Rabbi Berel Wein zt'l -- the first Yahrzeit

Despite it being the holiday season, Beit Knesset Hanassi was crowded last night as shul members, talmidim, friends and admirers of our late mara d'Atra, Rabbi Berel Wein zt'l, gathered to pay their fond respects on the occasion of his first Yahrzeit. 

The event was chaired by Rabbi Joel Kenigsberg, who worked alongside Rabbi Wein in his first three years at Hanassi and who, by his own admission, considered himself fortunate to have had the opportunity to have been mentored by him.

The proceedings got underway with a dignified recitation by one of our most respected senior members, Simcha Fass, of Tehillim 91 ("Yoshev Beseter"), followed by kaddish. Then came Rabbi Kenigsberg's introduction. The Rav opened with a sentiment with which we could all identify: that this was not the first occasion on which we had gathered to share our memories of Rabbi Wein; nor would it be the last. When the words of Torah of a talmid chacham are spoken by others after his death, it is as though he lives on through them. Happily, Rabbi Wein's words are available to us and we continue to hear them in his video and sound recordings, as well as in his many writings.

Much has happened in the past year, the Rav noted, wondering what Rabbi Wein would have made of recent events. What we can say is that his response would have been predicated by his attitude, reflecting how he dedicated himself to his belief in the Jewish people -- a cause to which we too must dedicate ourselves.

At this point we cut to the first of a series of extracts from the speech Rabbi Wein delivered on the party to celebrate his ninetieth birthday. In this first extract, Rabbi Wein spoke of time, alluding to the power of both Moshe and Yehoshua to make time stand still and describing it as "our greatest opportunity -- or our greatest enemy". He then spoke of four periods of time in his own life that had passed but, as he put it, were frozen in his memory. The first of these periods was his time in Chicago in his formative years with his father and grandfather: here, he was living the Torah-oriented life of Lithuania, and it was here that he studied law and went into legal practice.

Rabbi Kenigsberg then mentioned Rabbi Wein's role as a marbitz Torah, citing his immensely popular Pirkei Avot shiurim and his influence on his talmidim. This proved to be an introduction for our next speaker, Rabbi Mordechai Kronenberg -- one of the last people to receive semichah from him. Focusing on the parashah for the coming Shabbat, Re'eh, Rabbi Kronenberg spoke of the repetition of the names of birds that were not tahar, in particular the ra'ah, the ayah and the da'ah -- which were all different names for the same bird. This bird, according to the Gemara, had phenomenal eyesight and, perched in Bavel, it could spot a carcass as far away as Eretz Yisrael. There is a moral to be learned from this, he explained: the bird is not kosher because, despite its powerful sight, when it looked at Eretz Yisrael it saw only a nevelah, a carcass, that it planned to eat. Thinking only of itself, it saw past all the good and holy things. The moral was clear: when viewing Israel from afar, one should be careful to make sure one sees the good, not just the bad.

The next Rabbi Wein clip showed him talking about the second phase of his life, when he left Chicago and the legal profession and entered the rabbinate, taking on a small kehilla in Miami Beach; this venture was followed by his move to Monsey and his responsibility for promoting kashrut through the OU. He spoke of the encouragement he received from his wife Jackie a.h. and of the obstacles he faced from some other quarters. His summary? "If you are ever going to do something positive, the Satan will send you nay-sayers". He also spoke of the support he received from others, singling out the Satmar Rav, with whom he discussed many topics -- but not Israel! Rabbi Wein added a general principle that we should bear in mind: "The whole business of the Jewish people is people; it's not organizations, it's people".

Rabbi Kenigsberg's next task was to introduce one of our shul members, Simon Swidler, who for some years was tasked with accompanying Rabbi Wein to shul and back on Shabbat, when the latter's deteriorating health and mobility made it hard for him to undertake the journey alone. Simon spoke movingly of his attachment to this task and of the opportunity he had to exchange words of Torah -- including some ideas of his own -- with a rabbi who had all the sources at his fingertips and could point him to further reading suggestions. Describing Rabbi Wein as a giant in our times by comparing him to the Arzei Levanon (the heroic rabbis who gave their lives al kiddush Hashem), Simon concluded that Rabbi Wein was indeed a hero: "We define our heroes by how they teach, not by how they fight in battle".

The final video clip of Rabbi Wein had him confessing that his great ambition in life was to be a rabbi in Jerusalem -- an ambition which, fortunately for us, was fulfilled in Beit Knesset Hanassi. His final advice to us was that we should understand that, however good things may be, we always live in "bad times" and there are always struggles ahead. We are a great nation, but "the path to greatness is bad times".

Following this clip, Rabbi Wein's son Rabbi Chaim Wein offered us many personal insights into the private side of his father's life, particularly his deep commitment to shalom, his aversion to any form of machloket and his tireless commitment to tzedakah and chesed. 

The evening was brought to an end by Rabbi Kenigsberg. Asking why it should be necessary for the Chilsdren of Israel to leave Egypt by night, he quoted from Rabbi Wein's book BaMesillah Na'aleh the aphorism that our strength lies in the certainty that Hashem will take us from darkness to light. 

Eli Friedwald then recited Kel Moleh Rachamim and we trooped off home. Our minds were buzzing with the ideas we had heard, but the heaviness of our hearts at losing Rabbi Wein was at least a little lightened by our knowledge that his teaching, his wisdom and the warmth of his concern for his beloved shul remain with us still. 

This very special event was recorded in full by TorahAnytime. We will share the link once it has become available.

Beit Knesset Hanassi wishes to acknowledge with gratitude the generosity of those people who have kindly supported this event.