Sorry, it’s just that I use limited internet only for email, so I don’t have access to your respected site, which I was exposed to in the past; and if I may, sometime I’d even share with you points that hurt me a bit in your writing style and the sharpness of your formulations regarding the Jewish Torah world (I refrain from using the label “Haredim,” because in my view that is a narrowing sectoral definition; rather “people of Torah” or “the authentic Jewish people,” which seems to me a bit more accurate), but that is not relevant right now. In any case, I was impressed and received clear and important foundations for the building of my faith from reading your writings, albeit only a little. For that I have gratitude and a willingness to continue receiving from you in this area, if I may.
Rabbi Neugroschel once commented to me not to rush into outreach and explanation before I had acquired knowledge and skill in the field. I understand that this is your opinion as well (and the truth is that aside from that I really am young, only 25, and only relatively recently, during my army service, did I begin my process of repentance; by the way, it started in the Religious Zionist public).
The reality is that I (sometimes against my will) engage in outreach and explanation, both by creating discussion groups and by giving lectures (very recently they’ve even started inviting me to lecture), with secular people from the more disconnected segment from Torah and commandments that has managed to form in Israeli society. In any event, until now I have managed to stand behind every claim and question, and to sanctify Heaven’s name a great deal through rational explanation (perhaps you would disagree and define it as empiricist, but in any case, intellectual explanation). And perhaps the shallow thinking and average analytical ability of the average secular academic work in my favor. I have still not encountered an atheist whose doctrine is truly well ordered in his mouth; and perhaps it is simply Isaiah’s prophecy, “Every tongue that rises against you in judgment, you shall condemn,” that stands in my favor.

– As for the use of these terms, both foreign and Hebrew, it is because I try to express myself only in Hebrew as much as possible, but I noticed that specifically the use of foreign terms is more readily grasped, and otherwise I am less understood, so I combine them. And regarding “chaotic” and “random,” thank you, and sorry—this is how Wikipedia defined the terms as parallel, but in any case I trust your professionalism more, and so I accept it.

Regarding the winged demon: true, there is no way to refute it with scientific tools, but that does not mean it is proven by way of negation, since there is also no sufficiently good reason (if any) to assume the existence of such a demon, unlike the claim of a Creator for creation, which as stated is a first principle (intellectual, and also experiential)! And as stated, there is also no way to refute it by an empirical test (similar to the demon). Am I right?

Sorry in advance that I am not writing to you through the site; as stated, I do not have the technical possibility (by choice).
Sorry for the length in advance, but your answers will help me continue assisting the sons and daughters of the Omnipresent who have undergone consciousness engineering in the shallow secular world (as I myself once did), and who thirst for the resolution of doubts and for a clear faith-foundation that thereby consolidates (almost) a true Jewish identity.
More power to you, Dr. Abraham, for spreading the light of faith in a clear, orderly, and above all rationalist way!

Hello.
It seems to me that with the level of knowledge and skill that an average 25-year-old person has (unless he is an especially exceptional phenomenon), it is not advisable for him to become a lecturer. Even if you feel you are succeeding, it is not certain that this is also what your listeners feel. I speak from experience. Just a few days ago I spoke with an older man who lectures in many places and recently did a debate. He feels very successful and accomplished, but again and again I hear from his listeners that he makes a fool of himself מול atheists and gets the opposite result. At age 25, when you are only a few years into the religious/Haredi world, I would recommend that you continue learning, and later perhaps consider activities like lectures and so on. Beyond that, to use philosophy it is not enough to hear rumors about it from Neugroschel. Again, I very strongly recommend familiarity with the subjects one deals with in public, certainly when it comes to lectures and arguments about faith that can lead to problematic results. The youthful enthusiasm of newly religious people is well known, and of course it has value, but one has to be careful with it when it finds outward expression—lecturing others and criticizing those on the inside. I remember that Popik (Rabbi Mordechai) Arnon, the well-known singer, came to speak at our yeshiva high school and criticized the entire religious and secular universe and his wife, as though he knew everything and was fed directly from the mouth of the Almighty.

My policy is to refer people to the site in my answers. If someone’s filtering does not allow that, he must find a solution. Someone who chose Haredi filtering should not impose the cost on others.

As for the winged demon: if you assume that there is God, then of course you will arrive at the conclusion that He exists. That is begging the question. But to say that because this is not refutable it is therefore stronger than scientific claims is nonsense. The fact that this claim cannot be refuted is only a weakness of it (unless it is a tautology). What remains is the argument or intuition that leads to the conclusion that there is a God, and you need to discuss only that.
Your assessment of the “shallow” secular world is, in my opinion, incorrect. Most people are shallow in every world. The thinkers in the secular world are usually on a higher level than the thinkers in the Haredi world, which is usually very shallow and childish. And of course your identification of the Haredi world with the authentic Jewish world is also not acceptable to me. It is not really deep, and certainly not authentic. It of course also has virtues of devotion to Torah and breadth of knowledge and analytical learning among some of its learners, but in the realms of thought the level there is truly appalling.

