R' Abraham Joseph Rice

"Abraham Joseph Rice (born Reiss) (c. 1800 – 1862) was the first ordained rabbi to serve in a rabbinical position in the United States.

Rice was born in 1800 or 1802 at Gochsheim, near Würzburg, Bavaria. An injury in infancy left him with a limp. He studied at the Würzburg yeshivah, and was ordained by Rabbi Abraham Bing. He later continued his studies at the yeshivah of Rabbi Wolf Hamburger in Fürth, and then headed a small yeshivah in Zell. In the 1830s he married Rosalie Leucht, and in 1840 they immigrated to the United States. After a brief attempt at reviving the Jewish community in Newport, Rhode Island, he accepted an appointment as the first rabbi of Congregation Nidche Israel in Baltimore." Wikipedia

BTs are great candidates for Torah Im Derech Eretz.

Baalei Teshuvah are great candidates for Torah Im Derech Eretz. Most grew up in Western countries and Torah Im Derech Eretz. is designed for that. Here's a blog entry from a new BT that recently learned about Torah Im Derech Eretz.

"Sometimes I wonder….How will I ever find a community that fits my hashkafa?

I want a place that emphasizes Torah and its values- ahavas yisroel, treating others with respect, judging favorably, achdus, being a light to the nations.

I consider myself modern yeshivish but recently I started reading about Torah im derech eretz (I just learned about the difference between that and Torah uMadda) and I probably align with that a little more.

I think it’s important to be involved with the world and spread Jewish values to the world; not isolate myself in a frum community and shut out the rest." continue

A Threefold Cord

I just got back from the annual kollel breakfast at Breuer's and I'm going to have to amend my formula. I used to think German Orthodoxy, or more precisely the KAJ kehilla as based on Hirsch was the mid-point between Charedism and Modern Orthodoxy, containing the best features of each. It has the seriousness of Charedism and the engagement with life and the world of Modern Orthodoxy, it has the dedication to Torah study of the former but the interest in all parts of Torah of the latter. With every encounter at KAJ I see the truth of this. But now I realize that there's a third quadrant and that is Chasidus. KAJ has the community feeling of Chasidus. This is the KAJ community concept, the self-contained community with a beis din, a mikvah, a day school, a kashurs organization, and in Washington Heights, a senior center.

This was a kollel breakfast. And yet it seemed like a community event, not a kollel event with kollel graduates. At such events I usually feel like an outsider since I didn't go to the specific kollel or yeshiva. This was the community supporting its kollel. The co-rabbanim were there as was a dayan, as was the kehilla president. The head of the kollel was there and I know him from the shiur he gives to baal habatim in Monsey. The chazan from Shabbos was there. I saw there many of the men from minyan.

And they saw me. Several remembered me from Shabbos. People kept saying hello to me. Usually it's the opposite. I go to chassanos or parlor meetings and approach people, trying to get them to talk to me. Here it was the opposite. I became almost reserved after my usual desperation for human contact became nullified with the genuine community feeling. I couldn't decide if I was a chasid or a yeshiva man or modern orthodox, the latter one because I didn't feel ashamed sitting there knowing that I might listen to Beethoven on the way home and even get a spiritual feeling from it. And then it hit me, I'm not any of those three. I am a practitioner of Torah Im Derech Eretz.

A Threefold Cord is Not Quickly Broken says Koheles (4:12). I know many people that seem to bounce between charedism, modern orthodoxy, and chassidus. I can't know if KAJ is the answer for all, but I'm guessing that it could be for some, a blend of these three derachim that by themselves are not the answer, a threefold cord that is strong and beautiful.

The Blank Stare

Has anyone else ever experienced a blank stare from other Orthodox Jews when you try to explain that your hashkafah is neither Chareidi nor Modern, but something called Torah Im Derech Eretz?  Everyone has heard of Rav Hirsch and is familiar with the term Torah Im Derech Eretz but many seem not to comprehend what these terms mean as far as hashkafah is concerned.

As a mother of young children, I often find myself having this conversation with other women regarding educational methods and my desire to incorporate a Hirschian approach into secular education.  They generally nod their heads when I say I would like to see G-d brought into limudei chol but they do not seem to understand the bigger picture of what I am trying to explain.  For example, those who live a Chareidi lifestyle seem unnerved by the mention of secular studies.  And those with a Modern Orthodox viewpoint appear to pay only lip service to the idea of filtering out non-kosher ideas.

And on the rare occasion that I meet people who do feel comfortable with secular studies so long as they are presented in a kosher manner, they are usually not aware that a TIDE hashkafa even exists.  In that case, I direct them to this website : ) and to the writings of Rabbiner Samson Raphael Hirsch.

I'm wondering if anyone else has had similar conversations about TIDE vis-a-vis schooling or other topics and if so, how did you explain TIDE?

Even More on Separation

The blog has received several comments on my attempt to explain R' Breuer's view that Austritt was not limited to Hirsch's kehilla. I even go so far as saying that the idea can apply to Orthodox groups - on an organizational, not a personal level. To me this explains the avoidance of the official Breuer's kehilla from YU, even though the two are separated by 1/3 of a mile. Some commenters have countered that the cool relationship between the two had nothing to do with Austritt but to other factors. However, elaboration on what constituted those factors has not been forthcoming.

Owllake has pondered that disagreement between R' Solomon Breuer and R' Chaim Soloveitchik on the Agudas policy towards Zionism may have started off a kind of familial squabble that lived on in Washington Heights. I would hope that Hatfield and McCoy type hostility would not affect community policy.

Aaron Rakeffet tells the story of how R' Breuer was brought to the USA by Bernard Revel of YU and while appreciating that likely life saving gesture, R' Breuer was greatly displeased by what he observed on the campus, particularly the educational content in some of the classes. To me, this is the more likely explanation. YU housed one of the greatest collection of scholars in the world, in addition to Rabbi Soloveitchik. You'd think that the Breuer's yeshiva could have utilized this to attract students, rather than watch so many of its youth march off to Lakewood. I would argue that the Torah u'Maddah approach was not acceptable to R' Breuer and overtook any possible benefits from an educational association between the two places. I admit that this is conjecture.

Whatever the real story there, I still argue that a kind of separation, even if we don't call it Austritt, is necessary today and even to Orthodox groups. I thought of a metaphor to explain it. Remember Odysseus and the sirens from the Iliad? Here's how about.com describes the story:

A siren call means something that is alluring. It is dangerous and potentially deadly. Even if you know better, the siren call is hard to resist. In Greek mythology, the sirens who allured were sea nymphs beguiling enough to begin with, but with even more enticing voices.

In Odyssey Book XII Circe warns Odysseus about the dangers he will face at sea. One of these is the Sirens. In the adventure of the Argonauts, Jason and his men faced the danger of the Sirens with the help of the singing of Orpheus. Odysseus has no Orpheus to drown out the lovely voices, so he orders his men to stuff their ears with wax and tie him to a mast so he can't escape, but can still hear them singing.

When a person opens his ears to the enticing voices of the larger world, he needs something to hold him back, lest he leap to his death in the sea. As I have written, the Chabad shliach is safe running a Chabad house in Madrid because his focus is exclusively on Chabad. His clothing, his look, his mindset is all Chabad, so he's not enticed by Madrid. The Torah Im Derech Eretz person is open to the good of Spanish culture, so he needs something to hold him back lest he get too drawn in as some groups in the Orthodox world do.