Of Rabbis and Drinking

From my email-bag:

Would you say "enjoys a l'chaim" is something that would be helpful on a rabbi's skillset over "teetotaller"? Would you advise a, say, 26-year-old rabbi starting his career, who's neutral on spirits (groan), to develop a taste for it, as it will be helpful for his career?

I really, really, really don't want to answer "Yes" to these questions, but I suspect that is the correct answer.

I don't particularly enjoy drinking; any enjoyment I have in imbibing comes from the joy of doing something new, not from the drink itself. To the best of my knowledge, no one ever held that against me in my rabbinate... but I do think that rabbis who enjoy a drink will have an easier time socializing in certain settings.

Of course, every rabbi must know which situations are inappropriate for a drink:
1. Part of this goes back to my standard rants about inappropriate use of alcohol in the Jewish community; I do think we are much too free with alcohol, and this particularly bothers me in environments which include children. (For more on this, wait for the re-post next week of my standard Purim and Alcohol warning.)

2. And it's also a matter of people's comfort; a rabbi should realize that not everyone wants to see him drink, and to see him 'loosen up', in every setting.

But overall, I think a rabbi who knows 'when to say when' will socialize more easily, and therefore build relationships more easily, if he can enjoy a drink.

What say you?

Rabbis letting their hair down?

The Archbishop of Toronto is now in Rome, where he is going to become a Cardinal. As I heard it on the radio this morning, he entered St. Peter's Square wearing a Toronto Maple Leafs jersey, to demonstrate that his new position won't distract him from serving his Canadian constituency. [You can see pictures here.]

All jokes about Cardinals and Maple Leafs/Blue Jays aside, I wonder about this. "Cardinal" is a pretty serious position within their hierarchy; a Cardinal can become Pope. We don't have their system of authority, and I don't mean to make any sort of equation between what they believe and what we believe, but I imagine a rough corrolary, in terms of solemnity, would be a rabbi becoming a Rosh Yeshiva at YU, or a member of the Moetzes Gedolei haTorah, or the Chief Rabbi of a country.

So I'm imagining a rabbi who has been selected for some prestigious position doing something similar on the cusp of his inauguration - donning a sports jersey in the plaza before the Kotel, perhaps. I know some rabbis who would do it; I know others who would never dream of it. Certainly, I know many Jews who would consider it a diminution of respect for the position he is accepting; I get raised eyebrows just for having a blog!

What do you think - is this a playful nod to home, or a disrespectful lack of solemnity?

Note: It isn't clear to me that this photo-opportunity was during any sort of public event; perhaps it was done outside of any formal context. I still find the question interesting.

Rabbis and Super Bowl Parties

Do rabbis belong at Super Bowl parties? And if so, what should they do during commercials which display halachically prohibited sights, or during the camera's pan to the cheerleaders? [I'm not raising the bitul torah question; if you are reading my blog, you have no right to condemn someone else for wasting time from Torah study...]

I went a couple of times over the years, and hung around in the back where I could conveniently start a conversation with someone during commercials. I liked being with my friends/peers, I loved the subs, and I felt the tug of the game even though my New York Jets never got that far in the playoffs. I wasn't able to stick around for long in any case, as there were always too many other things to do, so I would just catch a few minutes here and there. But this question of whether I belonged always bothered me.

So: How do you think rabbis should handle invitations to the party, or their own desire to watch? And what about shuls which actually hold their own, official Super Bowl parties?

Owning the Rabbi

A friend of mine, a Rabbi, once received an anonymous letter complaining about an element of his wardrobe. Other Rabbis have other stories of such communications. I presented my view on anonymous letters a while back, but I'd like to discuss the content of such letters, instead.

Rabbis are under observation all of the time, on anything and everything, but that's not unique to clergy. Having people notice your style of dress – or diet, or exercise, or sense of humor – is normal for human beings. Clergy are not the only ones who live in a fishbowl; all of us are constantly under observation by the people around us. The difference is that many people – not one, but many - often feel free to comment aloud, and rudely, when it comes to the Rabbi.

