What is The Lesson Here?

I second what smalltowngirl said.

I also like what Smalltowngirl said. It shows compassion and love. BUT….

This is a particular hot-button issue with me. I really get upset by parents who shuckel away, oblivious to the fact that their little Soraleh or Dovid’l is disruptive to the rest of the people who are trying to daven. Too many people think of Shul as a babysitting service (i.e. moms who send the little ones with the father, so they can get some much-needed rest). One cannot do a mitzvah such as davening, on the backs of other mispallelim. I never brought or sent my children to Shul to sit there without zitzfleish and be disruptive. I took them to Hakafos, and when they were old enough, to the Megillah Leining. Then I brought them to Shul for short periods of time to acclimate to being in Shul, until they were old enough to actually daven. My neighbor either blew shofar for me, or I went to a specially-arranged shofar blowing after the davening, when my husband could watch the small children who were not old enough to be quiet during the shofar blowing. It seems so obvious to me, that this is what young women should be doing nowadays. Understandably they feel confined to the house and they want to get out, so they go to shul. But on whose cheshbon? What mitzvah are they getting? More important, what aveira might they be getting for preventing other people from davening? Some children are too young, too immature, and too antsy to be “shown the beauty of davening” until they are much older. And that is not a crime. They are, after all, little kids.

I believe that the test of Rosh Hashana is not how tolerant we are of other people’s wrong behavior, but of trying to make this world a better place. Maybe the FATHER of the child was the one being tested, to see if he would use the opportunity to teach his child derech eretz in front of the Aron Kodesh. It is so amusing and a little sad to me, that when someone is clearly in the wrong, it is always the OTHER guy who is supposed to be changing HIS behavior and reactions. And noch di tzee, he is further accused of failing to pass the nisayon! Put the responsibility squarely where it belongs, on the errant father and his ill-behaved child. If the child is too young to understand and behave, he is too young to be in shul,and that is NOT his fault, it is his parents’ faults.

I agree with smalltowngirl. In my old shul im Brooklyn we had a “tzaddik” who sat in the front of the shul and davened with unbelievable kavanah while his SIX kids ran wild in the rest of the shul preventing others from davening with kavanah. It’s easy to say, just block it out, snd I’ve tried. But the effort I expend to block out the noise takes away from my davening. As a moshel ,let’s say you had to be on the 20th floor of a building for a minyan, but you’re forced to take the stairs, not the eevator. Sure, with effort, you can climb the 20 flights, arriving huffing and puffing just as minyan starts. Do you think you can put in the same effort if you had taken the elevator?

“If someone is greatly disturbed by children not behaving in shul, perhaps they can go to a hashkoma minyan so they can concentrate on their tefillos.

This past purim, I was surprised that many mothers brought babies and newborns because the shul had a party to break the fast and have music afterwards. I asked one mother if she was concerned that she might not hear the megillah if her child makes noises or cries and she shrugged and said I don’t really care, what I hear, I hear. I was very miserable during laining because the kids did make noise. I also never brought little ones to laining until they could be quiet, but it seems like today it is a different generation. The end of this is that I decided that next year I will attend a different kriyah for megillah where I can be sure I can be yoetzai the mitzvah. “

I copied your entire post because it struck so many chords in me. It would not help me to daven in Hashkama, because in my Shul no women daven then. Some men go home so their wives can go to shul at the regular time. Very commendable of them. Others daven early and then go learn. Their wives bring ther small kisd to shul and let them run amok. For Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur we have only the one minyan, no Hashkama. We pay several fine (non-Jewish)women who work in pre-schools, to watch the children during the davening both days of R”H, for Kol Nidre, and all day Yom Kippur. Several women refuse to avail themselves of this free (to them) service, and their kids come in and out all day, and on Y”K it is especially annoying because they rbing food into the main shul and ezras nashim. One woman in particular brought her five children, including an infant, and the little ones were crawling under my seat, as she stood by and beamed. I couldn’t speak, it was during Shemonah Esrai, but I guarantee you my davening was worth nothing, because ALL I could think about was “be quiet, already, and get your kids out of here!” That is not how I want to approach Ha-Shem. This is NOT chinuch, all it does is teach the kids that they can do what they want and mommy and daddy will smile with pride. One mother,who had the grace to look embarrassed, actually said to me after Shul, “I couldn’t do anything, I was in the middle of davening.” DUH…..!