No Self-Awareness

I’m reading through Kedushah - The Abstinence of Married Men in Gur, Slonim and Toldos Ahron by Benjamin Brown, and I came across this spectacular case of a lack of self-awareness.

R’ Avrom Yitshok Kohn,the Rebbe of Toldes Aaron, wrote in his pamphlet,  Divrei Kedushah, that,

The difference between the  chasid   and the ordinary person is that the  hasid   says: “That which is forbidden is certainly forbidden, while that which is permitted—I nevertheless do not have to do it.” The ordinary person, on the other hand, says the opposite:“That which is permitted is certainly permitted, while that which is forbidden—I can nevertheless seek permission to do it.”

Apparently there was an incident years ago concerning a chassid who left Toldos Aharon for Ger because he felt that the Toldos Aharon restrictions on sex weren’t stringent enough. Toldos Ahraon permits sex between married couples three times a month to Ger’s one to two times, and permits couples to hug and kiss during sex, while Ger does not.

In an unpublished letter to the chassid, R’ Kohn wrote,

Now let us consider the crux of the matter. Even if, by means of this self-sacrifice, he appears to be committed to maintaining him-self in holiness and purity, and his intention [appears to be] good, it is nevertheless clear from the addenda of R. Tsvi Elimelekh of Dynów to the book   Turn Aside from Evil  [ and Do Good   ... ] 70 that if a person adopts stringencies and departs from the ways of the world [i.e., strays from the accepted norms of conduct], he draws upon himself accusations [from Heaven] [ ... ], and who knows whether he would be able to withstand them.

So which is it? Should one not do what is permitted, and take on stringencies, or should one avoid stringencies and “depart[ing] from the ways of the world” so that he won’t draws upon himself accusations [from Heaven]?

He also writes in an earlier letter concerning the same incident,

He has made a mockery [ leitsanut  ] of me, and a mockery of our whole community, including his own father, as if whoever wanted to bea [good] Jew had to run away from us.

As though his community didn’t do the same in regard to everyone to their left.

Annoying Vertlach

Does anyone else get annoyed by vertlach? The kind that build complex answers to their questions while ignoring the mundane straightforward answer, or the type that present some outlandish behavior as though it were praiseworthy.

There was a vort i heard years ago - i don't remember the exact details - that had something to do with bringing bikurim, and how the rich people would bring their produce on gold and silver trays that they would then take back afterwards, while the regular people would you use baskets the kohanim then got to keep. The vort made some point about the superiority common people who, while their presentation wasn't as nice, give the baskets as well as the bikurim. 

The vort was presented as though this was the reason the people behaved in this way. Yet the whole time, i couldn’t help but think that the common people probably didn't get the baskets back for the same reason that when you give someone something in a plastic shopping bag, you don't expect to get the shopping bag back. In other words, baskets were a very cheap and ubiquitous container. The answer to why people didn't expect to get their baskets back is likely entirely mundane, and has nothing at all to do with the relative merits of the rich and the poor.

Had the speaker made that point, and then gone on to say that, nonetheless, we can use this phenomenon to illustrate a lesson, i would have no problem with that. But that's not how these sorts of things are presented. They're presented as though the convoluted clever vort is the reason that the subject of the vort happened or is done that way.

Another example that I heard recently:

A speaker told a story about a rebbe who was traveling and found himself in a strange town for Shabbos. He had no money with him, and was forced to go to chassid to ask for money for a place to stay and for food for Shabbos. The chassid happily gave the rebbe some money, and expected the rebbe to be happy to now have arrangements for Shabbos. Instead, the rebbe gave him a tepid “Thank you.”

After Shabbos, the rebbe returned to the chassid’s house and thanked him profusely. He explained that he had been overjoyed when the chassid meet arrangements for him for Shabbos, but had wanted to save the joy that he had felt for Shabbos rather than express it at that moment.

The speaker treated this story as though it were an amazing example of piety. I was left wondering what was wrong with the rebbe. This is not a typical reaction. And by that, I don't mean that it's an unusually praiseworthy one. I mean that this is not sort of reaction we would expect from a neurotypical person familiar with interacting with other people. If the story is true, I seriously wonder if the protagonist was autistic.

The story also makes several unfounded and probably erroneous assumptions:

1. That joy is a finite commodity.

2. Expressing joy diminishes it.

3. Joy is fungible: it can be saved for later and its focus can be transferred.

One and two are just wrong. Emotions are not finite commodities. We have an infinite capacity for any given emotion, and need only something to trigger it. And the more we expressing emotion, the more we feel it and the longer it lasts. Three is partly right. Emotions color our experiences, and so it's one is feeling joyful, that feeling will color all of the experiences they have while it lasts. But emotions can't be saved for later, nor can their focus be changed through an act of will.

So what was presented as an inspiring story of the type of behavior that we should emulate is more likely a story about an autistic man who struggles to understand how emotion works.

My problem is that I can't help but listen when someone is speaking. I think that for most people, speakers become background noise, and so vertlach don’t bother them. I listen, and I can't help but wonder what the speakers are thinking. Are these sorts of things really supposed to be inspiring? Uplifting? Examples of lessons and behaviors to be emulated? Why don't people think through the implications of these sorts of stories? I know the point of a vort is really to provide a bit of uplifting entertainment while showing off how clever the speaker is, but these examples are not entertaining, uplifting, or clever. They're insipid, inane, and annoying.