Feel Good Platitudes Vs. Halacha

keym

Mon, Jun 26 2017, 12:51 pm

PinkFridge wrote:

I think you're both right. As parents, we know that if all we're concerned about is that our kids be happy, the kids may well end up entitled self-centered brats. I think we have to approach simcha on a more sophisticated level.

Liking.this wasnt enough. Its totally true, as parents, we wamt mote from our kids than simply beinb happy. We want them to be good and make the right choices.
Jashem, is our father who wants us to be happy but still wants us to be good and make the right choices. (what those actually are differ from person to person and are way padt my pay grade to discuss.)

PinkFridge

Mon, Jun 26 2017, 1:04 pm

keym wrote:

There is a level of happiness that comes from knowing you are we you are supposed to be. I heard Rabbi Warren Goldstein speak on leadership, and he mentioned the Mishnah, Eizehu chochom halomeid mikol odom, etc. Each of the traits mentioned - wisdom, strength, wealth, happiness, honor - are defined on an objective level, not comparative. IOW, someone is strong not because he's stronger than other people, but because he's stronger than his own yetzer. Someone is smart not because he scores higher but he learns from everyone. And so it is with wealth and happiness - he doesn't compare. (And honor follows the same line of thought.)

It's Rav Zushe who, when someone was sent to him to learn how to be happy in the face of troubles and this person was sure that Rav Zushe had nothing to teach him because of his wretched situation, said, "Me? Someone made a mistake. Nothing bad ever happened."

It's Rebbetzin Kramer of Holy Woman fame who sad that Auschwitz was not a bad place because she could still connect to Hashem.

It's back to Rav Zushe who along with his brother was arrested and sent to a dungeon full of dangerous scary people and started crying. His brother gently gave him mussar (I may be getting the brothers mixed up) and told him not to cry, that Hashem would help. He replied, That's not why I'm crying, of course He will. But it's time to daven and there's a chamber pot here.
- To which his brother said, Why do you want to daven?
Huh?...Because Hashem told me to.
- So Hashem wants you to daven, right? And He says you can't daven if there's such a smell. So if you are NOT davening because of the smell, you are also doing the ratzon Hashem right now.
You're right!
And the simcha shel mitzvah moved them to dance around the chamber pot. No one knew what to make of this but figured they'd join them in the dance. A guard came down and asked what was going on. Beats us, they said, these crazy Jews saw the chamber pot and started dancing.
Dancing? said the guard. If it makes them happy, it's out of here. And he removed the chamber pot.
Rav Elimelech turned to his brother and said, Let's daven.

yksraya

Mon, Jun 26 2017, 2:23 pm

PinkFridge wrote:

When I said happiness, I meant inner happiness, contentment. When someone wants too many materialistic stuff, and feels entitled, they are not truly happy, thus they think what they want will make them happy.

On the other hand tho, sometimes, certain thing in life can make it hard for us to serve hashem with simcha, and we do have bechira to choose what's right for us so that we can reach true contentment and serve hashem happily. And that does not at all make us entitled or selfish, although to others, with other life circumstances, our choices can seem selfish or lax in halacha etc.

marina

Mon, Jun 26 2017, 3:01 pm

pause wrote:

marina, if I was in your shoes, I'd ask another rav, telling him what the first one said and why I feel like it's not the right psak for me. My point stands: You cannot let your feelings guide you, but you don't have to ignore them.

However, I really wanted to avoid specific examples because there is so much variety in halacha across the board. IOW, to take your example further, with BC, someone might have been taught that they don't need to ask a heter at all. I can respect that. That's something they learned.

I don't understand how your feelings/cognitive faculties aren't guiding you here. What is guiding you in saying that I feel this isn't the right psak for me?

pause

Mon, Jun 26 2017, 5:19 pm

shabbatiscoming wrote:

I have never heard anyone use the phrase "ask a rabbi" unless... they were actually asking a rabbi.
If I am opening sfarim, listening to a shiur or discussing something, I would not use the vocabulary of "asking a rabbi" as I am not doing that. I think that is a very far stretch.

It's not a far stretch at all. It means "clarifying the halacha." My OP was not about exclusively asking a rav; it was about following dictates of halacha despite that it might not always feel pleasant to do so.

If following halacha is really unpleasant, a good rav can help one navigate the proper way instead of deciding this halacha can't be applicable to me because it's too hard.

amother

Yellow

Mon, Jun 26 2017, 10:09 pm

I think it is important to clarify the difference between asking for a Psak Halacha and an Eitzah.
If I am not sure if I should go to my cousin's wedding in a mosque on Saturday and I want to know what is the halacha, I ask for a Psak. I want to know what is the halocha and I am prepared to follow (hopefully) whatever psak I am given.

If however I want to know whether the move to Antarctica is a smart one for my family and I have done all the research and really want to go but I have some hesitations, then maybe I will ask a few people for Eitzah. This way, I can still come to my own decision that sits best with me.

