We Don’t Want You To Change - Choosing A Yeshiva Part 2 (Ep. 243)

greetings and salutations this is Rabbi dorowski I'm opening the show a little differently than I usually do because I just was looking for a particular episode and I was just watching every like four or five episodes in a row and every single time with the exact same Cadence I say hi this is D olowski and welcome to the r alasi show and I was like oh my gosh how do I say the same thing every single week so I'm going to try to mix it up a little bit just to confuse people don't want you to get too comfortable yeah and uh this is the rabbi orlovski show in coming to the end of its sixth year good Lord who would guess that I had so much stuff to say it's really great because I sit at my shopping table nobody talks to me so that's all right because I've got I got all of you out there who want to hear what I have to say and uh you know thank you so much everybody I just got a uh an email from uh from a RV who works in kras and he says I have to drive long distances to different factories and I listen to the rowski show and you know it makes a makes the ride that much uh easier and more meaningful thank you so much thank you to everybody who allowed me to be a part of your life I cannot put into words what it means that uh people are uh are um you know allowing me to share anything that I have to say and the fact that anyone gets kizic or meaning from it uh even if you just get annoyed and then you write angry emails because I get another episode out of that that alone is worthwhile and uh um if you're watching with our friends over you say this part of the line I need right if you're watching with our friends over a Time whoever you watch or listen to your podcast it's so nice that you're here with us and don't forget to like share and subscribe how about that um and we have a sponsor this episode sponsored by Lillian and Sandy Shapiro Lei nishas our parents Yehuda sh Isaac malash this is of course what we call the rowski show Bubby and Grandpa Shapiro from Stanford Connecticut because as you know uh We've mentioned before a good friend of the show is of course yti Shapiro this is his parents and uh of course producer yrel this is his grandparents in law so uh you know the shapiros are an essential part of the show and uh of course I always refer to him as kazen Shapiro because he was KH say in Stanford and when he comes you know I have a I have my own own little sh here in harof and in our little village of harof we have our own little sh the rowski show Sho and sometimes we have Theus of having him ding there and it's just delightful so uh thank you so much bbby and Grandpa and it should be a for the uh the ALB and the alter Zas and uh of whom I've heard many stories over the years from the extended Shapiro Clan so uh it should be a all of the Torah that we're doing should be uh a an alyah for the shamas okay we are in a um we're in a series we had part one last time and uh this is going to be part three I'm skipping part two I just wanted to throw people off uh I'm just kidding of course this is part two when I was learning here in ell um so we would make an effort to write home and it was essentially worthless because um it took two weeks for my parents to get the uh arram um I wasn't going to invest in an actual stamp my gosh I was on a very limited budget so they used to have these like pieces of tissue paper called arrs and you would write on them and then you would fold them over they had really NE glue on the side that you could glue it shut it had a little stamp well they were pretty cheap and you just send them off and um and sometimes you would just write like a series of four or five you know and a friend of mine every now and then would just like leave out one of the numbers so he would like number them one two four and five and four would start so now that I'm out of the hospital bar hasem my Lord is going much and they're searching for arram number three so uh so yeah that's what I was going to do episode number three but this is really episode number two don't want to confuse anybody yeah um we have all kinds of people who watch the rabbi lowski show most my audience is obviously the sharpest knife in the drawer as the expression goes but uh not everybody and uh we try to be shovel call we want to we want to try to give a product that everybody can have and although it is surprising there are people who watch the show who are humor impaired um which is an actual disability Dave Barry who is a humorist with the Miami Herald wrote a whole you know thing uh thing about uh people who are humor impaired where they just don't know that a joke took place and uh I have that problem very often I start to say something and people are like is he joking is he serious does he really mean it but because of that it allows me to get away with things that other people can't get away with because you always have the option of saying he was just joking in any event so uh the um I haven't said that in a very long time but once upon a time one of my phrases I used to use all the time was in any event I know that because someone impersonated me once and kept saying in any event in any event yeah I don't think I've said it that often could be I have I don't know I've been moving to develop a new catchphrases you have to always bend with the times so uh in any event the um uh we're talking about how to choose a Yeshiva so last time we talked about the idea of being clear that you want to learn Yeshiva right we talked about seminaries seminaries for girls to learn toyra is an option there are those who would maintain that bis it is essential because uh girls have to be able to learn Torah on a deeper Lev level so that it will be on par with the secular studies that they have and so that it won't be um won't be uh less serious in their eyes than uh than uh