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IN-DEPTH FEATURES
The Sages said Yerushalayim is in the middle of the world,
and the influence of holiness emanates from Yerushalayim to
the entire world, which draws from its Heavenly influence and
is nourished by it. The sages of Yerushalayim, the men of
Yerushalayim, the children of Yerushalayim, and regular old
men of Yerushalayim — all have a sparkling cleverness
and wisdom, with a heartfelt smile, and a shining, sensitive
face. The Yerushalmi simplicity among the winding cobblestone
pathways is a well- known thing. Yerushalmim do not flee from
honor, because it means nothing to them.
"The shining lights of Yerushalayim" (those with facial
radiance and a shining countenance — Rashi, Bava
Metzia 84a) were figures that shone over the entire city
with their beauty and shining countenance. One of them was
HaRav Moshe Halberstam zt'l who departed suddenly from
the Yerushalmi scene on 26 Nissan, 5766.
His great Rebbe, HaRav Shmuel Wosner the Shevet Levi, said
about him at his funeral: "A man who excelled in halochoh,
and excelled in interpersonal relationships, who made peace
between husbands and wives, and increased peace in the
world." This article presents a few sketches and rays of
light from his life.
*
Decades ago, HaRav Moshe took his young children on a trip to
pray at the gravesites of the tzaddikim. As they
traveled between Kever Rochel and Hebron, HaRav Moshe asked
the driver to stop the van by the roadside. He pointed out a
nearby mountain, and turned to his children in an emotionally
choked voice: "Do you see, precious children? This is where
they brought the he-goat to be killed on the sharp rocks on
Yom Kippur, which would atone for all the sins of the Jewish
people.
"You certainly remember what you learned in cheder?
The man who took the he-goat did not live to the end of the
year."
Rav Moshe suddenly raised his voice and turned lovingly to
his children: "Children, remember! Remember this well! For
despite this, the gemora tells us that there was a
long line of important Jews who were ready and willing to be
the emissary. Why? So that through their hand Hashem would
atone for the sins of the Jewish people!"
At this point HaRav Moshe's voice cracked with stirring
emotion: "See what we learn from this! This is an awesome
lesson. A Jew has to be ready to sacrifice his body and soul
to benefit another!"
HaRav Moshe not only educated his children with these
principles, he fulfilled them himself. He sacrificed himself
for the sake of Klal Yisroel. This was the principle
he indoctrinated within himself at all times: A Jew has to be
ready to sacrifice his body and soul for another.
In order to gain a perspective of his sacrifice for the
individual and the public we interviewed his son-in-law HaRav
Mattisyahu Deitch, one of the rabbonim of Ramat Shlomo,
Yerushalayim.
HaRav Moshe zt'l was ish ha'eshkolos, a man
of wide erudition. What was his life's central point?
He aspired to teach Torah and to give halachic rulings to
each and every person according to his situation and his
level. Such an aspiration is not easily achieved. He obtained
it with great toil and effort.
He was a great masmid in his youth. His primary Rebbe,
HaRav Shmuel Wosner, related that he does not recall a moment
that HaRav Moshe was without Torah learning. We do not
remember a single idle moment in his later years as well. He
achieved a very high level with his toil and investment of
time, to the point where every group and every community
found he had great openness and depth. He did not play games.
Rather, he had a special ability that he developed in order
to raise everyone he met to their special portion in the
Torah.
He delivered shiurim for decades in a kollel
for halochoh that he headed. In the notebook of
kabollos, resolutions that he accepted upon himself,
we found: "I accept upon myself . . . to continuously apply
myself to learning the holy Torah, and especially to prepare
well the shiurim that I say in public."
Even though he reviewed the Shulchan Oruch Yoreh De'ah
hundreds of times in his lifetime, to the point where he said
about himself that if someone were to wake him up in the
middle of the night he could recite every seif koton
of Yoreh Deah exactly by heart, he would still sit and
work to prepare the regular shiurim.
