many Egyptians left Egypt with Bnei Yisrael, primarily BECAUSE of the 10 Plagues, and even sincerely said na'aseh v'nishmah (we will do and we will listen) at Har Sinai.

 

• At the same time, many Bnei Yisrael did NOT leave Egypt.

So you have non-Jews who converted because of the 10 Plagues, but Jews who did not do teshuvah despite the 10 Plagues.

Whoa.

And, in contrast to common belief, Rav Miller states that the Bnei Yisrael who remained in Egypt were not actually wicked, but only called reshaim (bad) in contrast to those who left.

If those refusers were around today, they'd be our most respected frum Jews.

​So those who did actually leave were quite exceptional.

Continuing along this fascinating theme, Rav Miller describes the Erev Rav Egyptians as the crème de la crème of Egyptian society. 

That's right.

The original Erev Rav consisted of the "intellectual aristocracy" of Egyptian nobility.

​Actually, we see this today with the elite of American society. So many marry Jews! Especially the millennial generation. It's weird. Some even seem to convert (though with many of them, their commitment seems lackluster compared to the many sincere converts we've all encountered & according to what basic halacha requires; many don't even go to a real rabbi for "conversion") But I digress...

Is this partly why so many Erev Rav today (as predicted by Chazal) aim for the highest echelons of Jewish society, both politically & religiously? Are they trying to reclaim their former status?

​Anyway, these Erev Rav people gave up lives of luxury & prestige to follow Bnei Yisrael into the Midbar (desert wilderness)...all because of the 10 Plagues' display of Hashem's Mastery.

​The Egyptian intelligentsia discussed every plague with incisive analysis.

So why didn't Paroh (Pharaoh) do the same?

He did, actually. He just came to different conclusions.

Basically, says Rav Miller, Paroh responded like the academics today: He theorized that reddish microorganisms infested the Nile.

And Paroh assumed that Moshe Rabbeinu predicted it by analyzing the Nile beforehand.

In other words, Paroh concluded that Moshe Rabbeinu (whom Paroh knew to be very intelligent & educated) examined the Nile beforehand, realized what the red-producing bacteria were about to do, then based on that, told everyone the Nile would turn to blood.

Ta-dah!

​Likewise with the Plague of Frogs. Frogs already existed in the Nile. So what's the big deal about a sudden infestation of them? It can happen. Also, sometimes a hail of frogs occurs from the sky, right?

So with each Plague, that's how Paroh confronted it, which Rav Miller details further on pages 7-8.

​With this, Rav Miller segues into the great contradiction within modern society, which carefully analyzes the great miracles of every human tissue & of nature, yet dismisses all these wonders as happenstance.

And in answer to the question of why Hashem no longer performs Biblical miracles for us today, Rav Miller says: He does!

We simply don't view them as such.

But with our advanced technology (also miraculous, BTW), we can see into so much of the natural workings and truly see Hashem's Hand in it all—just like the Egyptians could see into the Plague of Frogs, etc.

But sure, Rav Miller acknowledges, New York's Hudson River doesn't turn to blood and frogs don't go invading movie theaters & places of ill-repute.

It would be nice if they did, but they don't. (About the frogs, I mean, not the Hudson River.)

Why don't they?

​Because (pages 9-10; emphasis mine):

And that, says Rav Miller (quoting the Mesillat Yesharim/Pathway of the Just) is our purpose in life: to pass this test of emunah by seeing Hashem in a world in which Hashem is hidden.

When we insist on seeing Hashem's Hand in a life seemingly devoid of Hashem, we reap tremendous reward for this.

We create for ourselves huge merits!

It's especially challenging today, so we get especial credit.

Yay us!

​To help us overcome this momentous challenge, Rav Miller delineates on pages 11-14 the Divine aspects of daisies, rosebushes, apple trees, and dandelions.

Also, make sure to check out the Practical Tip on page 15.

And though this dvar Torah didn't come out and say it, the implication here is that the Yisrael majority who stayed behind did not analyze the 10 Plagues properly (according to the principles outlined in this dvar Torah), but the Erev Rav did.

And that made all the difference.

Very chewy food for thought...

A couple of years ago, I went through a phase in which I obsessively researched everything I could about personality disorders (particularly narcissistic personality disorder) and also looked into sociopathy/psychopathy.

Like a lot of other people, the researched proved illuminating, explaining certain dynamics like nothing else ever had, offering reassurance & validation.

It felt nice not to feel so off-balance with these emotionally unhealthy people. 

And I wasn't the only one suffering these observations & feelings around personality disordered people.

But the secular world went down the fork it usually does, engaging in flawed solutions (offered with bluster & overconfidence), plus splitting the categories into an unending spiral of personality disorder niches: narcissist, covert narcissist, borderline, masochist, passive-aggressive, passive-aggressive masochist, oppositional defiance, avoidant, and so on.

It didn't take long to realize that, rather than a variety of personality disorders, it was the same old inflated sense of importance combined with a lack of empathy—exhibited in various ways according to personality.

Meaning, introverts tend to be covert narcissists while extroverts tend to be regular narcissists.

Borderline reflects the negative aspects of the female personality taken to an extreme while narcissist personality disorder often reflects the negative aspects of the male personality taken to an extreme (which is why women tend to be diagnosed as borderline & men tend to be diagnosed as narcissist—but the root cause is the same).

Naturally bold personalities will manifest as oppositional defiance disorder while more intimidated personalities will manifest as passive-aggressive.

All personality disordered people will at different times display traits of masochism, passive-aggression, narcissism, borderline, and so on.

This is why you see even successful people senselessly shoot themselves in the foot. That bewildering self-destruction is an aspect of personality disorder. However, they often maintain their success...because they lack integrity. In such situations, another person takes the fall or the scoundrel somehow manages to manipulate his or her way out of the mess. (Life is easier without scruples.)

​Having said all that, it still occurs at some point that their string of bad decisions finally wreak their vengeance.

It doesn't always happen in their lifetime, but it often happens.

It may be a quiet vengeance, but it's there.

They lose money, family, friends, health, career, power, support...

Anyway, someone sent me the conclusion of a study from the Mayo Clinic stating that narcissists are incapable of truly loving others—even their own children.

And it got me thinking about this whole subject again...

​...but with a new insight.

Professionals & laypeople already put forth theories explaining why recent generations produce so many people who are so lacking in empathy & so incapable of loving, people who are so immersed in their own ego needs.

And the theories make sense.

However, many people endured a horrible upbringing only to turn out pretty well.

Free choice exists regardless of innate nature or upbringing.

Furthermore, personality disorders seem to develop amid a backdrop of behaviors that don't seem so awful and are even encouraged by modern child-rearing methods, like overindulging a child, overvaluing a child, and offering a child extreme praise & admiration.

In other situations, the roots of personality disorder appear to develop from emotional abuse. (Emotional abuse is notorious for being very hard to spot from the outside, but it wreaks terrible inner havoc on its victim.)

In still other situations, extreme criticism plays a part in the development of a personality disorder.

The light bulb switched on after I couldn't stop thinking about something Rav Itamar Schwartz mentions a few times:

Just before Mashiach, Chazal predicted that the generations of the Flood, the Tower of Babel, and Sodom will be reincarnated.

"Just before Mashiach" is NOW.

It's a weird scenario because Chazal said that the souls of these generations have no portion in the World to Come.

Meaning, when they die, they cease to exist even in the Afterlife.

Perhaps this also sheds light on why Hashem will destroy so much of humanity at the End of Days—most of humanity do not possess souls meant to enjoy the World to Come.

In the ultimate end, we're left with the souls that AREN'T reincarnations of those 3 extremely dysfunctional generations.

