See Our Summer History Series For Details Regarding the Russian/Volozion Intervention
February, 2019
So succinctly did Rav Yisroel Reisman, Rosh Yeshiva of Torah VaDass, describe the new threats from New York State Education Commissioner Maryellen Elia.
While yeshivos were aware that they were on the radar, both the extreme nature of the suggested changes and the purported celerity of their implantations is nothing short of stunning.
Rav Reisman called for unity –from chassideshe schools to litvish, chareidi to the most modern orthodox.
I recall once on a proaba, in a public Q and A in front of a large membership body where I was asked “Which of the many day schools will you be sending your child?”
Knowing that my answer would not –could not –make anyone happy, as this was a most diverse crowd, I replied “My children and their particular needs will never be made part of this process”.
The response issued a standing ovation!
Meaning, frum Jews of all backgrounds and hashkafos recognize that while we have many differing points of view, we can all agree on what is most important, and do not have any disagreement on ‘first principles’. If we can agree that no employer can direct its employee where to send their children, then we can most certainly agree that the byzantine maze of government bureaucracy should not encroach its role on this most sacred of parental responsibilities. We must stand together on this issue. Even if one thinks that it does not effect their schools today, it may tomorrow.
My wife had an interesting –although scarastic- idea: we should all en-masse pull our kids and enroll them in Public Schools! The influx of tens of thousands of children from each neighborhood will remind the government that they save money from our private schools!
Who would have thought as they were davening this past yomim noraim that such a nisayon was on the table? Ah mentch tracht…
In some instances-it is reported-yeshivos will have to provide up to seven hours of secular education daily –a ridiculous number, and almost two hours more than public schools.
The irony is thick. One Jewish news agency-under the freedom of information act –recived regent test schools for all private schools in the state, and the results may shock Mrs. Elia.
In Physics, for example, Shevach High Scholl –where my daughters attend-scored a 90.1 –the highest in the state!
Most Yeshiva schools were not far behind. The average for Public Schools in this subject? 71.8.
The same is true across the board, with Beis Yaakov of Brooklyn having the highest results of all private schools in the state –some 30plus points above the average for public schools!
This is not the first time we had such challenges and chose to demonstate public achdus in chinuch’s defense.
Max Lilienthal was born in 1815 in the cultured city of Munich to upper-middleclass parents. Raised frum, he would go to study under Rav Wolf Hamburger.
Max would soon study under another rav who was seen as more controversial, doing so while attending the University of Munich.
Max began to make a name for himself after publishing a series of articles on Hebrew Literature. This brought up his name for recommendation to become the head of a haskala oriented school in Riga.
It was at this juncture that Sergey Oborav, the Russian Minister of Education felt he found the perfect lackey for his devious plans.
Oborav desired to shut down the chedarim, replacing them with State schools. Soon this would extend to prohibitions in dress etc. ‘Max’ though Oborav, “would sell this plan to the Jews’
While many report that Oborav was a ‘notorious anti-semite’ (see, e.g. Rabbi Berel Wein, Triumph of Survival, p.157), others paint him in a more nuanced light. Indeed, it was Sergey who rejected Max’s idea to simply create a law, a fiat to close chedarim and instead he sought to convince the Jews that this really would be best for them and their future. While his ideas were lethal, it is hard to know if indeed this was his intention.
Sergey rightfully surmised that Max Lilienthal would make the perfect advocate, a foil to sell his plan to the Jews. Like many before him, Oborav understood all too well that Jews could be used to be their own worst enemy.
From May through August of 1843 a conference was held in St. Petersburg, led by Oborav and Lilienthal, to convince prominent Jewish leaders of the new plan. Among them were representatives of various Jewish groups.
Two of the most prominent of this small group was Rav Menachem Mendel Schneerson of Chabad, known today as the Tzemach Tzedek, and Rav Itzelle Volozioner, the rosh yeshiva of the Volozion yeshiva and son of Rav Chaim Volozion.
They were joined by an askan from Berdichitv, Mr. Halpren (his first name seems lost to history and is subject to change based on the many sources) and Betzalel Stern, a maskil running the Oddesa gymnasium.