other things so uh so there are definitely those who will argue that's a necessity most of those people are people who run seminaries but uh you know it's it's an issue of whether or not it's a luxury or a necessity and um uh you can uh you could definitely hear the argument R pelis zal Who was the r of the white chel and farak Away um we had a shabbaton there a summer Regional shabbaton Long Island Den is why when I was there and he said something that made a deep impression on me ER the par says that you know their clothing didn't wear out and he brought a medish that says that you know we all know the Nace that the anani a covod would um clean and press their clothing and um uh and also the clothing would grow along with them and he brought a medis that said not all their clothing only the clothing that they wore and if they um had clothing when they came out of Mitra and they were 8 years old and they were 8-year-old clothing and it sat in a box 40 years later they were still aty year of clothing the only ones that grow are the ones that you wear and he said the same thing is true about your toy if you keep the Torah with you and it's growing with you then it uh it continues to grow but if you I used to tell this to people who would go to you know afternoon Hebrew school I said if you're Jewish Education goes up to the age of 12 you know or 13 you'll be wearing your bar mitzvah suit for the rest of your life and when you start to you know become an adult it gets very uncomfortable and there are people who come to Israel and uh I've noticed this particularly girls in seminary they take notes furiously take notes notebook and notebooks full of notes and they go on the shelf and most people never look at them again and that's you could say to somebody how was your year of Israel look it's over there you know that that's where it is it's on the Shelf as opposed to being with me all the time I've had uh girls from Seminary who told me that they would Kaza over my notes from missil or par and they would go over them every year to be able to keep it fresh and to to incorporate it that's the ideal so obviously according to that you need to be able to keep the Torah growing with you so that you're you know you go to university and you study Aristotle and Plato and Socrates and you say well uh we tried to kill these people so we could play with a dral and eat Lanz yeah if that's as far as it goes you understand your Jewish Education is not going to be enough to insulate you against the forces of the world so that's the uh that's the logic of it but a boy is MIT so that's first is that you have to get that clear okay next thing we want to deal with is and I'm not talking about the Der we'll talk about the LI afterwards but and that is the hash which means you obviously want a Yesa that's going to incorporate your belief system you don't want to go to a Yeshiva where you're at odds with the hash with the philosophy of the school I explain to you what I mean by this um when I uh I was working for particularly yiva and I was recruiting and November time uh the skies across the United States are filled with Rashi Yeshiva who are running around uh recruiting boys for the coming year in November because the boys were already in Yeshiva already have their money so we need to go and get more people so November is very hot time and people were flying around and I was just starting to recruit for this Yeshiva and uh another Riva there said kid let me give you a piece of advice whatever you do don't tell them they're going to change nobody hears that they want to they're going to change tell them yeah they'll come back just the way that they left so um it was interesting there was one particular Yeshiva where it was an alumni who was recruiting and he had a standard line he would say he'd say uh at the uh at the end of the year the Riva said to me what did you gain and I said well I gained an insight into Torah I gained insight into Hashem goes no you learned the importance of time of how to be able to use your time I hold a little speech like this okay we don't go to Yeshiva to learn the importance of time but the idea being that you try to talk around the topic so that you don't frighten people now I understand this concept I ran ncsy for 10 years well nine years in Long Island and W in LA and all of ncsy is based on on lying to the participants you know so you're going to some kid who is not religiously observant and you say I want you to come to a shabbaton says what's a shabbaton well you're going to come in on Friday once you come in Friday you will not be allowed to do any you have to get rid of your phone you have to get rid of this you have to get rid of everything like that you working there's no that you we're going to house you like a mile away from the shore and you're going to have to walk in the freezing cold you know and by the way you can't take a shower in the morning you know and you're going to come to SCH Friday night and we're going to pray and then we're going to have a speech and then we're going to have a meal and then uh we're going to have a speech and then we're going to dance boys with boys girls with girls and then we're going to um pray and then we're going to have another speech and then we're going to have a whole bunch of speeches and then uh everyone's going to go home you can go back the next day we're going to pray and pray and pray and pray for a very very long time and then we're going to eat and then we're going to sing and dance boys with boys girls with girls and then we're um we're going to uh have classes and then we're going to pray and then we're going to eat and then we're going to pray and then we're going to have more speeches oh goodie where do I sign instead we say hey you want to come to a shabat tone what's a shabat tone Oh it's a weekend for teenagers where everyone gets to