Torah Yerushalayim: Reflections from the Legacy of Rabbi Berel Wein zt'l | Rabbi Joel Kenigsberg

And it's really now uh my great honor to introduce my colleague, my friend, Rabbi Joel Kenningsburg. And Rabbi Joel Kenningsburg originally from Johannesburg Johannesburg. Uh he made aliyah after high school and studied at the Shivata Kotel later receiving and completing advanced rabinicic training at alongside degrees from college and university. He and his wife Sah served as Mizrai UK in London where he was a rabbi of Mot and Rafa UK. Since 2022 he has been the rabbi of Jerusalem where he teaches rights and leads the community with a focus on intro section of halafa and contemp contemporary life. So it's with great honor by Kenna [Applause] Okay, lift off everyone. Thank you Finkelestein. Thank you, Ry Burman, Rabbi Shaw, the entire U team that has that has worked so hard to put tonight together. And it's really an honor for me to be here with you tonight. It's an honor to be here be able to share words of Torah with you, but it's particularly an honor to be able to share some words in memory and in tribute for our dear teacher Moreno Vaber of Barrel Wine. of Rafa. You know, it's still very difficult to stand up here and speak about Rabbi Wine in the past tense. It's hard to believe that he's no longer with us. And I count myself very fortunate having had the opportunity these past three years to be able to be together with him in Bet Tanasi to form a connection to foster a personal connection with the Gadobi Israel. Many of you knew Rabbi W and learned from him. Many of you sat in his Shabbat shouad rash. What an experience it was to sit in a Shabbat Shab Shabbat Rashad Shabbat of Rabbi Wine. I mentioned to somebody today I just heard recently he writes in one of his books says that when he came to Israel on principle he never advertised his shabashu dashes and the reason was he was a big successful rabb from America he came to Israel he didn't want to he kept a low profile he tried we all know Rabbi wine could not keep a low profile people heard about it it didn't help him that he didn't advertise they came from everywhere came from all over the was packed. There was nowhere to sit. There was nowhere to stand. The atmosphere was electric. And I had the opportunity, my son, I had the privilege of bringing my son along to those drash. And I said to him, I said, you know, one day you'll be able to tell your children and their children that you sat in the Shabbat Shiva Dashas of Rabbi Wine. And today I asked myself, how can we approach Yum Kipur without his shabbasha dasha? We'll have to figure out a way. But tonight is not about giving him. And I'm certain that if Rabbi Wine could hear us or could hear me now, he would laugh and he would look at me and he would say, "What are you doing? Why are you talking about me? Teach them some Torah." That's what we're here for. So that's what we're going to do. We're going to learn learn from the Torah that Rabbi Wine taught us. learn from his legacy, learn from his sharim, learn from his lessons and particularly with a focus on chuva ship. Of course, that's the time of year and that's what we're here trying to prepare for this evening. So, I want to share with you three lessons. Three lessons specifically related to chuva, related to this time of year. three lessons that I learned from Rabbi Wine and that I think we can all take to heart and can help us all to prepare in a better way for the days ahead. So, let me begin with a story. It's the story that Rabbi Wine loved to tell. He would tell it often. You've probably heard it if you've ever heard Rabbi Wine. You know, something I noticed, by the way, over the last few years is that Rabbi Wine would repeat many of his stories. He would say the same thing over and over. Now sometimes I would wonder why does he repeat the story so many times you know and since his passing it dawned on me he wasn't repeating the stories because he forgot that he had told them he was repeating the stories because he knew that if he tell if he told us them enough times there was a chance that we might remember and it worked. He would repeat the same message over and over again in a different way. But he said if I tell them enough times then maybe eventually at some point their message will start to sink in. And it did. So, one of his stories, I'll allow myself to say this was one of his favorite stories based on how many times he told it. And you may have heard, but the story goes, Rabbi Wine's first grandson turned three and had a great birthday party for the three-year-old. And Rabbi Wine was tasked with a very very important job for that party of finding a present, a suitable present for a three-year-old. And Rabbi Wine tells he says this was not any ordinary three-year-old. This was his grandson. He was intelligent. He was obnoxious. He was precocious. He was he was special. He wasn't like any other three-year-old. It's a big job to find a to find a birthday present for a three-year-old. What do you do? So he went to the shop, went to the store and he looked around and he spent a long time he spent a long time in the toy store finding the perfect gift. It had to be educational. It had to be safe. It had to be enriching. It had to be all sorts of things. And he tells the story. He finally was able to select the gift. He came home. He brought the gift to the party. The grand day arrives. The three-year-old's birthday party is here. And he gets the gift. And lo and behold, he opens the gift. He opens the box. He pulls out not just any toy, but really I never asked her in my mind what the gift was. I always wondered. But he says the child took out the gift and he then proceeded to spend the next hour playing with the box. We can tell who's bought a gift for a three-year-old. But Rabine said, and this was the depth of the story, that was the mash. He said the nimshell. He said, "That's us. Are we not all that three-year-old? Are we not all playing with the box? How often do we forget the essence? Do we forget the