Song for the glory of the God of Israel, r45 3-4 time.

r45 B flat major  r1  r2 r43 r3 r4 r5 f major r6 r7 r8 C major

An American Folk Song about the Land of Israel. I should mention I was in Safed for seven years in the north part of Israel and this song is no exaggeration.

On Jordan's stormy banks I stand
And cast a wishful eye
To Canaan's fair and happy land
Where my possessions lie


There generous fruits that never fail
On trees immortal grow
There rocks and hills, and brooks and vales
With milk and honey flow

 I am bound for the promised land
I am bound for the promised land
Oh, who will come and go with me?
I am bound for the promised land



Oh, the transporting, rapturous scene
That rises to my sight
Sweet fields arrayed in living green
And rivers of delight

When shall I reach that happy place
And be forever blest
When shall I  see my Father's face
And in His bosom rest

I am bound for the promised land
I am bound for the promised land
Oh, who will come and go with me?

I am bound for the promised land

_________________________________________________________________________

I should mention I was in Safed for seven years in the north part of Israel and this song is no exaggeration.
In fact I think it is quite accurate  a description of how things were for me in Israel for the time I merited to be there.

The trouble with religious teachers is they are not trustworthy. Friendship is just a word, but money is forever. They get what they can from other people. Their obligations to others is null. Their attitude is: "There is only me. There is only what I can get for myself. Trust no one." And thus, no matter what you do for them. No matter how much you try, when you are in need, they will always turn their back on you.

There should be a list exposing the rotten religious teachers for what they really are. Anti Torah, Anti Jewish, anti Morality, that have penetrated the body of sincere Torah keeping Jews.


It can be helpful in understanding this  to take a
voluntary organisation like a yeshiva or a synagogue as the relevant social practice or concept, with the policies  and  principles  written  into  the  organisation’s  constitution  and
rules and the leadership body responsible for carrying out of these principles.
When a Trojan horse of religious teachers has entered the walls of Troy and managed to infiltrate into positions of leadership it is safe to say we are in a crisis.


This list is not hard to make. All religious teachers in LA are Trojan horses. Even places you would expect to be better because they learn Torah are in fact no exception.
There ought to be an official list that people could add to if their experiences with some religious teachers show that that religious teachers is in fact a Trojan horse. There are plenty of religious teachers to fill the bill and in fact so many that perhaps there ought to be a short list of the few one that are in fact loyal to Torah.

The trouble with religious teachers is they are not trustworthy.  Friendship is just a word, but money  is  forever.  They get what they can from other people.  Their obligations to others is null. Their attitude is: "There is only me.  There is only what I can get for myself.  Trust no one."  And thus, no matter what you do for them, no matter how much you try, when you are in need, they will always turn their back on you.


If it would be that they are rotten people I would not bother writing about it. But what really bother me is they give the holy Torah a bad name. When people find out how really bad the religious teachers are they tend to attribute the cause to the Torah.
However it is true that even without that reason, I would have an obligation to warn people about a stumbling block. But I just do not feel that degree of social responsibility to warn people about every bad group out there. But the rotten religious teachers is more close to home. So at least this one group I think it is proper to let people know about.

Perhaps we lack a right to engage in activities that reasonably appear to show an intention to harm or impose unacceptable risks on others. For example, I may not run towards you brandishing a sword, even if I do not in fact intend to hurt you. The principle also explains why we punish people for merely attempting or conspiring to commit crimes. Thus, suppose that people who read the Communist  Manifesto are slightly more likely than the average person to attempt the violent overthrow of the government. (This might be because such people are more likely to already have designs for overthrowing the government, and/or because the reading of the book occasionally causes people to acquire such intentions.) I take it that this would not show there is no on the face of it  right to read the Communist Manifesto—though perhaps the situation would be otherwise if the reading of the Manifesto had a very strong tendency to cause revolutionary efforts, or if the occurrence of this effect did not depend on further free choices on the part of the reader. But let us take the Koran. There is a strong tendency on the part of people that read it to take violent actions against Jews and Christians. This should be taken as good cause to  throw it out. Similarly I think we can show similar effects from that certain books of the cult that the Gra signed the  excommunication on. That is they may not directly cause violence, but  cause insanity. In other words reading any book we have to assume is OK unless some  kind of meme inside of it seems to cause people to swallow it and become violent or insane. It is for this reason that pharmacies are not allowed to sell poison under a label "Pain killer. Guaranteed to relieve all your ills." [The advertising would be absolutely true. Still it would be against the law.]

Rebuke

I saw recently in the Even Shelema which is a collection of statements from the Gra that even when you know the person will not accept your rebuke. I seem to recall the Shelah say the same thing. On the other hand one does need to know how to deliver rebuke. If one can not do it without anger then certainly he is not obligated. And the most obvious point is one does need to know when something is truly wrong or not.


There are good arguments for free will. Michael Huemer presented a few and so did Maimonides. But in any case once there is free will you have to assume that men and women can choose good or evil. The only moral superiority anyone has is when they choose good. That is clearly what the Torah holds.
On a side note there is a command in the Torah to rebuke your fellow man or woman when you see them doing wrong.

R48 D Minor

race

 race. I have thought for a long time that the way  nature operates to take  one species and make it into two or more is to start slowly with race.  I based this idea on Darwin. The idea is that you take one species and separate it. You put one group on some island somewhere. Then you take another group and put it elsewhere. After a short amount of time that one species will be two species. That is what race is. Race is you take a group of humans they go down to Africa. Another group goes north. Eventually they become two species.

But added to this I need a little wisdom from the Talmud: that is is not a good idea to go against nature,- because nature will win.

But that still does not mean anything about how to treat other people. It has to do with groups but not individuals.