socialize really what happens oh we're going to have a band yeah for Saturday night for an hour yeah we're going to have a band goes oh it sounds really cool what else oh we're going uh bowling satday night you know now it would have to be the Keen Observer to notice I just left out Friday night in shabas I skipped right to Saturday night but once you get them in there it's your job to then to go to sell the event so okay so uh so he says to me don't tell them they're going to change yeah so I thought to myself that's the dumbest thing ever who in the world is going to fall for that so I went into the first school and I told him the story I Saidi met a rabbi and he says whatever you do don't tell them that the don't tell them they're going to change and I said that's ridiculous how could you spend a year learning in yiva and not become a different person become a better Jew a better son a potentially better father and husband a better neighbor a better businessman a better lawyer whatever you have learning Yeshiva is going to change you in make you into a better person and nobody signed up for an interview because you're supposed to lie so there are yeshivas that actually advertise that send us your son and we will not change them we'll send them back to you the same turned off Jew that you sent to us I remember this kid comes back from Israel and he FRS out as sometimes happens you know and his father was very upset very upset he says this is not how I brought up my son look at him he's becoming a fanatic and I said to him don't worry it's just a phase he'll grow out of it eventually he won't care about anything just like you and on more than one occasion a parent said to me oh good the last thing I want is for my son to come home with a religious fervor that I can't even f so if that's what's important to you I want to go to Yeshiva where I will learn stuff have a year in Israel and not be affected at all okay then you definitely don't want to go to a really intense mus Yeshiva now um there are certain yeshivas which will be more modern orthodox and certain yeshivas that will be more uh zionis by the way that's not necessarily the same thing there are some zionis yeshivas which are very intense in their religious uh observance even though their philosophy is much morei right um and so where there are others that are essentially modern Orthodox and they're G to keep everything um pretty calm and you'll come back that way now having said that it all depends on the staff obviously because there are certain schools like this that I know have a secret track record of inspiring kids who then go on to become very serious in their Torah learning so Kat MTAR yeah bu beware so um uh so that's the um so that's the thing is first of all you want to know where where the school is coming from what their philosophy is I told this story earlier um cuz I haven't I don't think I've said anything controversial at least two weeks but um I was uh speaking on behalf of a seminary and I was speaking in a school and this girl says what is your school's Hasa I said what do you mean she goes you know you're hash I said no I understand what the word means I said I don't know what you mean and she goes you knowa I said well we believe in God we believe in Torah we believe in chabas we believe you know I don't understand what you're asking me do you say or not I said that's your entire has I said do you know what the word hash means means to get up on top of a mountain and look over the entire view that's your entire has with you say not I said the girls don't have a minion so they don't say Hal at all nor do they not say Hal and Y everybody Davin by themselves they don't have a communal daving so I assume if you want to go to a where they say you can if you want to go to a where they don't say hello you can no one is going to impose any religious observance on you but but that defined the entire hash of the of the school so obviously if you're looking for a play place where um you know there are certain obviously at basak of school they're going to ignore it completely and certain cion schools they will take you to uh you know to a sh where they're going to say Hal maybe with a Braha maybe without a Braha but you know celebrate its full thing and some of them will have a more casual laser Fair approach it'll be a day off or they'll take a to or something like that without trying to dictate any religious observant going on to it so if that's your if it all comes down to what they're do in y that's a good thing to be able to ask you understand um but uh obviously uh if you're looking for a school that's going to be more CI then you're going to go to um a more school if you're looking for one that's not going to be T you're going to look for one of those okay that's okay that's number one number two is the nature of the school and let me explain to you what I mean by that um there are certain yeshivas where you ask them the question what's your ultimate goal meaning where do you want to see the boys in three years now a guy who's learning in the mirror for example no one asked them that because the miror is considers is the final destination the mirror does not look at itself as a um as a stop on the way to another Yeshiva or to another program I would say the same thing is true of Lakewood yeah um that if you're learning in Lakewood they're not like okay so after you learn Lakewood for a few years where's your ultimate goal where do you hope to go yeah the idea is that there's a the destination there are certain yeshivas that present themselves as like a mere prep school you know they're going to learn here for X number of years and then they're going to go to the mirror or then they're going to go back and go to Lakewood but we're a step along the way so it's important for you to be honest where you are now and what your capabilities are