Where's the line?

I was at a meal on Shavuos at some religious friends of mine, the kind that are open-minded enough to not really care that I'm not religious; the kind of people for whom I don't ever have to pretend to be something I'm not. Unlike some of my ex-frum compatriots, I don't have any problem hanging around religious environments (well, certain religious environments), and I really don't think less of people just because they subscribe to religious ideas which I disagree with (again, certain religious ideas). But at the meal, something happened which prompted me to look a bit more closely at that fine line between what I consider normal religious behavior and the kind which I think is just short of crazy.

This particular group of people were a typically varied crowd of single men and women from the Upper West Side, most of whom were Modern Orthodox, some only nominally frum, some - like myself - not religious at all. At one point one of them launched into a classic Shavous dvar torah, and began expounding on the tradition of why people stay up learning on Shavuos night.

When it comes to shabbos meal divrei torah, my typical reaction is to just tune out entirely, as in most cases, such divrei torah usually fall into one of two categories, both of which I find utterly mind-numbing: There's the sort where some obscure textual inconsistency is reconciled by dredging up some even more obscure textual reference. And there's the kind where the inconsistency is reconciled by anachronistically inserting the persons ideological worldview into the text. Neither of which I (and to my cynical eye, anyone else at the table) have any interest in really listening to.

But this dvar torah was of a different sort. The guy was not content with simply reconciling an inconsistency, but he chose to invent a new one out of whole cloth, just so he could make his point when trying to address it. Ok, so I've seen this style too, it wasn't really new to me, but what started to grate on my nerves was that he was solving the problem he created by imposing some new-agey pop-psychology ideas onto the mental state of the Jewish People at Sinai. And it was at this point that I started to get annoyed at what I was hearing. Things only got worse when the rest of the table - people who I thought were of a more sophisticated intellectual bent regarding Jewish tradition - started seriously debating the merits of applying Gladwellian quasi-scientific ideas onto the midrashic narrative.

The same feelings surfaced when the conversation turned to why dairy products are traditionally eaten on Shavuos. As I heard supposedly intelligent people seriously explaining how the reason we don't eat meat is due to the dearth of kosher dishes after the giving of the torah, I found myself looking around in amazement, and thinking to myself, "Am I the only sane person here?"

But upon further reflection, I couldn't help wondering, why was hearing these ideas so particularly infuriating to me? I wasn't troubled by other things going on around me. It didn't bother me that they were commemorating the most dubious of historical events - that a nomadic tribe received a set of laws from a heavenly deity who transcribed them to a man who spoke to the being on a mountaintop for 40 days. It didn't vex me that they felt it necessary to make a blessing over a cup of wine before eating the meal or that they found turning on a light switch to be deserving of death. So many of the behaviors and beliefs of the frum person don't bother me at all, yet in this case, and in so many others, when I look at what's happening in front of me, or what's being said by seemingly intelligent people, I can't help wondering, "What the hell is wrong with these people?!"

Where is the line? Why do some things seem acceptable, normal, even possibly healthy, and others seem preposterous, foolish, and naïve?

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Photo Credit: Flickr user Norah M

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The High Price of Religious Defection

Here's a brief profile of two Israelis who left their ultra-orthodox lifestyle behind, and the price they had to pay for it: The High Price of Religious Defection.

Over the 19 years it has been operating, only around 2,000 defectors have turned to Hillel. "There are tens of thousands who have doubts and want out," Paneth says. But only a small number are ready and willing to make the sacrifices that defection demands. For example, most families completely break off contact with defectors. "Some even hold wakes," Paneth says, "as if the daughter or son has actually died."

I guess Der Spiegel can be forgiven for mixing up a wake with sitting shiva. I really wonder though about her numbers. Are there really tens of thousands who want out? How can she be sure about that?

One of the protagonists shares the picture she was painted of what would happen if she left:

"We were contantly told that the secular world was only waiting to turn us into prostitutes or slaves," Mayan explains, "that there was nothing but drug addiction waiting for us out in the modern world."

Sound familiar?

True Devotion

If you've been reading this blog for a while, then you probably know a bit about my past. But in case you're new here, I'll share with you something personal: When I was in high school, I was a pretty unhappy fellow. Why was I unhappy? Well, I'll get to that in a moment, but first, check out this video that a friend recently showed me. It was put out by one of the kiruv organization that exists to help "at risk kids." To be honest, I was actually surprised at how impressive the production quality of the video was. Not that I agree with its message, but these sort of frum productions are usually lacking a bit in their professionalism, and this one seemed to not suffer from the typical overuse of chassidish music, cheesy effects, and truly awful acting (the acting on this isn't what I'd call great, but it's nowhere nearly as bad as some of the other frum stuff out there).

However, once I saw the very first frame of the clip, I knew I wasn't going to like it. The entire piece was basically a dramatization of the stereotypical view that the frum world loves to tell about people who aren't frum: That the inevitable result of leaving frumkeit is a descent into a lonely life of depression, drugs, and alcohol. (I'm sure they would have also liked to show the drugs and sex, but I suppose that wasn't suitable for their intended audience.) And of course, it also showed that all it takes to turn around those who left is a friendly smile from a patient, "down to earth" rabbi (this particular one knew how to hit a baseball) who, with enough persistence (and love, of course), knows how to show them the beauty of Yiddishkeit. There were also other classic stereotypes throughout - the way that the characters connect in a video store (what else does a shaigetz have to do in his life but watch movies all day?), the directionless lifestyle of the characters, and other all-too-familiar characterizations. (I also found it funny how they showed the cluelessness of some of the frum characters, such as the father suggesting to his son that he put on a hat and jacket when lighting candles. Not sure if that was meant as an intentional joke or not.) It's because of the widespread prevalence of these stereotypes that I decided to start my "Better Know a Kofer" series. (See the sidebar for the full list of interviews.)

Of course, the truth is that, sadly, some people do end up on such a path. But one can't help but wonder if that would continue to be the case as much if the frum world didn't tell such people that that would be the inevitable result of such a decision. I've always felt that the frum world prefers to see a religious dropout burn and crash than succeed in his or her life, as it corroborates the messages the faithful have been told all along.

And that's what I find to be most troubling about these kinds of organizations: despite their professed concern for the troubled young man, it seems to me that when all is said and done, they care more about the persons adherence to halacha than they do about the person's emotional and physical well-being. I know they talk all the time about helping, but how willing are they to continue helping if the person has no interest whatsoever in being frum? Not very much, I'm afraid. I have a friend whose parents offered him an all-expense paid trip to Israel for a month. He was thrilled. Until he found out that it was contingent on him spending some time at Aish Hatorah when he was there. Needless to say, when he declined to accept the stipulation, the offer was off the table.

Let me be clear here, I don't blame anyone, or any group, for having strings attached to their beneficence. People are entitled to devote their resources to whatever causes they value, and the frum world is entitled to promote kiruv as much as they want. But to claim that your kindness stems purely out of a love for a fellow Jew is simply not true. Far too often, the generosity to that Jew is directly proportional to how receptive he or she is to the message of halachic observance.

From what I've heard, there are a large number of these kinds of organizations: Areivim, Eizer Bochurim, B'Derech, Priority-1, Project YES, Aishel, Tzofiah, Home Sweet Home, Eitzah, Rachel's Place, and more. And honestly, I think these groups do a lot of good work. Even if their assistance is driven by religious motivations, these groups are still deserving of much praise. It just bothers me that they aren't truly honest about their real motivations. It's disingenuous to act like you care nothing more than to just give a troubled soul a helping hand, when really your ulterior motive is primarily to give them a hand back onto the derech.

Which brings me back to my original point of my unhappy adolescence. So why was I so unhappy throughout my high school days? Well, there were probably a number of reasons for that, but one very significant one was that I was being raised in a world that valued torah learning above all else, and I knew very well that I was a thoroughly abysmal torah learner. No matter how hard I tried, no matter how much I shvitzed over that daf, no matter how hard I pleaded with god - "v'sein chelkeinu b'sorasecha!" - I never really understood what the hell was going on in that damn gemara shiur. I was a failure. I knew it, and everyone who spent 5 minutes talking the sugya with me knew it too. And I hated myself for this.

Now, I was fortunate that I had many caring, kind people around me then - my family, my rabbeim, etc. - and they all did their best to help me overcome this obstacle. They set up extra sedarim for me. They paid tutors to go over the shiur with me. They took out extra time from their schedule to learn with me. They even moved around the class chavrusas in the vain hope that someone would be able to help me understand what was going on. Like I'm sure the dedicated staff of these various kiruv institutions do for the people they are helping, my rabbeim went above and beyond the call of duty to help me overcome the source of my frustrations. They did everything they could.

