Dei'ah veDibur - Information & Insight
  

A Window into the Chareidi World

4 Cheshvan 5761 - Noveber 2, 2000 | Mordecai Plaut, director Published Weekly
NEWS

OPINION
& COMMENT

HOME
& FAMILY

IN-DEPTH
FEATURES

VAAD HORABBONIM HAOLAMI LEINYONEI GIYUR

TOPICS IN THE NEWS

HOMEPAGE

 

Produced and housed by
Shema Yisrael Torah Network
Shema Yisrael Torah Network

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

NEWS
Angel's Advocate: A Personal Appreciation and Tribute to Mori Verabi HaGaon R' Shlomo Hakohen Rotenberg zt'l
by Mrs. S. Weinbach

A MIND STAND

I have always been fascinated by the phrase, "Mishe'omad al daato" which, being such a Jewishly spiritual concept, has no accurate English translation. It roughly means: when a person reached a stage of maturity, or became morally conscious and aware.

When does this process begin?

Is it the first words of a baby? The first original thought? The first conscious realization of ego?

Is it a daily occurrence? Each morning, when a person suddenly discovers that he has awoken to a new day, that Hashem has restored his soul -- and his personal identity -- so that he can begin another page in his individual life and hope to make it count so that eventually, he can `come with his days' -- does it happen at that very morning moment before he gratefully gropes for the formula words to thank Hashem: "Modeh ani lefonecha . . . "?

Does that `standing upon one's mind' denote a single flash of enlightenment that changes one's life from an aimless plodding to one of conscious purpose? Or is it a series of lightning flashes of understanding and awakening into the spheres of the spirit?

Is it the rebelliousness of adolescence against rigid conventions he sees all around him and a vision for a braver new world that he can hope to be part of by using the vigor of youth to build upon the experience of age?

Ever since I heard the phrase, it has tickled my fancy and I have longed to discuss its magic on paper. What better opportunity than using it as a tribute to the very figure who introduced it to me and who actually stood me on my mind, who pulled off the blindfold of childhood, turned me round and round and then figuratively shoved me in the right direction and said, "This is the way of Torah. The straight and narrow."

I was still standing on the one foot, emerging from the eggshell, and beginning to search for my own identity and looking around. I needed guidance and conviction and R' Shlomo Rotenberg provided it custom-made. "Now go and learn it -- and follow through."

EAST AND WEST

It was some forty-five years ago that I was exposed to the unique figure of HaRav Shlomo Rotenberg zt'l, as a neophyte in the Bais Yaakov high school on South Eighth St., Williamsburg, eager to learn, but with fighting spirit to explore and make my own decisions, reach my own conclusions and not become part of the fold, conform to the mold, without a conscious coming-of-age. I still had to be introduced to many concepts and values in Yiddishkeit which a liberal day school upbringing had purposely failed to provide: Hashgocho protis, daas Torah, mesirus nefesh, ahavas Torah, yiras Shomayim and more.

At that point, there was a strict dividing line in my mind between sacred and secular, with both sides fighting to win. I was heavily addicted to reading, and still reading secular books even on Shabbos. I was westernized in culture, and coming to the Eastern European enclave of Bais Yaakov was a culture shock that I was not ready to absorb without a fight.

It was at that point that I became exposed to R' Rotenberg through a six year course in Jewish history and occasional lessons in Torah hashkofo. The sacred side of me was duly impressed by the figures of the various Rebbetzin- teachers, firsthand products of the Bais Yaakov movement in Cracow, direct proteges of Sara Schenirer. And who couldn't help feeling their spiritual impact? But that was on the sacred side. And in my mind there still existed the schismatic dichotomy of the secular world, separate and apart. Who could bridge that?

Along came this dynamic teacher and thinker who, for me, represented something of the western world which I still kowtowed to. He proceeded to debunk all of its values, and replace them with the crystal sparkle of pure Torah values, with the skill of sleight of mind -- bombshells that exploded all the myths and mythologies, Greek and otherwise, that I had read and absorbed through hundreds of books, sort-of kosher by the standards of those days.

He came to class with no more than a sheaf of closely written pages, the painstaking labor of years of meticulous research, and here-and-there, removed the pin of some thought-grenade releasing fireworks of controversy that shook the very foundations of our bourgeois upbringing.