you have to be realistic as to what it is you're looking for so there are certain yeshivas in Israel that cater to um Americans coming to learn in erel for a year or two and it's basically a one-year Yeshiva with a shabet right a second-year option and that's it that's as far as they take you and then after that you have to decide where to go there are certain yeshivas that are Sha gimel yeshivas that means after somebody finished in this one and they're not ready to go to the mirror or brisk so they go to a third year Yeshiva which might have a third and fourth year program yeah um so a person who says listen I'm willing to give a year maybe two years to learning so it doesn't necessarily make sense for you to go to uh yiva where the people are committed long term um it's better to go to some place where they're going to help you maximize your one or 2ye experience to be able to make that as meaningful as possible was interesting when I used to have girls who asked me about coming back for a second year I would tell them it depends there are some people who definitely should come back there are some people who definitely should not come back and there are some people who could come back I said a girl who has maximized her experience in the first year what is she coming back in the second year for what's the purpose what is she trying to accomplish yeah in other words is she going to get more out of the second year than she did from the first year or is it just more of the same in which case if she's accomplished whatever it is she wanted to accomplish why come back for a second year the flip side of that is a girl who did nothing first year and now wants to come back for second year to give it another chance and I say well second year should not be first year again so you're coming in and starting in second year without a first year that doesn't make any sense if you want repeat first year but it doesn't make any sense to go back for a second year unless the second year is just first year again in which case it doesn't serve any purpose and the other one is people who definitely need it which means they accomplished a certain amount in sha Al and they need another year to finish what their goals are so they're coming back for another year to continue growing what they building on what they did in the first year and then there were some people who could come back or not come back I mean I've had people came back for second year and they would they just deteriorated because they maximized their experience and they were ready to move on by boy yiva is a little different because by boyas um I'm sorry I'm getting on my Soap Box uh as I do from time to time and uh you know saying something a little controversial but um the Yeshiva system was more or less developed by R in the 1700s late early 1800s and the model has not changed and it's a mistake of course the world has changed I said this when the day school movement started the day school movement basically made yeshivas that were like yeshivas and I said that's great if you're dealing with the normal CLA Isel but if in fact the job of the Yeshiva is now to inspire the students to become from or to inspire the students to be you know meaningful Jews then learning gar three star is not going to do it it's a mistake but when salant started the Muslim movement it's because he saw that the standard Yeshiva model was not working people were not getting mus they weren't growing in in their mid in yay and that's why he started the musim movement to incorporate that into yeshivas there were people who fought him terribly because you want the system to stay the way it's always been and as famously said a and he was seen as as a radical he was opposed you know the briskers in particular fought against him you know that uh this whole concept of a musim movement musiva was something that had never been seen before and they and they didn't really want it now it's not a problem because the musin is dead yeah um there are certain yeshivas and I have seen with my own eyes that when the mashia gets up to give asmo they have to place piles out of the B mes no they don't want to hear it mus you know uh which is still clinging to the principles of mus to the best of my knowledge again I left many many years ago but but they used to tell a joke they used to say most Yas during mus seder they learned Mish he says and they turn misher into muser I said this over once to a guy and he says that's so interesting because I just saw this mus on the Mish so life imitates art but um uh you know so now there's not really that so if you don't have the muser you know there's Mish and is 15 minutes 30 minutes you know how much you getting you know tanak forget about it nobody's learning mus you know so it's gar three three star a day so the difference between sh Al and Sh is really negligible it's just more of the same that's why you know uh a girl will come out of a year of Seminary with a foundation you know in hash in in in tanak in you know different other areas and a boy will know the first eight blot of a m not very well I know he knows it not very well because I've learned with these guys afterwards and they pull out their gamara and it's like they're looking at it for the first time and they're looking at their little copious notes that they scribbled on the side and they say oh we spent a lot of time in this tus it says there was a pan shoe on it so so you spent eight going bean and you don't remember it very well then the next man you do another gamar and then the next man another gamar and you know so the educational model in my opinion needs to be rethought to Define what are the goals for aent to today and what do we need to do to make sure that he accomplishes it that's what R salant did when he started the Muslim movement he looked at the B Yesa and saw the system is broken it needs