FTR, my dh is fond of saying that when he was in H.S. he wanted to switch to another school that he thought would be better for him. He asked his Rosh Yeshiva who answered "I can tell you if it is good for you or not, but then you will grow into an adult who cannot tie his own shoelaces. You need to learn how to make a decision for yourself. My DH switched yeshivas -- and it was a great mistake! A year later he was back in yeshiva A. However, the lesson of making a decision for oneself has thankfully stayed with him.

shabbatiscoming

Tue, Jun 27 2017, 7:26 am

pause wrote:

OK, if thats how it is in your world. A I said, I dont know anyone who says "Im going to ask a rav" who actually means going to look in sfarim or any of the other things we mentioned. I dont find it a stretch. I find it two different things.
And many people just dont have relationships with rabbanim that way. Full stop.

pause

Tue, Jun 27 2017, 9:19 am

shabbatiscoming wrote:

I do think it's ideal to have a relationship with a rav (aseh lecha rav), but even if not, a question can still be asked of anyone with a greater Torah knowledge than yourself.

amother

Turquoise

Tue, Jun 27 2017, 9:47 am

Pause well said. Every word you said and more. Kudos to you for using your screen name to bring out the truth so many here are just making up excuses for.

It's so sad that so many are just paskening shailos on their own. I just think they don't understand how Halacha is so central to our life and that we can't just pasken on our own. Rabbonim learn for many painstaking years to know these halachos and some halachos are painstakingly so tough to learn. To pasken on your own is just telling me you have no clue how deepHalacha goes.

Please do yourself a favor and ask shailos you will be surprised to find out how complicated it gets. There are seforim out there that teach you Halacha up to a point so you know what is a shaila.

For instance when it comes to basar vecholov it can get severely complicated. Also colors for a nida is severely complicated because it's mesorah and no you can't learn colors from a Sefer it's from one generation to another and very complicated. Need I say I just rely on rabbonim.

I have plenty of other things to learn and do. If we don't u derstand how rabbonim come in then who will guide us? Who will we learn Torah from?

Moshe kibel torah misinai umeseruha..... mesorah is through our rabbonim.

When we give respect to rabbonim we teach our children that Torah is to be respected and be guided by and tells them who authority is.

Do rabbonim make mistakes? Yes

Are they human? Yes

this is our nitzchiyus. Am ysiroel is survived by keeping the Torah through our gedolim.

amother

Turquoise

Tue, Jun 27 2017, 9:55 am

Last week ds broke a window from a neighbors car, I wrote a thread about it. He has ADHD which doesn't change the picture.

Do you know what the Halacha is? I do not have to pay for it. Does it make sense? No. Halacha is not about making sense. Common sense is not in the Halacha. I asked a shaila. That's what I was told. Out of menchlichkeit it would be nice to pay her something.

It hurts me but I will have to do it. I know that this means menchlichkeit. I want ds to learn what that means.

Just clarification to the poster saying she uses common sense. No common sense doesn't fall in Halacha. That's what is wrong. It's not about being lazy or immature or silly it's being uninformed about how we go about Halacha.

PinkFridge

Tue, Jun 27 2017, 9:56 am

amother wrote:

We are coming from the same place, by and large, but some people may not need to ask shailos that others do. It could be they had an excellent halacha curriculum, or they have had enough experience with certain colors to know.

OTOH, what you say is so important. No question is insignificant and when we're dealing with serious issues, there is no question to ask.

shabbatiscoming

Tue, Jun 27 2017, 10:40 am

amother wrote:

Quote:

It's so sad that so many are just paskening shailos on their own. I just think they don't understand how Halacha is so central to our life and that we can't just pasken on our own. Rabbonim learn for many painstaking years to know these halachos and some halachos are painstakingly so tough to learn. To pasken on your own is just telling me you have no clue how deepHalacha goes.

Once again, just because someone does not ask halachic questions does not in any way mean that they are paskening things on their own. It could mean that the person knows the answer to the question, it could mean they looked up the answer. It also does not mean that they dont know that halacha is central to our lives. Many people really do delve into learning halacha. Why is that so hard to believe? Why is it hard to believe that many people just dont have questions?

Quote:

Please do yourself a favor and ask shailos you will be surprised to find out how complicated it gets. There are seforim out there that teach you Halacha up to a point so you know what is a shaila.

Im sorry, what? I live a halachic life. I rarely have questions to bring to rabbanim. Seriously. What are all of these questions that you think people should be asking?

Quote:

For instance when it comes to basar vecholov it can get severely complicated. Also colors for a nida is severely complicated because it's mesorah and no you can't learn colors from a Sefer it's from one generation to another and very complicated. Need I say I just rely on rabbonim.

There are people who dont like to rely on rabbanim. I dont see why that is a bad thing. They like to learn things for themselves and figure things out.

Quote:

I have plenty of other things to learn and do. If we don't u derstand how rabbonim come in then who will guide us? Who will we learn Torah from?

Guide us how? I dont know, maybe I just live differently, but I dont need anyone but myself to guide my life. And who will we learn torah from? Um, I love learning torah myself. Why do I have to learn it from anyone?

Quote:

When we give respect to rabbonim we teach our children that Torah is to be respected and be guided by and tells them who authority is.

We can all respect rabbanim and still not always be asking them questions. And why do the rabbanim have to be the authority? Also, I think this is really just the difference between people who live according to daas torah and those who dont. Its just a completely different way of living judaism.

Quote:

Am ysiroel is survived by keeping the Torah through our gedolim.

No, we do not survive because of the torah that is kept through the gedolim. We as am yisrael survive because of each and every one of our own merits of keeping the torah alive. Why just the rabbanim?