י׳ מרחשון ה׳תשפ״ז | October 20, 2026
Are We Missing the Point of Being Lubavitch?
“When someone is fighting a life-threatening disease, it makes little sense to focus his attention on a minor cosmetic concern. The cosmetic concern may be real. It may even be worth addressing. But proportion matters. And I think that is precisely where we sometimes go wrong.”
Part 1 of a discussion of the common root of several challenges facing Lubavitch
By Rabbi Aharon Lindenblit
My extended family on my mother’s side are an opinionated and articulate bunch. The family WhatsApp chat often blows up with discussions that seem terribly important in the moment, only to end up in the trash bin of history by the next day.
One such exchange revolved around the way the Lubavitch chinuch system handles children coming from a broad spectrum of frumkeit standards. In the midst of the discussion, a cousin of mine wrote the following:
“As an aside, I’m personally more worried about the influence of the ‘charedi mentality’ in Lubavitch than the secular one. By ‘charedi mentality’ I mean, in this context, seeing a holier-than-thou attitude as legitimate, using social pressure and exclusivity as tools to enforce standards, coupled with an acute fear of olam hazeh and being influenced by it.
“Yes, in the short term the secular influence is definitely more detrimental, which is why everyone talks about it more. But in the long run, the charedi influence will have longer-lasting negative effects. Both are dangerous, but the secular influence is at least clear for everyone to see and easier to get rid of. Not easy, but easier.
“Very few of our mechanchim are permeated with a secular mentality. I’m not saying no one, but overall the mechanchim are not the driving force of secularization in Lubavitch. As a whole, the yeshivos and schools have Chassidishe, ehrliche staff. But the influence of the charedi mentality permeates the mechanchim in the mosdos. It will be much harder to change that long term.
“As a side note, the reason we have the charedi influence in our mosdos is probably a reaction to the secular influence. We said, ‘Let’s bring a dose of Williamsburg into Lubavitch to stem the tide.’”
There is much in that diagnosis worth discussing. But I think it misses the larger picture.
I responded that when seen in the context of the actual challenges facing us as frum Yidden and Lubavitcher chassidim, the danger of “charedi influence” pales in comparison to far more fundamental problems.
When someone is fighting a life-threatening disease, it makes little sense to focus his attention on a minor cosmetic concern. The cosmetic concern may be real. It may even be worth addressing. But proportion matters.
And I think that is precisely where we sometimes go wrong.
The Missing Tile Syndrome
Rabbi Sholom Gold, an activist in the Religious Zionist Mizrachi movement, was once visiting Baltimore. He chose to stay at the home of Rabbi Yaakov Ruderman, rosh yeshiva of the decidedly non-Zionist Ner Yisrael.
The local Zionist leaders were dismayed by his choice. Why would a Mizrachi activist choose to stay with a rabbi who so strongly disagreed with his Zionist worldview?
Rabbi Gold reportedly answered: “There are 613 mitzvos. I have a disagreement with Rabbi Ruderman over one of them — the mitzvah of yishuv Eretz Yisroel — but we agree on the other 612. With you, we agree on one mitzvah, since we are all Zionists, but we disagree about the other 612, since I am religious and you are not. Where, then, do I feel more at home?”
The point is obvious, but easily forgotten: people tend to focus on what divides them rather than on the much larger body of things that unite them.
It is sometimes called the “missing tile syndrome.” Walk into a subway station and look at a wall covered with twenty thousand tiles. If one tile is missing, where does your eye go? Straight to the empty space.
Or take a blank sheet of paper and put a small black dot in the middle. Ask someone what he sees, and invariably he will answer, “A black dot.” He ignores the 99 percent of the paper that is white.
We sometimes do the same thing when thinking about Lubavitch.
We notice the things that distinguish Lubavitch from other frum and charedi communities, and because those differences are particularly noticeable to us, we begin to imagine that they constitute the essence of Lubavitch.
What Defines a Lubavitcher Chossid?
Lubavitch is a derech in avodas Hashem — a deeper, richer and more demanding way to fulfill the purpose for which a neshama came down into this world. Obviously, then, being a Lubavitcher chossid includes the fundamentals of being a frum Yid: Torah, mitzvos, yiras Shomayim, middos tovos, avodah, and a life lived in the service of Hashem.
