[Avodah] Chumros

[Doron Beckerman]

RMB writes:
>> Unless one finds the sevara compelling, such that is helps create a
relationship, an "ownership" of the mitzvah and thus gives the mitzvah
more impact, I'm not sure of the point.

 To case my point into RSWolbe's terms: Rote practice without spirituality
is frumkeit, not the pursuit of qedushah. And perishus from the mutar
is supposed to be all about qedushah. <<

I think we are looking at it from two different vantage points - you are
looking at it in terms "what do I want to get out of it", and I think that
when it comes to Rav Wolbe's frumkeit, the more relevant question is "where
is it coming from."
RSW begins the second paragraph of that piece with the following -
 "Frumkeit is a natural, instinctive urge, to draw close to the Creator."
and later - ".. the approach of frumkeit, is to  constantly feel the
spiritual pulse, is it in a situation of closeness or distance, and to force
himself to closeness."

 It isn't about rote observance, it is an undeveloped, unrefined, natural
urge to draw close to Hashem. The classic frumkeitniks are not the
melumadahniks, but the seven listed in Sotah 22b - the people who bump into
walls because they closes their eyes to avoid looking at women etc., the
people who shuckle really hard in Shemoneh Esrei, the people who measure how
long their own Shemoneh Esrei took - compared to the other bum who finished
30 seconds sooner, the people who grow the thickest payos they can, and so
on. There's no shikkul hadaas, just spiritual wildness. He'll shove to get
on the bus going to do Bircas HaIlanos on two trees, when there is an
Almanah who has one tree right down the block, who loves when people come to
her garden to make the Berachah. The shoving Shoteh thinks the people who
don't go on the bus to the two trees are feinschmeckers who don't really
understand what it means to be "frum."

A person can, must,  develop a sense of caring about the will of Hashem and
drawing close by fulfilling it - Mitoch Daas. When the Mesilas Yesharim
(chapter 13) talks about Perishus, he writes that it is for "Hachafeitzim
Lizkos Lekirvaso Yisbarach." IOW, it is the same basic instinct as frumkeit,
but it has to be guided by Daas, taken beyond the base, instinctive, selfish
ground-level. What Daas dictates as to "what do I want to achieve here" is
an important question in terms of application of Daas, but not the
definitional (though it may be a Simman, it isn't the Sibbah) demarcation
point between "frumkeit" and true striving for Kirvas Hashem.

My point was:
a) That one can sublimate or ignore even that basic instinct, and not
channel it at all. Kirvas Elokim is just not a significant part of the
calculus. For example, one who does not seek to improve his Shemoneh Esrei
concentration in any serious way is not utilizing that natural instinct.
Most people would probably occasionally stumble over the frumkeit michshol
if they were serious about their Avodah, just as most people occasionally
fail to apply their Daas in other areas of life. Complaining about
"frumkeit" can sometimes come from being a step behind it, not ahead of it.

b) In other instances, calling people on their "frumkeit" is simply another
manifestation of the same "frumkeit". It's a unbridled expression of a
feeling of being close to Hashem because he is beyond all that "frumkeit",
because he is very machmir on not being too "frum" (or frum). Using your
Simman - why are you really criticizing it?
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