Explain to your children how Yiddishkeit once looked

BS”D

Discussion with Moishe’la (and his family)     part 5

A handicapped child

22 Cheshvan 5773 (Nov 6 ’12)

I want to write about Chinuch today.

Chinuch is the most important part of our Yiddishkeit because that is what promises us the future of Yiddishkeit. The children that are educated to do Hashem’s Ratzon, are the future of Am Yisroel, and those who don’t receive the correct Chinuch (education) become the dropouts from what Hashem wants us to be.

Unfortunately the Egel HaZahav rules the United States of America, at least until now, and together with the Goyim it also rules the Yidden. Most of our Frum schools and Yeshivos are steeped in Gashimus, are steeped in ”the torah of the Egel HaZahav”  and not in the Torah of Hashem.

We look at the Kinderlach in the Chadorim. We look into their faces. We see Yarmulkas on their heads. We see Payos dangling at their sides, Tzitzis and so on.  We can also see on the faces of many aggression and the features of the modern world. We can see little Kinderlach that seem so Frum trying to give a judo-chops to each other. We can look into their faces and not see the Erlicha children, the Temimusdik expressions that we expect to be looking back at us.

The little boys that go to Cheder today, many of them, have lost their Yiddishe Chein. They have lost their connection with HaKodosh Boruch Hu. A generation that has grown up on pizza, coca cola, and ice cream can’t have the Temimusdik look of an Erlicha little boy. Unfortunately the teenagers in our community are suffering very much from a terrible malady, the illness of the Egel HaZahav, of the Gashimus.

The girls of Bais Yaakov today are not what the Torah calls Tzniusdik. At least most of them aren’t. T-shirts are common; short tight skirts. And even if they have uniforms or dress code most everything is too tight, not long enough, and not always buttoned to the top. The conversations between the young teenage girls are usually superficial and Gashmiusdik. The conversations of the Bochurim may be spliced with a bit of Torah, but most of them are also Gashmiusdik and not full of Kedusha.

The main thing, the Kedusha, that’s what’s missing. Do you hear? Do you hear Mommies and Tatties? You didn’t pass on to your children Kedusha. Why not? Because Motzai Shabbos you rather go out bowling. Because in the three weeks you take the kids to amusement parks. Because during the nine days you can’t eat meat, so you take the kids out to fast-food places for Milchigs. And that’s called Yiddishkeit. You have made a plastic Yiddishkeit and passed it on to your children, and then when they do abominable things, when they lose their contact with Hashem you are shocked. But why are you so shocked when most of you Mommies and Tatties and Bubbies and Zadies have also lost your contact with HaKodosh Boruch Hu and this is very bad. This is very very bad.

The generation from the beginning of World War Two until now is about three to four generations, and we have fallen way down. The American Frum Jew of today is almost totally different then the Frum Jew of yesteryear.

Oh sure, the Yeshivas are full, full of Bochurim learning. You hear the sounds of Torah being hummed, and the Bais Midrash is full of excitement and words of learning, however something very big is missing, and that is HaKodosh Boruch Hu. He has not been invited in to any one of our Mosdos. I can’t really say none of them, because I’m sure here and there, there are people who are still holding on to Hashem, but in most cases where Bochurim are worried about their hats and the color of their ties and they’re worried about how smooth their shave is and how tight their pants are and how skinny they are, and the girls are worried about their make-up and their clothes and their fancy Sheitels, in these places Hashem is not invited.

Another terrible Minhag in our circles is that if a girl Nebach wants a learning boy, her parents have to dig up a few hundred thousand dollars plus the girl herself must have some kind of profession to assure the up and coming Talmid Chachom that he’ll be able to sit and learn all of his life without giving up any of the Gashmius that he is used to. This is all in order just to have him consider the Shidduch. Today’s Bochurim also ask for a description of the girl’s Middos, however when they speak of Middos they are not speaking of character traits they are speaking of how tall she is what size dress she wears etc.  In all of the above situations unfortunately there’s no place for Hakodosh Boruch Hu.

