Hebrew Yated Ne’eman, denounces Yeshivah that provides a comprehensive secular education

The Frum world has gone crazy! We must stop this! 
We must get together and stop funding any Rosh Yeshiva that criticizes this normal Yeshivah! We should make it clear to every single Meshulach, that if the Institution that he represents does in any way denounce Yeshiva Darkei Torah, we will not give him a penny!

Just today, a Meshulach with a black leather briefcase, came to me, and before he had a chance to pull out his "Photo Album." I asked, does his kollel "approve or disapprove of Yeshiva Darkei Torah?"
He said, "well, I don't know," so I said, "here is a phone, call the Rosh Ha'Kollel right now and ask him."

So he called, and the Rosh Ha'kollel, told him, he doesn't approve.... 
I then wrote a substantial check to Yeshiva Darkei Torah right in front of him and  told him to kiss me where the sun doesn't shine and to get the H-- out of my sight!

These "gedolim" want to perpetuate parasites and poverty, we must put an end to this craziness!
 

Rabbi Yisrael Cohen-Rozovski Shlitah

 A new Charedi yeshiva that provides a comprehensive secular education alongside religious studies has aroused consternation and bitter criticism from the Charedi establishment. 

Yeshiva Darkei Torah was founded by Rabbi Yisrael Cohen-Rozovski one year ago and is poised to begin its second academic year in several weeks time when the Israeli academic year begins.

Despite having been up and running for a year and having had 25 enrolled students, Darkei Torah has only this week caught the attention of the Charedi establishment, and was bitterly denounced on Tuesday and Wednesday for combining religious and secular studies in the same institution by Yated Ne’eman, the largest selling Charedi daily newspaper and mouth piece for the Degel Hatorah non-hassidic Charedi political movement.

Cohen-Rozovski has been an activist for education and employment within the Charedi sector for close to twenty years but said that in recent years it was becoming clearer to him that change needed to be made at an earlier stage in the educational career of Charedi youth.

He said in particular that the intense, detailed study of Talmudic minutiae was not appropriate for everyone and that this method of study was frustrating for many students and does not provide a sense of satisfaction or achievement.

“In recent years the Charedi sector has begun to integrate more into Israeli society and to understand that it needs to be part of everyday reality,” Cohen-Rozovski told The Jerusalem Post.

“The Charedi community is in some ways like a group of new immigrants which must integrate but is finding it hard to do so,” he observed.

The process is underway however, Cohen-Rozovski asserted, and pointed to the growing exposure of Charedim to the internet and the new sources of information and horizons that it provides.

“The children of the revolution are requesting to make something of themselves. The Charedi world is being exposed to the idea that they can be Charedi Jews who are faithful to the Torah and the commandments and at the same time support themselves financially as well.

“This is the model for Charedi Jewry, which in the Diaspora, where Charedim are lawyers, accountants, businessmen and outside of their work hours study Torah,” Cohen-Rozovski continued.

“Right now, a young Charedi man will start his yeshiva studies but sees no horizon where he can gain an education and an income but nevertheless wants to make something of himself and realizes he needs and education to do this.”

To this end, Cohen-Rozovski established Yeshiva Darkei Haim in Jerusalem for young Charedi men. The institution is styled as a yeshiva gevoha or “advanced yeshiva,” for ages 17 and over which the overwhelming majority of young Charedi men attend after their secondary education which is generally comprised only of religious studies.

The yeshiva provides a daily schedule of three hours of religious studies in the morning, followed by five and a half hours of studies either for a high-school diploma or for professional, vocational courses in hi-tech.

The yeshiva offers 21 different academic units for the Israeli high-school diploma which is taught in an intensive one-year program. In addition, a vocational course in website building and design is on offer as well as an Open University in Computer Science in which Open University lecturers come to the yeshiva to teach.

In the last academic year 25 students joined Darkei Hayim, and Cohen-Rozovski says that the yeshiva will grow in size this year to between 50 and 60 students.

He said that parents from a variety of different backgrounds in the Charedi community had decided to send their children to the yeshiva, and that those from the mainstream were well represented.

It is the success in gaining significant numbers of students that Cohen-Rozovski says has led to this week’s bitter attacks against this yeshiva.

In an article on the yeshiva in Yated Ne’eman on Tuesday, the newspaper branded the initiative “dangerous,” “illegitimate,” and cited the words of two former leaders of the Charedi world on the issue who called the combination of religious and academic studies “the wielding of an ax towards the Charedi world.”
And in the paper’s editorial on Wednesday, it wrote that “even if those behind such initiatives have good intentions they are still sinning and causing the masses to sin.”

It wrote that if people wanted to leave yeshiva altogether and find a job then that is their own personal choice but that the attempt to teach both religious and secular studies at a yeshiva was “the first time that an initiative has been started to adorn a pig with a golden ring, to dress the head of a non-Jew with a Jerusalemite yarmulke, to erect a cross in the sanctuary of the king and to turn a sin into a religious commandment.”

Cohen-Rozovski rejected the criticism on ideological grounds and also intimated that it was politically motivated.

He noted that in the past two days since the exposure in the Charedi press he had received eight new applications to the yeshiva and had not received any cancellations from students already enrolled.

Currently, the yeshiva is supported by private donations and the backing of charitable foundations although it is also seeking support from the Ministry of Education for its study program. 

Israeli Yated says that Kidnapping Happened because Israel wants to Draft Chareidim!

 

Arutz Sheva  reports that  a scathing article appeared in today’s Israeli Yated Neeman, that says in effect that  the government of Israel is  responsible for the kidnapping of three teenage boys.

Thursday night’s act of terrorism is a direct result of the Israeli government’s effort to draft Chareidim into the army, writes the Yated,
“Statistically, every time that the government has tried to harm those who learn Torah, something terrible has occurred.”