meaning? Do we forget about what really counts? What really matters in our lives? What really matters in the Jewish people?" And there is so much time and there are so much energy and there are so much money and so many resources and so much invested on things that really don't matter on things that really aren't important. And the essence, the gift, the toy that's inside, we forget about and we play with a box. And he would bemoone this fact about Jewish life. He would bemoone this fact about the Jewish world. And I think that this story again he told it many times and there are many different aspects and many different things we can learn from it. But particularly now we find ourselves a few days from rash shah on a personal level it comes to our chuva it comes to what what are we thinking about what's the day about what are we going to do what are we going to achieve am I living my life am I living my life trying to find the essence or am I playing with the box and I saw this morning in one of his many many number of years ago there was a collection anthology of some of the shorter essays that Rabbi Wine had authored and he writes there an essay for Yonipur and lo and behold he brings the story of the box. Let me read to you what he says in this in this particular context about it. He says to a certain extent after telling the story of course to a certain extent we are all like that child we discuss he's talking about Yonipur we discuss how long the services took on Yonipur whether the break was sufficiently long or short whether the hazan was on key or not how much rest we were able to get during the rabbi's sermon but none of these are the presence itself off. None of these are yonipur. These are only the box and the wrappings that come with it. Yonipur should provide us with the ability to maintain a conversation with heaven. And it should not be easily squandered or neglected. This unique and holy day has the power to erase our sins, mistakes, transgressions. But it can do so only if we wish that those past errors truly be expuned and we're prepared to remove them from our persona and attitude. I believe that this life-saving objective can only be accomplished if we view Yonipur as a gift to us and not just as a day of fasting and physical abstinence. So too it is for Yonipur. So too it is for Asha. So it is for every day on the Jewish calendar. I remember once one of the pamphlets was dra to that was going around before rash shah and there was a full page advert and it was very very inspiring. It had this text at the top and in very a very large letters a very inspiring message. It said are you ready for rashash shana? It's a good good question, right? And underneath it had a list of all the local kosher bakeries. That's my friends is playing with the box. It's important you should have and I don't just mean you should bake the dessert yourself. You can go to the bakery if that will make your preparation easier. That's fine. We should have good food and we should have good meals and all all these things are very very important. That's part of rash sha. But there's something deeper. What are who are we? What are our goals for the coming year? Who are we going to become? Forget about the noise. Rabbi Wine always taught us to forget about the noise. He lived in Rakavia here. There was a lot of noise outside his windows. He taught us to zoom out. He taught us to see the bigger picture. And he taught us to look at ourselves and look at ask ourselves particularly at this time of year, what is the bigger picture in our lives? I'm going to share one more story related to this point before we move on to the second. But yesterday I was walking through downtown Jerusalem, walking down off of King George. And if you've been there recently, you know what chaos and pandemonium are. And it's like that throughout the city. And there's the traffic, the noise, the everything. It's chaos. Most of us, most of us walk through, we see of King George and we see chaos. You already know what I'm going to say. It's not what Rabbi Wine said. Forget to Rabbi Wine. I'm reminded that when he was the raid so towards the end of his life when he was already quite ill and he was bedridden and he was at home in his bed and there was construction taking place outside his window and his family members out of concern out of respect for the elderly Rav they went to the construction workers and they asked him to stop they said at least during such and such a time of the day this is when the RV is resting please don't please can put away the drills and whatnot. And when Rafal noticed that he couldn't hear the noise outside the window anymore, he asked what had happened. And they told him, they said, "We asked so that the rough can get some rest, can get some sleep. We asked there not to be noise." And Rafal said, "All my life I've had the privilege of seeing the rebuilding of Jerusalem. And now that I can't leave my bed and I can't see it anymore, at least let me hear it. And that was how Rabbi W viewed it. Like I said, we all walk into the street and we see chaos and he saw the fulfillment of prophecies. He saw vinana. I remember at his 90th birthday celebration last year. He gave an address. He spoke about the different stages of different snapshots in his life and the last one being yushim. And I still remember his words. He said, "I had the privilege to be a rav in yushim. The vilan couldn't dream of that the couldn't and me. So that is lesson number one. Zoom out. See the bigger picture. Ignore the noise on the macro level, on the micro level in our own lives. Ignore the noise. Stop playing with the box. Take out the toy. Lesson number two. Lesson number two. And this is something which we'll call if only they would have known. If only we had known. If the verse lesson relates to zooming out. So this lesson relates to zooming in. And this is something Rabbi Wine spoke about often as well. I heard him say many times. And he says, you know, to talk about Rabbi Wine and to talk about what we learned from him, it's