Consider two people.
The first is a Belzer Chossid. He is an ehrliche yerei Shomayim and a baal chesed with genuine middos tovos. He davens three times a day with a minyan, slowly and with kavonah. He learns Torah for hours each day. He is scrupulously honest in business and gives generously to tzedakah. He is kind to his family and lives with simcha and warmth.
Now compare him to a modern “Lubavitcher” who races through davening alone in his office at two in the afternoon. His frumkeit is largely mitzvas anashim melumadah — habit and routine. He hasn’t opened a Gemara in years. Perhaps he attends one shiur a week, half-heartedly, while spending much of it catching up on his phone. A hechsher is good enough if there is some Hebrew writing on the package. At home he is impatient and grouchy, spending much of his time absorbed in his phone and content better left undiscussed.
The question I am raising is not: Who is the better person?
The question is: Who is actualizing more of what it means to be a Lubavitcher chossid?
Lubavitch cannot be reduced to the things that distinguish us from Belz, Satmar, or Lakewood. Lubavitch is a derech for becoming better frum Yidden.
Now, I know the Chassidishe response. I honestly believe there is something profound in the old saying that unzer ziburis iz besser fun zeyer idis. There is an aspect of avodas Hashem that exists deeply within unzere: even when his actual avodah needs improvement, somewhere inside he knows that his purpose is not his own spiritual perfection. He was created leshamesh es Koni — to serve his Creator and fulfill His purpose in the world.
That is no small distinction. But it cannot become an excuse to confuse what actually living as a Chossid looks like.
Disproportionatism
I believe that our tendency to place disproportionate emphasis on those aspects of Lubavitch that distinguish us from other segments of charedi Jewry is part of a much larger phenomenon.
I have coined a word for it: Disproportionatism.
“Disproportionatism” is what happens when a true idea is emphasized out of proportion to the rest of Yiddishkeit until the idea itself becomes distorted.
The danger is twofold.
First, the fundamentals get pushed aside. Things like basic frumkeit, serious Torah learning, kvius itim, davening, middos tovos, and ordinary yiras Shomayim can somehow begin to sound ordinary — almost “not particularly Lubavitch.”
Second, even the distinctive Chassidishe value being emphasized loses its meaning. Once it is detached from the larger purpose it was meant to serve, it becomes an empty cultural marker.
In my view, this phenomenon lies behind many very different challenges facing Lubavitch. On the behavioral side, it can contribute to a decline in basic standards of frumkeit and kvius itim. On the hashkafic side, it can manifest itself in emphasis on external aspects of hiskashrus, disproportionate preoccupation with the identity of moshiach, and other cases where relatively narrow ideas and symbols take on an importance wildly disproportionate to their place within the totality of Torah and Chassidus.
These phenomena may look unrelated. I think they share a common root: losing sight of the whole because our eyes are fixed on the missing tile.
When Darkei HaChassidus Lose Their Purpose
Take darkei haChassidus, for example.
Darkei haChassidus encompass a host of behaviors, sensitivities, customs and values. They matter precisely because they are meant to produce something: a more refined person, a deeper avodas Hashem, greater bittul, stronger hiskashrus, more genuine ahavas Yisroel, and a life more completely devoted to the purpose for which Hashem sent the neshama into this world.
Detach them from that purpose, and something strange results. The external behavior remains, but much of its content disappears.
There is an old joke about Yankel walking home from Shacharis. He sees two municipal workers on the side of the road. One digs a hole; the second immediately fills it in.
An hour later, Yankel leaves for work and sees the same two men a few blocks further down, doing exactly the same thing. One digs; the other fills.
On his way home that evening, he sees them yet again. Finally, unable to contain his curiosity, he asks what on earth they are doing.
They explain that normally they are a crew of three workers tasked with planting trees. One worker digs the hole, the second places the sapling inside, and the third fills the hole.
“Unfortunately,” they explain, “the fellow who puts in the tree is absent today. But is that a reason the two of us shouldn’t do our jobs?”
It is funny because it is absurd. Digging and filling holes are not independent values. Their value exists because they serve the purpose of planting a tree.