I don't know this for sure. It just makes sense to me. But maybe I'm wrong.

Anyway, a lot of what we're seeing now (whether personality disorders or depravity) is merely the replay of old transgressions & dysfunction.

These original souls remained steeped in their sinfulness until it was too late.

For example, in the Generation of the Flood, Noach publicized the upcoming Flood for years & years. 

During that time, the great tzaddik Metushelach was still alive, known & loved by all.

Hashem sent that generation all sorts of natural disasters & obvious hints.

They weren't so far removed from the earlier generations who believed in One God.

Yet even until the moment the water covered their heads, they remained attached to their ugliness: abortion, all sorts of depravity committed with people of the same gender and even animals, wanton liaisons, rampant theft, corrupt courts, an inflated sense of their own importance (superiority complex) & the certainty that they were so smart & so privileged that nothing could harm them.

Like today, they enjoyed a quick transition from tough times to easy times, which imbued them with a false sense of superiority.

In our modern times, people went from kerosene lamps, outhouses, washtubs, wagons, coal or woodstoves, and homespun clothing to electricity, indoor plumbing, washing machines, cars, electric/gas stoves & ovens, and clothing stores—all within one generation.

The progress didn't effect every single person at the same time, and pockets of primitive living still exist in America, but in general, the progress occurred.

In fact, technological progress advanced so quickly that the same man who traveled the Oregon Trail on a horse-drawn wagon as a boy later flew the same journey in an airplane in his older years.

Such progress within one lifespan!

The journey from a horse-drawn wagon to cars to trucks & construction vehicles to airplanes to—for an elite minority—space shuttles all occurred with unprecedented speed. 

(Germany produced the world's first car in 1886; the USA put a man on the moon in 1969—mind-boggling advancement within less than 100 years.)

Similar progress occurred among the ancient pre-Flood generations.

​Initially, Hashem cursed the world: Animals were untrainable, fields sown with fruits or vegetables produced thorns, and cemeteries suffered distressing flooding. 

People were born with their fingers melded together, making it impossible to invent tools to make life easier—such craftsmanship necessitates separated fingers.

Noach was the first baby born with separated fingers.

With Noach's birth, the curse relented.

Later, Noach invented the plowing tools, making life much easier.

With the new convenience of obedient donkeys, cows, and horses, fruitful fields & easy harvesting, a wealth of clean-water wells, a comfortably temperate climate, improved hands & new inventions to make life easier, the Generation of the Flood used their life of ease & pleasure to sink into depravity—rather than thank Hashem for the gifts.

(Note: Much of the above is sourced in Rashi on Beresheit & Midrash Beresheit Rabbah. The following mention Noach as the first born with separated fingers: the Rosh & Baalei Tosafot, Yaarot Devash, and Binayahu on Gemara Sanhedrin.)

​Likewise, the Generation of Dispersion (Migdal Bavel/Tower of Babel) used their gifts and lives of ease to congregate together for unholy reasons. (Sort of like leaders today.)

Seeking to create a communist utopia, the Generation of Dispersion included men of science with heady ambitions. (They also wanted to put men on the moon.)

They, too, suffered from an inflated sense of their own superiority.

They gathered together for reasons of power, glory, and material & scientific accomplishment—not for true peace.

They cherished their material & scientific goals far more than they valued their fellow human beings, mourning over a fallen brick rather than over a fallen friend (much like the construction of the Burj Khalifa Tower in Dubai).

The Yeshivah of Shem & Ever existed in their time, as did Avraham Avinu and a pocket of like-minded people.

So it's not as if the Generation of Dispersion lacked the means to know the truth.

They simply didn't want to.

Likewise, Sodom enjoyed lush, fruitful plains and wealth. 

But cruelly corrupted courts, socially acceptable sadism, and the desire for toeva plagued Sodom.

Like today, much of Sodom's sadism & cruelty were viewed as "funny" or "clever."

And they've all come back.

Having presented all that depressing information, Judaism provides certain options.

(No quick or easy results, however—this is a whole rectification process.)

The Komarna Rebbe explains that when you pray for Erev Rav, it elevates the Erev Rav sparks, which nullify the Erev Rav aspects of a person.

Rav Itamar Schwartz notes that every Jew has some Erev Rav sparks (HERE). Some people possess a handful of these undesirable sparks while others possess so many of these sparks, they are mostly or all Erev Rav (and therefore, the least rectifiable).

Rav Itamar Schwartz recommends separating from Erev Rav, but knowing that it's a massive challenge to determine who is really Erev Rav, he recommends clarifying/sifting through who's Erev Rav via the following (HERE):

• learning Torah (clarifying each sugya)
• mesirut nefesh (self-sacrifice)

It sounds weird because it doesn't directly address the issue of who is & who isn't, but apparently you will either figure it out or elevate sparks by doing the above.

Now, the highest level of mesirut nefesh is dying al kiddush Hashem. 

But there are lower levels of mesirut nefesh, like breaking your middot and giving up taavot you might really like but shouldn't indulge, and so on.

The book Shomer Emunim states that because, theoretically, we could all be Erev Rav (or minimally, possess Erev Rav sparks), we must work voraciously on our emunah—that's the remedy.

The Lubavitcher Tanya explains that when Mashiach comes, the Erev Rav will be like how we are now, with a yetzer hara & a yetzer hatov. It's interesting to think that for them, elevation is being like how we are now.

Right now, the Erev Rav don't seem to battle their yetzer hara and don't seem to have much of a yetzer tov, if at all.

Erev Rav is a tremendous subject. If you'd like to know more, please check out Rav Itamar Schwartz's booklet on it HERE.

So this is what we're up against.

And perhaps this is why we're seeing so much unrelenting, seemingly incurable dysfunction.

Many dysfunctional immoral people around the world are simply souls with no hope & no future.

Since time immemorial, they always proved themselves incapable of doing teshuvah, no matter how hard the obvious stared them in the face.

A major reason why I find this knowledge helpful is because no matter how compassionately they present their immorality (like how abortion is an act of "compassion," and how euthanasia equals "compassion," and how treating criminals with kid gloves is "compassion," and how encouraging same-gender liaisons & marriages is "compassionate," etc.), it's most likely coming from Sodomite souls or souls from the other 2 generations.

In other words, it's not compassion! It all emanates from the inclinations of a depraved, condemned soul.

And I think knowing their roots can help in rejecting their ideas & manipulations.

As far as Erev Rav goes...some are obvious. But many aren't.

So dealing with Erev Rav calls for:

• working on our own emunah
• mesirut nefesh
• Torah learning (really learning Torah & striving to understand it on the TORAH's terms, and not using it for our own ego or power)
• davening for the people who hurt us to do teshuvah
• avoiding these dysfunctional types when we can

Note: Rav Itamar Schwartz defines Erev Rav by those who act on certain Erev Rav traits (like fomenting controversy or being a mosser/slandering traitor) regularly—as if it's their very nature to do so.

A person doing such things once or twice signifies bad middot, not a hopelessly Erev Rav personality.

Anyway, I think that's what's going on and why we're seeing so much incorrigible dysfunction combined with the promotion of so many harmful, immoral ideas.

​And may Hashem protect us all from such influences so we can be our spiritual best.

For more details regarding the Generations of the Flood & Dispersion, please see:

• ​The Invasion of 3 Ancient Generations: How to Explain the Current Chaos & Corruption of the Modern World
• The Generation of the Flood has Reincarnated into Our Generation: Here's the Evidence & Also What You can Do to Protect Yourself & Others

In Living an Inner Life in Today's Generation, Rav Itamar Schwartz mentions the idea from the Vilna Gaon and others that in later generations, the Generation of the Mabul/Flood, Dor HaPlagah/Generation of Dispersal (i.e., the Tower of Babel fiasco), and Sodom will ALL return in later generations (we are of those later generations).

