Showing Hakaras HaTov
&
Reflections of Rav Nechemia Rockove zt’l
October, 2020
I once heard a story about a student of Rav Soloveitchick of
Boston.
This man, in his 40’s at that time, and a rav in his own right –was
sitting in his office learning one night when he stumbled upon a
Tosphos. He simply could not understand an element of the logic
from this 12 th century French yeshiva.
So, he read Tosphos again, and then again, and still, ‘no dice’.
He finally thought to himself: What would Rebbe say if he was
learning this Tosphos?
That was all he needed. In a flash –like a sudden burst of lightning
–the correct understanding came to him. Tosphos now may perfect
sense!
This man was so inspired by this that he picked up the phone and
dialed Rav Soloveitchick.
“Rebbe” he began, “I know your time is precious, but I felt it was
important to tell you that anything I am in Torah, any wisdom that
I have learnt, and any abilities I have found in my self, they are all
because of you. Thank You!”
As soon as he finished saying his part he realized that he may have
made a huge error in judgment. The Soloveitchicks are not
emotional people, and now he feared he indeed just wasted his
rebbe’s time.
The phone went silent for a moment as the student braced himself
for a sharp retort. Finally, after what seemed like hours, Rav
Soloveitchick responded with the following words:
“There is no person on earth, no mater what they have
accomplished in this life, and no matter their age, that does not
need to hear those two words every once in a while. Those words
are ‘Thank You’.
My 9 th grade rebbe, Rav Nechemia Rockove died this week.
I never called to thank him.
This is not to say I didn’t have the opportunity. Aside for his
always calling at important times in my life –when I became a
chosson, when my mother was niftarah, etc. –I would see him
from time-to-time.
When I was a rav in Buffalo, rebbe would stop in for shachris on
his way to New York a few times a year.
I will never forget when he davened for the amud in Buffalo.
I was a grown man, a rav in his own shul. Yet, due to girsa
d’yankusa, I still trembled at the sound of rebbe’s voice.
My discomfort reached a fever-pitch when I realized that he was
waiting for me to finish the shema. I never felt more out-of-place
by the mizrach vant!
This is a good time to share with the reader that waiting for a rav
for shema or chazaras hashatz is not about kavod. In fact the Rema
rules (124:3) that a chazan should not wait for anyone due to
chashivus. The Mishneh Berrura (ad loc. #13) explains that the
minhag today of waiting for the rav is due, simply, to pacing
concerns. The rav sets the speed of davening so that those who are
merely trying to say every word not miss kedusha, etc.
By all these occasions, while I was reminded how much he meant
to me, yet I never said those words to him.
No man is above hakaras hatov (for an amazing idea and story
relating to this, I encourage the reader to see ‘Insights’ to ArtScroll
Midrash Rabbah on Bereishis, 32: 4)
Let me tell you all about rebbe.
Rebbe was tough. He was tall and imposing.
Most of the boys coming into Ner Yisroel Toronto that year were
typical good and wholesome American boys (well, Canadian!).
We were solid boys who took our yiddeshkeit seriously.
But 13 year-olds need to know how to learn, and he was the one to
introduce us into that secret society of the yam hatalmud.
He was unrelenting in his demands of us.
He informed us on Day-One that he would not respond to us unless
we spoke to him in the third-person.
Of course, he was not looking for kavod from a bunch of little
schnooks, rather he was teaching a new generation what kavod
haTorah is all about.
I should point out that his personality as our rebbe was not who he
was outside the classroom, and who I saw when I spent time with
him years later.
His entire persona was an act so as to properly mold righteous bnei
Torah.
I could still hear him scream, “Reish peh hei!”
Reish peh hei (285) is the siman in the Shulchan Aruch that
demands that every Jew learn the parsha each week with
Targum/Rashi.
We even had to sign a paper each week that we learnt that week’s
segment on chumash.
One day he came into shiur, sat down and made an odd request.
“Imagine that on my desk sits an orange”
Of course we all giggled to ourselves. “An orange? Imagine?!”
But he continued (and if I recall he was quoting from his own
rebbe, Rav Elya Svei):
“Now imagine that this orange is purple. OK, now imagine that
this orange is the size of a grapefruit. And, now, imagine that it is
the size of a huge ball –several feet wide –and still sitting on my
desk.
“Do you have that image of a huge purple ball resting on my desk
in your minds right now? Well, that image will be with you for the
rest of your life!”
We didn’t know at first what he was talking about, or how this
little experiment related to yiddehskeit. But then he concluded.
“You may ‘forget’ about it. It may not come back to you ever
again. However, the human brain forgets nothing it sees and
nothing it thinks about. This purple ball –and any thought you will
ever have- can never be
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