Rav Gamliel Rabinowitz said regarding his Rebbe, Rav Binyamin Rabinovitz, zt”l, that someone once observed him learning and noted he was able to sit and learn for seven hours straight without lifting his eyes from the Gemara even once. This person was very amazed by this, so he built up the courage and asked the Rav where he got his strength from to be able to learn Gemara for so many long hours.
Rav Binyamin answered him, “I also did not think that I would be able to do this, but I said to myself, that I will try to learn as much as I can, and see how long I can go for. I thought, ‘Isn’t learning for just five minutes straight a difficult thing to do?’
“So, I began to accustom myself to learn Gemara for just five minutes straight, without interruption. After I became used to this, I decided to push myself and learn an additional five minutes. Over time, in stages and with small steps, I was able to keep adding to the time I learned until I was eventually able to learn for seven hours without interruption!”
Reprinted from the Parshas Noach 5786 email of Rabbi Yehuda Winzelberg’s Torah U’Tefilah.
