They wear knitted yarmulkes, jeans and T-shirts, but are well-versed in maamarei Chassidus, farbreng on auspicious days in the Chabad calendar, daven from a T’hillas Hashem Siddur, observe some Chabad customs, and what interests them is avodas Hashem in t’filla, closeness to the Creator and refining their middos. * The phenomenon: meet the students from Zionist-Chassidic yeshivos, a new strain of religious-Zionist youth, who have spiritual ambitions and find in Chassidus the answers that they seek. * We met with Chassidim from this demographic and at a spontaneous farbrengen we asked them about the impact of Chassidus, about hiskashrus to the Rebbe and going to him, about crossing lines and why Chabad specifically.
By Zalman Tzorfati
It was nearly midnight on a Thursday night at Yeshivas Ramat Gan. The large, beautiful beis midrash was almost completely empty. Upstairs there was a shiur being given by the rosh yeshiva, R’ Yehoshua Shapiro. It was an “off Shabbos” as they would explain to me later. An older talmid stood on the side of the beis midrash opposite a lectern with an open Gemara. He learned out loud to himself. In another corner sat a young man, wearing a large knitted yarmulke, who was debating a point in halacha with a bachur standing near him.
Upstairs, as mentioned, a shiur was being given by R’ Shapiro, one of the leading religious-Zionist rabbis and one of the driving forces in the trend towards Chassidus, a Zionist yeshiva with the spirit of Chassidus.
Although R’ Shapiro officially belongs to the knitted yarmulke sector, he teaches Chassidus on a regular basis and has even published s’farim on the subject. The hesder yeshiva in Ramat Gat that he runs is known as a yeshiva with a Chassidishe atmosphere. It attracts many religious-Zionist young men who are interested in Chassidus.
It was a refreshing sight to see young yeshiva bachurim who sincerely seek closeness to the Creator. Many of the discussions and debates among themselves revolve around the differences between the various approaches in serving Hashem.
A BEIS MIDRASH WITH A CHIDDUSH
These talmidim have a unique look. Their refined faces have untouched beards, they sport peios of various lengths and types, and they wear large knitted kippas.
“Generally speaking, Zionist yeshivos lean toward the Litvish approach, both in the style of learning and the content,” Yonatan, one of the students, told us. “That there are Zionist yeshivos with a Chassidic spirit is a refreshing novelty in the world of religious-Zionist yeshivos.”
Yonatan himself came from a typical Zionist yeshiva in Haifa. After the army, he felt the need for more. “I grew up religious and kept Torah and mitzvos. I learned in a government-religious school and then in a yeshiva high school, but in the army I started questioning things. Not, G-d forbid, that I had doubts about faith,” he was quick to say. “I was looking for deeper meaning in things that I’d been doing all my life without quite knowing why. I spoke with friends from yeshiva, with rabbanim, and was exposed to Chassidus. I knew that after I was released from the army that I would join one of the Chassidic yeshivos. I call it, ‘filling gaps in my neshama.’”
Yonatan is not alone. The attraction to the teachings of Chassidus crosses sectors, worldviews and parties. Even among groups that previously strongly opposed the Baal Shem Tov and those that perpetuated his approach, you can find yeshiva bachurim and young married men who are drawn to the wellsprings of Chassidus. All the more so in those groups that are part of the general Chassidic world. However, what stands out about the yeshivos that have formally taken on a Chassidic approach is that it is institutionalized and structured. It’s not about learning Tanya secretly or an unofficial Chassidus shiur that the hanhala kindly ignores. Nor is it the personal interest of select individuals or even individuals that have coalesced into a group, but literally an entire yeshiva that clearly identifies with a different ideological demographic and yet, is run entirely with a Chassidishe atmosphere.
“Not all of the Chassidishe yeshivos are connected to Chabad.” Yonatan saw how excited I got when I heard the list of Chassidishe yeshivos he enumerated. He explained, “There are many connected with Breslov, and some are connected with Chassidus in general, or the spirit of Poilish Chassidus.”
The uniqueness of Yeshivas Ramat Gan among Zionist-Chassidic yeshivos is the conceptual and curricular alignment with Chabad in particular. Other yeshivos like this are Rabbi Yitzchok Ginsburgh’s Yeshivas Od Yosef Chai and Rabbi Adin Even-Yisroel’s Yeshivas Mekor Chaim.
HALACHA MAKES CHASSIDUS OBLIGATORY
“I am a man of Halacha,” says Rabbi Shapiro when he explains his derech in a special shiur that he gave in yeshiva on the subject of “Limud Ha’chassidus.”
