Today They 11 Tamuz is the Yartzehit of Rav Elchonon Wasserman HYD
Below is a article printed the Yated Neeman newspaper in 2016
“Rav Elchonon.” These two words contain a world of meaning. Rav Elchonon Wasserman was a gadol baTorah, leader of his generation, the rabbon shel kol bnei hagolah. Today, when we read the words he wrote over seventy years ago, it seems that he possessed he gift of prophecy.
Rav Elchonon was a talmid of the greatest luminaries of that generation, the pride and joy of Telz and Brisk, the rosh yeshiva of Yeshivas Ohel Torah in Baranovitch, and one of the foremost Torah leaders in the Jewish world. He was a man who waged the battles of Hashem and of the Torah, and whose teachings were collected in such classic works as Kovetz Shiurim and Kovetz Maamarim. The story of his martyrdom has long been recorded in works of history and is read with reverence and awe.
It was the month of Tammuz, after the Shabbos of Parshas Chukas, in the year 5701 (1941). That is what we know, but some details are unclear: Was he taken to his death on Sunday, the 11th of Tammuz, or on Monday, the 12th? And was he murdered on the day he was captured or on the next day? Furthermore, did his death take place before or after shkiah? All of this affects the question of when his yahrtzeit is. In several places, I saw that historians determined that the date of his death was the 11th of Tammuz, 5701, but that is clearly a mistake. Other sources place it on the 13th of Tammuz based on the assumption that he was taken away on Monday and was murdered at night. That may be correct, but some dispute that version of the story.
Rav Elchonon viewed the Chofetz Chaim as his rebbi. In many of his writings, he refers to him as “hakadosh baal haChofetz Chaim zt”l.” He once remarked, “It is impossible for us to perceive the full scope of the Chofetz Chaim’s greatness, since he used his brilliant mind to determine how to conceal his special qualities. How can we, with our puny intellects, hope to outsmart him?”
Rav Mordechai Zuckerman zt”l, another talmid of Radin, knew Rav Elchonon well. To this, he added, “Rav Elchonon’s face was always aflame with his burning yiras Shomayim, but the Chofetz Chaim showed no external signs of his greatness.” In a similar vein, he once remarked, “Rav Elchonon was visibly a talmid of the Chofetz Chaim, but the Chofetz Chaim, whose greatness was hidden, gave no sign of being the rebbi.”
The talmidim of the yeshiva in Radin grew accustomed to seeing Rav Elchonon attend the Chofetz Chaim’s drashos. Rav Elchonon would drink in his rebbi’s words, reviewing them over and over. Once, on the Yomim Noraim, a talmid commented that the Chofetz Chaim had repeated verbatim a drashah he had delivered the year before. Rav Elchonon disagreed. “This year,” he said, “there were eight new words.”
Rav Mordechai once met Rav Elchonon on a street in Vilna and introduced himself as a talmid from the yeshiva in Radin. Upon
hearing this, Rav Elchonon asked Rav Mordechai to accompany him to the home of Rav Chaim Ozer Grodzensky. Rav Chaim Ozer immediately recognized Rav Mordechai, and said to Rav Elchonon in a somewhat reproachful tone, “Why are you bringing me a bochur who is immersed in learning?” It soon became clear that Rav Chaim Ozer had asked Rav Elchonon to find a yeshiva bochur who could assist him; nevertheless, despite the passage of years, he had not forgotten Rav Mordechai’s stellar hasmadah during his years in Radin.
• • • • •
Everyone agrees on where and how it happened: Rav Elchonon was taken by bloodthirsty Lithuanian soldiers from the home of Rav Avrohom Grodzensky Hy”d. In her book, Ve’emunascha Baleilos, Rebbetzin Wolbe, Rav Avrohom’s daughter, relates, “On one of the days after the pogrom, when we were still holed up in our house behind locked doors, and while rabbonim, yungeleit and bochurim slept and learned in pairs in every room of the house, three Lithuanian partisans with their guns drawn suddenly burst into the house. They opened the front door abruptly, and they were inside the house before we could react. In the entranceway, Rav Elchonon Wasserman Hy”d was standing (not sitting) and learning with a chavrusah. The Lithuanians were enraged by this sight of Jewish men, especially rabbonim, who were still learning. Aiming their weapons at him, they began screaming, ‘Don’t move!’
“They ran wildly from room to room, even to the second story, and they gathered all the men they found. Some of the men managed to hide and were not discovered. Roaring like wild beasts, the soldiers gathered thirteen men, including my beloved brother Zev, who was only 21 years old; my uncle, Reb Shabsi Vernikovsky, who was a rebbi at the yeshiva of Lomza, along with his son Mordechai; and, of course, Rav Elchonon Wasserman. We, the women and girls, begged the cruel Lithuanians not to take them away. I was the oldest among the girls and I tried to explain to them that rabbonim were not Communists.”
Rebbetzin Wolbe describes how she pleaded with the murderous soldiers to spare Rav Elchonon’s life. The soldiers replied that they would accept her claims if she showed them documents to prove them. The young Rivka Grodzensky raced up the stairs to find some sort of evidence that they were not Communist agents. As she looked through the window into the inner courtyard of the house, though, she saw all the men being taken at gunpoint to their deaths.
At the end of that chapter, Rebbetzin Wolbe relates, “We found out only later that on that very day, those 13 rabbonim and bnei Torah met their deaths al kiddush Hashem. It was the 12th of Tammuz, 5701, and we were told that the place where they were murdered was the Seventh Fort.” According to her memories and the accounts they received at the time, the men were taken into captivity on Monday and were murdered that very day, before nightfall. To this day, the rebbetzin observes her brother’s yahrtzeit on the 12th of Tammuz.
Read more at the Yated
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