Darkei haChassidus are infinitely more serious, but the principle is similar. The purpose of a Chassidishe hanhagah is what gives it its importance.
When darkei haChassidus become detached from avodas Hashem, we can end up fiercely protecting the digging and the filling while forgetting to plant the tree.
The Real Danger
This brings me back to my cousin’s original concern.
Is there such a thing as an unhealthy “charedi mentality”? Certainly. Can social pressure, fear, conformity, or a misplaced holier-than-thou attitude seep into Lubavitch chinuch? Of course. Those things deserve discussion.
But the larger danger facing Lubavitch is not that we will become too much like others.
Nor is the solution to every challenge to emphasize more forcefully what makes us different from others.
Our greatest danger is allowing external features of Chassidishkeit to become detached from the purposes they were created to serve. It is defining Lubavitch primarily by the things that distinguish us from other frum Yidden rather than by the avodas Hashem those distinctions are supposed to produce. It is allowing identity to substitute for achievement, slogans for avodah, cultural markers for content.
Every genuine Chassidishe value needs to be returned again and again to its purpose:
- Does it lead to more Torah?
- Does it deepen our avodah?
- Does it make us more ehrliche Yidden, more refined people, more devoted Chassidim?
- Does it strengthen our commitment to the Rebbe’s shlichus — to make ourselves and the world around us a dirah Lo yisbarech?
If it does, then it is not a peripheral cultural marker. It is part of a living derech in avodas Hashem.
But when the marker becomes the destination, we have lost the point.
The task is not to make Lubavitch less charedi or more charedi. It is to make Lubavitch more Lubavitch — by restoring every Chassidishe idea, hanhagah and sensitivity to its proper place within the larger picture of Dirah Batachtonim.
The tiles matter. But only because together they make up the wall.
COMMENTS
There is also sometimes an element of cheerleading for “our team” and, along with that, looking down on the other “teams,” forgetting that in fact we’re all part of the same team with the same goal, לתקן עולם במלכות ש-די.
The Rebbe seemed to indicate one team with one /nosi. In other words EVERYONE should do Chitas. Everone should do mivtzoim etc.
So to reach that point, we have to drop the “us vs. them” mentality. The same way as there’s no particular “team” as far as, say, Chovos Halevavos, the same way there should be no particular “team” as far as Tanya. Or Daf Yomi. Etc.
The real test of this article is not whether we agree with it, but whether anything changes in the daily seder: a fixed time for learning that is actually kept, davening with a minyan when possible, and a phone put away during both. If the discussion stays at the level of identity, we will have proved the point by missing it.
For mechanchim and parents, the proportion question may be the most important one. Children can tell very quickly what makes adults excited, what makes them anxious, and what barely registers. If the visible panic is always about image and the visible joy is rarely about a blatt Gemara or a sincere tefillah, they learn the hierarchy even if our speeches say otherwise.
The describes a Jew who was not exposed chasidus but despite that is eidel vs a Jew who was exposed to chasidus and despite that is lacking in refinement.
And in that bchol zois lay the crux.
The moshol is trying to demonstrate that an eidel person who was not exposed to Chabad is more Chabad than a kal who grew up with it, because being Chabad necessarily includes being yerei shomayim etc. The question is who between these two stereotypes is more Lubavitch? Lubavitch has a definition.
I think there’s another point to make here regarding the concept of unsere ziburis being better vis-à-vis others.
From my research, this idea is consistently brought up in the context of choosing between two people or two options.
For example, in one letter, the Rebbe discusses the hanhalah of a yeshivah and explains that they should specifically choose mechanchim from within Chabad, even if those individuals seem to have certain chesronos, because unsere ziburis is better vis-à-vis others.
Similarly, in the context of shidduchim, the Rebbe addresses someone who is thinking that perhaps he could find a better bachur. The Rebbe tells him that he should choose one of unsere bachurim, because unsere ziburis is better vis-à-vis others.
In other words, the concept has to be understood in its proper context. When you have two options in front of you, and one is zeireis while the other is unsere ziburis, the Rebbe is saying that you should choose unsere ziburis, even if the other option might appear to have certain advantages.
