Rosh Yeshiva slams heavy Purim drinking

By Sammy Steiner

Issue of February 19, 2010/ 6 Adar 5770

It’s an annual event in the lead-up to Purim: rabbis and community activists sounding the alarm about out-of-control consumption of alcohol, particularly by underage drinkers. This year, however a very prominent rosh yeshiva — a member of Agudath Israel’s leadership, the Moetzes Gedolei HaTorah — has upped the ante with a condemnation of excessive drinking as sinful.

HaRav Shmuel Kamenetzky, during a teleconference last week sponsored by Agudath Israel’s Project Y.E.S. mentoring program, called excessive drinking on Purim an “aveirah” — a sin.

“Chas v’shalom (Heaven forbid) that our Torah would consider getting drunk to be a mitzvah!” exclaimed Rabbi Kamenetzky, who heads the Talmudical Yeshiva of Philadelphia, commonly referred to as, simply, “Philly.”

Regarding the halachic imperative to drink more on Purim than one is used to, the Rosh Yeshiva explained that the verse referred to a person drinking more than he is used to and losing his place in the song “Shoshanas Yaakov” — “Ad d’lo yodah bein arur Haman l’baruch Mordechai” (until you do not know the difference between cursing Haman and blessing Mordechai); not, in his words, “our balance or our mind.”

Another panelist on the conference call, Rabbi Dr. Benzion Twerski, who holds a PhD in clinical psychology, called drinking a “gateway” to more harmful drugs.

“The problem here is we are legitimizing drinking and getting drunk,” Twerski said. He mentioned an oft-repeated statistic that children who do not drink or smoke before the age of twenty-one, are nearly certain to avoid addiction throughout their lives.

Lazer Rosman, a founding member of Hatzalah in Borough Park, spoke out against making light of excessive drinking; something people do, he said, because they do not see the repercussions.

“I remember last year when someone ended up on a respirator,” he recounted. Rosman warned that, often, rabbeim give alcohol to children without knowing how much they have already had. The situation has improved in recent years, he said, particularly in regard to having designated drivers.

“Years ago we used to see some terrible accidents,” he said.

In an editorial published on the popular Charedi news aggregator, Vos Iz Neias, Rabbi Dr. Abraham Twerski, a well-known psychiatrist and expert on addictions, echoed Rabbi Kamenetzky’s point.

“Experience in the past several years has been that particularly young people who drink to excess on Purim get into both shameful and dangerous behavior,” he said. “Hatzalah cannot keep up with the calls to take these young men to hospital emergency rooms! Can anyone conceive that this is a mitzvah?”

Chabad.org offered a different take. The website quoted the Rambam who says, “One should...drink wine until he is drunk and falls asleep from drunkenness (Mishneh Torah, Laws of Megillah, 2:15).” The site continues to list support for drinking from the Shulchan Aruch, as well as the commentators Rif, Rosh and the Tur, who all cite a Talmudic imperative to get drunk.

“To summarize,” the website stated, “all Halachic authorities are unanimous in ruling that it is a mitzvah to drink, and drink to excess, on Purim, though there are differences of opinion as to whether the obligation is to get as drunk as Rava enjoins, or to a lesser degree.”

One local mental health authority was less enthused about drinking to excess.

“Teenage drunkenness is dangerous for a variety of reasons; most importantly, the teenage brain is prone to all kinds of problems from drinking,” said Dr. Michael Salamon, a psychologist in the Five Towns and occasional Jewish Star contributor. “Also, teens are at much greater risk of getting into serious danger while drunk.”

Four years ago, Salamon said, he visited a 17 year-old child who was in the hospital after suffering a stroke triggered by alcohol abuse.

Rabbi Yakov Horowitz, executive director of Project Y.E.S. and the organizer of the conference call, told the Jewish Star that drinking on Purim could have its own set of unintended consequences.

He told of a friend, an executive director of a yeshiva, walking into his institution’s Beis Medrash shortly before Pesach to find the custodian doing push-ups on the floor. Enraged, he told him that the Beis Medrash was a holy place.

The custodian was surprised.

“This is a holy place?” he asked. “You had a frat party here a few weeks ago.”