Legend has it that the two gedolim were so frightened about attending this conference that they either wore or packed their tachrichim (burial shrouds)!
We cannot overstate the importance to the klal of seeing these two giants, from two differing Torah schools, come together for a common cause and a unified fight.
Part of the government plan was written as, “The Russian government’s objectives in the encouragement of enlightenment among the Jewish people [should be] special emphasis to the moral as opposed to the academic aspects of the education of the Jews… To pay special attention to the teaching of Russian history and language….In order to thwart the harmful influence of the Talmud, without at this stage destroying the book… the rabbis should be empowered to prepare a short religious text… in accordance with the accepted principles regarding civil responsibilities to the tsar and the motherland… the Jews must be ordered to change their dress for the clothing commonly worn throughout the country…” (The Jew in the Modern World, Oxford University Press, 1995, p. 385)
Rav Yosef Yitzchak Schneerson, the great-grandson of the Tzemach Tzedek and the previous Rebbe of Chabad, records some fascinating details about this meeting in his memoirs (see ‘HaTzemach Tzedek V’Tenuas HaHaskala’, p. 42 ff. A translation for some of these records have been published by Betzalol Noar)
On of the proposals at this conference was to create an “abridged” version of the Torah and other holy works for school children—“excerpts of the Bible, to include (only) portions suitable for expounding and teaching to youthful pupils, and omitting portions deemed superfluous or inappropriate for instruction for young students.”
The Tzemach Tzedek would have none of this.
“How dare we presume to omit portions of the Torah…and declare with mortals’ understanding that they are not ‘vital’ or are not ‘proper’ for the young? He who asserts that even one sentence or word was not from the mouth of G-d…is considered a non-believer in Torah from Heaven.
“This is not to be compared to the Talmudic edict (Megillah 21a) that certain passages of the Torah are not to be translated. The Talmud discusses there the translations made during a public synagogue reading of the Torah, when illiterates hear the words as a simple story… There would be gross misunderstanding under such circumstances. But in a school, the instructor would make necessary explanations according to the commentary of Rashi, etc.”
Another proposal was to eliminate the study of Gemara and focus only on Rambam. Replied the Tzemach Tzedek:
“It is impossible to understand Rambam without the Talmudic background. The Rosh states (Responsa, principle 31, article 9), ‘Whoever reads Rambam (alone) and imagines he understands it understands nothing.’”
At one point during the conference Oborav publicly threatened that if the Jews, who number so many in Russia, do not adopt his new plan, and refuse to be Russiafied and modernize then he may have no choice and urge the removal of all the Jews from the country.
Rav Itzele laughed at this suggestion, to the shock of the attendees. Asked to explain his ridicule, the rosh yeshiva clarified that the last person to complain the we Jews ‘are covering up the earth’ was Balak. Like his plan, yours too will fail.
The outcome of the conference was mostly positive. Although some of the resolutions remained, the main battle was largely won—the yeshivos would be allowed to continue operating.
As for the new educational plan that included the establishment of modern gymansiums: it would achieve little success, and Max Lilienthal left Russia “under mysterious circumstances,” as one historian put it, heading for America in 1845. Eventually settling in in Cincinnati, Ohio, he would become one of the founders of the American Reform movement.
Sadly, not all of his plans went unfulfilled in Europe. Dr. Leon Mandelstamm (d. 1889), one of his protégés, went on to publish an abridged version of Rambam’s Yad Hachazakah. And in what can only be described as sheer chutzpah, on the title page he named “Rav Menachem of Lubavitch”, the Tzemach Tzedek, as one of the sponsors!
In a strange and ironic twist in history, he oddly chose to leave in, and to also translate into German, the Rambam’s arguments against Christianity. This abridged version of the Rambam—whose purpose was to take out all of the ‘offensive’ passages—wound up ignoring the most ‘aggressive’ sections in the eyes of the Christian public, eventually destroying Mandelstamm. The Haskalah Movement in Russia, a book written in 1913, describes this man’s ignoble end and the monies lost in his defense after his version of the Rambam was published.
Let us hope that our current battle has a shorter life and even happier ending and can allow us to continue this generation of children’s learning Torah in numbers at a level not seen in many generations. bers at a level not seen in many generations.
