A DovBear Rant That Deserves Repetition and Clarification
Were the indefatigable DovBear not observant, I would probably have looked askance at his recent rant blog, and maybe even accused him of being prejudiced against Chassidim. DovBear, however, is an Orthodox blogger who I think, like me, would like to see the en masse return of the Jewish populace to the ideals and way of life of the Torah it holds dear.
In his reprise of his article "Why Does DovBear rant?" he makes a stark statement:
It means that a certain old, and very good style of Orthodox Judaism has been murdered; yet another victim of the Eastern European Jewish tsunami.
Jigga wha...? Victim of the Eastern European...tsunami?? As the offense level began to raise itself from orange and started to redden, I continued through the article and realized -- DovBear is not only on point, he's quite right -- but with a small caveat.
Nusach Ashkenaz isn't modern; it predates Hasidic sefard by at least 500 years. Singing Yigdal on Friday night isn't modern; it was done in Amsterdam as early as the 18th century. [Hey! I knew this in early 2005! I guess I forgot until I saw it again last week!] Blue-shirts and ties aren't modern; until very recently Jews dressed like everyone else. Opposing upshurin or eating g'broks on Passover isn't modern; the customs of upshurin or refusing g'broks didn't even exist until less than 250 years ago. Singing the tefilla isn't modern; as far back as 1623 the Council of the Four Lands inveighed against it. And of course, imagining the universe is very old is not a modern idea. Jewish scholars of stature and rank believed this several hundred years before Darwin.But the average Haredi man on the street knows none of this, he chooses to remain ignorant of it. His leaders make no effort to educate him, and forbid him to seek education on his own.
This willful ignorance is overtaking us, the lies multiply, and no one gets the joke that what the Haredim call "modern" is, in fact, very old, and some of what the Haredim imagine essential to Judaism is, in fact, very new.
First of all -- were are talking about education "forbidden" in only the most exclusive New Squares of the world, we are talking about Jewish history as well as the historical progression of halacha. Singing the tefillah not modern? How about sanctioned by Chaza"l and Tana"ch (as one of the terms for prayer is shira/song, so says Midrash Rabbah).
Yigdal is no more than a remix of the 13 Affirmations of Faith of Maimonides, the pillars of Judaism put into song to be more easily absorbed by a less-and-less Torah-infused public.
Clothing?
I wish that more yeshiva kids were trained to say in the face of any fashion naysayer: "Oy vey! You mean I'm violating Yoreh Deah 178?" (Laws of Non-Jewish customs). How many of these people who scream to high Heaven about blue shirts have learned Yoreh Deah 178? Among other things, it shows the laxity of the actual halacha with these things -- one could wear traditional Arab garb daily and not transgress the prohibition of "dressing like a goy" (see the Beit Yosef in the Birchei Yosef).
Is there any halachic basis for alienating an adolescent based on the color of his dress shirt? No. Does even the most loud shirt violate halacha? Probably not. Nor does singing Yigdal.
What DovBear's problem is that he has -- like the rest of the duped public -- been mis-convinced that "haredi" only applies to traditional Chassidim or the ilk of Lakewood and Bnei Brak.
All a haredi Jew is is a Jew who believes in the immutability of halacha and has faith in the Torah Sages. One would be well-served to remember the term used by the Ramba"m, rav she'eino hagun, "a teacher who is not fitting". One should not even hear Torah from an unfit teacher.
Yet some of our teachers are telling us to violate halacha, or are routinely in violation of halacha themselves, and alienating Jews based on non-halachic arguments. Us, the public who just wants to do the right thing by G-d and Torah, we are told that that which is not halacha is, and vice versa. A common complaint, especially from younger people, is that the ba'al ha'bayis (head of household) who mistreats his non-Jewish workers is lauded in his shul as righteous for his charity given -- when the Sma"g lists mistreatment of non-Jews as a main reason Moshiach has not yet come -- whereas the ba'al ha'bayis making a siyum ha'Sha"s (completion of the entire Talmud) in jeans is told that "one day he'll do better."
Countless dinner invitations and shidduchim have been broken over a pair of jeans, a too-long sheitel, a not-quite-heimish Pesach kitchen. Are such things an expression of haredishkeit?
DovBear I think could -- along with all the rest of us who look into our holy books and sound a solid "WTF" at the world we see outside -- rightfully claim the term "charedi" for himself. If more Orthodox Jews did this, perhaps the dichotomy would shift to being between "those who actually shake at the word of G-d" and "those who shake at the posters on Rechov Meah Shearim."
We are not a nation of flimsy cultural mores and folkways, we are a nation of the eternal Torah; and ditching the eternal Torah for a passing fad of ultra-isolationism is as bad as ditching it for secularists.
Ein lanu ela ha'Torah ha'zos!
