The Library

A Woman asked: After being married for 2 years, I found gay hookup apps on my husband's phone. This was tremendously shocking and heartbreaking. We are dealing with it well but I feel totally tricked (into marriage) and betrayed. Also, my brother had known this whole time...

Please listen to this great shiur by Rabbi Shafier that he recently recorded for our members called "Guilt & Teshuvah". Please realize that although the Torah takes a tough stance when we don't listen to Hashem, however Teshuvah was created even before the world was ...

A. Just the fact that you had the will power to stop looking at forbidden things shows you have greatness inside you. How many people are willing to work on themselves and admit their past mistakes in today's world? This is very precious in G-d's eyes. Chassidus teaches...

A. This is a very good question and it is one of the deepest mysteries of the universe. I will try to answer it with explanations from Chassidus and the Ramcha"l but I hope you understand the terminology (if not, feel free to ask for clarification): Regarding one who say...

GYE Answers: First of all, share your life with Hashem. He is your very best friend. Believe me, no flesh and blood relationships can ever really solve your problems. I know so many people with many good relationships and still lonely inside. Only Hashem can fill that ...

Dear Scared! Let me first commend your level-headedness, a quality that is exceedingly rare when it comes to relationships. You obviously have your head screwed on right and you are walking into this with your eyes wide open. So often people enter or avoid relationships...

Questions: 1) May men masturbate? Is there any (rabbinic) dispute regarding that? If not, for what reason? 2) And the same regarding women. Are they prohibited to masturbate? Is there a discussion regarding that? If not, why? Reply: B”H To the honorable questioner. Alt...

Someone called us with a shailah: His wife is in her 8th month pregnancy and has a lot of sciatic pain and numbness in the legs and backside, which makes relations painful for her. He wanted to know if there is any heter of sex with his wife without penetration, such as...

We received the following sheilah: I am reaching out to you on behalf of a good friend of mine. She had a boyfriend for a few years, and now that she is soon going into shidduchim, she realized she may not be a besula but she is unsure. She did have relations a number of...

Dear Unwilling, What if your best friend told you the following: "I have a secret that I want to share with you because you are my best friend in the whole world. I have never revealed this to anyone. There is a forest at the end of the city. You need to go at night, so n...

I'm a lust addict. What does that mean? It means that even when I'm not actually doing the big act, I'm thinking about it. I'm fantasizing. I'm checking out women for lower-level excitement. And the pressure builds until I am completely out of control and act out again...

A nocturnal emission is something that occurs by itself, against a person's will, and therefore the person is not considered to have committed a willful transgression and there is no punishment involved. Nonetheless, t'shuva is certainly appropriate, especially if a pers...

I got a sort of halacha question. I know and feel like I'm in serious danger of falling right now, and I want to know if it's allowed for me to "reward" myself by doing wasting seed with my wife. Like if I can go 6 months without falling, then can I in turn do something t...

RABBI YEHOSHUA KAGANOFF Passaic, NJ 07055 201-953-2703 20 Sivan, 5776 / 26 June ‘16 Below is the pertinent part of my responsum to a highly regarded, prominent Talmid Chochom Posek, which is found on pg 158 of my sefer on addiction and halocho. I have translated (and ann...

Dear Scared Witless, The Tzadikim have already addressed this Zohar that implies there is no Teshuvah for this, and offered numerous answers and explanations. It’s not our topic, but the point is, you can definitely do teshuva even for this, and it does not contradict th...

Question: A GYE user sent me a message asking if I don't mind sharing my WhatsApp number so we could help each other. So far, we have exchanged personal messages on the website and it was ok, but I wonder, are members of GYE allowed to talk via WhatsApp? I mean, there w...

Question from a woman: I once heard that shmiras einayim isn't as serious for women as is for men. Sometimes I'll stop myself from looking at something for my future children. But I'm not as makbid with not looking at certain sites or certain types of movies as I was be...

You said yesterday that you can't accept the fact that you are (or you are labeled) a lustaholic - an addict to lust. I can identify with your fear of this stigma, I understand you so well. I (and many more on GYE) have been in the same boat and are still there. I will n...