The Point Of Davening

(Hat tip: JewishIdeas)

I love davening.  I absolutely love it.  Every since I got a decent Hebrew education in my teens and found I could understand most of the prayers I have very much gotten into praying with purpose and meaning.  Yes there are days when I'm rushed, tired or distracted by a headache but in general whenever I can I do my best to immerse myself in tefillah at the set times.  Whether davening alone or by myself I don't feel the time dragging when I'm speaking with God.
But there is something to be said about settings.  At home I have a specific room in which I daven.  I have everything arranged and set up so there is instant familiarity and comfort.  In shul I have my makom kavua as well which helps.
But there is more to a setting than a specific seat and this is where shul leaves me disappointed.
Many, many years ago the non-Orthodox synagogue I worked in (did their Junior Congregation) had a congregational meeting and the topic of how to make services more interesting came up.  More dynamic speakers, muscial instruments to accompany the singing, more activities to engage congregants, all sorts of ideas got thrown out from the floor until one guy on the board, not the most traditional in Jewish practice but still an intelligent guy with his head screwed on straight shouted out "Wait!  I come to shul to pray to God.  I'm not looking for a show or entertainment, I'm looking to commune and daven!"
The other board members just rolled their eyes.  Prayer.  What a quaint concept.
Unfortunately this lack of interest in the dignity and importance of proper prayer is getting increasingly lost in parts of the Orthodox world as well.  I think, for instance, of the Carlebach-type service my shul runs on Friday nights.  For me the service is a nightmare, a 90 minute affair that should only take 45 minutes tops in a real shul.  Song after song during Kabbalas Shabbos, two or three breaks where kids go up and dance around the bimah, and then a quick zip through Maariv so we can get to more singing for Kiddush.  I haven't attended Friday night services since I realized this format wasn't an occasional "treat" but rather the standard format.
Now I can understand why the Rav of the shul does this.  He's very much into outreach.  He runs an expensive shul and day school, he needs the money, ergo he needs members and how better to increase membership than to appeal to the non-religious?  After all, we frummers are stuck going to the shul whether we like it or not; it's the only one in town.  This means catering to the non-religious and how better to do so than to make shul fun?
It works too.  The little side chapel we use other than on Shabbos mornings is packed by folks who drive up conveniently right after Minchah has ended and who jump in their cars to go home after the last Aleinu.  In between there's the singing and dancing.  But when we hit Maariv everything changes.  Our Rav hasn't figured out how to turn saying the Shema into a loud, interactive experience (yet) so at that point people either daven (the few religious folks) or close the siddurim and stare blankly into space until V'Shamru, the next tune.
And I wonder: when did shul stop being shul?  I mean a place where there is a sense of dignity and propriety, a place where people stand in some sort of awe before our Creator and who recite the worlds from the prayer book as if they're interacting not with the shaliach tzibur and his happy tune but with God Himself?
Shouldn't there be a sense of majesty?  If not unending chazanus then at least tunes that carry some weight?  Shouldn't people be there to make a connection with the Divine instead of having the rabbinical equivalent of Krusty the Klown calling out "Hey kids!  Now for our next special song and dance..."?
The article that triggered my interest in making this post makes a similar point.  His most powerful paragraph for me was:
 A hazzan is not merely a precenter of the liturgy. He is a teacher of prayer. He interprets the mahzor or the siddur and renders it relevant and meaningful to his congregation. The prayer modes are the hermeneutics he employs. If all a hazzan does is sing some popular tunes for the entertainment of the congregation, or if all he does is sing big pieces to impress the congregation with his vocal abilities and musicianship, he is an abject failure, much like the rabbi who fills his sermons with jokes and teaches little about Jewish life and values. Leading prayer is not about timing the service so it ends before the cholent burns, nor is it about entertainment. It's not even about artistry for its own sake. It is about teaching the congregation what the prayers are, and what they mean. To do that a hazzan must wrestle with the text of the siddur. He has to ponder the depths of his soul and make the liturgy meaningful and relevant to himself. He must lead and teach both by exposition and by example (thus the halakhic requirement that a communal cantor must be known for his personal piety). If the cantor is unclear as to what prayer means to him, his message to the congregants will likewise be unclear. Once a cantor understands what the liturgy means to him, he must then go about presenting it, teaching that meaning to his students within the confines of accepted exposition of the text (with the liturgical hermeneutics, the nusah). Sometimes that meaning will be challenging to the congregation. It may make them tremble or weep. Sometimes it may be whimsical or entertaining. But the message notwithstanding, the cantor MUST always be interpreting the text of the siddur and teaching the interpretation to his students (i.e. the congregation). That is what the unconquerable Cantor Moshe Koussevitzky meant when he stated "I daven with the peirush,", I pray according to the meaning of the words.


We need to do something to reclaim the sanctity of shul, the kedushah of prayer.  Running in and runsing through the davening is unacceptable.  Why is it so hard to handle the middle ground, a decent service with the appropriate tunes that demands that the congregants focus on the real reason to be in shul?

Who's Afraid Of Yair Lapid?

The recent elections in Israel have resulted in what might turn into a society upheaval there.  For the first time in history a significant number of identifiably religious Israelis have become MK's.  What's more these MK's arent' exclusively confined to the Chareidi parties and Bayit Yehuda but spread out amongst several parties.  In fact given how many divrei Torah and religious references were made by MK's in their introductory speeches to the Knesset one can almost hear the sound of the founders of Secular Zionism rolling in their graves.  This was not the Israel they were hoping to build!
And then there's the new wunderkind of the Knesset, Yair Lapid, son of Tommy.  In his first run for office he garnered 19 seats for his Yesh Atid party making it the second largest in the Knesset.  With his charisma and media experience he parlayed that into what will be a commanding position in the next government.  And like his father one of the main planks of his platform concerns the Charaeidim.
Now for those who don't remember, Tommy Lapid also swept into the Knesset with a new party, Shinui, a few elections back.  From nowhere he earned 15 seats and a spot in the governing coalition based on a platform entirely devoted to attacking Chareidim.  There was little about Shinui that was positive save the "We positively hate Chareidim and are out to get them" plank.  Now his son is being viewed by the Chareidi community in the same way and for good reason.
For one thing, unlike Tommy, Yair is far more charismatic.  Lapid the elder always came off as a wide-eyed lunatic when talking about the Chareidim; not so his son.  For another, Lapid the younger's platform is far more comprehensive.  Yesh Atid is not a single issue party but has positions on most of the issues that Israelis find important.  Unlike the rest of the world the average Israeli is far more worried about the country's economic difficulties and income disparity than the so-called Peace Process.  Lapid correctly realizes this, hands people a few meaningless bromides about his thougths regarding the Arabs and then spends more time focused on economics.
For another, Lapid's approach to the Chareidim is not based on a "We hate them, let's get 'em" position but rather on one very similar to his economic position.  His message of sharing the burden, whether it be the wealthy with poor when it comes to economic opportunity or whether it be the Chareidim and the Chilonim when it comes to army service, is not one easily dismissed as hate-mongering despite Chareidi attempts to do so.
Despite what he says there will be no mass Chareidi draft in the next few years.  The Chareidi population is too entrenched and controlled by its leadership to meekly submit to such a drastic change overnight.  Furthermore, despite his importance to any new government coalition Lapid will discover that the Chareidi parties still hold great importance in the Knesset.  Bibi might not need tem today but he might after the next election and he is certainly keeping that in mind.
But what might happen is a gradual change in Chareidi society and this worth keeping an eye on.  Not for nothing did Lapid make an eloquent speech to Chareidi law students at Kiryat Ono recently, stressing the importance of the Chareidi community to Israeli society and its need to be aware of the rest of the country's concerns, not just its own. 
By speaking to these students Lapid tried a radical new approach. Until now most attempts to interact with the Chareidim on any societal basis have taken place through their leader, the "Gedolim" and their handlers.  Since Gedolim generally reject any requests made by "the outside" as a matter of principle this approach has led nowhere.  But Lapid has done something else.  He's gone directly to the people and interacted with them.  This might have quite a different effect.
How many disaffected Chareidim are out there?  Not folks wishing they could go OTD but people who are 95% satisfied with being Chareidi and yearn for a way to improve that final 5%?  By going to the leadership we will never find out. The social pressure and groupthink that pervades the community prevents anyone from finding out.  But by talking directly to Chareidim one might light a spark leading to positive change within the community - a movement towards some interaction with the outside world without a compromise in the religious quality of their lives.
The response from the Chareidi leadership to Lapid's outreach has been downright nasty.  This is not a surprise since an intelligent, think-for-themselves Chareidi is a threat to "Daas Torah" and its "You're stupid so just do what I say" system of leadership.  Instead we should quietly watch for the response from the rank and file and have patience instead of expecting a sea change.
On the other hand one can also invoke history.  Lapid the elder, in his first election, got 15 seats and a place at the cabinet table with the Likud and the Mafdal (National Religious Party).  After all his campaigning he did nothing to change the status quo with the Chareidim.  In his second election support collapsed completely and shortly after Shinui disappeared into history.
In his first election Lapid the younger got 19 seats and will most certainly wind up at the cabinet table with the Likud and Bayit Yehudi, the new Mafdal party.  Lapid might succeed in bringing some change to Israeli society or, like his father, his speeches might come to nothing and Yesh Atid might wind up having no future.

