Editor's Note: Since we found out too late that the
yahrtzeit of HaRav Schlesinger is observed in Adar I,
we missed that week, but we are nonetheless putting it in now
rather than wait for Adar II, when it was originally scheduled.
Introduction
"The path that has been handed down to us by earlier
generations, along which we tread in order to attain
knowledge of Hashem, involves toiling over Torah shebe'al
peh in particular. The agreement between us and our Father
in Heaven was consummated over the power of Torah
shebe'al peh and it is only on the basis of this power
that we are able to climb ever higher, until we attain the
level of knowledge of Hashem, that is, cleaving absolutely to
Him."
This brief passage, taken from HaRav Yechiel Schlesinger's
writings on the Haggadah shel Pesach, encapsulates the
idea which inspired his life's work, and which saw its
fullest expression in the brief time he spent in Eretz
Yisroel. He would not be satisfied by raising a generation of
chareidim of German origin. He strived for something more --
to fire them with the ambition to toil in Torah, raising true
bnei Torah from among the German olim. He
understood that successful spiritual development is wholly
dependant upon toil in Torah.
The ten brief years which HaRav Schlesinger zt'l spent
in Eretz Yisroel are the subject of the concluding portion of
our series. During this time he devoted himself heart and
soul to both the establishment of his yeshiva and the
education of his talmidim (and, it should be noted, to
that of his own family no less). As founder and leader of his
own institution, the splendor of his character, his ideas and
his vision are all revealed more fully than before -- how he
demonstrated to his talmidim that Torah study was the
most important pursuit in life; how his talmidim
perceived him; how he raised his children; how he viewed the
difficult and complicated state of affairs in the years
preceding and immediately following the founding of the
Jewish State; his ideas and hopes for the future -- some of
which remained unfulfilled, while others were fulfilled in
excess of anything he probably imagined.
Our account is based upon both records of what he did and
first person recollections of those who encountered him. Yet,
as much as these sources enlighten -- and the picture they
paint is truly awe inspiring -- they also show us that we are
far from able to attempt a full evaluation of all that Rav
Yechiel managed to pack into each of the twenty-four hours of
each of the days that made up those ten years.
Our only additional clue to the texture of the years in Eretz
Yisroel, is the quality and the endurance of the fruits of
those years' labor. The giant dimensions of the edifice that
has arisen on the foundations which he laid -- it is no
exaggeration to call it the altar upon which he sacrificed
himself -- are directly ascribable to the intensity with
which he pursued his goal and the purity of his motivation,
as well as the overriding fear of sin which guided him at all
times. Another important characteristic of this now also
comes to the fore: his dedication and single mindedness.
HaRav Sholom Schwadron zt'l, once commented to HaRav
Moshe Yehuda Schlesinger ylct'a that while his father
Rav Yechiel was a gaon in many areas, what made him
unique in Reb Sholom's eyes was his "geonus in
mesirus," which means, roughly, his extraordinary
dedication.
We can define this term a little more clearly if we
understand geonus of this sort as denoting a far more
intense form of a given characteristic than is generally met
with. What impressed Reb Sholom then, was the sheer force of
the convictions which drove Rav Yechiel Michel, his
unswerving pursuit of the goals that they inspired, and the
swiftness and decisiveness of the actions he took to realize
them. Reb Sholom added that in no way did he intend to
belittle Rav Yechiel's unquestioned greatness in Torah and
saintliness of character, but merely to point out that in
this one respect he showed greatness beyond what was
encountered in others.
Indeed, both the young yeshiva students themselves, whose
immediate concern would have been with setting themselves a
firm parnosso base in life, as well as their parents,
who looked to their grown offspring for help with the burdens
of settling in a new country and who, moreover, all belonged
to a constituency that had for generations been born and bred
to quite a different ideal, could hardly have become
convinced that the single most important investment in their
own and in their families' futures was time spent in yeshiva
learning Torah exclusively, by convictions any less forceful
than Rav Yechiel Michel's.
And yet, powerful convictions alone will almost certainly
fail to win over those who do not yet recognize the truths
which they convey, unless genuine regard and concern are also
shown for the other person. Rav Yechiel's devotion to the
mundane as well as the eternal needs of his talmidim
was always evident to them, in both his actions and his
manner. With his thirst for truth, the simplicity and
pleasantness of his ways, his gentleness on the one hand yet
his utter clarity of outlook on the other, the truth of his
message penetrated deep into the hearts of his
talmidim, and remained with them for life.
