Rosh Yeshivah HaGaon HaRav Meir Tzvi Bergman on Wednesday made his annual visit to the Tiv HaMatzos matza bakery, run by ba’al chessed and askan Reb Aharon Yosef Kornitzer.
In the course of the visit, Reb Kornitzer asked the Rosh Yeshivah, who grew up in a Chassidish home, if he eats gebrokts.
When HaRav Badani, Z'tl "Fought" With HaRav Meir Tzvi Bergman - The Yeshiva World
Who else does kiruv in the Chassidic world, Belz?
The strategy of “little
by little” is a lesson for us in our spiritual battles , as well. In our struggle
to banish our spiritual enemies from within, patience is the greatest virtue. Tackling
all of our obstacles at once will almost certainly end in failure; the
methodical and gradual line of attack has much great hope for success. We must
begin with easier steps, banishing first the most obvious forms of evil, and
only then advance to subtler struggles. (Daily Wisdom, Vol. 2, p. 148)
Here are two divrei Torah that I read yesterday, one from a neo-Litvish Rosh Yeshiva and one from a Chassidic Rebbe. Take a guess, which is which.
1) Yosef Hatzadik was alone for nearly twenty two years with no chavrusa, no shiur, no Daf, no kehilla, no shul, yet he maintained his madreigah. This shows the koach of a Yid.
2) This week’s Vort – פרשת שמות ותקרא שמו משה (שמות ב:ו) And she called him by the name Moshe. Moshe Rabbeinu had ten names; if so, why does the Torah refer to him by the name of Moshe? Especially if Basya, the daughter of Pharaoh, named him this name, why does Hashem refers to him by this name?
The Torah wants to teach us the value of an act of chessed - doing kindness to someone. Basya gave the name” משה - כי מן המים משיתהו”- because I pulled him out of the water - which was an act of חסד.
The name משה רבינו and the word בגמילת חסדים are both equivalent to 613 – the amount of mitzvahs in the Torah. This comes to prove that all mitzvahs revolve around chessed.
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So what do you say? Which is which?
Here's two more that I heard recently.
1) Famous American 'gadol' to visitors (I believe they might have been children):
Do you await Moshiach?
Yes.
Do you want him to greet you?
Yes.
Then you must learn the laws of brochos because he won't greet you if you don't know them.
2) ואלה שמות בני ישראל הבאים מצרימה (שמות א:א)
Why does it say these are the children of Yisrael (Yaakov Avinu) who are coming to Mitzrayim - הבאים is present tense – versus אשר באו - they came, which is past tense?
Because during the 210 years that the Jews were in Mitzrayim, they kept themselves estranged from the Egyptians, as if they had just arrived. They didn’t change their attire, language, or names. Therefore, it says ‘הבאים’, since they kept to their traditions each day anew, as if they had just arrived.
A chassid was struggling with parnassah (finances), and he asked Reb Yehoshua of Belz zt’’l for a blessing for good livelihood. Reb Yehoshua advised him to travel to America, where he will be very successful, on the condition that he should send the Rebbe letters from time to time and share his financial and spiritual status.
The chassid followed the advice from the Rebbe, and at first sent letters depicting his struggles in America. He was struggling both financially and spiritually –Shabbos, Kashrus, and Torah were a tremendous challenge. The chassid concluded each letter asking the Rebbe, "Should I remain in America, or return home?"
With each letter, Reb Yehoshua replied with words of encouragement and told him to stay living in America. After a while, the chassid finally saw success in business and he started becoming acquainted with his environment. He made good friends and he was satisfied with life in America. When he shared the good news with Reb Yehoshua of Belz, the Rebbe replied, commanding him to leave America and his business and return back to Galicia.
The chassid listened to his Rebbe and returned home to Belz. When he arrived, he asked Reb Yehoshua to explain, "Why when times were difficult you encouraged me to stay, and when I finally started being comfortable, you told me to return?"
Reb Yehoshua answered, “Yes, you're right! As long as you felt like a stranger, and the American culture didn’t pull you, I wasn’t worried about your spiritual state. But as soon as you became successful, and you started acclimating to your surroundings, I was afraid you’ll assimilate in the ‘melting pot’ of (then) America.”