If I go to a restaurant and sit beside a loud talker, I might move to another table. If I sit next to a person with bad body odor on a train, I might change seats. If I see someone wearing a hideous tie, I may make a mental note to check my own ties for such a lack of taste. And then I move on. Only if something is particularly egregious, and apparently intentional, will a normal human being engage the offender – and then politely and positively, not with an anonymous screed.

But if it’s the Rabbi, then plenty of polite and positive people will tell the Rabbi – nicely or otherwise - that he should really keep his voice down, or that his tie is a problem. They might even find a way to hint at the body odor. And that's in the best circumstance; in another universe they might resign from the shul, and/or broadcast their complaint to their 100 closest friends.

That's what creates the fishbowl – not the fact that a few people are looking, but the fact that everyone is looking, everyone is commenting, and often without sensitivity.

I believe that many people genuinely intend to be helpful, and their comments can be very beneficial. But for a dangerous minority, it comes from a sense of ownership, as though my dues, or even my presence at minyan, means that I have a form of baalus [gemara terminology, translating roughly and inaccurately to 'mastery'] over the Rabbi. There's a sign across his back, "Property of Congregation _____________". [Shades of Rav Yaakov Emden and שלא עשני עבד-אב"ד.] To me, this is not healthy.

We want members to feel invested in the institution, and we want the Rabbi to be sensitive to their needs and wants, so I can't say that members should ignore the Rabbi's conduct. It's also true – as explained in various gemara passages – that the Rabbi should make sure his clothing is clean, his manner reputable and his comport respectable, so I can't say that the Rabbi should do as he pleases.

But maybe we shouldn't comment for every thing; there should be a threshold of significance.
And maybe it shouldn't be all of us making these comments.
And maybe it shouldn't be an anonymous letter.

What do you think?

Rabbis and Blogs - another look

We've discussed the issue of rabbis and blogs and professionalism before, such as in Hypothetical Question and in Rabbis friending children on Facebook.

Here's a look from "Should your doctor be on Facebook", a column by Dr. Danielle Ofri in today's New York Times. It's about doctors, but it could just as easily be about rabbis. Here's an excerpt:

I worry that it is impossible to maintain a perfect firewall, so I’ve decided to limit my online presence to the professional side of my life, keeping personal information off the Web. And before I post anything anywhere, I try to imagine what a patient of mine might think if she stumbled across it. Would it make her cringe? Would she feel awkward during her next office visit? Would this somehow compromise our relationship?

This means letting go of the fun and casual side of social media, but I think that’s simply part of the territory of being a doctor. It’s the same reason I don’t wear flip-flops and shorts to work, much as I’d surely love to. Giving up posting vacation pictures doesn’t seem like a particularly high price.

Doctors — like everyone else — are entitled to private lives, with all the attendant warts, embarrassments and unflattering moments. But now that any patient can Google a medical team, doctors — like teachers and lawyers — need to consider issues of professionalism before sharing their private lives.

Much to contemplate here. For example:

Will you see your Rabbi as a leader, if you read his blog post about entering the rabbinate and you know he is less than confident about leading, or he is not properly trained?

Will you accept your Rabbi's moral instruction, if you have seen his taste in music and you think he's coarse and unsophisticated?

Will you be able to concentrate on the Rabbi's speech on Shabbat Shuvah once you have seen him in vacation shorts and a Hawaiian shirt?

And so on.

The Rebbetzin's Responsa #1: Why does my rabbi tell un-funny jokes?

[Those who have been around for a few years may remember seeing me post this elsewhere. If so, יישר כחך.]

Question:

To the honored and beloved Rebbetzin's Husband, Shlit”a,

I have long been confused by the rabbinic sense of humor, or lack thereof.

My rabbi makes so-called jokes like “How do we know that Yaakov wore a hat? Because the pasuk says ‘And Yaakov left Beer Sheva,’ and we know he wouldn’t have gone out without a hat!” and “How do you know G-d is a baseball fan? Because the Torah starts, ‘In the big inning!’”

And my current rabbi is not the exception; I have heard similarly un-funny jokes from my yeshiva rabbis as well as shul rabbis since my childhood. Why is this? Why do none of the rabbis I meet have a sense of humor?!


