The Commentator

While I was no stranger to YC, since it was housed in the same building as TA, I approached the start of collegiate classes in September of 1955 with misgivings and doubt. A high school can be conducted in a parochial fashion as an adjunct to a Yeshiva. However, a college is different since it possesses its own traditional character and outlook. Academic freedom in the pursuit of truth is an essential characteristic of the collegiate environment. This was certainly true of Yeshiva College which was thus described by R. Joseph B. Soloveitchik, "The greatness of the Yeshiva is that it is a real Yeshiva and on the second level a proper academic institution. Both divisions function without synthesis and compromise."

I was not as confident as those who set the tone of the institution that I would succeed in coping with the challenges of a liberal arts curriculum. In Lakewood, I heard endless verbal assaults impugning such studies. I was not yet certain my decision to give YC a try was correct. My first class was a course entitled "The History of Civilization." When I arranged my schedule, the instructor listed for this subject was Professor Alexander Brody, a veteran faculty member. Right before the academic year began, a small notice appeared on the bulletin board disclosing that a new teacher, Dr. Louis H. Feldman, would teach the course. Trying to ascertain his background, we learned that Feldman had graduated Phi Beta Kappa in 1946 from Trinity College in his native Hartford, Connecticut. He was awarded the Master of Arts in classics from the same school the following year. In 1951 Feldman achieved his doctorate from Harvard University.

I entered the classroom with much diffidence among a group of boisterous students. Many were upperclassmen who simply signed up for the course to complete some secondary requirement towards their degrees. Soon a short, slender, serious looking individual entered the classroom. He took his place behind the desk and opened his briefcase. He distributed a mimeographed sheet outlining the subject matter that would be discussed in the initial lectures. I quickly glanced at the page and was dismayed by what I saw. Among these topics were science and religion, universal traditions about the flood such as the Gilgamesh epic, and ancient law codes such as the Hammurabi, Hittite and Assyrian. I started to shudder and felt the words of our sages dance before my eyes. The Midrash declared that when Esau came to Isaac to request his blessings after Jacob received them "Isaac saw Gehenna (Hell) opening beneath him." (Bereshit Rabbah, 67:2; cf. Rashi to Genesis 27:33).

I fancied getting on the first bus back to Lakewood. Then the lecture began. "Religious Jews do not require scientific proof for their faith. Nonetheless, it certainly strengthens our commitments when universal concepts and scientific revelations confirm our traditions." Dr. Feldman then delivered a magnificent lecture illustrating the interconnection between the universal and the Torah traditions. The lecturer's span of knowledge was breathtaking and his insights were scintillating. Over the decades I was to utilize the concepts that were engendered in this initial class in my own lectures time and again. When the hour and a half ended, I left the class in a state of euphoria. I mentally ripped up the imaginary ticket from New York to Lakewood. I had arrived at Yeshiva College and I was not to look back.

The next day we learned from some of the dormitory students that the new instructor was spotted in the Yeshiva's dining hall at night. He was seen ritually washing his hands and pronouncing the appropriate benedictions before and after the meal. The following Sabbath, Feldman appeared to be an experienced worshipper as he joined in the prayer services at the Yeshiva. The word was out that the new faculty member was not only a unique scholar but also an observant Jew. Over the years Professor Louis H. Feldman gained universal acknowledgment as a classics scholar and the leading American authority on Josephus. I wrote a term paper which compared Plato's Republic to the religious kibbutz movement in Israel. I received an "aleph" for the course which Feldman considered one grade above an "A." Unfortunately, the registrar's office did not see it that way; lacking a sense of humor or of proportion, the "aleph" was only credited as an "A" in my freshman collegiate average. Our senior yearbook, the Masmid of 1959, was dedicated to Professor Louis H. Feldman. The words of the dedication could well serve as a guide for attaining greatness in the art of teaching and imparting knowledge. It read: "Love of learning can only be transmitted by a person who himself personifies in every aspect of his character, as a pedagogue and as an individual, the perfection attained through study. Dr. Louis H. Feldman, in the devotion he has shown towards his students has represented for us this perfection. His firm conviction in the truth and vitality of Orthodox Judaism, his vast erudition, his painstaking preparation of every lecture hour, his willingness to expend any amount of time and effort on behalf of a serious student; all of these qualities in Dr. Feldman inspired us to devote the fullest extent of our capabilities to gain mastery of the study we undertook with him. His challenge to our intellects impelled us to make use of our utmost potentialities, and simultaneously instilled in us a respect and admiration for the man who thus inspired us. We shall have pleasant memories of the laugh, we shall make extensive use of the knowledge, we shall never forget the man to whom we dedicate this, our final work, Dr. Louis Feldman."

