Haaretz
One cold night in Jerusalem about two years ago, I fell into a deep sleep. After what seemed like just a few minutes, I woke up. Terrified. In the twilight between slumber and wakefulness, a hand was placed over my closed eyes in an unmistakable gesture. It happened in an instant, but that recollection of the specific gesture that accompanies the recitation of "Shema Yisrael" - of four fingers covering one eye and the thumb covering the other, like a roof - shook me up. After all, the last time I said the prayer before going to sleep was over 25 years ago.
I have since forgotten most of the text, except, of course, for its impressive beginning: "Hear O Israel, the Lord is your God the Lord is one," which I would probably be able to recite even if I lost my memory.
In the darkness, after the confusion had passed, I tried to understand the significance of this message, risen from the depths of my consciousness. It was not a pleasant memory or a kind of childhood nostalgia, but rather reflected distress I had felt in the past, provoked by the fear that I had fallen asleep without saying the "Shema." I wondered what else remained there, deep inside the drawer of the life experiences of the child with the long, pinned-back braid that I used to be. Through the curtain that had lifted momentarily, I discovered the traces of fear that had been an inseparable part of my religious life. Fear that was constantly inculcated in the pure souls of the girls at the Bais Yaakov seminary in Tel Aviv where I studied - and in me as well. [...]
What is your point in publicizing the story of these misguided people?
ReplyDeleteI spoke to the head of National Jewish Outreach who is an old friend of mine and he told me that there is a group of guys that went to Yehshiva and used to read comic books in their seforim who still hang out together and have their own support group.
In any case, these people have lost the beauty and glory of Torah life and for some reason never had it (usually due to a dysfunctional family). What is there in this for us?
In any case, these people have lost the beauty and glory of Torah life and for some reason never had it (usually due to a dysfunctional family).
ReplyDeleteAre you a BT? You for sure sound like that ? It did not cross your mind that some of them maybe left Orthodoxy because they were molested by rabbis ?
In any case, this is result of the haredi attitude off all-or-nothing Judaism. People fail to realize that at least in the States People can enjoy the diversity of Judaism . from the ghettos of Williamsburg to the streets of West Hollywood and everything between.
@Monsey Tzadik???
ReplyDeletePlease leave my town. You don't belong in it.
Did you read the article? It was a general paean of praise for those that left for a variety of reasons and provided some sort of support for them for resisting the return back to Yiddishkeit. I didn't see any reference to molestation. Perhaps you should check if you have molestation on the brain.
What makes you think that there is any other valid form of Judaism than chareidi Judaism? So called Modern Orthodoxy is surely inferior to Yeshivish Torah Judaism.
In any case, where in my comments did you detect any reference a particular type of orthodox Judaism?
@tzoorba
ReplyDeleteYou did make reference that the reason people leave is usually due to dysfunctional families.
In fact there are a number of reasons that people leave. As someone who has and continues to do kiruv work with people who have left Orthodoxy, I find that as often as there are home problems there were also problems in the Yeshiva or B"Y.
The importance of such an article should not be understated. The reason that Klal Yisrael finds herself in such a predicament today with this scourge of molestation and other such horrors that we are waking up to, is because for too long we have tried to sweep our problems under the rug and not confronted them.
At times the rabbis are responsible for this, as they are more concerned with whether or not skhakh is kosher if it has not been checked for bugs, or if one is permitted to wear crocs on Yom Kippur, then they are with many of the truly problem issues that plague the Orthodox community. I can't walk ten feet in Mea Shearim without seeing a sign that tells me that my sukkah is not kosher if my skhakh hasn't be adequately checked for bugs. Yet I have never seen a pashkvel condemning the bands of thugs that call themselves "modesty squads" or that publish the psakim of the Gedolim on how to handle child abusers.
At times the community is also to blame. We get upset when someone points out our faults. I know a certain Rabbi in Lakewood who opened a school for "at risk youth", he faced lawsuits and was eventually forced out of the school building. The Rosh Yeshivah of BMG then saw fit to make space available to him. So what happens now? He recieves death threats... For what? For having a school that by its very nature says there are problems within the community.
