Frequently Asked Questions
Questions:
I Can’t Access The Site
Payment Processors
Which Payment Processors Do You Use?
Why Are The Clickbank Terms Different Than Paypal?
What Are My Options To Pay With A Credit Card?
Why do you start with Exodus and not Genesis?
Video Format
What makes you think that you know what’s best for the student?
Why do you have to take money at all, aren’t Orthodox Jews interested in disseminating Torah for its own sake?
Why do I have to create a subscription at Paypal for the Free Trial? Isn’t that a little tricky?
A. Here are general instructions for accessing the site. Because of software upgrades, certain pages might look a bit different now, but I trust that you will get the idea. First, go to here:
http://torahonline.co.il/member
The page will look like this:
Click the “Login” link as above.
You will get to the login page which looks like this:
Enter your email address or username and your password, and click the Login button, as above.
If you are entitled to access, you will get to a page which looks like this:
Click on the link “Torah Mastery” as above, and that will bring you to this:
This is the Chumash course page, and you will see the links to the lessons listed.
If you do not have access to the course, when you login you will come to this page:
Click the “Add/Renew Subscription” as above. You will come to a page which looks like this:
Then just put your first and last name into the form, and click “Next” as above, and fill out the form on the next page.
Q. Which Payment Processors Do You Use?
A. As of this writing, we use two payment processors – Paypal and Clickbank. Both are well-known, trusted, and safe-ways to buy online. Your payment information is never revealed to us or anyone else. And both let you cancel your subscription at any time with or without our help or consent.
Q. Why Are The Clickbank Terms Different Than Paypal
A. Please allow me to “answer a question with a question.” Why Clickbank anyway? When we launched, we only had the Paypal option. But there were a few problems with Paypal, in that not all countries have the Paypal option. Also, many requested a payment processor with which they can pay with their credit card without Paypal. For these two main reasons, plus a couple of odd-ball cases, I set up an additional payment processor with Clickbank.
The reason that the terms are different are because Clickbank has different terms with the seller than Paypal. For example, you can’t do a “free-trial” on Clickbank. The minimum is $1. So since I couldn’t do a free trial with Clickbank, only a $1 trial, I made it for two weeks in order to try to be fair. Whatever other differences you notice are also probably due to the same reason.
Q. What Are My Options To Pay With A Credit Card?
A. As above, it is really because of credit card payments that we added Clickbank as a payment processor. But the truth is that there are two possibilities:
1) You can pay via Paypal with a credit card, just that you have to have a Paypal account. Many people know that for single payments, you can use Paypal to pay with a credit card even though you don’t have a Paypal account. However, for a recurring subscription, Paypal demands that you have a Paypal account.
2) You can pay via Clickbank.
Q. Why do you start with Shemot (Exodus) and not from Braisheit (Genesis)?
A. I started with Shemot mainly because my goal in the course is to bring out for the student a sensitivity with the problems, and therefore the depth, in the words of Rashi, and to familiarize the student with the main commentators on his commentary who discuss these questions.
To start with Braisheit would mean to go deeply into Jewish philosophy, excuse the expression, which would lose the focus right from the beginning of the course. I considered starting with Parshat Lech Lecha, but it seemed to me smarter to start from the beginning of one of the Chumashim.
Q. My device doesn’t play mp4, do you have any other formats?
A. Please go to this page:
and see there if one of those formats works for you.
Q. What makes you think that you know what’s best for the student?
A. The one line answer is: try it out, I give you sample lesson, a money-back guarantee, and sometimes a free trial.
During my years of working as a private tutor for children who were having various difficulties in “cheder” (grade school), and during the years of running the Jewish Law program in Kollel Boston, I was trained and self-trained to make my focus to grasp and to fathom what the individual student needs, what the individual student is missing. This is my experience and this is my Standard Operating Procedure. This is the way I brought up my children, and this is the way I run Torah Online.
Q. Why do you have to take money at all, aren’t Orthodox Jews interested in disseminating Torah for its own sake?
A. The short answer is that I cannot afford the massive time-commitment that it takes to prepare these lessons and run the support desk plus the administration without some kind of funding. And we chose the model of accepting payment from the students (and not from outside sources) in order to force myself, so to speak, to have the students’ needs exclusively in mind. For you, this is an advantage which is well worth it. If I would put these lessons on so-and-so’s site and receive funding from him, there would be a natural pull to have his needs first in my teaching.
Q. Why do I have to create a subscription at Paypal for the Two-Week Trial? Isn’t that a little tricky? Shouldn’t a Trial be a Trial, no strings attached?
A. No, it’s not “Tricky” at all. It’s the price for the trial. You are getting access to protected information that cost sweat and blood to create, and that others are paying a full price for. Included is the ability to download the video lessons. Also usually the trial offer comes with a discounted price if you want to continue. To NOT have the person open a subscription means having to chase him down afterwards, something that I personally am not willing to do, I value my time more than that. And nor is anyone else at Torah Online willing to do. Do you want a trial and a discount afterwards? So then sign up for a subscription so that if you don’t cancel then you are in. The vast majority do stay for more than one month. You can cancel yourself via Paypal, or just ask me via email or better at the Support desk (because sometimes emails don’t get through), and I will take care of it promptly.
I myself and all of the others involved at Torah Online, we hold ourselves to be a head and shoulders above and beyond the online normality regarding honesty and straightforwardness. This is something that I personally demand. I have never, ever refused to honor a refund request based on our guarantee. You can try the course out, you can even pay for the first month after the trial, and if you see that it is not for you, you will be refunded, rest assured.