Professor Samuel Soloveichik was another faculty member who enriched my knowledge and insight beyond the confines of the classroom. During my sophomore year I studied chemistry with him to fulfill the requirement for a non-science major. (Reb Shmuel, as he was affectionately known, was the second-oldest child of R. Moshe Soloveichik. Reb Shmuel was the younger brother of the Rav.)

I took a number of courses with Dr. Milton Arfa, who was a professor of the Hebrew language and its modern literature. Among the subject matter I mastered under his tutelage were the poems of Hayyim Nahman Bialik and the essays of Asher Ginsberg. The latter was popularly known by his pseudonym, Ahad Ha-Am (literally "One of the People"). There always was a sense of challenge in studying with Arfa since we knew that he was a 1945 rabbinical graduate of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. We were constantly on guard to confront any inkling of Conservative Jewish doctrine in his lectures.

Dr. Hyman Bogomolny Grinstein was my professor of American Jewish History. Born in Dallas, Texas in 1899, he received his early education there and in Israel. A gentle soul, Grinstein was a link with the Yeshiva's earlier years. His affiliation with Yeshiva dated back to 1917 when as a student in the school he became a part-time secretary and aide-de-camp to R. Bernard Revel. Grinstein later continued his studies at Columbia University. Under the guidance of Professor Salo W. Baron, Grinstein achieved his doctorate in 1944 for his research in American Jewish History. His thesis entitled "The Rise of the Jewish Community of New York: 1654-1860" was published by the Jewish Publication Society in 1945. Consisting of 645 pages, it was a model of punctilious research and documentation. Grinstein never married and his students constantly affirmed that his children and grandchildren were embedded in the text of his book. In his introduction, Grinstein described his study "taking as it did almost ten years of work." If so, his students' witticism may have indeed been valid.

My rabbinic studies were the focus of my collegiate experience. Our general studies did not usually begin until three o'clock in the afternoon. The mornings and early afternoons were devoted to the sacred texts. From 9 a.m. until noon, we studied on our own in the Harry Fischel Study Hall. I was to have only two rebbeim from the time I entered Yeshiva College until my ordination. The first was R. Samuel Volk and the second was the Rav. For my freshman and sophomore years I studied with R. Shmuel Eliezer Volk, who was rescued from the tribulations of the Holocaust by R. Bernard Revel.

Reb Shmuel was indeed a master of the Talmud including the Kodashim and Tohorot divisions which were not as widely studied as the other portions. He was a product of the Telshe Yeshiva and a leading disciple of its rosh yeshiva R. Chaim Rabinowitz. Volk's study partner for several years was R. Azriel Rabinowitz, the gifted son and successor to his father in the Telshe Yeshiva. In 1931 Reb Azriel was appointed to the faculty after his father's passing. He remained a focal personality on the Telshe scene until the Holocaust in which he perished. R. Volk was a master of the "Telsher derekh" or the Telshe method of rabbinic study. This approach stressed acuity and skill in profound logical analysis of the rabbinic texts. R. Revel and his right-hand man in administering the Yeshiva, Samuel L. Sar, had both studied in Telshe. They were therefore very favorably disposed to the new arrival. Reb Shmuel joined the Yeshiva's faculty shortly after reaching the American shores in 1939. He became a fixture on the Yeshiva scene for the ensuing decades. R. Volk was also to publish a multi-volume set of his Telshe oriented rabbinic novellas. Titled Shaarei Tohar, these tomes were especially devoted to elucidating the Kodashim and Tohorot divisions of rabbinic literature. In a letter of commendation for these volumes, R. Samuel Belkin, the second president and rosh hayeshiva of Yeshiva, declared: "I am sure that you know the name of R. Samuel Volk who is one of our most distinguished Rosh Yeshiva. In addition to raising a generation of Torah scholars in America, he has literally committed his entire life to studying and writing monumental works on the Talmud. R. Volk is indeed a gaon of Torah learning."

Despite these achievements, Reb Shmuel was a prime example of those who were impaired by the Holocaust even if they were physically unscathed. In his presence I always felt the frustration of what would have been and what was. Had the world remained sane, he would have been in the forefront of the Lithuanian roshei yeshiva. At Yeshiva, the students related to him as a European rebbe who never totally mastered western culture. His English was quite good, but Yiddish remained his native and preferred idiom of expression. R. Volk functioned in the shadow of the Rav who had wholeheartedly and thoroughly mastered American mentality and contemporary enlightenment. Reb Shmuel Volk was a graduate of the gymnasium administered by the Telshe Yeshiva. Such a general educational curriculum under the auspices of an advanced yeshiva was unique for Lithuania. However, Reb Shmuel's formal general education ended with his gymnasium graduation. As high as the standards were in this school, in the eyes of his American students, it still was no match for a PhD from the University of Berlin.

