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I dont mean to say Yeshivish or Modern Community is right or wrong, I am merely wondering, is the Yeshiva community right in how we raise our children. Do you think we get more Schar for sheltering our children from the outside world completely or raising them in a quasi Sheltered/Non sheltered Life.
The reason/basis for my question in starting this conversation is, does a child get Schar for never being challeneged, more so than a child who has choices to be made and then chooses good.
I do not have a TV in my house, I have little children and do not allow them to watch anything on COmputer/TV and I believe sheltering is important, but to what extent. A part of me thinks that with some challenges, if the child can over come they would be better off.
On the flip side, sheltering them completely from the outside world would keep them more tahor and sound minded and give them a better chance of keeping true to the values of yiddishkeit.you get schar for following daas torah. whatever your daas torah tells you, do it.
Although we want to overcome obstacles, we don’t go out looking for them. In fact it’s better to avoid them.
For example, if a man must travel near the beach and he does not look, that’s a good thing. On the other hand, if he had an alternate road and still takes the road that goes by the beach, even though he does not look anything immodest, he is considered a Russia.
oiyveyismear – Exactly the Chet pf Adam Harishon according to the Meforshim. Adam Harishon’s logic was if I increase the power of my Yetzer Harah and I overcome, I will be better off.
We daven every day “Lo liydei nisayon”
Everything is in the hands of heaven except for yiras shamayim. Just cause your not in range of the well known challenges, Doesnt mean your on the golden road to gan eden. Numerous leaders of the generation had sons and daughters that left judaism and ditched the torah
What a refreshing question on this website.
You are to be admired. May we all be as careful as you describe.
As above, the apushatayid correctly advised, you need to have someone with whom you can discuss these matters with on an ongoing basis. There is no global reply to what you are asking. Every circumstance has to be weighed. A solution for one child will not necessarily apply to another. It also depends where children go to school. etc etc….
Wishing you much HatzlochoOVISM: if it makes you feel any better, from a logical point of view, the odds are in favor of the more sheltered community.
Although passing nisyonos may strengthen once’s character, innocence once lost can not simply be regained.
This is a major factor why you’ll generally speaking find a much greater percentage of young adults going OTD in the Modern Orthodox vs. Ultra-Orthodoxy world. If you see a Frum community where this does not apply, they may be too extreme, or “just for show” without substance.
This is an argument in the gemara whether it is better to go on a street of zonos and avoid them or not to go because it is hard to avoid them. If you bring be to temptation chances are that it will turn into shame.
A good mashal I learned about this is that of a tree. Ki haadam etz hasade. A mature tree is tall and strong and can weather many storms. However the smallest scratch in the seed can damage the tree for life. So too, by sheltering our children when they’re still seeds, immersing them in a much life giving waters of kedusha as possible, this gives them the foundation so that when they’re older and do get exposed, they’re all the stronger and better able to weather their challenges.
I don’t think you need to add nosyonos for the sake of it; there are plenty already.
That said, some communities are sheltered to the point that their members can’t function in the world.
We were meant to make a positive impact on the world. I am not a chabadnick, but I laud the way they fearlessly reach out to chilonim and even gentiles to make the world a better place. And they do it with positivity, not fear mongering. The chabad young men and women who stay on the derech do it out of free will, not because the are trapped by ignorance of the real world.
even though he does not look anything immodest, he is considered a Russia.
Does that mean if someone does the opposite he is a France?
@oyveyismear you can see the practical results in the different methods of chinuch (ie immersing youth in secular culture vs. giving them the highest standards of purity and kedusha possible.)
If anything, the proof is on you, the toien, to provide on how you see this approach, which had produced better results, is wrong.
As far as seeing an outright source in Torah is what I quoted about the tree sufficient? Or more stronger Torah thought? As I said I have some time now I’ll gladly write it up.
To a certain extent, truly sheltering is impossible, and by exposing your children to the world in a controlled manner, you can prevent them from discovering it from other sources.
