Haimy

This is something that should be considered. Maybe not a total cancellation, but a reduced vacation of 2 weeks would be fine. Yeshivos shouldn’t be pressured by the announcements from camps of their intention to open this summer.

I’m not here to tell anyone which Gadol to follow. I saw a video of Rav Shmuel Fuerst of Chicago (Who a talmid of Rav Shmuel Kaminetzky) stating that Rav Shmuel strongly encourages that we vote & that Rav Gershon said that Rav Shmuel is the final deiah in America. The political situation in E.Y is quite dangerous right now for the Chareidi tzibbur. My point is that there are enough senior manhigei yisroel like Rav Elya Brudny, Rav Shmuel, Rav Asher Weiss, supporting this that a sincerely Frum Yid can proudly take a stand & vote. My hope is that only good comes out of this campaign & that eventually even those opposed to voting will later agree it was right in hindsight. There’s only one day left to vote, please make up your mind either way & decide before it’s too late. Sitting back & doing nothing because your unsure who to follow while the yishuv is in a sakonah is not a responsible response. Ask you Rav or RH”Y & do what’s right for you.

I Actually requested YWN to remove this post after It went live because I realized that there are people that can feel hurt by my mentioning specific disorders. I ask mechilah of any person I may have hurt & request of YWN to either remove this post entirely or at least remove the sentence mentioning specific diagnoses. I acknowledge that there certainly are individuals who suffer from these & other disorders & who still maintain a stable home. My intention was about severely disabling situations.
I also know of people whose lives were ruined because they unknowingly entered a marriage with a mentally dysfunctional spouse & no one cared to warn them about it before.
At the divorce proceedings of one young woman (who nebach hasn’t remarried now 10 years later) the boy’s Rosh Hayeshiva berated her for rejecting his beloved dysfunctional talmid. This tragedy could have been avoided in my humble opinion if the right research had been done before the marriage.
Forget about trusting the references listed on a resume, they are the least reliable source of information. Use the references to find other unbiased people who will give you a true picture of the person. Roommates can provide invaluable information since they see the day to day interpersonal behavior of the person. I always ask the following question: Would you be comfortable with this person marrying a close relative of yours? the tone of the answer is very revealing. People aren’t offering bad information outright, we want to be positive about other Yidden & don’t want to hurt them. You need to ask the right questions to protect yourself.

I don’t know if we can bring a rayah from a personal story with Rav Moshe. It’s very possible that Rav Shlomo Zalmen davened privately for a refuah. His opinion was that public calls for tefilah when there is no possible derech hateva way to recover is not right because it weaken peoples emunah in the koach of tefilah. I can tell you that every time YWN issues a call for tefilah I sadly assume that this is a last minute thing & the person is more on the olom Haemes than on this world. Usually within 48 hours they are announcing the petirah R”L. I think this deserves a shealas rav whether this is appropriate. I know that there are people who feel discouraged from davening after seeing that it’s not working time & again.

We have a situation today where very wealthy frum Yidden develop pet projects where they invest millions of dollars in. These are icing on the cake endeavors that make a lot of buzz but are of negligeable benefit to the Torah community at large.
This is while critical needs of the klal like building new schools, supporting lomdei Torah respectably, lowering the costs of chasunahs, tutoring & mentoring programs, making post kollel job training affordable, etc. are falling behind.
This is an issue of bein Odom Lechavriro.
Chazal tell us that the people blessed with unusual wealth are Gisborim, caretakers for the Ribono Shel Olom to help out his children. Rav Ahron Leib Shteynman would obligate Gevirim to give up to 50% of their earnings to Tzedaka. Rav Moshe mentions this several time in Dorash Moshe That that really all the money in the world should be shared equally by society, Hashem decided to give it in an unequal way in order to be mezakeh the Ashirim in Tzedaka vochesed. He says thaey should look at themselves as mere trustees of the Klal.
It’s very possible that this overwhelming support of Trump puts us at risk of intimidating the many people who hate Trump in the local tristate area. Maybe it’s np coincidence that B&H was handed a law suit just a few days later.
Redifas Hakovod & lack of rabbinical guidance leads gevirim to foolishly squander their money when they can create so much good with it.
By society asking questions we can hopefully encourage the trustees of the Klall to put the funds to the most important needs we have.

The Siyum website clearly states that the reason for the many high priced seats is to ” Support further limud Hatorah after the siyum through theeir “Ki heim Chayeinu initiatives” Clearly not to cover the cost of the venue & not for their shtadlonus.
My humble opinion is that the way to support further limud Hatorah is to allow more middle-class Yidden attend & from that chizuk they will hopefully be inspired to learn more.( I personally don’t believe the Agudah will have much success from spending money in the future directly on limud Hatorah.) “As Chazal tell us M’bnei Aniyyim Teitzei Torah” Let the Anniyim feel good by being part of it.
Add in the cost of transportation roundtrip to the Siyum & you have a hefty bill.
I in no way mean to bash the Agudas Yisroel or their leadership, they are a critical organization for the success of the Torah world & are led by Gedolei Yisroel.

OK, the sacredness of the Siyum Hashas needs to be sacrificed in order to raise funds to spread more daf yomi among Klal Yisroel. I don’t know of any gadol or Rosh Hayeshiva who actually urges his talmidimg to join Daf Yomi anymore. Todays hectic work cycle makes it very difficult for a Yeshiva graduate to have a sipuk from daf yomi unless it’s done through Dirshu with it’s strong Chazarah & testing program.
How exactly will the funds generated create more lomdei Torah?
Every frum family gets a daf Yomi calendar in the mail each year from Agudah Torah commission which is promptly thrown in the garbage, A cute Sukkos poster with a daf ship riding the waves sent to every frum home?
More ads in the frum press & social media reminding us about how many days are left to the next mesechta?
Do they hire maggidei shiur? I don’t think so.
I don’t think the Agudah can increase Torah learning. This is the job of local rabbonim & rebbeim, not a national organization.
Before we know it, In 5 & 1/2 years this nonstop promotion machine will start all over again promoting the next siyum hashas. (before that we’ll experience a 2 year promotion from the Vaad Hashmitta)
I think Agudas Yisroel is a vital organization for the Klal but that the purity, innocence & inspiration of the Siyum is being compromised by all this hype & commercialization.

