RuffRuff, it is true that you will find a wide array of hashkafa issues on the net. Yes, the pure yeshivish hashkafa which I grew up with was very warm, and I sometimes long for the days when I thought along those lines. Everything was very rosy. Yet, I don’t think it is the internet which changes people’s thinking. It is very difficult life experiences that do. In addition, some of the behavior of kannaim which I began to read about in the last few years, as the frum news sites came into being made me simply nauseous. No need to repeat the various stories here, but there were probably close to half a dozen, including the dibbuk fiasco, etc. If the people who think that way can act so repulsively, then it requires a rethinking of one’s hashkafa.
While I used to take every medrash 100% literally, one is led then to believe that the world of Chazal was extremely supernatural, with sheidim and all kinds of miracles happening on a regular basis. (There is an aggadeta about the nachash and Chava, and another about snakes chasing women for carnal purposes.) That presents the problem then, that since I have never experienced those things, nor has anybody else here, to the best of my knowledge, that the gemara would then be chas veshalom irrelevant, since our world runs according to the laws of nature. (Of course to a maamin, that is the biggest miracle.) So, if in the days of Chazal the world was completely different and supernatural, then how does Chazal’s advice benefit us, who don’t have those experiences ever? It is therefore sometimes better for us to view the world of Chazal as being natural, just like ours, not supernatural. They excelled, because they persevered with the same nisyonos as we have and faced the same challenges. They were able to sit and learn despite it all, and one can see their scholarship and dedication to learning in their words and ability to quote and ask a kashya from anywhere. I.e., they had Shas on their fingertips without CD ROMS.
In addition, the Rambam who says sheidim do not exist is not only offering an opinion on an interpretation of an aggedata, he is saying that he personally never saw one, either. (If he did, he never would have written that.) He is making a statement on the metzius of his time. Now, he lived only 750 years after the close of the Talmud. In his time, therefore, the world was probably like ours. So even the Rishonim lived in a natural, not a supernatural world. That leads one to believe it was the same way in the time of the gemara, too. So the gemaras about sheidim were probably meshalim for deeper concepts, but not meant to be taken literally. Of course, this is not the Yeshivishe hashkafa, which says that these aggadetas are all to be taken literally, exactly as they say.
Another problematic area is Kabbala. The Yeshivishe hashkafa says that the mekubalim have deep and secret knowledge of how Hashem runs the world and how to predict the future and intercede in the mysteries of hashgacha pratis to change the outcome. But many of these people have been shown to be fraudulent, or simply to be unable to produce results that differ in any way from what one would expect in the natural course of events. And if one asks to be shown a proof or explanation of how they arrived at their conclusion, one will invariably be told that he is a nothing, and can’t possibly fathom the wisdom of these people.
I personally find it difficult to conduct myself in these areas if I can’t understand it. Should one say a Lshem Yichud Kudsha Brich Hu uShechintai (joining the RBSH with his Shechina) or joining the letter Yud Kay with Vav Kay before performing a mitzva, when one has no idea what in the world that is supposed to mean? Now, if one says I am not on the level to understand it, I can accept that, but how do I know that the mekubalim understand it either? When it comes to rocket science, I may not understand it, but I know it works, because the GPS system tells me where I am, and how to get to someplace else. When it comes to these mekubalim, what is their track record?
So for various reasons, my thinking has become much more rational, and the warmth I get now comes from chesed, not what I used to consider Ruchniyus in my Yeshiva days.