Painting Themselves Into A Corner

(Hat tip: DovBear)
One of the dangers of making blanket statements is having to deal with important exceptions to those statements.  It's a lot easier to say "Most people think..." or "The majority of people say..." than "Everyone thinks..." or "Everyone says..."  The latter statements might land you in an indefensible position and then your argument is lost.
Of course just because that's true it doesn't stop people from doing just that, especially some frum folks who really should know better.
For example, a recent controversy in Toronto illustrates this exact point.  The whole thing started with the publication of yet another Kugel-style book, Torah From Heaven.  Like others that have come before the author has decided to put greater faith in academics than tradition and has written a book to reconcile his desire to believe in the divinity of the Torah with his intellectual inability to do so.  Billed as a book for the skeptical Orthodox it's more another tome for the Orthoprax - those amongst us who talk the talk but don't believe a word of what they're saying.  For those who understand the incredible limitations of the Documentary Hypothesis and the weak positions academics based themselves on it's yet another cry of lack of faith hidden as desire for intellectual truth.  In other words: yawn.
That hasn't stopped those who share this (lack of) belief in the truth of Torah from gushing over it.  Dr. Rabbi Martin Lockshin of Toronto, for example, wrote a glowing review of the book.  He goes over the general contents and, in an open concession to the Orthoprax, announces:

Rabbi Solomon argues further that historical scholarship makes it impossible to believe that Moses was the author of Genesis to Deuteronomy, or that our text of the Torah today is identical to the original one. The Talmud often quotes biblical verses whose wording or spelling differs from our own (as do Rashi and basically every other Bible commentator who lived before the days of the printing press).

Really?  It's impossible to believe that Moshe Rabeinu, a"h, was the author of the Torah?  Impossible?  Or would the author and his followers just like to believe that so they can pursue their erroneous thesis?  Further, the word "often" in "The Talmud often quotes biblical verses" is also erroneous.  It does occur, true, and on a couple of cases this misquotes have halachic implications but it is not often by any serious definition of the word.  Rashi's misquotes also number less than a dozen.  Hardly a resounding basis of support.
The logic the author of the book uses is quite simple: it's a principle of faith that we believe that the Torah we have today is pretty much the one Moshe Rabeinu finished up before his death (with a few notable exceptions).  The Orthoprax can't accept this and so declare it to be impossible because modern secular academics say so.  And since it's impossible it can't still be a principle of faith.  Presto!  You don't have to believe in Torah miSinai to be a good Jew!
As far as that goes it's yet another tempest in a teapot.  Dr. Rabbi Lockshin, for example, is the leader of a small-time partnership minyan slowly moving towards right wing Conservatism.  His views are hardly going to be bandied about mainstream Jewish institutions in Toronto with any seriousness.  Like all the other hard-care Orthopraxers out there who would like to believe that they aren't a small minority he is not a threat to mainstream genuine Orthodoxy.
So what does the Toronto Board of Rabbis do?  It's leading lights, Ravs Shochet, Ochs and Miller, issue a blanket condemnation stating: "Halacha rules unequivocally that the denial of the G-dly origin of "even a single word" in the Torah... contravenes this principle (that our Torah is 100% identical to Moshe Rabeinu's) and constitutes kefirah b'Torah".
There are two problems with this response.  The first is that it's overkill.  Dr. Rabbi Lockshin wasn't suggesting a small part of the Torah, a few verses here and there, have been added, substracted or altered over time.  He is endorsing that the document itself isn't min haShamayim at all!  Why take such an ideological position when it would have been far simpler to say "Jews must believe in matan Torah in order to be considered Orthodox" and leave it at that?
But the second problem is far more difficult.  As Prof. Marc Shapiro shows in his work, The Limits of Orthodox Theology, there is plenty of legitimate evidence that small changes have occured to the text of the Torah over time.  Starting with a baraisa in maseches Sofrim which openly discusses Ezra editing the Torah after the return from Babylon in order to produce a reliable text, moving on to the rare times the Talmud misquotes a verse from the Torah and through various Rishonim and Acharonim who openly discuss the problem and its implication for fulfilling the mitzvah of listening to krias haTorah there is enough talk in the mesorah literature about the issue.  To state that 98% of the Torah we have today was what was handed to Moshe Rabeinu is doable.  To state it's 100% denies Chazal and the subsequent poskim who examined the facts.  Yet this is exactly what the Toronto Board of Rabbis does in its proclamation.  For them you're either 100% in or you're 100% out.
So here's the problem: their position is vulnerable.  Start at a position of 98% and you take away all your opponent's arguments.  Through a defense of the integrity of the text through its explanations in the Talmud and Midrash along with genuine scholarship that proves the antiquity and indivisibilty of the Torah the Orthodox position can be maintained.  Start at 100% and you're easily disproved and once that happens there is no red line stopping critics from moving from a 98% position to a 0%.  What's more, there can be no Orthodox counterargument since the original position was so unworkable.
The mishnah in Avos at the end of chapter 1 tells us there's nothing better than silence.  Another mishnah tells the sages to be exceedingly careful with their words lest bad consequences result.  Perhaps these mishnayos should have guided the proclamation.

With Their Nation Or With Their Enemies?