Except the one thing that would have really helped me.

They didn't do the one thing that would have solved my problem forever. The one thing that would have eased my constant guilt, and erased the shame that I was living with every single day: They didn't tell me that it was ok that I wasn't a good learner. If they had only told me that, and made me understand that my value to god was not contingent on how well I could make a leining, all that inner torment would have dissipated in an instant.

But they chose not to. They had no choice, really. Because they believed it did matter. And despite their concern for my suffering, they couldn't compromise their principles.

Looking back, I don't doubt for a second that those rabbis genuinely cared about me. And of course, the same goes for my family. But because they cared about the religious ideal of torah learning more than they did about my emotional well being, I ended up suffering through a large chunk of my life.

So you can see why I don't trust frum people when I hear they are doing everything they can to help out a troubled yeshiva bochur. I'm sure they do indeed love their fellow Jews. And indeed, they will do everything they can to help the person. Everything they can... up to a point. Because while their love for their troubled brethren might truly be sincere, their devotion to halacha is even greater, and if forced to choose, they will proudly sacrifice the happiness and well being of their loved ones on the altar of their religion.

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Photo credit: flickr user Onironauta...

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Meet My Baby

"Well, I understand your reaction," she said to me, clearly sympathetic. "But why did you have to go as far as you did?"

I smiled to myself. As if I hadn't heard that before.

"Why shouldn't I go as far as I did?" I replied. "For what possible reason should I retain ideas and practices which no longer have any meaning for me?"

Once again, I was rehashing the well-worn conversation of why I chose the path I did, of discarding the religious practices of my family. And as so often occurred in these situations, the person was earnestly trying to show me how misguided my choice was.

"Yes, but it isn't all bad," she explained. "You need to be careful not to throw out the baby with the bathwater."

Ahhhh, there we go. The baby and the bathwater. That time honored and irresistible analogy which frum people love to pull out of their copious collection of kiruv arguments. I doubt I've had a single discussion on the topic of my disenfranchisement where someone didn't remind me not to throw out that damn baby.

It's not that I blame them. I think they're right, actually. I wholeheartedly agree that it's vitally important not to discard the wheat with the chaff. But when it's all been mixed up into that one big chulent that's referred to as Yiddishkeit, it's hard to know what's worth keeping and what's not.

As those who've followed this blog know well, the sources of my religious disillusionment consist of a wide variety of factors, from unpleasant experiences in yeshiva, to being exposed to various eye-opening ideas, to meeting new kinds of people, to experiencing stifling religious dogmatism, to seeing religious corruption, to enduring religious extremism, to so many other formative, and unfortunately, often negative, experiences.

And so, when they finish hearing the story of my long and twisted journey, they invariably let out a long sigh of disappointment, and say something like, "I understand how so many of those things turned you off. But that's not what real Yiddishkeit is about. Just because you don't want those undesirable elements, doesn't mean you have to get rid of everything."

The baby and the bathwater.

In the past, the way I typically responded to this rejoinder was by explaining that although to them having to wear certain clothes, and not having a secular education, and maintaining all sorts of other extremist positions might not seem to be part of Torah True Authentic Yiddishkeit™, why should their particular vision of Judaism be any more authoritative than those who maintained that those practices were essential to proper Jewish living? In the yeshivas I went through those were the very things that distinguished us from those "other" Jews who were clearly not living as a proper Torah Jew should! Why should I trust their version of Yiddishkeit over the one I was raised with?

But as I was having this conversation the other day, something suddenly occurred to me that I had never realized before. There's a better way to look at the issue. They're absolutely right that I shouldn't be throwing out the baby with the bathwater. And I actually think that I didn't! The only difference between me and my interlocutors is that we just have very different definitions of what constitutes "the baby" and what to consider "the bathwater".

Yes, they're open-minded enough to admit that being pressured to conform to outrageous chumras is not really an essential part of Judaism. That they can accept is the bathwater which can be discarded. However, to them, keeping kosher, being shomer shabbos, and keeping the basics of halacha is clearly "the baby" that needs to be retained. Well, guess what? I think those things are actually the bathwater too!

To me, keeping kosher is as much an unnecessary practice as wearing a black hat is to them. I agree that it's something that has value, and serves to maintain a group cohesion and identity, but it's no more an essential part of being a good person, or a good Jew, than wearing pinstripes is to being a Yankee fan. If you want to do it, that's fine with me, but when the practice stops contributing to my life in any significant way, and even starts becoming an imposition, then it has, at that instant, earned itself the appellation of 'bathwater', and can henceforth be discarded. (Yeah, that's right. I used the word 'henceforth'.)

What they fail to appreciate is that their baby is my bathwater. Yes, I know they feel that shabbos is absolutely precious, but I simply don't find anything worthwhile in all the work required to observe the day of rest. I don't care if my girlfriend is not Jewish. It doesn't matter to me a whit if the packaging of my lunch has a lovely rabbinic seal of approval on it. The myriad laws and rituals of an observant Jew just don't really concern me in any meaningful way. It's all bathwater to me.

"Don't throw out the baby with the bathwater" truly is a wise maxim. That's why I try my hardest not to lose hold of those things from my Jewish upbringing which really matter. The values that truly mean something to me, like cultivating deep and lasting relationships, and honesty, and family, and a devotion to lifelong learning, and kindness, and pursuing truth at all costs, and standing up for the oppressed, and challenging corruption, and appreciation for all the goodness in my life, and constantly working to better myself.

That's the pristine Jewish baby that I hope will emerge when the murky waters of my religious past are allowed to finally drain away forever.

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Photo credit: flickr user Vinnie W.

Ulterior Motives

We were sitting at a sidewalk cafe, casually reminiscing on the frivolities of our lives, when my friend suddenly leaned over the table, and like a seedy peddler in a back alley, held his jacket slightly open, and said to me conspiratorially, "Hey, check it out."

My interest sufficiently piqued, I watched as he reached into his inside pocket and withdrew a highly polished pen of unique design. Holding it out in the palm of his hand, he looked at me expectantly, clearly wanting me to let him know how impressed I was.

"Ok," I said nonchalantly, refusing to play along, "So you got yourself a nice pen. What's the big deal? Why all the fuss?"

"No, no, " he said to me, nodding his head disapprovingly. "This isn't just any pen. It's a Mont Blanc. Retail price $700." His mangled attempt to pronounce it with the French accent made him appear pathetically condescending.

"Seriously?" I said, mildly impressed, despite myself. "How'd you get your hands on that?" There was no way my friend could afford anything that extravagant, let alone a mere pen.

"Hmmmm..." he replied mysteriously, pleased that I had taken the bait. "That isn't important. I've been using it for a week now. I love having this thing. It writes amazingly. Such an incredible piece of craftsmanship."

His pretentiousness was starting to grate on me. "Really?" I retorted sarcastically. "It writes so amazingly? That's why you enjoy carrying it around? For some reason, I suspect there might be some other motivation at work."

"What do you mean?" he answered defensively. "This really is one of the finest writing instruments ever produced. When writing with it, it smoothly flows along the paper. It sits perfectly balanced in your hand. It's elegantly sculpted. There's no doubt in my mind that this is a superior pen to the crap that everyone else uses!"

"Yeah, that may be true," I replied. "But it's still not why you enjoy using it. The real reason you like it is because it's a status symbol. It gives you cache. People look at you differently when they know you have a Mont Blanc. It may indeed be a far superior pen, but that's irrelevant to why you like using it."

Naturally, he vehemently disputed my allegations, insisting that it was the exceptional quality which earned the pen his unabashed adulation, but the begrudging tone in his voice told me I had indeed hit upon a sore point.

We kept going back and forth on this inane triviality until he insisted he had to take off, and left me alone to ruminate on our petty squabble. But even after he had been gone half an hour, the conversation was still repeating itself in my head. There was something oddly familiar about it to me, and I couldn't seem to put my finger on exactly why it felt that way. Finally, it came to me! I had had this conversation once before, a few weeks earlier! Only then I wasn't talking about luxury pens, but rather, about religion.

You see, every time there's something in the media about people leaving frumkeit (and lately there has been quite a bit about that topic - articles, books, movies, custody battles, documentaries, and more) people talk about the issue more and more. And inevitably I am approached by someone - a friend, a co-worker, a relative - and get asked the million dollar question: Why do people leave frumkeit?

There's many ways to approach this issue, but when the question is posed by a chareidi person, the conversation usually takes a very predictable turn. Chareidi people are ostensibly very bothered by this phenomenon, and when they ask it, they aren't just inquiring out of sheer curiosity, but rather because it's an immensely troubling issue to them. They ask because (so they say) they want to understand the issue better, and by better understanding it, they can work on figuring out a solution to what they see as a serious problem.

