Reply To: Question about secular studies

Home Forums Decaffeinated Coffee Question about secular studies Reply To: Question about secular studies

#1183697
Yserbius123
Participant

Wait wait, are we talking Chutz La’Aretz or Eretz Yisroel? Because in the US there’s a huge variety of people who refer to themselves as “Hareidi” and a similarly sized variety of Yeshivos. Some put nearly as much emphasis on secular education as limud Torah, and some barely (often not even) meet the minimal requirements stated by law.

So let me try to answer your question for both the Chutz La’aretz and Israel.

In Israel, there is a massive amount of distrust for the government and non-Torah studies in general. This stems from a history of the memshala trying to push Chareidim to go one way or another along with the huge anti-religious bent in a lot of Israeli universities. It lead to a culture of opposition to being machshiv anything that isn’t Torah. You can criticize it all you want, but that’s just how it is.

In the US, like I said for the most part there’s little open opposition to secular studies. Though there is a growing trend for High Schools to be more like Israeli Yeshivot Ketanot. Let’s focus on them. Those people who run those Yeshivos and the parent body have a modern Yeshivish mindset: That their little yingele will learn in Kollel his whole life and get a job as a Rebbi if he needs to make a chasuna. In that sense, yes. Secular studies are frowned upon. They are seen as a means to an end. The means in this case are the absolute minimal skills required to interact with the world outside the ? ????? ??? ????.

Chassidishe schools have a similar mindset, but not so much to train kids for Kollel as it is an idea that everything they need will come from the Chassidishe community so why would they ever need to learn trigonometry.

Personally, I am a ?? ????? ??? that comes from a long line of ?????? ????? which, for the last 5 generations as far as I could tell, have all gone to institutes of higher learning and taken secular education extremely seriously. My extended family consists of plenty of college grads few, if any, have strayed from the Derech and most of which are massive ?????? ?????. So I can tell you what the mindset is for people who frown upon secular studies, but I cannot explain it logically nor can I ever see myself agreeing with it.