It sounds truly awful because as Rav Schwartz notes, these three were "only" one-third of previous generations.

But in later generations (like now), they're ALL coming back — together. Simultaneously.

​And that explains so much of what's going on today.

But I admit that I'm not sure how to put it all together exactly.

On the other hand, it's still possible to draw parallels.

For example, Dor HaMabul (Generation of the Flood) was not Jewish or non-Jewish; there was no Torah or Judaism or Jew in that time. You had Noach and the ancestor of Am Yisrael, Noach's son Shem.

Dor HaMabul was all about corruption in every sense of the word.

​Theft ruled the day, although the Pele Yoetz notes that it was also steeped in the same sin that Er & Onan stumbled, along with other sins against chaste behavior, including extramarital sins.

I heard that abortion was also practiced.

They committed idolatry, which basically means that they indulged in occult practices.

The occult has made a massive comeback in today's world. Wicca is considered a cool feminist system, plus the whole goddess aspect has been a prized part of being "progressive."

Eastern religions with all their idols have become popular.

There are many indications of occult even within seemingly secular aspects of society.

I also read somewhere animal cross-breeding went on during Dor HaMabul, which was included in the overall corruption of that time. Hybrids are often sterile and rather than being the best of both kinds, hybrids often display the genetic faults of both.

Finally, according to the Kli Yakar, Dor HaMabul was plagued with moral relativity. Even the tzaddikim reassured non-tzaddikim that "we're all same." (Kamoni, komocha.) "I'm okay, you're okay."

A sinner stood among tzaddikim and said, "I'm a tzaddik like you."

It was the "feel good" generation.

​Sort of like now.

(For more on this generation, please see The Kli Yakar on Parshas Noach: Why Did Hashem Destroy the World with Water? And What is the Connection to Hurricanes? & The Hidden Sin of the Flood Generation: What We Can Learn From It Today — AKA The Kli Yakar on Parshat Noach.)

By the way, there is a LOT more to say about that generation. The commentaries, Talmud, and midrashim are full of insights.

Sodom was wholly non-Jewish and known for its warped value system, which extended into its justice system.

It was an externally beautiful & advanced society that condoned terrible cruelty under a system of terribly distorted morals.

Toeva was also fine with them.

Also, I do not know if this was part of Sodom, but the hymn of a Sumerian priestess from Avraham Avinu's hometown of Ur survived until today. (If the dating is correct — and accurate dating is much harder to pinpoint than scientists like to admit — the hymn predates Avraham Avinu.)

The self-lauding priestess is under the delusion that she is the wife of a moon "god" and she boasts of her ability to have "changed men into women!"

Meaning, she successfully accomplished this.

And she is mighty proud of it. She views it as a good thing.

Experts in that time like to debate exactly what she meant, but with all the meshugas of today, it's becoming clearer that she likely meant what a lot of people mean today:

​Even if one is clearly of a particular gender, one has the right to define themselves & be treated as the opposite gender — with the truly bizarre results promoted today, including completely irrational consequences within the medical field.

(Like when a woman who insists she is a man comes in complaining of abdominal pain, the doctor must pretend she doesn't have a uterus or ovaries and instead focus on something else, like her appendix. And vice-versa. I don't know if this has happened yet, but this is what they're promoting.)

Is this connected specifically to Sodom? Or to the surrounding occult systems?

I'm not sure.

But such a similar re-awakening cannot be incidental in an era in which 3 ancient corrupt generations return.

Also, speaking of Sodom justice...

When we were 16, a friend of mine went to court in order to be transferred into the custody of her divorced father, who'd been banished from her life.

She'd recently found him & discovered what she'd sensed all along: He wasn't the monster her abusive mother always insisted he was.

After enduring years of physical abuse by her mother and 2 years of abuse by her stepfather (who was an elder in their Mormon church & told her that he would no longer abuse her because at age 14, she was now "too old for him"), my friend decided to utilize the law that allows 16-year-old children of divorce to decide with which parent they want to live. 

​The judge deciding the case fulfilled the great feminist ideal: She was female.

According to feminists, all the inequalities in society are due to there not being females in charge.

Men are misogynists and incapable of providing fair & equal treatment...or so goes the feminist claim.

​Anyway, the oh-so exalted female judge ruled that it's best for children to be with their mothers, especially in a nuclear family situation (as opposed to living with a single father) and so my friend needed to stay in her toxic environment.

Ooh, it's best for the child! It's in the child's best interests to remain in a family with a stable marriage and a mother and a (step) father!

It doesn't matter that they're abusive creeps! Family first! It's best for the child!

And so much for the wiser & more compassionate authority of a female...

(And no, the judge didn't have a bias, like being a Mormon herself. She was apparently stupid & immoral all on her own.)

I admit that knocked a pretty deep chink in my own ideal as a self-proclaimed feminist at that time, plus crushed my perception of the American justice system as "fair." (Although certainly, it is much fairer than almost any other justice system in the world and in human history.)

Anyway, it was a ruling truly worthy of Sodom.

(In case you're wondering, our high school guidance counselor discovered an underground foster care system that operated beneath the law. So my friend hugged me good-bye and then literally raced off to be smuggled out of state to an unofficial foster home. She kept on the move during that time, shifting between 3 states until she could re-emerge on her 18th birthday & finally go live with her father.)

I was left seething, THE WORLD CANNOT WORK THIS WAY! THIS IS ALL WRONG!

​I felt like my friend, the victim, shouldn't be the one who needs to go into hiding.

​And that's Sodom: Welcome to Sodom — where we punish the victim.

To add to the return of the above 3 generation, we also have the re-emergence of Erev Rav and according to Chazal, they take the position of authority within Am Yisrael.

And all this explains why things are increasingly & intensively crazier than ever.

People don't seem to know what is right or wrong, and there is tremendous pressure to empathize with people who do bad things or who are extremely misguided & trying to drag society down with them.

As far as I can tell, Europe has lost its conservative religious faction. Yes, there may be conservative religious people in Europe, but they've lost their voice. 

Let's face it: When your big hero of conservatism is a toeva atheist, the game is over. (I'm looking at you, England.)

When the leader of one of your most conservative parties must apologize on behalf of a representative who merely states that he opposes toeva unions, the game is over. (England again.)

Yet in American where the religious conservatives still wield influence, they are still a far cry from the norm that existed (whether conservative or liberal) only 2 generations ago.

American conservatives — even the religious ones — have basically given up promoting abstinence before marriage. Instead, they focus on avoiding abortion via contraception or adoption.

Many conservative women pundits dress in an undignified immodest manner, and nearly all of the American conservative leaders, whether men or women, use foul language. 

They formulate excuses for why they allow themselves to watch movies that trash their self-proclaimed values, read books that trash their self-proclaimed values, and watch TV that trashes their self-proclaimed values. (So they end up immersed in all the things they claim to fight.)

It's increasingly confusing, especially when you see frum people (including VERY frum-looking people) involve themselves in aspects of the non-Jewish world that aren't so appropriate for them (or for any frum Jew, actually).

And they receive enormous accolades for this, including the impression that they are creating a big kiddush Hashem.

It's very, very confusing.

​So what's a person to do?

Basically, we need to realize what's going on:

Sodom is back.

Dor HaFlagah is back.

Dor HaMabul is back.

The Erev Rav are back & mighty powerful.

In the non-Jewish world, it's easy enough to figure that almost anything promoted probably reflects an agenda of those 3 ancient generations, whether it's a value system promoted in mainstream science or media, novels, social science bestsellers, political movements, movies, TV, and so on.