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland exists in a way that makes it seem graced by Heaven.  Just off the northern Atlantic it should be a frozen wasteland devoid of any meaningful population.  Nature, however, supplies it with ocean-based winds that keep its climate not too hot in the summer and not too cold in the winter.  Yes there's the rain but that makes up for the lousy water pressure.
In addition the culture seems so modern and liberal.  The British have presented us with some of the finest literature, cinema and television in the world, not to mention comedy.  Add to that their magnificent history of bringing culture and civilization to the four corners of the globe and their role, as the first truly global empire, of creating safe international commerce through the power of their navy.  Yes, Britain is an important country in world history.
It's almost enough to make you forget that they're generally a bunch of damned Jew haters.  Well, almost.
What we, in our rush to quote Monty Python at all the right occasions, like to forget is that while it is a Western democracy, fought against the Nazis and all that, Britain has been a hotbed of Jew hatred for centuries.  Whether it was expulsions, libels or outright massacre the soil of green England is stained red with the guilt the British should be feeling for their treatment of our nation.
One does not even have to look into perfidious Albion's dim past to make this case.  The 20th century will do quite nicely.  After liberating Israel from the Ottoman Turks recall that Britain solemnly took upon itself a mandate to create a Jewish national home in Israel composed of what today is Israel and Jordan.  Then, without any real authority to do so, it sliced off Transjordan to pay a war debt to some of its Arab allies.  Then, realizing the importance of oil and maintaining a powerful presence on international affairs meant sucking up to the emerging Arab states, the British decided to do away with the rest of their commitment to us.  Piece by piece, first by restricting land purchases, then attempting to deprive the chalutzim of the ability to defend themselves from Arab attacks, then a blockade of Israel's coast to prevent Jews from arriving (ethnic based immigration restrictions, how cricket is that?) and finally an attempt to partition Israel into mostly Arab Palestine and a tiny Jewish bantustan the British did what they could to ensure that the Jewish Nation Home project would be an abject failure.
And then there were British attempts to ensure that Jews fleeing the fires of Nazi-occupied Europe would be unable to escape that Hell.  In summary, as my father once said, maybe it was that Nazis, y"sh, that slit our throats but it was the British holding us down so they could do it more effectively.
It should therefore not come as any shock that Britain is slowly starting to show its true colours once again.  What must infuriate them now is their inability to bully the Jewish nation like they once could.  Their idiot MP's and ministers can stand up and hector Israel all they want and we don't have to apologize and ask for more.
Consider this article from The Spectator:

Glick recently came to London to take part in an Intelligence Squared debate. The debate was about Israeli settlements. Glick and Danny Dayan attempted to explain to the London audience that Palestinian rejection rather than Jewish settlement in the West Bank is the primary reason there is still no solution to the Israeli-Palestinian dispute. The debate is now available on Youtube and there you can see the deeply rancorous tone of the discussion. At one point Lord Levy’s son, Daniel Levy, (arguing against Glick and Dayan) has to be almost physically restrained by his own co-debater (William Sieghart). Levy’s frustration appears to come from being pulled up on an allegation he casually makes against Israel for which he turns out to have absolutely no evidence.

But the audience go with him, and go against Glick and Dayan in the final vote by a factor of 5 to 1. As Glick notes in her bitter farewell to London, the audience was so hostile towards her argument that when she even mentioned the matter of Grand Mufti Haj Amin al-Husseini and his involvement with the Nazis during World War II she was booed down by the audience. They – having been presented to her as open-minded – turned out to be so close-minded and partial that they would not even hear a historical fact about a Palestinian figure who was an actual Nazi.

There are also William Hague's endless one-sided anti-Israel pronouncements coupled with his empty statements about his friendship for Israel.  Some friend.  I'd rather have an honest enemy than a false friend like him.
There is a certain pride the British feel about their country, their history and their culture and there are many reasons they should.  But British Jews will soon have to make a choice.  In order to share in that pride as a member of that society, in order to maintain their good standing as "British" they will have to throw their status as "Jews" into the mud and stomp on it well and good.  If the "Jew" part of their being is of any value then they will have to face the fact that Jews who are proud of Israel and Judaism are not a welcome segment of British society.  Haven't been and aren't now.  Sorry old chap, you weren't expecting that?
Ah, but no one expects the Spanish inquisition!

Sometimes The Answer Is No

Despite all my criticisms of him, there is one essay of Rav Avi Shafran's that I like.  It's called "The Conservative Lie" and it's about all the failings of the Conservative movement.  Some of it is unforgiveably triumphant but those who read Shafran's materials know that he is given to that style.
The part that sticks in my memory is where Rav Shafran goes through the Conservative methodology and notes that whenever a difficult issue has come before the so-called Rabbinical Assembly the answer to whether or not the issue is permissible always seems to be "yes".  From driving on Shabbos to women rabbonim and, since the article was written, on to open acceptance of homosexuality the Conservatives never seem to be able to say no to anyone.  As Shafran correctly points out there's a problem with such a methology.  It lacks any sincerity or principle.
It seems that one of Morethodoxy's guiding principles is also the desire to say "yes" no matter what to whomever really wants something. In the past its members have opined about their desire to somehow find a way to make homosexual marriage permissible al pi halacha and their great frustration at not being able to (yet).  Now they've moved on to partnership services and decided that these are a great idea despite the abudance of halachic objections to them.
The responses on the Morethodox blog have been somewhat simplistic, create distinctions where there are none in order to generate leniencies that have no firm basis and ignore the strength of minhag in the current practices within the Orthodox world.  None of this is surprising from a movement that wishes to make huge changes in the way Orthodoxy is practice, all of them without the support of a single major posek. 
But the real motivator comes out in their latest piece which has to do with a young Israeli lady named Ophir ben Shitrit.  Ms. ben Shitrit is Torah observant and attends an Orthodox school in Israel. In violation of the school's rules she recently performed on an Israeli version of American Idol called "The Voice".  As a penalty for violating the rules she was suspended from her school.  Not a nice situation.
Rabbi Barry Gelman's response to this seems to lay bare what Morethodoxy thinks of the word "No" when it comes to halacha.  There is first the title of the article:

I do not know if Ophir Ben Shetreet will remain observant, but if she doesn’t, I may know the reason why.

Right.  So if she goes "off the derech" as a result of being punished for breaking her school's rules then it's the school's fault, not hers.  If she looks at the school and says "This is so unfair, I can't be observant anymore!" then it's perfectly understandable.
Well no it's not.  As Gelman's article notes there are indeed a variety of authoritative rulings defining and limiting the restrictions surrounding kol ishah.  If Ms. ben Shitrit isn't happy with her current school's hashkafah it would seem the answer is clear: switch to a school that isn't so strict. 
This doesn't seem to be what Gelman is advocating.  Instead of suggesting that Ms. ben Shitrit either switch schools or decide to obey the rules in the one she's currently enrolled in, he implies that since there are valid halachic opinions that allow the young lady to perform on television then the school should accomodate her by accepting those views.
Could one imagine a LWMO guy walking into a Chareidi shul and insisting on shaking hands with the Rebbitzen because he's aware of a lenient opinion that permits this and he happens to hold by it?
Ultimately Morthodoxy is moving towards Conservatism through its selective quoting of halachic sources and its desire to eliminate the word "No" from its Torah vocabulary.  Orthodoxy, in their model, must conform to our desires instead of the opposite way around. 
And isn't this the basis for partnership congregations?  Sure we're willing to do the Orthodox thing, they seem to be saying, as long as it's set up in a way that connects to us, as opposed to hoping we'll connect to it.
Halacha certainly has a great flexibility to it and a Rav with a deep knowledge of the legal sources can often work wonders in difficult situations.  But there are limits.  Sometimes the answer is "no" and it doesn't matter how much we would like it to be otherwise.  The challenge is for us to ask ourselves how to accept that instead of stamping our feet and demanding the ruling change to accomodate our feelings.

Is The Amud For Everybody?

