Q:
What’s wrong with a yeshiva man who eats in a pizza shop?
A:
Nothing wrong, except he has to watch out for bad company. Even kosher pizza shops are frequented by low people. You have to know, among the Orthodox there also is an underworld. There’s an underworld. They wear yarmulkas, they eat kosher, but there’s an underworld, however.
When I was in Slabodka, they said that in the yeshiva of Slabodka there was an underworld. Of course each place there’s a different kind of underworld. They all learned well. Everybody learned in the yeshiva. Everybody kept everything. But compared to the others, they were considered inferior. And therefore you were expected to choose, to associate not with the underworld but with the better ones.
The Orthodox bum is better than the outside bum, but keep away from him too. If he’s a loafer who doesn’t work – what’s he doing in the pizza shop in the middle of the day? You’re a yeshiva man taking a rest, a break between the sedarim but what’s he doing there, this other fellow? It’s bad company. And that’s why it’s better to avoid these places.
הרחק משכן רע – Keep away from bad company (Avos 1:7). You don’t know how terrible are the consequences! Even talking to them sometimes could start a train of evil results. So stay away from places, unless where the very best people go – that’s the yeshiva dining room.
November 1988