Teshuvah:

You ask a very good question, my son. When I listen to my rabbinic friends repeat the same joke they have been telling for years, I am reminded of Bruce Wayne’s comment to Alfred regarding party guests: “Keep them happy until I arrive. Tell them that joke you know.” (Batman Begins, 2005, naturally)

Allow me to first build up your question, before attempting to respond. You see, the rabbinic paucity of humor is all the more surprising in that it is a modern phenomenon. Back in the days of the Gemara, rabbis engaged in all manner of humor:

Slapstick - Bar Kappara in Nedarim 50b-51a does the talmudic equivalent of dancing with a lampshade on his head.

Sarcasm - Rav Nachman in Eruvin 36a tells Rava, “Sure, I’ll answer you when you eat a barrel of salt!”

Puns - Rava in Pesachim 9b asks, “Is a chuldah [rodent] a prophetess?” This is a play on the name of Chuldah the Prophetess.

Nicknames - Students called Rav Hemnuna “cold fish” for being unable to answer their questions, on Kiddushin 25a. It’s a play on המנונא Hemnuna, which is close to חמנונא Chamnuna, or “warm fish.”

Black comedy - Perhaps the most famous Talmudic joke, the declaration in Berachos 64a, “Torah scholars increase peace in the world!”

I can just see your sides splitting from all of these witticisms - and there are more like them! Let's not forget that the sages of Israel, in particular, were perpetually rolling with laughter in response to the comments of their Babylonian counterparts (Beitzah 14a, for example). So the question, really, is not why Torah scholars have no sense of humor. Rather, it is why today’s rabbis have not continued the tradition from earlier times.

1. It is appropriate here to quote a certain scholar, חכם אחד, who has alleged that the lack of humor is only found in Orthodox rabbis. He contends that it is not so much that the rabbis are not funny, as that they are using only old jokes, out of fear of creating something new.

2. The Kura d’Milcha sought to provide an answer based in halachic principles. He noted the traditional belief that נתקטנו הדורות, the generations have shrunk, and argued that this applies to the rabbinic sense of humor as well.

It is true that some apply "generational reduction" only to spiritual stature, but the Kura d’Milcha pointed out that this is clearly not the case, for the Tzlach (end of Pesachim) applied this axiom to physical stature.

3. The Levi Tzedek, on the other hand, considered the Kura d’Milcha’s answer legitimate proof that the rabbinic sense of humor is not entirely dead. Barely concealing a guffaw, he told his talmidim, “Had the Kura d’Milcha lived in our day, between his bizarre understanding of Torah and my laughter we might have brought Mashiach!”

After calming down, the Levi Tzedek argued that the answer lies in an explicit Gemara (Berachos 31a): “One is not permitted to fill his mouth with laughter in this world [post-Temple]… until the nations say, Gd has acted greatly with these people.” Clearly, then, your rabbi is un-funny because he is grieving for the Beit haMikdash.

As far as the post-Temple cases of humor in the Gemara, those sages did not live “in this world” - their holiness was such that they felt as though they were living in the time of the Beis haMikdash, and so they could laugh.

In closing, I must pay tribute to one of the few rabbis I have known who could tell a funny joke. Rabbi Philip Kaplan told me the following joke many years ago:

A yeshiva student gets married, moves into a home with his wife, and comes to his rabbi before Succos to ask how to build a Sukkah. The rabbi points him to certain pages in Gemara Succah, and to a long comment of Rashi that digests the discussions on those pages into a set of clear instructions.

The student follows the instructions to the letter, spending days meticulously acquiring the proper materials, then building and decorating his fine Succah. The first night of Succos, though, a mild wind demolishes the entire structure.

On Chol haMoed the student re-builds the structure, only to have it again collapse at the first gust of wind. The student tries a third time, but again meets with failure.

The student, devastated, comes back to his rabbi and tells him the story. The rabbi listens patiently, then smiles knowingly and tells his student, “Yes, you're right - Tosafos asks that question!”

Of Sarcastic Rabbis

[Post I'm thinking about: How personal should a blog be? at Jack's Random Thoughts]

In my early dating days – I was maybe 22 or 23, I think - my rebbe wanted to set me up with a girl. He emphasized that she was a very sweet person. I told him I wasn’t sure whether this would be a good idea – after all, I was somewhat sarcastic and sharp-tongued. [Those who knew me back then can stop giggling now.] [Yes, you.]