Isn't that what the murdering Arabs are writing, that it is the fault of the Jews?

The Yated article says that the kidnapping of three boys who have no military involvement but were just going home to their families violates the standards of justice even for terror organizations and goes on to lay the blame for the kidnapping squarely at the feet of the Israeli government.

“The government has done all that it can recently to endanger the lives of those who live in the holy country. Our lives here are not typical. We are here only by way of miracle and as described in parshas Bechukosai, if we follow the Torah then there will be peace in the land and there will be no reason for fear. But this government of corruption does everything in its power to uproot the Judaism from the lives of the Jews. Aside from the laws that have already been enacted, there are three more laws waiting in the Knesset that will further endanger the lives of all Israeli citizens, whose safety is guaranteed only by the performance of mitzvos.”

How about this week's parsha; Korach! These Rashaim also heard last weeks Parsha of the Meraglim and learned nothing!

The article describes the Chareidi draft laws as “Draconian” and explains that once enacted, they imperiled the lives of those who live in Israel, by removing those who are in the “true army” that safeguard the country, those who learn Torah, creating a status of impending danger.

I don't know but I'm seeing the IDF searching for them, I didn't see the "true army" anywhere, not even by the Kosel!

Determining who is at fault is pointless at a time like this, continues the article.
“We are all guilty. Every Jew is responsible for each other and when a tragedy like occurs, it means Hashem is talking directly to us. To all of us. The Chofetz Chaim explains that there are no prophets today but Hashem talks to us in other ways….There are those who blame Chamas and other entities but we don’t look to cast guilt. We need to turn our ears to the voice of truth. Hashem is talking to us directly. Are we not going to listen?”

How dare they quote the Chofetz Chaim!

When we had nevi'im, they were able to communicate with heaven and tell us why tragedy happens. Then for 2500 years this insight was lost. Now that we have the Yated, prophecy has finally made a comeback.

Do Girls Learn Anything In Seminary!!

My wife is a Shadchan, who did many shiduchim just this year alone. She is not a professional, she does it totally L'shem Shomayim. The very first question the boy's family usually asks is "which Seminary did she attend?" They are basically not interested what the girl actually learned there, or if she  possesses good or special character traits. She just wants to know so that she can boast her new daughter-in laws credentials to the Yenta next door. Then they want to know, how is this boy going to be supported, but this question requires a totally separate post. 


In a  letter to the editor in the March 11, 2011 edition of the English Yated Ne'eman, a young girl still in Seminary in Eretz Yisroel warns her parents that she will be coming back to the States a "changed person," since she had adopted "chumros" etc. She writes that her parents should understand that if you send your teenager to study in Eretz Yisroel and spend a lot of money getting the teenager there, then they better be ready to basically adopt the stringencies in  Halacha that the teenager learned in Seminary!
Now read an answer to her letter from a reader in this weeks Yated Ne'eman!

MENTCHLICHKEIT BEFORE CHUMROS

Dear Editor,

I was appalled by the letter from the girl in seminary in Eretz Yisroel to her parents. The letter reveals that this girl has learned little, if anything, of what one would have expected her to learn. There is clearly something wrong with this system. While she may have learned lots of chumros and, undoubtedly, numerous complex commentaries, she has not learned basic elements of mentchlichkeit, hakoras hatov and kibbudav v 'eim.

I do not know the economic status of the family of this seminary student, but if they are like most people, they struggled mightily to scrape together at least $20,000 of hard-earned money to send her to seminary in Eretz Yisroel. They may have even gone into debt over it. Yet, the only message conveyed in her letter is a warning shot across the bow to her parents. She has not even come home and she has already criticized her parents.

How about some hakoras hatov? Did you ever consider how difficult it is to make $20,000, particularly in these times? Do you know how many hours of work and how much effort, toil and heartache it takes to make that money? Were you ever taught in seminary to appreciate what your parents have done for you? This is the very first middah that the Torah teaches us. Adam was criticized for not being makir tov that G-d gave him Chava. This comes well before any chumros that you learned. Don't you think that your parents, at the very least, deserve at least one word - "thanks"?

Your year in Eretz Yisroel is a privilege and a luxury. No, it is not coming to you. It is not your birthright. It is precisely this "kumt mir" attitude that is so distasteful and the cause of much discord. It has fostered arrogance among some of our youth. You should be in awe of your parents. Ten months in a seminary apparently did not make you smarter, better, wiser or more experienced than your parents. That you may know a few more chumros, Rambans and halachos than your parents does not render them inferior to you. Indeed, the tone and content of your letter show that you have much to learn.

A Parent With Priorities In Order

Dusiznies: 

Now that the Rabbonim are in a mode of doing “Takonis” for weddings, I thinks its time to make a “Takana” to scrap the whole "Seminary in Eretz Yisroel" business. There are really great Seminaries here in the States. As far as having your daughter have an "Experience in Israel" is concerned, I propose sending our daughters to Israel for the summer after High School in a supervised controlled camp. It will save thousands upon thousands of dollars!

It won't happen though! Why?

I want to know why there isn’t any “Takones” for the prohibitive costs of the tuition of an Israeli based Seminary? Why are the costs of these Seminaries that brainwash our daughters to marry men that will never carry out what they promised in the Ketubah,  the same as a wedding?

Maybe, just maybe, the Rabbonim want these Seminaries to continue in business to push the "learning" agenda to keep the Rabbonim in business. 

I want to know why there aren't any Takones to stop the bleeding of Jewish Hard Earned Money!

Its ok to limit the number of musicians at weddings (thereby ripping away the Parnassah of many hard working family supporting young men).

But its not ok to stop stuffing tens of thousands of dollars in the pockets of the Seminary Administrators.  Makes sense???