Agudath Israel of America's 82nd National Convention opened
at the Westin Hotel in Stamford, Connecticut on Thursday
afternoon November 25-12 Kislev. It extended through the
weekend, ending on Sunday, 15 Kislev. Not all the reports
were available at press time.
Moetzes Gedolei HaTorah of America Voices Shock Over
Attempts to Interfere With Torah Education in Eretz
Yisroel
The 82nd Annual Agudas Yisroel of America Conference ended
Sunday 15 Kislev following three days of meetings in which
gedolei Yisroel were given an opportunity to address
the concerns of the American Jewish community and to field
questions regarding their stances on current issues.
On motzei Shabbos a special meeting of the Moetzes Gedolei
HaTorah in the US was held on the issue of the decrees by the
Israeli government and attempts to interfere in Torah-based
educational institutions.
At the meeting were the Admor of Novominsk, Rosh of Agudas
Yisroel of America, HaRav Shmuel Kamenetsky, rosh yeshiva of
Yeshivas Philadelphia, HaRav Avrohom Chaim Levine, rosh
yeshiva of Telz-Chicago, HaRav Aharon Shechter, rosh yeshiva
of Yeshivas Rabbenu Chaim Berlin, and HaRav Aharon Feldman,
rosh yeshiva of Yeshivas Ner Israel Baltimore. The meeting
was also attended by members of the Executive Committee of
Chinuch Atzmai in the US, HaRav Malkiel Kotler, rosh yeshiva
of Yeshivas Lakewood, and HaRav Yitzchok Sorotzkin, rosh
yeshiva of Yeshivas Telz-Cleveland.
At the request of gedolei Yisroel, an overview of the
present situation in Eretz Yisroel was presented by Rabbi
Avrohom Yosef Lazerson, one of the heads of Chinuch Atzmai,
who spoke of the attempts by the Israeli government to
interfere in education affairs. In response, all of the
gedolei Yisroel expressed staunch opposition and
called for efforts to fend off these incursions. He also
reported on another impending threat in the form of the
Dovrat Commission and answered questions posed by gedolei
Yisroel, who showed deep shock over the disturbing
situation.
Another special meeting addressed the new decrees affecting
the talmudei Torah in Israel, considered "exempt
institutions." The issue was discussed at an emergency
meeting of talmud Torah directors held one month ago
at the home of HaRav Michel Yehuda Lefkowitz with the
blessings of Maran HaRav Eliashiv shlita, where grave
concerns over the Education Ministry's involvement in
institutions for tinokos shel beis rabban were heard
and a decision was reached to set up a foundation to assist
these institutions.
Gedolei Yisroel of America expressed their agreement
with the opinions of gedolei Yisroel in Eretz
Hakodesh, saying the matter should be related to in all
seriousness. They voiced their support for the Torah-based
educational institutions of Eretz Yisroel and discussed ways
they could stir chareidi Jewry in the US to take part in the
formidable struggle.
Thursday at the 82nd National Convention
The convention will commenced on Thursday afternoon with
three concurrent symposia: "Lessons from the Flames: What
Survivors of Churban Europe Want Us to Know," "Exploring
Concepts in Hilchos Yisroel Bein Ho'amim," and "The Challenge
of Chosenness: Raising Children Bein Ho'amim." Details of the
speakers were given in last week's Yated.
The attendees of all the afternoon symposia came together
that evening, and were joined by hundreds of others, for the
Thursday night Keynote Session. Partitions between the
symposia rooms were dismantled to create a massive convention
hall, which was quickly filled to capacity and beyond.
At the Keynote Session, Rabbi Yaakov Perlow, the Novominsker
Rebbe, Rosh Agudas Yisroel, delivered a strong and heartfelt
message to the gathering, to whom he applied the posuk
"Ve'ameich kulom tzaddikim" — "and the members of Your
nation are all righteous" (Yeshayohu 60:21).
Gatherings like the convention, he explained, bring out the
tzaddik- character in all who are present which, as the
mishna in Sanhedrin assures us, benefits both
those gathered and the entire world as well.
