Lecture 4: The Rav and Tradition The focal theme of the Rav's life was change, from Berlin to the United States, from philosophy to Torah. The Rav was, above all else, a teacher, so let's look at his thoughts on teaching. He gave two legendary hespedim, the first in memory of Rav Chaim Heller, who died 33 years ago. The first is based on the blessing "al hatzadikim" from the Shemoneh Esreh, specifically the phrase "al pleitat sofreihem" [on the remnant of their scribes]. Why is there an adjective only here, where there is none for the three preceding nouns (al hatzadikim, v'al hechasidim, v'al ziknei amcha beit ysrael). This reflects how young people want to be tzadikim, chasidim, zekeinim, while thinking that their parents do not understand them and their needs. But they cannot become tzadikim, etc., without the remnant of the older generations. A medrash: Bnei Ysrael are about to leave Egypt, but Moshe turns back at the last minute to find Yosef's casket. He finds an old woman, Serech bat Asher, who tells him where it was sunk in the Nile. He has the casket raised, and brings it with them as they leave Egypt. This shows the need for a link with yesteryear, one who had seen and known his fathers and uncles. So it was with the Rav and Rav Chaim Heller; the Rav would go to visit him after teaching his class at Congregation Moriah. He would find R' Chaim buried in learning, carrying on a dialogue with R' Yosef Dov Halevy Soloveitchik (the Rav's great-grandfather), the Netziv, and others. R' Chaim had known the Beit Halevy, the Netziv, and other gedolim, and thus served as a link to yesteryear. The Rav wrote a letter on 9/23/65 to R' Rothkoff-Rakeffet, thanking him for his hearty, loving attitude. "Not many know how to sustain this feeling, which you have done so well -- this is the foundation of the relationship between talmid and rav." Unfortunately, Conservative rabbis have lost this connection. A few months later, the Rav gave a hesped for his uncle, R' Velvel Brisker, entitled "Mah Dodi Dodech", from Shir Hashirim. It was a play on words: Where is my uncle? Note: this hesped was actually given in 1960 or 1961. It was published in 1963. (courtesy of Shlomo Pick) In this hesped, he described the Brisker method with an analogy. What is the difference between engaged couples and married couples? Engaged couples talk endlessly about everything. Married couples: one wink, a gesture, we know what we're thinking. [R' RothkoffRakeffet ran a yeshiva in the Soviet Union. One requirement was that teachers be married, so they can talk with each other while avoiding KGB bugs.] The Rav's father and uncle were married to the Torah, so one or two words from them communicated a whole world of meaning, like the "hahu cheftzah, hahu gavra" example a few weeks ago, a few words communicating a whole concept in Rambam or whatever. A hesped for his mechiten, the Talner Rebbe. Here is a juxtaposition: the Rav's daughter, a scion of R' Chaim of Volozhin, whose rebbe had put the cherem on the Chasidim, married to Isadore Twersky, a scion of the Chernobyl dynasty. This was given in 1972. The Rav coined catchwords in homiletics. He described two types of rebbes, "harav shechotmo malchut" and "harav shechotmo kedushah", loosely, a king teacher and a saint teacher. Every human being wants education, every Jew yearns for Torah. There are two aspects to this. First, one wants knowledge, that is, words, understanding. One needs a rebbe to put together sentences in the Gemara. This is the king teacher, like Moshe, teaching discipline. Second, one wants the soul of the Torah: the rhythm of internal life, the purity of the soul, the heartbeat -- if a rebbe is saintly, then he is worthy to teach. Aaron is the archetypal saint teacher. Nowadays, we have the whole Mitnaged/Chasidic argument again, in Rav Schach vs. Chabad. The Rav said that we always have both types, Litvish and Chasidic. Esoterica are taught by king teachers, like R' Chaim Heller, the Gra, and others. Saint teachers are Chasidic rebbes, "teach to purge immoral thoughts". They breathe Torah, even to a shoemaker. Their teaching is exoteric, available to all, equal to or better than Litvisher teaching. But Chasidic rebbes have changed. The Besht, Dov Baer, Levi Yitzchak their teaching was available to all. But some, such as the Gerer, Alexander, Radzominker, went all the way back to learning. But Chernobyl stayed loyal to emotion and Chasidus. They could say Tehillim with genuine tears. Both styles are good, and both are needed. The Beit Halevy wrote two Torahs. How does one write the Oral Torah? How does one write the Written Torah? Know this: the sofer lives in purity, goes to mikveh every morning, to make this most sacred object. But doesn't the Oral Torah have sanctity? We cannot understand one word of the Written Torah without the Oral Torah, for example, pri etz hadar, al mezuzat beitecha -- but where is the sanctity? Where do we write it? On the inner soul of the one who learns Torah. Every Torah student is a living Oral Torah. What is the proof for this? Mokeh: when we hear of any Jew dying, we have to rip kriyah. What is this like? When a Torah scroll is burned, one must rip kriyah. Thus a person who learns Torah has equivalent sanctity to a Written Torah. This mesorah was the core of the Rav's ideology. At the 1964 RCA Convention, the Rav spoke more on this theme. This is why, before a teacher teaches, he must be aware of the importance of what he's about to do. Just as the sofer is cognizant of purity as he prepares to write the holy Names, the teacher will be writing on living children: future Torahs. In Sotah 13a, Moshe Rabbenu is called "Safra Rabba", the great scribe. Pleitat Sofreihem, the remnant of the scribes: there is no greater title for a teacher of Israel. The Rav and his students inspired each other, as a pleitat sofer and his Torahs. In Sanhedrin 68a, R' Eliezer is dying, and he says, "I learned much Torah, I taught much Torah, and I didn't get as much as a dog lapping at the ocean." I didn't transmit as much as a toothpick picking up a drop of paint from a can. This is the perpetual tragedy of lost opportunity. An example: in Brachot 9a, the students are returning from the funeral of Rav and stopped to eat. They ate separately, so the question arose, should they bench with mezuman or not? R' Ada bar Ahava ripped kriyah again: we all learned from our rebbe, but we didn't learn the simple Bircat Hamazon rules, a lost opportunity. R' Rakeffet had a similar thing, trying to recall the Rav's shitah on some aspect of kiddush. Nobody could remember exactly what the Rav did. The Rav had great respect for women. A hesped for the Talner Rebbetzin (published in 1978 in Tradition): the father is a king teacher, the mother is a saint teacher. What is Torat Imcha (Prov. 8)? One learns how to read, to interpret, to conceptualize and analyze, the discipline of thought and action, that is, mussar. Torat Imcha is seeing the holiness of the day, of reciting prayers, the order of things on Friday night. Judaism expresses itself as a living experience, the scent and texture of mitzvot. One sees the Shabbat as a living entity, gained from the mother. The father teaches how to observe Shabbat, the mother how to greet and enjoy its 24-hour presence. In Bereshit 24:67, Rivka's tent described as "mother's tent." It became just like Sarah's tent: the house bright, the bread blessed, the Divine Presence upon it -- once Rivka entered it.