In all this Rav Yechiel greatly resembled the Ponevezher Rov,
who also devoted himself entirely to building Torah in
postwar Eretz Yisroel with visionary foresight. Had the two
perhaps discussed the future of Torah chinuch in Eretz
Yisroel together during their years in Ponevezh, when Rav
Yechiel was an avreich learning in the Rov's
kollel and gathering experience from his beis
din? Did they share a powerful inner drive, that led to
the blossoming of Ponevezh and Kol Torah, among the first
yeshivos for the sons of the new yishuv to open before
the war, into major Torah institutions?
A common vision certainly inspired both leaders: to see Torah
taking firm root in the new yishuv.
Seeds for the Future
On the very day of his arrival in Yerushalayim, Rav Yechiel
met one of his talmidim from Frankfurt, Reb Yitzchok
Vanderola, and invited him to join the new yeshiva. "Come,"
he said, "you can announce that the yeshiva will open!"
How typical this was! Though a preliminary attempt that had
been made while still in Switzerland to secure serious
financial backing for the new venture had met with utter
failure, though knowledge and support of his plans was
confined to a relatively small circle of family and friends,
and though on such a day there were surely personal concerns
to attend to -- what was uppermost in Rav Yechiel's mind was
to declare the yeshiva open. He may well have decided that
since, under the circumstances, reasons to postpone or even
abandon opening were unlikely to disappear quickly, it would
be harder to close an institution that actually existed than
to abort one that was only being planned. At any rate, as we
have seen before, when convinced of the correctness of his
path, Rav Yechiel allowed no considerations to stop him.
On his second day in Yerushalayim, Rav Yechiel visited HaRav
Isser Zalman Meltzer zt'l, the rosh yeshiva of
Eitz Chaim, and asked for his guidance in selecting a
talmud Torah for his oldest son. Reb Isser Zalman
recommended Eitz Chaim, despite its being a stronghold of
traditional Yerushalmi chinuch (it was the first
cheder of its type in Yerushalayim, having been opened
almost one hundred years earlier by HaRav Shmuel Salant
zt'l) and thus possibly not the place where a young
boy just arrived from western Europe would feel most
comfortable. Rav Yechiel did not question the Rosh Yeshiva's
advice however, and he enrolled his oldest son, Moshe Yehuda
in Eitz Chaim where, in time, his other sons also learned and
progressed.
A talmid, Dr. Yonah Cohen, recalls Rav Yechiel's first
Shabbos in Eretz Yisroel. On Shabbos afternoon, the
talmid saw his rebbe leaving the home of his
brother (Dr. Falk Schlesinger z'l, who later became
director of Sha'arei Tzedek Hospital), burning with
indignation about something and shouting with an intensity
that gave rise for concern. With good cause indeed! Rav
Yechiel had witnessed chilul Shabbos in Yerushalayim
ir hakodesh!
We are taught that just as a seed contains the blueprint for
the entire organism that is to grow from it, so our
aspirations, thoughts, feelings and actions on the first days
of each new year encapsulate the progress of the whole year
that lies ahead. This also seems applicable to Rav Yechiel's
first days in Eretz Yisroel. The passionate concerns which
are evident in the above three stories, were the very ones
that would occupy him and consume him in the ten years that
lay ahead: his yeshiva and talmidim, his children and
their upbringing, Torah and mitzvos and their observance, or
lack of it, among the wider community. These are the strands
that run consistently through his life, from which the
threads of each new day were spun, in time forming strong
ropes, upon which many were later able to support themselves
in their own upward ascent.
A Yeshiva for the New Yishuv
In view of the fact that Kol Torah has grown to become one of
the finest jewels in the crown of Eretz Yisroel's Torah
community, it might seem puzzling that when it first opened,
doubts were expressed (quietly or otherwise) in sections of
the chareidi community as to the path the yeshiva might end
up taking. Although today such an idea seems outrageous, to
say the least, a closer look at the times will reveal that
there were legitimate grounds for concern.
Practically speaking, the most controversial departure lay in
fact that when the first Sephardic bochur was
accepted, the language of instruction in the yeshiva was
changed (from German) to Ivrit, over whose use in
chinuch a fierce debate was then raging which, in its
day, had profound ideological implications.