I'll admit it: I'm an amud snob.  I don't think just anyone who wants to lead services should do so.
I'm not the worst snob though.  My personal requirements are limited.  I think a person who leads services should believe in God, have a decent command of Hebrew and be able to carry a tune.  Am I asking too much?
In the shul I daven in, apparently I am.
Perhaps it's just me but when people who fail to meet the qualifications I just mentioned go up to lead services it grates on my nerves.  A few years ago, for example, we had a guy saying kaddish for his mother.  This is a gentleman who will happily explain to you why he doesn't believe in God, the hereafter, etc.  When asked why he was making the effort to come to shul every day to lead services and say kaddish he said he was doing it in memory of his mother.  Not because she was watching from the Heaven he didn't believe it but because he thinks it's what she would have wanted.
Would you want to be part of a congregational service lead by this guy?
And then this weekend it got worse.  On Friday afternoon one of the teens in the congregation who belongs to a Frum-for-fun (see prior posts for explanation) family decided he wanted to lead Mincha.  He decided this and was given the opportunity despite barely being able to have read Hebrew and (I overheard him saying this after) not even having looked over the Amidah he had to repeat out loud.  He stumbled over pretty much every word except "Baruch attah" and a couple of times looked over at the Rav and asked "Did I say that right?" 
And then on motzei Shabbos we had another congregant who is now starting to say kaddish for a parent.  A nice guy from the FFF crowd he also can barely read Hebrew and stumbled over almost every word.
Give me some credit.  I sat patiently through both "performances' without saying anything but by the end of it I felt like someone was dragging their nails across the chalkboard.
The leading of services should be something special.  A shaliach tzibur isn't just up there because he has a chiyuv or because it's "his turn" but to serve as the spiritual uniter for the congregation's prayers.  Shouldn't that mean meeting some kind of minimum standard of competence instead of giving over to anyone who wants it as a form of outreach or keeping people interested?
Or is it just me?

The Academic Torah

One of the big mistakes people make with Torah study is approaching it like it's just another field of knowledge.  I know that I often do this, comparing a concept in Torah to one in medicine or science or trying to use an approach that works for me with secular studies when it comes to Gemara or halacha. 
This is generally a mistake because Torah isn't just another field of knowledge.  It's a piece of the Divine, a chance to share an enounter with the Ribono shel Olam.  We don' learn Torah simply to know facts but to gain an insight into existence itself.  It must be approached with reverence and awe. 
That's why, for example, Professor Marc Shapiro isn't a posek (nor does he wish to be, I would assume).  While he may have a broad and deep knowledge of Torah sources he analyzes them from the point of view of a modern academic.  Here's the big hint: when you read an essay and the Chofetz Chayyim is repeatedly referred to as Rabbi Kagan you know something's missing.
This is also why some folks don't like Rav Natan Slifkin's approach to Torah.  The man is brilliant and erudite but some of his work comes across as academic more than religious.  Presenting the Rationalist Judaism approach as an academic one detracts from what is important - that the only real Torah study is done through a religious, "irrational" (for lack of a better word) approach.
This flaw in learning and promulgating Torah isn't restricted to the MO academic world.  The Gemara, in discusssing the destruction of the Second Temple (may it be speedily rebuilt) lists various reasons as to why the Churban happened.  One of them is that people who learned Torah didn't recite bircas haTorah before studying.
Obviously this is absurd.  Is it reasonable to assume great Torah scholars sat down to learn all day long but didn't recite the blessing beforehand?
The deeper answer, as I've heard from various sources, is not that they didn't recite the blessing but that the blessing was disconnected from its source.
There are two ways to relate to a blessing over a mitzvah or a benefit (for example, food).  The preferred way is to concentrate on the meaning of the blessing, that we are acknowledging the kingship of the Ribono shel Olam and His requirements for us or thanking Him for a benefit He has provided us.  The not-so-good way is to treat the blessing like it's a secret passcode.  I want to wave the lulav so I mumble the requisite words and get to do it.  The only thing standing between me and this apple is a sentence so I fire it off without really thinking about it.
Too often we all (I'm especially guilty) pronounce the blessings in the second way.  It's a formality or an annoyance to get through on the way to our goal.  The blessing is not about taking an instant to recognize God's kingship but instead is detached from its holy source.  It's a ritual with no depth.
This is what Chazal meant when they said that the Churban was due to scholars not reciting the bircas haTorah.  Of course the scholars said it but that's all they did.  It was a formality and then they sat down to learn Torah all day.  Not God's Torah.  Just Torah.  It became a field of knowledge no different than biology and physics, a body of facts to know and understand.
This approach to learning seems to be the dominant form today.  How else to explain people who dress the part, act the part. speak the part, spend their days swaying in prayer and learning and who then go and steal, cheat and abuse?  Are they doing the right thing?  Yes, absolutely.  Their observance of ritual is punctillious but it is superficial.  Even their prayers are empty.  They provide the lip service and none of the heart.
Thus while the academic approach to Torah is obviously cold and lacking religious meaning the opposite approach is similarly empty but hides it quite well.
It's time to take a step back and look again at how we interact with God and how sincere and meaningful our observance is?  Both from the left and right we have distanced ourselves from the Source of all existence and turned our religion into a series of activities devoid of true meaning.  In order to become the moral beings we are meant to be we therefore must find a way to reconnect.

In The Culture Of Death

The most precious thing any of us have is our lives.  Just being alive and sentient is an amazing gift from the Creator of the Universe.  It also seems to be the one gift from Him that we take most for granted and often resent that we don't have ultimate control over it.  After all, we don't choose when we are to be born or die. The processes of conception and death occur independently of us and sometimes despite our best efforts and wishes.
Is it any wonder, then, that as society moves away from an awareness of God and sanctity towards a hedonistic, self-centered form of civilization in which personal pleasure is the highest personal goal, that we start to introduce voluntary death into our daily lives.
Abortion, for example, is already commonplace in society, so much so that we don't even think of it in terms of snuffing out a life but rather as a medical procedure done much of the time for convenience.  A human being, DNA and all, is destroyed and we argue instead over "right to choose".
It should therefore not be a shock to anyone that once we've established that a foetus can be killed with impunity that society would then turn its sights on someone else.  As a result we now have the efforts of some to declare that a person with a terminal, painful illness now has a right to demand someone help him die so as to end his suffering.
Recently the province of Quebec moved towards making euthanasia legal there when an "expert" panel recommended allowing mercy killing in certain limited cases.  Of course, they don't call it mercy killing but rather death with dignity, just like we don't call abortion foetus killing.  That doesn't change what it really is though.
Quebec is an interesting place in any case.  Originally a very religious population tightly controlled by the Catholic church, the mainstream went secular decades ago and has defined itself by being anti-religious.  If God says "X" then you can be sure Quebec opinion will be "We hate 'X'".  As a result the province has one of the highest abortion rates in Canada.  Interestingly enough it also tops the list for suicides.  No surprise then that mercy killing is something the population wants.
Now I do not want to gloss over the suffering some with terminal illnesses endure.  I've met patients with Lou  Gehrig's disease who are prisoners in their own bodies.  I've attended to patients racked with the pain of cancer eating into their bones and organs.  I know that there are some horrible diseases out there that don't take life quickly but slowly and painfully over months to years.  I do not claim that this suffering is tolerable or at all desirable.  Even with the best medical care people can still undergo significant difficulties on their final journey.
Years ago as a resident I took part in a discussion on mercy killing and was asked what the Jewish position was.  I pointed out that in Jewish tradition every instant of life has immeasurable value.  In addition life is a gift from God and only He is in a position to take it.  As a result any measures that specifically aim to shorten the lifespan of a person, no matter how much they are in pain, is forbidden and those measures would be considered murder.
Indeed the Talmud and Shulchan Aruch deal with the idea of terminal suffering and how to alleviate or shorten it without violating that rule.  This is a complex subject, not one that can be discussed standing on one foot.
Naturally my statement was met with a rolling of the eyes.  In the view of the secular culture where moral relativism is king anyone saying that they have a non-negotiable red line in their beliefs is automatically an unreasonable fanatic.  But really, without the red line what do we have?
For example, most physicians facing a patient with end-stage cancer who is going to die shortly anyway and is screaming with unbearable pain would not have much of a problem administering just a little too much morphine which would lead to respiratory arrest and death.  But what about a scenario in which the patient's pain is currently controlled but expected to spiral in the next day or two?  The patient knows he will be in agony and doesn't want to suffer.  He wants that injection of morphine now because it's too late.  Is that still okay?  If not, why not?  If the whole point is to minimize suffering then why does the guy rolling on the bed get the shot but not the guy who's going to be?
Heck, why is physical and not psychological pain the main criteria?  A person might, chalilah, receive a diagnosis of inoperable cancer and simply not want to deal with it.  The idea of waking up every day and knowing there is a dark force slowly eating away at his insides is intolerable to him.  Why can't he have the shot to relieve that burden?
To take it to the extreme a few years ago the local paper told the story of an elderly widow who wanted to have an assisted suicide.  She was in great health but was very lonely following the death of her husband and wanted to be with him.  She felt she was quite the candidate based on that.  Even the most dedicated proponents of mercy killing weren't in favour of this but if a competent woman like her reached such a decision why should she be denied the opportunity?
We live in a society in which "dirt" is not allowed.  We don't want to suffer.  We don't want to feel pain.  We don't want to wait more than 5 minutes for that burger we ordered.  We want what we want and we want it now.  The idea of being in pain is justifiably frightening but it is also part of life.  To treat one's existence like one's cell phone, as something that's fine for now but to be disposed of when no longer convenient, speaks to a shocking devaluation of the great gift.
Imagine a society in which mercy killings are as commonplace as foetus killings, where lobby groups fight to prevent anti-euthanasia groups from protesting, where the idea of even questioning the morality of mercy killing leads to screams of outrage.  Once upon a time abortion was a procedure undertaken with great care and caution.  Now it's a form of birth control.  Today we are told that mercy killing would only happen under exceptional circumstances.  Does anyone really believe that as time goes by it won't become easier and easier to get?

