The Hunger Is Coming

This an old post of mine that I wrote before I stopped blogging. I'm sad to say that this will probably be my last post. I would have loved to continue my series on education, but I don't have the time to do this anymore.

The Hunger Is Coming

Shabbos 138b: When our sages came to Kerem B'yavneh they said: In the future the torah will be forgotten from yisroel as it is written (amos 8) "Behold days are coming... and I will send a hunger onto the land. Not a hunger for bread and not a drought for lack of water, only to hear the words of hashem." and it is written "they will search from the west to the north to the east to seek the word of hashem and they will not find". "The word of hashem" this is halacha. ad kan hagemara.

I am afraid that the hunger is coming. We may be approaching a time where we will have no one qualified to determine the proper halacha. I have this fear because I have visited Lakewood. From what I understand, there are many yeshivos in America that focus on educating yeshiva bochrim until they reach age 20. At that age, the options for them in America become very few and most of the bochrim go to learn in Israel. In Israel there are less yeshivas that cater to Americans and the yeshivas are larger. Most of the bochrim do  not stay in Israel forever, and when they come back their is only one yeshiva for them; Lakewood. There are a few others, but  they are very few.

So when you visit Lakewood you must keep in mind that this is IT. If torah is going to come from anywhere in America it's going to have to come from here, and that is frightening. The following is what I have gathered about the place. I urge anyone who cares about the future of torah in America to make their own investigations.

Problem 1:There are few rabbeim there. The rebbe talmid relationship is almost non-existent. A few people speak to the Roshei Hayeshivas in learning, some of the Roshei hayeshivas give chaburas once a week to something like 20 students, and the Roshei haYeshivas give a shiur kelali in each beis medrash (there are many  batei medrashim, numbers is the one thing Lakewood has) once a week. When this shiur is given a large percentage of the beis medrash leaves to learn elsewhere. The yeshiva has tried to combat this problem with the chaburah system. The Yeshiva makes it in everyones best interest to join a chabura of 15 - 50 students that will learn together. Every chaburah has a rosh hachabura. Theoretically it may be possible for students to develop a rebbe talmid relationship with the rosh hachabura. This, I am told, rarely works out that way, for a number of reasons and partly because the yeshiva is unwilling  or perhaps unable to be involved enough to make it work. I wonder if the lack of rabbeim in Lakewood comes from a lack of need (I've heard the claim that the students in Lakewood know so much that they have no need for rabbeim), or an inability to produce rabbeim.

Problem 2: The level of hasmada in Lakewood is lower than that of other yeshivas. A sizable amount of people are eating breakfast well into first seder. A sizable amount of people leave early. Almost no one is in the beis medrash during  their 2 hour lunch break. And then there's the infamous "coffee room" where we can find many of the students during seder. Why is the level of hasmada so low? I think that at one point, maybe it was when they hit 1000 students (they now have something like 4000), the yeshiva ceased to be a yeshiva. Without a yeshiva it's hard to promote a concept of sidrei yeshiva.

There is also the problem of the babysitters. They run their schedules to almost fit the yeshiva schedule. So students who have to drop off their children  must wait until after seder starts to do so and they must pick up their children bein hasedorim.
I don't know whose fault it is but there is definitely a problem with hasmada in Lakewood. The question you have to ask yourself when evaluating Lakewood is this: Who is working harder? The Baal habos, that works until late at night  without a 2 hour lunch break, and then has a night seder and devotes  an enormous portion of shabbos and sunday to learning, or the Lakewooder?

Problem 3:  The level of the learning is not high enough. Please don't take my word for it. Go to Lakewood and ask around. Ask people what they learnt last zman. If they learnt slowly see if they gained in depth. If they learnt quickly see if they remember what they learnt.

I'm very happy that we have the amount of torah in Lakewood that we do, but it's not nearly enough, and the entire frum world is in denial about it.

Yehoshua Weinberg

Alert Samuel Heilman! Another blog has slid (Sled? Slud? Slidden?) to the right. I'm trying to target a more chareidi audience. Believe it or not, there are chareidim that could appreciate an O Henry story.

More O Henry: A Harlem Tragedy

Harlem.

Mrs. Fink had dropped into Mrs. Cassidy's flat one flight below.

"Ain't it a beaut?" said Mrs. Cassidy.

She turned her face proudly for her friend Mrs. Fink to see. One eye
was nearly closed, with a great, greenish-purple bruise around it.
Her lip was cut and bleeding a little and there were red finger-marks
on each side of her neck.

"My husband wouldn't ever think of doing that to me," said Mrs.
Fink, concealing her envy.

"I wouldn't have a man," declared Mrs. Cassidy, "that didn't beat me
up at least once a week. Shows he thinks something of you. Say! but
that last dose Jack gave me wasn't no homeopathic one. I can see
stars yet. But he'll be the sweetest man in town for the rest of the
week to make up for it. This eye is good for theater tickets and a
silk shirt waist at the very least."

