A Rosh Yeshiva was sitting having a meeting with some talmidei chachamim when a bochur stuck his head round the door.
'Rebbe, Rebbe - Chaim is engaged!' he exclaimed happily.
'Mazal Tov! Mazal Tov! That's such wonderful news! Thank you so much for telling me!' the Rosh Yeshiva enthusiastically replied.
A few minutes later, another bachur stuck his head around and said,
'Rebbe, Rebbe, did you hear? Chaim is a chatan!'
'Oh that's wonderful! Mazal Tov! Thank you so much for that happy news!' the Rosh Yeshiva again was enthusiastic with his reply.
A few minutes later, the scenario repeated itself, with the Rosh Yeshiva showing no knowledge of having already heard the news.
One of the talmidei chachamim turned to the Rosh Yeshiva and asked him why he didn't tell the bochurim that he had heard the news already.
'What? And spoil his happiness that he was able to tell me the good news?'
This is such an easy but so important chesed that we can do for eachother. How many times have you been eager to share knowledge of asimcha, or simply something you found out recently, only to hear 'I know', or 'I heard already'. Remember how deflated you felt?
We can all do a big chesed to our friends, just by showing the same enthusiasm to something we may already know, to share in our friends' excitement and simcha.
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Sunday, December 09, 2007
Hey guys - 2+2=4 you know!!!
After the Shoah, the Torah community in Eastern Europe was decimated. Understandably, the focus of the frum community was to replace what was lost, in Torah, learning, genius and community. The focus was 'get the men into yeshiva'.
As a result, a very large change took place in the frum world. Where previously only those who could afford it or had a wealthy father-in-law who could support them were able to learn all day, and there were relatively few that lived in poverty for the sake of Torah learning, with the majority of men learning a trade and earning a living, now the majority were in kollel. Where previously women could mostly concentrate on running the home and raising children, now they were being almost forced into the bread winner role that their husbands would have taken in a previous generation.
Here we are, a generation on, and ONE IN FIVE of the Israeli chareidi children are dropping out - going 'off the derech'. That is a huge percentage and it's not so hard to see why.
When I was becoming religious, I was totally sold on the 'women in the home' stuff - it made total sense. Women were naturally maternal, empathic beings created for looking after the children. Their intelligence would be used in educating them in Torah and creating the spirituality in the home.
However, once I'm frum I'm being told, right, now your husband is going to learn all day so you have to get a job, girlie!
Hold on a sec, who is looking after the kids then? Oh, the childminder/metapelet/gannenet etc etc.
When the husband is learning all day and the wife is working all day, who is there to stop the kids going off the derech? The childminder? With parenting like that, who needs outside influences?
As a result, a very large change took place in the frum world. Where previously only those who could afford it or had a wealthy father-in-law who could support them were able to learn all day, and there were relatively few that lived in poverty for the sake of Torah learning, with the majority of men learning a trade and earning a living, now the majority were in kollel. Where previously women could mostly concentrate on running the home and raising children, now they were being almost forced into the bread winner role that their husbands would have taken in a previous generation.
Here we are, a generation on, and ONE IN FIVE of the Israeli chareidi children are dropping out - going 'off the derech'. That is a huge percentage and it's not so hard to see why.
When I was becoming religious, I was totally sold on the 'women in the home' stuff - it made total sense. Women were naturally maternal, empathic beings created for looking after the children. Their intelligence would be used in educating them in Torah and creating the spirituality in the home.
However, once I'm frum I'm being told, right, now your husband is going to learn all day so you have to get a job, girlie!
Hold on a sec, who is looking after the kids then? Oh, the childminder/metapelet/gannenet etc etc.
When the husband is learning all day and the wife is working all day, who is there to stop the kids going off the derech? The childminder? With parenting like that, who needs outside influences?
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