“There are two problems facing Yeshiva University today,” says Rabbi Dr. Norman Lamm. “Survival and excellence. We can’t have one without the other.” The 48-year-old Orthodox rabbi and philosopher has just been elected president of the university, the first American-born person to hold that position. “I had hoped, fought and fifty thoughts about taking the job,” said Lamm while relaxing in the presidential suite at Yeshiva’s Washington Heights campus. “We have the same problems that are facing every college, only ours are double because of our dual program of Jewish and secular studies.” Yeshiva, which dates back to 1886, is the oldest and largest American university under Jewish auspices. Its 18 divisions include two undergraduate colleges, and graduate schools in social work, natural sciences, and humanities. An affiliated seminary trains Orthodox rabbis. This fall the university will open the Benjamin Cardozo School of Law, which Lamm said will have an entering class of 265 students. A widely-published author and frequent international lecturer, Norman Lamm is generally considered one of the outstanding personalities in American Jewish life. His opinions have been quoted by U.S. Supreme Court Justices Earl Warren and William O. Douglas in decisions concerning the Fifth Amendment, and in 1967 he testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee on the issue of privacy. Before accepting his current position, Dr. Lamm had been offered the presidency of three other colleges, as well as the chief rabbinate in England and Haifa. Despite his commitment to the rabbinate, a field he has been in for 25 years, Lamm came very close to embarking on an entirely different career. A summa cum laude graduate of Yeshiva with a degree in chemistry, Lamm gave serious thought to becoming a chemist. “During the 1948 Arab-Israeli war I was working in upstate New York on a secret munitions project developing a rocket bullet,” Lamm recalled. “Mos

Rabbi Dr Norman Lamm zt”l was an outstanding leader of American Jewish Orthodoxy, as Rabbi of the Jewish Centre, author of outstanding books on Jewish ethics, law and philosophy, and above all as President of Yeshiva University between 1976 and 2003, and then as Chancellor and Rosh Yeshiva until 2013. As President, he did three important things for the University. He rescued it from financial disaster. He directed its rabbinic studies to contemporary issues so that Jewish religious leaders could speak, with the authority of tradition, to the challenges of today. And he personally embodied its ideal of Torah u-Madda, Torah and the wider universe of knowledge, having mastered and integrated both. Elegant in mind, cultivated in speech, sensitive in manner, fastidious in scholarship, warm and generous in his dealings with people, he was for me and many others a role model of rabbinic dignity and humanity. There are textbooks; there are also text-people, rare individuals who, by the perfection of their personality, teach us how to live. Rabbi Lamm was a text person. It was a privilege to know him, see what he achieved, and count him as a friend. The Jewish world is be a smaller place as a result of this loss.

On July 15, 1979, Dr. Lamm rose in the sanctuary of Congregation Kehilath Jeshurun on the Upper East Side of Manhattan to eulogize Rabbi Joseph H. Lookstein. He began as follows: “I feel woefully inadequate to the task of speaking the eulogy for my teacher, my colleague, and my friend, Rabbi Joseph H. Lookstein. In truth there is only one person who could do justice to this occasion in honor of Rabbi Joseph Lookstein, and that is – Rabbi Joseph Lookstein. Who else but that master orator could compose the proper farewell for so distinguished a man?”Almost fourteen years later, on April 25, 1993, Dr. Lamm delivered a hesped for Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik in the Nathan Lamport Auditorium of Yeshiva University. He began as follows: “Surely such a prince and such a giant, who became a legend in his own lifetime, deserves an appropriate eulogy. I therefore begin with a confession: I feel uncomfortable and totally inadequate in the role of the one delivering a eulogy for my rebbe, the Rav. Only one person could possibly have done justice to this task and that is – the Rav himself; everyone and anyone else remains a maspid she-lo ke-halakhah.”Surely, Dr. Lamm’s sentiment is, kal va-homer, more relevant today. Who else but Dr. Norman Lamm would be able to capture, with rabbinic depth and homiletical virtuosity, with thoughtful perspective and clever turns of phrase, the greatness and the contribution of Dr. Norman Lamm?Dr. Lamm was a distinguished leader of American Orthodoxy for more than six decades. Visionary leader and gifted orator, multi-faceted intellectual and powerful thinker, imbued with hasidic sensitivity and endowed with intellectual rigor, Dr. Lamm devoted his life to the Jewish community. One verse in the biblical book that bears his name, Nahum, describes Dr. Lamm’s tenacious and passionate efforts on behalf of our community. “Man the guard posts, watch the road, gird your strength, and gather much vigor” (Nahum 2:2). In a lifetime of service to the Jewi…

A grief-stricken testimonial by a lifelong admirer, devotee and friend. This is not meant to be a eulogy. The death of a giant, be it a monarch or master Jewish scholar and leader, demands a full and fitting recounting of all that defines his greatness. That will surely come to pass in the weeks ahead, as we try to come to grips with the grief of the passing of Rabbi Dr. Norman Lamm, who died this week at the age of 92. There will be many others who will provide the details of a life filled with so many achievements that it is almost impossible to believe they represent the legacy of one human being.