My rebbe smiled and said something along the lines of, “When I was younger I also thought it was a chachmah [display of wit] to be able to say something sharp. Then I grew out of it.”

This comes to mind because Hosheia 7:5 describes delinquent leaders who put their lot with לוצצים, people who mock and scorn others, rather than take care of their responsibilites. Building on this, Rava said to the sages (Avodah Zarah 18b), “I beg of you, do not mock, lest suffering come upon you.”

Certainly, there is reason to use constructive mockery in highlighting the foolishness of a particularly destructive activity (see Megilah 25b regarding mocking idolatry). But as a general rule, I am with Rava: Mocking anything, dismissing it from consideration and making light of it, is self-destructive on several levels:

• As my rebbe said, sarcastic scorn is not a chachmah; it doesn’t show any particular wit. Anything can be mocked; there’s always room to find something ridiculous in an idea or practice or person, and anyone can do it.

• Sarcasm is lazy, relying on superficial caricature of the opposition instead of reasoned, articulate debate.

• The result of a dismissive attitude is that we fail to take others seriously, even when they have something to teach us.

• Sarcastic humor is contagious and addictive, so that the trait doesn’t remain within a circumscribed area; the same rabbi who delivers a speech mocking his ideological opponents may well find himself mocking his children, or his spouse, or his students in a shiur, or someone who comes to give him constructive criticism.

So I am uncomfortable with “rabbinic comedians,” who are known for making light of their opposition in their schmoozes. I’ve seen it in mussar schmoozes, kiruv seminars, shul derashos and more, and it troubles me. [Please keep specific names out of the Comments section; my omission of those names is not out of ignorance.] Cheap shots play well with the high school and “Gap year” crowds, and with adults who have never “grown out of it,” to use my rebbe’s phrase, but to me it betrays a mind that doesn’t think things through, that doesn’t see the other side, or that needs to resort to cheap humor rather than eloquent argumentation. It also makes me wonder what the speaker is saying about me when I am not present; what sarcastic jokes are aimed in my direction?

In my blog header, I thank my Rebbetzin [who is not the girl my rebbe suggested to me] for making me a Rabbi. This is one of the several reasons behind that line: She continues to teach me, by example, to lose that addiction to sarcasm. One day, I hope, I’ll successfully put the lesson into full-time practice.

Rabbis friending children on Facebook?

The titular question arises now because of a CNN video clip in which an interviewer asks whether teachers should Friend students on Facebook.

The teacher interviewed gives a definite No – teachers should not be friends with their students, not off-line and not on-line. From the sound of her words, friending a student would be the equivalent of inviting him/her over for pizza, a decided no-no in today’s age of impropriety and abuse.

So what about a shul rabbi? Facebook frequently suggests teens and pre-teens from my former communities as potential Facebook Friends. Do I offer to friend them? Is it, perhaps, less appropriate now that I no longer live there?

I see arguments on both sides:

Yes
• It’s the digital equivalent of going over to say Hello at kiddush – nothing intrusive or over the line, just a way to be friendly. Communities gain when kids feel like they have an open line of communication with the rabbi. Like it or not, the rabbi represents Judaism, and even Gd, for many children, and his availability and willingness to answer questions can have a tremendous positive effect.

• Even if kids will never use this avenue to connect with the rabbi, Facebook use – or use of its eventual successors – demonstrates that the rabbi isn’t some stodgy, regressive, cave-dweller.

No
• It’s creepy to be friended by your rabbi, particularly for kids who use Facebook as a real form of friendship, a club for socializing, and not just a utility for hunting up email addresses, as I usually do. (My other main use is ignoring suggestions I “like” or “fan” various causes. Sorry.)

• Being friended by your rabbi may be even worse than being friended by your grandmother – truly a sign that Facebook is about to become the next Friendster. It doesn’t mean your rabbi is hip; it just means that Facebook is yesterday’s news.

• What if it just seems like a pathetic attempt to be 'hip'? It could come off as patronizing rather than friendly.