to be fixed and uh and if you don't fix it you're going to have a problem but I'm not here to discuss that because the odds of you finding a Yeshiva that does a different to a different type of a program it's probably about Yesa or or you know a Mone or something like that you average aiva you can count on them to do gor Ian first Sader um maybe beus second Sader and third Sader will usually be Kora of the Ian seder that you didn't shear and and you know and things like that it might continue with the pus that you were doing in the afternoon there might be a half hour of H you know that's about it there might be some vadum that are going on that are voluntary you know I mean but for the most part it's going to be whatever the mea is doing now they are different yeshivas you know and fredman's Yeshiva they do one M until they finish it so the uh the standard we do this and you get the you know the that's it it's not how it goes you know in the Mir right he does a blot and he does it Bean you know they set quite a pace um is notorious for going very slowly and very be right so um so that's all D I'm not even up to that yet I'm talking now just about what is it that you're looking to accomplish so if you're planning to give it only a year or two years you're probably doing better to go to a yiva that's Geared for a year or two years and in fact those will sometimes have a more varied program they might might have a they might have a they might have a they might you know different yeah they might have different Things That Vary the regular program um and uh you know that's uh that's a another approach it's another approach as I say the other yeshivas will just do gamar three star day with no bells and whistles yeah and that's that's what it's going to be so you have to Define like I say beforehand what kind of yes you looking for yeah so when that comes along let's let's categorize it right and I know I'm generalizing here but there are two types of people those who generalize and those who do not so let's generalize there are going to be programs a program is not even a Yesa right they might call themselves a Mone they might call themselves uh you know uh mosad I don't know they might have a different name it's not technically Yeshiva it is a general is a religious studies program and it might have other programs along with it yeah it's not a Yeshiva per se okay uh those are very good if that's your particular goal I.E let's say you're looking to go to a place where you're going to learn and also take college courses you know so okay that's going to be a different kind of a institution than one that's just learning Torah right okay then there are the one or twoyear Yas and those have to be divided up between those that have a more modern Orthodox slant and those that have a more of a yisha slant and uh you know that won't be hard to figure out you can you know uh talk to the boys who go there and you could talk to the people who are recruiting and get a picture of the student body right so if you look at their brochure and um and you see a picture of a boy wearing kipasa reading um lonely man of Faith by uh by salic you got a pretty good idea what message the school's trying to send if you go in you see two guys with black yamakas sitting over gamorra hovering like this you have a idea of what they're trying to give over you understand um if you see the talm all wearing hats and jackets in the brochure and there's someone wearing a frock speaking up front you understand more or less what message they're trying to send you so brochures in them themselves may not be that informative but at least it shows you what image the school is trying to project and to give over so like I say those are good options if you're looking for a post High School what they sometimes call a gap year in England where you have your year before you start University you have a gap year where you uh are looking to do something for that time so that's that's the schnit that those fit and within them there are obviously different levels some of them are on a lower level some of them are seen as being on a higher intellectual level but at the end of the day um the goal is a one or twoyear program and then you go back to your country of origin and do whatever right they may have as a goal for you to stay in learning and then to move you into another Yeshiva but that's not what the yes itself is about yeah okay it's interesting that there are um uh those that try to mask their appearance much as I used to do in ncsy when I tried to get people who are not chabas to to a shabat tone by stressing different things so there are certain yeshivas where you can see the Riva come in and he's got a black hat and pays behind his ears you know what I mean and he tells you how uh you know yeah with we're very open and we're very this and we're very that and they try to present themselves as not a Yesa and it could be they even have a student body that is not a Ki group but essentially that's the goal of the Yeshiva and so uh they you know they're they're wearing a mask the problem with those kind of yeshivas is you can see through them in about two or three years when you see what happens to the B will come back and if you see that if the majority of them they could they transfer over to the mirror then you know they're sending one message and if you see if the majority of them end up you know let's say going to Wu or to turo then they're sending a different message so uh you can usually see you know sometimes past the marketing again you have to do a little research just to know what the place is so that's the that's the first level I should say the first level is the the second level or the one or two years yes the third level is um what I call the mere prep schools these are yeshivas that are not meant specifically for one or two years yes they get boys