So in responding to their inquiry, I usually flip the question back around and ask my interlocutor to explain to me why people are frum. A variety of answers are usually presented in response, but the main one given is simply that... It's the truth! Frum people believe that god has revealed to them the proper way to live, he explains simply, and so observing those rules is the most correct and true lifestyle one can follow.

However, I always dispute that point. Yes, I fully acknowledge that they believe it's the truth. But I don't believe that this belief is the reason why they are frum. I maintain that most people are frum because it serves their own interests, and not because of some lofty devotion to truth. I don't dispute that they believe it. They can still believe it is true, and at the same time, they can be primarily motivated by something other than that truth. Just like my friend with the pen, he honestly believed that it was a truly superior pen (and was probably correct about that), but despite his claim to the contrary, that superiority was not really why he liked the pen so much. His real motivation in using that Mont Blanc was the fact that it brought some tangible benefit to his life (the newfound respect with which people viewed him). And it's the same thing with frumkeit, I say. Whether or not people believe it is true, that's not really why they're frum. They are frum primarily because it brings some tangible benefit to their life. The truth is mostly irrelevant.

Unsurprisingly, frum people staunchly resist attributing their motivations to such self-serving forces. They much prefer the notion that they are frum because they are fervent devotees of the truth and they therefore follow what they believe to be the truth of god's revealed word.

It doesn't bother me that they think this. I honestly don't have any interest in arguing with frum people about it, nor in trying to convince them that my perspective is correct. If my advice on how they can better solve their problem is too difficult for them to accept, I'm not going to force it on them. But despite their resistance, I oftentimes can't help bringing it up in discussion because I feel it satisfactorily resolves a question that is repeatedly raised by frum people in response to a very frequent occurrence, that of the pronouncement by someone (typically an ex-frum person) who, in response to some indiscretion, corruption or criminal activity by a visibly religious figure, will loudly exclaim, "You see?! That's why I am not religious! If that's how religious people behave, I don't want any part in it!"

Whenever they hear someone say this, chareidi people immediately reject it out of hand with what, at first glance, seems to be a very logical reply. "But that doesn't make any sense! Just because some people aren't behaving properly, doesn't disprove the truth of the religion! Their indiscretions do not invalidate God's truth! Why would you throw away something good and true just because of a few rotten apples?" It's a logical reply because they're absolutely right in making their point. Witnessing a religious person behave unethically doesn't have any bearing whatsoever on the truth of the religion. But nonetheless, it always frustrates me when I hear frum people responding this way, because they are entirely misunderstanding the subtext of what one is expressing when making that angry accusation!

When a person passionately declares that seeing a prominent religious figure act inappropriately makes him want to stop being frum, he's not saying that the religion per se has now been disproven. Rather, the primary incentive for him being religious has now been demonstrably refuted. Until that moment he believed that being religious improved the "quality" of a person, or that it genuinely enhanced one's morals somehow. But faced with this spiritual fraud, he now recognizes that religion, in fact, falls far short of achieving that goal. This, then, is what is being expressed in that moment of rejection. Not a statement about the truth of religion, but simply a newfound appreciation for what frumkeit can and can not do for a person's life. He understands now that the benefits he was hoping to accrue from frumkeit will not necessarily be granted to him. And if he isn't going to obtain those rewards, then why bother with it at all?

This is what I keep trying to make frum people understand, but they seem unwilling to accept it: Most people stop being frum for the same reason they choose to remain frum - because of how much they are or aren't benefiting from it. As long as they feel they are tangibly benefiting somehow, either because they genuinely enjoy torah and mitzvos, or because they trust that being frum somehow protects them from the evils of the outside world, or because they think it will guarantee them eternal reward, or because they think it ensures them a moral life, or because they think that they have a better chance at a happy life following those rules, or even simply because they enjoy the social aspects of frum life - for whatever reason it might be, as long as they feel they are prospering in some way from it, they will want to stay frum.

But as soon as the benefit is reduced sufficiently, either because the person doesn't get any significant enjoyment from it anymore, or because torah and mitzvos have become more of a burden, or because the promise of a world to come seems less certain, or because he sees that being frum doesn't guarantee a more moral life, or because he has come to realize that it doesn't shelter him from criminals, corruption, and the dangerous elements of 'the outside world', or for any of a variety of other reasons, then he will stop caring about being frum.

This mental calculus, which more often than not is an unconscious thought process, has very little to do with how much one believes in the truth of Judaism. It is almost entirely self-serving. No doubt on some level they genuinely believe in the truth of Judaism. But again, that belief plays only a very minor role in why they are frum.

Admittedly, if a person truly believes, with a firm conviction, that Judaism is true, he probably won't stop being religious even if he no longer benefits from it, but this is a moot point. The vast majority of frum people do not possess any such conviction. Their 'belief' in Judaism's truth, if it can even be called that, is a barely sustainable faith built upon a hodge-podge of gedolim stories, midrashim, gematrias, some degree of trust in their rabbinic leaders, a whole lot of superstitions, and a few poorly constructed arguments that they might have once heard from a kiruv rabbi. (Additionally, if a person really has a firm conviction that Judaism is true, then he presumably still believes in olam haba, so in effect, he still DOES believe that he is benefiting by being frum.)

"Why are so many people leaving yiddishkeit?", the frum world constantly asks. They can ask it as often as they want. They can hold conferences devoted to the topic, and every month print op-ed's in their publications about it. They can seek the advice of gedolim on the topic and hold tehillim gatherings for siyata d'shmaya in solving it. But all their efforts simply won't amount to much at all. Because until they put aside their inflated sense of spiritual devotion, and acknowledge the mundane truth of their society's self-interested motivations, they will never even begin to truly understand why so many people choose to leave that world behind.

Freely Enslaved

The other day, a rabbinical acquaintance and I were having a discussion about a young fellow we knew who was having trouble in yeshiva. It was clear to both of us that the kid was reasonably bright, yet no matter what enticements were offered to him, he didn't seem to have much success in the part of the curriculum that was devoted to torah studies. I kept trying to explain to my well-meaning friend that he should stop trying to force the poor kid to do something he wasn't interested in, but the guy was determined not to give up, insisting that if only the kid was made to appreciate the beauty of what he was missing, he would have a change of heart. As the conversation wore on, getting ever more argumentative, I could feel anger and resentment bubbling to the surface of my emotions. This exchange was starting to sound all too familiar. I knew it was taking me to a place I shouldn't go, but at the same time a part of me was eager to step into the fray, desperately wanting to tell this person something he needed to hear.

But the conversation ended unexpectedly, he had to leave abruptly, and I lost the opportunity to express something that I had wanted to say to someone like him for a very long time.

Unfortunately, I missed the chance to tell him what it's like to be kept trapped in a box where your mind, body and all your energy is supposed to be devoted to something that doesn't interest you in the slightest.

To make him understand what it must be like for that kid, what it was like for me, to be stuck in a shiur for three consecutive hours, granted only a 15 minute reprieve in the middle; to have to sit silently, doing nothing, not understanding a word; imagine how much I try to keep my mind occupied in some way, but of course the rebbe keeps pulling me back from my mental excursions, figuratively putting his hand on my neck and forcing me to look into the gemara, to pay attention to something which I find utterly incomprehensible. And even when I manage to escape to my own world, what good does it really do me? How much tic-tac-toe and daydreaming can a person distract themselves with already? I can't sneak anything into the class to keep busy with. Although at times I was indeed tempted to smuggle in some such contraband, it always brought with it an attendant risk. If I was unlucky enough to have my rebbe catch me with such a thing, not only would it be summarily confiscated (never to be seen again in my lifetime), but he would always make sure to accompany the inevitable spectacle created specifically to highlight the infraction with an accompanying moral lesson in how terribly disappointing it was that a yeshiva bochur such as myself would consider such a meaningless diversion more worth his attention than the lofty words of Rashi and Tosfos. So I just sit there, frustrated and bored, hour after hour, day after day after day.

There are some moments when I actually do attempt the occasional escape. I take every bathroom break I can possibly get away with. Yet, upon gaining my freedom, I am faced with the disappointing reality that life on the outside is hardly more exciting than what I've just left behind. Usually there's nothing much for me to do other than wander the halls, reading the bulletins on the boards, the losts, the founds, noting the suits, shtenders, and sefarim for sale, hunting for something that even remotely piques my interest. Typically, nothing of any consequence. Still, I relish the fleeting sensation of being unshackled. Until my time runs out and I must return to my taskmaster. Eventually, after carelessly over-utilizing this tactic of gastrointestinal subterfuge, my rebbe catches on to my deception and decides to not allow me out of my cage even for that. Trapped again.