So what do you think? Should the Rabbi be friending the children in his congregation? Or better to find other ways to connect?

Lesson of the Rabbinate: Don’t do me any favors

I’m pretty sure I’ve blogged elsewhere about what may have been the best phone call I ever received as a rabbi.

The call came from an administrator with Torah uMesorah’s Summer SEED program, at a time when I had been trying, without success, to work with a different organization to arrange a summer learning program in my community. The other organization was hemming and hawing about whether and how much it would be able to help my community – and then in came this call, out of the blue, asking, “How can we help you?”

It wasn’t just that this call was a genuine and unsolicited offer of assistance. It was also that through the entire conversation, and through our subsequent conversations, I didn’t feel like a beneficiary.

With the other organization, I was made to feel like an unworthy petitioner. The SEED agent made it clear that I was doing him as much of a favor as he was doing for me, and for my community.

The result: I felt really good, and I was happy to work with him.

Critical Lesson in Community Service: The people I serve are doing me the favor, not the other way around.

Practical application for rabbis: Say Thank You, repeatedly, sincerely, with a smile, whether you are kashering their kitchen or learning Torah with them or officiating at their wedding. They are doing you the favor.

Why?

1. Simple: They are doing me a favor. Were I not benefiting on some level – emotional, financial, spiritual, whatever – I wouldn’t be doing it.

2. People like to give. If they feel like they are giving to you, and the experience doesn’t hurt, they will give to you again.

3. And the flip side: No one likes asking for a favor. If you make them feel like they are getting a handout, they won’t come back to you to do it again.

4. As the Sefer haChinuch likes to observe, אחרי הפעולות נמשכים הלבבות, your heart follows your deeds. If you express gratitude, you will come to act in a grateful manner – and that will be appreciated.

5. This is not necessarily intuitive, but in my experience it is true: People value interactions more when they feel like the giver, than when they feel like the recipient.

6. Your attitude is the prism through which your actions are viewed. If you display a sense that you are the giver, everything you do will be seen in that light - somewhat arrogant, somewhat condescending, somewhat entitled to thanks. And if you display an understanding that you are receiving, then everything will be seen in that light – which I believe is more positive.

7. And if you are a recipient, people will give to you in order to help you. If you are offering a favor, they might just as easily say, “No, thank you.”

In a sense, this last point is a lesson of the gifts brought by the נשיאים (heads of the tribes) for the dedication of the mishkan. Rashi to Bamidbar 7:3 cites a midrash to explain why the נשיאים did not bring gifts for the mishkan’s construction, and then did bring gifts at the start of its dedication: During the construction the leaders said that they would fill in whatever the nation didn’t bring, and so the nation did it all themselves. No one accepted their “favor.” This disappointment then motivated the נשיאים to stop seeing their gifts as a favor, and to rush to give at the beginning of the dedication.

Lesson of the Rabbinate: Don't do people any favors; instead, accept the favors they offer you...

Why Rabbis have no friends, Part 24

[Update: I noticed a burst of traffic coming to this page from Facebook today; my thanks to the linker! If anyone could tell me where the link is, I'd appreciate it.]

Picture the following opening from an actual conversation I once had with a friend, who also taught at the school my children attended:

Me: Hi!

Friend: Hi, how are you?

Me: Good, thank Gd. Do you have a minute to talk about X [a controversial communal issue]?

Friend: Sure. But I need to know: Are you calling me as my rabbi, as a board member, as a parent of my student or as Mordechai Torczyner?

And then you wonder why rabbis have no friends.

It’s a matter of Roles: The rabbi is expected to play all sorts of different roles in the community, relating to people on many levels depending on their personalities, their type of observance/affiliation, their communal involvements, their children, etc, and in consequence to pay attention to many different sets of boundaries, keeping them straight at all times. That’s hard work.

When we play Sunday morning football and I tackle you, is that because:
a) You were holding the ball,
b) You missed minyan Wednesday night,
c) You didn’t vocally support my proposal at the board meeting, or
d) All of the above?

When I call you just to say Good Shabbos on Friday, is that because:
a) I like you and want to be in touch,
b) I plan on soliciting a serious contribution for the Youth program,
c) I know something you don’t yet know about how your children are doing in school, or
d) All of the above?