In the Jewish world, it's easy enough to see that a secular Jew fighting Torah is Erev Rav, but much harder when the Jew looks frum and seems to be on the side of good.

For example, in Surviving Spiritually Today, Rav Itamar Schwartz relates the story of the daughter of an avreich who attends a charedi seminary where she learns that she must get a job to support her husband in Torah. 

Rav Schwartz notes that the seminary taught a lot of good Torah & hashkafah from well-known speakers, but one of the "charedi" teachers also encouraged this girl to find a job working in the Israeli government because those jobs are the steadiest and bring the best pension — all for the sake of supporting the husband in Torah, of course.

Rav Itamar Schwartz responds:    

Rav Schwartz is generally against receiving any financial support from the Israeli government because of their Erev Rav souls, all the more so, sending a precious bat Yisrael to go work for them.

Rav Schwartz strongly opposes working in "impure" places because it affects one's Torah. 

As he mentions regarding the famous Chazal, "If there is no flour, there's no Torah," if the flour is wormy, then the Torah learned will also be wormy.

So it's genuinely confusing. 

As Rav Schwartz notes:

The post was sparked by 2 posts I came across on the same day, which I saw as a message from Hashem:

• ​Living an Inner Life in Today's Generation
• Rav Avigdor Miller on How To Become A Baal Teshuva

They both contained the same message: Disconnect.

That is so, so hard to do nowadays.

Even if you've physically isolated yourself into a frum neighborhood, you still have your gadgets.

In many places throughout the world, you can no longer carry out certain necessary functions without Internet access.

​So in some areas, even very sincerely frum people have some sort of Internet gadget (with the best filter available, of course).

And even if you've got a strong filter and read only "frum" sites, a lot of mixed hashkafah still gets through.

Also, a lot of frum people work in spiritually difficult environments. The environment might be non-Jewish, secular Jewish, or frum with secular hashkafot.

And something else that isn't spoken of much is family members who aren't on the level.

The most obvious is a secular family who does teshuvah later, but one of the spouses or kids never makes the switch, yet lives in the frum home.

However, there are frum people who got married in the frum way, but are stuck with a spouse who lacks integrity or looks for loopholes and finds the outside world alluring.

Also, a lot of teens who teeter still live at home and they bring in their cell phone, their clothing styles, their secular music, and new attitudes into the home.

(Sure, the parents can tell them not to...and watch how that doesn't work either.)

In some cases, they even bring secular-style dating into the picture (but it's usually temporary & secretive, so the family doesn't know about it).

Parents often try to find another living situation for them, but it often either doesn't work out, the child refuses to go, or the child still comes back for vacations and the like.

Pop psychology, which infiltrated the frum community, placed the blame squarely on the parents.

I used to buy into that too.

But over the years, I couldn't help noticing families in which the mother strove with everything she had (even if it wasn't much) to be a good parent while her husband was dysfunctional in some way.

Despite the motto "A child needs only one good parent!", I soon realized that often wasn't true.

Children need fathers. They need GOOD fathers. They just do. That's how Hashem set things up.

So the mother, who was actually killing herself to parent healthily in an unhealthy situation, still suffered at least one child going off the derech (at least temporarily) while also being shoved into the same "problematic parent" box as her truly problematic husband.

​Not fair.

Furthermore, even two very good parents often cannot overcome an overall poor school experience.

And I even know couples who get along very well and attended chinuch classes (which they took very seriously), strove to find the school to best fit their kids, kept an Internet-free home, and still ended up with problems with a couple of their kids.

So a lot of stuff gets into the home regardless of what you do. 

So with being attacked from within & without, plus our own yetzer hara, what's a Jew to do?

So...you disconnect as much as you can from Dor HaMabul, Dor HaFlagah, Sodom, and Erev Rav.

And you do so not just by sur me'ra (turning from evil), but also aseh tov (doing good).

You make up a schedule to learn some authentic Torah everyday, whether that's Rashi on Mishlei or Pele Yoetz or Mesillat Yesharim — and even if it's only 5 minutes or 1 paragraph a day.

Spending time reading or listening to Rav Avigdor Miller's shiurim can also have a profound effect.

Rav Shimshon Dovid Pincus's books also provide tremendous influence in an enjoyable way.

​If you have more time, you can even make a whole project out of it — yes, even if you're limited to English only.

For example, let's say you wish to really imbibe the Pele Yoetz. So you go to the first chapter (Love of God) and read it in English HERE. 

Then you go to the page where all the chapters are arranged (HERE), and you click on the arrow on the left side of the shiur by Rabbi Eli Mansour to listen on the spot or you click on the right download it.

Then you mosey on over to Torahanytime.com, where you find Rabbi Noach Oelbaum's shiur on that same chapter (HERE) and you listen to that.

With all that, you are well on your way to being positively & profoundly influenced by the authentic Torah of the Pele Yoetz.

Personally, I'm very into filling up our minds & hearts with good and pushing out the not-good that way. It's much more natural and more effective.

​Things work best when you simply DON'T WANT the bad stuff.

(I wrote about my personal experience with that here: What is the Most Painless Path to True Teshuvah?)

Needless to say, I'm still working on this all myself.

Many posts result from my own struggles in these areas.

And finally yet most importantly: real tefillah from your heart in your own words.

Even a few minutes a day can reap rewards.

Upon re-reading Rav Itamar's Schwartz's booklet on the Erev Rav (a collection of different lectures given on the topic), one section (pages 43-46) jumped out at me: Protection from Illness. 

He notes that the impurity of a world without Torah is what makes a Jew sick, pointing out how Yaakov Avinu only got sick once he ventured into the impure environment of Egypt.

(Needless to say, this means specifically the impurity of the non-Jewish world, and not the wonderful non-Jews who strive to follow the 7 Mitzvot of Noach. A truly non-Jewish world rejects Torah, instead of embracing Torah via the 7 Noachide Laws, like a sincere non-Jew does.)

Quoting the Chatam Sofer (Shabbat 86b), Rav Schwartz explains that we cannot bring medical proof from non-Jewish medical healing on how to heal illnesses found in Jews — even when it appears to be the same illness.

Does this mean that, say, studies showing that extra doses of vitamin C & zinc reduce the length of illness don't apply to Jews?

So I'll risk extrapolating that yes, it could mean that vitamin C & zinc will work fine for Jews too, but it doesn't have to mean that. In other words, the studies don't prove that it will be effective for Jews, but yes, it can also be effective for Jews.

(Interestingly, recently, there was an unusually high rate of measles in the frum community, despite frum communities being generally pro-vaccination and therefore comprising a high percentage of people vaccinated against measles. Could the Chatam Sofer's chiddush explain that? I don't know enough about the whole issue to say for sure, but it's intriguing.) 

Rav Schwartz says:

The more a person shows that he is of the seed of Amo Yisrael (His Nation Israel), the more he expresses the Yisrael within him...the more he merits Hashem's Healing. 

In other words, the more we think & act as if we're saying, "I'm one of Yours, Hashem!"— then the more Hashem treats us like one of His.

When did the deadly plague appear among the Jews in the Midbar?

Only when they allowed their hearts to hanker after the influences of Egypt.

Bamidbar 11:4 - 5:

Yes, the main kvetchers were from the Erev Rav, but the Yisraelites allowed themselves to be influenced by all the fracas too.

Yet despite the powerful sway of the Erev Rav, Rav Schwartz reminds us that we also have the power to NOT be influenced.

The proof is that in Egypt, we did not change our Hebrew names, our refined Jewish style of clothing, or our holy Hebrew language.

Apparently, that's all the proof we need.

So, tachlis, what do we do?