There were however, some more general fears as well. If
anyone other than Rav Yechiel -- whom HaRav Dushinsky
zt'l, head of the Eida HaChareidis and a rebbe
of Rav Yechiel in Galante, trusted implicitly and whom he
declared enjoyed his unreserved support -- had been leading
the new venture, things may well have turned out
differently.
"It can now be revealed," wrote Reb Fishel Gelernter (a close
friend of HaRav Yechiel's and a partner in the yeshiva's
first years) in an article that was published in
Hamodiah to mark the latter's twenty fifth
yahrtzeit, "that besides the many practical
difficulties along the way to establishing the yeshiva, there
were no few fears and doubts of an ideological and spiritual
nature, owing to the yeshiva's unique character. Various
groupings saw the Yekkische yeshiva as some kind of
foreign graft on the soil of the Holy Land, and especially in
Yerushalayim. They were worried about the yeshiva's future
path and the implications it could have and their doubts were
perhaps not wholly unjustified, in view of several
unsuccessful attempts that have been made in our time. Its
establishment was only made possible by virtue of the
agreement of the gaon R' Y. Z. Dushinsky zt'l,
who placed his full trust in his esteemed talmid, in
the knowledge that he would keep watch to prevent the
slightest digression from the path handed down to us by
earlier generations in organizing yeshivos kedoshos in
Eretz Yisroel and outside it."
While this is not the place to try and identify the "several
unsuccessful attempts that have been made in our time"
mentioned above, it should be noted that the opposition of
the leaders of the old yishuv to the introduction of
any secular or vocational studies into the traditional
curricula of the yeshivos and chadorim of
Yerushalayim, had not been confined to the veiled attempts of
assorted religious reformers to infiltrate the city's
educational system. It also extended to the efforts of well-
meaning subscribers to the Torah im derech eretz
school of thought. There were those among them who saw this
as a goal, an ideal to be pursued -- as a way of bolstering
rather than undermining traditional Judaism, as is clear from
the following paragraphs, written by HaRav Avrohom Yosef
Wolff, founder of the Wolff Seminary in Bnei Brak.
"It is well known that among German Orthodoxy in recent
generations, general education, viz. studying in gymnasia and
universities, was very common. There were two ways of viewing
this state of affairs. One approach saw it as something
desirable, as a goal, or a [sacred] trust. Just as Polish
Jewry carried aloft the banner of chassidus, and
Lithuanian Jewry was the flagship of the yeshivos, German
Jewry was the standard bearer of the idea of living as a
committed, fully Orthodox Jew in the very epicenter of
enlightenment and culture.
"The second approach saw the phenomenon as a fact of life;
something to which one had perhaps, to become reconciled but
at any rate, not a calling. The rav and gaon Rabbi
Chaim Dr. (Med) Biberfeld zt'l, of Berlin, spoke for
this second school of thought in Kattowicz [at the founding
of Agudas Yisroel] when he declared, `We, who hail from
Germany, have come to Kattowicz to learn [from others], not
to teach [them]! '"
Not In Yerushalayim!
Despite the fact that in his article Rav Wolff places Rav
Yechiel and his father Rav Eliezer Lipmann Schlesinger
squarely in the second group, the old yishuv did not
distinguish between one nuance of Torah im derech
eretz and another. Any chareidi institution of that type
to have opened in Yerushalayim, even if it were only geared
to youth from families of German origin, would have
constituted a breach in the integrity of the city's Torah
chinuch, which was guarded by the cheirem
against the incorporation of such studies that had been
proclaimed by the leaders of the yishuv over eighty
years earlier.
The old yishuv, to be sure, was by this time powerless
to prevent other distinct groups that placed themselves
outside the Eidah's authority from opening such schools as
they wished. However, the Eida HaChareidis still represented
the Ashkenazic chareidi community, broadly speaking, at least
as far as chinuch was concerned. (Some of the
chareidim of the old yishuv had split with the
Eida over the founding of the Rabbinate.) Moreover, at this
time, the Eida was still working together with Agudas
Yisroel, which supervised the interests of all segments of
the chareidi world. (The split with the Agudah arose
ten years later over whether or not to join the Zionists in
governing the newly-proclaimed state.) With regard to
chinuch then, the stand of the old yishuv was
that of virtually all chareidim.
