Rav Elozor Menachem Mann Shach

Early years

Rav Elozor Menachem Mann Shach zt"l was born on January 1, 1899, in Vaboilnick (Vabalninkas), a rural village in northern Lithuania. His parents were Rav Ezriel and Batsheva Shach. The Shach family had been merchants for generations, while Batsheva’s family, the Levitans, were Torah scholars who served a number of Lithuanian communities. Her brother, Rav Osher Nisan Levitan, later became an important figure in the Union of Orthodox Rabbis in the United States. From his earliest years the boy was recognized as an illui (prodigy).

At the age of seven he left home for Ponevezh, thirty-eight kilometers away, where the yeshivah was headed by Rav Yitzchok Yaakov Rabinowitz, known as Rav Itzele Ponovezer. In 1913 he began learning in Slabodka, under Rav Yechezkel Bernstein, author of Divrei Yechezkel, and then under the Alter, Rav Nosson Tzvi Finkel.

When World War I broke out in 1914, many of the Slabodka students were scattered across Europe. Elozor Menachem first returned to his family. He then wandered from town to town across Lithuania, sleeping and eating wherever he could, and kept learning Torah all the while. In 1915, on the advice of Rav Yechezkel Bernstein, he traveled to the yeshivah in Slutsk.

Torah and leadership in Europe

In Slutsk he met Rav Isser Zalman Meltzer, and the two began a close relationship that lasted all their lives. There he also met Rav Yosef Yozel Horwitz, head of the Novardok yeshivah, who had come to introduce the students to the study of mussar. Rav Moshe Feinstein, who often visited Rav Isser Zalman at his home in Slutsk, was another sage he first met in those years.

In 1921, after political changes in the region, the Slutsk yeshivah split. Rav Isser Zalman stayed in Slutsk, while his son-in-law, Rav Aharon Kotler, took his students and started a yeshivah in Kletsk. Elozor Menachem joined Rav Aharon there and was appointed maggid shiur (lecturer in Gemara). In 1923 he married Guttel Gilmovski, a niece of Rav Isser Zalman, and the couple moved to Mir, where Rav Isser Zalman lived. In Mir he formed a lifelong bond with the town’s rav, Rav Avrohom Tzvi Hirsch Kamai. The two often learned together, and even after Rav Shach settled in Eretz Yisroel they kept up a correspondence, letters that were later printed in his Avi Ezri.

After a time in Mir he returned to Kletsk. In 1925 Rav Isser Zalman moved to Eretz Yisroel, and from then on Rav Shach took a much larger part in the daily running of the yeshivah. Around the same time Rav Yechezkel Levenstein joined as mashgiach ruchani (spiritual guide), and the two began a lifelong relationship of mutual respect. In 1927 Rav Shach served as rosh mesivta in Kletsk under Rav Aharon.

After the passing of Rav Meir Shapiro, head of the Chachmei Lublin yeshivah, Rav Chaim Ozer Grodzinski wrote to its administrators recommending Rav Shach for the position. After giving a shiur at the yeshivah, Rav Shach traveled to Vilna to consult Rav Chaim Ozer about whether to accept. After hearing the various sides of the question, Rav Chaim Ozer advised him to turn down the offer.

From 1932 to 1934 he was rosh mesivta in Novardok. This came about on the recommendation of Rav Avrohom Yeshaya Karelitz, the Chazon Ish, to Rav Bentzion Brook, one of the yeshivah’s founders. His family stayed in Kletsk during this time, and he remained in Novardok for long stretches. In his own words, he left because it was not the place for him, for many reasons. In 1935 he became rosh yeshivah of the chassidic Karlin yeshivah in Luninets, where he also served as mashgiach ruchani and gave the customary mussar talks to the students. He remained there until the outbreak of World War II.

To Eretz Yisroel and Ponevezh

Shortly before the war several yeshivos began to consider evacuating their rabbonim, students and families. Rav Aharon Kotler escaped to the United States, traveling across Siberia and arriving during the war. In 1939 Rav Shach first went to Vilna, where he stayed with Rav Chaim Ozer Grodzinski. Later that year both his mother and his eldest daughter fell ill and passed away.

In early 1940 the family decided to leave Lithuania. Rav Shach’s maternal uncle, Rav Aron Levitan, had helped Rav Aharon Kotler obtain visas for the United States. After consulting Rav Yitzchok Zev Soloveitchik and Rav Chaim Ozer, Rav Shach chose instead to go to Eretz Yisroel, where Rav Isser Zalman was serving as rosh yeshivah of Etz Chaim in Yerushalayim. Rav Shach would later serve as rosh yeshivah there as well. His uncle helped the family obtain immigration certificates and took them in when they arrived at his door in a destitute condition.

In 1951, several years after the Ponevezh yeshivah was re-established in Bnei Brak, Rav Yosef Shlomo Kahaneman asked Rav Shach to serve as one of its roshei yeshivah. Rav Shach first discussed the proposal with Rav Yitzchok Zev Soloveitchik, who encouraged him to accept. He held the position until his passing, one of three roshei yeshivah together with Rav Shmuel Rozovsky and Rav Dovid Povarsky. Every Tuesday he delivered a shiur on Gemara, and from time to time he gave other shiurim to the students.

Leader of the Torah world

Rav Shach received semichah (rabbinic ordination) from Rav Isser Zalman Meltzer and served as chairman of Chinuch Atzmai and of the Vaad HaYeshivos. From 1970 until his passing he was widely accepted by Lithuanian chareidim, and by some other chareidi circles, as the Gadol HaDor (leader of the generation). He was a revered spiritual mentor to more than a hundred thousand Jews.