I know the father of a family who came to ask him a
shailoh in halochoh twenty years ago. He put on
a kippah in the hallway when he came in to ask HaRav
Moshe, and his wife also put on a hair covering just before
she entered. From the love and the kiruv he showed
them they became close to him, and today the family are all
outstanding bnei Torah. There are hundreds of stories
like this!
He received everyone with a true love that has power to
influence many. This love originated in emeskeit, and
he saw it as a special part of his personal avodas
hakodesh.
This ability brought him to the level where his face shone.
He had a shining countenance. No one ever saw him with an
angry expression, even in the difficult situations he
sometimes endured. He was always in fulfillment of the verse:
"And Moshe descended from the mountain to the people."
However, he was not naturally like this. After he passed away
we found notebooks of kabollos from an earlier period
of his life in which he wrote that he accepts upon himself
not to be annoyed or irritated by any man, and to greet
everyone with a cheerful expression. A few days later in the
daily journal he notes: "I stumbled in this, and I will work
to overcome this trait even more."
Similarly, people who learned with him in his youth noted
that he was very introverted, and that he labored very much
to reach the level where he would greet everyone cheerfully.
The many people who came to him with sheilos, some of
whom were very troublesome, never knew how much he worked on
his traits to obtain the iron-willed patience for which he
was well known.
In a notebook from his youth we find a painful statement,
apparently written in the midst of his battle with his
yetzer hora to acquire pure character traits: "Today I
stumbled in the trait of anger."
A man who stumbled in a serious transgression once told us
that he felt completely crushed and did not know how to
rectify himself. He visited HaRav Moshe and poured out his
bitter feelings to him. HaRav Moshe told him: "I want you to
strengthen yourself in Torah and the fear of Heaven, and I
will take upon myself the transgression you made. I will
write it down in my notebook. On Yom Kippur, I'll pray
especially for atonement for this sin. You should know, from
the moment this sin is on my shoulders it is mine . . . You
have nothing to worry about from it . . . "
From that moment this man returned to himself.
For some reason, HaRav Moshe earned appreciation from the
entire Klal Yisroel in general and from the gedolei
Yisroel in particular. One of the roshei yeshivos related
that years ago he moved from Bnei Brak to Yerushalayim.
Before he left, he asked Maran HaRav Shach ztvk'l to
whom he should ask sheilos in Yerushalayim. Maran
ztvk'l thought for a moment and answered: "R. Moshe
Halberstam — ehr iz gut" (Rav Moshe Halberstam
— he is good.) Similarly, HaRav Rimer relates that one
of his family members asked Maran HaRav Yosef Shalom Eliashiv
whom he should ask, and Maran instructed him to ask HaRav
Moshe.
Stories about his Righteousness and
Kindness
A day never passed that he did not occupy himself with some
charity. He founded the Vaad HaRabbonim LeInyonei Tzedokoh,
and was the head of the charity Chibas Yerushalayim Kupas
Rebbe Meir Baal Hannes. He would sign every check by himself.
He insisted on having continuous surveillance of every
expense of the Kuppah. Sometimes, he added a title to the
check's recipient so that he would have some gratification
from the recognition.
Whenever a talmid chochom was in trouble, HaRav Moshe
initiated a fund to help him. He never felt it a slight to
his honor to pick up the phone and call donors he had never
met to help other Jews. He always used to say: "My
grandfather, the holy Gaon the Divrei Chaim zy'a,
never paid any attention to his honor when it came to matters
of tzedokoh and chesed."
He also did tzedokoh bodily, and whenever he heard
about someone who was sick he would go to visit them.
HaRav Moshe would be up late at night trying to raise large
sums of money for widows and orphans. He would call on
friends in Chutz La'aretz on the telephone, but in
Eretz Yisroel he traveled to their homes.