who are coming for one to two years but the goal is that they can stay in the ISA for three or four or five years and eventually move on to the mirror lakid or some like that and that's a whole uh set of yeshivas when you get into that level of Yeshiva then you're basically um almost always dealing with Yeshiva yeshivas I don't it'll be hard pressed to find mod orx shivas that go on for three four five years for you to continue learning um someone might argue that the Jewish studies program in Lan is like that okay uh maybe um but as far as what you think of a yiva where a guy can come for one or two years and then stay on for three four or five years is almost always going to be aiva that's where you're going to find it now there's another category where you can stay on for a long time and it's not a m prep school and it's not a Yeshiva and that are the hezer yeshivas um hez Yeshiva was by the way started in kavna and uh the it was very interesting he was once there was there was a dinner and the Prime Minister came and said how wonderful kav is that it's azda yiva and gold got up and he said I have to make a correction we are not a hezer Yeshiva we are a regular Yeshiva with a hezer program hezer means Arrangement and what does it mean Arrangement this means that um until recently uh a boy who was learning Yeshiva was entitled to a deferment from the Army just like an America a person learning in a religious Seminary had a deferment that's why yiva uh attendance during the Vietnam war increased dramatically as bad as Yeshiva is it wasn't considered as bad as the swamps of Vietnam it wasn't the hoim man Trail so it was close but not as bad so they would get a deferment so Israel always gave you a deferment yeah now the Supreme Court has uh has canceled that and uh Israel's a little bit of turmoil and what's going to happen I'm not sure but this much is clear it'll be bad but uh but that was uh that was the arrangement for a long time and it was called getting a pure a uh a um an exemption from army service because you were learning Yeshiva then there were people who just went into the army at one point they started something called the uh which was supposed to be run with more religious uh supervision and concern and things like that there were those whoan famously would was in favor of it Rach was opposed to it arach was opposed to it so it became very controversial but uh that was the so what came up with was what he called heer which means Arrangement where you would learn six months in Yeshiva and then go to the Army for six months and learn you know go back and forth so your total service was longer but this way people could feel like they were going to the Army and also being in Yeshiva at the same time and they had their own special units Etc so um uh so some hez Yas have an American program not all of them but some of them do yeah a m program which is M it's yeah a a program so there are the straight Israelis who are going to the Army and there are Americans who are learning in the hez yiva in a program which is not going to the Army and just learning but has to Yeshiva so Yeshiva is like shalim kavna gush um uh I'm going to forget some I'm sure I think a hotel um you know they have azda Yeshiva so you could go to azda Yeshiva and stay and go to shalim and stay there for four or five years of course and the goal is not for you to graduate and go onto the mirror or lakid yeah and um and the hashkafa will be much morei I don't know if you would call it modern Orthodox but certainly it won't be and uh that's an option for longtime learning yeah and then uh there's the um and then there's the mirror mirror and brisk and and Lage which consider themselves the destination you're not going from there to any place else now some of the you know M prep schools would argue that we're not merely a mere or brisk prep school we are there in and of ourselves we serve our own purpose so uh so those are the considerations when you're going to choose Yeshiva where am I holding on this hash offically and structurally of the Yeshiva and therefore as the say who's smart someone who can see the future and so the future is look at this and say where do I see myself in 5 years and 10 years and choose the yiva that's going to help me to accomplish that okay next time we'll talk about DK Li and uh what the Yeshiva does and what we're trying to accomplish we'll talk about that more next time and that brings us to the question answer portion of our program we don't have a sponsor this week but remember that you can sponsor simply if you want the um uh the question answer portion as opposed to sponsoring an entire episode by Anonymous in is blessed with is there a way we can try to maintain that all right so let's develop this uh a little bit right is uh essentially saying that every Jewish Home is a mishkan and that's why the first uh completely Jewish Home which was the first completely Jewish kid to get married which was Yak it says when he took his wife into the tent all of the Nim of the mishkan took place the cloud hovered over the bread stayed warm like the L upon him all week the candles burnt the entire time like uh thei and the manora so the their home was actually a mishkan um how do we achieve this and um It's Tricky I'm going to tell you up front It's Tricky the first thing is you have to be clear that this is a goal there are a lot of people who will pay lip service to this but they don't really mean it they they don't think that their home is a makum kadosh nor do they necessarily want their home to be a makum kados uh I'll give you an easy example and you'll be able to tell how old this uh this question is by the technological terms that I'm referring to um this girl said I went out with a boy and he says he wants to go to movies and I said I don't want to go to a movie theater I don't think that's proper if we want