In order to be more sensitive and aware of what is going on in the streets of Yerushalayim, I went with my daughter to see the String Bridge - after the official event was over. We walked from Kanfei Nesharim - passing by the Merkaz HaRav Yeshiva. The yeshiva is only a stone's throw from the bridge. This is the picture I got of the yeshiva and the bridge.
R'DE,
ReplyDeleteIMHO, YOU should NOT be on the defensive in response to the missionaries who have been posting to your blog.
They are merely using a very effective and common set of tactics from their training to manipulate you in to acquiescing to their views. (It's fondly known among missionary circles as a "Come to Jesus" talk.)
TACTIC 4
Make the person re-evaluate the most central aspects of his or her experience of self and prior conduct in negative ways. Efforts are designed to destabilize and undermine the subject's basic consciousness, reality awareness, world view, emotional control and defense mechanisms. The subject is guided to reinterpret his or her life's history and adopt a new version of causality.
TACTIC 5
Create a sense of powerlessness by subjecting the person to intense and frequent actions and situations which undermine the person's confidence in himself and his judgment.
TACTIC 6
Create strong aversive emotional arousals in the subject by use of nonphysical punishments such as intense humiliation, loss of privilege, social isolation, social status changes, intense guilt, anxiety, manipulation and other techniques.
TACTIC 7
Intimidate the person with the force of group-sanctioned secular psychological threats. For example, it may be suggested or implied that failure to adopt the approved attitude, belief or consequent behavior will lead to severe punishment or dire consequences such as physical or mental illness, the reappearance of a prior physical illness, drug dependence, economic collapse, social failure, divorce, disintegration, failure to find a mate, etc.
They are trying put those who adhere to halachic Judaism on the defensive and it is working.