"I should hope," said Mrs. Fink, assuming complacency, "that Mr.
Fink is too much of a gentleman ever to raise his hand against me."

"Oh, go on, Maggie!" said Mrs. Cassidy, laughing and applying witch
hazel, "you're only jealous. Your old man is too frapped and slow
to ever give you a punch. He just sits down and practises physical
culture with a newspaper when he comes home--now ain't that the
truth?"

"Mr. Fink certainly peruses of the papers when he comes home,"
acknowledged Mrs. Fink, with a toss of her head; "but he certainly
don't ever make no Steve O'Donnell out of me just to amuse
himself--that's a sure thing."

Mrs. Cassidy laughed the contented laugh of the guarded and happy
matron. With the air of Cornelia exhibiting her jewels, she drew
down the collar of her kimono and revealed another treasured bruise,
maroon-colored, edged with olive and orange--a bruise now nearly
well, but still to memory dear.

Mrs. Fink capitulated. The formal light in her eye softened to
envious admiration. She and Mrs. Cassidy had been chums in the
downtown paper-box factory before they had married, one year before.
Now she and her man occupied the flat above Mame and her man.
Therefore she could not put on airs with Mame.

"Don't it hurt when he soaks you?" asked Mrs. Fink, curiously.

"Hurt!"--Mrs. Cassidy gave a soprano scream of delight. "Well,
say--did you ever have a brick house fall on you?--well, that's just
the way it feels--just like when they're digging you out of the
ruins. Jack's got a left that spells two matinees and a new pair of
Oxfords--and his right!--well, it takes a trip to Coney and six
pairs of openwork, silk lisle threads to make that good."

"But what does he beat you for?" inquired Mrs. Fink, with wide-open
eyes.

"Silly!" said Mrs. Cassidy, indulgently. "Why, because he's full.
It's generally on Saturday nights."

"But what cause do you give him?" persisted the seeker after
knowledge.

"Why, didn't I marry him? Jack comes in tanked up; and I'm here,
ain't I? Who else has he got a right to beat? I'd just like to catch
him once beating anybody else! Sometimes it's because supper ain't
ready; and sometimes it's because it is. Jack ain't particular about
causes. He just lushes till he remembers he's married, and then
he makes for home and does me up. Saturday nights I just move the
furniture with sharp corners out of the way, so I won't cut my
head when he gets his work in. He's got a left swing that jars you!
Sometimes I take the count in the first round; but when I feel like
having a good time during the week or want some new rags I come up
again for more punishment. That's what I done last night. Jack knows
I've been wanting a black silk waist for a month, and I didn't think
just one black eye would bring it. Tell you what, Mag, I'll bet you
the ice cream he brings it to-night."

Mrs. Fink was thinking deeply.

"My Mart," she said, "never hit me a lick in his life. It's just
like you said, Mame; he comes in grouchy and ain't got a word to
say. He never takes me out anywhere. He's a chair-warmer at home for
fair. He buys me things, but he looks so glum about it that I never
appreciate 'em."

Mrs. Cassidy slipped an arm around her chum. "You poor thing!"
she said. "But everybody can't have a husband like Jack. Marriage
wouldn't be no failure if they was all like him. These discontented
wives you hear about--what they need is a man to come home and kick
their slats in once a week, and then make it up in kisses, and
chocolate creams. That'd give 'em some interest in life. What I want
is a masterful man that slugs you when he's jagged and hugs you when
he ain't jagged. Preserve me from the man that ain't got the sand to
do neither!"

Mrs. Fink sighed.

The hallways were suddenly filled with sound. The door flew open at
the kick of Mr. Cassidy. His arms were occupied with bundles. Mame
flew and hung about his neck. Her sound eye sparkled with the love
light that shines in the eye of the Maori maid when she recovers
consciousness in the hut of the wooer who has stunned and dragged
her there.

"Hello, old girl!" shouted Mr. Cassidy. He shed his bundles and
lifted her off her feet in a mighty hug. "I got tickets for Barnum
& Bailey's, and if you'll bust the string of one of them bundles I
guess you'll find that silk waist--why, good evening, Mrs. Fink--I
didn't see you at first. How's old Mart coming along?"

"He's very well, Mr. Cassidy--thanks," said Mrs. Fink. "I must be
going along up now. Mart'll be home for supper soon. I'll bring you
down that pattern you wanted to-morrow, Mame."

Mrs. Fink went up to her flat and had a little cry. It was a
meaningless cry, the kind of cry that only a woman knows about, a
cry from no particular cause, altogether an absurd cry; the most
transient and the most hopeless cry in the repertory of grief. Why
had Martin never thrashed her? He was as big and strong as Jack
Cassidy. Did he not care for her at all? He never quarrelled; he
came home and lounged about, silent, glum, idle. He was a fairly
good provider, but he ignored the spices of life.

