A PUBLICATION OF THE RABBINIC ALUMNI OF THE RABBI ISAAC ELCHANAN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY • AN AFFILIATE OF YESHIVA UNIVERSITY CHAVRUSA Volume 49 • Number 1 אין התורה נקנית אלא בחבורה (ברכות סג:) September 2014 • Elul 5774 Remembering Preparing for Shemittah: Rabbi Gershon An Interview with Rabbi Yankelewitz zt”l Shalom Rosner Page 4 Page 15 In This Issue Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary Page 3 In Pictures Richard M. Joel Mediation Training for Rabbis, Shavuos with Yeshiva, PRESIDENT, RIETS June Zman Siyum, RIETS Kennes Petichah Rabbi Dr. Norman Lamm ROSH HAYESHIVA EMERITUS, RIETS Joel M. Schrieber CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES, RIETS Page 4 News Remembering Rabbi Yankelewitz zt”l, Rabbi Moshe D. Tendler ‘48R Receives Honorary Degree from Bar Rabbi Menachem Penner Ilan, Bringing Torah to the Masses, Mussar Initiative at MAX AND MARION GRILL DEAN, RIETS AND UNDERGRADUATE TORAH STUDIES Yeshiva, Rabbi Lau at YU, Conflict Resolution Workshop for Rabbis, and Rabbi Mostofsky ‘03R Joins CRC Rabbi Kenneth Brander VICE PRESIDENT FOR UNIVERSITY AND COMMUNITY LIFE Page 10 Divrei Chizuk Rabbi Zevulun Charlop DEAN EMERITUS, RIETS Recognizing our Kochos SPECIAL ADVISOR TO THE PRESIDENT ON YESHIVA AFFAIRS Rabbi Moshe Weinberger ‘83R Rabbi Robert S. Hirt Divrei Chizuk VICE PRESIDENT EMERITUS, RIETS Page 13 Transforming our Communities Rabbi Yaakov Glasser Rabbi Yaakov Glasser ‘01R DAVID MITZNER DEAN, CENTER FOR THE JEWISH FUTURE AND UNIVERSITY LIFE Rabbi Chaim Bronstein ADMINISTRATOR, RIETS Page 15 Special Feature Rabbi Adam Berner • Rabbi Binyamin Blau Preparing for Shemittah An Interview with Rabbi Shalom Rosner ‘97R Rabbi Kenneth Hain • Rabbi Elazar Muskin Rabbi Moshe Neiss • Rabbi Dr. Shlomo Rybak Rabbi Shmuel Silber • Rabbi Perry Tirschwell Rabbi Elchanan Weinbach • Rabbi Howard Zack Rabbi Eliezer Zwickler YESHIVA UNIVERSITY RABBINIC ADVISORY COMMITTEE Page 19 Divrei Hesped In Appreciation of HaGaon Rav Gershon Yankelewitz zt”l Rabbi Elchanan Adler ‘90R CHAVRUSA A PUBLICATION OF RIETS RABBINIC ALUMNI Rabbi Aryeh Czarka Page 23 Recently Published Books EDITOR, CHAVRUSA Page 24 Life-Cycle Events Noson Waintman EDITOR, CHAVRUSA Editorial Policies Ms. Keren Simon ASSISTANT EDITOR, CHAVRUSA • CHAVRUSA will consider articles and letters for publication. • Books authored by musmakhim that are reviewed by musmakhim will be considered for Rabbi Robert Shur publication as well. GRAPHICS AND LAYOUT, CHAVRUSA • Obituaries about and authored by musmakhim will be considered for publication. CHAVRUSA is published by the Rabbinic Alumni of the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan • CHAVRUSA aims to maintain the Hebrew pronunciation style of the author of the article. Theological Seminary, through the office of Yeshiva University’s Center for the Transliterations follow the author’s preference i.e. academic, Ashkenazic, modern Hebrew Jewish Future. Yeshiva University’s Center for the Jewish Future serves as the or the like. While we will remain consistent within articles, each author will be afforded to community service arm of the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary (RIETS). It continues the work of the Max Stern Division of Communal transliterate within his comfort level. 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CHAVRUSA • ELUL 5774 In Pictures Mediation Training for Rabbis May 19-21, 2014 Shavuot with Yeshiva • RIETS Annual Yarchei Kallah June 3-5, 2014 June Zman Siyum on Masechet Shabbat June 11, 2014 RIETS Kennes Petichah August 25, 2014 3 CHAVRUSA • ELUL 5774 News Remembering Rosh Yeshiva Rabbi Gershon Yankelewitz zt”l The Yeshiva is saddened by the loss of Rabbi Gershon Yankelewitz zt”l, who passed away on August 19. Rabbi Yankelewitz taught a daily Gemara shiur at the advanced age of 104. “Rabbi Yankelewitz by his nature and learning so represented both our history and our destiny,” said RIETS President Richard M. Joel. “For over half a century he taught his students how to learn and how to live. We will always remember him.” Born in Lubcza, Poland in 1909, Rabbi Yankelewitz studied in the Radin Yeshiva until the death of its founder, the Chofetz Chaim. Rabbi Yankelewitz then continued his studies at the legendary Mir Yeshiva in Russia, before being forced to flee from the Nazis at the start of World War II. The entire yeshiva relocated to Kobe, Japan before eventually settling in Shanghai, China, where they remained until 1947. Rabbi Yankelewitz joined Yeshiva University in 1958 and gave a daily shiur at RIETS for semicha and college students for more