Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Student Reaction to Mrs. Sinensky's Post

Not the last one.

I don't think I fully understand Mrs. Sinensky's blog post. If friendships with boys are problematic because of what they may lead to, I can understand that logic (personally, I think halacha itself provides enough boundries from inappropriate activities, and drawing the line at friendship might be putting an unnecessary chumrah on ourselves. Why not say that boys and girls should never talk or see each other because we're scared of what it might lead to?)
But I'm confused about the second reason, that boy-girl friendships are bittul Torah. What's the source of the concept of bittul Torah, and where do we draw the line? If you want to say that non- Torah activities can be outside the realm of bittul Torah as long as they in some way compliment your Jewish life and your identity as an oved-Hashem (I don't know if that's a real answer), than I would think that(assuming they're appropriate), boy-girl friendships have as much potential as single sex friendships to fall into that category of non-bittul Torah things. What are the boundaries of bittul Torah?

-Rachel Friedman

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