I was part of a group of aggressive and resourceful Yeshiva College students. Some were Holocaust survivors while others were American born. We were united in our incessant desire to attain unlimited Torah knowledge. We, perhaps, arrogantly assumed that we were ready to study with the master. We resolved that our next rebbe in the Yeshiva must be the Rav. However, a major obstacle blocked our aspirations. At this time the Rav was only teaching the advanced Codes of Jewish Law to post-graduate Yeshiva students. We began to petition the Yeshiva's administration. Our main interchange was with Norman B. Abrams. He conveyed our request to the Rav. I would imagine that the president, R. Samuel Belkin, was also included in the deliberations. After a few weeks of ambiguity, we finally got the word that we succeeded. Beginning with the semester of September 1957 the Rav would also conduct a class in Talmud which would be open to undergraduates. With the initial flush of elation in our accomplishment, there also came an awareness of our inadequacies. Next term would find us sitting in the same classroom with the Rav! How could we bridge the gap between own conventional Talmudic backgrounds and that of the world's premier rabbinic scholar?

The summer raced by and the new term was upon us. We began the study of the Talmudic tractates of Sanhedrin with the Rav. It was breathtaking and his brilliance and insights motivated us to more dedicated study and preparation for the lectures. From the Rav's vantage point, I imagine he now faced a group of younger pupils for the first time in his Yeshiva classroom. The average age was no more than eighteen or nineteen. Perhaps he wanted to be certain that we were serious students and would strive to prepare the relevant texts in advance of the two weekly lectures. Early in the semester, the Rav evidently decided to make this message clear to us. He met with us on Tuesday and Wednesday. That Wednesday he began his lecture by announcing he wished to test us on our understanding of yesterday's class. He added that there would be three classifications. Either you knew, did not know, or you were a liar. If you raised your hand in response to his question and answered to his satisfaction, he recorded next to your name "yadah" (he knew). If you did not lift your hand, he marked down "lo yadah" (he did not know). However, if your hand was up and you did not respond and explain the topic in an acceptable fashion, the Rav recorded "shakran" (a liar). This quiz traumatized the class. We experienced the lecture that day in a state of distress. That afternoon, we discussed these events and the consensus was that we would not survive such classroom tension. It was decided to send a delegation to discuss the incident with the Rav's wife, Dr. Tonya Soloveitchik. My classmate, Gerald Blidstein, assured us that he could handle the situation. I can still see Jerry waving his hand in confidence as if to say "leave it to me." He led the entreaties to the Rebbetzin as we referred to her. Only years later did I come to appreciate my classmate's special relationship with the Soloveitchik family. Jerry was the grandson of R. Moshe Binyamin Tomashoff, known as the Mabit after the acronym of his name. The latter was a preeminent Lithuanian Talmudic scholar and the author of impressive rabbinic tomes. The Mabit arrived in the United States in 1912 and served as one of Brooklyn's leading rabbis. Jerry evidently enjoyed an informal relationship with the Soloveitchiks outside of the classroom due to their friendship with his grandfather. The Soloveitchiks returned to Boston and we spent the weekend in a state of apprehension and stress. The next Tuesday we glumly entered the classroom. The tension was palpable as the Rav took attendance. Everyone kept his head down. The Rav began his lecture with a simple but sagacious declaration: "You are a bunch of crybabies! Crybabies!" The tension was broken. The class laughed, and the master moved into the essence of his lecture. The Rav evidently made his peace with our youth. We understood that we had to extend our utmost abilities for the privilege of sitting before the Rav.

In the classroom setting, I only recall one incident when you picked up on the Rav's breadth of knowledge. In the midst of a lecture, he asked a student to bring him a cup of hot tea. The student dutifully went across the street and obtained the tea in the "Greasy Spoon," a luncheonette located on Amsterdam Avenue, which catered to the Yeshiva students. The tea came in a plasticized covered cup. When the Rav removed the cover, he noticed that there were some foreign objects floating on top of the tea. He showed the cup to Ahron Batt, a student who was later to attain a doctorate in chemistry. Ahron looked at the cup and deduced that it was part of the plastic cover that had melted due to the heat of the tea. Within seconds, he and the Rav were exchanging chemical equations to explain this phenomenon. This certainly was not an experience I encountered in any other Talmudic classes

On June 18, 1959, I graduated Summa Cum Laude from Yeshiva College, first in a class of eighty-six. I received the degree of Bachelor of Arts, with a major in Hebrew and a minor in Education. My rabbinical ordination by the Yeshiva was granted on the fifteenth of Tammuz 5721 which corresponded to June 29, 1961. Fortuitously, my wife and I also became parents that very day. While I had officially graduated from the Yeshiva, I still retained an ongoing relationship with the Rav. He was to remain my inspiration and the paradigm for my own aspirations and deportment. His teachings and personality guided me throughout the myriad of situations which I encountered after I graduated from the Rav's formal classroom.