than five decades. “Rabbi Yankelewitz was an extraordinary person,” said Rabbi Zevulun Charlop ‘54R, Dean Emeritus of RIETS. ”He was a man of God and a man of principle, who brought with him the Torah learning from the great European yeshivas. His students were devoted to him and he was dedicated to them.” “As someone who was fortunate enough to be a talmid in his shiur, I saw what type of tzadik he was up close,” said Rabbi Chaim Bronstein ‘72R, RIETS administrator. ”It was a great privilege to have known him all these years.” “It is so far beyond impossible to capture who the niftar was, not just because of the longevity of the niftar or the many worlds that he lived in, but simply because of who he was,” said Rabbi Menachem Penner ‘95R, Max and Marion Grill Dean of RIETS, addressing a crowd of hundreds at the August 20 levaya held in Yeshiva University’s Glueck Beit Midrash. “It’s easy to focus today on the arichas yamim of the niftar, to say that what was so special about him was that he had such unbelievable arichas yamim and was still teaching at Yeshiva. But the hespedim give us a sense of not just how many years he was blessed to teach, but mostly just how he taught and learned.” Rabbi Yankelewitz’s wife, Bluma, passed away in 2010. He is survived by his sons, all of whom serve the Jewish community: Dovid, Yaakov, Yoel and Moshe; and his daughters, Devorah Fromowitz, Gity Lipsius and Perl Gross, and their spouses and many grandchildren and great-grandchildren. n Rabbi Tendler Receives Honorary Degree from Bar-Ilan Rosh Yeshiva Rabbi Moshe David Tendler ‘48R, the Rabbi Isaac and Bella Tendler Professor of Jewish Medical Ethics and professor of biology at Yeshiva College, received an honorary doctorate from Bar-Ilan University at its 59th annual meeting of the Board of Trustees. Rabbi Tendler also headlined the 41st Nitzotzot Conference of Bar-Ilan’s Ludwig and Erica Jesselson Institute for Advanced Torah Studies on Sunday, May 18, with a discourse on “Value Judgments in Bioethics: Halachic and General,” a summary of his life’s work. The Nitzotzot Conference explores the ways in which Jewish law affect bioethics, and the halachic questions that emerge from practicing medicine in Israel. A world-renowned posek and scholar, Rabbi Tendler was ordained at RIETS in 1948, and earned a PhD in biology from Columbia University in 1957. Rabbi Tendler has written and lectured widely on medical ethics and is known as an expert on the relationship between Jewish medical ethics and halacha. n 4 CHAVRUSA • ELUL 5774 News Bringing Torah to The Masses From Tape Cassettes to Mobile Apps: How YUTorah Grew into the Leading Site for Online Torah Study It started with one semicha student. While studying at RIETS, Rabbi Marc Spivak ‘98R was training for a career as a pulpit rabbi outside the tristate area—but he didn’t want to miss out on the advanced learning and shiurim he loved at Yeshiva. He began taping shiur after shiur, building a collection of Torah lectures he’d be able to listen to anywhere, anytime. When his apartment could no longer hold the sheer volume of tapes he’d created, he tried digital storage, learning how to encode the shiurim and burn them to CDs. Eventually, with help from fellow student Chaim Jaskoll and others still exploring the Internet’s fledgling potential, Rabbi Spivak turned to the emerging world of online media, uploading all the shiurim he had The Marcos and Adina Katz YUTorah.org Today recorded to a single website where they Robert Shur ‘05R, director of YUTorah. can’t be filmed according to Jewish law. Or would remain accessible, for free, to any “We started out limited to just shiurim the Reconstructionist rabbi who reached Jew, anywhere in the world, who wanted to that were happening at YU and RIETS, out to Lebowitz after Hurricane Sandy to broaden their Torah horizons. just to give people access to the rabbeim ask how his congregation was doing. Or That turned out to be just the they had learned from as students. Then Rabbi Greg Wall, of Westport, CT. beginning. The site was an instant we made a decision to expand it to become “As a returnee to active Judaism as an hit. Rabbi Spivak joined what would more of a forum for the Torah happening adult, it became painfully obvious that my eventually become known as YU’s Center throughout Yeshiva University and the YU lack of a traditional yeshiva education was for the Jewish Future to embark on an even community, a one-stop shop for high- keeping me from getting the most out of more ambitious project: recording and quality Torah content from a whole range my Jewish observance,” said Rabbi Wall.