How do we prevent illness?

We prevent illness by distancing ourselves from non-Torah influences.

How do we do that?

First of all, says Rav Schwartz, we must trace the source of anything we encounter.

Is it an authentically Jewish source or a non-Jewish source?

In other words, is it sourced in holiness...or not?

In this lecture, Rav Schwartz specifically discusses the following issues:

• The compulsion of some to immediately seek to bring any new non-Jewish product or idea into the frum world (with kosher certification & rabbinic approval, of course).

 

• The enthusiasm to get a hechsher on as many different foods as possible or to create a kosher imitation.

Yet what, for example (says Rav Schwartz), is the root desire of those who seek to either kasher non-kosher foods or to create a kosher imitation?

Giving into physical desires, making money, garnering accolades for this "accomplishment"...  

Now, maybe sometimes there is a holy reason for doing the above.

For example, the wide availability of hechsherim means that secular Jews have more of a chance of eating kosher food (even without meaning to).

But generally Rav Schwartz's stated reasons are the real ones. Not always, but mostly.

• New styles of clothing are created by some of the most degenerate people in the world.

Miniskirts, high heels, and tight pants are some of the least uncomfortable clothes to wear.

Waist-length loose hair is also a major pain in the neck (and in a shaitel, a massive expense in both the purchase & the upkeep).

​Yet look at how some otherwise frum people insist on wearing them.

Their insistence is certainly not out of a dedication to uphold Jewish values because miniskirts, high heels, tight pants (for either men or women), and long loose hair (for either men or women, real hair or wigs) are not tsnius.

So what is the source? We all know it's not holiness.

It's something else.

Going off on a tangent: It is my secret wish to go back to the clothing of our Imahot – long, loose robes. With the right kind of design and fabric, these can look elegant enough for a wedding. And it's not just me. I have a chassidish friend with impressive yichus who secretly wishes the same. Maybe someday, we'll no longer be confined to wearing modern Edom-style shirts & skirts...sigh...

• Many books today are authored by frum people borrowing non-Torah ideas.

And yes, Rav Schwartz acknowledges that they get rabbinical approval for these books, even when the entire book is in the spirit of the non-Jewish ideas about life.

(Usually, rabbanim do not read the entire book; they judge by a sampling & their estimation of the author's character, plus their good-hearted desire to help a fellow Jew with his or her parnassah.)

This happens quite often with books on psychology & psychiatry, although we must commend those frum professionals who gradually broke out of the mold of their university indoctrination and started to sift through the sources, in addition to using their own experience, research, and study of Torah sources. 

Rav Schwartz says in other lectures that some frum people are writing legitimate stuff and also Rav Avigdor Miller said that some frum psychologists are using genuinely kosher techniques but speaking with psychology-jargon so that other will take them seriously.

The supposedly frum chinuch today is another massive culprit of dressing up non-Jewish ideas in Torah garb, then selling it to unsuspecting new mothers.

(Actually, I was a suspicious young mother myself because a lot of what I came across presented as "authentic Torah chinuch!" reminded me of all the Western child psychology I'd been reading in my teens & twenties. But my peers were uncomfortable with my questioning the methods we were learning, so there was no one to discuss it with, and thus it took me a while to break away from it. Reading Miriam Adahan's Awareness and then a talk with my rebbetzin really helped me cut free from it all.)

​It's important to note that the people selling Western child psychology as "authentic Torah chinuch!" are not tricksters, but simply unaware that it's not actually Torah chinuch.

Rav Schwartz himself says that some of the people misguiding others are not bad, but well-intended. For example, those who are, say, trying to get charedim into the army aren't always Erev Rav, but a Yisrael-soul convinced it's doing a good thing. They're not evil, just misguided.

I'm not trying to rip apart these chinuch "experts," especially since they have such good intentions. However, they often hurt as much as they help. The assistance and the damage goes hand-in-hand.

I can't help being concerned that parents be made aware of this so they don't suffer like I and many others have.

Having said that, there are definitely people who ARE offering authentic Torah chinuch and who help much more than they hurt.

May they be blessed.
​

• Our external appearance, our homes, and our actions may seem like pure Torah, but our minds & hearts often yearn for aspects of Mitzrayim (i.e., the non-Jewish influences).

This is a huge challenge. As written in a previous post, the secular world has everything down to a science. 

They carefully study & calculate how to attract your very brain.

Songs are carefully composed so that just hearing a briefest sample of a song tricks your brain into wanting more.

Movies and TV shows are timed exactly to what your brain wants regarding scenes and turning points.

Advertisements spend a fortune on research to cultivate images and words to attack your brain into thinking a certain product or idea is irresistible.

Video games also hit you right in your brain.

Facebook has long been famous for their carefully crafted addictive aspects.

The list goes on and on.​

​The best way to fight the root desire for outside influences is to:

Bring more authentically Jewish influences into your life.

• Read material by real talmidei chachamim. (Nefesh Chaya by Rav Shimshon Dovid Pincus is a wonderful resource for women. It's also a real page-turner.)
• Read well-written books about tzaddikim, like Rebbetzin Kanievsky.
• Listen to or read transcripts of Rav Avigdor Miller when he starts describing how the non-Torah lifestyle & values appear through Torah eyes. (It's pretty witty too.)
• Listen to Jewish music composed by Jews with pure souls: chassidic niggunim or Sephardi piyutim are a great place to start.
• Do mitzvot. Learn Torah. Give tzedakah. Do chessed.
• Pay attention to talking like a Jew — what slang do we use? Do we pottymouth? Lashon hara? Any meaningless chatter or unnecessary clowning around? 
• Talk to Hashem as you would a Best Friend Who truly cares about you and genuinely wants to listen to you.
  
  

These are just some suggestions to start. You probably have your own.

Also (and I feel kind of silly saying this), but I'm obviously not any different or better than anyone reading this. All the above are things that I've either had to face with myself or am working on now.

I'm learning new aspects and gaining new insights all the time — sometimes on a daily basis.

Basically, you want to keep adding light to whatever your own personal darkness is.

​May we all succeed in meriting a complete healing of both the body & the soul.

Here are some links you might really enjoy:

Rav Avigdor Miller on Losing Your Bashert
Rav Miller describes how you can miss out on marrying your Divinely-ordained spouse, both before and even AFTER marriage.

This ties in with Rav Kanievsky's 5 tips for finding your soulmate because the idea of not criticizing nor being makpid with people helps you find what you really need in a spouse prior to marriage & is essential for a successful marriage after the wedding is over.

Rav Itamar Schwartz on Erev Rav: Amalek Exposed
Amalek seems a totally separate nation from the Erev Rav, who came from Mitzrayim and are now part of the Jewish people – at least in body. 

So why is it that the Vilna Gaon typifies one of the Erev Rav types as "Amalek"?

There's a real connection, which is described in the above article.

Also, Rav Schwartz explains the connection between Erev Rav, Amalek, and the twin Exiles of Esav & Yishmael.

Just to give you a taste: Rav Schwartz explains that Amalek cannot stand Hashem's Oneness.

Amalek's all-consuming goal is to prevent Hashem's Oneness from being revealed.

This might explain why there is such a resistance to pure monotheism throughout the world, including self-proclaimed monotheists who are actually polytheists in belief & practice.

So Amalek strives to destroy Am Yisrael's oneness so that Hashem's Oneness cannot be revealed in This World.

Pretty nasty stuff, Amalek.

In line with that idea, please note that the Nazis were either nature-worshipers or atheists (both of which deny Hashem's Oneness), the Jew-persecuting Communists were atheists, and the Catholic Church, which instigated terrible persecution against the Jewish people over the centuries, has been polytheistic or pagan, depending on who you follow.