I am always happy to receive substantive comments about my way of speaking. I have already received comments about my decisiveness, and sometimes (rather rarely) I agreed with them. In most cases I answered as I answered, and this is not the place.

I’ll address briefly only a few main points in your remarks.
1. Many people correspond with me by email, and that is not the “cost” I was talking about. The cost I was talking about is when people cannot enter links on my site and ask me to discuss things again from scratch (they cannot read the references I give). About that I say: get rid of the Haredi filtering and do not impose the cost on others. By the way, when people ask me to send them a file, I do send it. That “service” I do provide, but not a discussion of something I have already discussed.
2. Haredi filtering is not a tool for wise and responsible internet use, as you wrote, but an economic tool for a group with an interest that ensures foolish internet use. There are different filters for violence and sex and so on, but Haredi filtering also filters opinions, like my site. This is simply keeping the masses in line with the Pied Pipers of Hamelin, not wise use of the internet.
3. As for listening to the leading rabbis of the generation, they understand the internet much less than you do and are fed by mere hearsay and manipulated by interested parties. Their instructions on this matter are worth nothing.
4. Great Torah scholars are indeed those who devoted their lives to it, but that is a necessary condition, not a sufficient one. There are quite a few who devoted their lives to Torah and still think like children, at least in certain areas. Contrary to the common Haredi example, Torah study, with all my appreciation for it, is not a substitute for acquiring other knowledge and skills.
5. You speak of having escaped from Religious Zionism or modern religiosity into Haredi society, whereas I almost made the opposite journey (I was never really Haredi). Unfortunately, that way of relating is very childish, even though it is energetically cultivated in Haredi propaganda. In my eyes there are greater Torah scholars in the Religious Zionist world, without any comparison at all. By the way, it took me a very long time (and at an older age than yours) to get rid of the false consciousness that Haredi society implanted in the public at large (both secular and Religious Zionist), which cannot manage to see a man wearing a knitted kippah and sandals as a great Torah scholar. Only a frock coat and hat. In my eyes, greatness in Torah is not determined by the color of the clothes or the kippah but by content, knowledge, skill, and common sense. Those ingredients are, in my estimation, found much more among non-Haredi rabbis. That is certainly true in the areas of thought (what in the Haredi world is called “hashkafah,” outlook), and no less so in the application of Jewish law to life, but even in Talmudic analysis itself there is sometimes an expression of crooked thinking among learners who truly do devote their lives to study. There is something warped in someone who has been shut up in the study hall all his life, and it takes hard work to straighten it out. Some do so (like Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach of blessed memory), but most do not (because of the baseless Haredi model that the four cubits of Jewish law are a substitute for everything, and from there one can derive all knowledge and skill).
6. Your reference to Aviv in the debate as a villain outrages me. He has a different view, and he is no more and no less a villain because of his views. The position that sees everyone who thinks differently as a villain has villainy in it. It is true that he was tendentious in his thinking, and I also wrote and said this, but which of us is not? Certainly someone who belongs to Haredi society cannot come with complaints against a person with tendentious and inferior thinking. The figures you study and are close to are more tendentious than he is.

To conclude: if you have points you would like to discuss, you are certainly welcome. I much prefer through the responsa system on my site, but after the fact, email is also possible, within the above limitations.
Well then, that’s all for now.
All the best and good luck,

The jargon is not that of a fresh baal teshuvah but of a Haredi kollel student from the womb, used to Talmud. Aside from small signs scattered along the way that are hard to point to explicitly, what stands out is the use of the wording that the claim is “stronger in force than a scientific claim,” which is a Hebrew translation of an Aramaic mode of expression about the strength of claims, and likewise the casual use of the abbreviation “unlike.”

Rabbi, you wrote, “In my eyes there are greater Torah scholars in the Religious Zionist world, without any comparison at all.” Could you give an example?
I know a great many rabbis of all kinds, and I do not see who is greater for us than Rabbi Feinstein, the Hazon Ish, Rabbi Elyashiv, Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach, etc.?

In my eyes, younger rabbis whom you know are no less great than they are. Not to mention Rabbi Lichtenstein, Rabbi Amital, Rabbi Rabinovitch. I will not mention the younger ones by name, but you know some of them. Just ignore the sandals and the knitted kippah that bias us all. It’s not that they have more knowledge. Usually they have less. But their judgment is straighter, and certainly in areas that are not Jewish law proper. Therefore, in my eyes, they are greater.
By the way, Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach certainly had very straight judgment, and I was not talking about him. Nor about Rabbi Feinstein (though I identify less with his mode of thought). And it is no coincidence that those two were not Haredi leaders.

Miki, it’s strange that rabbis who are great and have straight judgment get labeled by you as non-Haredi.
Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach isn’t Haredi? Rabbi Feinstein isn’t Haredi? And likewise Rabbi Ovadia?
And if there are such people, then only in earlier generations.
It’s obvious that you are biased and your hatred of Haredim is making you lose your judgment.
You just have to notice the sentence, “In my eyes, younger rabbis whom you know are no less great than they are,” meaning no less great than the Hazon Ish. That is not serious.