But that is very different from applying this idea to your own avodah as an excuse not to grow. You can’t say, “Well, we’re better anyway,” and use that as a reason not to work on yourself.
Your personal growth is measured by what the Eibershter expects of you, not by how you compare to someone else. In fact, the opposite is true: on a personal level, you’re always supposed to recognize the mailos of others, as the principle teaches us: vehevei Shefal ruach bifnei kol adam (שפל רוח בפני כל אדם).
So to use unsere ziburis as a blanket justification for not correcting anything—whether in your own avodah or in your influence on others—is clearly missing the point. The fact that we may be better than others in a particular comparison doesn’t absolve us of our responsibility to improve. It certainly doesn’t mean we should stop striving for growth, either personally or in our efforts to help others grow.
A thought: Not sure if unsere ziburis applies across the board nowadays
“Unzere Ziburis” is certainly better. But who do you consider “unzere”? Someone who calls themselves Lubavitch…
The original vort was that the “daled-daled” in Lubavitch was greater than an “alef-alef” in some other yeshivos. The example for “daled-daled” was Reb Shlomo Aharon Kazarnovsky whose kishronos were mediocre. His sincerity and devotion put him higher than others with advanced kishronos in other yeshivos.
It would be ridiculous to go and apply that concept to people who are from Harav Kazarnovsky stature, to say the least.
In the last sentence I assume you meant to say “FAR from Harav Kazarnovsky”. Exactly right
the chareidi mentality that you mention sounds like yeshus. Hechaltzu was written exactly for that chareidi mentality as you call it. The Rebbe said it should be learned periodically. There is a saying and I don’t know who said it, if it was a Rebbe or not, about people who don’t have the right ahavas yisrael (as described in hechaltzu) being more dangerous to Yiddishkeit than the Haskala movement/enlightenment. So these points are not new.
Yeshus is not exclusive to any particular group and BH Lubavitch has a healthy dose too.
The solution to abuse of power is not to do away with standards and authority (that’s what leftist liberals do and it destroys society – socialism instead of capitalism). Standards are critical to the success of a society and community, even though it runs the risk of yeshus.
The solution is to work on our middos by learning Heichaltzu and real avoda.
Thank you very much. Very well said.
Its okay for a lubavitcher to have a shtoltz about it and not want to דריי זיך ביי די פרעמדע. The caricatures are just caricatures.
Leaving aside the fact that they’re not ch”v פרעמדע, but אחינו בני ישראל and עם שאיתך בתורה ובמצות –
these are not פרעמדע concepts at all, but part and parcel of what a Chabad Chossid should be, and which some have unfortunately neglected. Is your “shtoltz” to not care about tefillah betzibbur and bizmanah, to consider kevius ittim latorah unimportant, etc.? Because that’s not far different than a Reform Jew saying that Shabbos and kashrus and so forth are for the “ultra-orthodox fanatics” and not for him.
No. Shulchan aruch is obviously important. But pretending we have to go visit the neighbours to find a shulchan aruch isnt accurate. My shtoltz is that if I see a lubavitcher I who doesnt do the right thing my problem is not with calling him “chabad” and it isnt מעורר ספיקות about my choices in life. My problem is that he doesnt do what the Eibishter wants.
You don’t have to visit them to obtain a Shulchan Aruch, but you can and should be inspired by how they actually live that Shulchan Aruch and improve your own avodah thereby. איזהו חכם הלומד מכל אדם. (And you can also dispose of the פרעמדע label.)
How does this disagree in any way with what the article is saying? Does the article promote dreien zich by fremde?
The point of the article seems to be that our closed minded shtoltzkeit made us frei and we should be more like the rest of the קהילות החרדים. Im saying that taking a caricature of a bad lubavitcher and a good poilisher doesnt mean lubavitch is any different. Lets get more specific here. I could make my own caricature. A lubavitcher with a blue shirt and a smartphone who does chitas and rambam and keeps mitzvos behiddur and a satmer chossid who doesnt put on tefillin every day and dresses the way hes supposed to to keep up appearances. But these people dont exist. I made them up to prove a point on the internet.
It’s not ok to be foolish. We are supposed to see and learn from the good in others. Asside from arrogance being bad middos, ugly and off putting, it is a hindrance for hafatzas hamayonos.