And so on.

The potential mindgames, and the potential political landmines, are very real. The result is that having friends is very difficult, because there are no relationships that are only about friendship; all of them have multiple roles and associated overtones. Do you really want to go about your day talking to people, visiting them, teaching them, or interacting socially with them, while having to maintain in the back of your mind an awareness of what role you are filling at the moment, and what boundaries you need to observe?

I don’t, and I didn’t. In my rabbinate I dealt with everyone as friend, because that was the relationship I wanted, but I must admit that this was not always the wisest approach.

Other rabbis solve the problem by making no friends locally, and finding friendship outside the community, such as with rabbinic colleagues – or blog readers, I suppose.

And others never really figure out how to square the circle, and it can be tough on them.

So go be friendly to your rabbi – but make sure to clarify how and why you are doing so…

Shh! The Rabbi's Coming!

First: A reader has started a new website, Mi Yodeya, posting questions and answers about Judaism on a Wiki-style site. The site just opened for business last week, and is particularly interesting for the types of questions it has gathered - Did Rav Moshe Feinstein pronounce his last name “Feinstain” or “Feinsteen”? and Kosher accommodations in out-of-the-way US places are two recent examples.

-

Almost two years ago (I actually mentioned it in my post here), my Rebbetzin recommended Marilynne Robinson's Gilead to me as a book with both great writing and a compelling story. I never got past the opening chapters; Death is a major theme in the book, and I shy away from that topic when I can. But yesterday I finished my current reading and decided to pick it up again.

I'm glad I did; the words of the book's narrator, an aging preacher, resonate with my own experience. In particular, an incident on pages 5-6 grabs me, both for its writing and for its authenticity:

The preacher talks about walking past two young men and seeing them laughing at some joke. As he nears, they stop laughing. He says to himself, I felt like telling them, I appreciate a joke as much as anybody. There have been many occasions in my life when I have wanted to say that. But it's not a thing people are willing to accept. They want you to be a little bit apart.

Very true - but even more true is the piece on the next page:

That's the strangest thing about this life, about being in the ministry. People change the subject when they see you coming. And then sometimes those very same people come into your study and tell you the most remarkable things. There's a lot under the surface of life, everyone knows that. A lot of malice and dread and guilt, and so much loneliness, where you wouldn't really expect to find it, either.

This has certainly been my experience; the same people who won't make an inappropriate joke within my earshot will tell me about experiences that reflect on them in a far worse light, or will divulge inner feelings and doubts and struggles, personal pain and loss, that are far closer to the reality of their souls than some email humor.

It is, as Robinson writes, a remarkable thing. Here's my own take:

Telling a 'dirty' joke is lighthearted fun, and is not a serious source of temptation; it simply says I am corrupt. In divulging personal weakness, though, I can portray myself as struggling, working to perfect myself or to overcome a challenge.

There is no shame in telling the rabbi I am having trouble dealing with an addiction, if the message is that I am trying to deal with it.

Shades of מתחיל בגנות ומסיים בשבח at the Pesach Seder; we don't mind portraying ourselves as fallen heroes, so long as we can add that we are picking ourselves up and aiming for glory.

Are there ways for a rabbi to accept gifts?

[Jack’s Gaza Update 16 is here.]

15 of my last 16 posts, going back to Saturday night December 27th, have been on the Gaza war. The war remains as significant as ever, but I have nothing new to say about it today (although this short piece on Israel and the media is starting something in my head). So, here goes with something else:

One of the truly vexing problems that comes with the rabbinate is this: How do you handle presents?

Yes, I know what you’re thinking: Some big problems you have, rabbi. No wonder you have so much stress. How about you send that problem my way?

But I’m actually serious: Gift-giving is a real problem for rabbis.

People are kind, and they like to display gratitude for the things the rabbi does. Maybe it’s because of a lifecycle event with which he helped, or some counseling he did, or a crisis he helped them weather, or one of any number of things... there are people who like to give the rabbi a gift, whether cash or an item or a service.

