Every Shabbos in the home of the tzaddik, R’ Chaim Kanievsky zt”l, was an event. People vied for the exclusive opportunity to sit at a Shabbos seudah with the Gadol Hador. It wasn’t the food they came for. It was to bask in the presence of gadlus. The Rebbetzin a”h, would cook and host a large seudah for those fortunate enough to be invited.
Many family members were in attendance and even two bochurim per seudah were allowed in, usually after waiting months on a list, just to sit at the table with R’ Chaim. One such bochur, who finally received his turn about ten years ago, described the experience with a sense of awe.
“After davening vasikin in R’ Chaim’s house,” he said, “they spread a tablecloth, set out the food, and the seudah began. It felt unreal. R’ Chaim was sitting right there, eating simply, quietly, with that same otherworldly focus you always hear about.”
As the meal went on, each person at the table was given a chance to ask the Rav a question. The bochur waited, rehearsing his question over and over in his mind, trying to steady his nerves. He had been warned beforehand: “If you want R’ Chaim to hear you, you have to speak loudly. He cannot hear very well so whatever you do, speak loudly.”
Finally, there was a brief pause in the conversation - it was his time to shine! The perfect opening. The bochur gathered up his courage and focusing on R’ Chaim shining countenance, he practically shouted his question across the table. But R’ Chaim didn’t move. Didn’t turn. Didn’t blink. He didn’t react at all. Obviously, he hadn’t heard the question.
R’ Chaim was facing the opposite direction, completely absorbed in whatever sugya was flowing through his mind at that exact moment. The bochur felt his face burning. He tried again - louder. And louder. His voice echoed through the room, but it was as if the Rav was in a different world entirely. Later, the bochur would say, “It was like shouting into the side of a mountain. My voice was loud, but it couldn’t penetrate the walls of Torah surrounding him.”
He kept trying, each attempt more desperate than the last. Still nothing. R’ Chaim remained motionless, his mind clearly elsewhere, his thoughts wrapped in Torah. Someone sitting opposite the bochur noticed his distress. The man locked eyes on R’ Chaim and pointed directly at the bochur sitting there. Loudly, he said, “Rebbi, this bochur is asking something.”
And in that instant, everything changed. R’ Chaim turned his head. His eyes locked onto the bochur with full, total attention, as if the entire world had just snapped into focus. The bochur, now mortified by how loudly he had been yelling, lowered his voice to a near whisper and nervously asked his question.
R’ Chaim answered immediately, clearly, without hesitation, as though the question had been waiting for him all along. The whole exchange lasted no longer than a few seconds. The bochur later reflected on the moment with amazement. Until someone pointed him out, nothing in the world had been able to interrupt R’ Chaim’s concentration. His immersion in Torah was absolute.
But the moment he became aware that someone was speaking to him, he turned instantly, fully present, fully attentive. The scene remained etched in his memory: the quiet room, the long table, the simple Shabbos food, and R’ Chaim sitting with a calm stillness, his mind soaring in the heights of Torah one moment and then, in the next, turning his focus to hear the question of a young student who had waited months for this moment.
Reprinted from the Parshas Vayikra 5786 email of Rabbi Dovid Hoffman’s Torah Tavlin.