What The Torah Lifestyle Didn't Give Them

One of the problems I have with mass kiruv organizations like Aish and Chabad is their pushing of the frum lifestyle as a panacaea to all one's problems.  Religious people have better marriages because the time-out of the niddah period acts as a refreshing break.  Religious people are more honest because the Torah forbids lying and cheating.  I well recall a chozer b'teshuvah friend of mine years ago recounting how she had found an item of considerable value in the hallway of her apartment building and put up a sign in the lobby asking the owner to contact her.  A few days later an elderly woman knocked on her door and claimed to be the owner.  Despite having no proof my friend handed over the item because, "well she was frum so I knew she must be telling the truth".
Uh huh.
I suppose one reason ultraOrthodox leaders have such a hatred of the popular press and blogs is because spending the day reading what's out there quickly shatters that illusion.  Decades ago David ben Gurion, a"h, predicted that once Israel became a state like all others it would have the same problems as all other states, like criminals, prostitutes, drugs, etc.  This was hardly an inspiring vision.  Unfortunately the Orthodox community has quietly done the same thing.  We are a community like all others.  We have saints and we have sinners.  We have inspiring leaders and twisted menuvalim.  We have people who are exemplars of the values the Torah espouses and we have others who have twisted God's word into a bacon-flavoured cheese pretzel.  Italians have the same thing, as do Poles, Germans, Chinese, and others.  No better and no worse.  We are just another ethnic group with a language, rituals and holiday costumes.
All this has recently been put on parade at the Nechemia Weberman trial.  For those of you still living in a cave, Weberman is a chasid whose views are somewhere to the right of Satmar.  He belongs to a spinoff group from Chabad that is now closely aligned with Satmar and the Neturei Karta because of their shared hatred of Israel.  His group is so frum that calling themselves Chasidim, "pious ones" isn't enough to describe how holy they feel they are.  Based on what they called their founding Rebbe they call themselves Malachim, angels!
You would think that men who call himself angels and pious ones would conduct themselves on the highest levels of sanctity and holiness.  Stuff like fasting on a regular basis, being extremely careful about speaking loshon horo, eschewing violence, even the threat of it. 
Not these guys.  As the JTA reports upon Weberman's sentencing:

Chasidic counselor Nechemya Weberman was sentenced to 103 years in prison for sexual abuse of a teenage female patient over several years.
Weberman, 54, a member of the Satmar Chasidic community in Brooklyn, did not speak during the Jan. 22 sentencing in New York State Supreme Court. He had been sent to Rikers Island prison without bail immediately after his conviction in December.
He was found guilty on 59 counts of sexual abuse. The encounters started in 2007, when his victim was 12, and lasted until she was 15. She is now 18.
Weberman had faced up to 117 years in prison.
The girl's parents sent her for sessions to Weberman, an unlicensed therapist, at the recommendation of the child's school. The girl was referred for not meeting her sect's strict modesty guidelines regarding women's dress and asking questions about the existence of God.
The victim reportedly gave a tearful statement in court.
"I clearly remember how I would look in the mirror. I saw a girl who didn't want to live in her own skin, a girl whose innocence was shattered, a girl who couldn't sleep at night because of the gruesome invasion that had been done to her body," she is reported as saying.
The New York Daily News reported Jan. 19 that a new investigation conducted by the paper showed that Weberman had violated at least 10 other female patients.
At Weberman's trial, prosecutors said they were aware of six additional victims -- four married women and two underage girls. The newspaper reported that it identified four additional women, who do not want to come forward out of fear of being ostracized by the community.
Weberman victims, according to the new investigation, include four married women, three of whom he counseled, and six unmarried women, all of whom were Weberman clients.
According to the paper, sources close to the women abused by Weberman said he used patterns of grooming and nurturing to lure them. He showered outcast teenagers with attention, taking them on road trips and buying them lingerie, they said. The unlicensed counselor also cited kabbalah when forcing his victims to have sex with him to convince them his acts were allowed, once telling a victim, “I learned kabbalah and we were a couple in another incarnation.”
“The intimate acts he was performing were intended as a form of repentance for sins committed in their previous lifetimes,” Rabbi Yakov Horowitz from Monsey, N.Y., in whom other victims had confided, told the Daily News.
Five others told the New York daily that they were aware of Weberman’s misconduct with clients years before he was accused of sexual abuse, and sources said the anonymous victim who put him on trial came forward after friends told her Weberman “was a known pervert.”

What is not told in the article but was details in various news reports and on blogs over the last several months is the campaign of threats, intimidation and outright slander that these "angels" engaged in so as to protect one of their own.  It's one thing to proclaim one's innocence and announce the intention to vigorously fight accusations but these thugs went far beyond that, defaming the victim and anyone who tried to help her and presenting the face of a cult that seems to worship hatred in place of God.  The Chareidi community has a well-known "circle the wagons" mentality but this went far beyond with the perpetrator and his friends seeking to re-victimize the young woman that had already been damaged.
(To their credit the main Chareidi news blogs haven't starting Rubashkin-style ads calling for a pidyon shevuyim campaign for Weberman.  Matzav and TheYeshivaWorld seem to have totally ignored the trial while VisIzNeias is simply reporting the events without attempting to run the "He can't be guilty, he's one of us!" angle)
And what's amazing is that if I ran into Weberman tomorrow with my coloured shirt and knitted kippah he'd look down at me and think "Ach, a goy".
Living in a small community as I do I don't really run into folks like Weberman.  The only shtreiml-wearing guy in the neighbourhood is an Aish grad here to do kiruv and who has a good heart and happy attitude.  Even during my trips to Israel I generally don't find myself in those kinds of neighbourhoods.  In short, I can sit back and pretend that frum Jews are normal folks because those that around me generally are.  I hate being reminded that there are huge numbers of dysfunctional freaks running around out there who just don't get the bigger picture but think that Judaism is entirely defined by rituals and 18th century costumes.
After all, one can say that Weberman was a bastard.  We can't guarantee there are no evil people masquerading as frum Jews out there.  But the way his henchmen and the Satmar community mobilized and saw destroying the victim as a religious duty, that shows to me that this kind of Judaism has gone completely off the rails.
After all the swaying, shouting and praying, after all the lulav waving it's all about the clothes you wear and the rebbe you swear allegiance to.  At least for these guys.

