The Commentator

When initially asked to contribute a piece on my father-in-law, I began writing a short biographical sketch. Upon seeing Zalman Alpert's article ("The Life and Times of Rabbi Shimon Romm: A Biography"), I realized that his fine essay included more information than was available to me. Hence I have chosen to refocus my contribution so that it be far more anecdotal than biographical, and to therefore complement Zalman Alpert's piece.

As was noted in Mr. Alpert's article, Rabbi Romm had lost his father at an early age. He often commented on his great admiration for his mother's "messirat nefesh" and extreme righteousness in sending him off to study despite her loneliness. His mother also died young, and from early on in life he was left orphaned of both parents.

At the yeshiva in Slonim he became close friends with another brilliant young orphan, Shmuel Belkin. (Dr. Belkin also saw his father die young, having witnessed his father shot in front of his eyes by communists.) Due to their extreme poverty, the two friends shared articles of clothing, including an un-tattered pair of shoes which they would alternately wear on formal occasions. (One would like to assume that they were of similar sized feet.) It was perhaps because of his orphaned state and the great physical deprivation of his early youth that made Rabbi Romm extremely sensitive in later years to the financial hardships and deprivation of his students. On many an occasion, he gave away a coat or other article of clothing to a needy student (Rabbi Romm was extremely well-kept and his clothing was always in meticulously good condition) or would insist that he be allowed to buy him some article of clothing. His general sensitivity and kindness was often exhibited in his role as rabbi of Congregation Noda Bi-Yehuda in Washington Heights where the people most frequently invited to his home were the indigent and needy.

Rabbi Romm had a particular fondness for ordinary folk and would always strike up conversations with the mailman and people in the street, and even with young children whose clever responses to his queries he would greatly enjoy. I recall one occasion where he passed a young child familiar to him who was quite terrified of an approaching dog. Rabbi Romm commented that he should not be afraid because if the dog wants to bite him, he should bite him back. Rabbi Romm derived immense pleasure from the boy's quizzical look, but even more so from the obvious fact that the child seemed quite comforted by the notion that the dog was not viewed as quite as invincible as he had supposed it.

My father-in-law had an extremely sharp, perceptive and penetrating mind. On one occasion we were taking a late Shabbat afternoon walk, when all of a sudden he seemed to be concentrating on a certain person conversing with someone in the park. He approached the man and with completed self-assurance identified him by his not particularly unusual voice and after not seeing him for over sixty years.

After Slonim, Rabbi Romm went on to study for a short period of time in the Mussar Yeshiva of Novardok, and then on to study in Kletzk under its youthful rosh yeshiva, Rabbi Aharon Kotler, zt"l, where he came to greatly appreciate both Rav Aharon's brilliance and fiery personality. When he decided to leave Kletzk for the Mir (largely due to the difficult physical conditions in Kletzk) Rav Aharon attempted to dissuade him from leaving. My father-in-law told me on one occasion that a good part of his life he felt the heavy burden of having refused Rav Aharon.

As was noted in Mr. Alpert's article, my father-in-law was a truly great orator, perhaps the finest I have had the privilege to hear. In his days at Yeshivat Mir, he was often asked to speak in honor of distinguished visitors to the yeshiva. Years later when he was in Israel, he was asked by the legendary Chazon Ish [Rabbi Avraham Yeshaya Karelitz] to speak on behalf of the then fledgling effort to found the Vaad HaYeshivot in Israel, which today is a venerable institution there. Though enjoying particular influences in the realm of "darshanut," he ultimately developed a unique style based on the total command of the Hebrew and Yiddish languages in which he spoke, combined with a masterly weaving of Tanach and Midrashim, (the Nach he had taught himself by heart at the age of thirteen, together with the body of Midrashim which he had completely mastered.) Regarding his early derashot, an "alter Mirrer" once described to me the strikingly romantic settings of the derasha he delivered in the city of Vashilishok after he became engaged to Kaila Eisenbod, daughter of the rav of Vashilishok, Rabbi Eliyahu Eisenbod. (The saintly Chafetz Chaim lived for a while in the city and wrote part of his Mishnah Berurah there. Earlier, a number of the Talmidei HaGra who emigrated to Eretz Yisrael originated from there.) While all the men had gathered in a courtyard below to listen to the derasha he had been asked to deliver, his new "kallah" stood in an open balcony above to listen with pride to her very talented "chatan."

