In Ukraine even the churches have armed guards.

 A concentrated nuclear war would not be the end of all mankind. But it still ought to be considered a sufficient risk that would prevent France and NATO to stop sending troops to  attack Russian soldiers. And besides the unstated principle here is that Russia considers this war to be justified. And though no one in the West cares to take that into consideration, still it is what Russia thinks. Not just because  of Ukraine always being a part of the Russian Empire, but also because the criminal elements have taken over. You can not really see this from the West, but if you have ever been there, you know exactly what I mean.

In fact there is no such thing as one united Ukraine. Anyone can tell you that there are two distinct Ukraines. One is the well known bandits --the people that have theft and murder deep inside their DNA. The other are the vast majority who are close to angels in their good character. The trouble is that it is always the bandits that get the power and control. Thus without Russian rule the place becomes a nightmare even for the average Ukrainian. This is the reason even the churches there need armed guards. There is just a bit too much of the wrong kind of element.

 While at the Mir in NY I heard once from the head of the kollel there a musar "shmooze" on Tuesday night. He is the grandson of the Mashgiach of Ponovitch. And that was the very start of his giving a Musar talk on Tuesday night. It was devoted to the subject of "to bear a yoke with your friend".That is one of the 48 means by which Torah is acquired. He had heard from his grandfather that that is the most important of them all. 

 

 

 

לא תעשה לך כל תמונה "Do not make an picture"

 Even though I do not want to be overly legalistic, still it occurred to me yesterday how a lot of the laws of the Torah are ignored or even worse--explained away. לא תעשה לך כל תמונה "Do not make a picture." ''Temuna'' means image or form. It does not say that it has to be 3-d. [In fact, this was noticed by Protestants who then spent their creative efforts in the direction of music instead of the visual arts--as had been the case with the Catholics.]

There are other examples. Interest is well known example, for the banks in Israel have the "היתר עיסקא" (heter iska) which is sort of ok, but also somewhat awkward. This is towards the end on Bava Metzia [I forget the page number.] But the main idea is still that the possibility of loss has to be included in the deal which doesn't seem to happen in practice. 

The Gemara says: אין מקרא יוצא מידי פשוטו "The verse does not come out of its simple explanation." The Gra said this principle applies to all verses. 

[There are lots more: Honor thy father and thy mother. Thou Shalt Not Steal. etc. ]

 I thought to mention that my mother in law, Mrs. Rita Finn was on the Kinder-transport that  her parents sent her on to save her from the Nazis. But though being saved, she was severely abused in England which gave her a lifelong hatred of men.  Still she struggled to be a good wife and raise good children--which she did. After all the only reason my wife got married to me was that I was at Shar Yashuv --an authentic Litvak Yeshiva and she could feel and sense the taste of authentic Torah. 

It is sad  that the difficulties that people go through  can end up defining them.

But I do not think there is any cure for this sort of thing. People's emotional wounds can be much deeper than physical wounds.

Still I do have one suggestion, Musar. That is the idea of Rav Israel Salanter to learn the canonical four books of ethics, חובות לבבות מסילת ישרים שערי תשובה  אורחות צדיקים for learning the right attitudes can go a long way to reliving one from the burden of harmful attitudes.