There is a Prophet in Israel (1986)

/ There is a Prophet in Israel (1986)

Speech

April 6, 1986

There is a Prophet in Israel (1986)

Neviim The Rabbinate

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Outline

I Samuel Perek 2 (1969)

The reason we are given details of the desecrations committed by the sons of Eli is that their transgressions were so severe, we later find that their punishment was equally severe. ומשפט הכהנים וגו׳ – the gifts normally allotted to the priests were severely proscribed by the Torah. Chafni and Pinchas exploited their positions – whatever the three-pronged fork brought up, they took for themselves. In addition to being exploitative, it was crude, vulgar. גם בטרם יקטרו – this again manifests the entire desecration of the מתנות כהונה, and in the process they used strong-arm methods.In the midst of reading about the sins of the sons of Eli, we are suddenly told that Samuel ministered and was a young boy. The Torah is here presenting a study in contrast. While the two (Chafni and Pinchas) are making a lucrative business out of the Kehunah, the other (Samuel) is entirely selfless in his devotion.This garment was normally only worn by Kohanim, but Samuel wore it to give it a sense of reverence – as opposed to Chafni and Pinchas, who, although Kohanim, disgraced it.This little coat is very interesting – almost tender. Every year Hannah came and brought Samuel a little coat. Apparently, the literal meaning is that each year she brought him a new coat. In rabbinic tradition (Aggadah), the coat assumes new proportions. We are told some interesting things about it. Hannah didn’t make a new coat for him each year – she made it only once. She brought it to him for Yom Tov and took it back home with her afterwards. The following year, the same process was repeated, and the coat fit Samuel. And so, throughout the years, the same coat fitted Samuel. After Hannah died, he still wore the coat and was buried in the same coat – reminiscent of The Picture of Dorian Gray, wherein only the picture grows old; he remains eternally young.Two things are interesting: why the coat growing, and why was he buried in it? As I interpret it, there seems to be something very special involved, which t…

Note

Ideas for Chag Hasemicha (1989)

The address should consist of a kind of manifesto of Yeshiva University's philosophy of the rabbinate. It should include the primacy of Torah; Torah U'Madda; the ideal of service to the community; the combination of commitment and open mindedness, loyalty to Orthodoxy and Outreach to the non-Orthodox community, dedication to our own religious growth and the spiritual and well-being of others. Included in this, should be a statement on the combination of a sense of responsibility to Torah (and, hence, the careful consultation with Roshei Yeshivah and older colleagues on important questions) together with the assumption of one's own professional, spiritual, and halakhic responsibility. Speak about Rav Chaim Volozhener's teaching of intellectual independence, and how he learned this from the Gaon, and how he even used it in refusing to go along with the Gaon's fulminations against Hasadism. In this connection, two of my greatest recollections of Rabbi Soloveitchik are: when he scolded me in class (see my Introduction to the two volume Soloveitchik Festschrift) and when I asked him about the Manhattan eruv, he told me to go figure it out myself and do what I think is right.

Article

The Makings of a Ben Torah (1983)

To be a rabbi, one must first of all be a ben Torah. What or who is a ben Torah? The translation, “a scholar of the Torah,” does not do the term justice – it is far too restrictive. A better definition would be “a Torah person” – bearing in mind that one cannot truly be a “Torah person” without first being an accomplished Torah scholar. What, then, are the extra ingredients, beyond talmudic learning, that go to make up a Torah person, a Torah personality? Someone once said that education is what a person has left after he has forgotten all that he has learned. Applying this to a ben Torah, we might then ask what distinguishes a ben Torah from others after you have subtracted all that he has learned of Talmud Bavli and Yerushalmi, of Rashi and Tosafot, of Rishonim and Acharonim, of Rambam and Ramban, of Tur and Shulchan Aruch, of Shach and Taz, of R. Hayyim and R. Akiva Eger. Remove all that and ask: What makes (or should make) us different and special? What, in other words, are the attitudinal foundations that inform the mentality of a ben Torah? The most obvious and the primary answer is that a Torah person loves and esteems the Torah and Torah learning. So, if a ben Torah forgets all that he has learned, his first task is—to learn it all over again. “For [the words of Torah] are our life and the length of our days” (Siddur). Inscribed in the cornerstone of our yeshiva is the principle that R. Hayyim of Volozhin cemented 180 years ago in the foundation of his yeshiva, Yeshivat Etz Hayyim, the mother of all yeshivot since. This mishnaic dictum, v'talmud Torah k’negged kulam—the study of Torah outweighs all other commandments—is to be taken not quantitatively, but functionally. The study of Torah is not only greater than the sum of all the other commandments; it is their very source. Torah is the “tree of life“; all the other commandments are the branches of that tree. Accordingly, the study of Torah is the source of all Jewish life. That is why your overarching co…