And I, for one, have a hard time accepting gifts, for several reasons:

First, I don’t want to have visions of reimbursal in my head when I help someone.
Can you imagine a kid making nice to his great-aunt as part of a plan to gain an inheritance? Yuck.
And lest I say I could accept the gift and remain neutral, I am reminded of the gemara in Sanhedrin (re: judges) warning that one cannot accept a gift and remain neutral.

Second, I don’t want anyone to think that I give special treatment to people who pay more.
I worry that if I were to accept such a gift, even without letting it affect me, people (whether the giver or anyone who heard about it) would assume that I had been affected by the gift.

Third, I don’t want anyone to have to feel like they need to pay me in order to get my assistance.
I am here to help, that’s it. Yes, the community pays me, so there is money involved - but no individual should ever feel like they have a lesser or greater claim on my attention, based on how much they have contributed toward that salary.

Fourth, I don’t want anyone to see me as a charity case.
I work hard, and make a good salary. Granted that some 40% of that salary then goes for tuition, but it’s no different from anyone else’s day-to-day struggle. So why am I getting unsolicited help?

On the other hand, people mean well when they offer these gifts. They aren’t trying to bribe me, or to gain some special advantage; it’s just an expression of gratitude or respect. Therefore, refusal can sometimes be viewed as an insult.
Worse, declining might sometimes be viewed as rejection of the person, instead of the gift.

Which leaves me trying to figure out what to do, every time this comes up. I usually demur, but there have been occasions when I have accepted, rather than insult a person.

So the other day I declined a generous offer someone had extended, and he said to me, “You know, rabbi, there are ways to give gifts, and ways to accept gifts.”

That has the ring of sage advice. But how? What are the ways?

I turn to you:
1) What are good ways to accept gifts?
2) And - please comment anonymously on this - what is your rabbi’s approach to accepting gifts?

The Rabbi's Face[book]

I joined Facebook the other day, more or less because everyone else was on it and I wasn't. It was embarrassing; I had one of the first Torah websites with Webshas(http://pages.nyu.edu/~mat6263) back in 1995, and here I was, behind the times. So I decided to catch up.

Facebook immediately offered to email close to 300 email contacts of mine and offer them the unique opportunity to be my friend. I whittled down the list to about one-third of that, by removing those for recipients whom the request would be embarrassing as well as those for whom I would be embarrassed to make the request, and then let the requests fly. Less then 36 hours later, I am the proud friend of about 50 people, and feeling pretty good about that.

I don’t really plan to use Facebook much, but I did notice that a lot of people post a picture of themselves on their page. It becomes an icon for them, much like the pictures people post on Blogger.

I don’t know what to do with that. I'd like to think I was above vanity, but even if I were - rabbis get judged for their appearances all the time, and I'm a rabbi, so I need to weigh that issue.

Don't think rabbinic appearances matter? First, the gemara says they do; a talmid chacham who has dirty clothing is "liable for his life." And second, my own experience bears that out. It's hard for me to listen to someone who doesn't take his appearance seriously. And I know congregants (of other synagogues, of course!) who are critical of their rabbi's appearance.

So what do I put on Facebook?

I’d like to leave it blank, but that’s so… fuddy-duddy. Ditto for having a formal picture; way too pretentious. No frowning, for sure. But then, funny rabbinic pictures also feel fake to me. Who do you think you are, rabbi? Everyone knows you’re a rabbi, and rabbis are no fun at all.

And, unfortunately, a cartoon doodle is a copout.

Should I go bearded, since as a rabbi I feel pretty much confined to bearddom?
Or how about a beardless picture from a Purim-past?
Or maybe I could use one from last Purim, when I dressed up as a member of our local AAA baseball team, the Lehigh Valley Iron Pigs (I kid you not – but I was fully under hashgachah, as you can see below)?

And then there’s the competition between my vanity and my vitiligo. I was diagnosed with vitiligo a few years back (yes, me and Michael Jackson), and now have a partially-white eyebrow, and an inconvenient white spot on my moustache. (If I had a nickel for every time someone “discreetly” hinted that I need a tissue…) So do I go with a pre- or post-vitiligo picture?

It really shouldn’t be this difficult. I turn to the democratic process: Here are some pictures. Let me know, by comment or email, which one I should use. Or, am I better off leaving it blank…