The Rebbe focused on another mishna in Sanhedrin,
in which Rabbi Eliezer presents his prescription for what
a person should do in the fearful times before Moshiach's
arrival: make efforts in Torah and in gemilus chassodim.
The spiritual aspect of human beings, he explained, lies
in sechel and middos. Torah is the highest
expression of the former; chessed of the latter.
Together they comprise the highest expression of humanity.
Where though, asked Rabbi Perlow, is tefilloh? He
suggested that it is fundamental: our stark recognition that
all is from Hashem and that He alone controls our destiny. We
can only be mispallel that we receive what we need in
whatever merit we might have. That merit though, is achieved
through Torah and chessed, "our refuge, our ir
miklot, in times of fear."
The Rebbe issued a challenge to his listeners, indeed to all
of Klal Yisroel, a challenge to recognize a means of
supporting Torah that is at the same time an expression of
chessed. All too often, he lamented, we recognize the
need to support renowned institutions, but neglect the less
celebrated — but in a sense more fundamental —
neighborhood mosdos. "They are the foundation, the
cornerstone" of the great Torah edifice we have built in
America, he asserted, and the mechanchim in such
mosdos are particularly grossly underpaid — when
they are eventually paid. All parents who can manage full
tuition for their children, he declared, must do so, and
endeavor to help pay for less fortunate others' children as
well.
It has become apparent, he continued, that much of the
challenge we face of "children at risk" would best be met by
the appointment of special mashgichim in yeshivos
ketanos and mesivtos to address the needs of
children and their parents. "But how can they afford that
when they cannot even pay their rabbeiim?"
Rabbi Perlow also spoke of the need to have a rov not just
for halachic questions, but rather a rov to ask the many
important life-questions everyone faces. In addition, he
proclaimed, we must all study seforim that provide us
guidance in such things.
A third point Rabbi Perlow chose to address concerned the
fact that despite the seeming emphasis in our country —
from the legend on our currency to the Pledge of Allegiance
— on G-d, it is astounding that since September 11,
2001 "no political leader has articulated, loudly and
clearly" that it is G-d who allowed the attacks of that day
to happen. No such leader countenanced the possibility that
the collapse of the Twin Towers pointed a finger at us, was a
message that all that may seem powerful and invincible can be
reduced in minutes to dust and ashes.
That, the Rosh Agudas Yisroel explained, is the mandate of
the difference between the world and the Jewish people, a
difference alluded to in the convention theme: "Yisroel Bein
Ho'amim, Living Among the Nations: A Part of the World, Apart
from the World." What the larger world should have learned
from September 11 — "the twin towers of emunoh
and bitochon" — we must.
*
Agudath Israel of America executive vice president Rabbi
Shmuel Bloom then delivered a message, in which he described
two pressing elements of what he characterized as the agenda
of Agudath Israel in days to come.
Acknowledging the observant community's problems, he noted
that they are all problems of growth, the inevitable outcome
of success. "The problems of the larger American Jewish
world," he averred, "are much more dire."
The Agudah leader explained that, according to demographic
studies, thirty years hence there will likely be only
approximately 2.5 million Jews in the United States —
and half, if not more, will be shomrei Torah
umitzvos.
That scenario, Rabbi Bloom declared, is "not one in which we
may take pleasure." Instead it demands of us that we
recognize our mandate as individuals to reach out to our
fellow Jews who are far from Jewish knowledge or observance,
those who "are poised to fall off the demographic cliff, to
disappear forever, chas vesholom, from the Jewish
people." Outreach to our brothers, he insisted, cannot be
left to "professionals" only, but is the mission of each and
every Jew.
The second challenge born of the shrinking and shifting of
the American Jewish population, Rabbi Bloom continued,
concerns who shall address the larger issues facing the
Jewish community, like countering antisemitism, defending
Israel's security, addressing economic difficulties in Eretz
Yisroel and in Jewish communities around the world. "Do you
know," the Agudath Israel leader asked, "that, in a poll
before the recent presidential election, Israel's security
needs ranked only sixth in importance as a factor among
Jews?"