His entry into the warm home of the greatly beloved rav of Vashilishok must have had special meaning to Rabbi Romm, who as noted, was orphaned at a very tender age. Indeed, he set out to take an active part in aiding Rabbi Eisenbod with the burden of his rabbinate. He also got quite close and developed a very warm relationship with his brother-in-law, Noach, who was known to be one of the most brilliant talmidim in the Mirrer Yeshiva (Rabbi Dovid Lifshitz, zt"l once told me that he felt greatly privileged to have studied with him as a "chavrutah" for a period of time). Rav Noach was a son-in-law to the famed Rabbi Aharon Walkin, (the "Beit Aharon," as he was known after his publication,) the rav of Pinsk. He too helped his father-in-law with the many burdens of the rabbinate of Pinsk, while simultaneously being a "maggid shiur" at the Yeshiva of Pinsk, (Our family has published a Torah correspondence, seemingly one of a number of such correspondences, between Rav Noach and Rabbi Dr. Isaac Herzog, zt"l, the Chief Rabbi of Israel, where among other things he discusses the burdens of the rabbinate of Pinsk).

Tragically, when Yeshivat Mir applied for visas for their miraculous trek to Kobe, Japan, and ultimately to Shanghai, China, Rav Noach did not believe that these visas could possibly be effective and did not apply for one. He and his young wife ultimately met with death in unknown circumstances at the hands of the Nazis. Rav Noach is believed to have been perhaps the last person remaining as a "maggid shiur" in Europe.

As for Rabbi Eliyahu Eisenbod, the rav of Vashilishok, for many years my mother-in-law was unable to ascertain what precisely had happened to her parents, although it was rumored that they had died at the hands of the Nazis in a forest outside of Vashilishok. (Because his death had not been established with absolute certainty until a number of years after the war, they were unable to name their son after him, and it was my eldest son, Eliyahu, who was the first to carry his name).

Remarkably, the precise circumstances of the death of Rabbi Eisenbod and his wife first became known to us in full detail just over 2 years ago, when my wife was sitting shiva over my mother-in-law, of blessed memory. When we were hastily preparing the text for the poster that is traditionally plastered around various neighborhoods of Jerusalem to notify people of a pending funeral and shiva, we thought it appropriate to include mention of her being the daughter of the rav of Vashilishok, not because we thought anyone would still know of the city and its rav, but because she had a great love for her saintly father. In the midst of the shiva, a very, very old man was ushered into the shiva by his son. Since no one recognized him we asked him to identify himself, but his name did not strike a chord. He then stated that we wouldn't know who he is, but that he was a "Vashilishoker" who wished to pay last respects to his great rav. He then proceeded to relate remarkable stories about my wife's grandfather that he had personally recalled or that had been related to him by his own father. With all eyes riveted on him, he then proceeded to describe in precise detail the circumstances of Rav Eliyahu's death. The Nazis had rounded up the entire town to the forest skirting the town, where they had prepared a mass grave. They started by tormenting the rav (he described the great wail that emanated from the townspeople over witnessing the torture of their beloved rav). They then shot Rabbi Eliyahu Eisenbod and proceeded to shoot the entire town over the mass gravesite. This man was the only escapee from the entire town.

As is recorded in Zalman Alpert's article, my father-in-law was one of a group from the Mirrer Yeshiva who left Shanghai in the midst of the war and in 1942 managed to make his way to Israel where he lived for over six years. Although circumstances compelled him to leave Israel and take up his old friend Dr. Samuel Belkin's offer to join Yeshiva University, he always retained a great love for Eretz Yisrael, which was a consistent theme of his "derashot" and prompted him into active involvement in Mizrachi. There was a period of time that both he and the "Rav," Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik, zt"l would pray shacharit at Yeshivat Rabbi Moshe Soloveichik, an elementary school in Washington Heights and they would frequently take a short post-shacharit stroll together. I recall one occasion when I had the privilege of accompanying them that my father-in-law commented to the Rav how he often regretted have left Israel and he thought that it was perhaps the great mistake of his life. Interestingly the Rav responded that on occasion he too wonders where he had the obligation not to refuse the positions offered him in Israel (the "Rav" had refused an offer to seek the Chief Rabbinate there). I had always felt that my father-in-law's sentiments, while due largely to his great love of Israel, was in part also due to the fact that despite his total mastery of Hebrew and Yiddish, somehow he never seriously pursued the study of English, and hence for a man of his articulation, he never felt fully comfortable with his less that perfect command of the United States' vernacular. He occasionally commented to me that Dr. Belkin would often admonish him, "Shimonke learn English." (It is well know that Dr. Belkin, though more a scholar that orator, had spent great efforts on mastering English upon his arrival to the United States).

