4winds of wealth for happiness This is a link to an audio tape of Rabbi Dovid E. Eidensohn explaining the Four types of wealth that make for happiness. You may begin by listening to the audio, or you can read this material first.
4winds of wealth for happiness is about the great decline of Torah especially in America, that has resulted in a great lack of prominent gedolim, and has brought to the leadership of the Torah community people who regularly do the opposite of the Shulchan Aruch and poskim, as we have often discussed on this blog and elsewhere.
There is now a great crisis with broken Torah families, often leading to terrible fights in secular court and Chilul HaShem, not to mention the suffering of the people involved. There is something wrong. But what is it? One thing is that when we hear what present Torah leaders in America want to do, they never talk about broken marriages. It is fighting the Internet or some such thing. This is how I got into the 4winds, as I will explain.
It all began some years ago when the Magid of Jerusalem was in Monsey. Since it was my style to pester every Odom Gadol who came my way, I used to regularly talk to him when he visited Monsey during his various campaigns to raise money for Israeli Yeshivos, etc. This time, I came to him after he gave a lecture with a new kind of request. I told him that a video store had opened in Monsey right in the center of town. In those days, Monsey was all about Torah. A video store was a shocking thing. I anticipated that Reb Shalom would say something fiery, perhaps in public, perhaps as part of his regular derosho, to arouse people to this problem. So how surprised I was that just the opposite happened.
Reb Shalom, a student of Reb Elya Lopin, was a master speaker and an artist with his gestures. He answered my remark about the video store by turning away from me, so I was staring at the side of his face, and the face was cold, very cold, granite that did not know I existed. I repeated myself, but no change. I tried, again, and no change. So I thought, "Here I am, Mr. Azuse ponim, because how else could I speak to all of the gedolim? I raised my voice and said, "Rebbe! Hashchoso!"
Reb Shalom was waiting for that. Suddenly, he woke up. His eyes flashed. With great theatric control he slowly turned and moved his hand and finger at my face and declared, "A Yeshiva is haschoso!" I felt myself falling down, down, down. But a still quiet voice said to me, "Just be quiet. He said this in public. He has to explain." Reb Shalom relished his triumph by smiling and saying, in a nice way in Yiddish, "That shut his mouth." I used to banter with him when he was in a good mood. Now he blew me away. But I was waiting. And then Reb Shalom explained why he said such a drastic thing. Yes, he was very upset about what was going on in Yeshivas, and he meant what he said.
A few weeks later, at the wedding of my son, I saw that a very prominent Rosh Yeshiva was there, as he was the mechuten of my mechuton. I went to pester him and sat with him for half an hour talking about my compalints about the Agudah and Rosh Yeshivas. He listened and did not dispute anything. I then mentioned about Reb Shalom's remark. The Rosh Yeshiva suddenly became aroused and enthusiastic as if to say, "Yes."
I asked my son how this could be, as he was a major Rosh Yeshiva, and my son answered, "He is always talking like that."
From that time on, I became even more critical of what was going on in the Torah world. And if today you read my ferocious comments about major RoshYeshivas who coerce Gittin and make mamzerim, that is when it really got started.
For a few years I battled major Rosh Yeshivas brutally because they were giving out letters commanding people to coerce a GET from somebody who was related to a Rosh Yeshiva and another person who was married to the daughter of a friend of a Rosh Yeshiva. I let loose and claimed that they were making mamzerim, which was true.
But as time went on, and I saw that I had succeeded in presenting the sources for my complaints, but I saw no change in the posture of those I criticized, even after Gedolim in Israel joined in the battle, I realized that the whole American Torah world was sinking. What could I do?
I recalled that the Chofetz Chaim said, "We don't punch darkness. We create light." I began to think how to create light. First I came up with the idea of Shalom Bayis Beth Din, to educate couples and to work with them when there were problems, and maybe to fine people who don't listen to the Beth Din that could save a lot of people from being forced to stay married with problems of coercion. But I realized that the problem would not be solved with that, as the problem is the great lack of Gedolim and the emergence of people who are not only ignorant about basic halacha in Gittin but they are also corrupt.
One day, I had an idea. The solution is really to reach into the schools where young people learn, and teach them the real Torah, the one I had learned from much personal talking to Reb Aharon Kotler, Reb Moshe Feinstein, Reb Yaacov Kamiinetsky, Reb Yosef Shalom Elyashev all of them zt"l, and others. But what would be the focus, the program? I came up with the idea of the Four Wealths.
People must be taught from childhood to be great or wealthy in Torah, to be great and wealthy with money, to be great and wealthy with social skills and Derech Erets, and to be great and wealthy with knowledge of the world, the physical and political issues.
(Continued in Post Two)
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