I see that the Jewish people are in a spiritual situation that is serious . I have been hoping to emphasize the importance of learning the Avi Ezri in the hope that learning that book would save our souls.
Too many false prophets and demonic religious teachers claim to represent Torah.
The religious world is an scam pretending to represent Torah, while in fact seducing people into the Dark Side of worship of religious teachers by means of using the appearance of Jewish rituals
So the book of Rav Shach I think is perhaps the only thing that can help. Everything else can be perverted. Even Musar and even Gemara, Rashi, Tosphot.
One should have a fast session in it and an in depth one. The fast one should be just to say the words in order and go on until you have finished the whole book word for word. The slow one is more difficult to describe. To do a slow session in the Avi Ezri you will need to pick one chapter and get the sources associated with it like the Gemaras that it is written on and the Rambam also.
[Appendix: The Avi Ezri is the book of Rav Elezar Menachem Shach on the Rambam. It is in essence close to the Chidusei HaRambam of Reb Chaim Soloveitchik. But slightly different. There are few or no יסודות (foundational principles). That is he does not depend on finding some underlying principle to explain things, but rather takes a common sense approach to answering contradictions and problems in the Rambam and the Gemara. It is deep while at the same time being much more understandable than the Chidushei HaRambam.
In the past I have said to learn it because it is a good thing. Now I am trying to make my point a little clearer. The difference is a doctor who says, "Take this medicine because it is good for you," and the doctor who says the same thing but puts it in this way,"Take this medicine so you do not die."
A יסוד is foundational principle. Reb Chaim depends on these very much. He starts in the normal way of finding some contradiction in the Rambam, or between the Rambam and the Gemara. Then he introduces a axiom. Then tries to answer the problem based on the axiom. Rav Shach also begins the same way, but skips the idea of introducing some axiom though he might end up with one.
Instead of Torah and the Oral Law people get interested in Kabalah
Kabalah might be a negative thing. It might be similar to New Age cults and such. After all how is it that it got to be so widely and wildly accepted in the religious world? I am not sure how to answer this? From what I can tell there might be some reason to think the entire acceptance of it as a legitimate part of Judaism might have been a mistake.
In any case it is hard to see any good that comes out of it.
However sometimes it seems people that were good did learn the Zohar and the Ari. And that does not seem like a bad thing. After all the Ari is just developing a modification of a neo- platonic system and using it to explain the Torah. Still you have to wonder is there perhaps some kind of bad energy mixed up with the whole thing? Based on what we have seen for the last centuries as Kabalah became popular we certainly did not see people improving in any way because of learning it.
What might be going on is that people are putting anything that smacks of the Dark Side all in one trash basket and throwing it all out without inspecting the particulars of each case. Thus they would be putting the cult that the Gra signed the excommunication on and Cabala and New Age and Hinduism all together and saying that it is underneath all the same dark side. This might be the best approach.
Too many false prophets and demonic religious teachers claim to represent Torah.
The religious world is an scam pretending to represent Torah, while in fact seducing people into the Dark Side of worship of religious teachers by means of using the appearance of Jewish rituals
So the book of Rav Shach I think is perhaps the only thing that can help. Everything else can be perverted. Even Musar and even Gemara, Rashi, Tosphot.
One should have a fast session in it and an in depth one. The fast one should be just to say the words in order and go on until you have finished the whole book word for word. The slow one is more difficult to describe. To do a slow session in the Avi Ezri you will need to pick one chapter and get the sources associated with it like the Gemaras that it is written on and the Rambam also.
[Appendix: The Avi Ezri is the book of Rav Elezar Menachem Shach on the Rambam. It is in essence close to the Chidusei HaRambam of Reb Chaim Soloveitchik. But slightly different. There are few or no יסודות (foundational principles). That is he does not depend on finding some underlying principle to explain things, but rather takes a common sense approach to answering contradictions and problems in the Rambam and the Gemara. It is deep while at the same time being much more understandable than the Chidushei HaRambam.
In the past I have said to learn it because it is a good thing. Now I am trying to make my point a little clearer. The difference is a doctor who says, "Take this medicine because it is good for you," and the doctor who says the same thing but puts it in this way,"Take this medicine so you do not die."
A יסוד is foundational principle. Reb Chaim depends on these very much. He starts in the normal way of finding some contradiction in the Rambam, or between the Rambam and the Gemara. Then he introduces a axiom. Then tries to answer the problem based on the axiom. Rav Shach also begins the same way, but skips the idea of introducing some axiom though he might end up with one.
Instead of Torah and the Oral Law people get interested in Kabalah
Kabalah might be a negative thing. It might be similar to New Age cults and such. After all how is it that it got to be so widely and wildly accepted in the religious world? I am not sure how to answer this? From what I can tell there might be some reason to think the entire acceptance of it as a legitimate part of Judaism might have been a mistake.
In any case it is hard to see any good that comes out of it.
However sometimes it seems people that were good did learn the Zohar and the Ari. And that does not seem like a bad thing. After all the Ari is just developing a modification of a neo- platonic system and using it to explain the Torah. Still you have to wonder is there perhaps some kind of bad energy mixed up with the whole thing? Based on what we have seen for the last centuries as Kabalah became popular we certainly did not see people improving in any way because of learning it.
What might be going on is that people are putting anything that smacks of the Dark Side all in one trash basket and throwing it all out without inspecting the particulars of each case. Thus they would be putting the cult that the Gra signed the excommunication on and Cabala and New Age and Hinduism all together and saying that it is underneath all the same dark side. This might be the best approach.
