Guest Post: LazerA's comment to "
Kollel & the needs of the Times":
Garnel Ironheart said...
For one thing, if the yeshivos actually had dedicated tracks and students had to choose one, you could produce experts in various areas after only a few years.
While you might be able to produce people with reasonable competence in various areas, you would not be producing experts. I think we are dealing here with a different standard of expertise. For example, in my opinion (which I believe is shared by most bnei Torah), an expert in kashrus has a ready knowledge of all of relevant Tur/Shulchan Aruch, with the sugyos in Shas and a wide range of knowledge in the relevant shailos u'teshuvos.
Given that such studies cannot even begin until the student is a fully matured Talmudic scholar, the idea that we could readily produce such experts in "few years" is simply not realistic.
It's because most guys sit and "learn" aimlessly (well, they won't admit it but if you haven't learned enough to get semichah after 10 years and you're still just "learning" it's aimless, I mean, they even given you only so many years to get a PhD!) instead of towards a defined goal of expertise.
Here we are dealing with an obvious major difference in ideology.
First, on the facts, while there are certainly some kollel yungerleit who never really settle down to learn seriously, the vast majority of such fellows leave kollel after only a few years. From my observation, the vast majority of kollel fellows leave kollel after only a four or five years regardless of how well they are learning. (I am, obviously, only talking about America. Israel is an entirely different story.)
As for the idea of "expertise", the basic ideology of Torah l'shma expoused by R' Aharon Kotler and others is that the purpose of learning Torah is simply to learn Torah. Expertise in any specific area - including semicha - is, for the most part, a by-product of this endeavor. Obviously, there are many bnei Torah who, for whatever reason, find themselves attracted to a particular area and become experts, but that is not the primary function or goal of a yeshiva or kollel.
To say that bnei Torah who are studying b'hasmada for years and are, in many cases, bekiim in shas, are learning "aimlessly" because they haven't gotten semicha demonstrates a basic ideological difference. This difference may well be the most critical distinction between the "chareidi" worldview and that of the "Modern" Orthodox.
Earner said...
Whatever these yungerleit are learning in kollel after their chassunas it is not worth much as an unprecedented number of our youth are off the derech, there are a record number of divorces and our communities are plagued by drug use, sexual problems etc etc in our communities is a real Chillul Hashem.
I am not sure I am following this. The youth that are off the derech are not former kollel fellows. While divorce is rising throughout the Orthodox Jewish world, I suspect that it is probably lowest amongst those engaged in long-term Torah study. It certainly isn't higher. The same thing is true with regard to "drug use, sexual problems etc etc". I can't say that kollelim will save the general community from these problems, but they certainly aren't contributing to them in any significant way.
The widespread practice of defrauding the government of both Israel and the US to support our families so men can "sit and learn" is stealing. To raise an entire generation to steal tzedakkah from the sick and disabled in the name of "Torah", is a crime against the Torah and a chillul Hashem.
I agree with you that defrauding the government is stealing. Any yeshiva or kollel that engages in such forbidden practices should be shut down. But this problem is not inherent in the idea of kollel. I don't know how widespread these forbidden practices are. I, personally. did not encounter such fraudulent practices when I was in kollel. Granted, many yeshivos and kollelim are very adept at working the system to get as much money as is legally possible from the government. There are also kollelim (in America, at least) that specifically prohibit their members from taking any money from the government.
A man who receives tzedakka cannot even qualify as a kosher witness, so what does that say about the generation of learners who live off of the gov't and the tzeddaka of our communities? That they should not even be counted for a minyan.
This is a pretty radical statement to make without supporting it. To my knowledge, only a person who publicly takes charity from non-Jews when he could do so privately is invalid for testimony. (Yoreh Deah 34:18) Applying this to kolleleit is obviously problematic for many reasons:
A) A very substantial portion of kollel yungerleit receive their primary support from their families and from their wive's employment. Just as an example, when I was in kollel, I never received any government funds nor did I get any kollel checks. (I also did not receive money from my family.)
B) Those who take tzedaka while in kollel are taking it from fellow Jews.
C) It is questionable whether taking government money is considered public. The standard definition of בפרהסיא is in front of ten men. It seems to me that getting a check in the mail is certainly not בפרהסיא. Cashing a WIC check or using one of those government cards at the checkout counter would probably also not be, but it might depend on how obvious it is.
D) Even if it is, you have to determine whether or not they have the ability to do otherwise. Such a determination can only be made case by case.
E) In my opinion, it is questionable whether taking government money is considered taking charity in the first place. (Briefly, as our government moves more and more in the direction of socialism, taking government money is just how the system works. Almost everyone takes government money in some form or another. Entire industries, e.g. agriculture, are based on government handouts.)
F) There is no connection, to my knowledge, between being kosher for eidus and being counted for a minyan.
--------------------While I don't agree with much of
Bartley Kulp's comment, he does raise an important issue regarding the economic viability of the kollel system. It seems to me that while this is a major issue in Israel, it is much less so in America. I simply know too many former kollel fellows who went off to law school (or similar) and/or got good jobs. At the same time, I know even more fellows who never learned in kollel who are working as checkout clerks (some with college educations). I am not convinced that spending three to five years in kollel creates that great an economic disadvantage. (As for those who chose to stay in kollel for much longer, in that case we are dealing with a relatively small and very committed group that will either stay in kollel permanently or go on to the rabbinate (or related fields) or into education. The next generation will need roshei yeshiva also, after all.)
Again, it seems to me that the bulk of these criticisms are rooted less in actual practical issues but in basic differences in ideology. For those who truly believe that limud haTorah, in of itself, is the key to all of klall Yisrael's success materially and spiritually, these arguments are, for the most part, non-sequiturs. Perhaps the most dissonant idea is the apparent underlying assumption that we already have "enough" talmidei chachamim. I'm not sure if that is even possible, but, even if it is, I certainly don't think that we are anywhere near that point yet.
I would add an additional point. There are a fair number (I won't guess at percentages) of yeshiva students who don't really "come into their own" in learning until they are in their twenties. (I was one such, and I wasn't alone.) To rule out kollel for such students would mean eliminating their most productive years of Torah study.
Quite frankly, many of these complaints sound too much like social engineering. Ultimately we are talking about private decisions made by individuals. Who is going to decide who gets the chance to become a talmid chacham and who doesn't? Who is going to decide when someone has "lost his chance"? Without answering those questions, all of this is just kvetching.