Why did they care so much about Jews secretly keeping Shabbat during the Inquisition?

​Why did the Church feel the need to so horrifically torture Jews for keeping Shabbat?

Shabbat is a massive revelation of Hashem's Oneness in the world, if you read all that Chazal has to say about it.

(Note: I am not talking about the praiseworthy individual Catholics who risked torture & death to save Jews, but the powers-that-be behind the Catholic Church.)

Likewise, the holy & pure tzaddik Rav Levi Yitzchak Bender was one of the Ministry of State Security's most wanted "criminals" in the Ukraine in his time.

Why? Because he was so committed to Torah.

(Russia's Ministry of State Security was the forerunner to the KGB. Didn't they have bigger fish to fry than a couple of gentle, kind, saintly chassidim? I mean, it's the Ukraine after all...a matter of "state security," eh?)

Rav Bender & his fellow tzaddikim were forced to convert gerim in secret for fear of the Ministry of State Security. He was nearly executed for davening at the gravesite of Rebbe Nachman of Breslov.

​Yes, saying Tikkun Haklali by the grave of a tzaddik is DANGEROUS to your nation's survival...if you're Amalek.

However, we can overcome Amalek by connecting to the point that came before Creation.

Why?

Because Am Yisrael came before Creation; we were b'machshavah techilah - we already existed in Hashem's Thoughts before Creation. 

Only Am Yisrael possesses the power to connect to that pre-Creation point.

How to do that?

It's in the article, but just as a hint:
The Torah was the blueprint for Creation. It also preceded Creation.

Anyway, the whole post is really fascinating.

The idea of a secret Jewish or non-Jewish identity continues to intrigue many Jews, particularly religious Jews.

Me too.

Whether it's a potential convert from a Spanish-speaking country who discovers proof (or at least, compelling evidence) of a matrilineal line of Jews from the anousim or Jews who seem not to be Jewish (whether a possible Erev Rav soul-root or suspicions regarding the maternal line) or adoptees who uncover either Jewish or non-Jewish maternal ancestry, the underlying identity of a Jew or non-Jew continues to intrigue many of us.

For me, it has always been an enduring interest that refreshes itself anew every so often.

(As the generation above mine dies out without doing teshuvah or without even leaving Jewish descendants in some situations, my interest in the topic is renewing again.)

Over recent years, I've found myself focusing more on & strengthening my own Yiddishkeit or wanting to exchange chizuk with other frum Jews.

In contrast to my former more kiruv rechokim-orientation, I found myself coming into kiruv-krovim — including being mekarev myself, if you know what I mean.

At this point, I feel that sincere davening for fellow Jews reaps more than external action, like talking and other kiruv-based interactions.

Having said that, for those who enjoy hosting secular Jews for Shabbos or passing out all sorts of Jewish pamphlets or Shabbos candles or giving kiruv seminars/classes, this is not meant as discouragement! 

On the contrary, if you enjoy and succeed at kiruv rechokim, by all means — CONTINUE.

​You're doing a lot of good!

But despite a lot of frum focus to the contrary, I'm slowly discovering the value of getting the core into healthy shape.

In other words, my focus has become more inner-directed. Not self-centered or selfish, but a fortifying of the roots and trunk of the tree, rather than developing more outlying branches.

While I don't necessarily apply this to those who clearly succeed in bringing assimilated Jews back into the fold, I feel that a deeper focus on improving and strengthening the core is vital — perhaps even more vital than searching out the assimilated.

(If our roots are strong and healthy, branches & blossoms will develop & multiply on their own.)

I think this reflects my renewed appreciation of Rav Avigdor Miller's approach, which clearly focused on building a vibrantly healthy core: a vibrant & sincerely frum Torah community connected directly to Hakadosh Baruch Hu.

Certainly, I developed a love of Rav Miller's Torah in my early twenties as a newcomer to frumkeit. I listened to so many of his tapes and bought the books containing his divrei Torah and Q&As.

​But I appreciate him even more now.

As described on this blog previously, it has taken me over 25 years to discover that I'm not remotely successful (to my knowledge) with kiruv rechokim.

And anyway, I see so much in myself that needs "kiruv." I've done so much work on myself over the years, and there's still so much work that needs to be done.

Furthermore, I can't help seeing how much there is to do within the frum community.

​Whether it's participating in helping mommies recover from birth, tending the needs of sick people, supporting poor people, single parents (whether divorced or widowed), kollelim & yeshivot...there is so much good to accomplish WITHIN the frum community!

Helping other frum Jews find employment, creating businesses to serve frum needs, and especially...SCHOOLS.

There is so much to invest in the frum school system to ensure our children receive all their needs (spiritual, academic, physical, emotional) and nurture their precious souls in the best way possible so that they can become the best Jews possible and merit a truly wonderful portion in the World to Come.

And many of we religious Jews very much need chizuk from each other. We need to continue deepening & expanding our relationship with Hashem, our emuna & bitachon, plus exchange "light" with each other.

In addition, the open secret that even many frum Jews feel uncomfortable acknowledging is that many of our most vital mitzvot apply mostly to Jews who are shomrei Torah & mitzvot REGARDLESS of their particular affiliation (and even if another FRUM group holds some hashkafot that produce friction against your group's personal hashkafot).

If another Jew is shomer Shabbat, shomer kashrut, etc., we have a mitzvah to love that person, give the benefit of the doubt, refrain from speaking lashon hara or rechilut about that person, and so on.

A fellow shomer mitzvot is "your brother" (or sister).

Are there dissenting and more expansive opinions?

Yes.

But the core opinion across the board is that a shomer mitzvot Jew is your brother or sister, to whom all the bein adam l'chavero mitzvot apply.

This is the Gemara. (Please see Rav Avigdor Miller's Should We Love Irreligious Jews? for a very brief summary with sources.)

If one is not shomer mitzvot (and especially if a Jew is ANTI-mitzvot), then not everyone says this is "your brother."

It depends.

(Please see the above link, plus Rav Avigdor Miller on Loving All Jews and Loving Your Troublesome Neighbor and Can the Rav explain to us how we could actually learn to love all Jews? for even more.)​

Furthermore, I've reached the age where the generation above me has started dying out (may we all live in robust health ad 120, b'ezrat Hashem).

In my family & former non-religious Jewish community, people are intermarrying (sometimes divorcing and intermarrying again).

Among the movements for Reform & Conservative (which is actual extremely liberal) fake "conversions" are all the rage, further diluting the crumbling Jewish identity of ignorant Jews (and deceiving non-Jews) by declaring 100% NON-Jews as Jews, and making these non-Jews believe they are bona fide Jews too.

I recently received photos and enthusiastic emails about Rosh Hashanah meals, complete with honey cake and apples dipped in honey, in which not ONE participant in Jewish.

Three generations of participants...no Jews left.

Not one.

Just non-Jews, some of whom think they're Jews.

And while a non-Jew acknowledging Rosh Hashanah kinda makes sense (after all, it is a day of universal Judgement), these people will celebrate a Pesach Seder too, which has absolutely no connection to their history or souls.

But they sure love singing Dayenu and eating matzah ball soup.

I'm seeing Jews die without leaving one Jewish descendant.

A Jewish line stretching back centuries...culminates in a dead end.

And many of these people lived a lifetime steeped in cheit & aveirot (married to a non-Jew), some with random mitzvot interspersed within (like lighting Chanukah candles).

And despite all the information & resources available, despite the ever-expanding copious outreach & approachability of their nearby frum community, and despite outreach efforts directed at these people, plus being davened for by frum family members or other associates — these people make no steps toward teshuvah, not even one, until & including the moment they die.

