What Judaism really says about "learning" full time or learning through charity

[jdl4ever]

Part One: The Problem

There is a very big problem today with the Charedi Yeshivot.  They are trying to change our holy religion and uproot the traditions of our forefathers by telling us nonsense that the goal of every Jew should be to be a full time learner, and they discourage working.  They tell you to learn all day, get handouts from the governement and try to scheme as much money you can from your parents and relatives etc to support your learning.  This is all heresy, and goes against the fabric of Judaism.  Speak to any old Jew over 80 and ask them what life was like a few generations back and in the days of their fathers, and then ask them what they think about this concept of learning all day they will all tell you that this is all nonsense and it did not exist in the days of old. From generation to generation, Jews worked and made a living.  They would learn when they got home form work or on the holy Shabbat.  My grandfather told me that it was extremely uncommon and unheard of someone learning full time in the days of old, the exception being the Rabbi and eldest son of the Rabbi who's title passed down from father to son, and he would not really be learning full time, since he would be busy with the needs of the community like teaching Torah, taking care of the synagague and other things.  There was one other exception in his town, that being if the man could find no work, so he could do nothing else but study in synagague until he found a job, but these were the exception and not the rule.  These were the only two people that would learn all day in my grandfather's town. This thread will expose the evilness of the "learning all day" lie that the Yeshivot try to brainwash you.   

What the Ancient Rabbis Really Thought About Learning All Day or Learning Through Charity

RAMBAM SEFER HAMADA, HILCHOT LIMUD TORAH
10) Anybody who undertakes to learn Torah all the time, not work, and support himself from charity is desecrating G-d's Name, disgracing the Torah, extinguishes his Jewish spark, causes bad to befall him and destroys his life in the World To Come, for it is forbidden to benefit from Torah matters in this world. The Sages said that anyone who does benefit from Torah matters is destroying his life, and they further commanded one not to make a garland with which to glorify oneself, nor an axe with which to dig. Furthermore, one should like one's work and dislike being a rabbi. Any Torah which one studies without working at is worthless, and causes punishment. A man who acts like this will become a bandit.

11) Someone who supports himself by his own work is at an advantage. This was the way of the first pious people, and will merit one to all the honour and goodness of this world and the World To Come, for it is written, "For you shall eat of the labour of your hands; you shall be happy, and it shall be well for you". The words, "you shall be happy" refer to this world, and the words, "and it shall be well for you" refer to the World To Come, where everything is good.

Mishnah Pirkai Avot (off my memory, exact verse coming shortly)  "Torah without a worldly occupation causes sin and will eventually lead you to hell"

[jdl4ever]

Part Two:  Why is it sinful and evil to learn full time or learn off Charity? 

1.  Learning full time distances yourself from the physical world and distorts your understanding of the Torah. 
For example, the Torah not just about learning, it is mostly about action.  When G-d gives a command in the Torah, he demands that we fulfill it and not make excuses.  Learning about a commandment is a waste of time unless you are going to go out and do it.  When you go out into the world and work, G-d gives you an understanding of what action is and you understand the Torah better.  Real Judaism believes that the commandments in the Torah are eternal and must be fulfilled in every generation. However, if you speak to any learner, they will have a different perspective.  Many of the full time learners acquire a distored view of the Torah that their Yeshiva taught them.  They think that in order to fulfill commandments in the Torah that require work or risk, that G-d must send you a miracle, or Moshaich must come first.  The Yeshivot make up these excuses so that the learners will feel good about sitting and learning without doing any action, but this is a big lie and distorts Judaism.  Similarly, the Talmud gives a story of a Rabbi and his son living in a cave for many years studying Torah and relates how they came out with no understanding of the physical world so they were punished by G-d and forced to spend more time in the cave to learn their lesson.  The story I want to focus on though is the Jewish mentality before the Holocost.  As you all know, most of the religious Rabbis before the Holocost didn't support emigration to the Holly Land but instead wanted to stay in Europe and pray to G-d, and learn (and most these guys were working full time, not learners by the way).  The Rabbis said that eventually, G-d will send them Moshiach and save them if they learn hard enough and pray hard enough.  Did that work?  No it didn't.  G-d wanted action, not praying and learning.  He wanted people to fulfill his commandment to settle the land of Israel and the Zionists were successful.  Similarly, the learners don't believe actually doing the commandments, they believe in making excuses and making up nonsense like, half of Israel was learning and half was fighting in the Torah (which is nonsense).