In sharing my memories of Rabbi Dr. Norman Lamm, I want to focus not on my connection to him as a faculty member at Yeshiva University, but on a different and more personal connection that goes back almost sixty years. Even so, these thoughts are only partly about what Rabbi Lamm means to me; they are also about what he meant to World Jewry well before he became president of Yeshiva University, and about what his labors will mean for generations to come. As I reflect, every fiber of my being is filled with gratitude to him, with hakarat hatov—but also with inexpressible sadness, a sadness that already began with the passing of Mrs. Mindella Lamm just six weeks before her husband’s petirah.When Rabbi Dr. Ari Berman was rabbi of The Jewish Center, he wrote about Rabbi Lamm’s sermons, “The words he spoke changed the lives of our members.” Mibesari echezeh: I can testify to that from my own experience. When I was thirteen, right after my bar mitzvah, my family moved from the suburbs to the Upper West Side. My father, who loved divrei Torah, said to me shortly after we moved, “David, I just heard a fantastic speaker. You’ll love his sermon this Shabbos.” Sure, I figured, what thirteen-year-old would want to pass up a good sermon? But my father was right: I was blown away—I, along with other thirteen-year-olds and forty-year-olds and sixty-year-olds and eighty-year-olds. In a word, everyone! He was mesmerizing. In his hands, the sermon, the derashah, became an art form.Everything about the sermons was fabulous: the soaring poetry of the language; the depth of the message; the cleverness and incisiveness of the vort that served as a springboard, a vort often drawn from Chassidic figures like the Baal Shem Tov and the Kotzker; the capacity to move and inspire; the fluid integration of references to world culture and social phenomena; the astonishing powers of imagination and creativity Rabbi Lamm used in applying his core message to a broad range of situations in human and…

Last night, after spending four hours writing only to conclude that what I wrote was wholly insufficient, certainly not eloquent, and was a document that my grandfather would mark up with hundreds of track changes, I burst into tears and exclaimed to my husband Tzvi, whom I co-opted as my editor in lieu of Zeida, “Too bad I can’t give this to Zeida to edit.” And maybe that’s precisely the point. I can’t give this to Zeida to edit, nor would it be possible to edit a description of a life, and to arrive at a masterpiece final draft.

Dear Friends, We have all been in mourning this week over the loss of our teacher and leader Rabbi Dr. Norman Lamm. I was privileged to offer words of eulogy at his memorial service an I share them with you below. Today is a solemn and sad day for all of us. We have lost a leader and a legend, a friend and a father. Rabbi Dr. Norman Lamm’s myriad achievements are well known and documented. His profound love for his wife and life partner, Mindy, and his enormous pride and dedication to his family will be addressed by others here today.

In the early modern period, we find reference in the works of Jews in the Islamic orbit to the ideal of a hakham shalem—expert in both Torah and the various forms of wisdom. If we wish to be yet more ambitious, we can imagine an individual who supplements these already daunting characteristics with a constellation of exceptional personal qualities. Rabbi Norman Lamm came remarkably close to meeting this extraordinary standard. He was a major thinker who articulated and embodied an ideal of interaction between Torah in its purest sense and world civilization and culture. He contributed to the academic study of Jewish thought. He composed works that inspired Jews to renewed and enhanced observance of mitzvot. He delivered shiurim to classroom audiences and to packed auditoriums, and he published a book of hiddushei Torah. He was an orator of almost transcendent talent; no one in the Jewish world—certainly in the Orthodox world—after Rav Soloveitchik came close. He radiated atzilut (which I would translate inadequately as an aristocratic demeanor) while maintaining genuine concern for virtually everyone he knew; he is said to have responded personally to every letter he received, and he sent congratulatory notes to friends and acquaintances upon reading a review or even a letter to the editor of which he approved. He stood at the helm of a religious movement, leading its central, indispensable institution, founding the Orthodox Forum, the Orthodox Caucus, and the Torah u-Madda Project, serving as the first editor of Tradition, and initiating GPATS, the primary expression of Modern Orthodoxy’s commitment to genuinely advanced Talmud study for women.

When I was a pre-teen in the 1950s, our Congregation Kodimoh in Springfield, Massachusetts, welcomed Rabbi Norman Lamm and his family with open arms. The decorum in the shul was excellent. No one socialized or talked throughout the davening, Torah reading or during Rabbi Lamm’s brilliant sermons. Occasionally, a few silly friends and I would sit in the front balcony aisle seats right above Rabbi Lamm’s pulpit. We would chat and giggle together—even during sermons. Rabbi Lamm would stop in the middle of a sentence and look up at us. Silence.

Rabbi Dr. Ari Berman Reflects on Rabbi Lamm Jewish Action: When did you first meet Rabbi Dr. Norman Lamm? Rabbi Dr. Ari Berman: Growing up in a Modern Orthodox family I always knew Rabbi Lamm. As I became more serious about my future as an Orthodox Jew, in high school, I began to read his articles and books. I heard him speak when I was in Yeshiva University. So even before I had any sort of personal connection with him, I already saw him as an essential leader of our community. Later in the semichah program and Kollel Elyon, I had a few opportunities to meet with him as he always made it a priority to meet with the next generation of Jewish leaders. Once I began my tenure at The Jewish Center, we began to have a more personal relationship. I was the rabbinic intern under Rabbi Jacob J. Schacter and at the time Rabbi Lamm, who had previously served as rabbi there, was a congregant.My first interaction with Rabbi Lamm at The Jewish Center foreshadowed his role as a central mentor in my life. My first day as rabbinic intern was on a Sunday morning. I was only twenty-four and spent the morning unpacking our belongings into our new apartment. I was late for Shacharit and forgot my jacket and tie. Rabbi Lamm was present at the minyan and I went over to introduce myself, sharing that I would appreciate any opportunity to spend time with him and get his advice in my new role. Rabbi Lamm looked at me with a smile and said, “Sure, here is my first thought: You need to dress the part of rabbi in order for people to take you seriously as a rabbi.”If you look at those who eulogized him, so many people were former interns and assistant rabbis at The Jewish Center. In a way, I began the tradition of young rabbis in shul approaching him for advice. I always marveled at how much time he gave me. Rabbi Lamm, even in his later years, was ever the teacher.JA: What role did he play in your life?RB: Through our Jewish Center connections, he became a mentor. He taught me how to be a bet…