Mrs. Fink's ship of dreams was becalmed. Her captain ranged between
plum duff and his hammock. If only he would shiver his timbers or
stamp his foot on the quarter-deck now and then! And she had thought
to sail so merrily, touching at ports in the Delectable Isles! But
now, to vary the figure, she was ready to throw up the sponge, tired
out, without a scratch to show for all those tame rounds with her
sparring partner. For one moment she almost hated Mame--Mame, with
her cuts and bruises, her salve of presents and kisses; her stormy
voyage with her fighting, brutal, loving mate.

Mr. Fink came home at 7. He was permeated with the curse of
domesticity. Beyond the portals of his cozy home he cared not to
roam, to roam. He was the man who had caught the street car, the
anaconda that had swallowed its prey, the tree that lay as it had
fallen.

"Like the supper, Mart?" asked Mrs. Fink, who had striven over it.

"M-m-m-yep," grunted Mr. Fink.

After supper he gathered his newspapers to read. He sat in his
stocking feet.

Arise, some new Dante, and sing me the befitting corner of perdition
for the man who sitteth in the house in his stockinged feet. Sisters
of Patience who by reason of ties or duty have endured it in silk,
yarn, cotton, lisle thread or woollen--does not the new canto belong?

The next day was Labor Day. The occupations of Mr. Cassidy and Mr.
Fink ceased for one passage of the sun. Labor, triumphant, would
parade and otherwise disport itself.

Mrs. Fink took Mrs. Cassidy's pattern down early. Mame had on her
new silk waist. Even her damaged eye managed to emit a holiday
gleam. Jack was fruitfully penitent, and there was a hilarious
scheme for the day afoot, with parks and picnics and Pilsener in it.

A rising, indignant jealousy seized Mrs. Fink as she returned to her
flat above. Oh, happy Mame, with her bruises and her quick-following
balm! But was Mame to have a monopoly of happiness? Surely Martin
Fink was as good a man as Jack Cassidy. Was his wife to go always
unbelabored and uncaressed? A sudden, brilliant, breathless idea
came to Mrs. Fink. She would show Mame that there were husbands as
able to use their fists and perhaps to be as tender afterward as any
Jack.

The holiday promised to be a nominal one with the Finks. Mrs. Fink
had the stationary washtubs in the kitchen filled with a two weeks'
wash that had been soaking overnight. Mr. Fink sat in his stockinged
feet reading a newspaper. Thus Labor Day presaged to speed.

Jealousy surged high in Mrs. Fink's heart, and higher still surged
an audacious resolve. If her man would not strike her--if he would
not so far prove his manhood, his prerogative and his interest in
conjugal affairs, he must be prompted to his duty.

Mr. Fink lit his pipe and peacefully rubbed an ankle with a
stockinged toe. He reposed in the state of matrimony like a lump
of unblended suet in a pudding. This was his level Elysium--to sit
at ease vicariously girdling the world in print amid the wifely
splashing of suds and the agreeable smells of breakfast dishes
departed and dinner ones to come. Many ideas were far from his
mind; but the furthest one was the thought of beating his wife.

Mrs. Fink turned on the hot water and set the washboards in the
suds. Up from the flat below came the gay laugh of Mrs. Cassidy. It
sounded like a taunt, a flaunting of her own happiness in the face
of the unslugged bride above. Now was Mrs. Fink's time.

Suddenly she turned like a fury upon the man reading.

"You lazy loafer!" she cried, "must I work my arms off washing and
toiling for the ugly likes of you? Are you a man or are you a
kitchen hound?"

Mr. Fink dropped his paper, motionless from surprise. She feared
that he would not strike--that the provocation had been insufficient.
She leaped at him and struck him fiercely in the face with her
clenched hand. In that instant she felt a thrill of love for him
such as she had not felt for many a day. Rise up, Martin Fink, and
come into your kingdom! Oh, she must feel the weight of his hand
now--just to show that he cared--just to show that he cared!

Mr. Fink sprang to his feet--Maggie caught him again on the jaw with
a wide swing of her other hand. She closed her eyes in that fearful,
blissful moment before his blow should come--she whispered his name
to herself--she leaned to the expected shock, hungry for it.

In the flat below Mr. Cassidy, with a shamed and contrite face was
powdering Mame's eye in preparation for their junket. From the flat
above came the sound of a woman's voice, high-raised, a bumping, a
stumbling and a shuffling, a chair overturned--unmistakable sounds
of domestic conflict.

"Mart and Mag scrapping?" postulated Mr. Cassidy. "Didn't know they
ever indulged. Shall I trot up and see if they need a sponge holder?"

One of Mrs. Cassidy's eyes sparkled like a diamond. The other
twinkled at least like paste.

"Oh, oh," she said, softly and without apparent meaning, in the
feminine ejaculatory manner. "I wonder if--wonder if! Wait, Jack,
till I go up and see."

Up the stairs she sped. As her foot struck the hallway above out
from the kitchen door of her flat wildly flounced Mrs. Fink.