impossible to put it better in my words. So I went to his writings. I went to his books. Why you want to hear what I have to say when you can hear what Rabbi Wins and one of his many many books there's a book called the legacy which he published together with Rabbi Warren Goldstein chief rabbi of South Africa. It's a remarkable work. It's a book that talks about it's the subtitle is teachings for life from the great Lithuanian rabbis. It's a book that attempts to reconstruct a world that was and is no more. the world, the great Torah giants, the Muslim movement, the great values and ideals of that lost generation. It's a world that we never saw, but we did see it because we had a bridge to it. We saw it through Rabbi Wine and we felt that we were there as well. So, in this book, they write about many things. There's a chapter called mission and destiny and in that chapter there's a section called history and small events small quote unquote and they quote here the midrash the midrash that says as follows the midrash takes the actions of three individuals in the tan of ru son of yakov of aron and of bo from and all three of these the midrash says all all these individuals did seemingly small actions but they were small actions that carried cosmic consequences and the midra says like this had Ru known that the holy one blessed be he was writing about him that as it says in the Ruven heard and saved him saved yourself from the pit or from the brothers he would have carried him on his shoulders had he known that was being written he would have carried him on shoulders. Had Aaron known that it was written about him, behold he Aaron is coming towards you when he comes out to greet Mosher Rabenu when he's coming to lead his younger brother coming to take leadership of the Jewish people. So had Aaron known it was written about him, he would have gone out with symbols and tambourines. Had Bo has known that it was written about him and he handed her Ruth parched grain. Had he known that was being written in the Tanakh for all generations, he would have fed her fattened cows, would have given her steak. And what is this midrash telling us? Is it teaching us that all these people just didn't realize how famous they were? Is it teaching us that they wanted extra honor and glory for themselves? Of course, that's not what it's saying. So wonder Goldstein quote here of El Roash who says that it's often the smallest things that gain eternal and historic significance. The point is these individuals didn't realize they thought they were just doing something small. They didn't realize that that small act was being written in the Tanakh was shaping the course of our mission and our destiny was shaping the course of Jewish history forever. And the Midrash continues. It says nowadays where are things written? Nowadays there is a great heavenly safer Torah and the things that we do are written in that obviously not everything but the actions that we think are small but really are so meaningful and are so impactful like Rashai spoke about beforehand the things that make a difference in other people's lives the things that make a difference to the future to the destiny of the Jewish people and the language the mid says it talks about the safer Torah quotes from the prophet Mali who calls it a book of remembrance or not of course makes us think of Sha coming up in just a few days time we have those three very very special of two Rabbi wine had a very unique understanding of what are all read to you from his from his commentary. He says, "I believe one of the possible interpretations as to what means is that on the day of judgment, our memories are also judged. Namely, we're judged not just for our actions, not just for our words, for our memories, for our thoughts as well. Heaven is concerned as to what we do remember and what we have chosen to forgot to forget. What is in the forefront of our conscious mind and what we have sublimated. The sounds of the chauffar bring forth all of our memories. Everything that lies within the computer of our brain for examination before the heavenly tribunal of judgment. As such, we are judged not only by what we actually remember, but by what we have somewhat willingly chosen not to remember. And this is what makes the judgment of heaven so exact and exquisite. It is beyond our powers of rational understanding and human knowledge. In other words, what are the actions and what are the things, the small things and the big things that we think about that we think are important that we have chosen to remember or not to remember? That is what zikernut is about. It's about who we are. You I heard him say this I think he repeated every year over the last over the last three years. Every time we got to rash he spoke about chuv the mind chuv the attitudes they say not just tremendous but it's not just about what we do and it's not just about what we say but it's about what we think and how we think. How do we relate to the Jewish people? How do we relate to the state of Israel to what is going on here? Remember, Rabbi Wine once said in a in a sermon, he said, you know, I've never been a card carrying Zionist. It's political affiliation. He didn't have political affiliation. But he said, you have to open your eyes and you have to be grateful. You have to recognize what aes has given us. You have to see his hand in history in the events that are taking place. So, it's again about zooming out and it's again about realizing what is happening. something else that I that I saw this morning in one of those essays, Rabbi Wine talks about sermons and he wrote there something very interesting. He says he knows other rabbis would disagree with this but he says what does he talk about in a sermon? He says I don't speak about current events, politics, diplomacy or other relevant topics. I don't feel that people come to synagogue to hear my opinions about Iran, about the prime minister of Israel or the president of the United States. They come to the synagogue for inspiration, for strength and faith. I