The Oral Law is not a porous concept. It is fairly well defined. The two Talmuds, the Mechilta and Sifra, Sifri, Tosephta, and the Midrashim. When the Zohar came out there was (and still is) debate if to include it in the set. But later on books are at best are commentaries, not the thing in itself.
With so many people trying to pull you into their cults, it is easy to lose focus on this.
So I suggest either plowing through this material on your own at home after work, or to find a straight Lithuanian yeshiva in your neighborhood to go after school or work to do this.
I remember when I was at the Mirrer Yeshiva in NY, there was some kind of after school program where students from the local high schools would come in the afternoon to learn Torah and get credit at school for this work. I don't know why this has to be a solely NY kind of thing. Why could it not be in Tel Aviv or Jerusalem or Baltimore?
However care should be taken to exclude cults. There is a significant danger level that very damaging cults could take advantage of this arrangement. For that reason I have stressed that this should be only with straight Lithuanian yeshivas. And these types of places can be hard to make. In fact in the whole world there are only a few in Jerusalem, Bnei Brak and Flatbush. There is something hard about making such places. I could count the sum total of legitimate Litvak yeshivas on two hands.
What makes a legitimate Lithuanian yeshiva? Certainly lack of "shtick" games plays a role. Schedule also. But I think the main component is the Rosh Yeshiva. The Rosh Yeshiva has been learning for about twenty years before he became a rosh yeshiva. He is not a novice. He has not been spending his time making money for the yeshiva. he has been learning. He is like a doctor who did his time in pre med and then in med school. Without that period of training he is not a doctor but a dangerous quake.
[Most roshei yeshivas are in dangerous quakes because of the fact that hey did not put in the time.]
The students are also a factor. If you have to pay them to learn then they are not worth money. No one ever paid students to learn in Torah VeDaat, the Mirrer yeshiva or Chaim Berlin. Frankly it is hard to know why people learn in these places but something motivates them. And what ever it is that motivates them better not be money if you want the place to be authentic.
Appendix: I did not take part of that program teaching high school students Torah. I am not sure what they were teaching the students. I assume it was not Gemara, Rashi, and Topshot. It was probably something more basic like the Five Books of Moses in Hebrew. That is my best guess. In general people go through the Five Books of Moses anyway every year but the students were secular students so I assume they were probably needing an introduction. My own background was such that in fact I did spend time on the Five Books of Moses before I got started on Talmud. That was at Beverly Hills High School and in the Reform Temple, Temple Israel of Hollywood. And even later when I got to yeshiva I spend my first year doing a lot of work on the Five Books of Moses. It was only in my second year that the Talmud studies started taking precedence.
With so many people trying to pull you into their cults, it is easy to lose focus on this.
So I suggest either plowing through this material on your own at home after work, or to find a straight Lithuanian yeshiva in your neighborhood to go after school or work to do this.
I remember when I was at the Mirrer Yeshiva in NY, there was some kind of after school program where students from the local high schools would come in the afternoon to learn Torah and get credit at school for this work. I don't know why this has to be a solely NY kind of thing. Why could it not be in Tel Aviv or Jerusalem or Baltimore?
However care should be taken to exclude cults. There is a significant danger level that very damaging cults could take advantage of this arrangement. For that reason I have stressed that this should be only with straight Lithuanian yeshivas. And these types of places can be hard to make. In fact in the whole world there are only a few in Jerusalem, Bnei Brak and Flatbush. There is something hard about making such places. I could count the sum total of legitimate Litvak yeshivas on two hands.
What makes a legitimate Lithuanian yeshiva? Certainly lack of "shtick" games plays a role. Schedule also. But I think the main component is the Rosh Yeshiva. The Rosh Yeshiva has been learning for about twenty years before he became a rosh yeshiva. He is not a novice. He has not been spending his time making money for the yeshiva. he has been learning. He is like a doctor who did his time in pre med and then in med school. Without that period of training he is not a doctor but a dangerous quake.
[Most roshei yeshivas are in dangerous quakes because of the fact that hey did not put in the time.]
The students are also a factor. If you have to pay them to learn then they are not worth money. No one ever paid students to learn in Torah VeDaat, the Mirrer yeshiva or Chaim Berlin. Frankly it is hard to know why people learn in these places but something motivates them. And what ever it is that motivates them better not be money if you want the place to be authentic.
Appendix: I did not take part of that program teaching high school students Torah. I am not sure what they were teaching the students. I assume it was not Gemara, Rashi, and Topshot. It was probably something more basic like the Five Books of Moses in Hebrew. That is my best guess. In general people go through the Five Books of Moses anyway every year but the students were secular students so I assume they were probably needing an introduction. My own background was such that in fact I did spend time on the Five Books of Moses before I got started on Talmud. That was at Beverly Hills High School and in the Reform Temple, Temple Israel of Hollywood. And even later when I got to yeshiva I spend my first year doing a lot of work on the Five Books of Moses. It was only in my second year that the Talmud studies started taking precedence.