"Oh, Maggie," cried Mrs. Cassidy, in a delighted whisper; "did he?
Oh, did he?"

Mrs. Fink ran and laid her face upon her chum's shoulder and sobbed
hopelessly.

Mrs. Cassidy took Maggie's face between her hands and lifted it
gently. Tear-stained it was, flushing and paling, but its velvety,
pink-and-white, becomingly freckled surface was unscratched,
unbruised, unmarred by the recreant fist of Mr. Fink.

"Tell me, Maggie," pleaded Mame, "or I'll go in there and find out.
What was it? Did he hurt you--what did he do?"

Mrs. Fink's face went down again despairingly on the bosom of her
friend.

"For God's sake don't open that door, Mame," she sobbed. "And don't
ever tell nobody--keep it under your hat. He--he never touched me,
and--he's--oh, Gawd--he's washin' the clothes--he's washin' the
clothes!"

Does anyone else see a problem with this?

ArtScroll.com -- A DAILY DOSE OF TORAH
If one had only 18 minutes to learn everyday, I hope that he'd spend them on something better than this.

Fading Away?

I haven't commented on any other blogs for a while. Commenting can be much more time consuming than blogging and I have much less time than I used to, but I don't think that's the reason why I've stopped. I just don't find myself getting provoked to comment by the blogosphere anymore. I wonder; is the blogosphere changing or is it me? GH came back as XGH and I no longer find him the least bit entertaining, but I don't think that's me. I think he just got boring.

My comments on popular blogs have been my greatest source of traffic. If I stop commenting will this blog just fade away? When I originally started this blog I made one rule for myself: I will not give my blog a topic. If I do that I will quickly get bored of the topic and have to start another blog. So I titled my blog "JOSH WEINBERG" (I really regret using caps lock when I did that, I keep forgetting to change it to Josh Weinberg). A blog titled Josh Weinberg could be about anything. I chose the name Josh because I thought it would get me more respect than a name like Yehoshua. (That is another decision that I regret. I may explain this later). It worked well, I've found myself covering topics I never would have discussed had I given my blog a title.

I set up this blog in recognition of the fact that I won't stop reading blogs any time soon, and when I read blogs I need a better place to express my own ideas than the comments section. Now I'm finding that the blogs I read no longer provoke me to respond, Is this the end of my blog? I also find that I haven't been provoking a lot of other people to respond. (although this may be just a result of not generating a lot of traffic, which may be because my blog does not have a real title). It seems like me and the blogosphere are drifting apart.

But I'm not throwing in the towel yet. Strangely enough, I still feel like I have a lot to say, and I'm going to say it whether anybody's listening or not. I'm going to try to finish that series on social promotion and I still have many more stories from my years in elementary school.

I have a lot more to write, and if I don't find anything thought provoking in the blogosphere I'll just have to be provoked by my experiences in real life. This past summer I spent time in many different Frum communities, and I did what I always do. I observed them. It's what I've been doing for years and I think that some of my observations may be noteworthy, so I'll note some of them over here.

But don't expect me to be back in full force. I've changed my tagline to irregular and unusual to reflect the lack of regular posting. There's another reason I did this. I was taking a look at where my readers have been referred here from and noticed someone had reached my site by searching for the words "yossarian syndrome". I thought this was interesting so I Googled it myself and discovered that this was the number one site for those search terms. Could you believe it? There's no such thing as yossarian syndrome! I realize that I can't have some nonsense terms as my tagline unless I explain what they mean. Maybe I will. Someday.

Who is a true torah giant?

I really enjoyed this old post of Gil's. I'll cut and paste it for those who find it difficult to click on the link and then comeback here:

No True Torah Giant Would Say That

I was recently talking to someone who told me that he was shocked by what he saw in writing in the name of a Torah giant, which he later verified in person. He considered this to be heresy [totally unrelated to Torah and science], and I asked him whether this was not proof that it is not heresy. His response was that this proved that the Torah scholar was not as great as people claim.

This is, I believe, a commission of the "No True Scotsman" logical fallacy. Wikipedia defines it as such ( link):

No true Scotsman is a term coined by Antony Flew in his 1975 book Thinking About Thinking. It refers to an argument which takes this form:

Argument: "No Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge."
Reply: "But my uncle Angus likes sugar with his porridge."
Rebuttal: "Ah yes, but no true Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge."

This form of argument is a fallacy if the predicate ("putting sugar on porridge") is not actually contradictory for the accepted definition of the subject ("Scotsman"), or if the definition of the subject is silently adjusted after the fact to make the rebuttal work.

The definition of a Torah giant is not someone who agrees with you or your teachers. I would posit that it is someone who is greatly accomplished in Torah learning and continues in the path of his mentors. There is, of course, much more that could be said in regard to defining this amorphous term. However, redefining the term after finding a Torah giant who disagrees with you is a logical fallacy, perhaps committed too often.