Many credited him with promoting the idea of a “society of learners” in the postwar chareidi world. Under his guidance, full-time Gemara learning in yeshivos and kollelim became widespread. Although this had no precedent in Jewish history, it became the norm in some chareidi communities in Eretz Yisroel and the United States, supported by donations from the community and, for young families with many children, by government subsidies.

He held that secular studies at any level, including high school, were forbidden by the Torah, and he wrote that one should not learn a trade before it became an immediate need.

At the request of Rav Aharon Kotler, Rav Shach joined the Moetzes Gedolei HaTorah. After the passing of Rav Zalman Sorotzkin in 1966 he became its president, until he resigned when the other leading rabbonim declined to follow his lead. This came amid tensions between him and the Gerrer Rebbe, Rav Simcha Bunim Alter, who passed away in 1992. Some saw it as a return of the old dispute between chassidim and misnagdim, but the conflict cannot be explained that simply.

From the time the State of Israel was established, Rav Shach wrote that every observant citizen should vote, since a vote not cast for the right party or candidate in effect helps the wrong one. In 1984, when Shas ran for the eleventh Knesset, he called on his Lithuanian followers to vote for it, a step many saw as the start of his split with Agudas Yisroel. On the eve of the November 1988 election he broke with Agudas Yisroel to protest the publication in Hamodia, as paid advertisements, of articles based on the teachings of the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rav Menachem Mendel Schneerson. All the chassidic groups in the party except Belz declined to back him.

He and his followers formed Degel HaTorah (Flag of the Torah) to represent non-chassidic Ashkenazic chareidim. After he visited Rav Yosef Shalom Elyashiv and Rav Shlomo Zalman Auerbach in Yerushalayim, both agreed to support the new party. In the 1988 election Agudas Yisroel won five seats and Degel HaTorah two. After the bitter contest the two parties agreed to work together, and in the 1992 elections they ran jointly as United Torah Judaism, an arrangement that continues. In 1992 he and Rav Ovadia Yosef disagreed over whether Shas should join the government, and the two parties parted ways. Around 1995, as his health weakened, his political activity lessened and then ended. Leadership of Degel HaTorah passed to Rav Elyashiv and then to Rav Aharon Leib Shteinman.

Rav Shach was not troubled by the dispute his strong words could cause. He said there was no need to worry about machlokes if it was for the sake of Heaven, for in the end it would endure. Basing himself on the principle of pikuach nefesh (saving a life), he supported withdrawal from territory under Israeli control, saying that for true peace it was permitted and necessary to compromise even on half of Eretz Yisroel, and he urged chareidim not to move to settlements in the territories. Not all agreed: Rav Yitzchok Hutner declined to support this position, and Rav Shmuel Tuvia Stern asked why Rav Shach had not given halachic sources for it.

From the 1970s until the Lubavitcher Rebbe’s passing in 1994, Rav Shach spoke out publicly against the Lubavitch movement. He objected to its call to “demand” Moshiach’s appearance, and when some followers proclaimed the Rebbe to be Moshiach he called for his own followers to keep apart from Chabad and its institutions. He also wrote against Yeshiva University-type institutions, and in 1989 he joined a group of rabbonim in banning three books by Rav Adin Steinsaltz.

Yet he said he held no personal animosity toward the Rebbe. When the Rebbe became ill he recited Tehillim for his recovery, explaining that his fight was against an approach and a movement, not against any person. He also said he was not at all opposed to chassidim or chassidus, including earlier generations of Chabad, whom he called yera’im and sheleimim (God-fearing and wholesome). When someone told him that after 120 years the Vilna Gaon would give him a warm handshake in Heaven, he replied that it would be the Baal HaTanya who would shake his hand.

He told his students that it pained him deeply that he had acquired the bad name of a hater of chassidim, which he called a total lie. “We are fighting against secularism in the yeshivos,” he said, and he pointed out that Torah was being learned in both chassidic and Lithuanian yeshivos. He saw no difference between them, he said, and invited anyone to ask the chassidic bochurim at Ponevezh whether he made any distinction.

In 1982, when his honor and standing were challenged in parts of the Orthodox press, a group of leading rabbonim decided that a public protest on his behalf was needed. They were Rav Yaakov Kamenetsky, Rav Shimon Schwab, Rav Mordechai Gifter, Rav Shneur Kotler, Rav Avrohom Yaakov Pam, Rav Aharon Schechter, Rav Henoch Leibowitz, Rav Yaakov Yitzchok Ruderman and Rav Elya Svei. One protest was held at the Kaminetz yeshivah in New York, and another at Yeshivas Ner Yisroel in Baltimore.

Later years and passing

Rav Shach passed away in Tel Aviv on 16 Cheshvan 5762 (November 2, 2001), almost 103 years old, and was buried in Bnei Brak. About 200,000 people attended his funeral. Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said that Israel had lost an important person who had left his mark over many years.

Family and seforim

Rav Shach and his wife Guttel had three children, all born in Kletsk in the 1920s. Their daughter Miriam Raisel passed away as a teenager in 1939, of pneumonia. Their daughter Devorah married Rav Meir Tzvi Bergman, and they had nine children. Their son Ephraim joined the Religious Zionist camp. He served in the Israel Defense Forces, earned a doctorate in history and philosophy from the Bernard Revel Graduate School of Yeshiva University, and worked as a supervisor for the Israel Ministry of Education. He married Tamara Yarlicht-Kowalsky and they had two children. He passed away on October 17, 2011, at the age of 81. Guttel Shach passed away in 1969, from complications of diabetes.

Rav Shach’s writings include Avi Ezri, his insights and expositions on various topics in the Rambam’s Yad HaChazakah, and Michtavim U’Maamarim, a collection of his letters that has appeared in several editions of four to six volumes.