There is no way to prove a review is illegitimate on Amazon, Amazon always sides with the customer over the seller. Leaving fraudulent reviews is illegal on Amazon but there are ways to game the system. My point is that those who are gaming the system are also (possibly unknowingly) damaging the Parnassah of other Yidden. I hope people take this issue more seriously now that I’ve made this public.

If we’d turn back the economic clock 30 years & have 20,000 kollel graduates with 5-10 children & minimal secular education looking for a job we’d be in big trouble. Hashem created this tzinor as a yeshuah for the Chareidi tzibbur. So many former yungeleit are making a respectable parnossah using technology & internet we should make a brocha thanking Hashem for this nes. No one is benefiting more from the internet then the Olom Hachareidi.

The Brisker Rov was 16 by his engagement. Chazal have harsh words for someone unmarried by age 21. A successful magid shiur told me that it’s not talked about but mechanchim are aware of the difficulty litvishe bochrim face due to the delayed opportunity to get married. It’s a win win for both boys & girls to begin marriage closer to 20 when a boy is mature enough.

When I say Takanah I don’t mean forcing anyone how to act. I mean a communal recommendation to stop this unnecessary expense. Thousands of dollars are spent collectively each Chasunah on one time use gowns, do we really need it?

I apologize for disappearing after posting this. I blocked the frum news sites from my phone because it was wasting too much of my time, so it’s harder for me to respond. I’m sure MO Jews get married with 100% commitment, but subconsciously, I don’t think they look at marriage as a one way door to the extent Chareidim do. MO Jews who are unhappily married hit the exit doors much sooner than A chareidi person would. My point is not to put down the natural need Hashem put into a man. Rather, that a combination of fear, a false fantasy being fed by the secular modeling industry, & near zero exposure to the feminine personality is creating this. I allow my daughter to invite her teenage friends over even when my boys are home because I want them to have some idea of how girls are, though I make sure they remain separate. I’m not proposing that boys & girls should mix Ch”v, just that we may need to do a better job educating our boys about how life is realistically.
What I do know is that we Chareidim are making a bigger deal out of externals (as well as money) than other groups. Perhaps one of the readers can enlighten me why this is.

Chussid: The Chabad shliach can preach as much as he wants to the couple about the need for a get but by the time they’re ready for divorce they have long forgotten all his drashos.
50% of American marriages end up in divorce, why are they marrying these people of with kosher eidim & causing more mamzerim to be born later? It would be much better if they weren’t married al pi halacha.

Even if a shliach won’t actually marry them off, the sad thing is that they’ve gotten to know each other through a rabbi who’s trying to do outreach!.
Another problem going on is with mohelim who specialize in doing brissim for freia people but don’t verify that the child is a Jew. The child assumes he’s Jewish since he had a rabbi do his bris so he goes & marries a Jewish girl. I asked one such Michel what he does about making a brocha on the milah, he said safek brochos lehakel, he doesn’t say the shem Hashem.
People who are involved in kiruv are true hero’s who save neshamos. It’s still important for the rest of us to ensure no harm comes out of the best intentions.

Thank you Chossid for clarifying Chabad’ s protocol. I saw no mention of a screening process on the website to apply. I’m happy to learn that Chabad does screen every participant as you said.
I chose Chabad because they place tefillin on anyone who says their Jewish without asking about ancestry. I wondered how far they go with being inclusive to anyone who considers themselves a Jew.
I know that Partners in Torah asks all applicants if they were born to a Jewish mother.
As this golus continues it’s becoming more & more difficult to know who is a Torah obliged Jew. At some point, we shouldn’t be treating anyone who thinks their Jewish as a ben mitzvah. If we treat them like Jews, we are like encouraging them to go marry another Jew who may truly be Jewish.
Even if my numbers are off, we are certainly going in that direction rch”l.
This is a question for all kiruv organizations but especially for Chabad.

I read the brochure inviting all Jewish teens to attend which didn’t mention anything about a Jewish mother. Even if 25% were non Jews is that ok? There are no formal studies about the percentage of secular Jews who are halachikly Jewish. There’s no question in many areas of the US the majority of Jews are not Yehudim. Should we be stopping random people on a public square & putting tefillin on them knowing that many are not Jewish?
I E ven when secular Jews marry each other, many of those they are marrying are actually non Jews who think they are Jewish. Should we be treating all cultural Jews as though they are halachikly Jewish?

My point is not to support high density but that we’re becoming overly reliant on it for financial survival. High density is harming our quality of life in numerous ways but for many people it’s been the source of their Parnassa. We are now married to the curse of high density housing in Lakewood.

When you build a new home in Lakewood you are required to dig a water catch basin underground for all the rainwater to collect. This is because non of the rain can collect & then evaporate. Imagine 100 homes densely built in a former piece of forest, all the water that would have remained on the trees or on the surface of the earth to evaporate is now flowing directly underground. Repeat this over & over again & the water table will rise. Surely the recent wet weather isn’t helpful which is even more of a reason for the township to consider this problem.

I’m specifically addressing underage drinkers who may impulsively drink alcohol despite the danger involved with mixing with meds. It’s up to us adults to be responsible & not offer them a possibly life threatening substance.