But it's not just shiur that is so wearying for me. Outside of class, among my peers, the day's sugya continues to be the primary focus of what the rest of them are preoccupied with, into the afternoon seder, and inexorably continuing into night seder too. And so I wander the halls of the yeshiva trying to find something, anything! to distract me and provide some entertainment. But of course, in the hallowed environs of the yeshiva they make every effort to ensure that there is nothing distracting you from Torah - no magazines, no Internet, no secular studies, nothing. Despite my ambivalence, I have to admit that the beis medrash is usually the best option there is to keep me preoccupied.

At times, I recall how, despite their best efforts, there are still some distractions the hanhalah is unable to eliminate from the environment, however dull they may be - there is still the daily goings-on of any large institution, the steady hum of its workers and staff persistently going about their daily routines. So I head to the kitchen to see if they need any help, maybe I could peel some vegetables, or watch the giant mixer in action. Or I'll stop off at the administrative office, hoping they have a mailing which they need help with. I'll even look out for the maintenance workers, curious to see if they're busy fixing anything interesting today. This is how pathetically desperate I am. I would rather find any sort of menial tasks to keep my mind focused than to have to dazedly sit through another minute of that mind-numbing gemara. But when they find out that I am doing this - and they inevitably do, because after all, how long can I keep up this charade? - my overseers sternly remind me: "This is not for you. You belong in the beis medrash." They do their best to impress upon me again, making sure I fully understand, just how wrong it is for me to prefer wallowing in the trivialities of olam hazeh than to be swimming in the heavenly waters of nitzchius. I understand. The pitiful looks of my classmates remind me how thoughtlessly I have behaved.

And I believe them. I understand how right they are. How I have to work harder to correct this flaw in my character - that I would rather choose playing with worthless trinkets than to be involved in the greatest undertaking a person could ever participate in! What is wrong with me? Why am I such a lowlife?! I'm being given the opportunity of a lifetime! And I would rather squander it to watch the janitor mop the floors! I disgust myself!

This is what I would like to make my friend understand. To hopefully make him recognize what being in yeshiva is like for those not fortunate to have the desire to spend their time buried in a gemara. To make him appreciate the awful self-loathing that being in such an environment creates in such a person. To make him realize the harm he is doing by forcing this kid to sit through another gemara shiur.

But would it even matter?

"Ain Ben Chorin Ela Mi She'osek Batorah" (Avos 6:2)
"There is no greater ‘free person’ than one who is involved in Torah study."

Echoes

After writing up my answers to my own 'kofer interview', it got me thinking about the past a lot, and the experiences that I went through all those years ago when I was still frum. Back when I was younger, and struggling with the challenges of making sense of the frum world I wasn't fitting into, I actually wrote down a lot of the thoughts that were going through my head at the time. My purpose in writing them was not because I ever intended to share them, but simply because attempting to transcribe all the confusing ideas onto paper helped me make sense of it all, however slightly. It helped me clarify and untangle the disjointed mess of new ideas, old beliefs, personal biases, and unclear motivations that were constantly battling each other in my mind. So, after thinking about all the things I had shared in the interview, I figured it might be worthwhile to take a look at some of those writings, and see how they appear to the very different person I am now.

It was a surprising, but quite pleasant, discovery. Because, amazingly, so many of the journal entries seemed to express exactly the sentiments that I had described in my interview, and in many of my previous posts. It's been almost a decade since I wrote some of those things down, and the pain of that period has indeed subsided, but my memory of that difficult time has not let me down. The doubt and confusion that wracked my thoughts were indeed very real to me.

I thought that it might be interesting to share some of those emotional/intellectual battles I was trying to work through back then. Below is one brief stream of consciousness that I committed to writing. I'm not absolutely certain, but I believe that it was written when I still had both feet firmly planted in the yeshivish world, but was probably a few years out of high school already. I've decided to reproduce it here without changing it in any way from the original. Please keep in mind that this was never intended to be read by anyone other than myself (in fact, I didn't really intend to read it myself. The act of writing itself was the point!) so it isn't entirely grammatically correct or even totally coherent at some points. It isn't meant to be an eloquent essay, or some articulate statement of skepticism. It is just a very fleeting glimpse into the mind of a pained and confused young man.

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Somewhere in the last five to seven years of my life when I was in yeshiva and hearing the message of "learning is the most important thing in life" etc.. I somehow became antagonistic towards that idea because somehow I felt that it was putting me down, disregarding me, and those who encouraged that idea were stepping on me. Consequently I became antagonistic towards those people. Nowadays, it seems that anyone who is a self respecting Torah Jew (and G-d, who most definitely is a Torah Jew!) subscribes to that idea and if I am against that idea then, in effect, I'm against a Torah philosophy, which brands me a heretic. I don't like to be a heretic. (Although I don't particularly mind seeming like a heretic.) Therefore I want to find out and figure out exactly where the tension of this idea and my personal feelings lies.
This is how I feel it is. It's like this: They're yelling at me "you're wrong! you're wrong!"
And I'm saying "No! Stop it! Stop hurting me!
And their saying back: "We're not hurting you, you're hurting yourself by not agreeing to us, by not joining us."
I'm in this world and I'm constantly hearing things which I feel are putting me down. And I want to distance myself from these things because it hurts me. But the problem is that it seems that this is a Torah-true idea and if I want to distance myself from it and not accept it then I'm somehow a traitor and a heretic.
So I want to figure this out once and for all because I can't go on living like this where I have to be part of a society that I feel hurts me and if I break off from that society I'm not able to live with myself (both from myself and from outside myself)
It could be put like this. There seems to be an idea - from what I have been taught and instilled with is the Truth - that I am somehow something which is to be somehow disregarded. And it's not a simple matter for me to ignore it and say "Na, probably not, it's probably only someone's personal idea.", because it seems to be that everyone who is someone seems to be saying it. And I also can't somehow say that all these people who are saying it are a bunch of fanatics, because it's been driven into me - very, very deeply - that these are the people who are speaking the truth.
Is it true that I have to associate and be a part of that which I feel hurts me?
To answer that I don't have to associate with it - isn't an alternative. Because it's something which has been driven into me is part of the fabric of my existence.
The only other answer is to redefine it into something which doesn't hurt me (and remain consistent with what everyone seems to be saying it is).
And that's somehow what I've been doing this past while. I've been saying that learning isn't the most important thing and that it's only an aspect of a larger picture. But it doesn't seem to be working because I'm still hearing these messages, quite often too, that it's really learning, learning, learning.

When to leave frumkeit?

The interviews that I've posted have prompted both positive feedback and also a number of negative reactions. Many people have said that the subjects interviewed only perpetuate the stereotypes which I had hoped to overcome. Although I thought it was clear that they are mature and thoughtful individuals who didn't leave religion based on shallow, impulsive motivations, and who are living meaningful and productive lives, many people still were quite critical of them. They felt that each one simply demonstrated a weak and untenable approach to rejecting Judaism, thereby proving the critics right that people who leave really have no idea what they're talking about.

It seems that many people feel that there are only certain, very specific, reasons to stop being frum, and if your motivation for leaving does not fall within those rationales, then your choice is clearly illegitimate and your rejection of your family’s tradition is indefensible.

Irrespective of the conclusion that the critics seem to be drawing, the premise of these objections do touch on an important question: Does one need a justification for leaving religion behind? And if so, what is a justifiable basis for doing so?

One can find a broad range of opinions addressing this question. On the one hand are those who feel that any reason whatsoever – no matter how trivial - is good enough, since there’s no rational basis for a religious lifestyle anyway ("Does anyone demand a solid intellectual refutation to reject the tooth fairy?"). At the other side of the spectrum are those who feel that no rationale at all could ever justify a person leaving frumkeit, since it’s the only true and right way to live ("It doesn’t matter what perfectly constructed argument you have, if you say 2 +2 = 5 you’re obviously making a mistake!"). And there are those in the middle, that seem to grant, albeit very cautiously, that in certain situations, leaving frumkeit could possibly be the prudent and correct choice for a person.

I haven't totally made up my mind about it, but personally, I feel that any person is entitled to take whatever steps he wants to in his own life, for whatever reasons he desires, and does not have to explain himself to anyone. Of course, that doesn’t mean that all reasons are equally valid. Sometimes people do things for stupid reasons. Ideally, any significant choice a person makes in his life should be approached with deliberation and proper reflection.

Off the top of my head, here are some general reasons why I think it makes sense for a person to stop being frum:

If he has put a sufficient amount of deliberation into the issue and concluded that...