As aspiring rabbis, we were also educated by New York's leading rabbinical figures in addition to the roshei yeshiva. The Rav acknowledged "Rabbis Leo Jung, Joseph Lookstein, and Herbert S. Goldstein" as the "heroes" of his students during the forties and fifties. The students alluded to them as "The Big Three." R. Jung, a graduate of Berlin's Hildesheimer Rabbinical Seminary, also attained his masters at Cambridge and his doctorate at London University. In 1922 he became the spiritual leader of the Jewish Center on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. In 1931 he was appointed to the Yeshiva College faculty where he taught a course in Jewish philosophy and ethics. One concept he expressed in class became a focal point of my own thinking. It was simple, but yet far-ranging. Dr. Jung declared that his life experiences taught him that "Judaism is perfect, Jews are not." I was to cite this aphorism endless times during the ensuing decades.

After college, while in the postgraduate semikhah program, we also took courses in homiletics and practical rabbinics. One year we studied with R. Herbert S. Goldstein and the other with R. Joseph H. Lookstein. Goldstein was the spiritual leader of the West Side Institutional Synagogue. A graduate of Columbia University and the Jewish Theological Seminary, Goldstein originally organized the Institutional Synagogues in Harlem. Years later, he gradually transferred his activities to the Upper West Side as the neighborhoods changed. Despite his reputation as a singularly successful, creative and charismatic rabbinical leader, R. Goldstein comported himself as our colleague rather than as an elite professional. He understood our quests and aspirations. He taught us how to preach, and stressed clarity and conciseness. "If you cannot get the idea across in twelve minutes, do not get up to preach." Most memorable was the time he challenged a classmate regarding marriage. "How can you be studying for rabbinical ordination and not be married!" The young man shot back, "Find me a wife!" One week later, after the next class, R. Goldstein suggested a young lady who was a member of his community. Within a few months, the blissful couple stood under the chuppah, the bridal canopy.

R. Lookstein was ordained by RIETS in 1926. His general education was acquired at the City College of New York and Columbia University. Already in 1923 Lookstein came to Congregation Kehilath Jeshurun as a student-rabbi. He went on to become its assistant rabbi and in 1936 succeeded the late R. Moses Zebulun Margolies as the spiritual leader. A year later, Lookstein established the Ramaz School under the aegis of Kehilath Jeshurun. The institution was named in memory of R. Margolies with Ramaz being the acronym of his given names. The new school soon evolved into a modern day school which thoroughly integrated Judaic and general studies. The KJ synagogue and Ramaz were located on Manhattan's Upper East Side, one of the city's most fashionable neighborhoods. Into this area, Lookstein introduced an Orthodoxy that was graced with dignity and modernity.

In the classroom, R. Lookstein regaled us with the description of his struggles in doing away with the cuspidors in KJ. Some of the old-timers insisted that this removal was a violation of traditional synagogue deportment. Short in height, but tall in determination, Lookstein gradually guided KJ into a flagship synagogue of Modern Orthodoxy. Possessed of a golden tongue, Lookstein was acknowledged as the leading orator of the Orthodox rabbinate. He sought to guide us so we would be capable of discharging our rabbinical functions in dignity. The wedding ceremony, the funeral oration, and the weekly sermons were to be reflections of the new standards that the KJ rabbi pioneered on the modern scene. He also taught us the importance of well crafted titles for our sermons that would attract interest. Among his own sermons there were titles such as "Clothes Make the Man: A Religious Analysis of Fashion" and "Between Washington and Lincoln." Years later I heard of an incident which transpired towards the end of R. Lookstein's life. A young RIETS rosh yeshiva was invited to deliver a lecture under the sponsorship of the synagogue's adult education program. Lookstein learned that there was a poor turnout for this event. He subsequently met the young scholar and enquired as to the title of his lecture. The rosh yeshiva responded that it was about the unique analytical method of Reb Chaim Brisker which was utilized in contemporary Talmudic study. R. Lookstein instantly remarked that with such a title it was not surprising that there was such a poor attendance. The rosh yeshiva asked what should he have headlined the lecture. R. Lookstein immediately responded, motioning with his hands as if spelling the title out in the air: "There is more to Brisk than tea."

With such an education, you thought you were ready to enter the real world. Yet there was another aspect to the Yeshiva University milieu which also became influential in forging my scholarly interests. This branch of the institution was to add an entire new chapter to my own intellectual maturation.

Rabbi Dr. Aaron Rakeffet-Rothkoff, YC '59, RIETS '61, BRGS '67, is a rosh yeshiva and professor of Rabbinic Literature at Yeshiva University's Caroline and Joseph S. Gruss Institute in Jerusalem. This essay has been excerpted from the chapter on Yeshiva College in R. Rakeffet's forthcoming memoir.