Taking Musar seriously

The beginning of my taking Musar seriously was on Rosh Hashanah in the Mir in NY. It was during Musaf [a prayer on Rosh Hashana] and I had the book of a disciple of Reb Israel Salanter, The Light of Israel by Rav Isaac Blazer.
Going through the introduction, I got an idea of what it is all about. However I should add, that I was in any case attracted to the Mir in the first place because I felt it had an atmosphere of Fear of God.

At any rate, I got into it deeply. But that was in a way I can not describe now at all because I fell from that higher state of consciousness.

And I would like to add that it is possible for people to come to a higher state of consciousness and to fall to a lower state. Not just individuals, but even whole countries.


The main way I got into that  higher state of consciousness was simply doing the Musar thing as it had been originally accepted in Litvak Yeshivas--that is to learn Musar about a 1.5 hours per day and the rest of the day Gemara. I do not say that I could do that now, but that is what I was doing back then, and I found it   to be an amazing method and path.

[I admit I might have over done it. But I figure it is better to overdo it than to under do it.]



What I'm trying to say is that at the Mir in NY and also in other Litvak yeshivas, the Musar session is short. It is 20 minutes before Minha [afternoon prayer] and 15 minutes before Maariv [evening prayer]. However in Europe the Musar sessions were longer and if you added them up, they came to about about 1.5 hours per day.

I also think that the approach of the Boy Scouts is important--that is one learn good traits by action. The way the Boy Scouts do that is to learn good traits as an aspect of survival skills. [The Boy Scouts used to be more based on faith. Sadly they fell from that.]


[I should add that Rav Shach thought that the Musar movement was very important. I mainly can see the importance of Musar in terms of the ideas that it implants into one. It helps to develop a healthy world view. And people in their teens and 20's are looking for making sense of the world around them. And Musar does a great job in giving an accurate representation of what the world is actually like, and what one's responsibilities in it are.  And for me I think the main effect of Musar was to help me form my world view and correct mistakes. I did not perceive any effect on my traits--though I might have missed that.]

[So why do Litvak yeshivas learn less Musar than advocated by Reb Israel Salanter. I imagine it is because of the "law of limited returns."That law indicates that there is an upper limit as to how effective it can be. It is like drinking water. It is good for you, but there is a limit.]

u92 music file

u92 F Major

u-92 nwc filw

"History is just one damn thing after another." (anonymous) This to some degree helps to understand the Rambam who saw learning history as Bitul Torah, a waste of time.

"History is just one damn thing after another." (anonymous)
This to some degree helps to understand the Rambam who saw learning history as Bitul Torah, a waste of time.
Yet there is some aspect of history that I think is important because it helps to understand the USA.  English History [especially the history of England after Elizabeth.] helps to understand the issues that became part of the USA Constitution.
And the USA was until around 1960 one of the great wonders of the world. But socialists could not stand to see the good times, and came over from Europe to destroy it by means of socialism, Therefore, it is important to understand the basic principles upon which the USA was founded.

After thought:
Democracy as in the USA actually stems from England with modifications based on English experiences with conflicts between with Parliament, and the King. So it has a long history. Even in ancient Rome elections took place. So the way democracy is understood in the USA is not actually all that new and has deep roots. So I feel it is unlikely to disappear any time soon.

On running for office in Rome

[The basic formula that made America great was the combination of Reason and Revelation. That is faith with reason.]

if you take the Rambam seriously about the importance of learning Physics that the way to go about it is to guard the first hour of the morning when you wake up for that alone. T

I am no expert but to seems to me that if you take the Rambam seriously about the importance of learning Physics that the way to go about it is to guard the first hour of the morning when you wake up for that alone. That is,- to get up and start right away immediately with no time lapse between waking up and getting started. [I think however a quike coffee is OK.]. And then just to say the words and go on as I mentioned before lots of times. [That is brought down in tractate Sabbath I think around page 63. Also the Musar book Paths of the Righteous brings that kind of learning. ]

[If you have a copy of Rav Shach's Avi Ezri or a Gemara,I think that is a good idea to  do them along with the Physics.  In fact I found learning Rav Shach's Avi Ezri and Tosphot to be a help to understanding Physics.]

Economic Equality

It seems if A lives a good life and B lives a vastly better life there is nothing wrong. Just the fact that they are not equal does not seem to matter at all to either one of them but only to  academic economists.

 Economic Equality seems to have nothing to recommend it as a goal except jealousy.   "Redistribution" is a kind way of saying "theft."

The problem seems to be kind of what you see in the philosophy of the Middle Ages. Axioms are picked that to them sounded good but to our ears seem strange. Then they go on to logical deductions from those axioms. But the deductions do not seem to hold water since the axioms themselves did not look solid.
Nowadays to convince young people of things the same process is done. They find some nice sounding slogan. Then draw the logical consequences from that slogan. Yet if you think about it you can tell there was nothing holding up the slogan in the first place but the fact that young people want to fit in with their peer group and the fact  that the slogan sounded nice.

critique against the Hegelian State by L T Hobhouse.

There was a well known critique against the Hegelian State by L T Hobhouse. Now it is more or less forgotten, but to me he makes some great points especially in the appendix where he brings out a major fallacy in Hegel's Theory of Right.

Edward Feser has gone back to Aquinas Michael, Huemer to Thomas Reid and the Intuitionists. But to me the best approach seems to be along the lines of Leonard Nelson. That Nelson school of thought [Kant-Friesian] anyway seems pretty close to Saadia Gaon and Maimonides--a lot more so than Hegel. [sunwall proves this on the web site of dr kelley ross]

Fries himself saw value in the approach of Hegel as he says in his history of philosophy, so i see value in the kant- fries school and hegel also.    

u91 u95 music files--bot in midi format

U-91 A MIDI File  U-95 B Minor