• he is unhappy, and his unhappiness is a direct result of the frum lifestyle (e.g. if his frum society insisted he value things that he finds deeply objectionable)
• due to frumkeit, he is always going to be lacking things that he feels are essential to his life (e.g. he feels there is no outlet for his creative expression)
• he finds that many of the core premises of the frum lifestyle factually untrue (e.g. historicity of the Bible)
• he finds too much of that lifestyle (either practical or theological) to be incompatible with what he feels to be right (e.g. perspectives on homosexuality or women's issues)
• it provides no significant benefit or meaning to his life
• he no longer trusts the system

(I suppose some of those categories overlap a bit, but it covers the general areas for me. Please don't try to disprove the examples above by showing, for example, that other branches of Judaism do provide a creative outlet. We're all well aware that there are many different kinds of societies in Judaism and that some of them have environments which don't have the flaws mentioned above. However, disproving the example is pointless because a) the examples are just that - examples. The general category still stands, even if you feel a specific illustration of it isn't accurate. And b) irrespective of the possibly mistaken impression the person has, the fact remains that this is the reality to them! They may be wrong, but they think they're right, and since they believe that Judaism is falling short somehow, they have a right to act based on what they perceive to be true.)

Obviously, in a situation where the person has certain practical obligations and commitments (such as kids), that affects the decision somewhat. But in a normal situation where the person is single and mature minded, he should be allowed to pursue a path that he feels is right for him.

What do you think?

Dispelling some myths about Footsteps

Last night on the radio (and online) was a talkshow in which Zev Brenner interviewed Malkie Schwartz, the founder of Footsteps. Also present was Michael Jenkins, director of programming at Footsteps. Footsteps is an organization designed to assist people who have left the ultra-orthodox world and are trying to integrate into the general mainstream society. They provide educational resources, such as GED and college tutoring, scholarships, assistance with the college application process, and more. Another area they help people with is employment assistance (interview workshops, resume writing assistance, job placements, etc.). They also provide social services, such as support groups, counseling, mentoring, referrals, etc. Most importantly, what Footsteps provides is a new support structure that helps people whose traditional familial and communal network no longer exists to assist them in undergoing what can be a most traumatic and trying time in their lives. The list of services they provide is too long to go through here; you can check out their website at www.footstepsorg.org, or give them a call to find out more. If you'd like to listen to the entire interview with Brenner, it is available to be downloaded here.

At the start of the interview, Brenner immediately asked them the commonly heard question of "Why don’t you have someone on staff who is presenting the religious argument to the people who come to you? Why only have non-religious people?" Although Malkie tried explaining that Footsteps does not push any agenda either way, neither to leave religion or to stay, Brenner kept getting all hung up on that, repeatedly harping on the fact that if they are truly neutral then people should be presented with a religious perspective when coming to discuss their situation with Footsteps.

What Brenner, and the frum callers (and I imagine, most of the frum world), seem unable to appreciate is that while Footsteps does have a clear agenda (which is to assist those who are trying to leave religiosity), it can still be, and most definitely is, neutral in regards to whether people should leave or stay in the first place. Frum people need to understand that unlike kiruv organizations that attempt to persuade people to become (or stay) frum, Footsteps simply does not take a position on that issue. They do not encourage people to leave. Nor do they encourage people to stay. What Footsteps is designed to do is to try to help those people who have already decided to leave get whatever help they need to achieve that. So if the person is seeking to leave, then Footsteps has a whole host of resources that are there to help the person achieve this successfully. However, if the person wants something else, something Footsteps isn’t designed to do, then they will help the person find the right resources to achieve that goal, wherever that may be. The primary goal of Footsteps is that, if you have already made the decision to leave, then there is an organization designed to assist you in accomplishing just that. But they will not advise you one way or another to take that step. Therefore there is no need for any kind of rabbi or religious figure to be present in order to present the "other" side. There simply is no need for an "other" side because there is no "initial" side being foisted on anyone.

I think that frum people have a particular hard time comprehending that because in the frum world everyone is actively, and unabashedly, trying to win over converts all the time (yes, I know, not actual non-Jewish converts). Aish Hatorah, Ohr Somayach, and all the countless other kiruv programs out there all go to great lengths to win people over. All the "kids at risk" programs (by the way, we hate that appellation) don't ever present the option of being non-religious to the individuals they are reaching out to. Although they might at times be tactful enough not to say it outright, everyone knows that there is ultimately an unambiguous agenda at these institutions, which is to make as many people as they possibly can frum (preferably the black-hat, yeshivish kind). So it’s understandable that a frum person would think that an organization that helps people leave frumkeit is operating under the same assumptions, just in the other direction. But this notion is simply wrong.

That being said, there are admittedly people who come to Footsteps who may not yet have come to an absolute decision that they will permanently leave the community. They may feel they want to leave but are wracked with guilt about how it will affect their family. Or they may face social pressures which obligate them to stay. It may simply be that they believe a lot of the propaganda that they have been told about how anyone who leaves is destined for a life of unhappiness (this sentiment was echoed by a number of the callers). Even in such situations, Footsteps does not encourage the person to leave, but what they instead do is to try to help the person come to a clearer decision if this is what is right for them. Obviously, there is no denying that the atmosphere at Footsteps is going to be more conducive towards leaving the community, but this is not because of any overt pressure or coercion to choose that path. There is in fact effort made to do just the opposite, to ensure that the atmosphere at their programs is not overtly hostile towards those who have not fully committed to the path that most of the participants have already embarked on. Admittedly, sometimes it may be difficult to maintain this tone (considering the feelings and experiences of most of the participants), but it is always something that they as an organization strive for. Indeed, as Malkie mentioned in the interview, there are a small number of people who have decided to return to (or remain in) the religious community after being involved with Footsteps, and I can attest to this fact. For those people who want to maintain aspects of religiosity in their life, Footsteps is more than happy to help them do so. For example, I have a friend from Footsteps that expressed an interest in finding a nice shabbos meal to go to, and efforts were made to set them up at a nice, "open-minded", frum family that would be ok with their level of religiosity.

Another important point that was only touched on in their discussion was that the people who come to Footsteps are not kids. They are all adults, at least 18 years of age, and most are probably in their twenties. More importantly, almost all these people have already extensively been through the exercise that Brenner is suggesting Footsteps provide. These people didn’t just wake up one day and decide to suddenly call Footsteps because they were having a particular frustrating day in yeshiva. They have already been through months, if not years, of agonizing deliberations on this decision. They’ve had heartfelt talks with friends and family, been brought to top rabbis who were supposed to enlighten them to the truth, been sent to Israel to be "fixed up", been forced to sit through Discovery programs and other kiruv efforts. They've been threatened, cajoled, and even bribed. They’ve already had countless discussions with religious figures presenting "the frum side" of this choice. There is nothing to be gained by having them go through another frustrating, demoralizing experience of being told that they should still try to remain religious.

Amazingly, Brenner spent almost 20 minutes obsessing about the fact that Footsteps provides non-kosher food, even claiming that it would be more neutral to provide only kosher food than to give people a choice. I’m not sure why he thinks that presenting only one of two options is more fair than presenting both options but it seems clear that he’s missing the point: people who come to Footsteps don’t come because there’s kosher or non-kosher food. They come mainly because they are seeking an environment which will allow them to freely explore the option of leaving frumkeit, free of any judgmental attitudes towards that choice, and likewise free of any pressure to necessarily take that route. Providing kosher food at their venues allows people to feel comfortable that they are not being pressured to do something that they are not yet ok with. (Also, they didn’t get to address it in the discussion but the email which mentioned the pork and matzah thing was absolutely wrong. That "event" is NOT a Footsteps thing. Although there is some such gathering every year among certain people, Footsteps has nothing to do with that whatsoever.)

Another detail which was not fairly addressed was that a caller took them to task for coming on to a frum station, saying that an organization such as theirs has no place reaching out to the frum community. The truth is that Malkie was asked by Brenner to come on the show and not the other way around. Brenner should have corrected this misconception instead of letting Malkie take the brunt of it.

Just for the record, I want to clarify that I am speaking here as a private individual and not in any way as a representative of Footsteps, so if I have misrepresented something about Footsteps here it is my own error. I do not work for Footsteps in any official capacity and do not pretend to speak on their behalf in any way. All of the above is merely my opinion, from the perspective of a long-time, and immensely grateful, participant in the organization.

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Update: Here are two related posts which provide a counterpoint to some of the misconceptions that Brenner and the frum callers seem to subscribe to: Pen Tivokeish, Chassidic Whistleblower.