to watch a movie we'll rent a vcr and rent a tape from Blockbuster and watch a movie this is what she says to me and I said if you think it's wrong to go to a movie theater why would you bring it into your home your home should have a certain level of kadosa above the street I would much rather that the two of you go out to a movie theater to watch a movie than to bring the movie into your home because your home should be a Mak kados orwick said to me uh he heard from an ad and he didn't tell me who but he says I heard from an ad that you should always speak a different language in the house than they speak on the street so your family knows that your home is not the street and this is the difference between is the street is not the street and that's why on chabas theim only goes up but goes all the way up to heaven the the Kad goes up and that's a significance of a muza that you should know when you pass this threshold you are coming into a home that is a holy place so um so he says you always speak a different language and he says when I lived in America I only spoke Yiddish in the house to the children when we moved toel I spoke English so that's when I decided to move to Israel because I can only speak English and so I could speak to my kids in Hebrew but then they'll end up in special education so uh so in my house we only speak English because that's the only language I know but the idea is that when people come in they know that it's different um Gua told me that his mother told him about his grandfather who was a of the you know the you know carried with malus and they I hope I have the story right I don't think every guys actually watch the podcast although we had him on as a guest but this is a story he tells me he says he never walked into the house ever he knocked on the door and waited for somebody to answer it and if he had to stand there a long time he stood outside but you don't just walk into a house you understand the level of sensitivity you have to have he says it was one yandi says he must have been shmooing after doing you know and my mother had you know a bunch of guests for the suda and she says to me o he making us wait he's really going to get it when he comes home and she says I was very excited because I never never heard my mother and father fight ever anyway so he finally comes home knocks on the door she answers the door he goes good y she says good y says the guest and I'm sorry I was late you know somebody had was asking me a question said you know oh good come me kidish you know afterwards they go into the kitchen and she says my mother says to my grandmother goes I thought you were going to give it to him goes you didn't see oh boy he knew I was upset with him so what do you mean because usually I smil like this and now I only smiled like this that he knew I was [Laughter] upset you know when you when you have a house and you ask yourself what comes in and what doesn't come in right um so there was a time when the big fight was about a television do you let a television in your house do you not let a television in your house you know all these kind of fights uh they would have uh certain schools that would ask on the application do you have a TV on your house and so before they would go to the interview they would take the TV outside put her on the porch and say no we don't have a TV in our house you know it became very you know emotional uh going back to the time when they had big consoles you know vicd deila famously said he goes should I have a television in my house says absolutely you just have to break that little glass thing and then you have plenty of room to put in a [Laughter] Shas so why did schools have this because you could tell the difference between a kid who watches TV and a kid who doesn't watch TV we had been living in ell for a number of years and uh of course we didn't have a television and we went to stay with relatives in the states and my kids they had a TV and my kids were just glued to it this is a genetic thing I know because my parents worked and so uh I was raised by a television they would just sit me in front of the TV and I just sit the like this and watch the TV all day you know and um when other children my age in other situations were memorizing mishas Bal I can tell you the theme song to any television show from the 60s and 70s or early 70s yeah so uh that's how I grew up I could tell you all of the commercials yeah I sometimes incorporate them into shur because like I say they're lodged in my brain forever and I can't get them out you know it's so funny Dave Barry what he was talking about uh um I don't remember he has two books Dave Barry turns 40 Dave Barry turns 50 and he's talking about aging and in one of them he says people think as you get older your memory starts to go but it's not true he says you just have too much stuff in your brain that you can't get rid of he says so when when it comes to something like remembering I don't know all your children's names that might be a little hard for you he says but I bet you can sing the theme song to The Beverly Hillbillies with no problem come on oh listen to my story about a man named J there no question about it anyway so we're there just for a month in the summer and at some point I went to the supermarket to do some shopping and one of my kids said look tricks part of a balanced breakfast now nobody believes that tricks is part of a balanced breakfast you'd have to put in a lot a lot of health food for tricks to balance it out in fact there was a story I heard years ago I don't know if it's true but like I always say I'm not Bas grow where they uh gave this rat a box of Froot Loops and he ate the Box instead of the Froot Loops cuz he sensed there was more nutritional value in it but um uh the uh uh television changes the nature of how people talk when I was in high school I noticed