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So what do you say? Which is which? I'll tell you. The ones that are only about Torah study and knowledge are the neo-Litvish ones. The one which wonders how Yosef could survive in Egypt without the daf is neo-Litvish. The daf. The one where Moshiach is portrayed as a redeemer who could easily reject you is the neo-Litvish one. The one about Chesed is Chassidish. The one about a Rebbe caring about his chossid, encouraging the earning of parnassah, giving chizuk, not being terrified of going out into the world yet paying attention to general kiddushah is Chassidic. That one that references power is neo-Litvish. That one that references spirituality is Chassidic.
You see where I'm going with this?
Neo-Litvacks - you are second rate for not being in learning, but while you are there make lots of money to support yeshivas. If you insist, you also can make a kiddush Hashem by being honest (even as you try to become rich which strains honesty considerably.)
Hirsch - you can improve the world by making it a better place.
Chassidus - just being a Torah observant Jew in the work environment frees up sparks of holiness that were trapped when the world was created. You don't have to lose your mind being the super honest guy who at the same time tries to get to a position where he makes enough money to pay yeshiva tuition or to make yourself crazy trying to improve a world that mostly gets worse all the time.
This is analogous to a
compassionate, wise and righteous father who hits his son. Surely a wise son
should not turn his back to escape and find himself help, or even an
intercessor to his father, who is compassionate, righteous and kind (chassid).
The Rebbe
Rayatz once remarked1
that when the Alter Rebbe first speaks of the father who punishes, he does not
use the term “chassid”. (He uses it only later, in the context of the
intercessor.) The reason, says the Rebbe, is that a father who smites his child
may indeed be compassionate, righteous and wise — but he is not a chassid, for
a chassid does not hit!
So what about all these "Chassidim" that hit kids in school? I guess they are not Chassidim.
https://torahinmotion.org/podcast/the-making-of-my-most-recent-book-a-thirty-year-story-part-42 50:30
https://torahinmotion.org/podcast/the-making-of-my-most-recent-book-a-thirty-year-story-part-43 21:50
"(Reflecting on a long letter that the Lubavitcher Rebbe wrote to Professor Marc Shapiro's father, who is a historian) It shows you that someone he just met for a few minutes, but in writing a letter he's cognizant, he could have written just a short little letter, thank you, he goes into pages, expounding on this (that we have an advantage over earlier generations in having living proof of faith through Jewish history). And he had to think about this when he wrote it. That's the greatness of the Rebbe. Unfortunately, many people don't see this. They are always looking for negatives. What can you say about the Rebbe? He created a revolution in Judaism. So every time you have a revolution, you have certain dark spots and unfortunate things. (Shapiro had talked earlier about mashichist shluchim in India and Rutgers College). But what he accomplished in terms of the Jewish world, no one came close. And to the Rebbe's credit, and the Litvish don't like this but it's the truth, the Litivsh who were so opposed to kiruv and all these things, Shlomo Carlebach had to leave Lakewood because of that, now of course they are leaders in it, it's all because of the success of Chabad. If Chabad had not gotten into it, they never would have. And they do the exact same thing that Chabad did. They are in all these colleges now, the Litvish Charedim, and what do they do? They ask people, are you Jewish? Come, we're having a seder, we're having this and that. They do the same thing that Chabad did. Chabad I guess had to break the ice on it. This is the vision of the Rebbe. And there's a lot that can be said about the Rebbe, and just because you have some crazy shulchim in certain places, that doesn't take away from all the great things that shluchim do and what the Rebbe did.
And the Rebbe's a thinker. Elliot Wolfson could not have, Elliot Wolfson who's so erudite, he's written so much, he's wouldn't have written a whole book on the Rebbe's kabbalistic ideas if the Rebbe wasn't a great thinker. And the fact that it's hard to understand one page of that book because all the jargon it's written in, derida and all this stuff, post-modern stuff, doesn't take away from the fact that the Rebbe is not just a doer, he's also a thinker. And most thinkers are not doers and most doers are not thinkers. So the Rebbe is special. "
Professor Marc Shapiro https://torahinmotion.org/podcast/the-making-of-my-most-recent-book-a-thirty-year-story-part-43 28:35 - 30:02