The Evolution Of My Disbelief - Part II

When I last left off discussing this topic, I had described that I had been going through a tumultuous period in my life. Many long established ideas and perspectives were being challenged in fundamental ways, and as a result, my belief in the veracity of chareidi Judaism was being drastically affected. Before I continue on, I’d like to step back briefly and expand on that period a bit further.

Although I described some of the challenges which I encountered as primarily intellectual in nature, it’s important to recognize that although the challenges were rooted in intellectual issues, they didn’t just affect me intellectually. Like any other seriously committed chareidi Jew, the ideas that I believed in were directly expressed in my behavior and psyche. When I subscribed to ideas such as the notion that secular studies held nothing of any lasting value, or that people who owned TV’s didn’t really care about halacha, or that people who interacted with the opposite sex were licentious and immoral, it wasn’t just an abstract notion of no practical relevance to real life. No, it was a very real and tangible concept that translated directly into how I acted, what I valued, what I believed, and how I thought about the world. For example, when my rabbeim explained how dressing stylishly was an obsequious attempt to fit in with the goyim, I stopped wearing any kind of brand name clothes, and even let myself dress kind of shabbily (which was the accepted style among the yeshivish crowd I was in at the time). I even lost much respect for people I previously admired, simply because by caring about dressing nicely, they had proven themselves to be too materialistic for me to emulate. These numerous ideological perspectives had direct effects on my actions and thought. But even more critical than my behavior and beliefs though, was how the ideas they taught me directly affected my emotional state. Because even though on the outside I might have been going along with all these new ideas and adopting all these strict new ways of behaving, inside, a part of me still felt some connection with all these now-forbidden practices. And this tension often caused me quite a bit of guilt:

That I still did in fact care about my appearance clearly demonstrated how, inside, I was just a vain and self-absorbed person. The fact that I would rather be studying math than learning gemara was a painful reminder of how I wasn’t really a true ben torah. That I tended to not be super careful with every little halacha was one more sign of how spiritually deficient I was. That I let myself sometimes sneak a little Entenmann's donuts despite my vow to only eat chalav yisrael just proved that in my heart I really was just another "oisvorf".

All my time in yeshiva, I sincerely did want to become what they taught me was the only kind of person who really mattered - a proper ben torah. But throughout it all, I knew that a part of me just wasn’t really trying as hard as it should. And despite the fact that in many ways I was truly striving to become that ideal person, the subconscious awareness that I was never really going to become that ben torah, that person who had any true worth, filled me with a deep unhappiness.

So when I started having the intellectual challenges that I described previously, the effect was not limited to a purely cerebral debate of how to reconcile an intellectual quandary. It disturbed me on a multitude of levels. Yes, it was a theoretical puzzler to me - how could something which all my rabbeim had told me was bad actually not be so? But more fundamentally, it raised extremely upsetting questions with more practical ramifications - if it really wasn’t bad, then couldn’t I have it in my life? And if I can have it in my life, then I didn’t have to feel bad about it! And if I didn’t have to feel bad about it, why had my life been shaped in a way which had caused me so much guilt?

The most fundamental example of this crisis was, unsurprisingly, in regards to the idea of learning torah. As I’ve mentioned here many times, I had been through many years of indoctrination where I was told that there is nothing more important in my life than learning torah; that learning torah should be the prime focus of my life; that learning torah is so great that it outweighs all the other mitzvos of the torah; that people who don’t devote their lives to torah are wasting their lives; that every spare moment of my life I should be trying to squeeze in another pasuk, another daf, another halacha, another Rashi. The messages were endless, and they were very effective - I knew what my life was supposed to be about and that I should desire nothing more than to be able to sit in the beis medrash for as long as possible and imbibe the wisdom of the sages. The only problem with this lofty goal was that I actually sucked at this learning thing. I didn’t have a clue how to do it right, and after years of banging my head in frustration, I absolutely abhorred gemara. (Truth is, I wasn’t too fond of the other yeshivish areas of study either (halacha, chumash, mussar, etc.), but those I could get through with a modicum of competency.) But the very notion that my ultimate purpose in life was meant to revolve around something that I could barely stand caused me a fair bit of cognitive dissonance.

As a loyal devotee of the yeshivish hashkafa, I fully believed that this message of torah learning primacy was the truth, yet I also couldn’t deny that it clearly wasn’t working for me. I lived with this tension for many years, struggling to succeed at what I knew to be my divine mission in life, but all along knowing that my heart wasn’t really into it. Somewhere along the way I resigned myself to the idea that I would never be the kind of person god really wanted me to. As difficult as this was to admit, I knew that I had no one else to blame but myself. After all, the gemara teaches "If a person doesn’t succeed, it’s because they haven’t tried" (Megillah 6b). I obviously hadn’t tried hard enough. Yeshiva lore was filled with tales of students who had overcome insurmountable obstacles through the sheer determination of their commitment. Despite my extra kavana when davening the words of, "v’sen chelkeinu b’sorasecha," I was quite clearly not meriting the divine blessing I so desperately needed. I knew that this didn’t make me a bad person, but I also knew that my place in heaven (and society) would never really amount to much, that I could never call myself a real ben torah, and that I would have to answer for my failure in the world to come.

So when I was first exposed to the idea that I actually didn’t have to devote my life to torah learning, aside from the disbelief that such a concept could actually be true, what hit me was a tremendous emotional upheaval: If I didn’t have to be a learner, then why had everyone told me I did? Why had so much of my energy been wasted in that objective? Why had people who were supposed to be bastions of truth lied to me about something so essential? Why had people who had claimed to act in my best interests discouraged me from succeeding in other areas? Most importantly, if this idea was true, then I didn’t have to feel that I was a failure; that my life didn’t have to focus on something I didn’t enjoy. If this was actually true, I didn’t have to feel ashamed for who I was.

The perspective of how to view torah learning is just one example, but so many more of the beliefs which were being challenged were not just abstract ideological principles, but concepts which had direct, practical consequences to how I viewed my life and myself:

• The idea that secular studies were of no value had always been difficult for me to swallow, considering that the only classes I ever did well at were in those subjects. They had, by negating the value of secular studies, in essence, deprived me of the one activity that could provide me a sense of accomplishment. If it was true what I was now discovering that secular studies indeed had value, then I could be proud of my accomplishments in those areas (instead of hiding that fact, as those of us who did well in secular studies were often mocked for focusing on such "worthless" activities). Maybe I didn’t have to feel like I was totally useless.
  
• If wanting to dress nicely wasn’t really so terrible, then I didn’t have to feel like I was betraying my heritage (by imitating the goyim!) when dressing more contemporarily.
• If being super medakdek about every single halachic issue was not absolutely crucial, then I wouldn’t have to feel so guilty for being resentful that God was making my life crazy with the endless halachic inanities invading my life.
• If not everything a gadol said had to be followed unquestioningly as the word of god, then...well, I couldn’t even bring myself to conceive of what that would mean.

So when I started realizing all the ways in which my chareidi upbringing were untrue, my life really started changing. It changed in many external ways, such as how I dressed, activities I allowed myself, and people I hung out with. And it began to change in internal ways too, such as my values and priorities shifting considerably. But more importantly, it changed how I viewed myself. I no longer felt a need to hide who I was. I could be open about my true nature and not have to be ashamed of it. When my rebbe asked why I wasn’t paying attention in shiur, I could be honest and say, "Because this stuff doesn’t interest me!" (Not that I would be openly disrespectful, but privately I could admit this to him.) When I’d sleep late and miss the minyan, I wouldn’t feel it necessary to apologize for it. When someone would demand of me why I wasn’t following a certain chumra, I’d just shrug and say I didn’t feel it was necessary. When some big rabbi made a new pronouncement, I no longer felt it necessary to go along with it like everyone else.

And so, for the first time ever, I allowed myself to step off of the chareidi path I had been traveling upon all my adult life. I had begun to escape the restrictive mindset of my past and now understood that there were other legitimate ways to be a halachic Jew. But I had no inkling of just how significant this step would prove to my life down the road. Because even though this transition didn’t cause me to challenge the underlying foundations of Judaism, it had opened the door for me to question principles which I had previously thought unassailable. And once that door had been opened for me, nothing would ever be the same again.

A New Perspective

Far too often than I care for, I'm posed the question of "What made you become non-religious?"

Similarly, I noticed on Rabbi Horowitz's website, he has added a poll, asking basically the same question, "What is (are) the primary cause(s) of children abandoning Yiddishkeit?"

Like Hillel being asked to teach the entire Torah in a brief lesson, I believe that it's impossible to properly address that question with any simplistic answers (at least in my case). Every time I think about the matter, I uncover new dimensions of the issue that seem to shed further light on my choices, and at times, the new insights even contradict perspectives that I had previously, confounding me further.

