One of my biggest taivya’s (desires) is reading, I hate movies and TV, but reading has always been my nisayon and now I’ve decided to stop reading all together because I cannot find anything good and kosher to read. I remember laughing in yeshiva when the rabbis told us that books were evil, but I now understand why this is so and why I must change my evil ways.
Unlike movies and TV, goyishe books have always been somewhat accepted by the community. Sure, there are various ways that one can check to see if the book is kosher, like opening to random pages and finding explicit writings, but these are not foolproof and therefore books have never really been glatt kosher. Reading secular books is like holding of the OU, everyone knows it’s not really the best, but the yetzer harah gets us to lower our madreiga by convincing us it’s ok.
While one can get their news from Hamodia and their magazine material from mishpacha and ami, finding a good glatt kosher heimishe book to read is not so easy. I’ve searched far and wide and have come to the conclusion that I will have to read these cliche frum novels about baalei teshuva searching for their long lost frum holocaust survivor family members in South America.
I guess I’ll have to start reading English seforim for entertainment, since anyone who knows a blatt gemara realizes that all English seforim are just for entertainment anyway, one can’t possibly consider reading an English Kitzur Shulchan Aruch to be learning!
If anyone has suggestions as to what I can read to stave off the yetzer harah and his evil goyishe literature it would be appreciated.
Find frum novels on 4torah.com