Nothing But Torah
Once upon a time Jewish men didn’t stay home at night. They weren’t at the movies either; they were in the study halls, in the shuls. When fathers and sons would return home at night from the beis medrash they would bring all their baggage of Torah with them. Mothers and sisters would hear nothing but Torah. And therefore the Jewish street used to be a street of Torah.
Even a certain writer, an enemy of the Torah – I won’t honor him by saying his name here – when describing Cracow in the times of the Rama he said that the children in the street “babbled Torah.” And the truth is that it wasn’t only Cracow. That’s how it was in every Jewish community; every town was a yeshivah town.
I remember when I was a little boy in Baltimore, when the new immigrants arrived, they used to laugh when they saw that the shuls were locked during the day. Locked?! “Aren’t there people learning all day in the shuls?” And it wasn’t the talmidei chachomim who laughed; it was the peddler, the poor working man trying to eke out a living. It was something impossible to them! Because in Europe, even a hundred years ago, they were still emulating the Dor Hamidbar, and still learning the lessons of the Mishkan. Some were there all day, some would come in for an hour here and there, but to close the shul?!
No Seats Available In Shul!
When I was in Lithuania I once visited a shul in a small town and an old melamed, a remnant from the old generation, said to me, “Before World War I there was a time when if you came a little bit late to this shul on Thursday night you couldn’t find a seat. It was filled with people learning late into the night. Every night the shul was filled with people learning.”
In Slabodka, a bachur whom I learned with b’chavrusa once told me that in Beers, his hometown in Lithuania, there used to be a chevrah mishmarim. This was a group of people who were peddlers all week; it was their bitter lot in life to put a pack of merchandise on their backs and trudge through the gentile hamlets and villages to peddle merchandise among non-Jews. Now in those days a Jew still looked like a Jew, so the gentiles would set their dogs on the Jews as they passed through the town. It was a hard life, a wearisome week of work. And where did they go when they finally returned home? They gathered in the shul in Beers where they would spend all Thursday night learning to make up for the time they missed during the week. That was the chevra mishmarim!
And as a young man in New York, I saw echoes of those great days. I once tried spending the whole night learning in a chassidishe shtiebel on the Lower East Side on Montgomery street. I tried staying awake, but I kept dozing over the Gemara. But I couldn’t sleep anyhow because the Poilisheh chassidim started coming in while it was still dark. They put on their gartels, took down their Gemaras, and started learning before the morning came. Early in the morning when it was still dark, the shtiebel was packed with Jews sitting and learning. And in the Gerrer shtiebel I used to watch a Litvishe Jew standing and learning Mishnayos by heart all night. Once in a while he would look into the open Mishna to refresh his memory. That’s a remnant of the older generation; once upon a time the Jewish nation studied Torah.
The Greatest Mitzvah
There are two pesukim in Mishlei: One says “All of the things that you desire cannot equal to the Torah” (Mishlei 3:15). All the things that people love in this world – people love wealth, they love honor, they love food and all types of pleasure – it’s nothing compared to the Torah. Everybody desires things in this world, all good things; health and happiness, nachas, long years, and wealth. But nothing compares to one word of the Torah.
But there’s another possuk, (ibid. 8:11). Here it doesn’t say chafatzecha, your desires; it says chafatzim, all desirable things, even the things that Hashem desires, cannot compare to the Torah. What does that mean? It means that even all the mitzvos of the Torah cannot compare to the mitzvah of studying Torah (Moed Kattan 9b).
Of course if you have to do a mitzvah, and there’s no one else who can do it, you have to stop learning and do the mitzvah; but the mitzvos of the Torah are not as great a privilege as the one mitzvah of studying Torah. All the things that you consider important, and even all the things that Hashem considers important, all the mitzvos, they don’t equal one thing of the Torah.
One line of Torah is more important than all the mitzvos put together. How can that be?! It’s astonishing! All the mitzvos together, the tefillin and mezuzos and tzitzis and matzah and korban pesach, all the obligations of the Torah cannot compare to one thing of the Torah. You sit down, open a Gemara and learn one line, it’s such a tremendous happiness, such a great achievement, that it eclipses, it far outdoes all the good things together. If you can open the Gemara for one line, you should know what you’re doing for yourself in this world. I’m not saying you’re a talmid chochom already; that takes work after all. But you’re already joining the aristocracy of the Am Yisroel; you’re emulating the upper class, the elite of our nation. You’re becoming a Torah Jew; because that’s the function of a Jew in this world.
The Kosel In Your Living Room
You know it has become the style today to travel. People are busy traveling, going, doing, visiting, and there’s no time left for the most important function of our lives. Even to Eretz Yisroel, people are traveling back and forth, back and forth. For what? Who needs you there? What is the purpose of Eretz Yisroel? It’s only for you to make something out of yourself. You’re going to give up learning, even one line of Gemara, for travel?!
If you want to go to the Kosel Ma’aravi, then you should know that the Shas Bavli is your Kosel Ma’aravi. Make the seforim shrank with the Shas Bavli in it, your Kosel Ma’aravi. That’s your success! The success of life is transferring the contents of the Shas into your mind. So stand in front of that big Shas on the shelves and make that your Kosel Ma’aravi. You want to give that up to travel thousands of miles to Eretz Yisroel? If you want to, you can put kvitlach, prayer notes, in between the Gemaros on your shelf and pray to Hashem for success in becoming a Shas yid.
The Ambitious Couple
The Shas is our everything! That’s why the luchos were the centerpiece of the Mishkan, because that’s everything. Since the churban Beis Hamikdash, when the kodesh kodoshim and the luchos went lost, there’s nothing more important to Hakadosh Baruch Hu than the place where Torah is studied (Brachos 8a). There’s nothing in the world more kadosh, more special to Hakadosh Baruch Hu than the study of His Torah.
You must have seforim in your home and they should be your pride. It’s very important! Even if you don’t have the competition of a television set, nevertheless if you live within four walls without those important companions that every Jew must have then you’re not going to utilize your life. Every young couple that begins to feather its nest after marriage should have an ambition to line the walls of their home with bookshelves of seforim.
Building Your Dream House
That should be your dream house! If your wife wants drapes, OK, nothing wrong with drapes; you can buy her drapes at the five and ten too. Explain to her – first you’ll have to explain it to yourself – the beauty of a home where the walls are covered with shelves of seforim. And even if you’ll dip into the sefer only once in your lifetime – you bought a sefer and it cost you sometimes twenty dollars and you used it only once? It was worth it; it was a bargain. Sometimes you get a lift, you can get some inspiration from one line, and there’s no price you could put on it. So in case your wife tells you, “Look Chaim, you used this sefer only once, or maybe you never even used it yet. So why did we spend so much money on the seforim?” So tell her, “Chana’leh, wait; if I’ll ever look into it once it’s going to be worth everything that we paid for it.”
And the truth is that even if you never looked inside, it was worth it. Because just to have seforim lining the walls of your house, it’s a demonstration of where your heart is. It should be the showcase of pride in your home. I always say that even if you’re never going to open it, it’s worth all the money in the world to have a big Shas – buy the biggest one you could find and display it in your home. The Shas, the seforim, should be placed in the most prominent place in the home. When you walk into a Jewish home, it shouldn’t be the chandelier or the curtains that you see. It should be a big Shas, shelves and shelves of seforim should be showcased in your living room. The seforim shrank, that’s the glory of our nation, that’s what makes your house into a Mishkan.
Important Demonstrations
And if the loyal Jewish home, with seforim lined shelves is the Mishkan, then the beis medrash, the yeshivah is the kodesh kodoshim.
