Torah Personalities

Shmuel Greene describes the lessons he learned from his Rebbe, Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz ztz"l

R. Meir Simcha Cohen of Dvinsk, the legendary author of Meshekh Hokhmah and Ohr Sameiah and early-20th century community leader, passed away exactly one century ago. In honor of this centennial, Chaim Oscar Jacob reappraises the legacy of R. Meir Simcha.

David Selis and Zvi Erenyi share their memories of JTS Librarian Professor Menahem Schmelzer for his sheloshim.

The Haredi community in Israel and its institutions have resisted army service and other forms of societal integration since the founding of the State. As the controversy over drafting Haredi citizens continues to feature in headlines, Nathaniel Helfgot revisits a well-known but underexplored episode in early Israeli history: the meeting and correspondence between Prime Minister David Ben Gurion and Rabbi Avraham Yeshaya Karelitz, known as the Hazon Ish.

In a never-before-published memoir, Rabbi Joseph H. Lookstein recalls the politics that surrounded Yeshiva University upon the death of President Bernard Revel and the search for his successor. 

Shana Strauch Schicks's reflection commemorating the passing of Yaakov Elman, ob"m.

In honor of Yud Shevat, The Lehrhaus presents an excerpt from Eli Rubin’s forthcoming book Kabbalah and the Rupture of Modernity: An Existential History of Chabad Hasidism. Rubin explores the theological meaning of an influential series of discourses by the sixth Lubavitcher Rebbe, R. Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn.

The back-and-forth about Shadal and Modern Orthodox kiruv continues. Here are letters to the editor by Daniel Klein and Simon Levy.

Zev Eleff offers a rejoinder and some reflections on "What if Rav Aharon Had Stayed?"

There’s a miniature kaf at the beginning of the parashah. As Gabriel Slamovits explains, what the diminished letter says about how Abraham mourned for Sarah fits well with a prominent teaching of Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, zt”l.