I actually understand very well where the person who commited the logical fallacy is coming from. I understand it based on another post of Gil's. This post comes from Gil's planned speech at the publishing event of the millennium, (The return of Slifkin, hopefully not to be followed with the Empire Strikes Back ). Here is an excerpt:

 As a member of an ideological community, regardless of physical location, your rebbeim are the leaders of that community and every student should seek guidance from his own mentors. Sometimes these mentors are not even alive but one is certainly still allowed to follow the example and approach set by one's rebbe when he was alive.

So it comes out that a true torah giant is a torah giant from my own ideological community. The problem is that the boundaries between communities aren't so clear. On some blogs recently I've seen the terms RW UO, LW UO, RW MO, LW MO. And at Harry Maryles' blog we can find the Centrist community. I am also a Centrist. Let me explain it.  Everyone less frum than me is MO. Everyone more yeshivish than me is chareidi. I am a well balanced centrist.

I am the greatest judge of the boundaries of my own ideological community, and any torah giant that disagrees with me has no place in my ideological community. If the torah giant is not in my ideological community then practically for all intents and purposes he is not a true torah giant.

I'm sorry I missed this.

No true torah giant...
I just came back from vacation. I'm so worn out that I need another vacation. The above linked post is just the sort that I like to discuss on this blog. I will if I manage to start blogging again.

What Motivates Children to Do Well In School?

Classwork. It's really important. That's why my first grade teacher used to give us work to do in class. Everyday. Unfortunately classwork had a negative side effect. Some children finished their work faster than others. Those children got bored and restless with nothing to do while waiting for their friends to finish their work. My teacher had a simple solution for this problem. She had some games in the back of the room. Anyone who had finished their work was allowed to go play quietly in the back of the room.

Al kein yomru hamoshlim, boh-u unechasben cheshbono shel olam. hefsed mitsva kineged sechara vesechar aveirah keneged hefseidah (bava basra 78b). I had not learnt this gemara back when I was 6 years old, but is a very simple concept. Before taking any action it is normal to ask oneself "what do I gain by doing this, what do I lose by doing it, What do I gain and lose by not doing it".

I had a lot to gain by doing the classwork, when I finished I could go play games in the back of the room, but what did I have to gain by getting the right answers? It was a lot easier to just write down random numbers as answers to the math questions. It would go a lot faster. This was a no-brainer, I was surprised no one else had thought of it. Whenever the teacher would give out math sheets for us to do, I would start writing random numbers. Soon I grew bolder, I answered some questions with the number 100, an impossibly high number in those days. Usually I would stick to the number 1, It was so simple to write. I really wanted to answer a couple of questions with the number zero but I was afraid that that might be percieved as too much of a chutzpah.

My teacher caught on. "Josh" (I still had a first name back then) "your not writing any of the right answers!"
"I know" I said while happily playing with some lego.
"Why not?"
"I wasn't trying to"
"Why not?"
"I don't want to"
"I'll think your lazy if you don't try to answer the questions right"
I thought about that for a half a second, I liked that idea. A lot. "I am lazy" I said with a huge smile on my face.
That was it. I don't have to do work. Lazy people don't do work. There was something wrong with being Lazy. It was one of those names people called each other. Reuvain would call Shimon a dumbell and Shimon would call Reuvain Lazy. Sticks and stones will break my bones but names will never hurt me. I was Lazy.

It is slightly distressing that I was made to think of myself as lazy for not doing something, when I did not have sufficient motivation to do it in the first place. A person who chooses not to run a marathon is not lazy, he is only lazy if he has a reason to do so which he ignores out of laziness. They killed my self image (if you believe in that sort of thing).
* * * *

One day in June our teacher announced that it was time to finish our mathbooks. Everyone should start answering problems in the book from where we were up to and continue to the end. I started from the end and worked towards where we were up to. I skipped around the book finding the pages that looked the most interesting, and I worked.

All around me, my classmates were finishing their books and going to play games, while I sat there and worked. I realized that this wasn't an impossible task, I didn't have as many pages left to do as I thought I did.

Someone came over to me, he asked me why I was still doing this, I could give my book in if I wanted to. I answered him no, I wasn't finished. There were so few pages left and if there was one thing I wanted to do this year it was to be able to say that I finished the book.

Again someone came over to me, my teacher wanted the book. I told him that even though I finished the last page, it was because I started from the last page but I had not yet finished the book. I continued working, I hated this school year but g-d help me I was going to finish this book.

A boy came. He took the book. The teacher told him to. I cried, "I'm not finished!"
"You don't have to finish" they told me. They never let me finish that stupid book.

What does motivate children to do the work the school tells them to? Can someone please answer that for me?

Animal School

Back in school I used to spend a lot of time in the bathroom. Not using it (BTW whoever has the opportunity, should take a look at an elementary school bathroom. In my day they were criminally disgusting facilities for use) but just hanging out there. There are no places in a school like it's bathroom. I was able to go in and out of the bathroom as much as I wanted because of my learning condition. My learning condition had some of the symptoms of stupidity without actually being stupidity. The staff really wished it was stupidity. If it was stupidity they could treat it, they'd stuff me in some special ed class and convince my parents to hire tutors. This almost being stupidity but not quite was really annoying to them.