try to speak about timeless ideas represented by Jewish values and Torah. And I try to convey a broad historical perspective in which we can see ourselves as part of the great drama of Jewish life. There is nothing as obsolete as being current, timely, and relevant. Now, I can tell you that having sat alongside Rabbi Wine week after week on Shabbat, he spoke about current events. He always spoke about current events, but he never spoke about politics. He never spoke about the noise. He gave a flavor of eternity to the things that are happening here and now. And always the question was what does this mean for us? What are we being called upon to do? What is heaven trying to tell us by the things that we see around us? So lesson number one, don't play with the box. Learn to zoom out. Learn to ignore the noise. Learn to see what's really going on. What's really important for our people? what's really important in our own lives. Lesson number two, maybe paradoxically is that it's not only the big things, it's the small things. It's the small actions. Every individual and every action that I take and every thought that I have has an effect and has an impact and is so important. But each one of us, as he said, is part of that great drama. Each one of us has a role to play. And he empowered us. Every time he spoke, he made us all feel so so important. Lesson number three I'd like to share relates to his unstoppable drive. Unstoppable drive to always do more for the Jewish people to always achieve more. I feel that Rabbi W was the epitome of the story of Rabel Salant the famous story Rabel Salant where he sees the shoe maker and he's working late at night and there is a candle in front of him and he says so long as the candle burns then there is more work yet to be done. And Rabi knew and he felt inside him that so long as the candle is still burning, there is still more that can be achieved, how much he achieved. It struck me recently after his passing when I read his autobiography book that was published about a decade ago. He was 80 years old when he published it and he talks about the things that he's done. He talks about the books that he has published from the time that that book was written when he was 80 years old. The things that aren't mentioned because they only happen afterwards. Another dozen books that he wrote, another film that he produced about the Abar Banel, thousands of Sharim and lectures and tapes and he achieved more in his last decade than many people achieve in a lifetime. But he was teaching us not just by what he taught us but by what he achieved. The question is us what can we achieve? We can all we're all important. We just said and that should spur us on and that should inspire us. And again at this time of year, okay, what are my goals? What am I going to achieve? I have I have an I have a responsibility. Every one of us has a responsibility. What are we going to do for the Jewish people? I can't not mention the famous story of Robert. I'm sure everyone here knows, but if you don't, you're in for a treat. I think when was 12 years old when he was a young boy in Chicago, Roertzog came to visit. He told the story many times and he describes his father took him to go and greet to go and greet Roertzog and Roertzog told the story. He said he had just been to the pope and he gone to the pope and told him there were 10,000 Jewish children that had converted to Christianity that had survived the Holocaust and Rover said, "We want our children back." And the pope said they've been baptized to Christianity. They're Christian now. They're not yours. And a revers standing standing there standing tall began to weep to weep. And he turned to his audience and he said there's nothing more that I can do for those children but what are you going to do for the Jewish people? And said as they all left the room and they went out and they shook shook Rahersong's hand one by one he turned to them and he said to them did you hear what I said did you hear what I said remember what I said what are you going to do for the Jewish people taught us that that moment changed his life and he never forgot it but of course when he would tell us that story and this was mentioned in one of the when he told us that story he wasn't just repeating of Herzog's question to him he was asking that question to every one of us what are we going to do so I truly feel that Rabbi W would not forgive me if I just stood here tonight and just shared with you stories so I've tried to do a little bit more than And I think that the message for all of us is let us not just remember his life with nostalgia, which of course we will. But let us continue his legacy. And at this time of year, let us take particularly take those piercing questions to heart as we approach Rosha Shana and Chuva and Yonipurin. Lesson number one, don't play with a box. Forget about the noise. Think about what's real. Think about what's real on a national level and think about what's real on a deep deep personal level. That's often much harder to do. Number two is don't make the mistake of thinking that we're not important. Don't make the mistake of thinking that my actions don't matter. Remember that everything I do has the potential to be part of that great storyline of the Jewish people. Every action I take has the potential to be written in that great heavenly safety Torah. And every attitude and thought that I think has the potential to be judged and to enter into that safe as if we're not. And number three is don't sell ourselves short. Keep going. achieving, trying to do more, trying to achieve even greater heights. Remember how much he achieved and remember what a calling that is to every single one of us. And if we do all of that, we will not just remember him, but we will elevate his nama and will bring merit to ourselves and to the Jewish people. Thank you all for listening. I want to take this opportunity to wish everybody great, happy, healthy year, year of victory, year of peace, the year of guru for us and for all of Isra.