Rav Moshe Aharon Pinto

Early years

Rav Moshe Aharon Pinto zt"l, known as the "Light and Pillar of the World," was born in 1912, the son of the saintly Rav Chaim Pinto HaKatan. He came from a distinguished line of Kabbalists. Among his ancestors were Rav Yoshiyahu Pinto, author of The Rif on Ein Yaakov, and Rav Yaakov Pinto, author of Mikdash Melech, a work on the Zohar.

He was also a great-grandson of Rav Chaim Pinto HaGadol, whom he would invoke in moments of need.

Torah and leadership

Rav Moshe Aharon was counted among the tzaddikim nistarim (hidden righteous). He did not wish to be known and forbade people from speaking about him. Yet on the day he passed away, people came forward to testify to the miracles that had come through his blessings.

His father had commanded him to avoid the pleasures of this world and asked him to take a vow to remain enclosed in his home for forty years. He kept that vow, living almost entirely on scraps of bread dipped in oil. He spent thirty of those years in his home in Mogador and ten in Casablanca. Inside his home he built a synagogue and a beis medrash (study hall), and thousands of people came from all over to receive his blessing.

When the forty years were over, he went to the kever (grave) of his great-grandfather to reflect and to daven. There he asked permission to go and settle in Eretz Yisroel. He then began to travel, explaining, "Hashem created a beautiful world. What will I tell Him when He asks me after 120 years whether I witnessed and appreciated the wonders of His creation?"

In the street, as at home, he was careful to guard the sanctity of his eyes and always looked at the ground, never gazing at anyone. On Shabbos he prepared a number of items himself, and it was always he who placed the water on the hotplate. His son Rav David recalls how he listened to every person, rich or poor, with the same consideration, and how his whole being inspired faith and confidence in Hashem.

Teachings and seforim

In 1984, before his illness, Rav Moshe Aharon gave his children two suggestions. The first was to print commentaries on Hilchos Teshuvah (the Laws of Teshuvah) of the Rambam and to make the publication freely available to shuls, schools and community centers.

The second was to show the Sefer Torah of Rav Yoshiyahu Pinto, written about 360 years earlier, to Jewish communities around the world. In his view that Sefer Torah was a segulah for the destruction of avodah zarah, which would bring Moshiach closer, an event he had awaited his entire life. His talmidim also gathered his writings into a book.

Later years and passing

Rav Moshe Aharon suffered from many illnesses, most of all from gangrene. The doctors at Hadassah Hospital in Yerushalayim wanted to amputate both his legs. He always refused, saying that no descendant of Rav Yoshiyahu Pinto had ever suffered mutilation. "I came into this world with two legs," he told them, "and with two legs I will leave this world," and as he spoke he would raise his hands to the sky and call on his great-grandfather. On the day he was to be operated on, the doctor told the family he would try one last treatment. That same day his blood circulation improved markedly and the operation was no longer needed. Once free of the gangrene, Rav Moshe Aharon said, "It is now that my sufferings will begin."

From then on his condition worsened steadily. He lost his speech, his hearing and his sight, and suffered heart attacks. Each time, he raised his hands toward the sky and kissed them in joyful acceptance. The Admorim and Rabbanim who visited him noticed two things: whenever he touched his head, it was to be sure his kippah was in place, and whenever he made a gesture, it was to ask that people wash his hands for him. Medically his brain had ceased to function, yet his spirit remained with his people, for whom he never stopped davening.

When his children brought him his tallis and tefillin, he took them in his right hand, held them firmly to his heart and began to cry softly, because he could no longer perform the mitzvah. In his last moments other tears flowed, not from physical pain but from the sorrow of not having seen the coming of Moshiach in his lifetime.

After a long and painful illness that lasted three years, Rav Moshe Aharon passed away in Ashdod in Elul. He was buried on a Thursday in Ashdod.

Legacy

His descendants have printed and distributed thousands of copies of Perek Shira, which describes how every creature takes part in a worldwide symphony of praise to Hashem. His oldest son, Rav Chaim, is the rav of Ashdod. Rav Chaim's son, Rav Yoshiyahu Yosef, founded the Shuvah Yisrael organization, which draws many young people back to Torah and mitzvos.

Another son, Rav Yaakov, traveled to America and founded the Pinto Center in Los Angeles during the 1980s. He is president of the Netivei Chaim veMoshe Pinto institutions that he and his brothers established in Ashdod, which include a beis medrash, a supermarket and kitchen for the needy, a publishing house and more.

His son Rav David Hanania Pinto dreamed of building something large in his father's name. Friends and associates in the United States and elsewhere joined him in a project in Ashdod, on land bought near the cemetery where Rav Moshe Aharon is buried, and they acquired three residential complexes for Sephardi families. In 1991 property prices fell sharply and the Be'er Moshe institution lost a great deal of money. Rav David refused to close it, borrowed from friends to meet the banks' demands, and finally managed to rent out almost all of the apartments, saving Kiryat Be'er Moshe. Today it houses about 100 families.