So Mommies, Tatties, Bubbies, Zadies you’re going to be held responsible because you yourselves have done this. You yourselves have put Hashem on the side and you come to Him only when you want Him, when you need Him. When a person is sick Hashem Yirachem, and when there is some tragedy Hashem Yirachem, when you have lost a lot of money Hashem Yirachem etc. Then you start crying out to Hashem. However it doesn’t help because Hashem knows very well that the minute you get what you want you’re back to your old tricks, and He is pushed aside. Yes you keep Torah and Mitzvos, Yes you try to do more or less what’s expected of you technically, but the heart and the soul is not there.

There is a certain roughness and a lack of Erlichkeit. Look at our singers, the people that put out all the Frum music of today.  Who are they? Rough people, not refined, not close to Hashem. The sound of their music is the sound of the American street. Even if it’s a kind of soft music, it’s still the sound of the street. Its superficial sounds of the American scene, and therefore the music that there once was has disappeared, and the Yiddisha person doesn’t want to hear the old songs, the old songs with the old heart with the old soul. They want the new smooth jumping singer, who have most of the time shaven faces or even if the singer looks like a Tzaddik with a long beard, his movements do not coincide with the look of a Chassid.

No we are very confused. Our education is going down the drain, and because of this, this must be the last generation before Moshiach, because if not we’ll have no more future generations of real Jews Hashem Yirachem. Maybe we will have a few relics of our once beautiful Yiddishkeit but no more than that. The real Yiddishkeit will have disappeared, and therefore Am Yisroel take stock.

After the storm Sandy, many of your children are home you have a great opportunity to talk to them before they go back to school. Before you talk to them, do Teshuva first and beg Hashem to redirect you because you have forgotten what Yiddishkeit really is. You have forgotten that you can’t have your cake and eat it too. You can’t have everything. You can’t have the Goyisha world and the Yiddisha world. The way you are going, you’re loosing so much. With all your Gashmius you’ve lost the essence of life. The closeness to HaKodosh Boruch Hu is the main reason for life, to do Hashem’s Ratzon without all the Gashmiusdik frills is the essence of life.  You can’t concentrate on getting close to Hashem after you have eaten a pizza or a falafel or any other other junk food because it doesn’t coincide with spirituality; it’s the street.

After you have done Teshuva, speak to your children about what is the essence of Yidishkeit .Explain to them that this terrible storm came to wake up the Frum community to the fact that Gashmius is something that can disappear with a strong wind, rushing water, or fire etc. But Yiddishkiet, true Yiddiskiet Torah and Mitzvos is Eternal. And if we want to be eternally with Hashem we must rise above the Egel Hazahav and hold on very tightly to our true Kesher with HaKodosh Boruch Hu through Torah and Mitzvos. However we most explain that Torah and Mitzvos should be the main part of our day and night, and all the stupid pastimes that we have created for ourselves is just the Egel Hazav sent to destroy us by the Yetzer Hora.

You have become street people. Your dress is outlandish for a Yiddisha person. Your jokes are not refined. Your thinking is very primitive, and therefore you don’t look like Yidden. You sit in your bungalows groups of husbands and wives Shmussing and joking, Oy Lonu.

You go to Disneyland with your portable Sukkas and you think you’re giving your children a good Jewish education by that, Oy Lonu.

There is no problem to go to Disneyland because there is a Kosher restaurant in Disneyland,   Oy Lonu.

No problem at all to meet ten times and take her out to all kinds of restaurants and entertainments.  Oy Lonu.

No problem that the women should wear long fancy Sheitels that make them look obviously not married and of course skimpy clothes goes along with it, Oy Lonu.

Our minds are full of money and Gashmius, Oy Lonu.

And all these girls want boys that learn, Oy Lonu,

but a girl like that can never understand a boy that really wants to learn. But most of our Yingerleit have one foot on the Egel HaZahav and the other foot next to the Torah and in the end this Yingerman will certainly lose his Torah, and drown in the Egel HaZahav.