CS, The Chasan Sofer explains that the pasuk on the Haggadah בעבור זה is applied both for the the child who can’t ask and the rasha child. Be careful when the child can’t ask and raise him properly, so that he should not become a rasha.
Isnt there a gemara that about an amora who used to “taunt” the yetzer hara? the gemara comments, its not a good idea to start up with him (he has way more skill at his job than you do!).
If the only way Yiddishkeit can survive is in a place with virtual ghetto walls , then something is really wrong
ZD: Yiddishkeit can survive either way to some extent. (Think Russia – just mentioned… – during communism. Though practicing Yiddishkeit then was basically outlawed so it’s not a perfect analogy.)
We want Yiddishkeit to flourish.
And yes something is terribly wrong, but did you consider that the world at large with its amorality is at fault?
The majority of our avodah is in the realm of divrei ha’reshus; in areas not explicitly stated in the Torah, Mishnah, Gemora, Rishonim, Achronim, Poskim, etc. The vast majority of iur challenges are exactly that, OUR challenges. The Mesillas Yisharim explains that much like the individual who finds himself in a maze can best reach the goal by seeking the advice of those who have the vantage point of one who has already to reached the point to where you are trying to reach. For this, it is a must to seek daas Torah. True, his answers may not be found in the Torah. True, his answers may, therefore, appear as just his opinion. In reality, however, they come from the perspective of one who has seen much, accomplished much, conquered much. May you have much hatzlachah!
Obviously it depends on the level of sheltering. The reality is not really as black and white as the OP makes it sound. The highly sheltered Yeshivish style being described seems to mostly be practiced by the creme de la creme of the Yeshivish velt (like probably Lakewood). It’s become pretty standard for yeshiva bochurs to know a certain amount of pop-culture references (too many in my opinion). The no-smart-phones thing didn’t really catch on well in America at all (I wish it had, but it didn’t). A lot of people in the yeshivish world like to pretend to be more out of touch than they really are when you first meet them.
Sheltering from all references to non-Jewish culture (even stuff like Shakespeare and perfectly kid-friendly literature) can make them seem like weird aliens who are new to the planet when they go out into the workforce. Obviously, that will help them not assimilate, but I’m not sure it’s good for their happiness and success.
In times like this you can raise a child with no internet and TV and they still can be the least naive people out there. The world outside is insane, and no matter what you do to “shelter” your kids, they’ll find out about it.
Now, I think it’s more of a concept of teaching our children to fight their battles, grow, think for themselves, make decisions, work on themselves etc, but also knowing what battles aren’t worth fighting. I gave up my smartphone a while ago because I realized that fighting all the tuma and the bad parts just wasn’t worth it. Theoretically I could of said “well it’s so useful, and Hashem really created technology, he must want me to harness it’s ability and overcome myself”. And yes, sometimes Hashem DOES want that from us, but I think, and I can really only speak for myself here that the world is filled with SO many battles to fight that children will not grow up weak without smartphones and TV.
There’s so much more overcoming our yetzer in the lesser more mundane and not exciting type of headline things. In addition if you raise your kids with a love of the Jewish people and allow them to socialize with people who may not share all the same hashkafos as you, that’s a great way for your kids to learn how to deal with the real world and deal with these types of technology.
as mentioned before, we daven every day VE’AL TEVIANU …..vloi lidai nisa’yon.
also, its not enough to raise children sheltered, we must incorporate in the sheltered chinuch the strength and the tools to deal with challenges that come up in life. learning sifrei musar and chesidus is a necessity today. and children should made to be happy and proud to be frum and a yarei shama’yim.Neville, I’m surprised and disappointed at your biases these days. I thought your post was so nice at first but the underlying disapproval seems to peek through. And this last line: “but I’m not sure it’s good for their happiness and success.” is a bit presumptuous. Living with people who live as you described allows me to respond this way – if you think it isn’t good for their happiness and success than you seem to be unaware of what truly makes a yid happy when his priorities are straight, and you seem to be projecting what your priorities are, onto them.
It is only natural for a person to be biased toward his own opinion.