Once, he labored extensively for a large donation from
generous individuals in Chutz La'aretz for an orphaned
young kallah in southern Eretz Yisroel. The
kallah only agreed to accept the help anonymously. One
day, HaRav Moshe received a telephone call that the money had
arrived in Eretz Yisroel and needed to be brought to
the kallah. Faithful to his promise that no one would
know her name, HaRav Moshe traveled himself to the center of
the country to pick up the money, and continued personally to
the south to bring the money to the kallah's family
before returning to Yerushalayim.
On the last morning of his life, a short while before his
sudden collapse, he made a phone call and managed to arrange
for a $5,000 donation for a sick talmid chochom who
could not afford the necessary medical treatments.
Once, a woman in great pain came to see him from the Tel Aviv
area. She was troubled because a relative had passed away and
she felt that the funeral was not in accordance with his
honor. She knew no rest since then. HaRav Moshe told her
gently: "A few minutes ago an avreich was here who
intends to publish a sefer. Contribute the expense of
printing the sefer to the memory of your departed
relative."
The Rov's family made the connection between the two parties,
and the avreich sat down with her to compose the text
of the commemoration. She said her relative was named Yisroel
after the Maggid of Kozhnitz. The avreich was
astonished. The sefer he was publishing was the hand-
written manuscripts of the Maggid of Kozhnitz!
He always felt the pain of other Jews. He stood very firmly
that no one should ever be slighted even in the midst of
religious struggles. Teaching Torah and halochoh was the
ultimate value in his eyes.
Hundreds of avreichim gained experience from him in
rendering Halachic decisions (shimush), and were
tested for semichoh. He was instrumental in raising
the consciousness among the Torah world of the need to learn
halochoh, and brought life to this occupation.
And always, everything was done pleasantly and peacefully.
However, he said the truth must come first. It is said:
"Truth and peace shall you love," and he would always
emphasize that truth comes before peace and love.
Whenever two litigants came before him for a din Torah
they both left satisfied, both the claimer and the claimant.
He had the ability to form a bridge between the parties. This
was an integral part of "his shivisi Hashem lenegdi
tomid, his closeness to Hashem," explains Rav
Mattisyahu.
HaRav Moshe would never mix in at the beginning of the
judgment in Beis Din. He listened carefully to what the
litigants said and, after hearing both sides, he summarized
calmly and sensitively. Both sides felt that he was indeed
ruling "on their behalf."
From the time that he joined the Beis Din he was extremely
concerned about any gift offered him. He viewed it as a
"chefetz chashud," a suspicious object. Once he
received an envelope on Erev Yom Tov as "yom tov
gelt," which is customary to give to the rabbis of a
community.
After an extensive investigation HaRav Moshe found that there
seemed to be a slight connection to some forgotten din
Torah. That was enough to convince him to immediately
mark the envelope with a thick permanent marker in bold
letters: "Shochad gelt, bribe money," so he would
remember to return the money after the yom tov.
In another incident, he found a new siddur at his
place in the beis knesses. HaRav Moshe understood that
someone wanted to give him a present, and had inscribed his
name and his mother's name inside the front cover so that the
Rov would remember him in prayer. After investigation, it
became clear that this person was connected to a current case
in the beis din. HaRav Moshe quickly sent the value of
the siddur to the man's house.
It is fascinating to note that in the semichoh HaRav
Moshe received from HaRav Pinchas Epstein zt'l, the
Head of the Beis Din in Yerushalayim at the time, it is
written: "He is accepted to all his brethren . . . this is
his name and his remembrance forever."
A Room in Yerushalayim
For many years the cheder hahoro'oh, the room in which
he was available to the public for halachic rulings, was the
central address for halachic matters in Yerushalayim.
HaRav Yaakov Chaim Dinkel, a close associate of HaRav Moshe,
related to the Musaf Shabbos Kodesh of Yated
Ne'eman that a new custom developed there in the past
years. When it is morning in Eretz Yisroel, it is late
at night in the U.S., and many took advantage of the time
difference to call HaRav Moshe in Yerushalayim when there was
no posek available locally in the wee hours of the
morning.