The Bigger Picture

Quick question: why do some folks seem to think wearing a black hat while davening is mandatory?  Superficial answer: Because the Mishnah Berurah says you have to.
Deeper answer: No, it doesn't.
Look carefully at the part of the Mishnah Berurah where hats during prayers is mentioned and you'll see that the Chofetz Chayim, zt"kl, says something different.  He points out that where and when he lived hats were part of daily formal wear.  If you wanted to dress neatly and formally you wore a hat.  Therefore, since during prayers we strive to appear appropriate before the Ribono shel Olam and since if you were to stand before the local governor or king you'd wear a nice suit and hat, when you daven you should wear a nice suit and hat.
This is quite different from what people think after a superficial reading.  What it means is that whatever is considered neat and formal in any given place and time is what is appropriate for prayers.  The point isn't the black hat.  The point is standing respectfully before God.  When we focus on the former we risk forgetting the latter.  When that happens we have a cultural devolution where not only is a hat a di rigeur requirement but also a sign of religious allegiance.  Forget everything else, the hat you wear determines the type of Jew you are, not your actions, not your neshamah.
Here's another quick question: if the reason we don't take medications on Shabbos is because of the prohibition of grinding (back then a 'script from a doctor meant going to the local apothecary and having him grind up your personal recipe) then what's the problem with taking pills nowadays?  Big Pharma doesn't care when I take my acetaminophen (paracetamol for my Israeli readers) and doesn't change their assembly lines based on my usage.  Yet if there is no sakkanah then I am not to take acetaminophen on Shabbos.
The answer is given by the Nishmas Avraham and fits in perfectly with my thesis.  The taking of pills on Shabbos in non-dangerous situations is forbidden.  Our Chazal, when faced with having to categorize this prohibition, stuck it under the heading "Grinding" because back in their day that's where it went.  But even nowadays when that classification no longer fit we still avoid the pills because, in the bigger picture, that's what's forbidden.
This bigger picture is something often missing from our Judaism today.  We are, as people go, petty and small-minded.  We therefore focus on petty, small-minded things.  We segregate people by accent, by type of kippah, by how much swaying one does while learning and the like.  We seek truth but only from those with whom we already agree.
Consider something I've heard a couple of time.  There is apparently a school of thought out there that says that unless you're using a Vilna Shas format in your Talmud study that you're not really learning Talmud.  I first heard this when, while sitting in a yeshivah in Israel waiting for someone, I cracked open a Steinsaltz Talmud I'd just purchased.  "Ah," said an unhelpful passerby in an uninvited comment, "you know you're not really learning if you use that, right?"
But if the point of learning is to develop a great knowledge of Torah, to engage in the religious requirement to learn and to come closer to the Ribono shel Olam, and if by using the Steinsaltz Talmud I do all that then why doesn't it count?
What is the purpose of being a Jew?  To create a dveikus between oneself and the Creator.  To bring His holiness down into this world and make it a better place.  Since Matan Torah this has meant performance of the mitzvos and the learning of Torah.  If one is doing that properly then where does this attitude of "one size fits all" come in?"
We all of us need to remember the bigger picture because it brings more meaning to our learning and our mitzvos performance.  Without it we start to do things without deeper intention and by rote, something we all need to avoid.

The Real Holy Spot

While speaking with a prominent and wise Rav the other day, the topic of the Kosel came up and he shared an interesting insight with me.  He pointed out that the Kosel, as important as we all perceive to be, is not a real holy site.  Rather it's the elevated piece of ground beyond that is the actual prime spiritual real estate, the Temple Mount.
Now let's leave aside the argument over the permissibility of going up the Har HaBayis.  As this Rav noted, and I agree, we seem to have forgotten that the Kosel isn't the centre of Jewish world but a poor substitute because of the current occupants beyond.  We shouldn't see praying at the Kosel as an end unto itself but as an expression of the desire to one day prostate ourselves before the Shechinah in a rebuilt Temple (may it occur speedily in our day).
Yet habit and time seem to have robbed us of this awareness.  Consciously or not, we don't see Har HaBayis as the place prayers need to be offered from.  That belongs to "them" while we have the Kosel.  That's good enough.  Or is it?
This is what makes all the kerfuffle caused by the Women of the Wall so absurd.  They show up at the Kosel plaza dressed to instigate.  They succeed in getting the attention they want and then they shout that the Kosel isn't a Chareidi synagogue, that they too have the right to worship as they see fit, and so on.  And no one points out that while the Kosel isn't a Chareidi synagogue it's also not a synagogue in any sense of the word.  It's the one remnant of the outer wall of the Second Temple.  When that Temple was standing no one stood at its base tearfully offering prayers.
What's even more ironic is that, were the Temple to be rebuilt tomorrow, it would reinstitute worship that would be extremely class and gender segregated.  Women would be restricted to a small part of the Har HaBayis.  Non-Kohanim would also be limited in their movements and imagine the guards checking for one's tumah status.  For all their screaming about an inclusive Judaism that respects everyone, we would finally know that Torah worship is, in fact, very formal and rigid on what it allows.
Why is all this important to mention now?  As the Israeli election campaign careens to a close the story has broken that a candidate for Bayit Yehudi has been caught on video saying that he thinks it would be great if the Dome of the Rock were to be blown up.
The Tzipi Livni Party announced Saturday that it planned to request from the Central Elections Committee that a Bayit Yehudi candidate, who spoke of the Dome of the Rock being “blown up” in a video clip, be disqualified from running in Tuesday’s election.

The clip, which was first revealed by Channel 2, shows the 14th candidate on the Bayit Yehudi list, Atlantanative Jeremy Gimpel, addressing a group of Christian Zionists in Florida in November 2011. Gimpel states in the clip, “Imagine today if the golden dome, I’m being recorded so I can’t say blown up, but let’s say it was blown up, right, and we laid the cornerstone of the Temple in Jerusalem. Can you imagine what would be? None of you would be here. You would be going to Israel. It would be incredible.”

Well you know what?  I also think it would be great.  I have no plans to make it happen.  I would oppose anyone who said they intended to make it come about.  I am sure we as a people are not ready for it and the needless bloodshed that would follow such an event would be incredibly tragic.  Having said that, yes I don't think the Dome belongs there.  I don't like that it's a non-Jewish place of worship.  I would much rather have a Temple there run by the right people acting as a central source of identity and unity to our nation.  I don't think that's anything to be ashamed about.  It's certainly not racist because the identity of the occupants of Har HaBayis is irrelevant.  It is our property, our spiritual centre and we belong there.   Frankly, what frum Jew wouldn't think that?
We need to remember the bigger picture, we need to remember the goal of history and we need to be as possessive of our property as other people pretend to be of it.

