Reply To: Jewish Students Off Plane

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popa_bar_abba
Participant

Why am I being so strong about this point? I will tell you.

One very bad thing which parents and teachers in our world often convey, is that fault does not depend on whether you made a voluntary bad choice. This messaged is conveyed the first time you were punished for running around in shul like a child, and every time thereafter you were punished for doing things that children naturally and normally do.

This idea is very harmful, because we perceive Hashem as being like our parents, and if our parents punished us for things which were normal and we could not control, we imagine that Hashem will do the same. Hence the impossible perfectionism that infects many in our yeshivos, and hence most of the issues that people in our community deal with.

This theory you are espousing is really an outgrowth of that, and it is a harmful and incorrect theory. Hashem asks us to do what we can; he does not punish us for things which are beyond our control.