there were certain people who could only talk about three things what they watched on TV what they were going to watch on TV and repeating entire conversations and lines from what they saw on TV and this is it their entire identity was just defined by watching TV oh those are the good old days now with the internet you watch people on their phone all the time they're watching videos they're watching this they're watching listen thing going and going and going and going and it and there's no there's no let up and you come into a house you know you can see people sitting at the at the table assuming that there's still a dinner table and everyone's on their phone you know uh Netflix had done a documentary about this about how social media is designed to uh become addictive and um they showed this family where they the mother was trying to get control and so she's she got this like glass lockbox says everyone's putting your device in the lockbox for the duration of the meal so we can have a regular meal anyway it lasts for a while and then the girl goes over and she just like just breaks the box and takes her phone back you she just can't handle it um so what do you want in your house what do you want you know what do you put up in your house you know pictures of GD Torah the what you're putting up there is very important um I was deeply moved one time because I was speaking someplace and a guy comes over with his son and he says can we take a picture I was like sure and he takes it and he says my son has a display in his room with all of the G Torah that he's met so I didn't feel so bad because it was like me and P cron and you know and uh so I I felt a little better at least I felt at least I was in comfortable room if it was like and me I would have got a little nervous I've got this picture with me and shinberg we were both sitting on a and I don't know who looked more uncomfortable but um uh you know what do he put up I was talking with this fellow once who uh was nominally observant nominally more towards the not observant than than to observant and we were to he was worried about his daughter into marrying and how do how what can I do when she was in public school and how can I make sure that she only dates Jewish boys and we're talking and at some point he says to me oh by the way Rabbi my grandfather passed away he was a religious man and he left all these boxes of you know Jewish books that I can't really read and uh if you want you could take them so I said you just answered your own question I said look around your living room you've got um display cases you know with Collectibles and uh artwork you know and uh you know all these fancy kind of things he says get rid of those put your grandfather's SPM up there so your children get to see what's important to you I took the Collectibles because I already have for but um but what do you want what message you sending your kid you know you can walk into certain homes and you see that the artwork is Jewish art even if the people may not be that from but what you see in the house reflects what it is that you're trying to bring across therefore you have to know your house is not the street and don't treat it like the street you have to maintain a certain standard in your house and what you do outside you do outside but the house itself has to be a certain standard there are certain hashas that some people eat and some people don't eat and uh um I don't let them in my house because I want everyone to know that in my house anybody can come in and eat with confidence with nothing to worry about the house will try to be on the highest standard and that's always the important thing my brother Galia and uh my sister-in La mirl who live in Muny um they were building a house in forche and they built a very large dining room and it had a speaker system Etc and uh he told me once he says I'm embarrassed by having such a large house and I figured why would Hashem give it to me except to do and he signed up for people who can't afford a hall that if they don't have a very large event you know chevas or you know a vort or whatever it is they would he would give their house to them to be able to make the event you know and this where they could play the music over the speakers and the people could speak you know microphone and you know and uh they made their kitchen available sometimes they made the food and served it themselves you know to be able to provide it when people grow up and see that your home is a place of of of things like that it sends a message that this home is not just a regular house it is a mish and that's it for this episode but if you want to find out more about the show you can go to my website R ali.com you can leave a comment you can write an email you can um uh sign up for one of our online shorum um you know uh I've mentioned this now a couple of times and I have gotten some email response that there might be people are interested in starting a p so uh we'll have to see if more people express interest on that we'll have to add a little button to to sign up for that if somebody's interested in the meantime we still have missil for women uh um DFI for men um and we may add like I say another share so uh that's it you can have other online content you can sponsor an episode you can sponsor a question answer you can sponsor a par five and that's it for this episode I am de rowski and this has been the rabbi olowski show it's the rabbi orlovski show Torah and S ready to go the rabbi orlovski show knowledge and wisdom will help you grow lots of fun in every episode and we don't have to rhyme no we don't it's the rabbi orlovski show on Rabbi ori. comom T anytime you two and more it's Gra Ori show Torah and ready to go the rabbi orski show till next time till we meet again it's the rabbi Orlowski show it's the rabbi Orlowski show it's the rabbi Orlowski show