Over 20 years of being their frum relative super-nice and receptive, sending these people appealing videos and links to kiruv websites, Shabbos invites (and actual Shabbos hosting), davening for them, their own experiences (POSITIVE experiences!) of visiting Eretz Yisrael & the Kotel & spending Shabbos with a frum family, davening at a frum shul, and so much more — nothing, nothing, nothing.

​No effort on anyone's part and no experience no matter how pleasant — nothing in authentic Judaism has touched them one iota.

​What to make of it?

Well, here's one possibility — an admittedly unpopular possibility for many Jews today, but it's one stated by the Rambam no less:
Rav Avigdor Miller on Are You a Descendant of Avraham Avinu?

Apparently, the Rambam states (I don't know where) that a Jew who NEVER comes back to Torah and Mitzvot is not from the seed of Avraham Avinu.

In his great integrity, Rav Miller acknowledges that this isn't necessarily set in stone: "...I wouldn’t be stubborn as to tell you definitely. There may be some exceptions to the rule." 

The fact that he describes his dissenter as a "chassidishe Rav" indicates that Rav Miller respects his dissenter's scholarship and that the chassidishe Rav based his dissent on legitimate sources and not sentimental feelings.

Also, Rav Miller himself admits that it's not necessarily absolute, as stated above.

Indeed, Rav Petiyah's Minchat Yehudah describes his encounters with Jewish souls who sinned throughout a series of lifetimes, never doing teshuvah and dying as complete degenerates.

They reincarnated again, and when they still didn't do teshuvah, they spent some time in unbearable hellish suffering in the Slingshot of Hell or an Ocean of Lava (which saying Kaddish helped to lift one man out of the lava for the duration of the Kaddish), then merited an afterlife rectification from Rav Petiyah.

Phew!

So who's right?

Well, we know that all the big poskim in Chazal are correct, even when they contradict each other:
​

• I don't think it's difficult to say that in some situations, the unrepentant Jew really isn't Jewish at all, i.e., he is not from zera Avraham. 

 

• Yet in other situations, he is from zera Avraham and will suffer another gilgul, some kind of Gehinnom, and/or rectification by a tzaddik if he doesn't do teshuvah in his lifetime.

In short (if I'm understanding everything correctly):

• You can hold by the Rambam and it is perfectly within your right to do so.

 

• You can also hold by an equally solid source that disagrees with the Rambam. It is equally within your right to do so.

But you can't go trashing the Rambam or any other fundamental source in Chazal.

​And, like Rav Miller says, I don't think we can claim to know for sure.

We can hold by one giant posek or another, but we can't say with our small minds that we know.

However, if you want to make the most lucrative investment in your fellow Jew, then going with those who are shomrei Torah & mitzvot seems to be the surest way to go.

Nothing is 100%, nothing is perfect, but investing in fellow shomrei mitzvot appears to be the lowest-risk investment.

One Jewish male family member who died this year was originally married to a Jewish woman. They had 1 son, then divorced.

(That son married a non-Jewish woman, had a non-Jewish daughter with her, then he died when his daughter was around 8.)

The Jewish male family member then married a non-Jewish woman (but got her a fake conversion first). The "conversion" was totally bogus. She never intended to keep the 10 Commandments, let alone kashrut or anything else. They lit Chanukah candles & hosted a Pesach Seder every year, but that's the limit of their "observance" as far as I ever saw.

A non-Jew cannot convert with the intention of profaning even a single commandment (i.e. "I'll keep everything EXCEPT..."); such an intention invalidates the conversion.

Anyway, they had 2 children together.

I knew this man my entire life and all I ever saw was a quiet blob who was sometimes grumpy.

He always reclined in his chair, either at the table or on the sofa.

If he was on the sofa, he clutched a beer in one hand and watched sports on TV, preferably American football.

But it didn't matter. Any sport would do. He even watched horse races.

Even as a child, I thought that was weird.

(FYI, I never saw him drunk, just indolent.)

Sure, he held down a job and provided for his family. But other than that, he was a blob. Sometimes, when his non-Jewish son Harley irked him, he emitted a Brooklyn-accented warning growl: "HAWWW-LEEEE..."

But that was it.

His children never seemed to like him, even when they were young. They certainly despised him when they were older.

Toward the end of his life, this man developed mental & physical debilitation.

Due to the expense, his non-Jewish wife resisted getting care-assistance for him, despite her physical inability to care for him properly. (She was also getting old.)

A couple of months prior to his death, his non-Jewish thirtysomething-year-old son finally had it out with him, yelling at him that he was miserly and that the son was sick of the father being such a tightwad.

(The inciting incident was the son's purchase of $400 dollar tickets to attend a ball game.)

I seriously questioned the appropriateness of such a confrontation when one's father is in a both physically & mentally decrepit state.

Childhood resentments aside, it seems kind of mean.

Anyway, he died before his fake-convert wife really needed to hire professional assistance, so everyone was relieved.

And no one misses him in the least.

That's sad, but it is the most expected result based on the way he lived his life.

​To me, his whole life seemed sad & meaningless (and a bit grumpy).

Anyway, I'm not a mekubal and never will be, but since learning about the pinteleh Yid and all that, it has been hard for me to accept that this somewhat grouchy indolent blob is from zera Avraham.

The fact that he left absolutely no Jewish continuation, and that the one Jewish child he produced never displayed any connection to Judaism and also died with no Jewish continuation hints something to me.

I can't know for sure, but I'm with the Rambam in this particular case.

I think we've all met people with surprising histories.

There are the people converting to Judaism who discover a possible Jewish ancestor, whether a mother who gave them up for adoption or a long-dead great-great-great grandmother.

A chassidic friend of mine was approached by a co-worker who said, "I see that you're Jewish. You know, some of my relatives are Jewish."

"Oh?" said my friend. "Like who?"

"Like my mother," came the reply.

His Jewish mother married a non-Jew, then she died when he was a toddler. His non-Jewish father made a second marriage to a non-Jewish woman, who raised this man as her son.

So he felt he was fully non-Jewish.

Fortunately, my chassidic friend managed to gently break the startling news of his true identity to him and he showed up at her and her husband's Pesach Seder that year.

My husband & I once found ourselves in a taxi driven by an apparent Muslim-Arab from near the French Colony in Yerushalayim.

In the course of conversation, he revealed that his mother's mother was a Jew from Yemen.

After a brief pause, my husband asked him if he realized that made him Jewish?

Yes, he was aware of that. But he was well-entrenched in the Muslim-Arab lifestyle, including marriage to a Muslim-Arab woman, with whom he had children.

There is actually a lot of that with Yemenites.

One of my sons, who attends a yeshivah with many Yemenites, said that literally everyone has a story of an aunt or great-aunt who was taken by Muslims in Yemen and forcibly absorbed into the Muslim community.

Yemen borders on Saudi Arabia and these borders are new, relatively speaking. Based on some of the pro-Judaism attitudes coming from some Saudis today, one cannot help but wonder whether they are descendants of stolen Yemenite Jewish girls.

The truth is that families all over the Muslim world have stories like this.

Rav Alon Anava has mentioned his own family's story, explaining how because of this, he has Jewish cousins is Syria & Lebanon who think they are Muslim.

My sister-in-law's aunt or great-aunt suffered the same fate in Morocco. She was forcibly married to a Muslim.

A couple of years back, one of this abducted woman's sons contacted the Jewish relatives in Eretz Yisrael.

They accepted him with open arms, but he betrayed their trust somehow (my sister-in-law didn't go into any detail) and they felt they could not trust him in their homes.

He returned to Morocco, leaving his mother's Jewish family members feeling disappointed & exploited.