At the same time though, most of the chareidim who were then
arriving in Eretz Yisroel belonged to the new, rather than
the old, yishuv. This means that they came in the
framework of the general efforts to resettle the land, with
the aim of there being a specifically chareidi element within
the new yishuv. They settled either in cities and
towns like Yerushalayim, Tel Aviv and the fledgling Bnei
Brak, or in agricultural settlements like Kibbutz Chofetz
Chaim. As such, these olim, a high proportion of whom
were from Germany, could not really be considered as having
placed themselves under the Eida's auspices and
jurisdiction.
Nevertheless, the preservation of the integrity of all Torah
chinuch in Yerushalayim and of Torah chinuch in
yeshivos everywhere -- kal vochomer of a yeshiva in
Yerushalayim -- has always been axiomatic for all chareidi
groups. Though this stand found differing modes of expression
in recent times (the Eida's opposition to any compromise of
Torah chinuch in Yerushalayim attributed itself most
recently to the Chasam Sofer and that of the Lithuanian
yeshivos to any compromise of Torah chinuch in
yeshivos, to the stand taken by the Netziv in Volozhin), the
separation of kodesh from chol was always
understood and adhered to by all chareidim in Eretz
Yisroel.
The sole exception was Orthodoxy in Germany, whose own
precarious position and particular needs were understood and
accepted by the gedolei Yisroel of the other European
centers. In our own times, the Chazon Ish and HaRav Shlomo
Zalman Auerbach zt'l, and ylct'a HaRav Shach,
all strongly advised against the establishment in
Yerushalayim of any institutions that incorporated secular or
vocational studies in their curricula, however urgent the
need for such steps was judged to be for particular groups,
even among the community that identifies with the new
yishuv.
By definition then, the transplantation of what was viewed by
most Torah leaders of the time as a necessary concession in a
specific situation to the very different conditions of the
growing chareidi community of Yerushalayim, was an unsuitable
and uncalled-for operation. The delicate position in which
the chareidi olim from Germany found themselves, and
the suspicions to which the establishment of a yeshiva geared
for them gave rise, can therefore be easily understood, as
can the assertion that only because the head of the Eida and
the new Rosh Yeshiva were rav and talmid
muvhak, respectively, was there no outright opposition to
the yeshiva.
Reb Fishel Gelernter continues, "Indeed, we witness today how
Yeshivas Kol Torah continues the glorious tradition of the
yeshivos hakedoshos without any digression, and its
part in raising upright generations of chareidi Jewry in
Eretz Yisroel and abroad is great . . . At the suggestion of
HaRav Boruch Kundstadt zt'l [who was coopted by Rav
Yechiel at an early stage to lead the yeshiva with him] the
following paragraph was introduced into the yeshiva's
regulations in 5724 (1964): "As it has been until now,
Yeshivas Kol Torah will continue being a true yeshiva
i.e. the introduction of any secular (high school) or
similar studies, such as crafts, into the program of learning
is forbidden, and no changes whatsoever may be made to this
paragraph."
Close to the Mokom Hamikdosh
Rav Yechiel was fully aware of the great care that the
situation required and he sought a location for the yeshiva
that would help ensure that it always remained true to his
ideals. This was why he chose to open in Yerushalayim,
stronghold of the old yishuv, rather than one of the
newer towns or settlements, where most of the families he
sought to attract were settling. He knew that in this way,
the yeshiva would be under close scrutiny and at the
slightest sign of any deviation there would be a
commotion.
He even wanted to have the yeshiva within the walls of the
old city, close to Har Habayis, though this plan did
not materialize. To Reb Fishel Gelernter, Rav Yechiel
explained, "We find that at the time of the akeidoh,
Yitzchok Ovinu asked his father Avrohom to bind him up and
tie him, in case he shook during the shechita, which
would render it and the entire korbon invalid. We must
attach ourselves to kedusha in the same way, so that
we don't stumble, chas vesholom."
The yeshiva's first location was in the Sha'arei Chesed
neighborhood, whose inhabitants belonged to the old
yishuv. In order to minimize any friction over the use
of Ivrit, the shiurim that were delivered in
that language were not said in the beis haknesses
where the bochurim learned, but in a private apartment
nearby.
The assurances about Rav Yechiel which HaRav Dushinsky had
given to the members of the old yishuv were soon also
confirmed by the evidence of their own eyes. At an event held
for the yeshiva, HaRav Dovid Baharan zt'l, one of the
leaders of the old yishuv, sent along a
representative, who spoke on his behalf.