In fact I wasn't stupid. You know how when you're asking for information about someone for a shidduch and the one giving the info says the guy or girl is "streetsmart", then you know that he or she is as stupid as paint? I wasn't streetsmart, I was a shy, timid boy that did not fare too well socially, but I was booksmart. But being smart won't get you anywhere in an elementary school. In school all they care about is effort. They just want you to try hard. I didn't put in the effort. I didn't try hard. This probably made me their worse student. Which was why I ended up spending a lot of my time in the bathroom.

Like I said there are no places in a school like it's bathroom. This was the place where the guys that were kicked out of class all came to congregate. We'd also get guys that legitimately came to use the bathroom. There were no teachers here, they had their own bathroom (a decent one). It was here that I could hear all sorts of stories about the teachers that I'd have one day (In truth I never had most of them, the higher the grade was, the higher the turnover rate for teachers.) I could read all sorts of bad words written about teachers on the wall over here. Some of the teachers had left years ago, some were still around. Here I would listen as older boys would talk about a lot of things that seemed important at the time, they'd talk about passing different classes and they'd worry about graduating.

"I'm in big trouble" one of them said one day. I knew he couldn't be in trouble, he was way too calm.
"You think your in trouble? I'm the one in real trouble" I spoke up.
"You can't be in trouble you don't know what trouble means yet" he answered back. I didn't believe him. I had no reason to. I knew I was definitely in trouble.
We stayed in the bathroom for a while and we weren't driven out by some Texan, we were driven out by Rabbi Cathcart the principle. He used to check in on the bathroom once in a while. He started talking to the older boys about why they weren't in class and I figured it was time for me to leave. I'd find some other place to hang out, I knew the hallways of this school like no one else did. Maybe I'd go to that stairwell at the end of the building, the one only I knew about. I can sit there and think up stories about my favorite TV show characters. Or maybe I'd just go back to class.
* * *

Outside of the bathroom it was still going on. Boys went mad and were awarded with ... with good marks, and the ability to feel good about themselves. They knew they could feel good about themselves because their teachers told them they could.
Losers.
My name was Josh Weinberg. I was in the 3rd grade. I was 7 and a half years old

Our grade was made up of 2 classes, my class and the other class. There wasn't any higher or lower class. Someone pulled 20 or 25 names out of a hat and called it class A, everyone else went into class B. I had been together with my class since the first grade. Our rebbi from 2nd grade in a momentary lapse of good judgement told our class that he hoped we'd have Rabbi Reuvain as our 3rd grade rebbi. We got Rabbi Shimon. This was in the morning for what we called Hebrew. In the afternoon we had English. There were two teachers for english. I thought both of them were bad, they were teachers after all, but Mrs B was, without question, much more intent on making her students lives hell then Mrs A was. My class got Mrs A.

The school recognized that two randomly arranged classes would not gain as much from a class on reading as they would if they were grouped based on ability. So for a small section of the afternoon half of my class switched to the other class and half of the other class switched to my class to form 2 classes grouped based on ability. Mrs A taught the higher class and Mrs B taught the lower class. There was no stigma associated with either class. Maybe if we had something like 8 classes the upper ones would have been considered nerds and the lower ones would be considered stupid. Two classes was innocent enough. I was placed in the upper class with Mrs A. This was probably because I knew how to read. Very well. So I had it made, I was in the upper class in the same classroom that I was in the rest of the day, with the less nasty teacher.

There wasn't only one catch and it wasn't catch-22.
Catch-1 was that we had to do work in our workbook every day. I had been asking for a while why I should want to do this work. No one ever gave me a straight answer, so I didn't do it. I also wrote very slowly and I had much better things to do with that time. I could sit back and make up stories about my favorite TV show characters.
Catch-2 was that after the allotted time for doing the work (way too short, can't I dream for one more minute?) we had to switch books with the guy next to us and mark each other's books while the teacher read out the answers. It could be that this was to done in order to teach us responsibility. Or maybe it was done to save the teacher time.
Catch-3 was that I was sitting next to Appleby.

We would go through this routine everyday. Mrs A would ask us to open our workbooks and do page x. I would open up my workbook and proceed to make up stories about my favorite TV show characters. Mrs A would announce that it was time to switch books with the person next to us. All the movement in the classroom and Appleby would wake me up. The teacher would read off the correct answers. The class would mark each others books. Appleby would look bewildered. I would proceed to do what I had been doing until now: I'd make up stories about my favorite TV show characters. This was all really hard for Appleby.
"How am I supposed to mark this?"
"Don't mark it just write an x on all the questions."
"But you didn't answer any of the questions."
"So just mark me wrong on them" I tried to tell him.
It didn't work. In his mind one couldn't mark a workbook with nothing written in it. Marking involved deciding what questions were answered right and what questions were answered wrong. Noting the absence of answers was not marking. He was being told to do something impossible on a daily basis and he wasn't going to stand for it. So everyday against my protests he would take my book up to Mrs A and ask her: "How am I supposed to mark this?" I sometimes feel bad for him when I remember his bewilderment. He was also feeling left out. All around him all his classmates were experiencing the power of a teacher, the power to mark questions right and wrong, and all he could do while Mrs A was reading out the answers was be bored.