I think klal Yisroel is made up of 12 shevatim, each group specializing in different areas. Lubavitch has alot to teach and at the same time Lubavitch growth will come from turning to other communities and humbly being open to learning.
We have limited experience in building kehilos. We spent the last 50 years building chabad houses around the world. We have room for growth in the kehila building side.
I would sign my name but sensitive (shpitz chabadniks) Lubavitchers will cancel me.
Unzere ziburis is better. In many case it’s clearly ziburis, but are you sure its unzere ziburis, or ziburis from somewhere else? Food for thought.
A reader privately shared the following objection:
Collective identity, distinctive customs, and cultural boundaries play a vital role in transmitting Chassidus across generations. A young Lubavitcher may initially identify with Lubavitch through external features long before developing a mature understanding of Chassidus. Those external features are not merely empty symbols. They preserve belonging, establish aspirations, and create the environment in which deeper Chassidishe values can flourish.
Indeed, if Lubavitch were to weaken its emphasis on distinctive practices, the result might not be greater attention to fundamentals. It might simply be assimilation into generic frumkeit.
Even if identity is not the ultimate purpose, it may be one of the most effective mechanisms for preserving and transmitting that purpose.
My response:
It never occurred to me to view darkei haChassidus primarily as “cultural markers that preserve belonging.” If one wishes to point to these benefits as additional advantages, so be it. I certainly agree that developing a strong Chassidishe identity has value.
But this does not undermine the central argument of my article: even genuinely valuable things can be overemphasized.
There are two reasons for this. First, excessive emphasis on secondary matters inevitably comes at the expense of the primary areas of avodas Hashem that deserve our attention. Second, and more fundamentally, the entire purpose of a Chabad identity is to help a Yid better fulfill the purpose for which his neshamah descended into this world.
If cultivating that identity becomes an end in itself, rather than a means toward that purpose, we have lost sight of the point. The fact that identity helps preserve and transmit Chassidus is an argument for its importance, not a justification for allowing it to overshadow the very avodah it is meant to nurture.
The same reader shared a second objection:
Chabad presupposes Torah and mitzvos, but its unique contribution lies in the additional dimensions it introduces. Therefore, emphasizing the distinctive aspects of Chabad is not necessarily disproportionate. It may be an entirely appropriate emphasis on the particular contribution that Chabad has to offer.
My response.
It is entirely appropriate—and indeed imperative—that every Chabad Chossid, and indeed every Yid, whether already frum or on the path toward becoming so, understand the unique contribution of Chabad Chassidus and its way of life.
The concern raised in my article is not with emphasizing what makes Chabad unique, but with the danger of overemphasizing something genuinely valuable, out of proportion to the broader demands of Yiddishkeit.
When Chabad loses its context within Yiddishkeit as a whole, it ceases to be Chabad in any meaningful sense. A guf without a neshamah is a corpse. But a neshamah without a guf is somewhere up there in the spiritual realms. The neshamah of Torah must animate a guf. If there is no guf for it to be mechayeh, what purpose is it serving?
Chassidus is the neshamah of Torah, but its purpose is not to exist independently of the guf. It is to permeate it, enliven it, and transform it. The value of the neshamah is not diminished by insisting that it must animate a guf. On the contrary, that is precisely how its purpose is fulfilled.
Moreover, we must not lose sight of the two dangers discussed in the article. First, excessive emphasis on secondary matters inevitably comes at the expense of the primary areas of avodas Hashem that deserve our attention. Second, cultivating a distinctive Chabad identity can become an end in itself, rather than a means of fulfilling the purpose for which that identity exists. When that happens, we may succeed in producing people who identify strongly as Lubavitchers, without necessarily bringing them closer to living as Lubavitchers ought to live. And that is the danger of disproportionatism.
The line about Mashiach’s identity ruined it.
Why assume this is political?
The author’s argument isn’t about politics—it’s that any specific focus or practice loses its meaning when it gets detached from the core fundamentals of avodas Hashem.
the fact remains that this is one of the things that puts some people off associating with Lubavitch. Something that the Rebbe already warned about in the 5740s.
Different topic for a different article.
Classic disproportionatism! Making a whole to do about one line! Just proves the point!