Rav Shlomo Zalman Sonnenfeld, historian of the old
yishuv and author of Guardian of Jerusalem,
recalled Rav Yechiel as having been "consumed entirely by a
holy fire." He praised Rav Yechiel and the other heads of the
yeshiva for the clear stand they successfully maintained,
while drawing talmidim from the very circles for whom
Torah im derech eretz was virtually an article of
faith. Rav Sonnenfeld also recalled the purity, the zeal and
the truth that shone from Rav Yechiel's face, and mentioned
too that one could see on him that he was cleaving constantly
to Hashem.
It is interesting to note that there was one contemporary
godol beTorah who thought that the course which Rav
Yechiel had charted was not necessarily the ideal one. When a
nephew of Rav Yechiel's ylct'a, Rav Meir Schlesinger,
was planning a visit to HaRav Yechiel Yaakov Weinberg
zt'l, author of Seridei Eish, on a trip to
Switzerland, his father, Dr. Falk Schlesinger z'l,
warned him to be careful not to reveal his name to the
Seridei Eish. Dr. Schlesinger did not want to reopen
the very serious debate that had taken place between his
brother and the Seridei Eish over the law requiring
animals to be stunned before shechita, which practice
the former, although then the junior of the two in age and
position, had strongly opposed.
Although Rav Meir did not explicitly introduce himself, the
Seridei Eish caught on to the fact that he was HaRav
Yechiel's nephew in the course of their conversation and
began to speak with boundless admiration about HaRav
Yechiel's genuine greatness in Torah and the depth of his
understanding. "However," the Seridei Eish added,
"there is one thing that I don't understand about him. When
he was oleh to Eretz Yisroel, he submitted to those
who were not as great as himself. He is the man who was
capable of establishing the Torah Im Derech Eretz
outlook in Eretz Yisroel in the proper way . . . "
A New Flask Full of Old Wine
While Rav Yechiel was adamant that Kol Torah be patterned
upon the great yeshivos in Europe, without any deviations, he
did not seek to produce a carbon copy. He had something more
in mind.
He wanted for example to cultivate derech eretz in
another sense. Among the sterling traits with which German
Jewry as a group are identified, is a wonderful sense of
precision in time keeping, and order in the making and the
execution of arrangements. Rav Yechiel wanted this to be a
feature of his yeshiva, both of the training received by the
talmidim and of the policies according to which the
yeshiva was run.
To achieve the second aim, he gathered a group of friends and
supporters and formed a management board, which he took pains
to convene on a regular basis. The hanholo formulated
the yeshiva's regulations and ensured that the institution
functioned as an orderly unit. At meetings, the rosh
yeshiva would report on progress in the study of the
talmidim and on the results of the examinations which
were held regularly and he would put forward new ideas for
the yeshiva's growth and development. The proceedings of
these meetings were duly recorded in detailed minutes.
From leafing through the pages of minutes, much can be
learned about HaRav Schlesinger's plans for disseminating
Torah amongst the German aliya and his strategies for
winning them over to the idea of total dedication to Torah
learning in a yeshiva kedoshah.
In the protocol of the board meeting which took place on the
twenty-first of Sivan 5699 (1939), several suggestions were
made as to how the awareness of the necessity for the
existence of a yeshiva kedoshah might be heightened.
At the same meeting, the idea of holding public examinations
of the talmidim was put forward. Such events would
increase the honor of Torah and would also heighten the
public's appreciation of what the yeshiva was achieving. This
in turn would widen the circles from which new
talmidim would be attracted to the yeshiva. At the
meeting which took place on the fourth of Tammuz, the rosh
yeshiva reported on the arrangements for the first event
of this kind, which was scheduled to take place eleven days
later.
HaRav Schlesinger also planned other, more significant
modifications for Kol Torah, as opposed to the regular
pattern of the Lithuanian yeshiva. HaRav Elyokim Schlesinger
of London writes, "On a number of occasions, my uncle greatly
praised to me the approach to learning and the organization
of the Hungarian yeshivos, which was close to his
heart. When he founded Kol Torah, he didn't want to appoint a
mashgiach of the mussar school until I put
great pressure on him and suggested the gaon and
tzaddik Rav Gedaliah Eisemann zt'l. I arranged
for a meeting between them and having been impressed by him,
he agreed to the suggestion."