Exposure to the world in a controlled way is a fallacy. We all have temptations and the more we are exposed to the world’s ocean of temptations, the more it pulls us. It does not stop us from wanting more. That is the very nature of worldly temptations.
No, the parents are the ones projecting priorities. The priority of staying frum over everything including sanity and well being. I’m not talking about moderate sheltering here. I’m also not talking about an alternate society like the Chassidim have where it can work. What I’m talking about is Litvish parents who expect their children to succeed in the normal, working world, but make it impossible for them to connect to people.
We can talk about reality here. We both know there are frum yidden who “have their priorities straight,” and still are not happy. The older generations pushing their children into getting abjectly worse secular educations than what they received does not help anything. I’m not sure how you interpreted my opinion, but it obviously was not supportive of fully, unlimited, unsheltered upbringings. If you’re bothered by any criticism of sheltering I have to assume you support the full-throttle sheltered upbringing that produces fully grown men who write emails that look like they were written by a 12-year-old because they got a proper 21st century yeshiva education.
I heard about sheltering it says כי חיזק בריחי שעריך ברך בניך בקרבך if you streghten the bars on your gates or locks on your doors, your children will be blessed among you, specially having cars around.
Intetesting response. Obviously coming from some bruised or injured places….if you ever feel ready to have a give and take type of conversation on this topic we can revisit it then.
” If you’re bothered by any criticism of sheltering I have to assume you support the full-throttle sheltered ”
I feel the need to explicitly state that the reason I object is because of the descriptions and language used. They are jews regardless of what *I* think of their lifedtyle and i dont appreciate the l”h, ms”r or simply anti-demeticISH stereotyping. Period.
Laskern, the problem here is that people have such a visceral response to the concept of sheltering that you will never get them to see the value, nor seperate their bigotted view of the chasdidish world from the advantages of protecting your neshama. And others indicate they wrongly feel threatened by people who shelter themselves and still somehow manage to pen literate emails and live professional lives without mingling.
Syag: I never said anything about sheltered people not being Jews, I complimented the lifestyle of Chassidim, and I don’t see how level headed responses to the tune of “there has to be a limit to sheltering at SOME point” is extreme.
We’re the ones arguing for the moderate approach here. Saying that we’re all just arguing from personal experience and therefore our points are invalid is pointless. Everyone’s opinions are based on personal experiences or on people we’ve met. What makes you think your personal experiences are more valid than our’s? Because they were purely positive and we also see the negative side? If sheltering is done properly everyone turns the blind eye to the negative side and ignores the unhappy?
Sorry about my last two posts, Syag. Classic case of needing to go back and reread a threat later.
I think you interpreted my first comment as a put-down of the most separated communities, and I think I misinterpreted your comments as claims that the sheltered people have it totally blissful with almost no problems compared to others.
I don’t think I did a good enough job making it clear: the arguably most sheltered communities in America (Chassidim) I do respect and admire. But, that is not the lifestyle any of us here were raised with, otherwise we wouldn’t be posting here. I was viewing this thread as purely applying to the Ashkenazi, Litvishe velt (including the MO in this context). I think a lot of us here associate with the sort of centrist-yeshivish derech where a lot of baalhabatim work as lawyers and doctors and people are expected to interact successfully in the business world.
I think the argument for me is on whether or not we’re juggling the priorities correctly. I think parents have decided they need to be more careful with their kids than their parents were with them, which makes perfect sense in the internet era. I think the worst thing (and I hate when people make comments like this here but I’m going to anyway) is for kids to be on internet forums and chats. The children who have grown up with the internet don’t necessarily know how to differentiate between how they speak on the web vs. real life. From my experience with kids, I see that there are clearly many who have not been properly sheltered from the internet in this regard, yet they have been sheltered from the well-rounded educations of yesteryear. What good does this do? You could just say these are isolated cases where the parents failed to shelter properly, but I disagree. I think it’s pretty common.
There is a problem with sheltering girls. When they go outside the bubble, they will be affected more and can go OTD.
laskern: Why girls more than boys?
