Rabbinical ordination or PhD?

Regarding ''Haredi employment: Isolation to integration'' (April 14): While Israel may be lucky in persuading many haredim to join the workforce, they will not aid the country in being a leader in the high-tech world. Haredim have a different worldview – hashkofo in yeshivish language or hashkafah in modern Hebrew – than other Jews.

In sharp contrast to modern Orthodox Jews who strive for excellence both in Torah study and in a profession or activity, haredim live in another world where rigid observance of religious rituals is paramount and secular education and knowledge are belittled.

I often wonder about the Rabbi Dr. honorifics of modern Orthodox rabbis, whether they are more proud of their rabbinical ordination title or their PhD? On January 14, Rabbi Dr. Ari Berman, president of Yeshiva University in New York – the flagship of modern Orthodoxy in America – wrote in an op-ed article in The Wall Street Journal of his joy that his university had produced a team which had become a powerhouse in basketball.

Haredi culture does not promote a passion, in fact disdains to be a success in the secular world like others, although there are individuals who are exceptions. The obituary of Sidney Altman, Jewish Nobel laureate in chemistry, who died on April 5, described his hard work and fascination for science. Similarly in the non-Jewish world, while youth in Jamaica aim to be the top sprinters in the Summer Olympics, young people in small Norway are leading medal winners in the Winter Olympics, aside from the fact that the country has a well-educated population.

In contrast, the current excitement in the haredi world in Israel and the Diaspora is the Torah study program called Dirshu, funded by a Toronto haredi philanthropist, which pays adults to master the Talmud and Halacha, full-time work.

JACOB MENDLOVIC

Toronto