We recall that as a bochur, Rav Yechiel used to
preface his Torah study with the tefilla of the Sheloh
HaKodosh, `I want to learn so that my learning will bring me
to fulfill the Torah in practice, and to attain upright
character traits,' and this prayer was fully answered. At the
same time as Rav Yechiel's talmidim drank in his
Torah, they saw before them a repository of yiras
Shomayim and nobility of character. With honesty at the
foundation of their interactions, Rav Yechiel related to his
talmidim with sincerity and fairness, and in a manner
that was simple, straightforward and pleasant.
He was as suited to provide instruction in mussar as
in Torah and he combined the two, demonstrating that they
were two sides of the same coin. By personal example, he
showed not only how toil in Torah learning refines character
as well as sharpening the mind, but also how purity of
character facilitates comprehension of Torah. He would
preface his sugya shiur with a few minutes study of
Mesillas Yeshorim. He would also deliver
shmuessim in which he drew upon the ideas of Reb
Yeruchom zt'l, and Rav Avrohom Grodzensky zt'l,
Hy'd, spurring the bochurim to have high ambitions
in Torah, yiras Shomayim and purity, all together. Rav
Yechiel also wanted to introduce the study of Nach in
his yeshiva but this plan did not materialize.
At the same time, Rav Yechiel also took pains to hide the
extent of his influence in shaping every aspect of the
yeshiva's organization and educational program. When the
yeshiva issued an appeal to aid in its establishment, the
letter signed by the distinguished signatories rightly
stressed the Rosh Yeshiva's extraordinary achievements.
Rav Yechiel deleted that entire sentence -- his praises, the
titles that had been used and even his name. Here again, he
was not alone among some pioneers in the Torah world of
recent generations, whose lives' work has had lasting
endurance, for perhaps that very reason -- that they
concealed themselves.
HaRav Yehuda Addes, rosh yeshivas Kol Yaakov, relates
that although he only learned in Kol Torah several years
after HaRav Yechiel's petirah, his stamp was clearly
recognizable on the yeshiva and the talmidim, to the
point that one could not have imagined his influence having
been greater. Whilst the decorum, the discipline and the
derech eretz for which Kol Torah gained a reputation,
were strengthened and continued by all the roshei
hayeshiva who worked with and who followed Rav Yechiel,
it was he who placed a distinctive stamp on the yeshiva,
which it bears to this day.
Beacon and Shelter
In the early nineteen thirties, there was already a constant
stream of German Jewish refugees, who simply got up and left
Germany after Hitler ym'sh came to power. Those of
them who, after arriving in Eretz Yisroel, sent their sons to
learn in the existing yeshivos were a very small minority.
Most did not feel sufficiently at home with those
institutions, and for this and/or other reasons they enrolled
their children in high schools. The refugees who arrived
towards the end of the decade invariably followed the latter
path. The significant differences in the mentalities and
outlooks of the Orthodox German olim and their
brethren in Eretz Yisroel made it very difficult for the
former to adjust and to find their places within the existing
framework.
As their numbers increased, the severity of the problem grew.
Having finally arrived in Eretz Yisroel, Orthodox Jews were
refraining from educating their children in the traditional
Jewish way for the lack of suitable places of learning.
Without leaders with whom they felt they shared a common
language, their childrens' spiritual futures were in
jeopardy. Two well known German rabbonim summed up the
problem in an open letter which Yeshivas Kol Torah circulated
in 5702 (1942). HaRav Ezriel Munk zt'l, rav of Kehal
Adas Yisroel in Berlin and HaRav Pinchas Cohn, rav of the
kehilla in Ansbach, wrote, " . . . pirchei
Yisroel have gone astray here in the Holy Land. Like
sheep without a shepherd, they have found no tree under whose
branches they can find shelter."
During this period, the new yishuv hachareidi was
taking shape all over Eretz Yisroel, and to a lesser extent
in Yerushalayim. Many of the newcomers were baalei
batim, while others had spent time, prior to departing
from Europe, on hachsharah in order to prepare them
for life on agricultural settlements. New chareidi
settlements were established, and the olim also set up
schools for their youth in the spirit of German Orthodoxy.
Despite their dedication to their childrens' education, they
did not view the establishment of a yeshiva for their own
people with any urgency. A yeshiva was not the only forum for
inculcating Torah and yiras Shomayim, they felt. Many
families considered even a single year in yeshiva as
representing a great sacrifice. It was of prime importance
therefore, to introduce the idea of study in yeshiva
gedola as being a fundamental need of every segment of
Jewish youth.
