Well, as long as they look frum....

A little background on this story....

A boy about 12 years old is struggling at his yeshiva because the English is overwhelmed with nothingness and there is no respect for adults and teachers. His parents are professionals. Father is very learned and a well respected national attorney-A very righteous man doing huge amounts of work on behalf of Israel and the Jewish people.

Parents end up sending the boy to a co-ed day school where he does very well, but as he enters 9th grade, they would prefer he go back to the yeshiva where his two older brothers are. A few days before his summer interview at the yeshiva, something happens. The mother of a former classmate at the yeshiva-let's call her Yenta-sees the boy talking to a girl who happens to be in his class at the day school. Yenta the mother, knowing of the boys upcoming interview, grabs her cell phone and places an urgent call to the principal and because her husband is a board member at the yeshiva, she feels she can call the principal at any time. So on his summer vacation, she calls the principal and demands he turn the boy away from the yeshiva, because even though her son and the boy are the best of friends, she does not want his influence of talking to girls around her son. Her son is a true ben Torah and he does not need this kind of bad apple in the yeshiva. The one thing the mother has forgotten to mention to the principal is that she is making the phone call to him FROM A LOCAL (not jewish) PUBLIC POOL WHERE MEN AND WOMAN ARE SWIMMING TOGETHER. She, of course, SELF-APPOINTED ARBITER OF FRUMKEIT THAT SHE IS, can be there because she has covered herself up more than those "others" at the pool who clearly do not understand teh lessons of right and wrong that she administers.

Understand this. This self righteous mitzvah doer is relaxing her day away at a public swimming pool when she notices on the sidewalk some few hundred feet away, this boy, who, passing by a girl he is in class with, stops to say hi and she takes it upon herself to make sure the boy is not in her sons class at the yeshiva because her son does not need this awful influence in his life-being the true ben Torah that he is.

Fast forward two years. The boy is thriving in the day school after the parents resented the yeshiva's treatment of their son based on him being spotted talking to this girl by Yenta and her subsequent reporting of it to the Principal. He is a leader and a mentsch on his way to being a masmid. This past Wednesday, Yenta's son is caught by his principal at the local JCC leaving the building with his brand new girlfriend. The irony is so rich you have to wipe it away from your face with both hands. Of course there were no repercussions for Yenta's son because the father and Yenta are now both board members and the president of the school is their best friend...

So where does this leave us?

I don't really know when it started, but sometime in the past twenty five years, the religious Jewish people made style over substance the most important criteria in life. Funny thing is, it was this very thing that Rabbeim railed against when they gave their Thursday night schmoozes, decrying the non religious for the manicured lawns and their fancy cars, wondering why they turned their backs on Torah. How could they choose style over substance? They need to learn Torah to understand the shortcomings of their life decisions. Now, we have embraced their philosophy even though our people study Torah every day. Funny how that happens....

A few times each week now, I have men knocking at my door collecting for their yeshivas. My one question to each of them is, would I, in my three button polo shirt and kakis, be allowed to study Torah in their yeshiva if I was 18 years old? Invariably, they hedge the answer until, when pressed, they say no, I would have to conform to the standard white and black fare. When asked why, they cannot give me anything better than this is how a ben Torah dresses. Really? The Chofetz Chaim dressed like that? How many of these great Torah scholars know that we stole this get-up from the polish and russian nobleman. Chas V'Shalom is their response when enlightened.

It no longer matters what you are, it matters what your look like you are. And therein lies the rub...

I have so much more on this, but I will stop here for now because I have made my own stomach turn and another shamas is at my door....and just In case you're wondering, I do give all the men Tzedakah, but I always wonder why....