Based on the idea of Rav Nahman that there is even such a thing as Torah scholar who is a demon, the question is- how far can you take this? How far is there suspicion on anything they say. After all, if lets say you have a delicious chocolate Sunday ice cream, but mixed within is  slight bit of arsenic? How good can that be? And the question ought to be asked,-- after it is known that this is not just in theory, but in fact in this very time and age now there are countless of victims. So the issue is very relevant.

My feeling is to follow the basic, authentic, straight path of the Gra and Rav Shach, and straight Musar. But it does not seem simple to do so, or what kind of "Birur" [sifting] is needed- even on a private level. One solution I have thought is to simply bury my head in the sand, and walk in the path of straight Torah as well as I can. Yet I feel there probably is something important about at least letting others know so at least others can be forewarned.[If I at least warn people, I do not have their blood on my hands. I guess that is the most I can do.] להרים מכשול מדרך עמי

F sharp minor  Oboe, French horn, 3 bassoons, piccolo, violin.

Howard Bloom (in The Lucifer Principle) explained why people do jihad because of a social meme that gets hard wired into their mentality. Like an electric circuits board that before it is hardened in the oven can be rewired in a different configuration. But after it has become hardened, it can not be undone except by taking out all the wiring.

[In the Gemara this is called "Girsa DeYankusa" [learning of youth], i.e., what one learns when he or she is young sticks.]
So you have to try to get the wiring on your circuit board attached well before it get hardened.
And that applies I think even in the beginning of the day. To start with Musar. That is why I think it is good to start the day right at first with the whole page of the Levels of Man of Navardok (Madragat Haadam) about trust in God.


However one needs care to decide what values are in fact good. "There is a crowd that willingly follows anything that moves." Have courage. Stand on right principle.

Objective morality is possible to know by prima facie evidence. [Dr Michael Huemer goes into this.The point is open in the gemara that there are reasons for the commandments and they are knowable. So the commandments are not good because God said so, but they are God said so because they lead to good. The question in the Gemara is between R. Shimon ben Yocahi whther you go by the reason for the commands or by the written word. See Bava Metzia page 119.]

From my little reading of history of Spain I recall a theme. Muslims took over areas of Spain. But the people were Christian.  [So in those areas the rulers were Muslim, but the population were Christian.] That was the setting for the next stage. "Soft jihad" you might call it. That was like this. Muslim adults would be great people. But their teenage boys would venture into the towns of the Christian and do acts of violence. More or less events of jihad. So two opposite streams tended to soften the population to eventually accept Islam. That is kind of how I recall the events in history but I have not read upon this in detail. [I think it was this process which ignited the Martyrs of Cordoba where some people would seek to be martyrs by going up to some Muslim and opening insulting them knowing the penalty.] So it seems like jihad sometimes does work.

[ It is a political problem. And I think that the Constitution of the USA has solved the political problem on how to create a just society. But it seems to work mainly with a Protestant society. So how could one deal with the issue of a different kind of population in a society that is "post Christian"{lukewarm of not at all}?  But looking at Hegel I did not see much helpful, because his forte was philosophy, not politics. Socialism has the basic problem that the very first Plymouth colony discovered when the Pilgrims went to settle in America. Why should the industrious work to feed the lazy?  So when the founding fathers of the USA were dealing with this problem they decided that the Constitution and their system could only work with a kind of people that had an essential set of values. [Basically Christian values as in family, belief in God, in kindness.]

the Gra and Rav Shach

The importance of the Gra and Rav Shach is not to follow them in every detail. The way I see things is that there is a kind of בירור האמת [the truth coming into the clearing like a meadow you find in the middle of a forest -to borrow an analogy from Heidegger.] The point is that sometimes even a great tzadik gains only certain aspects of the truth--but not the whole thing. So I see a kind of dialectical process that happens over time.
Even if Bava Sali was a great tzadik, it does not mean he never made a mistake. We do not even say that about Moses who made at least one major mistake that is recorded in Numbers. We do not say even the greatest tzadik does not and can not make a mistake. Even a sin. But the tzadik tries to repent. And if he does not know or understand his mistake in this world, he tries to correct it in the next world.
The the issue is not to choose a particular tzadik to follow. Rather the point is balance. To find the good values that one ought to stick with and some way to determine what kinds of people or ideas come from the Dark Side [the Sitra Achra] in order to reject what is evil.


[To me it seems that the Musar path of Rav Israel Salanter was in fact very much balanced. Still the "Musar movement" became a movement instead of a path of personal improvement as implied by the words itself. But the actual "Igeret HaMusar" is about learning musar, not making any kind of movement..]

I should add that the path of the Gra certainly is that of "Iyun" deep learning, even though there is an aspect of "Bekiut" [fast learning--saying the words and going on] also. There is a kind of balnce between these two types that I saw in the Mir in NY.

The path of the Gra

The path of the Gra involves learning Torah as a prime ideal. But I want to add to that learning Physics and Math because of discovering this in the Musar of the Rishonim [first authorities, i.e the authorities of the Middle Ages] even though in the achronim [later authorities after the Beit Yoseph.] the opposite is their approach.
 [The Rishonim also add Metaphysics.]
The way to accomplish this I believe is by the  Derech HaLimud [method of learning] of Rav Nahman of saying the words and going on.
(Sicha 76 in Sichot HaRan).
That would mean going through the Gemara with Tosphot and Maharsha. [That is the Oral Law]. In understanding the profound aspect of the Gemara I also think one must add the Avi Ezri of Rav Shach. In terms of the Math and Physics, I think one should have a session in getting through Algebraic Topology and Quantum Field Theory and String Theory. [But I have no specific texts in mind.] [As for Metaphysics, clearly the Rishonim were referring to the Metaphysics of Aristotle. But I would add Kant, Leonard Nelson, and Hegel. (I do not have much of an idea how to resolve the difference between Hegel and Nelson.]


[I hope this is clear, But just in case let me add that the idea is to have a session in Gemara Tosphot and Maharsha every day. That is to do a few pages just straight. Then put in a place marker. Then pick up an Avi Ezri of Rav Shach and also go through a few pages. Put in a place marker. Then Physics. Same as above. Then a few sessions in Mathematics.]

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