Poor Appleby. Mrs A also felt bad for him. And then Appleby started acting all indignant. "And this is the higher class. He doesn't belong here!" Everyday we would go through this. At last Mrs A could withstand Appleby no longer.

As far as I can recall no one was ever sent from the higher class to the lower class. I'm sure no one was ever promoted from the lower class to the higher class. That would've opened up a real sticky situation. It's easiest to fight off mothers who think that their child deserves to be in the higher class when the policy is that no one switches classes. So no one did switch classes. Either way. Except for me. If I'd been the sort of stupid child that couldn't get more then a 70 if I tried they wouldn't have done that to me. You can't punish stupidity. But being that it was simply a case of not doing the work, they decided they could send me down a class. It's an odd sort of punishment if you ask me. If I wasn't working in the higher class why would I do any work in the lower class? But they did have Appleby to worry about. Mrs A also felt that it was important that the upper class felt they were in the upper class. This way she can say to them, "I expect the best from you, you're the upper class". The day I left she probably made a speech to the class, "You know why I sent away Weinberg? Because this is the upper class, and if your not committed to doing your best work you don't belong here."

So for the sake of the upper class, I was sacrificed. I was sent to Mrs B's class which was ten times less interesting. The book was ten times less interesting. I didn't like it there. My mother once asked Mrs A what I was doing there. Mrs A responded that "Josh has to show that he's really willing to work before I can let him back in my class." With this new knowledge that if I worked I'd be let out of Mrs B's horrible classroom, I applied myself fully to the work that was ten times beneath my level until they let me out. NOT.

I came in and no one even told me where to sit. When I found a seat I didn't sit there making up stories about my favorite TV show characters, I didn't find that classroom a very comfortable place to daydream. I just sat there being mad. And this was just the beginning of my troubles.

Besides for the low level of the class, Mrs B was the teacher from hell. I don't have the time nor the memory to dwell on this right now. Mrs B did not like my handwriting. I agree with her, my handwriting was bad. Mrs B then decided that I needed extra out of classroom help with my handwriting. I'd get this help from the 19 year old tutor who worked in our school that dealt with children like me. So everyday I was pulled out of Mrs A's class (They couldn't pull me out of Mrs B's class, teaching me how to read again was far too important) so that I can me tutored by Miss C who would help correct my handwriting.

Have you ever tried to change someone else's handwriting? You might as well try to change their voice. These lessons were totally worthless. While I was taking these lessons my mother found something I had written in 2nd grade. She compared the handwriting with what I was writing now. My handwriting in 3rd grade was worse. Looking back it's obvious to me why this was so. I had much more pride in my work back in 2nd grade.

These classes wouldn't be such an injustice, if it weren't for the fact that I was being pulled out of Mrs A's class during math. While I was writing nonsense letters for some 19 year old girl, the rest of my class was learning the times tables. I walked into class from my handwriting lessons one day and was told to line up with the rest of my classmates against the wall. They were having a "math bee". My turn came up.
" What's 8x5?" How in the world was I supposed to know. How quickly could I add up 5+5+5+5+5+5+5+5. Not quick enough.

It's a miracle they didn't drive me out of school. I had to teach myself the times tables. First I learnt the 2s then the 5s and 9s. The 3s and 4s came next. But the 6s 7s and 8s, those were killers. I still remember all the work I had to put in to memorize 6x7=42. And this was only to discover years later by reading a Douglas Adams book that 6x9=42.

I always knew when it was time for me to leave Mrs A's class to practise my handwriting with Miss C. Everyday Mrs A would give a quiz on math. It was at that point that I would raise my hand and ask if I can go to study with Miss C. One day she didn't give the quiz on time. She noticed that I was in her classroom later then I should be. "Weinberg, why are you still here? Shouldn't you be by Miss C?" Something was very odd here but it was time so I left. Towards the end of the day she announced that it was time for the quiz. Immediately my hand shot up.
She called on me "Yes, Weinberg what do you want? Everyday when it's time for the quiz you ask to go to Miss C. Is that what you want now?" Wow did I hate her at that moment (and a lot of moments but never as much as Mrs B).
"No, I want to go to the bathroom."
She let me go.