@tzoorba
ReplyDeleteYou did make reference that the reason people leave is usually due to dysfunctional families.
In fact there are a number of reasons that people leave. As someone who has and continues to do kiruv work with people who have left Orthodoxy, I find that as often as there are home problems there were also problems in the Yeshiva or B"Y.
The importance of such an article should not be understated. The reason that Klal Yisrael finds herself in such a predicament today with this scourge of molestation and other such horrors that we are waking up to, is because for too long we have tried to sweep our problems under the rug and not confronted them.
At times the rabbis are responsible for this, as they are more concerned with whether or not skhakh is kosher if it has not been checked for bugs, or if one is permitted to wear crocs on Yom Kippur, then they are with many of the truly problem issues that plague the Orthodox community. I can't walk ten feet in Mea Shearim without seeing a sign that tells me that my sukkah is not kosher if my skhakh hasn't be adequately checked for bugs. Yet I have never seen a pashkvel condemning the bands of thugs that call themselves "modesty squads" or that publish the psakim of the Gedolim on how to handle child abusers.
At times the community is also to blame. We get upset when someone points out our faults. I know a certain Rabbi in Lakewood who opened a school for "at risk youth", he faced lawsuits and was eventually forced out of the school building. The Rosh Yeshivah of BMG then saw fit to make space available to him. So what happens now? He recieves death threats... For what? For having a school that by its very nature says there are problems within the community.
I have since forgotten most of the text, except, of course, for its impressive beginning...
ReplyDeleteInteresting. I'm 29, grew up Episcopalian, and left it at 19-20 for Yiddishkeit. Granted it's not 25 years yet, and KS is longer, but I still remember the "Lord's Prayer" perfectly, and I only said it once a week - and the Pledge of Allegience, for that matter, which has probably been more like 18 years since I recited it. How can one raised Haredi in EY not remember Kerias Shema?
It strikes me how much more careful and "normal" Christian recitations are; in Torah, le-havdil, there's so much in the liturgy, you have to be burning and possessed with great concentration if you're going to do anything more than just mumble away, melumadah. Plus the non-native language barrier for many of us. I hear somebody mumbling away behind me in shul, probably has no idea - "nekadesh es shimmrmmrmrmmr - ve-amar..."
That's one of the few trapping of Christianity that I miss, other than the music - I was an organist/choir director. Everyone actually spoke to/before G-d in a normal way during services.
@Mekubal,
ReplyDeleteI read through the article again and I found nothing that explained why most of these people abandoned Judaism except for the fact that most of them are superficial people that somehow never had any spiritual yearning and never learned about the dept and meaning that enriches the Torah way of life.
We need to search our own deeds but we need to stop bashing every aspect of our own Orthodox life at every turn and feel guilty for everyone that turns away from the truth. There still is something known as free will and people can freely choose to be evil.
The world today is full of temptations and apikursus and even under the best conditions, many will be drawn to these things. We don't have to wallow in their self degradation.
Are there problems in the system? For sure. We are plagued by a rash of am hooretz kanoim. It's always easier to make frum noise than learn Torah seriously. Those idiots put up the nonsensical pashkavilim.
In every large community, you will always have hotheads and fools. Those type of people forced the shutdown of the school in Lakewood. It is not a valid characterization of the Lakewood community.
The truth is that what we lack is righteous anger. You need energy and righteous cruelty to put down those evil people that ruin it for everyone else. This is the major item that is missing today. Someone who can muster the forces of good to forcefully put down the types that would close a school for kids at risk and would issue death threats.
... So called Modern Orthodoxy is surely inferior to Yeshivish Torah Judaism.
ReplyDeleteSure you went to Kol Yaakov where they learn to hate Modern Ortodoxy before they learn alef beis.
Sure you went to Kol Yaakov where they learn to hate Modern Ortodoxy before they learn alef beis.
ReplyDeleteI happen to have learned in Lakewood for a number of years. I have continued my learning in the higher centers of learning in Monsey.
I learned my attitude about modern Orthodoxy from Rav Elchonon in Kovetz Maamorim when he discusses religious Zionists.
They are good people but misguided.