One of Rav Yechiel's talmidim, R' Yosef Sheinberger
z'l, made notes of a lecture which his rebbe
gave to a group of German chareidim, in which he strove to
win them over to the unique vision which he had for their
sons' chinuch.
"First," Rav Yechiel argued, "there is a need to relate
honestly and straightforwardly to Hilchos Talmud
Torah, as set out in Shulchan Oruch. She'eilos
surrounding chinuch are no less important than those
surrounding say, the appointment of a new shochet.
Both cases require (1]) clear knowledge of what the
Shulchan Oruch rules on the matter, and (2]) that the
knowledge be implemented in complete confidence in the
din and halocho, springing [in turn] from faith
and reliance on the decisions of the contemporary sages who
transmit the word of truth to their generation. From this it
follows that the laws in the Shulchan Oruch ought
neither to be ignored nor veered from, even on a temporary
basis, and not even if it is not done on purpose.
"Second, the task of earning a livelihood -- `by the sweat of
your brow' -- is not a positive commandment. The ideal to
strive for is that the pupil develops into a talmid
chochom. This is something which must penetrate our
outlook.
Third, in addition, our experience has shown that the very
best way for us -- who hail from the German lands -- to
fulfill the task of educating our youth is by cleaving fully
to our own heritage, which includes among its merits [the
cultivation of] a thirst for learning, scrupulous mitzva
observance, strongly Jewish surroundings and an organized
kehilla. If we follow this path, we will succeed in
achieving the coveted goal of Talmud Torah keneged
kulom."
Such a bold and uncompromising stand was not allowed to pass
unchallenged by those to whom it was addressed. It was no
less than a call to reevaluate the situation that had been
accepted at all levels of German Orthodoxy for generations,
to which many gedolei olom had to accommodate
themselves and which for numerous other religious leaders
represented the achievement of an ideal. But HaRav Yechiel
was asking no more from others than he asked from himself --
total, wholehearted dedication to the truth -- and the truth
of his message gradually had its effect.
On All Fronts
The deep sense of responsibility which Rav Yechiel felt
towards all of his landsmen led him to continue
disseminating Torah among them in the broadest possible way,
as he had done in Frankfurt. His talmidim in yeshiva
had first claim. He spared no toil or effort in fully
cultivating the abilities of those among them whom he felt
were suited to remain in the beis hamedrash.
At the same time though, he put his mind to work on behalf of
those whom he felt were unsuited for this. In addition, some
bochurim were subjected to intense pressures to leave
yeshiva and they had to battle their parents over every extra
month. Sometimes the parents were justified, for they
desperately needed their sons' assistance in supporting the
family and in any event, for a young man to continue learning
in kollel after marriage was then very rare indeed.
Rav Yechiel therefore placed special emphasis upon learning
practical halocho and developing a broad foundation of
Torah knowledge within a relatively short time so that those
who had to leave would be taking with them the necessary
spiritual tools to enable them to lead lives of full Jewish
commitment.
"I want to advance all the other `nine hundred and ninety
nine students who enter the cheder,' and to see them
progress," Rav Yechiel once remarked to Rav Dovid
Goldschmidt, who taught in the yeshiva in its early days, "to
say nothing of the need to invest in the single individual
who will go on to become an authority in halocho."
The progress which Rav Yechiel wanted every one of his
talmidim to make was not only in actual Torah
knowledge, but equally as important, in the realization that
whether they remained in yeshiva or not, they would only find
true happiness in life by cleaving to the yeshiva's aims and
goals and striving to learn as much Torah as possible.
Rav Yechiel maintained contact with the religious
kibbutzim, such as Chofetz Chaim, and would pay them
occasional visits. He spoke to families about sending him
their sons and he tried to set up a mandatory `year-
in<196>yeshiva' scheme for all the kibbutz youth. "He
had a special connection with the people on the chareidi
settlements," wrote Reb Fishel Gelernter, "and many of their
sons went on to study in Kol Torah, for longer or shorter
periods. In this way, our teacher's influence was visible on
the settlements, on several of which, a majority of the
members were talmidim of Kol Torah."
In conjunction with religious high schools, he organized
shorter periods of `yeshiva days' or at the very least a
`Shabbos in yeshiva,' to give these students a taste of the
Torah world. He did not hesitate to accept boys with weaker
backgrounds or abilities into the yeshiva and he paid them
special attention, with the result that they went on to
establish fully committed Torah homes. Rav Naftali Nebenzhal
recalled one of Rav Yechiel's shmuessim, on Rosh
Hashonoh just before tekias shofar, in which he
encouraged the new talmidim from the kibbutzim,
crying out, "One more year in yeshiva rips up the evil
decrees!"