In Praise of Anonymity

It began on Cross-Currents as a challenge to those in the Chareidi community who have such a distaste for blogs and the multitude of anonymous personalities that populate them.  The post, submitted by Dr/ Yoel Finkelman tried to explain why anonymity is so important when dealing publicly with issues within the Chareidi community.  In brief, he voiced the well-known concern that the high degree of conformity demanded by the Chareidi lifestyle, combined with the social pressures that conformity brings with it and the small-minded mobs of askanim who are the true rulers of that society.  The piece was relatively short and very accurate.  Naturally it demanded a response so Rav Yitzchok Adlerstein decided to provide one.
Unfortunately after a polite and eloquent introduction, Rav Aderlstein immediately goes to work with his usual style.  First he says:

I am not an apologist, neither professional nor amateur

Then he says:

Very few of us can say and do whatever we want within our professional world. Company policies, social conventions, the exigencies of diplomacy all limit our ability to express ourselves as we may want. We have to be polite to coworkers we may dislike, because the alternative would be horrible. We realize that these restrictions serve a positive purpose, even if we chafe against them.

The charedi world is much the same. People in it may grumble (some more and some less) about their inability to share their opinions and concerns, but they understand that this is the price of membership. The strategy of imposed uniformity may be good, bad, or terrible, but even those rugged individualists who find it most objectionable can understand the fears, insecurities and needs of their neighbors who perpetuate it. This makes it easier to live with. Those who have difficulty with it can also often (but admittedly, not often enough) find ways around the rules.

Which makes him sound like an apologist to me.  He then goes on to (accidentally?) confirm the worst suspicions of those on the outside.  Who's running the Chareidi community?

To the extent that they are being led, who is doing the leading: the most responsible and mature segments of the community or irresponsible and immature kanaim?” This is probably the question asked most often within the community. The answer is nuanced, but simple: it is a mixture of both. The challenge is finding out what is coming from the minds of the leaders, and what is coming from the gatekeepers and the kanaim.

Now one might claim that any religious or social community could have a similar structure.  The problem is that one of the defining features of Chareidism is an absolute loyalty to their "Gedolim" and the magical "Daas Torah" they possess.  How long was it that a certain prominent personality announced at the Agudah annual conference that to even ask the Gedolim for the reasoning behind their rulings was to demonstrate a terrible lack of faith in God and Torah?
To say that dictates to the unwashed masses don't always originate from those Gedolim or that the askanim have perverted the situation to the point that anything other than a direct televised statement from the Gadol in question is suspect leads one to imagine a society in which any trust in the leadership is misplaced.  Why should I care about what Rav Shteinman or Wosner say?  I didn't hear it directly from them so therefore it shouldn't count.  If the leaders are so disconnected then they aren't real leaders.

I don’t think that hypocrisy is the issue, especially given the strong background in Torah texts in the yeshiva world. The gemara is replete with strongly-worded statements, that to the untrained eye seem exaggerated or simplistic. We learn that such statements are part of a style, and we look for – and value – the latent message more than the manifest one. The charedi community understands (at least many people understand) that when they see a sign heaping invective upon some behavior that it may not mean anything more than “this is really not such a good idea.”

What is really frustrating is knowing that this simply isn't true.  Would Rav Adlerstein also have us believe that the rioters in Meah Shearim are  screaming insults at the Israeli police and calling them "Nazi's" because they're trying to be nuanced and they don't really mean it?  A few months ago some of his Chareidi compatriots paraded in Yerushalayim wearing mock concentration camp outfits to protest the Israeli government's plan to draft them.  Were they really trying to pass on a more subtle message?  When Chareidim in Beit Shemesh spit on 7 year old girls who don't pass their uber-tznius expectations are they really saying "Oh child, why cannot you be more pure?"  Please, no one in the Chareidi community really believes this.  When they scream with hatred they are doing just that, not imitating the gemara's style.
In short, the community that defines itself by absolute loyality to its Gedolim is led by Gedolim who can't lead unless they go in the direction the community is always heading.  And in the background are the askanim, always looking for dissent so they can neutralize it and maintain the fiction that all is well.
However, as apologetic as Rav Adlerstein was, his response was far more civilzed than what came next.  As usual, Rav Yaakov Menken proved all the inital assertions raised by Dr Finkleman were correct.

Put succinctly, I think the use of pen names has reduced the overall quality of comments and level of dialogue of this journal. This is not universally true, but I believe that if one weighs the cost and benefit, anonymous comments have done more harm than good.

First of all, Cross Currents is not a journal.  Despite all its aspirations to the contrary it's just a blog.  A popular one, a well-read one but just a blog.  What's more it's a censored blog run by a bunch of rabbonim who are interested in presenting their point of view without the inconvenience of having to defend it.  In this group Rav Avi Shafran is the only really honest one.  He simply refuses to have comments about his pieces posted.  Whereas he has no problem giving the middle finger to his critics, Rav Menken and friends allow comments but limit them to those that either agree with them, congratulate them or raise such weak rebuttals that slapping them down is easy. 
No wonder Rav Menken is against anonymous comments.  His buddy Eytan Kobre, a man whose grip on the truth is sometimes less than firm, was bothered by the negative feedback to his pieces.  Perhaps people were so busy pointing out his mistakes that he began to have self-doubt and wanted to avoid this progressing to actual self-awareness?  I can only imagine the stuff that Menken himself has to read and how many times a day he has to shake his head in disgust at the people who dare to disagree with his "correct" view of things.  DovBear himself also recently brought a very relevant example of why anonymity is so important when commenting on some blogs as he showed how the great Rav Menken, the man so concerned with proper and upright behaviour, slandered a negative commenter on Cross Currents after doing a Google search on him.  The only catch?  The search turned up someone else who had the same name!  And the stuff that Rav Menken excoriated him over?  Hardly controversial.  In short: you disagreed with me, therefore you are stupid.
There is plenty that is positive about the Chareidi community. Unfortunately its PR people are not one of those things and the more they try to defend the fictional perfection of the community the more the opposite impression seems to become cemented in people's minds.

When Is Something Wrong?

