Halacha states that one must turn away a ger or giyores a few times before we finally open up our arms and embrace them in the loving embrace the frum community is so famous for; after the geirus they get…
OTD Geirus Procedures
Tag: off the derech
Off The Derech halachic committee wonders who is really OTD
With the Off The Derech community growing at such a rapid pace, the Rabbonom who set community hashkafa have been unable to keep up. Splinter groups keep forming and I think they’ve reached a critical point, just last week, several…
Kiruv Rabbi comes up with 10 reasons kids go off the derech
Just like the shidduch crisis before, the OTD crisis is hitting the frum community pretty hard. There are seminars, chinuch round tables, asifas, and a lot of discussion behind the scenes amongst gedolim and rabonom as to how to fix…
Why people go off the derech: An Illustration
I believe this was created by Leah Vincent and shown to me by Rachmuna Litzlon.
Could there ever be an Off The Derech shul?
There’s an article in the USA Today about Atheist Megachurches that basically take all the fun things that large Churches offer and leave God out of the equation. Sounds like fun, except I’m not sure how it works when they…
Would you break shabbos for $1000?
I always figured that the Off The Derech community was immune to scandal, after all many of the members had left Orthodoxy due to the hypocrisy perpetuated on a daily basis by its leaders. Yet, they are prone to the…
Rabbis begin the war on OTD
The interviews of Rachmuna Litzlon last week were such a huge success that Rabbi Yitzchok Fingerer himself contacted me for advice with regarding how to do kiruv to folks who are already frum, or supposedly frum. After reading the interviews…
Interview with an Off The Derech community leader Part2
The interview was too long for one post and so here you have it, part two of the interview with Rachmuna Litzlon, one of the Off The Derech community leaders. We don’t need another long introduction. I should mention that…
Interview with an Off The Derech community leader
You may remember that guy who was trying to sell his olam habah on Ebay, but Rachmuna Litzlon AKA Ari Mandel is also one of the Off The Derech community leaders online. Between his overly active Facebook page, groups, twitter,…
Why do people go off the derech? Take part in this OTD Interview
It used to be that going off the derech ensured a lonely existence, you couldn’t tell your friends and family and you mostly suffered in silence. In the past couple of years, the Off The Derech community has gone through…
Off The Derech Israel Tours
Just over a two years ago, Shalom and Micha decided to use their formerly religious mischief to battle the evil they saw perpetuated at the multiple missionary institutions in Jerusalem. Sharing a few victory beers after their first escapade, walking…
Stop trying to make Off The Derech people frum again
I’m not a big fan of kiruv, as many of you know, I believe that the FFB master race has become diluted with Baalei Teshuva and converts who inflict us with their secular culture. I also believe that those who…
Help us save an OTD neshama
I have been wondering when the frum community was going to start sending letters like this out, it seems as if the frum community has decided to ignore the growing OTD movement, because if you ignore it – it doesn’t…
Ebay Yanks chelek in olam habaah auction
Ebay yanked my auction for my portion in Heaven because “We don’t allow listings that aren’t offering anything for sale or those that have intangible items (generally things don’t physically exist).” I take this as proof that Olam Habaah (Heaven)…
Off The Derech shayala: I’m scared to make a kiddush Hashem
Since you had yourself thrown out of the group (the Off The Derech group), here’s a shaylah for the OTD dayan. Advice needed. I sometimes ride the subway, and when an older person comes into my subway car, I want…
An apology to the Off The Derech community
Apologizing is always hard, because you’re admitting you did something wrong and since much of the time people are insincere when they apologize you may just be furthering your douchieness along. For all of you who don’t know, I wrote…
Imagine an Off The Derech Utopia
Thanks to Love Equality for writing it. Imagine a Neo Hasidic community, where you can believe in evolution, the Big Bang and the FSM, you can play basketball, football and hockey, wear a t-shirt, jeans and Rashi-gatches, unlimited masturbation, loads…
Off The Derech Community writes Halachic Guidelines
In the early 90’s when the Kids At Risk movement began it wasn’t anything to get too excited over, basically a bunch of yeshiva kids with ADHD who would roam from yeshiva to yeshiva until they hit the end of…
5 years ago I was an atheist, then I was brainwashed by chabad!
A few weeks ago there was an article on a chabad website titled 5 Years Ago I was An Atheist and it ticked a whole slew of people off. Now being the pot stirrer that I am, I read through…
If Judaism makes no sense to you, why don’t you go off the derech?
It seems that I rubbed some people the wrong way when I stated in a post last week that Judaism made no sense to me. It also seems that some folks mistook that for meaning that I am not a…
Matisyahu gets heter to eat on Yom Kippur for Parnassah purposes
It seems that Matisyahu is trying to stick it to the frum world by going off the derech in a very public manner. First he chopped off his beard, which is almost as bad as coming to shul in those…
If an FFB goes OTD and then comes back on the derech is he considered a BT?
Dear Heshy, I have a predicament which I’m sure you can help me with. I grew up frum, fairly yeshivish by some standards and then during my year in Israel I decided to go off the derech. I have since…
Streimel Viking: Ex-Chabadnick Death Metal
All I have to say is oy my ears are shvitzing.
Matisyahu posts pictures of himself without a kippah
Matisyahu has a couple pictures of him in his Vanilla Ice hair looking slick sans peyos and yarmulke (kippah). I really hope he stays frum, not because I think it’s right for him, but because I really don’t want to…
Off the Derech movement is good for the Jews
It seems as if the frum community has just discovered that those who went off the derech may be a problem for future generations of sheep following the grand master bearded fellows who dictate orders about what you can and…