Neville: There are a number of Chasidim posting even on this forum. (Not myself.)
Laskern: define bubble please. Are you talking about going to college for example, or simply a doctor’s appointment?
The idea of sheltering girls is, espcecially by Chasidim, that it’s lifelong, or at least until they’re married and on more solid ground when they may choose to expand their circle. Those that marry later definitely have more nisyonos in this regard, but I don’t think less sheltering at an early age is the answer here.
What helps in these cases is to have guidance on how to make changes and for support, and actually WANTING to remain pure.
Bubble means sheltered within their own kind that is not going outside of their environment. Going to college is not bubble, once in a while going to a doctor’s appointment is not bubble,
Joseph, usually we protect the girls more than the boys and I heard instances about girls.
The Shpoler Zaide had a chossid whose parnosoh was owning and tending a bar. He approached the Rebbe with a complaint. “I spend my day in the company of the customers, who are at various levels of intoxication, who are speaking about the worst subjects with the worst vocabulary. I feel this detracts from my Avodas Hashem.” The Shpoler Zaide responded, “So you prefer wearing the levush of a rebbe, sitting all day in a room full of seforim, and occupying your day with only Torah and davening? That is the Avodah of a Malach. HKB”H placed you where you are because he wants you to perform mitzvos in the environment where you are.”
It is one thing to bring on nisyonos. It is another to lock one’s children in a box. The latter, in the extreme, is quite dangerous. One will eventually emerge from that box and encounter the world. There will not be the needed immunity to withstand challenges, of which there will be plenty.
There is another reality. The yetzer horah takes no vacations. If it cannot expose our children to the schmutz of the world via internet and technology, he will simply find another way. There is an important aspect of סור מרע, where we give our best to block ourselves from exposure to toxicity. But equally as important is the עשה טוב, where we fill our space with kedusha that repels the influence of the yetzer horah. Sadly, we have reduced so much of our Avodas Hashem to perfunctory performances, theatrical shows, and efforts to impress others. I heard someone on Sukkos bemoaning the inability of leaving a price tag hanging from his esrog so that he could advertise to all how much he paid for it. For whom did he spend to fulfill the mitzvah?
No way is wrong or right. It is the matching of the derech to the individual, and the moderation that makes the difference. It becomes bullyish to dictate these details or standards for the public.
Laskern: please clarify your bubble comment.
Not sure how you ever define how wide the circle may be outside the home in relation to any so called “schar” in olam haboh or even olam hazeh. I would imagine the Ebeshter looks holistically (excuse the “new age” terminology) at the entitreky of how you live your life as compared to how many credits you may have taken in an online or resident college, how you relate to others, your level of observance of taryag mitzvos (or at least those that may apply), your level of emunah in times of stress or peril etc. Such subjective terms as “innocence’, “purity” etc. are increasingly less relevant as we find ways to conduct a balanced life of torah and secular activities. As we see more frum men and women take leadership roles in both the public and private sector and working hard to make life better for ALL, its difficult to draw a bright line for Yeshivish or other members of the tzibur.
Mammele, google the expression, ‘people kept in a bubble’ not getting out of their comfort zone which also means religious comfort zone. See the post of ‘the little I know’.
oiyveyismear,
It’s hard to make absolute and fast rules
The short answer is it depends on the parents.If they could and are capable -Expose them in normal increments in order to immunize them then they should should definitely expose them to more of the world
I am responding to the OP.
I am in the modern community. YU. TV. Internet.
Just so you can have a window into who is writing: One kid is Charedi (married). One kid is Neo-Chasidic (in Yeshiva). One kid is modern (married). And two in HS. (The non HS all live in Israel).
I dont think that there is anything wrong with shielding or sheltering your kids. ALL parents, of all religions to so to a certain extent. Your “line” may be different than my line but we both have limits. This also changes with age. We treat little kids differently than teenagers. The main quesetion is what do you do when the shelter fails. (There are documentaries — you can find on YouTube that a Chasidic kids go to the Museum of Natural HIstory and is ill equiped to deal with the subject of dinasours. For me — there is nothing that we cannot deal with. With my kids — i told them all the answers i could think of ).