Neither did he confine his manifold efforts to those starting
out in life. Rav Yechiel started a shiur for
baalei batim among the German olim in
characteristic style. Meeting one of his acquaintances, Rav
Yechiel asked him to participate in a shiur. Arriving
at the appointed time, the man was astonished to see that
nobody else had shown up. "Where is the shiur?" he
asked.
To his astonishment, Rav Yechiel simply replied, "Well, the
two of us are here," and they sat down to learn. Gradually,
other baalei batim began coming to sit around the
Rosh Yeshiva's table and listen, until the
shiur became a regular fixture in all their lives.
After a period, when the affairs of the `founding member'
were meeting with success, he pressed Rav Yechiel to accept
some remuneration, making his own continued participation
conditional upon his offer being taken up. Despite his own
family's straitened position, Rav Yechiel of course adamantly
refused to accept any money for teaching Torah.
In all and any circumstances where Rav Yechiel felt his
advice or intervention could help, he spoke out. When he
discovered that a neighbor, a fellow German oleh, had
enrolled his son in Ma'alah, a Mizrachi
elementary school, he paid the family a visit, together with
his friend Rav Dovid Carlebach z'l of the Adass
Yisroel of Cologne (they had learned together in
Slobodke), to influence the father to transfer the child to
the Chorev school, which in those days was run in the pure
spirit of the German chareidim.
Rav Naftali Kober zt'l, related that Rav Yechiel was
once approached by a newly arrived German oleh who
asked his advice as to which educational stream he should
entrust his children. The reply was terse: "Lend your support
to that group where you see the youth follow their parents'
path and go in their footsteps!"
With the initial organization of the Jewish youth of
Palestine into the four educational streams that in later
years would later be supported in varying degrees by the
State (the level of support being in inverse proportion to
the level of Yiddishkeit taught), Rav Yechiel's heart
bled over the high numbers of children being registered in
the Zerem Ha'ovdim, the Worker's Stream, the standard,
secular sector. His talmid Rav Yosef Reiner
zt'l, related that Rav Yechiel wanted to set up a
chareidi youth movement that would be run according to the
directives of Torah sages (presumably in the hope that such a
movement would be able to open schools for the children of
those who then felt they had no alternative to the standard
education), but circumstances prevented him from realizing
this plan.
And sometimes, even without prior deliberation, it was simply
impossible for Rav Yechiel to remain silent, as the following
story demonstrates. In 5705 (1945), many Jewish youngsters
were called upon to join in the armed struggle against the
Germans. The son of a neighboring family, with whom Rav
Yechiel maintained cordial relations, was also taken off to
fight. After victory had been won in Europe, but while war
was still being waged against the Japanese, the boy returned
home for a visit. When his furlough ended, the young man
wanted to rejoin his regiment in Cyprus. When army
transportation arrived to take him, Rav Yechiel began to show
signs of extreme distress and he began to call out inside his
own house, with incredible emotion, "Why is Mr . . . letting
his son go to the army?! Does he want him to marry a non-
Jewess?!"
Somebody in the house said, "What can be done?"
But Rav Yechiel continued to roar, "Does he want his son to
marry a gentile?!"
He then went out into the yard like this, crying out again
and again, "What does Mr . . . want? Would he like his son to
marry a gentile?!"
A small crowd gathered, with Rav Yechiel standing in the
middle shouting with great emotion. His son relates that he
never saw his father more aroused and excited. Rav Yechiel's
cries however, fell upon deaf ears and the young man went off
with the transport. A few weeks later, he informed his
parents that he had become engaged to a Christian girl, with
whom he remained.
Nothing less than a profound sense of personal duty towards
each and every Jew, and first and foremost towards those of
his own community, could have resulted in the far reaching
influence which Rav Yechiel exerted. The true extent of that
influence is only visible now, two generations later. In his
maturity, Rav Yechiel's life fully bore out a comment that
had been made years earlier by his first rebbe, HaRav
Avrohom Shmuel Binyomin Spitzer zt'l, at a Keren
Hatorah meeting in Hamburg in 5685 (1925). "I have no fears
for the future of Torah Jewry in Germany," HaRav Spitzer
declared, "since it has produced for us a godol like
Rav Yechiel Schlesinger!"
End of Part I