What can I tell you? My heart breaks. Am Yisroel is going to the abyss. Therefore take this storm that has hit hard every Frum community in a very wide area, and understand that now is time to do Teshuva, complete Teshuva. You have to sit down on the floor, tear your clothes, put ashes on your head and beg forgiveness for Retzach first of all, for killing the Yiddisha Neshomah. Ask forgiveness for killing your whole family, for putting them in the wrong direction, for putting them in the direction of the Egel HaZahav. Beg forgiveness for each and every Aveirah, and unfortunately because we’re so tied to the Gashmius we have many Aveiros, very unpleasant Aveiros, and it’s very terrible.

Am Yisroel, the Frum Am Yisroel suffers from Aveiros that are embarrassing even to talk about. Aveiros that never before Frum people were usually dealing with, but now even Rosh Yeshivas are guilty of some of these Aveiros. What else can I tell you? Sit and do Teshuva. Cry and beg for forgiveness. Hashem will forgive you, but only if you truly want to change and if you don’t, if you think this is a joke you’ll soon see that it’s no laughing matter.  If you think this storm was bad wait and see what’s going to be next.

I beg you. I beg you Am Yisroel, do Teshuva, true Teshuva. Not just a fast for one day or a half a day, like you were told to do when it was discovered that a certain person was feeding you Treif for years. It’s not enough. You must beg Hashem to forgive you. Even if you ate the Treif not knowingly, still you are careless with your Kashrus and you’re careless with all of your Yiddishkeit, and you have almost no Kedusha left, and that is a terrible situation.  It’s more than terrible. It’s catastrophic. So Am Yisroel sit on the floor. Tear your clothes. Put ashes on your head. Wrap yourself up in your Tallis and Tefillin, and beg forgiveness for each and every Aveira, and then decide that you’re going to come back; a new person; a real Yid the way Hashem wants us to be.

I suggest that you take all of your children aside and explain to them what it is to be a Yid. Take your boys and your girls. Take each age separately and explain to them what it means, really means to be a Yid, that nothing is more important than to be a true Jew.

In the near future anti-Semitism is going to increase in a terrible way. A Yid might be called upon even to sacrifice his life for his Yiddishkeit! Rachmana Litzlon. And why? Because we weren’t willing to sacrifice our everyday lives and make a Kiddush Hashem. We weren’t ready to take the Goyishkeit out of our lives and to make a Kiddush Hashem.

So therefore we may be called upon to sacrifice ourselves. How could a child understand such a thing when he grew up in such an anti-Frum, Frum society? How could he understand how to be willing not Davka to die for Hashem, but to be willing to live as a true Jew and not being afraid to endanger his Gashmusdik life.

Explain to your children how Yiddishkeit once looked. The only trouble is that you yourselves have forgotten and you yourselves don’t know, so maybe you find a Bubby or A Zaidy that can remind you what it meant to be a Yid. However today even the Bubbies and Zadies don’t look the same the same as their forefathers, and many Bubbies into their ninties are wearing blond Sheitels and coloring their eyes and even if they don’t understand what it’s all about and their children dress them up that way in gaudy Goyish-like dress, still they have forgotten also. And many of the Zadies have forgotten also, and you can see long bearded men, elderly men talking like a Shaygutz and that’s really sad.

Try, try finding someone that remembers Yiddishkeit the way it was, and teach your children, teach your children what it is to be a Yid and demand it from the schools and from the Yeshivas. By the way, Yeshivas are a big business so it’s not going to be so easy to do that. Schools are also businesses so it won’t be easy to do that. They put all the Goyishe attitudes into your schools and you’re so happy with it.

I’m warning you; you’re getting warned by  HaKodosh Boruch Hu with hurricane Sandy, that if you don’t want to take away or tone down very much of your Gashmius and go back to what’s real in your Yiddishkeit that can connect you to HaKodosh Boruch Hu, then Hashem will take it away from you in a stronger way.

I pray that all of Am Yisroel will all be Zoche to greet Moshiach Tzidkainu, and that all the Yidden with true Yiddishe Neshomas will be saved without suffering.