What i wonder about — and dont know — is the following. It seems to me that when the kids in the Yeshiva community wander away from the life style — they turn to a harsher, non-normative lifestyle. (Go on Facebook — and find a kid you know who is OTD — and see all their friends named Faygie and Blumie with pink hair and tatoos). I would guess that in the Yeshiva world it is a binary decision — yes or no. (Obviously, I am aware of “modern yeshivish”).
In the modern community — we lose our kids to college campuses — where their observance lessens or disappears. They may come back to the community at some point and be marginally connected or not at all.
Again — i have not done the study so this is purely anecdotal.
Perhaps, if the Yeshiva world — instead of sheltering their kids from the outside world, taught their kids how to engage it (or at least deal with it) — they would be better off. I dont know. (I certainly feel strongly that the Yeshiva world should educate their children so that they can support themselves in middle class jobs, law, medicine, accounting, engingeering. It seems to be a bigger problem in the Israeli world and the Chassisdic World).
A little rambling … for that i apologize.
SarahL: thanks for your informative post.
You left out the most interesting tidbit many of us want to know. What percentage of kids in your world would you guess (since you didn’t conduct any studies…) become OTD?And what percentage attend college, since you mentioned that’s where you lose them to Yiddishkeit? Additionally, is YU just as risky as any mainstream/ non Jewish college?
SarahLevin613 I said before in my first post that it’s just basically balancing sheltering and also teaching your kid how to deal with it. And although people may disagree, you CAN shelter your child from internet, and TV and they’ll still learn how to deal with the outside world.
There’s still not religious cousins, less religous cousins, neighbors and friends who are unsheltered or have different hashkafos. The yetzer hara to be involved with gashmiyus and pritzus can express itself with radio use, getting a hold of non-jewish music, going out to ben yehudah with friends to just “watch” what’s going on. (No one will know, right? And we won’t do anything). Buying a smartphone when they are old enough to do so of their own accord and finding themselves addicted, bombarded with messages from other frum people of the opposite gender, realizing that there’s enough struggle without the smartphone and choosing to get rid of it, delete instagram, etc of their own accord.
As a child there’s so much to be exposed from, in the street, on vacations, from cousins, neighbors, friends, schoolmates (Why can’t we do that?) (Doing things by their houses).
My siblings went to the Beis Yaakov system and so did I, the things we heard in school, or the things classmates did, you wouldn’t believe. Hearing stories from my younger siblings, who go to one of the most prestigious and sheltered BY’s in the city, it DOESN’T matter. There’s still kids there coming to school and telling my sister about an extremely graphic movie she watched with her mother (Don’t ask, why isn’t this child kicked out already? They have money, and doing so makes the school stop being in denial. How can children in their school be watching such things when clearly they are so frum all the girls must wear skirts 5 inches below the knee, the won’t even MENTION the word internet because it’s so obvious that none of the children would ever know about that)
Add to mamaleh:
SarahL,how about all those who was still wearing kipot Or the like
going through the motions In an artificial way but that’s about it?They get all their cues From Spirit destroying Society
the feeling is all gone
To Shopping 613:
I am not sure i understand your post.
First, i dont think a child needs internet or TV. I dont think that pop-cultural exposure is important. I think that academic exposure is more important. I think that understanding others is also important. Do i think its important for kids to be aware of Taylor Swift? No, I dont.
Second, of course, kids learn things by osmosis. I get that.
Third, my point is — and this will sound a bit obnoxious but is not meant to be in the least. I think learning how to “talk” in the outside world may be lost. I cant express it correctly, but there is a certain bluntness or agressiveness that i see in the charedi world (which is accepted there) that doesnt fit in the outside world. I could be wrong totally — but I see it on occassion. I dont think its mean spirited — but perhaps just cultural. I really dont know….and maybe i am just imagining it. Completely possible.)
SL
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