“According to Halacha, you need to love G-d, to fear Him, and that is impossible to do today without learning Chassidus. There are foundations of Judaism and faith that cannot be acquired without the study of those topics in Torah,” explains Rabbi Shapiro.
The impact of Chassidus, especially that of Chabad, is apparent on the talmidim, some of whom gradually adopt Chabad customs. On the bookshelves of siddurim you can find quite a few T’hillas Hashem siddurim. R’ Shapiro himself uses nusach Ari.
How do you feel Chassidus impacts on you?
“That’s a hard question …,” Yonatan says. “One of the things that bothered me in other yeshivos was that everything was connected with learning, as though learning is the whole picture. I eat to be able to learn, I daven so I can learn, it’s all connected to Torah study. What about G-d? What about fixing character traits? What about feelings for another Jew? What about love of G-d? What about simcha? This worldview of learning and learning, as much as possible, bothered me. As though learning is the goal. Then there are issues of competitiveness, positions and feelings of superiority.
“Chassidus helped me a lot with this. It is like it calms the soul. It guided me to a calmer place, a place where heart and mind cooperate in avodas Hashem. It’s not that I stopped learning chas v’shalom, but my learning is altogether different. It’s more calm, I’m more at peace with myself. It’s hard for me to talk like this, maybe I sound like some big Chassid, but I feel, to a certain extent, that I stopped learning for myself and started learning in order to connect to Hashem.”
I asked the same question of Avishai, who joined our conversation. His woolen kippa covers nearly his entire head and two long, curly peios hang along the sides of his head.
“To a certain extent I grew up as a Chassid,” he says. He learned in Yeshivas Od Yosef Chai in Yitzhar and that he is one of the close students of R’ Yitzchok Ginsburgh. He ended up in the yeshiva in Ramat Gan after being arrested several times and was expelled from the hills of the Shomron.
“For me, Chassidus is not new. I grew up with it and it’s a part of me. Chassidus is the neshama of the Torah. It is also the neshama of my Torah. I cannot see myself keeping Torah and mitzvos without a connection to Chassidus.”
Assaf is a bachur with a childlike face and a refined bashful smile. Until that point, he stood on the side and listened without getting involved. When he heard the question, he said he wanted to say something. He sounded quite passionate when he said, “I don’t understand how it’s possible otherwise. You don’t need to ask us how Chassidus impacts on us. You need to ask all the bachurim in other yeshivos who don’t learn Chassidus how they fulfill mitzvos, how they achieve love and fear! Love and fear of Hashem is not a Chassidic practice. It’s a halacha in Shulchan Aruch!
“That is the debate between the Chacham (wise man) and the Chassid in the introduction to Mesillas Yesharim. The Chassid says to the Chacham: ‘It says, “And now Israel, what does Hashem your G-d ask of you, but to fear Hashem your G-d, to go in all His ways, and to love Him and serve Hashem your G-d with all your heart and all your soul.” Only then does the verse say, “to observe His commandments.”’ Says the Chassid to the Chacham, ‘True, the most important thing in the realm of action is to observe commandments, but that only comes fifth in the list. There are four things that precede it that need to be done – to fear, to love, to go in His ways, and to serve Him with all your heart and soul.’”
“Learning Torah is wonderful, but you need to love Hashem and serve Him and for that, you need Chassidus. Without Chassidus, even Torah study can be not for the sake of heaven.”
HISKASHRUS TO THE REBBE
One of the principles of Chassidus is bonding with a tzaddik. Concepts like Nasi Ha’dor, Moshe Rabbeinu in every generation, Roshei Alfei Yisroel and Rosh B’nei Yisroel are foundations in the outlook of Chassidus in general and Chabad in particular. In Chabad, the Chassid-Rebbe relationship is somewhat different in that it is demanded of the Chassid that he do his own inner work, as opposed to general Chassidus, which demands of the Chassid to have simple faith in tzaddikim and to rely on the blessings of the tzaddik to achieve personal salvation, spiritually and materially.
With all the learning, farbrengens, classes, Chassidic atmosphere – what place does hiskashrus to the Rebbe hold?
“If you want to get into all of the sides and opinions within Chabad, I actually am on the side of the Meshichisten,” says Avishai. “They have a living Rebbe. And hiskashrus to a living Rebbe is a basic element of Chassidus. My rav, Rabbi Ginsburgh, also believes that the Rebbe is chai v’kayam. I personally feel that the Rebbe is alive.”
