Today is the seventh day of mourning for Maran zt”l which marks the conclusion of the Shiva period. Let us therefore eulogize him as best we can.
Our crown has fallen, woe unto us for we have sinned! Our hearts are broken and our eyes have been dimmed.
In the year 5762, with the passing of “the true genius, crown glory of Israel, the great light of the Kingdom of the Talmud and Poskim, the light of Israel, the right pillar, the mighty hammer, an individual unique to the generation, Hagaon Harav Chaim Kreiswirth zt”l” (an excerpt from Maran’s very own eulogy for the Rav), Chief Rabbi of Antwerp, Belgium, Maran Harav Ovadia Yosef zt”l was thrown into great mourning. Maran zt”l was a dear friend of this great sage and Maran would constantly say that the world did not really know who Hagaon Harav Chaim zt”l really was. According to Maran’s words, this was a Torah personality that could not be matched.
When Maran zt”l rose to eulogize this giant of Torah, he began by asking, what is this tumult all about? Our Sages tell us (Kiddushin 72b) that “a righteous individual does not depart from this world until another man as righteous as him is created, as the verse states, ‘The sun rises and the sun sets’-before the sun of Moshe set, the sun of Yehoshua rose. Before the sun of Yehoshua set, the sun of Otniel ben Kenaz rose. Before the sun of Eli set, the sun of Shmuel Ha’Navi rose.” This should be our comfort, for another person as righteous as the deceased has surely been born. If so, why do we mourn the loss of the great rabbi so much?
Maran zt”l explained in the name of the commentators that even so, not necessarily will the righteous man just created be as great in Torah as the deceased righteous man, as the Gemara (Baba Batra 75a) states regarding Yehoshua, “the elders of that generation would say, ‘The face of Moshe shined like the sun and the face of Yehoshua shined like the moon.’” This is because the generations become progressively weaker as time goes on and the leader is relative to the generation.
Likewise, we mourn today along with Zion and the nation of Israel, for Hashem has sent us a great redeemer, Maran zt”l, who saved Sephardic Jewry from destruction and raised the glory of Halacha when it was almost completely forgotten from the Jewish nation. This man was the pillar of Torah, kindness, and prayer. He was the leader of the generation in so many ways: In his humility, in his holiness, in his discourses, in his halachic rulings, and in his understanding. Now, we have lost Maran zt”l and as downtrodden as we are, we have no choice but to gather together the remaining Torah sages of our generation and only together will they be able to continue the tradition which Maran pioneered on his own.
Many times when speaking with Maran zt”l, we were able to catch a glimpse of his greatness in Kabbalah, which was truly far more advanced than any of the greatest Mekubalim in our generation who have not reached Maran’s level, just as no Torah scholars have reached his level of Torah knowledge in the revealed portion of the Torah.
Besides for Maran’s greatness in Torah, he would perform loving-kindness with all his heart. Maran’s right-hand man, our dear friend Rabbi Tzvi Hakak, recounts that many times, serious questions in Halacha were sent to Maran regarding Agunot (women whose husbands have gone missing and are “tied down” to their husbands and are forbidden to remarry) and children born from forbidden unions (who are prohibited from marrying regular members of the Jewish nation) and Maran told him to place these questions on the desk in his bedroom. At 2:00 AM, Maran zt”l would go to sleep. When Rabbi Hakak would arrive at Maran’s home at 6:00 AM, Maran would already be sitting and learning and would tell him to send the response to the relevant parties immediately, even before morning prayers. Everyone would be flabbergasted, when did Maran find the time to write this lengthy and tedious response?! He only went to sleep four hours before…
We cannot possibly adequately eulogize Maran zt”l, for every single one of his character traits can fill volumes. His tremendous greatness was unfathomable, so much so that two of the greatest Mekubalim of the previous generation, Hagaon Harav Yisrael Abuchatzera zt”l (the “Baba Sali”) and Hagaon Harav Mordechai Sharabi zt”l, attested that Maran’s soul was kept from the times of the Geonim (period preceding that of the Rishonim) and Hashem told Maran’s soul, “Wait until your time comes. During a generation when heresy will spread all over the world, it will be your time to save Israel.”
Indeed, it is almost non-existent for a child of six or seven years old to decide to dedicate his life to Torah study. However, when Maran zt”l was all but a young lad, he would sit and learn Torah, Prophets, and Scriptures for hours on end. By the age of ten, Maran had already written unbelieveable novel Torah thoughts (see the biography on Maran, “Abir Ha’Ro’im,” for some incredible pictures of Maran’s handwritten Torah essays when he was a child). At the age of fourteen, he had already mastered the entire Talmud. At the age of twenty-five, he was already greater in Torah knowledge than any Torah scholars living among us today. Maran was a supernatural genius in Torah. Who can replace him?
When contemplateing all of Maran’s accomplishments, we are reminded of Rabbi Chiya about whom the Gemara (Ketubot 103b): “Rabbi Chiya said: I prevented Torah from being forgotten from the Jewish nation, for I planted flax seeds and from the flax that grew, I wove nets and trapped deer. I fed the meat to hungry orphans and I processed the hides to produce parchment and on that parchment I wrote the five books of the Torah and the six orders of the Mishnah. About me did Rabbi Yehuda Ha’Nassi exclaim, ‘How great are the actions of Chiya!’”
Similarly, we exclaim, “How great are the actions of Rabbeinu Ovadia!” With all of his greatness and genius in Torah, he would be able to stand before laymen and speak to them in a language they understood and enjoyed through parables and anecdotes. He would speak about the deepest segments of the Talmud with the Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem, Hagaon Harav Tzvi Pesach Frank zt”l and then hurry off to deliver a Torah lecture to simpletons. He was unable to open a Sephardic Yeshiva because there were no Sephardic Yeshiva boys to learn in it. However, he did not give up; he was relentless. He began by teaching regular working men Torah daily until their children grew up; he troubled himself to place their boys into Talmudei Torah and Yeshivot and girls into Bet Yaakovs. He likewise taught the children Torah himself until many of them flourished into outstanding Torah scholars. In this way, an entire generation that was doomed to straying from Hashem’s path became completely G-d-fearing and Torah observant. Maran indeed “built up Jerusalem with mercy,” for all Sephardic Torah scholars and many Ashkenazi sages who are involved in rendering halachic rulings are all in Maran’s merit. Praiseworthy is the generation which had the merit of being led by Maran.
The entire Jewish nation felt a great void upon Maran zt”l’s passing and the reason for this could very well be because Maran’s soul was tantamount to that of Moshe Rabbeinu whose soul was comprised of all of the souls of the Jewish nation. Thus, anyone with a soul within him felt a great lacking with the passing of Maran zt”l.
May Hashem have mercy on us, the remaining ember of the Jewish nation, and not let us be like a flock of sheep without a Shepard. May Maran act as a righteous defending angel on our behalf, let him not leave us or forsake us. May his blessings to the entire nation of Israel, whom he loved deeply like a father loves his child and whom he comforted like a mother comforts her child, come to fruition, for indeed, Maran was dedicated to the collective needs of the entire nation with every fiber of his being. May Hashem finally redeem us eternally and may we soon merit witnessing the Resurrection of the Dead at which point Maran zt”l will lead us and teach us once again, Amen.