"All in all, he was raised as an Arab," she explained to me. "That's his identity and value system. He could not relate to us at all and was just trying to use the situation to his advantage."

On the subject of Yemenite Jewish girls being abducted:

We know a man who's great-aunt in Yemen was taken by Muslims. She was around 11-13-years-old.

One of the things they did to break these girls was to force them to eat non-kosher food. (Then it was easier to forcibly marry them off to a Muslim and all that followed.)

But this Jewish girl refused.

So they locked her in the cellar and told her she couldn't come out until she would eat their non-kosher food.

She died in that cellar.

Then there are the Jews who aren't really Jews.

(Yes, we're getting back to where this post started.)

When Irish-Catholic Alice Collins Plebuch took a DNA test for fun in 2012, she discovered that her proud Irish-Catholic father was most likely an Ashkenazi Jew.

Research nixed any possibility of illegitimate relationships or a hidden adoption.

​It took years and a couple of lucky "coincidences" to discover the truth.

​To make a long & convoluted story very short:

In September 1919 at the Fordham Hospital in New York, the Irish Catholic baby Jim Collins was accidentally switched with the Jewish baby Phillip Benson.

The identifying mother-baby bracelets standard for today only came about in the 1930s-40s.

In 1919, hospital births weren't common and certain practices hadn't yet developed. Hospitals relied on the nurse's memory and mother's facial recognition to determine whose baby was whose.

So the Jewish family went home with a non-Jewish baby.

Did they ever suspect he wasn't really theirs?

No one knows, but interestingly, the parents of his first wife Esther Abulafia did not believe he was Jewish when they first met him.

Of course, they had nothing on which to rely their suspicions. They met the Bensons and saw that they were bona fide Jews. 

As far as the Bensons were concerned, this person was their biological son.

Except that he wasn't.

​Think about that.

And think about how that probably wasn't the only time that happened.

(Even Rabbi Meir Lehmann has a based-on-a-true-story book about such a switch — I think it's called Del Monte.)

Furthermore, I wrote a post a long time ago with other stories along these lines:
​​Only Hashem Knows, So Just Stick Close to Him

I think we've all heard of situations, like the guy shteiging away at a yeshivah for baalei teshuvah who only informs his rosh yeshivah after 2 years that he's adopted; his Jewish identity isn't biological but adopted.

In many cases, the person converts. (The guy in the above example converted & is an exceptionally fine Jew.)

But what if the issue hadn't been caught?

Or what if his parents hadn't told him he'd been adopted? (That happens less nowadays; but still.)

I heard that Rav Tauber has a story of a yeshivah bachur who discovered that his mother's conversion wasn't kosher.

Everyone was sure he'd convert.

But he didn't.

​And what if that issue hadn't been caught? How would things have continued?

This is one of MANY things for which we are waiting for Mashiach to sort out.

The Phillip Benson-Jim Collins switch is the most chilling.

Esther Abulafia's parents are described as observant.

The initially expressed suspicions as to their future son-in-law's Jewish identity.

Yet their daughter unknowingly married a non-Jew.

She didn't want to.

Her parents didn't want her to.

But she did.

How on earth can one prevent such a hidden mix-up from happening?

Practically speaking, the best advice is found in our tefillot.

Looking over tefillot for parents to say for their children, I was struck by how concerned the tzaddikim were for ALL the future generations until the end of time.

For example, the Admor and author of Archot Aharon includes in his prayer a plea that one's children will merit spouses from mishpachot kasherot v'hagunot (kosher and halachically proper families).

Rav Eliezer Papo, author of Pele Yoetz, composed several prayers for parents to say for their children, which also included kol yotzei chalatzeinu (everyone to issue from us) and kol zereinu v'chol hanilavim eleinu (all our seed and all those attached to us -- i.e, those who join our family, via marriage, etc.) to be without any blemish. (He even includes a plea for all descendants to be from zera anashim — human origin — a topic beyond the scope of this post.)

In Sefer Tzavat Abba, page 24, the tefillah includes a plea for there to be nothing passul (nothing flawed that nullifies one's descendants) "in my seed and in the seed of my seed until the end of all generations, and may there not come into our hands and not into our seed and not to the seed of our seed until the end of the generations any transgression and passul and ugly thing..."

The book Tefillah L'Ani offers a prayer for "our sons and our daughters, our grandsons and our granddaughters, and about all that issues from us until the end of the generations." It asks that we merit "holy and pure neshamot" that are clean from "kol shemetz shel pagam" (any and all speck of blemish).

"Neshamot" implies specifically Jewish souls. The above prayer repeats the whole "ad sof kol hadorot" (until the end of the generations) several times.

​In reading all the tefillot written by tzaddikim for parents to say over their children, it's impossible to miss their concern for completely kosher zera throughout all generations until the end of time.

Clearly, they foresaw the problems we've been seeing on a sharp rise over the past 150 years.

And again, there are hints in these prayers not only about obviously halachically forbidden unions (non-Jews & mamzerim & betrothed/married women), but spiritually undesirable unions (like with Erev Rav or non-human beings, etc).

​In short, there's a lot to daven for.

So for those of us concerned about this issue (and I think it IS a concern, especially nowadays), we've got these beautiful prayers to help us out.

​And other than that, we'll need to wait for Mashiach to come and sort us all out.

Looking at what's going on in the world, I find myself growing increasingly concerned for the future.

And I'm far from being the first to come to this conclusion.

Right now, I don't want to go into the nitty-gritty of what we're all seeing and what I think it portends, but I do want to talk about the best response.

And it's not about prepping or making aliyah (which most Jews either won't or can't do right now anyway — and who even says that the Erev Rav leaders would allow millions of Jews, especially if they're frum, to enter?) or writing letters to representatives or newspapers, or signing petitions, and so forth.

(Although if those things will help, then it's good to do them. But they shouldn't be your sole focus.)

There's a lot we can't control and I think this creeping inability to positively affect opinions & situations is only going to increase.

So it's time to re-focus on an age-old authentically Jewish response:

Looking back at the classic parable by Rebbe Elimelech of Lizhensk (author of the classic Noam Elimelech):

He said that the End of Days will feel like a rope being jerked around.

Only the people who can hold on tight will make it.

This means that you already need to be holding on to the rope when it starts jerking & shaking.

Sure, if you're not already holding on, you can always make a lunge for the rope, hoping to grab onto it as it wildly whips around.

And maybe you'll find a place to grasp. Some people will, I'm sure.

But that's pretty risky.

Better to grab on to the rope NOW.

And to take the metaphor even further: 

Who has a better chance of hanging on:
​

• the person with only their index finger curled around the rope?

or

• the person who has wrapped their arms and legs around the rope and clings to it for dear life?

Or even better:

• the person who coiled that part of the rope around them, so even if their hands slip, they still can't fall off?

I don't know Hashem's Secrets & Cheshbonot, nor do I know the soul-tikkun of others, but it seems to me that part of the reason why so many people are having such a hard time, not just with obvious nisayonot, but with inner trials too. 

Their moods, their perceptions, their feelings...

So many people struggle with depression, despair, disappointment, anger, lethargy, apathy, feelings of rejection, loneliness, and distance from Hashem, and so on.

But those of you who fight your way out of these pits (even when you fall in again for the umpteenth time) are actually forging your connection to Hashem.

In other words, you are securing your grip on the rope.

It may not feel like it, but you are.

And that's exactly what we all need to strengthen ourselves to continue doing.

I'm not trying to be the Voice of Doom.

But if Mashiach doesn't come already, I think things are going to get increasingly more bizarre & difficult in the not-so-distant future.

And I think that focusing on strengthening our relationship with Hashem is a positive way of facing that future.