He was always available even after the set times of
reception. When someone would peer through the window to see
if he was there, he used to walk out and offer his help. In
his last months he said: "In the past they had no mercy on me
and would call even after two in the morning. But today,
boruch Hashem, the beis din has made a schedule
for rabbonim to be on call in the late night hours, and the
weight of the yoke is off of me."
Among the hundreds of questioners who came to him daily,
there was no lack of bothersome individuals who arrived
nearly every morning with a "shailoh." HaRav Moshe
always smiled graciously to them and answered them with his
characteristic warmth. The gabboim were concerned that
his smile encouraged these characters even more, and gave
them the feeling that they were welcome every morning.
When they approached him about it, HaRav Moshe answered them
in his sharpness: "These Jews have a regular daily track:
First Shacharis. Then they buy milk and bread in the grocery.
Then a bank deposit, they pay a bill in the Post Office, and
a shailoh by Moshe Halberstam . . . They are going to
come anyway, even without my smile. So why shouldn't I smile
at a Jew?"
HaRav Moshe once made a very sharp comment about himself: "A
rov who thinks he has the right to sleep one night without
being disturbed has no right to be a rov!"
His family relate that just about every Shabbos evening,
after he poured the wine for Kiddush, they would hear someone
knocking on the door . . . it was another bewildered Jew
with a shailoh . . . and then the knocking came
again, time after time.
On the First Night of Succos
Once, on the night of Succos, after all the regular
questioners had come and gone before Kiddush, an
avreich appeared in HaRav Moshe's succah and
asked if his rosh yeshiva, HaRav Yehuda Tzadkah zt'l,
could come up to ask a shailoh.
HaRav Moshe put down his silver cup and quickly descended the
stairs to greet the rosh yeshiva of Porat Yosef. HaRav Yehuda
Tzadkah explained that there was a doubt in the
kashrus of the succah of one of his students who lived
quite a distance away. HaRav Moshe agreed it was a very
complicated shailoh, and he had to see . . .
Immediately, he walked to the neighborhood where the
succah was located to see if he could find a way to
permit using it on the chag. Kiddush at home would
have to wait until he found a halachic solution for another
Jew's succah.
When he gave a halachic ruling, the main point in his eyes
was the result that would come out of it. There are various
rulings, he said once, that in essence are permitted, but
since the results from the leniency would be severe one must
rule that it is prohibited. In a number of subjects he had
discussions with gedolei Yisroel in which he explained
the need to be stringent because of the likely outcome.
Six years ago on Shavuos, there was a terrible tragedy in the
U.S. His grandson's wife and daughter were killed in a fire
that burst out in their home. The information came to
Eretz Yisroel only on the day after Isru
Chag.
HaRav Moshe came to the cheder hahoro'oh as usual. He
was in great pain, and it showed on his face. He said sadly
to the avreich who came to sit with him and gain
shimush, "You must have heard about the tragedy that
struck us . . . "
But when the people entered with shailos, he answered
them with his usual shining countenance. Between questioners
he spoke painfully about the tragedy, but as soon as someone
came with a shailoh, he wiped the tears away from his
face.
He would use the time he spent traveling to test
avreichim for semichoh. The candidates being
tested would always marvel at his outstanding knowledge and
memory, as he was exact in every Shach and Pischei
Teshuvoh in the Shulchan Oruch. An entire
generation of future Halachic authorities did shimush
with him.
Furthermore, in halachos of a seasonal mitzvah such as
shmittah, he would devote himself completely to the
farmers who kept shmittah. In the hospitals Bikur
Cholim and Shaarei Tzedek he was the halachic authority in
the matters of medicine and halochoh.
HaRav Moshe actually had great expertise in the field of
medicine and halochoh. This expertise acquired him renown
amongst the bnei Torah who encountered medical
problems.
