Sittin' In The Wrong Chair
Last week one of the rebbeim was telling me a story (I forgot he context as to how it came up, sorry) about how this young kid, 13, 14 years old about. One day, he walks into to Lakewood yeshiva, he wants to learn a bit. He doesn't see any spots open, except this one rickety chair in the front, so he sits down.
As the rabbi told me, he was chucked out of there so fast he didn't know what happened -- he had sat in the Rosh Yeshiva's, R' Shach's (I'm pretty sure it was him) chair.
I don't know what is it about people like that they have to do something like that. Throw him out of the yeshiva for sitting accidently in the rosh yeshiva's chair? He came to the yeshiva to learn some Torah, one of the [if not the] most important things in Judaism, and for such an innocent act he's subsequently thrown out for sitting in the rabbi's seat accidently? I don't like that. Some people have become not frum because of stupid actions like that. They think, this is what Torah is about? and they leave it. That was such a chillul HaShem, doing that. Just throwing "don't embarass people in public" out the window. The Gemara says that it's better to burn in a fire than to embarass someone in public. Why couldn't they act like a mentsch? Why couldn't they say, "Excuse me, but you're sitting in the Rosh Yeshiva's chair, could you please get up"? Why couldn't they? WHY?! It bugs me so much that people can't just act nice towards people, especially when they don't know what's up, how things fly in certain places. I don't care about kavod harav (honor to the rabbi) here, kavod habriyos (honor to fellow people) comes first, plain and simple.
As the rabbi told me, he was chucked out of there so fast he didn't know what happened -- he had sat in the Rosh Yeshiva's, R' Shach's (I'm pretty sure it was him) chair.
I don't know what is it about people like that they have to do something like that. Throw him out of the yeshiva for sitting accidently in the rosh yeshiva's chair? He came to the yeshiva to learn some Torah, one of the [if not the] most important things in Judaism, and for such an innocent act he's subsequently thrown out for sitting in the rabbi's seat accidently? I don't like that. Some people have become not frum because of stupid actions like that. They think, this is what Torah is about? and they leave it. That was such a chillul HaShem, doing that. Just throwing "don't embarass people in public" out the window. The Gemara says that it's better to burn in a fire than to embarass someone in public. Why couldn't they act like a mentsch? Why couldn't they say, "Excuse me, but you're sitting in the Rosh Yeshiva's chair, could you please get up"? Why couldn't they? WHY?! It bugs me so much that people can't just act nice towards people, especially when they don't know what's up, how things fly in certain places. I don't care about kavod harav (honor to the rabbi) here, kavod habriyos (honor to fellow people) comes first, plain and simple.
posted by Karban Nesanel at 22:46
2 Comments:
*shakes head* how sad...
So a few weeks ago I was at Neve Yirusalim(i'm too drugged up and too tired to worry about spelling right now) and I was in a mechina class...now you may know me well enough,Tonny, to know that this is below my level.
Thats beside the point.
The point is, this teacher asks "so whats the point of mitzvot?"
I say, after a while, "To serve Hashem" or something like that."
She looks at me with dead sincerity and says "That's just too frum for my classes..sorry thats just too frum!" and turned away.
I was so embarassed and like "wtf? excuse me? is that how you treat students?" I felt like crawling under a desk or something.
If this is how a teacher teaches a student, how will the students treat others? With that same attitude...May those who treat their students with dignity and respect override those who embarass others to enable a spread of yiddishkeit throughout the world.
Dude - i don't know where i read it, but there was sa tory out of Russia about a rebbe who didn't treat a talmid in the manner he should have. That talmid grew up to have some wildly communist ideas of his own about society, religion, and what not. He even changed his name. His name... Stalin.
Post a Comment
<< Home