Rabbi Romm was a man of great integrity, which among other things expressed itself into extreme loyalty to his job. He once told me that until he was hospitalized with heart trouble, there was a period of some twenty years where he did not miss one day of giving shiur.

Despite his generally friendly, warm demeanor, Rabbi Romm had little patience for laziness and incompetence. On one occasion, one of the Shabbat gabbaim of Yeshiva University came over to him after the Torah reading had been completed and asked him if Av Harachamim is to be recited on that Shabbat. [Ed: Av Harachamim, recited on Shabbat after the Torah reading, was written in response to the Crusades]. He wryly responded "Vat do you tink, I am a luach [calendar]?" (The comment obviously left a strong impression on those that heard it, since a number of people recalled it during my wife's shiva for my father-in-law).

I consistently marveled over the fact that though he was fully a product of the European yeshiva tradition, (and one of the outstanding ones at that. On at least three occasions in Israel, when I was engaged in conversation with an "old Mirrer" when somehow the conversation got around to the fact that I was "Rav Shimon Wysoki's, as he was known, son-in-law they spontaneously stood up at the mention of his name), Rabbi Romm was fully and equally comfortable with the tradition of Torah and Madda for which Yeshiva University stands. Though he remained closest of friends with his old Mirrer friends like Rabbi Michel Feinstein, the son-in-law of the Brisker Rav and first cousin of Rabbi Moshe Feinstein, (Rav Michel, old, sickly and frail, came on a pouring night from his home in Bnei Brak to Jerusalem to eulogize his old friend Rabbi Romm) and others whose tradition lacked tolerance for secular endeavors, he appreciated and retained great respect for the ideal of Torah u-Madda. He greatly encouraged my pursuit of my doctorate from the Ferkauf Graduate School, and took great pride in my wife's attainment of a doctorate in Near Eastern History at New York University.

His standing as a classic Talmid Chacham of the European mold, and his unusual love of Nach and Midrashim, to Rabbi Romm were not a result of split interests but constituted what he viewed as a unified whole. In the early stages of my marriage, when I lived in Washington Heights, my father-in-law offered to have a seder with me in the weekly Haftorah. When we were about to begin our first session, he commented to me that when studying Midrashei Chazal, one must take it fully as seriously as the study of Gemara since the approach and methodology are in essence more or less the same. There is the text, the problems the text presents, and the sources in Chazal that seek to resolve them. Hence just as in Talmud study one can only get to the core truth by doing justice to the text, the problem, and a proper comprehension of the sources (the rishonim) that seek to resolve the difficulties, precisely the same format holds true for the study of Midrashic texts where there is a textual problem and a ma'amar chazal that seeks to resolve it.

Despite the fact that, like every good seder with a father-in-law, ours lasted some four or five weeks, this approach and the manner in which he applied it had a profound influence on me, and ultimately led to my life long interest in parshanut culminating with my editing of a journal on Machshava and Parshanut (the journal, Jewish Thought was published by Yeshivat Ohr Yerushalayim in conjunction with the Orthodox Union between the years 1990-1998). Indeed in all of my father-in-laws derashot, one sensed a sense of solidity where despite some poetic license taken, justice was being done to the sources presented.

In conclusion, when students of my yeshiva, Yeshivat Ohr Yerushalayim, and other yeshivot in Israel, return to study at Yeshiva University, they enjoy outstanding maggidei shiurim (all of whom are quite remarkably products of Yeshiva University) from whom they receive excellence in Torah. I nevertheless lament the fact that they can no longer benefit from a first hand exposure to the rich tradition of Torah, kindness, "chochmat ha-chayim" [knowledge for life] and a certain old world class embodied in the predecessors of their present outstanding group of educators.

Rabbi Dr. Moshe Chaim Sosevsky is the rosh yeshiva of Yeshivat Ohr Yerushalayim. He received his rabbinic ordination from Rabbi Jacob Joseph Rabbinical School and has a doctorate in Education and Psychology from Ferkauf Graduate School of Yeshiva University. He has published numerous articles in the field of education, halacha and machshava. He lives with his wife and children in Jerusalem.