http://www.jewishpress.com/displayContent_...mp;sectionid=14

Do you think the "working" boy will be satisfied with this response to his letter?

Well I just lost a lot of respect for Rebbetzin Esther Jungreis. (Or perhaps the OPS edited her reply.)

no, it's just what i expected.

She's pretty good with personal dilemmas, but anything that smacks of a social problem within the Orthodox community gets deflected.

i read it on shabbos and was thinking that the guy won't find it satisfying. my other thought was that Cassie should contact the rebbetzin and ask her to be a shadchan

I'm always surprised when the JP prints something even remotely critical of the standard line.
The letter raised some good questions, but as usual, the regular columnists can't stray too far from the standard answers.

and here i'm thought of as sooo modern by my friends for reading it!

The question I have is why the JP often has at least one article critical of Kollel.

Do the other newspaper like Hamodea and Yated ever have articles critical of kollel?

Not directly... but they hint at it.

i do think it's because it's not as right wing as hamodia or yated

In some circles, a woman being able to read is probably considered very modern.

forget about writing, right?

Kollel stirs up heated debate on the internet,.
Even on the Yeshiva World News kollel is attacked with venom in the comments section.
I wonder if all the criticism raises any doubts in true adherents.

i don't think so.

but what do you mean by "true adherents"? if it's those who really believe in it and want to learn for the sake of learning, then i have no problem with it and they shouldn't change their views. if it's those who do it because that's what's expected nowadays, then i also don't think it'll change caause they are too afraid to become albinos in their circles.

nah, i'd apply the "don't debate a heretic because it will only entrench him in his evil" here.



don't they get what they're doing to torah and to yiddishkeit and how they're endangering innocent jewish neshamos with all kinds of missery and tzar and sin?

Well you can be a "true adherent" and want to learn and be very pious but realize from what people are saying that there may be another way to go about it. (wake up early and learn, etc.). That is being independent mature.

i hear you, but i still have no problem if some (really serious learners) would be full time learning for as much as they want, nothing bad for our society would come out of it. it's not about another way, this is THE way they want, for its own sake, not because their neighbors will look at them as different if they don't go to kollel. also, most of these people would eventually go into rabbanut/chinuch anyway. the thing is, that such serious learners are not expecting to drive the latest model car and buy a house in 2 years. their lifestyle is according to their means and their wives agree with it.

If the kollel program were only about learning, it would not be controversial.
All the incidentals surrounding it cause the invectives.
It would make sense to develop a program that would unite people rather than divide them.