The other day, as I was sitting in my bed, pondering this never ending quandary, it occurred to me that the discussion might be enhanced somewhat if the question was sharpened just a bit. I realized that in my case, to ask the question of what caused me to become irreligious was too vague, as there were actually two distinct categories of what led me along my path, which can be reflected in the following formulation:

1) What made me want to become non-religious?
2) What made me actually become non-religious?

The distinction highlights that there are two aspects to the process: the experiences, ideas, and emotions that make a person want to leave, and the things that actually allow the person to act on those feelings, which usually are the circumstances in the persons life changing to some degree.

I realized that when people discuss this topic they often mix up the different aspects quite a bit, and one can usually tell from which aspect they may focus on how they fundamentally view the issue.

When you hear people talking about how important it is to keep young people away from those things that might cause them to "go off the derech", what do we usually hear? Internet, college, people from different religious backgrounds, secular media, etc. But if we take a closer look, all those things don't make a person actually want to leave - they just open a door to a world that is off limits to a person. Isn't it strange that they're so afraid of opening a door? Well, it's not really so surprising, because they know very well that so many people, if given a chance to get out, would jump at the soonest opportunity. These things don't make a person want to leave, they just help them make the choice to leave. The seeds of discontent which have brought the person to this point had been lain much earlier, when they were experiencing all the unpleasantness that can be part of a religious upbringing.

So most of the frum world's (and seemingly the Gedolim's too, based on their public pronouncements) strategy against defectors is basically premised on the fact that they know that people don't want to be frum. But they figure if they lock the ghetto doors tight enough they can prevent people from leaving. Or at least keep them in until they're old enough to somehow find some rationale of their own for staying; either due to arriving at some sort of appreciation of their own for being frum, or because they are trapped due to familial and/or social obligations, or some other factor which compels them to adhere to that lifestyle even when no external pressures are present.

Yet so few leaders (if any!) ever address the real issue of why people want to get out. They just talk more and more about how crucial it is to keep people under a tighter and shorter leash, always keeping an eye out on everything that a young person might do, just in case there is some telltale sign of their potential straying. Their whole focus is on restricting access, and tightening the reins, instead of honestly examining what is so fundamentally wrong with their lifestyle that so many people want to get out of it.

I had this confirmed recently in a talk I had with a close relative. We were discussing his choices for where he was going to send his son to high school. It was quite clear to him that his son is not the serious learning type, and is more interested in basketball, music, computers, and other non-torah pursuits. To his credit, he is ok with his son being like that, but he is concerned that if he isn't in a strict torah focused environment, the kid will be at risk of ending up much less seriously religious. I told him that he should let his son go to a school that is less frummie and more accommodating of his child's natural makeup. He says that if he goes to such a school, he runs the risk of ending up less religious, and then who knows what might happen? I knew right then he was thinking of me when he said that, being that when I was a teen, I was just like his son - not interested in being serious about my torah studies, distracted by my own interests, etc. and I ended up going to a less strict yeshiva, and see where I ended up?!

What he (and so many others) just don't get is that my going to the less strict yeshiva, where I had friends from Modern Orthodox families, and where they took secular studies seriously, and where I first listened to non-Jewish music, and flirted with some local girls, and where I was allowed to thrive in a field outside of limudei kodesh, isn't what made me not frum, and it's not even what put me on the path to being not frum. All that environment did for me is to make me feel that I no longer had to hide my long suffering dissatisfactions as much. It allowed me to admit that I wanted things which were forbidden to me. And even to experience them a bit. It allowed me to connect with people who had lives like I wanted to have.

Basically, it allowed me to get in touch with all the things that my yeshiva conditioning had made me repress.

Instead of trying so hard to make me stifle something that was a genuine feeling, maybe if they had actually allowed me to express it openly, and give me an environment where that part of me was able to flourish, there would have been a chance that much of the resentment that was building up inside of me would have dissipated. I don't know, maybe. And although I doubt I ever would have really gotten into frumkeit, maybe I would have been ok with it enough that I wouldn't have felt that I had to get as far away from it as possible. Who knows?

What I do know is that no matter how hard they may have tried to prevent me from being able to leave frumkeit, deep down inside of me, nothing they ever did made me stop wanting to get out.

Rationalizations

A lesson from the yeshiva bochur's playbook:

1) Torah is right and true, and that fact is patently obvious to everyone who bothers to think about it.
2) So, then, how could it be that people don't follow the torah?
3) Because they simply don't care enough about doing what's right.
4) Obviously, no one wants to think of themselves as someone who doesn't care about right and wrong, so in order to let themselves sleep at night, they rationalize and say that really they believe that the torah is not at all true.
5) But of course, we all know that the torah is totally true. From here we see the amazing power of the mind to rationalize and make us change our beliefs when the heart wants to do something that it shouldn't (a.k.a. following the yetzer hara).

This is a basic fact of the world that most any yeshiva guy would be able to tell you. "It's pashut," they would tell you. Simple. And just one of the many unflattering ways in which non-religious people are portrayed in the chareidi world - unprincipled, impulsive hedonists who do whatever they want and then come up with a justification after the fact to rationalize their behavior.

Putting aside the fundamentally flawed premise that the argument rests on, I would actually agree with part of that assertion. I tend to agree that people find ingenious ways to rationalize their behavior all the time. Cognitive dissonance is probably far more prevalent in our lives than we care to acknowledge. We don't ever want to admit that something we are doing may be wrong. But despite that concession, I don't think it's fair or accurate to look at the world the way the chareidi world does.

And specifically in this regard, I think there's another approach which might actually better explain why people stop believing certain things about Judaism when they stop following halacha: It's simply that for many people, the main reason they were believing those ideas in the first place was not out of a conviction of their truth, but rather because they needed to believe in them in order to justify how they lived their lives! And now that they aren't living that lifestyle anymore, they consequently have no need to believe the ideas anymore either!

Think about it: What could possibly justify putting ourselves through the burdens and nuisances of frum life? For most people, the only thing that could really make it worth staying committed to such a demanding responsibility would be if they believe that it really matters in some larger sense. But if they stopped having that massive yoke weighing down on them, they wouldn't have to believe that all of that stuff mattered!

Imagine a person who is trapped in an unhappy relationship, with no chance of ever escaping it. Because they're stuck in it, their mind comes up with all sorts of reasons why this relationship is actually a good thing - how it provides so many benefits, why no one else can see how wonderful it is, how it's the fulfillment of all their deepest wishes, etc. They need those explanations, because without them, the reality of their life is simply too distressing to acknowledge. But if somehow, through some unexpected yet fortuitous turn of events, they managed to escape their prison, do you think they'd retain those views? Would they actually look back on that relationship with any fondness?

This perspective is actually the exact opposite of the frum explanation. They see the situation as people starting with a core belief, and from that conviction their torah observant lifestyle arises - The actions derive from the belief. The way I'm seeing it now is people being straddled with a challenging and difficult lifestyle and needing some rationalization for why they have such a demanding life -The belief is born from the actions. So, according to the frum world, when people's beliefs change in response to the lifestyle changing, it's a result of dishonest rationalizing. The way I see it, when the beliefs change to match the actions, it's actually a more honest expression of who they truly are than when they imposed those beliefs on themselves. In fact, now that I think about it, it was back when they were believing all those ideas, that they were rationalizing more than ever!

Ironic, no? Chareidim look at the rest of the world and see endless rationalizing, yet it may well be that for so many chareidim, it's their ability to rationalize that lets them get by without having to face the inconsistencies and inanities of their lives!

You know, I think they may have been a bit mistaken about something they taught us back in yeshiva: It wasn't Torah that sustained klal yisrael through the ages. It was our ability to rationalize the absurdities of our existence.

The Exit Interview

In Rabbi Horowitz's latest article he writes about the concept of the "Exit Interview". Overall, I think it's a worthwhile read. After going over it, I found myself thinking more and more about this concept of the Exit Interview, and after some time, it made me figure out something that's been bothering me for a really long time.

The analogy of the exit interview is a truly excellent one. Because an institution that truly cared about improving itself would eagerly want to do such a thing, and they'd want to be brutally honest about it. And it wouldn't be afraid to face the flaws that such an inquiry might reveal about itself. Frum society likes to think that it does these sort of exercises. When a problem finally becomes big enough that the public starts grumbling about it and the leadership can no longer ignore (or deny) it, that's when we usually start to see some sort of activity. Articles start being printed. The issue gets talked about at conventions. Organizations start. Studies are done. Reports are published. Experts are trotted out. Panels are held. Tehillim starts being said for it. And you know that it really has their full attention when it's pronounced "a crisis".

