I had in mind to mention the 10,000 hour rule. That is the amount of time it takes to become expert in any serious discipline. And I wanted to discuss the problem this makes for learning Torah and a vocation. Plus the time factor that people adding to the prayers during the ages has made. These are interesting topics.
There really is no short cut towards Torah, but one thing I have discovered that does help the learning is the book Chafetz Chaim. That is care in Lashon Hara. [Not to slander.] [I should add that warning people about a bad group is not slander--even if they do not accept what you say.]
. People in yeshiva that were more careful in Lashon Hara simply did better in their studies. This might not help a lot to shorten the 10,000 hours but at least it helps that the time accumulates. And in any case as far as Torah is concerned 10.000 was no where near enough for me to get anywhere. That is even with learning with Reb Shmuel Berenabum, and doing the Maharasha and Tosphot and the Pnei Yehushua still I had no even gotten my feet wet. It took many years after that to finally start figuring out what was going on in Shas. It is like playing the violin. It is not just the time but the continued effort over many years.
In any case because learning a vocation also takes a similar amount of time it is hard to know how to balance Torah with a vocation.
One thing I think would help would be to shorten the daily prayers. Look at the Sidur of Saadia Gaon. The entire first blessing of Shema is two lines. Why the prayers are so long is simple. People found that they were going through times of persecution and the regular prayers were not helping. Some person came along and said "these is the way I have been praying all these years and if you add these things to the prayer that will help." and thus the prayers got longer and longer. It is organized schizo tendencies.
Birchat Hamazon is another example. And besides this the grammar needs correcting. Bore nefashot should be בורא נפשות רבות וחסרונן על כל מה שברא להחיות בהן נפש כל חי ברוך אתה ה' חי העולמים, That is nefesh is feminine. and one needs a bracha at the end.
It did also occur to me to explain a little bit about what Reb Chaim Soloveitchik and Rav Shach are doing. You might say they are writing the Tosphot that the Rambam would have written. That is they see the Rambam is totally different than Tosphot. So they ask why? What would the Rambam have answered to the kinds of questions that Tosphot was asking in order to bring the Rambam to his conclusions?
There really is no short cut towards Torah, but one thing I have discovered that does help the learning is the book Chafetz Chaim. That is care in Lashon Hara. [Not to slander.] [I should add that warning people about a bad group is not slander--even if they do not accept what you say.]
. People in yeshiva that were more careful in Lashon Hara simply did better in their studies. This might not help a lot to shorten the 10,000 hours but at least it helps that the time accumulates. And in any case as far as Torah is concerned 10.000 was no where near enough for me to get anywhere. That is even with learning with Reb Shmuel Berenabum, and doing the Maharasha and Tosphot and the Pnei Yehushua still I had no even gotten my feet wet. It took many years after that to finally start figuring out what was going on in Shas. It is like playing the violin. It is not just the time but the continued effort over many years.
In any case because learning a vocation also takes a similar amount of time it is hard to know how to balance Torah with a vocation.
One thing I think would help would be to shorten the daily prayers. Look at the Sidur of Saadia Gaon. The entire first blessing of Shema is two lines. Why the prayers are so long is simple. People found that they were going through times of persecution and the regular prayers were not helping. Some person came along and said "these is the way I have been praying all these years and if you add these things to the prayer that will help." and thus the prayers got longer and longer. It is organized schizo tendencies.
Birchat Hamazon is another example. And besides this the grammar needs correcting. Bore nefashot should be בורא נפשות רבות וחסרונן על כל מה שברא להחיות בהן נפש כל חי ברוך אתה ה' חי העולמים, That is nefesh is feminine. and one needs a bracha at the end.
It did also occur to me to explain a little bit about what Reb Chaim Soloveitchik and Rav Shach are doing. You might say they are writing the Tosphot that the Rambam would have written. That is they see the Rambam is totally different than Tosphot. So they ask why? What would the Rambam have answered to the kinds of questions that Tosphot was asking in order to bring the Rambam to his conclusions?