His son-in-law HaRav Mattisyahu Deitch founded the Yad Ramah
Institute under the guidance of the greatest halachic
authorities of today, and it deals with solutions for
problems in halochoh and medicine. This institute provides a
continuation of HaRav Moshe's blessed work.
Complete Devotion
A few months before he passed away, HaRav Moshe spoke to one
of his family about his mechutenes, a righteous
Yerushalmi woman who had recently passed away. One sentence
he said was engraved on the hearts of his listener like a
halachic ruling: "Many people speak about her kind deeds.
These are certainly wondrous things, but one must speak about
the main thing — complete devotion to Torah and
chesed, and the self-sacrifice to implant true
chinuch in her descendants. This is what we must speak
about, so that the youth will know that only when they
continue to live in the path cut out for us by our holy
forefathers without any changes will they feel the vitality
of holiness and true simchah."
The entire family, his disciples, and admirers feel this
today. We must continue his great light so that it will not
be extinguished. Sometimes we saw him shining in certain
fashion so strongly that we could not see his other brilliant
facets. His wondrous personality was a fiery holy flame whose
light was extinguished suddenly.
His image remains inscribed on our hearts, an unbounded
influence. He had pleasantness without any stress, without
the slightest drop of pressure. His countenance was etched
entirely from pleasantness. A world of great friendliness
surrounded him from one end of the land to the other. His
patience was so outstanding, tried and tested by situations
so difficult.
In the words of Maran HaRav Yeruchom zt'l, the
Mashgiach of Mir: "Everything depends on man. A great man
goes and carries bundles of greatness [even] from the
smallest things."
These lines are a few of the "bundles of greatness" from the
days of the life of HaRav Moshe zt'l. May his memory
restore the soul from the ways of earthiness, as was said at
his eulogy by his great Rebbe, the Shevet Halevi: "Rebbe
Moshe! Our mind is on you and your mind is on us! We are not
forgotten from him, and he shall not be forgotten from
us!"
"For the Conductor, upon the Shoshannim" — "They
established this Psalm in honor of the Torah scholars, who
are as tender as roses and as beautiful as roses, and perform
good deeds as fresh as roses. A song of love, a song of
praise for them [the Torah scholars] to endear them to the
people and to endear their Torah to them [the people]"
(Tehillim 45:1, and Rashi ad. loc.).
A rose is enclosed within a number of red leaves, until the
time arrives for the flower to blossom and its petals to
expand. Even when it is unopened, someone who crushes the
rose bud in his hand will find the petals tender, beautiful
and fresh. The tenderness, beauty, and freshness are the
essence of the rose. The rose is striking from a distance as
it dwells among the thorns, which surround it to guard it.
The difference between the rose and the thorns gives more
strength to the rose's uniqueness and points with great
emphasis to its royal qualities. The rose's pleasant aroma
wafts on high and affects even its guardians.
Talmidei chachomim are compared to roses. Their
sensitivity and the freshness of their deeds are the lines of
their unique form and etch the radiance of their
countenance.
HaRav Moshe zt'l was a rose. He was tender and
sensitive, with a fresh sweetness, beautiful in wisdom that
always illuminated his countenance. Full of moisture that
moistened his good deeds, full of a holy freshness for every
mitzvah, he was like a rose in a fragrant flower bed among
the roses.
He returned many from sin with his pleasant ways and speech.
A natural desire to bestow goodness and grace, to straighten
the crooked accompanied him in every walkway or corner that
he turned. His life was a song of friendship with all of
creation. His radiant countenance and heart were the same. He
dearly loved Yerushalayim, the royal city, upon whose walls
he guarded day and night.
"You are more handsome than [other] men; charm is poured
into your lips. Therefore, G-d blessed you forever" —
"You are more handsome than [other] men who engage in the
work of transitory life. Why? Because charm is poured into
your lips to instruct according to the halochoh . . . "
(Ibid. 3).
"And your glory is that you will pass and ride for the
sake of truth and righteous humility" — "To instruct
according to the law and to behave with righteous humility"
(Ibid. 5).
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