When I was in Shar Yashuv [Rav Freifeld's yeshiva in Far Rockaway] and in the Mir in Brooklyn I did not want to hear about secular learning. This was in spite of the fact that Rav Freifeld told to me to take classes in Brooklyn College.
This was as you can see not a matter of my belief system, but rather I felt I had found something amazing, awesome, powerful and full of holiness in the Litvak {Lithuanian} Yeshiva.
I had already had a full stomach of secular learning for the past 12 years from kindergarten until 12th grade.
But this was more of a matter of finding a kind of synthesis between learning Torah and keeping Torah. These two things were tightly bonded in the Litvak Yeshiva environment.
[I have not been recently a strong advocate of the Litvak yeshiva in recent years because of later experiences as I have hinted to a few times. But I have not gone into these later experiences for a few reasons. The main thing is: "Abuse does not cancel use." The fact that people can misuse an institution does not invalidate its proper use.]
This applies to institutions as much as anything else. Maybe even more.
Nowadays the religious world is against the secular learning not from any kind of involvement in Torah. The religious world sadlly gives a great living example of everything wrong with religious fanaticism. The religious world has external rituals but not the essence. [But they do have the "cult of personality" which is not really any different than any other groups that do the same.]
[I should mention that after the few years at the Mir I did not do much learning Torah. So to me it is clear that without those few concentrated years of learning Torah I would not have gotten very far.
The fact is the Enlightenment was an attack on religious values. But was motivated by much of the kind of behavior I have seen in the religious world. So what I try to do is to keep a sense of balance.
[This aspect of balance in keeping Torah I saw in my parents, and in Musar. But Musar is generally misinterpreted to mean religious fanaticism. But then I also saw it in the Guide for the Perplexed of the Rambam and that book is harder for people to willfully misinterpret.
Reb Freifeld I should mention stressed lots of review. To a large degree I have to agree with this.It i just hard to find the right balance. Recently in learning gemara and Rav Shach I have found review to be the only way to make progress. And now I am seeing this in Physics also.
I have to mention that Rav Freifeld held so strongly about review that even for beginners like myself he was very firm about it. Ten times review for anything you learned. That was his "thing."
I should mention that in spite of all I have written, one must keep in mind to have loyalty to Torah, --not towards any yeshiva. If a yeshiva helps provide an environment where you can learn, then by all means support it. But if it is just a private country club [as so many are] for some supposedly elite group, then do not go near it.
[I did not ignore Rav Freifeld. It as rare to get to ten times review but I tried. And recently I would take one basic page of Gemara or chapter of Rav Shach and just read it through every day --which is not exactly what Rav Freifeld was saying to do but I have found this to be workable. [My learning partner David Bronson was extremely stubborn to stay on every word in Tosphot until we would get it-as you can see from my notes I wrote on the subjects in Bava Metzia we learned together.
This was as you can see not a matter of my belief system, but rather I felt I had found something amazing, awesome, powerful and full of holiness in the Litvak {Lithuanian} Yeshiva.
I had already had a full stomach of secular learning for the past 12 years from kindergarten until 12th grade.
But this was more of a matter of finding a kind of synthesis between learning Torah and keeping Torah. These two things were tightly bonded in the Litvak Yeshiva environment.
[I have not been recently a strong advocate of the Litvak yeshiva in recent years because of later experiences as I have hinted to a few times. But I have not gone into these later experiences for a few reasons. The main thing is: "Abuse does not cancel use." The fact that people can misuse an institution does not invalidate its proper use.]
This applies to institutions as much as anything else. Maybe even more.
Nowadays the religious world is against the secular learning not from any kind of involvement in Torah. The religious world sadlly gives a great living example of everything wrong with religious fanaticism. The religious world has external rituals but not the essence. [But they do have the "cult of personality" which is not really any different than any other groups that do the same.]
[I should mention that after the few years at the Mir I did not do much learning Torah. So to me it is clear that without those few concentrated years of learning Torah I would not have gotten very far.
The fact is the Enlightenment was an attack on religious values. But was motivated by much of the kind of behavior I have seen in the religious world. So what I try to do is to keep a sense of balance.
[This aspect of balance in keeping Torah I saw in my parents, and in Musar. But Musar is generally misinterpreted to mean religious fanaticism. But then I also saw it in the Guide for the Perplexed of the Rambam and that book is harder for people to willfully misinterpret.
Reb Freifeld I should mention stressed lots of review. To a large degree I have to agree with this.It i just hard to find the right balance. Recently in learning gemara and Rav Shach I have found review to be the only way to make progress. And now I am seeing this in Physics also.
I have to mention that Rav Freifeld held so strongly about review that even for beginners like myself he was very firm about it. Ten times review for anything you learned. That was his "thing."
I should mention that in spite of all I have written, one must keep in mind to have loyalty to Torah, --not towards any yeshiva. If a yeshiva helps provide an environment where you can learn, then by all means support it. But if it is just a private country club [as so many are] for some supposedly elite group, then do not go near it.
[I did not ignore Rav Freifeld. It as rare to get to ten times review but I tried. And recently I would take one basic page of Gemara or chapter of Rav Shach and just read it through every day --which is not exactly what Rav Freifeld was saying to do but I have found this to be workable. [My learning partner David Bronson was extremely stubborn to stay on every word in Tosphot until we would get it-as you can see from my notes I wrote on the subjects in Bava Metzia we learned together.