Yonatan, on the other hand, is less forceful. “There is talk about the need for hiskashrus to a tzaddik, but that is presented in a very general way. It is not presented in terms of hiskashrus to a specific tzaddik. Rav Yehoshua himself speaks a lot about the Rebbe. Not always openly, but when he describes the ideal image of a true tzaddik it is fairly obvious who he is referring to. Actually, this week I heard a vort from him on this topic. He spoke in the shiur about the subject of tzaddikim. The idea was that on the one hand there needs to be absolute devotion and hiskashrus, but on the other hand not to abdicate the role of intellect and always check that everything is consistent with Torah and Halacha.
“The official topic was about the personalities of the Avos, but throughout he kept drawing parallels to our times. One of the students pointed out that the Avos are distant characters that have no relation to our times. The rav answered him, ‘I was by tzaddikim that made the Avos very real and close for me. Go to such tzaddikim and you can bond and commit yourself to them without any concern.’”
How much of the Chassidic studies are devoted to learning the teachings of the Rebbe?
“We recently learned a maamer of the Rebbe with Rav Shapiro. Over two nights, half the night each time. Each shiur was three or four hours.”
Just as we had begun to discuss the question I posed, in walked a slim bachur holding a volume of Likkutei Sichos. “It’s a shame we weren’t talking about Moshiach,” I said.
“I am looking for a sicha about Yud-Tes Kislev,” he responded with an apologetic smile. On his table was lying a typical double set of Chabad t’fillin, Rashi and Rabbeinu Tam, in blue pouches embroidered with the picture of 770 and the name Uriel Katz on top. “I am actually from a Chabad home,” he said. “From Belgium, connected with R’ Shabtai. He cried over the fact that I did not go to learn in Tomchei T’mimim, but at least I am here.”
“Well, from what it sounds like, it is almost like Tomchei T’mimim,” I point out. “That depends,” he replies. “It’s possible that you will talk to me and get a certain impression of the yeshiva, and if you talk to someone else you will get a completely different impression. Aside from the fact that there is a general Chassidic atmosphere, there are many variations here. There are also many discussions and even debates among the students over the different paths and approaches in avodas Hashem. There are those that lean towards Chabad, but there are also those that lean towards Breslov and others that lean towards general Chassidus. As a matter of principle, the yeshiva allows for and encourages all approaches. This can be difficult at times as it requires inclusiveness of diverse variants, but that is the style of the yeshiva.”
Uriel continues, “Davening is at 7 AM, so it is difficult but I try to study Chassidus every day before davening. We have an in-depth Gemara study session and a session devoted to covering ground each day that everyone is required to participate in, and in the evenings each person has his own personal curriculum. Some learn Halacha or Gemara, but most study Chassidus according to an individualized syllabus arranged by Rav Shapiro or one of the other staff members. There are also farbrengens in the yeshiva. We farbreng on auspicious days, we note the Chassidic holidays, not all of them, but the more outstanding ones.”
A significant portion of the Rebbe’s teachings deal with the topic of outreach and mivtzaim. In recent years, the knitted yarmulke crowd has also gotten into the act of spreading Judaism.
“Obviously, we also do mivtzaim,” says Avishai. “First of all, the school motto is ‘to light up the city.’ The mission of the yeshiva is to be a lighthouse of Judaism for all of Ramat Gan. The yeshiva operates t’fillin stands throughout the city. Additionally, we have a ‘preschool rabbi’ program, in which bachurim or married guys run Jewish activities in the city preschools. And here on the premises, we work with those that have a background in Torah study.”
Are there students that actually “cross over” in a formal way and become full-fledged Chabad Chassidim? And if so, how does the yeshiva react to that?
“Some have crossed party lines. Less to Chabad, more to Breslov. The yeshiva supports their decisions fully. On this issue, the yeshiva is very open and allows each bachur to choose his own path in Avodas Hashem. There is someone here who just came back from a visit to the Rebbe, and there is another bachur who is planning a trip in the coming weeks.”
MORE DRAWN TO FIGURES FROM THE PAST
“You need to understand,” Uriel says in trying to sum up the discussion and explain why in his mind we should not be expecting Chabad communities to be absorbing large numbers of students from Yeshivas Ramat-Gan, “most of the bachurim in the yeshiva learn Chassidus, farbreng, mark Chassidic dates, are versed in maamarim, daven with ‘avoda,’ and even follow some Chabad customs. But from our perspective, the personalities that we see as models that we aspire to are Chassidim from the past, like Reb Hillel Paritcher and Reb Mendel Futerfas. We relate less to the social-communal aspect, and more to the idea, to the approach, to the outlook, to the Torah of Chassidus.”