Big world, small life

Was in Supreme Court Thursday. Table in lobby had copies of "Hamodia." First time I've seen it, took a copy as they were free and read it Friday evening after davening.

It puts alot of issues I'm dealing with into a different perspective. I became frum and was magired by Lubavitch. I lived the only manner of frumkeit I knew, as a lubavitcher. My education in CH was slim to nothing, but I blame myself mostly. I thought all of learning was going to be with the same passion and brilliance as M. Friedman taught us in MN and clearly that wasn't the case. I loved the Rebbe z'tl. He was the father I lost early, and I felt small and somehow unclean standing in front of him, he always took time for anything I needed, sometimes even before I asked. I dont know how many 'life' lubavitchers can say the same. But having said that and having read Hamodia, I see that the jewish world is huge, brilliant, compassionate for the most part, thriving and alive.
Its not the world of whiney adolescent writing depicted in the Jewish Press. The frum world of Lakewood, Boropark, Williamsburg is a world I never knew and a place I could never be a part of...because its a world of yechus and family, pedigree and accumulated respect, learning, parents, simchas, mitzvahs...its a life inside and I remain on a periphery looking in.


This was the world I thought I was coming into when I tried to become frum in '73. The jewish community written about in Hamodia appears functional, not dysfunctional. There wasn't any obsessive writings about messiahs or groupiness or cultiness. There is profound respect for rabbis, but also clear acknowledgement of personal responsibilty, duties to one's relationship to Hashem and other yidden. It may be a community joke about alot of gemachs, but you dont know what it is to see from the outside, what kind of love, whether its yerushamyim or some other purpose, people are busy taking care of 'family.'

I called the woman I met on Thursday, coming out of court and as I went into the subway. I called to wish her only a gut shabbos. I didnt want anything, only to connect in a way to thank her for speaking with me. I didnt want a meal or to bother her. Her husband answered and I asked him just to tell I called to say good shabbos. I dont know that he did, she didnt call and its motzeh shabbos and nothing. So its okay...I guess I would have been surprise if she had.

I was careful to bentsch on time, daven and cooked before shabbos. I bought a book by Rabbi Hayim H. Donin called To Pray as a Jew because although I can still read in hebrew and yiddish I never learned really how to daven correctly. I know some of it, but if I had known what I'm reading now...in davening, history maybe if my chinuch had been solid, choices that I made would have been very different.
Chinuch seems more critical than ever, and will remain a survival factor for coming generations. Its not just an issue of remembering the Holocaust, we have to somehow imbue faith and make faith a central part of jewish life in every aspect. Its not about turning people on and then forgetting the small details of everyday life that makes being jewish, Jewish. So many people in my time who became frum lacked family, a core issue in judaism. Having a mashpiah is not the same thing. While passion in spirituality drew me to chassidus...my nature needed a misnagid education and discipline.
Children raised by jewish parents who are thoroughly educated in spirit and intellect about judaism cannot possibly succumb to the insanity taught in universities and the possibility of intermarriage. I am convinced from my experience, if jewish youth strays from the religion and gift of being born a jew, its out of ignorance, its because something was not taught right or at all and likely not at home.

So I am trying to teach myself now, b'ezrat hashem, to be a jew. It doesnt matter now that I am older or too old. I am relearning how to daven, reading parshah, small things. I need a nusach ari siddur like we used to have. the small fat ones with everything, tehillim, rashi....maybe in BoroPark.

I would normally look at an enormous task as this seems at a late age and after wandering about in the world, but its actually a relief. I questioned myself about this very closely, bizaare as that may sound, because I need to be sure its not a rebound reaction to other personal issues I'm cleaning up. I want frumkeit to come from the right source inside me because I do not ever again want to be in a state of denial with myself, with others or in front of G-d about who I am and what I believe.