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Rabbi's weekly message

Pirkei Avos
Chapter 5:4
 
I thought I would take this opportunity to update everyone on the latest news in the world of high-class fashion. It seems that a new craze is about to be unleashed upon an unsuspecting world. This latest fashion item will soon become a “must have” that will change the very way we go about our daily lives.
“What is he rattling on about?” I hear you wondering. Well, let me take you into my confidence. This newest innovation is articles of clothing wired up for high technology. The first model is already available. It consists of a jacket with a hood. In the hood are speakers through which you can hear your favorite cassettes or radio broadcasts. If the mobile phone rings, have no fear - the tape will automatically stop and your call will come through. The microphones built into the sleeves will ensure that you can be heard loud and clear. And that's not all. You can then call your office with the aid of a fancy voice-activated dialer that is attuned to your every word.
This is not science fiction. You can purchase this gear today. I don’t promise it’s shaatnez-free, but I'm sure such niceties will soon be worked out. So instead of going to the office, you will be able to just slip it on.
In truth, no one should be surprised at this development. Our world today has become obsessed with being in constant contact. You can’t even take two steps anymore without your mobile, your fax, and of course your computer; you feel bereft if by chance you’re left without these techno props. I know all about this because I'm no different from the rest of the herd.
You can’t live in the world and deny the reality of what it has become. The fact is that there are a lot of positive aspects to these devices. There are programs that produce volumes of Torah material. So who is to say that a long frock coat won’t soon come with all the electronic gizmos? And who is to say that this will be wrong?
Unfortunately, though, there is much that is negative as well. Like everything else in life, we have to learn how to glean the good and discard the chaff. More to the point, with all this technology floating in the very air we breathe, we slowly become encompassed in a cloud of noise and distraction. Everything comes at us with a buzz, a frisson of excitability. There are no longer any comfort zones, a place where you can think and reflect.
Look at our youth. They seem to need more and more volume in their lives. The music is louder, the dancing more frenetic. Frum concerts that would never have attracted heimishe youngsters, and surely not their parents, are held in packed concert halls, replete with all the dazzle that goes along with such events. 
This buzz factor has an effect on all areas of heimishe life. As a well respected chassidic pedagogue recently told me with only a trace of humor, to learn HilchosTreifus in the future Rabbanim will have to drag a live cow into the beismedrash and shecht it then and there. Why? Because learning from a sefer will not hold enough excitement for talmidim brought up on a diet of virtual experiences.
It is a fact we must face - our youngsters are being brought up in a vastly different environment from the one we knew when we were young. No amount of hiding will change this reality.
The task at hand is to figure out ways to keep our youth holy. Only if we devise stratagems that will uphold vital borders while taking into account realities that can’t be changed can we see the next generation grow into its spiritual potential.
This is easier said than done. Let me share just one small example.
Mobile phones, or cellulars, or Pelephones - however you refer to them - are a pretty good idea. They free you from having to sit in the office when an important call is expected. More importantly, they are safety devices when children are out alone or the mother of the house has to be away. You know you can reach your loved ones at all times, so you feel better.
It is now possible to get onto the Internet through some mobile phones, and it is inevitable that such will be the case with all phones in the not-too-distant future. So instead of handing your son a mobile phone with a smile and a promise that he keep in touch before he sets off to yeshiva, you will have to think twice or maybe three times. Is it worth it for me to know that my young and vulnerable son can call me no matter where or when, or am I putting a terrible stumbling block in his path if and when he figures out how to browse the Net on his bus ride home?
I have written on this subject for a number of years and am well acquainted with how the Internet can wreak havoc in a heimishe home (a place it definitely doesn't belong). So what can we do? We just finished explaining how this stuff permeates the very atmosphere, and we can’t possibly escape by just running away. How do we live with reality, yet protect ourselves at the same time? It seems to be a contradiction in terms.
The answer is clear, and we read of it in the Mishna: “Ten miracles were performed for our ancestors in Egypt and ten at the sea. Ten plagues did the Holy One, blessed is He, bring upon the Egyptians in Egypt and ten at the sea” (Avos 5:5). Pirkei Avos is not an historic study, but a study of ethics. What are the plagues in Egypt and the miracles at the Red Sea doing here?
They are here to tell us that anything is possible. Hashem had Klal Yisrael march up to the sea with a wild enemy hot on their heels. They cried out to Moshe, and Hashem told him, “Why do you cry out to Me? Speak to the children of Israel and let them journey forth.” At this dramatic moment, the Yidden learned their most important lesson: Ours is not to make cheshbonos. Things never add up. We are meant to do what's right and let Hashem run the world. 
If the mobile phone creates a possible stumbling block, if it opens an avenue to a real danger, either use your wits to find a higher level of technology to prevent that possible tragedy or use something even higher - emuna and bitachon - and trust Him to keep you in touch with your child. But you need to make sure he doesn’t get in touch with the wrong things.
The verse tells us that when the Yidden walked through the Red Sea it was “within the sea on dry land." A contradiction in terms? Certainly. An impossibility? Nothing is impossible for the Creator of possibilities. The Kotzker Rebbe explains that the sea remained the sea - it was still water - but its essence became like dry land for the Yidden because Hashem wanted it to be so.
We may be standing in an ocean of rubbish and temptation, but we need not worry. Hashem already broke the mold at the YamSuf. We may need to walk through this ocean, but the ground beneath our feet can be as safe as dry land. We need but to walk and have true faith. All the miracles are recounted to us to give us courage for the future. Once Hashem creates a miracle, that dynamic is possible forever. 
In fact, it becomes ever more possible with each successive generation. Each epoch builds on the certainty of its predecessors. That's why we need the knowledge of all that took place at the YamSuf. It gives us the strength to do the impossible. And that's why it finds itself in Avos, for what greater ethic can there be?
 
OUTTAKE:
Ours is not to make cheshbonos. Things never add up. We are meant to do what's right and let Hashem run the world