One time I walked in from Miss C and there was a problem on the board: 17 x 5. We had never memorized the 17 tables. We weren't expected to. There was a way to solve this problem without memorization. She had presumably taught it while I was writing nonsense letters for Miss C.
"Weinberg, why don't you do this problem for us". I wanted to yell at her "Don't you know where I was when you were teaching this?" but I was a shy quiet boy. I tried to solve the problem.
"7 x 5=35"
"yes that's right" she told me. So far so good
"put the 5 on the bottom"
"right"
"3 on top of the 1"
"good" Here I knew it was going to get tricky. There were so many possibilities for what that 3 meant.
"3 x 1=3" The class burst out laughing.
"No don't laugh at him, Michael you finish the problem"

Michael continued to multiply 5 by 1 and then add the 3. I audibly muttered to myself as Michael did this "Oh so your supposed to add it".
"yes" the teacher said "you add it".

The truth is that had the teacher not have put me on the spot like that, I probably would have just sat down, not have bothered listening to a class that had started without me, blamed my teachers for making me go to Miss C, and then proceed to make up stories about my favorite TV show characters. It's arguable that Mrs A did what she did on purpose, but it's not likely. She couldn't have been smart enough. She was so stupid about everything else.

Social Promotion part 3

The truth is that what I described in my last post was not an example of social promotion. It was a case of a school teaching on the level they thought was the best compromise when teaching to the group they had in front of them. Many people in the group were holding on different levels so they sought a middle level to teach on, gave some of the slower ones some extra help outside of the classroom and they even gave some of the smarter ones (I was never zoche) some more interesting classes outside of the classroom. (When I say outside of the classroom I mean that these students were pulled out of class for these added lessons).

The only question here is why did the school group the classes the way they did in the first place. Instead of dividing up classes based on age and then keeping the entire class together for the rest of their elementary school career, the school could have divided the classes based on ability. That decision to keep a class of students with such a large range of ability together was done for social reasons.

Did the school have legitimate concerns? Perhaps yes, but had they done things differently all the students would have learnt a lot faster. Imagine if swimming was taught in this fashion, where all the students had to wait until  almost everybody had mastered the art of dunking there head in the water before moving on, and then they'd start learning the back float, then next year everyone starts again from the beginning for the few who didn't get it the first time. Even the slowest swimmer learns faster in an environment where classes are grouped based on ability.

Apparently the schools attitude is, "What's the rush, the gain from the improved social environment greatly outweighs the loss from learning a bit slower". Maybe they're right.

I think this will be my last post on social promotion for a while. Had I not gotten interrupted on motsei shabbos this would have ended up being just another chareidi bashing post, eventually getting to the way gemara is currently taught. I've gotten distracted lately. Harry Maryles brought this slide show to my attention. At first it just seemed cheesy, I've seen this moshol before. Did they really have to make a whole slide show out of it? And did they really have to go over it again explaining the nimshol? Don't they know that you kill a joke when you explain it?

Then I got angry (that doesn't happen that often). I realized that the teachers that are watching this slide show are all nodding their heads saying to themselves "yes this is a big problem with schools that's why I always try to..." It shocks me to see that educators really believe they are doing something to combat the sort of problems described there. Probably some of the very teachers that taught me will watch that slide show and nod their heads.

I was the duck squirrel zebra and all the other animals in that slide show and a few that weren't. I didn't leave school that long ago. Nobody I encountered lived by the principles in this slide show. So now I've got a new topic to talk about. It's a topic that I've felt passionate about since first grade. I think I'll write about how much I HATE SCHOOL. I think I'll be reliving some of my formative years in the next few posts. Eventually I may make my way back to the present.

Not MY rabbi

Here's Gil's defence of his republishing the banned Slifkin books.
From what I've seen there and on canonist, his claim is that although R' Elyashiv assurs the book, HIS posek holds it's muttar and he is following his own poesk. I've already said what I hold of posek choosing. I wonder why this paragraph from the RCA pesak does not apply:

"Secondly, given the fact that there are many leading poskim who clearly do rule that smoking is prohibited, there is the general rule in pesak halacha that safek deoraisah lechumra, further mandating that halacha lemaaseh we rule smoking to be strictly prohibited."

It's long overdue for someone to come out with a book Hilchos am haaratsim. How am haaratsim should go about determing the halacha when the rabbis do not aggree. Here are some questions that I'd like to see addressed:

Do I have to always pick the most machmir pesak by deoraisahs?
Can I ask a rabbi that I know will give me the answer I want?
If I move to a new city do I have to start following the rulings of the rabbi in this city?
If yes, is that true even when the rulings contradict the way I've been practising halacha until now?
Do I have to ask all my shailos to one rabbi?
Is there such a thing as a rav of a city anymore?
When I call a rabbi and ask if something is muttar and he tells me "it's better not to do it" what does that mean?
Why don't rabbis state the reasoning behind their pesak especially when they give an answer like "it's better not to do it"?
Is halacha really so subjective that my rabbi has to know me before answering my question properly?

Until somebody come out with some answers I'm going to have to give my own. The best way is not to rely on the local rabbi lottery. It's best to learn the sugyos on your own to find the right halacha.