It's all crap, in my opinion. It's a farce. It's all just empty gestures. Ok, not totally empty, but not anything worth applauding. Because no one really is seriously responding to, admitting to, and most definitely not addressing any real issues. If we pictured some actual "Exit Interviews" at a real company that were conducted similarly to how the frum world responds, I imagine they would look something like the following exchanges:

Company Representative: Please tell us what we're doing wrong.
Former Customer: I think your service sucks.
CR: What are you talking about?! Our service is the best. If you don't like it, you're obviously the one with the problem, not us! Can't you see how many satisfied customers we have!

CR: Why are you leaving our company?
FC: Your service doesn't provide anything of value to me.
CR: What do you mean no value? How can you say that? You're just not using it properly!
FC: Maybe not. But I tried it for 10 years and it didn't do squat. I think that's enough time to try something.
CR: No, you're just not doing it right! Stick around and we'll show you how to really do it. You just need to try harder!

CR: Why are you going to our competitor?
FC: They offer me much more of what I'm looking for.
CR: No, you're mistaken. They're lying to you. We're really the best. We're the only ones that matter! If you go to them, you're going to regret it terribly.
FC: Are you kidding me? Look how many successful people are with them!
CR: No, it's all a lie. They're not really successful! Our people are the only ones who have real success! Really!

CR: Tell us why you're leaving our company.
FC: I found your representatives insulting, abusive, manipulative, obnoxious, and all around offensive.
CR: No, that can't be. You're just leaving because you're angry.

CR: Tell us why you're leaving our company.
FC: I'm leaving because I'm angry with you! You people don't respect me, you ignore my needs, and you make my life miserable!
CR: Oh, please! You sound like you have some emotional problems you need to deal with. Stop blaming us for your problems.

CR: Tell us why you're leaving our company.
FC: I find that you're not meeting my emotional needs.
CR: It doesn't matter how you feel! We're the only ones who are based on truth! And we've been around the longest! You have to stick with what's proven, and not go with what the latest popular fad is.

CR: Why are you leaving us?
FC: I think you're business model is a crock of sh*t and founded on a pack of lies. Totally unsustainable.
CR: No, you're really just angry. You were probably abused. You know, it's just dishonest to try to rationalize your emotional reactions with intellectual justifications. What's really going on is that you're not prepared to make a commitment.

CR: Why are you leaving us?
FC: Your company abused its customers, lied to the public, and covered it up for years!
CR: Impossible! You're making that up!
FC: It's not impossible. And it's true.
CR: You're always looking to bad-mouth us! Don't you know how much good we do?!

CR: Why are you leaving us?
FC: I find your company out of touch with its customers. You don't know what the hell is going on in today's market. And your executives are totally misinformed about how things are running in the company.
CR: What?! How can you say that!? Do you know who our CEO is?! Do you know how many degrees he has?! Do you know how many billions of dollars he's amassed?! He'll make more money in one minute than you'll ever make in your lifetime. Who do you think you are to question our executives? Misinformed?! Our board knows more about the market than anyone else out there! You have no idea how many connections they have and how much they do behind the scenes! It only looks like they're not doing much because they try to stay out of the public eye. But really, they're the ones holding it all together! You have no idea!

CR: Why are you leaving us?
FC: Why am I leaving you? I've been trying to tell you for years why I want to get out. I just never had the opportunity or the guts! You've never listened to a word I've said!
CR: You're acting impulsively! Come, have some kugel and we'll talk about it. Can't you see how concerned we are for you?
FC: Oh, now you're concerned?! That's really convincing! If you were really concerned, how could you have let things gotten to where they are now!? Don't you see how screwed up everything is!?
CR: Oh, please, stop exaggerating. It's not that bad!

CR: Why are you leaving us?
FC: You obviously don't value your customers. You treat us like children. You try to control every aspect of our relationship!
CR: You misunderstand. We truly do value you. But we know that our way is really the best way for you. Trust us. We know what's best for you. We're just trying to look out for your best interests.

CR: Why are you leaving us?
FC: How can I possibly stay with you? Your clearly do not have my best interests at heart.
CR: No, we truly do care about you. We care about every customer. You wouldn't believe it, but our executives cry themselves to sleep trying to figure out the best way to serve you! We promise!
FC: Really? Then how come I lost all my money when I followed their advice?

CR: Why are you leaving us?
FC: To be honest, I just can't keep up. You're standards are just too demanding for me. I'd like something a bit easier to handle.
CR: Well, our standards are absolute. We don't bend just because someone can't handle it. Either you keep up, or maybe you really should be finding someplace else.

CR: Why are you switching to a different group in the company?
FC: Well, I found a different group where I feel much more comfortable. In fact, I'm glad I didn't have to leave the company entirely, I want to stay with your company, but your department's style and standards weren't a good match for me. Now, I'm still in the company, but without the discomfort I had prior.
CR: No way! You're not serious, are you?! That division sucks! They don't know what they're doing! They're just pretending! Believe us, its not worth investing in that group. Those guys are idiots! And you've got to be an idiot to join up with them!

Yes, they're parodies, and exaggerated (but only slightly). But they all illustrate how the frum world just doesn't really understand what this process is supposed to be about. They say they want to know, but then they just defend themselves. This isn't what listening is supposed to be about. They're mouthing the words, "We care", but their body language and tone very clearly says, "Go screw yourself." And when faced with real issues, they just keep on denying it in some way.

Yeah, the frum world likes to think they go through lots of "soul searching." And to their credit they actually have finally come to grips with some of the serious problems in their society. But they never really want to admit the real problems. They won't admit how it was some of their society's values and the insistence that their lifestyle is the ultimate, the perfect, the God-ordained lifestyle and society, that caused those problems to become so pervasive.

You can't pat yourself on the back for saying "Oy! There's sexual abuse in the community!" when you were the ones preventing anything from being done about sexual abuse for decades! Your act of "coming clean" about that abuse might be admirable, but it just deflects from the much more deeply rooted problem that you were a society that allowed child molesters to get away with their shit for decades! (And still do!)

I remember ten years ago when they first raised the issue of how kids were dropping out of yeshiva. And all the articles, and all the experts, and of course all the Gedolim (well, some of them), concluded then that there needs to be more remedial learning, and people shouldn't be held to such high standards, and that they need to give everyone a chance to become a successful learner, not just the smarter guys. So they started new programs. And they adjusted curriculums. They were so proud of themselves for all they were doing, their Jewish Observer Special Editions, and their panels, and their "tackling the issues", and I was just disgusted by it all, because never at any point did someone say, "Hey, instead of all that crap, maybe we should just stop teaching our children that they have to be learners to have value in our society?" The real problem was never addressed, never raised, never even mentioned. And from what I can tell they still haven't seriously said that. (But there are more people realizing it, thankfully.) But of course they won't look at the real, underlying issue, because that would mean they'd have to reexamine one of their core values and see if it really is working for them like a Torah True(TM) value is supposed to.

Besides for all that avoidance of looking at the deeper issues, there is still so much denial about problems even when they're being spoken about outright. People just don't listen to what is being said. The following exchange actually happens all the time:

Yeshiva Guy: I really don't believe in God, Judaism, Torah, all of it.
Rabbi: No, you don't know what you're talking about. You just want to have sex.

When you're in the frum world, you're taught how to see the world, how to see life, how to see people, how to process and understand all that you may encounter. And no matter what others tell you, about themselves, about their choices, about their experiences, about their values - if you've been properly indoctrinated, you know better than them. After all, you're frum. You have the Torah perspective. You have the Gedolim. You have Da'as Torah informing you. How could they possibly know more about life than you. You have the Shulchan Aruch guiding you. Those other people have nothing, only MTV and the Internet. How sad for them. And they don't even know it!

That's why this whole pretense of doing an exit interview, of being self-critical and truly looking at why people are leaving is just a farce. Because the frum world never really thinks there's anything wrong with their system. They believe their system is Torah True, through and through. It's the system God wants there to be. It's the system frum yidden have been living by for the past 3000 years! It's the system guided by generations of gedolim going back to Moshe Rabbeinu! There are no flaws in God's system. Yes, they acknowledge, at times things might not be working out exactly right. But that's not a problem with the system. That's only a problem in the implementation. Somewhere, at some juncture, we're just not doing something exactly right, and we'll investigate that, but the system is as sound as ever!

That's not a true self-examination. That isn't honesty. That's just an infantile way to make yourself feel like you're doing something to better yourself while allowing yourself to maintain the fantasy that everything about your life is just fine.

You're all so full of it.

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PS - I invite the readers to submit their own interview exchanges.