GENERATION OF SECURITY

Ours was the generation of security, the post-Holocaust people determined to survive. In relative comfort. To make the best of the golden opportunities of the liberal Goldene Medina which promised freedom from racial discrimination (read: antisemitism), and a fair chance to all. The generation of "My son, the doctor; my son, the lawyer." And what was to stop me from becoming "My daughter, the (secular) journalist/ writer/ translator"? Lack of opportunity? Lack of skill? Lack of secular education?

The battle for Shabbos had already been won, and those who had survived it were, more or less, safe. The battle for kashrus had also been won, and you could be an orthodox Jew without too much sacrifice, in middle class comfort.

The battle was pitched against college, secular education, bourgeois complacency in Yiddishkeit. It was the battle of Torah: R' Aharon Kotler's crusade for Jewish boys, and on the distaff side, no less vehement, the campaign of R' Boruch and Rebbetzin Kaplan for the Jewish girls who would establish the homes of the coming generation.

SHIVTI BEVEIS HASHEM

The concept of shivti, kol yomov, of casting aside all of those trappings and living purely for the sake of Torah, was foreign to America in those days, all the more so to a Belgian transplant of a family of upper class diamond dealers. The money had been left behind, to be sure, and we struggled for our daily subsistence, but the `class' still existed, perpetuated by a gaggle of Tantes who were continually spouted tachlis and higher education. Torah? Leave that for Shabbos, at best.

R' Rotenberg was a five star general. A very product of that Belgian society, he had rejected it. He was over and beyond it. His were the eyes of Bar Yochai who could subsist on miracles in an everyday existence, a R' Chanina ben Dosa who was even beyond miracles. He aimed to teach us that we Jewish daughters could turn vinegar to oil -- and to think nothing of it!

Today, every three year old Rivky and Chanale know the story and its full impact is somewhat lost. To us, Rebbetzin Ben Dosa, Mrs. Rochel Akiva, Rebbetzin Bruriya, wife of R' Meir, were all presented as women living a viable Torah life that actually appealed in its poverty, motivation, direction, pure devotion.

ANGEL'S ADVOCATE

R' Rotenberg was the angel's advocate. He made everything come alive with panoramic vigor and beauty. It was heady stuff, rich wine, and I don't know how he managed to do it, injecting it into those vintage, yellowed pages of history that leaped to life, lesson after lesson.

We looked forward to those lessons each week. To what concept would we be introduced this time? How would we be able to defend ourselves against his onslaught of logic, facts, perspective? At what point would we capitulate? At what point would we suddenly `stand on our minds' and incorporate a major new value into our life system?

I was the product of Reader's Digest, Life magazine, and books. When it came to subjects like evolution, I couldn't help nursing a reserved respect for the pictures and the `facts.' Along came R' Rotenberg and debunked it all, but from a scientific vantage. He ridiculed the `Missing Link' and disproved the currently popular notions in their own language.

And we were duly impressed. Very much so, in fact. I might even say that he was our missing link, our bridge from east to west, from profane to sacred, from middle CRASS mediocrity to the pure and otherworldly. He put down the American golden calf of money and skillfully replaced it with golden crown of Torah. Lesson by lesson.

And it eventually penetrated. Poverty, simplicity, austerity - - became values onto themselves. A prodigious feat for those times. Indeed, he introduced the very word `histapkus' to my lexicon, perhaps a reality in our home of necessity, but completely foreign as a positive value.

Today, it is a household word. Eretz Yisroel society, and kollel society in the diaspora, is based on the very values that were so novel and alien to us then. I am certain that he played a very pivotal role in producing generations of girls who established homes with a solid appreciation for Torah, and if some of us still had a foot in the business world, at least the next generation went forward in the right direction. The Jewish world today, fifty years later, is bigger and better for the principles he taught to hundreds of us, and which we avidly absorbed.

I, personally, am convinced that my values in life, my goals and my lifestyle, directly reflect on a daily basis what I was taught by this unforgettable teacher, and I will forever be grateful to him for his having stood me on my mind.

 

All material on this site is copyrighted and its use is restricted.
Click here for conditions of use.