There is a well-known gemara in which Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai's students are surrounding him as he lays on his deathbed.  They ask him for a blessing and he tells them he hopes they will fear God as much as they fear man.  "Not more?" they ask.  He replies by pointing out something obvious.  When a person sins he looks around to see if no one saw him but forgets there is an all-seeing Eye recording his activities even in the most hidden of locations.
The Torah itself repeats the phrase "V'yareisa meHaShem Elokecha" multiple times, especially when dealing with actions that are sins but which can be presented as proper.  Remember, the Torah is telling us, you can fool some of the people some of the time but you can't fool God and there will be an accounting for this.
The idea that we are constantly accountable for our actions to an objective external authority seems to stand in direct contrast to the current reigning secular morality in which the golden rule is "It's only illegal if you get caught".  In truth, the Chazal noted this when they described how everyone is pretty much involved with gezeilah to some extent.  We borrow things and forget to return them, we walk off with someone's pen and assume he won't notice or care.  We take someone's time for no good reason when  they're busy.
All these are little things but there is no boundary in today's society.  When one reads the news it seems there is one item after another involving someone who stole in one fashion or another getting caught.  And the question always seems to be: "What were they thinking?"  After all the high falutin' explanations are given there is a simple one that no one ever offers: "Well I didn't think I'd get caught."
This may work for people like Eliot Spitzer and Chris Spence but should Torah observant Jews hold the same view?  Is believing that it's only illegal if you don't get caught in consonance with the Jewish belief in an all-knowing, all-seeing God?
With all the hoopla in some parts of the Torah observant community around external values, about the pernicious effect of the internet and smart phones, the hysteria over gender separation and ever unrealistic standards of modesty in dress for women, no one seems to notice that this value has crept in and taken hold. For all the mussar stuff that's out there, does anyone stand back and say "If you're a real yirei Shamayim then be very afraid that God is watching you when you do wrong!"?  Why does it always seem to be about something else?
I believe the answer is something I've commented on elsewhere a long time ago.  Simply put, it is always easier to blame someone else for your problems, so much so that one eventually loses insight into one's role in one's issues.  Why address problems and make changes in the way you do things when it's really an external locus that is the cause and which, if it goes away, will solve the dysfunction?
As children we internalize the value of something being wrong only if you're caught.  One of the things that is supposed to happen when one grows up and matures is to realize that there are things which are inherently wrong.  They aren't done not because of the fear of getting in trouble but because they are wrong.  This does not seem to have happened in Western society for a few generations now and it is also evident in our culture.  Is it possible that it's tied to the idea that a man, when he grows up, gets to avoid his real duties in life forever in exchange for a permanent high school-like existence?  Is it just selfishness run amok?
Veyareisa meHaShem Elokecha.  As Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai noted, we fear the disapproval of other men.  How much is the black hat a symbol of religious observance versus how many times it's worn so people won't look at one and say "Tsk, thought you were frum"?  So much of our observance is based on keeping up with the Jonesteins, not out a sense of real connection and meaning.  This goes all the more so for the bein adam l'chaveiro component of halacha which really takes abuse nowadays.
Whenever someone cheats as gentile and says "Ah, but it's only a goy" the attitude is there.  Whenever someone says "Ah, but he wasn't convicted by beis din but only by the goyisher courts" that attitude is there.  And like all bad middos, what starts with a limit soon exceeds it.  We start by not caring what "they" think and it doesn't take long to no longer care what God things, chalilah, despite our protests to the contrary.
In last week's parasha we are told that before Moshe Rabeinu killed the Egyptian striking the Jew he looked around and saw there was no man.  One possible way of understanding this is to see it within this light.  As the Torah narrates, life wasn't completely hefker in Egypt.  Even Jewish slaves could petition their mistreatment before Pharoah (even if they couldn't get a great answer).  Moshe Rabeinu at that point was a prince in the royal palace and yet even he was held accountable for murder.  But when the Torah says he looked around and saw no one around perhaps it's referring to this principle of Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai's.  What the Egyptian was doing was wrong.  Not wrong according to Egyptian laws but inherently and objectively wrong.  That no one was visible to Moshe's eyes to confirm this was irrelevant.  He did not seek out social approval or want to defy societal norms.  He simply sought to carry out justice.
This is a value we need to start reminding people of, as simplistic as it might seem to be.  Instead of whinging about mehadrin min mehadrin standards of food or claiming that not working for a living is a Torah value the emphasis must be on remember the true standard of behaviour that we, as observant Jews, are expected to maintain ourselves at, which means a constant positive awareness of the Ribono shel olam.

Another Example Of A Lack Of Unifying Ideology

As I've noted before, one of the problems with Religious Zionism is a lack of practical religious ideology.  The political is all there but when it comes to levels and types of observance, the Dati Leumi are all over the map.  Chardal'niks and congregants at Shirah Chadasha get lumped in together because of their Zionistic beliefs but the two groups are poles apart when it comes to so many fundamental Jewish issues that it's hard to see them in the same group.
One reminder of this lack of religious ideology came up recently when Rav Shlomo Aviner, a leading figure in the Religious Zionist world, issued guidelines for what he considers modest clothing for women.  for many people who automatically associated Religious Zionism with Modern Orthodoxy (and centre-left Modern Orthodoxy at that) his rulings came as a shock but really they shouldn't have.
Now for some background, Rav Shlomo Aviner is a top notch talmid chacham with an impressive stable of seforim so I have no doubt that his recent release is a product of much study and research.  But reading through the requirements leave one with a simple impression: "This guy is Chareidi".
But how is this possible with his big knitted kippah and his strong allegiance to Rav Kook, ztk"l, and his school of thought?  The answer is simple: Religious Zionism as a political and religious philosophy does not address large areas of halacha and hashkafah.  That's why the LWMO feminist from Shirah Chadashah and the right wing Chardal'nik can both be in the same camp when it comes to relating to the State.  That's why Rav Aviner can be a Dati Leumi leader but still sound completely Chareidi.  When it comese to matters such as tznius he is indeed part of that ideology.  As was, by the way, Rav Kook himself.
One of the problems with this system is that it has led to a fragmentation of the movement.  The Mafdal, once a meaningful player in the Knesset, basically no longer exists.  HaBayit HaYehudi, its inheritor, and its leader Naftali Bennett, are representative of a very specific type of Religious Zionist.  Would Rav Aviner, for example, feel more comfortable in Bennett's home or in the home of a Chareidi colleague in Bene Beraq?
It will be interesting to see how HaBayit HaYehudi does in the coming elections.  If it places well and doesn't turn out to be a flash in the pan (like too many other "great idea" parties) it may change the face of the Religious Zionist community and create something for the Dati Leumi to coalesce around.  Only time will tell but certainly addressing this gap in Religious Zionist ideology is something the movement must eventually do to prevent itself from splintering into irrelevancy.

What To Do With The Mystical

I've not yet had the opportunity to learn any kabbalah up close.  I've skirted around it, learned excerpts brought in other seforim like Nefesh HaChaim and the like, read about its importance and am aware of the huge amount of it out there but I've not yet sat down and made serious study of it.  My coming thoughts should be understood in this light.
I've always had a problem with the mystical side of Judaism.  Not because I don't believe it's not there, chas v'shalom.  It's quite clear there is much to this universe that is not physical, that is not quantifiable by physical means and which does not follow the laws of nature.  The easiest example I can think of is the subject of tumah and taharah.  It's easy to make the mistake of thinking that it is some kind of contagious affliction, especially the way physical contact or even close proximity transmit it.  But even a cursory study of the rules around tumah and taharah make it clear that we are dealing with something supernatural.  Why do sealed clay pots resist tumah?  Why is the sprinkling of the ashes of the parah adumah the only cure for tumas meis?  None of these things make sense from a simple, physical perspective.
I guess what bothers me is how it's presented.  The Zohar, for example, is something I've had issues with.  Leaving aside the ongoing debate on whether or not it's the genuine work of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai the biggest problem I've had with it has been how to fit in into the schema of Jewish law as I understand it.
Perhaps I'm just a simple person but for a long time I understood that God presented the Torah, both in Oral and Written form (but no apps) at Sinai.  The function of the Oral Law was to teach us how to understand the framework of the Written law and apply it in daily life.
Then along comes the Zohar which seems to me to exist as a parallel Oral Law for the spiritually special.  In other words, yes you could learn and follow the Talmud but if you really want to practice genuine Judaism it isn't enough.  You need to go a level higher and follow the Zohar. 
And what concerns me is the question: Why would God give us two parallel sets of laws, one for the unwashed masses and one for the special?  Doesn't the Torah emphasize there is to be one law for everyone?  Am I really doing my best to serve my Maker by following Talmudic law or am I just fooling myself becaise I'm really just doing a childish version of Torah practice?  And most annoying of all, if the Zohar is genuine Jewish law why is there almost no allusion to it in the Talmud, something like "And when you're ready for a higher level of observance..." or the like?
On the other hand I read an excerpt from the Yismach Moshe that might have helped my thinking.  After going through the whole PRD"S schemata he notes that different people, depending on their spiritual level, reach different levels at which certain expectations appear.  Some people function at a basic level and for them the Gemara is fine.  Some people, having built themselves up spiritually, develop a new type of relationship with the Ribono shel Olam and so for them it's not that it's wrong to follow the rulings of the Talmud but because of their enhanced level the rulings of the Zohar are more appropriate for them.
But then that got me thinking in a different direction.  We are all supposed to strive to connect to the Creator.  Does this include a desire to strive towards higher levels of spiritual understanding?  By not feeling a need to move beyond Gemara and embrace Zohar study, am I not fulfilling my purpose?
I'm still working on that one.