2.  Supporting yourself off the community or charity leads you to stealing and into compromising your morals to get the money. 

The Shas party and the learners.  What more do I have to say?  The Shas party, a sell out party that has probably led to many Jewish deaths by supporting the peace nonsense that legitimized the fakestinians.  The learners will support any evil party no matter how evil it is as long as they give them money.  As for stealing and learning, in Brooklyn NY, the Chassidik learners steal from the government all the time to support themselves as you can see in the paper every few months.  Nursing home schemes, slip and fall schemes, credit card debt, collecting money for themselves in synagagues every day, fake welfare and food stamps when they have a cash business, etc.  The Rambam specifically says that doing this will cause you to become a "bandit".  What more do I have to say?

3.  The massive amount of funds collected to support the learners takes away money from vital Jewish causes and directly leads to the spiritual death of thousands of Jews every year. 

The biggest example is the silent holocost taking place in America.  Jewish education is very expensive and many parents can not afford to send their kids to a Yeshiva, and many are not religious at all so don't care.  These kids end up going to public school and the vast majority of them marry non Jews and become non Jews.  This is what we call the silent holocost.  Funds are despirately needed to support free Jewish education, like the Rav said so that any Jewish child that wants to go to Yeshiva in America and that does not have the funds should be able to go.  However, the massive amount of funds needed for this project is not available due to the Kollel and Beit Medrish Yeshivot eating up all this money to support their learners.  In order to make themselves look good, these Yeshivot divert a small percentage of their funds for scholarships to poor kids, but this is a drop in the bucket.  Also, a massive Kahanist movement is needed to save Israel but significant funds are not being raised because of these learning Yeshivot sucking up all the money. 

[Lisa]

Great post, JDL Forever.  I agree with you 100%.

[cjd]

A very interesting post jdl4ever you make very good points.

[kahaneloyalist]

You know Rav Kaduri zt'l worked till he was 87 as a bookbinder.

Rav Ginsburg shlita is a theoretical mathematician

The Lubavitcher Rebbe was an engineer and worked at the New York Shipyards designing Submarines during WWII

Even until this day many Tzadikim of the Nationalistic variety work as well as learn.

[jdl4ever]

You know Rav Kaduri zt'l worked till he was 87 as a bookbinder.

Rav Ginsburg shlita is a theoretical mathematician

The Lubavitcher Rebbe was an engineer and worked at the New York Shipyards designing Submarines during WWII

Even until this day many Tzadikim of the Nationalistic variety work as well as learn.

Well, these were the last of the Rabbis.  The Rabbis who follow the old tradition is rapidly declining and disappearing, and this new nonsense is replacing our religion and spreading everywhere. 

[Lubab]

Thank you JDL4ever for this.

I would just note that for a minority of people it may be appropriate to work out an arrangement where one learns and the other works and supports the one who learns. This was the arrangement that was in place by fathers of the Tribes Yissachar (learned all day) and Zevulun (did business and supported Yissachar).

Chaim did say in a previous AskJTF that in a Kahanist run Israel some would be allowed to learn full time and avoid army duties as long as they were "really learning".

However, I agree with you in most cases, and this has probably gotten out of control as many kids are simply not cut out to be great Torah scholars but are told to learn all day anyway, unsuccesfully. I do think this is tragic in many cases and can cause those children to get frustrated and leave Torah observance altogether .

[Dominater96]

Thank you JDL4ever for this.

I would just note that for a minority of people it may be appropriate to work out an arrangement where one learns and the other works and supports the one who learns. This was the arrangement that was in place by fathers of the Tribes Yissachar (learned all day) and Zevulun (did business and supported Yissachar).

Chaim did say in a previous AskJTF that in a Kahanist run Israel some would be allowed to learn full time and avoid army duties as long as they were "really learning".

However, I agree with you in most cases, and this has probably gotten out of control as many kids are simply not cut out to be great Torah scholars but are told to learn all day anyway, unsuccesfully. I do think this is tragic in many cases and can cause those children to get frustrated and leave Torah observance altogether .

100% agreed. Learning full time is only is only for certain talmid chachamim. I do not think it a sin, but it should only be done by certain people.