Quoting Professor Marshall Breger, who wrote, "The Orthodox
community has come of age, and feels comfortable pressing its
viewpoints, both within the Jewish agenda and within broader
American public life," Rabbi Bloom stated that the Orthodox
community has an "unprecedented opportunity to have a true
impact on the American political scene."
"The time has come," Rabbi Bloom declared, "for Agudas
Yisroel to stand up and take its rightful place at the helm
of the Jewish community," and to "develop the personnel and
programs to face this new challenge in the spirit of
Torah."
*
Rabbi Matisyahu Salomon, Mashgiach of Beth Medrash Govoha in
Lakewood, then delivered a special address, in which he
cited, from the parshas hashovua, Yaakov's remaining
"levado" — "alone" — on the far side of
the river, when the Sar shel Eisov attacked him. The
Mashgiach explained that Yaakov's "aloneness" did not bespeak
loneliness or vulnerability, but rather his embodiment of the
Jewish imperative of remaining apart from the larger
society's attitudes and beliefs. That was our Forefather's
strength, his independence, his uniqueness — and that,
he explained, was why he was attacked and what "sent the
Sar of Eisov into a panic."
That apartness and independence is our own uniqueness too,
Rabbi Salomon continued, and it is our strength; it is,
moreover, what Agudas Yisroel was created to maintain and
promote.
While in much of the Jewish people, the Mashgiach continued,
the apartness from the world has dissipated, the miracle
perseveres in the community of "chareidim ledvar
Hashem." But there are, he said, "cracks in our
defenses" as well and we must endeavor to seal them.
Recalling how the Anshei Knesses Hagedoloh instituted a
nineteenth brochoh — birchas haminim —
in the Amidah because, in the Rambam's words, they
perceived a need "greater than any of the other needs of
people" at the time, he imagined what an Anshei Knesses
Hagedoloh might similarly deem a singular need in our day.
Were all Jews, he asked theoretically, imprisoned by an enemy
and injected with a drug that would force into their minds
objectionable images and ideas, would that not qualify for a
twentieth brochoh? The reality of the Internet and
media, he averred, is not much different.
We must beg Hashem, the Mashgiach concluded, to save us and
our children, to help us be proud of, and fully embrace, our
apartness, and in the merit of our levado, soon attain
the time when "venisgav Hashem levado."
*
The evening's special speaker was Rabbi Asher Wade, a
renowned ger tzeddek — and ex-pastor — who
lives in Yerushalayim but lectures around the world.
Rabbi Wade regaled the crowd with his life history, a
trajectory that passed through Scotland and Germany and
amassed him an education in fields like astrophysics,
philosophy and, of course, theology. "You couldn't," he
quipped, "get more `glatt Christian' than me."
Rabbi Wade described the "earth-shattering" event that began
his awakening to emes, his serendipitous opening of a
newspaper in Hamburg, where he and his wife lived at the
time, on November 5, 1978, the fortieth anniversary of
Kristallnacht. The paper featured photographs of the
destruction of Jewish institutions and property in the very
city where the Wades sat eating breakfast — and they
recognized landmarks in the photographs that made the images
all too real to them. Researching the events of four decades
earlier, they sought to understand why religious Christians
at the time had been largely silent in the face of the
beginning of European Jewry's destruction, and thereafter.
With the research came disillusionment an exploration of the
religion of those whose grievous persecution had led the
Wades to their research. Rabbi Wade provided his listeners
with interesting accounts and ideas of his remarkable journey
to Torah Yiddishkeit.
*
At the opening of the Thursday night session, greetings from
the Nesius of Agudath Israel of America were delivered by
Rabbi Zachariah Gelley, rav Khal Adath Jeshurun of Washington
Heights. Convention chairman Shmuel Yosef Reider extended his
greetings as well, and Rabbi Yonah Feinstein, Agudath
Israel's director of special projects, presented the
organization's Avodas HaKodesh awards to David Bunim of
Boston, Alan Kalish of Philadelphia and David Winston of
Dallas.
The Thursday night session was chaired by Rabbi Ben Zion
Twerski, rav Congregation Beth Yehudah of Milwaukee.
Information about tapes of Thursday's symposia and addresses
can be obtained from Agudath Israel of America, 42 Broadway,
New York, NY.
