8:00pm: Our Yeshiva System; Dating Advice; Lashon Hara
This week’s edition of MyLife: Chassidus Applied with Rabbi Simon Jacobson, Episode 70, will air tonight, Sunday, here on CrownHeights.info, beginning at 8:00pm. This week, Rabbi Jacobson will address the topics: Our Yeshiva System (Continued); Dating Advice; Lashon Hara.
Much buzz was generated by the discussion in last week’s episode about whether our yeshiva system is failing us. Clearly, this topic touches a deep nerve. Which is not surprising: We and our children – our very future – are directly affected by our education system. With many comments and questions pouring in around this issue, Rabbi Jacobson will continue the conversation in this week’s 70th episode of My Life: Chassidus Applied.
“I am a teacher in a yeshiva, and when your essay contest came out I took a personal responsibility to encourage my students to write, and b”H 3/24 of my students submitted essays. However, most of my students were unable to submit anything as they have never been taught how to construct a sentence or paragraph, let alone an essay. Others had no experience in formulating their thoughts into a comprehensible piece even for themselves. Can Tomchei Temimim teach writing skills as a subject, or would that be considered limudei chol? You often mention that one should do rather than complain. I am more than willing to work in my own small way in helping my class. However, in your opinion, should I make it my agenda to push this idea into as many Yeshivos as possible?”
“I take issue with what you said. Chinuch is not like a gemilas chesed organization that we all have a responsibility to help out. From a halachik and moral perspective, the responsibility to give my son or daughter the best possible chinuch I can possibly provide sits squarely on MY shoulders. At what point do I need to consider the klal – or the mosdos the Rabbeim established – at the expense of my own child’s growth?”
Other topics that will be addressed include lashon hara and its place in Chassidus.
“Why is the sefer Shmiras Haloshon not used in Chabad schools as an authority against lashon hara?
In this episode, Rabbi Jacobson will also provide dating advice, including looking for a prospect outside of one’s community, a baal teshuva’s foray into the shidduch scene and dating younger men. He will also present methods with which one can learn Chassidus passionately, in ways that enable it to transform their being and conversations.
In addition, Rabbi Jacobson will review more essays submitted in the MyLife: Chassidus Applied contest: “On Toleration and Celebration” byHayyim Rothman, “Powered by G-d” by Shterna Ginsberg, “Am I Being Genuine or Hypocritical?” by Estie Shemtov. These essays and others can be read online at http://meaningfullife.org/mylife/contest/.
This hour-long dose of insights is meant to inform, inspire and empower us by applying the teachings of Chassidus to help us face practical and emotional challenges and difficulties in our personal lives and relationships. To have your question addressed, please submit it atwww.meaningfullife.com/mylifelive.
The topics in this Sunday’s hour-long broadcast will include:
Chassidus Applied to Shelach
Repairing the yeshiva system (continued)
Lashon hara – slanderous talk
Dating advice
Outside of the community
For Baalei Teshuva
How to learn Chassidus passionately
MyLife Essays: tolerance, being genuine, the power of G-d.
MyLife: Chassidus Applied addresses questions that many people are afraid to ask and others are afraid to answer. When asked about the sensitive topics he has been addressing, Rabbi Simon Jacobson commented, “I understand that the stakes are high, but the silence and lack of clarity on matters plaguing the community can no longer go unaddressed. The stakes of not providing answers are even higher.”
The on-going series has provoked a significant reaction from the community, with thousands of people viewing each live broadcast and hundreds of questions pouring in. At the root of every question and personal challenge tackled by the series is the overarching question: Does Judaism have the answers to my personal dilemmas?
In inimitable “Jacobson-fashion”, the broadcast answers people’s questions in simple, clear language while being heavily sourced. Each episode is jam-packed with eye-opening advice from the Rebbeim, gleaned from uncovering surprising gems in their letters, sichos, and maamorim that address our personal issues with disarming relevance. Simultaneously, Rabbi Jacobson is able to crystallize a concept quickly, succinctly, and poignantly for any level of listener.
All episodes are immediately available for viewing in the MLC’s archive and can be downloaded as MP3’s for listening on the go.
Questions may be submitted anonymously at www.meaningfullife.com/mylifelive.
Great Dane
Toleration?! Is this even a word?
Tolerance is a broadly defined noun with applications in science, medicine, and mechanics, in addition to its common use referring to one’s acceptance of others’ rights, beliefs, and practices. Toleration is mainly a less common variant of tolerance, though there are qualifications to this that we’ll outline below. It was once the more common form, but this changed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. In this period, the words initially began to differentiate with tolerance taking on the newer, more esoteric senses in science, medicine, etc., but as tolerance became more common in these uses, it gradually began to encroach on toleration‘s long-held territory. Today, toleration‘s last refuge is in writing on religion, where it continues in a long tradition.
Toleration also comes up often in reference to reluctant sorts of tolerance. Think cats and dogs living together, neighboring peoples who were recently at war with each other, or law-enforcement agencies that look the other way on minor traffic offenses. This sense probably came about because tolerance, a defining quality of a progressive modern society, has positive connotations, while toleration of this sort is not positive, but thorny and precarious.
Toleration has also recently been defined as a particular act of tolerance, but we’re having trouble finding 21st-century examples that bear this out (which is not to say they’re not out there somewhere—we’ll add them if we find them).
Finally, there is also the view that toleration is a tolerance backed by law or judicial precedent. There is a good basis for this, as religious toleration has often been imposed by law while a spirit of tolerance cannot be forced on anyone, but the distinction isn’t consistently borne out in general usage.