Letters to the Editor 1/1/2010

Posted

Issue of January 1 2010/ 15 Tevet 5770

The real story behind Hesder

To the Editor:

In an article appearing in the December 18, 2009 issue of The Jewish Star (“No evacuation, says Hesder founder”), Rabbi Eliezer Waldman is credited with being the founder of the hesder yeshiva movement. While Rabbi Waldman no doubt has many great achievements, the credit for creating the concept of the hesder yeshiva is properly lodged with Rav Chaim Yaakov Goldvicht (1925-1995), the late Rosh Yeshiva of Yeshivat Kerem B’Yavneh. In 1991, Rav Goldvicht accepted the Israel Prize on behalf of the hesder yeshivot.

Kerem B’Yavneh, founded in 1953 by Rav Goldvicht, was the first of the hesder yeshivot. To this day, it refers to itself as eim yeshivot hahesder - the mother of the hesder yeshivot. As a student there in 1970-71, I recall Rav Goldvicht telling us of the origins of the hesder yeshiva concept. With the yeshiva located adjacent to Kevutzat Yavneh outside of Ashdod, its students came to be nominally enrolled in the army’s Nachal (Noar Haluzi Lochem) program, which combined military service with agricultural activity. When the army ultimately learned that the boys were learning and not farming, it objected, and there began discussions to formalize an arrangement for combining Torah study and army service.

Nachal was a four-year program, but the army insisted that the new learning program be for five years. Rav Goldvicht told us that there were only a handful of times in his life when he felt a secular Jew had bested him, but this was one of them. He objected to a five-year program, saying that few boys would be willing to make such a long-term commitment. The army officer replied, “You may get fewer boys, but they will be better boys.” Rav Goldvicht conceded the point, and the first hesder yeshiva at Kerem B’Yavneh was born.

Abbe Dienstag

Lawrence

Why air security failed

To the Editor:

It seems that no one throughout the ranks, from the security guards up to the top, has what is simply common sense. We are relying too much on technology and not enough on intuition. When this young man, not a US citizen, chose to pay for a one-way ticket with cash coming from Nigeria, a simple question should have been asked: why? Now innocent passengers will be subjected to over-the-top measures to appease the public perception that something more is being done, when all that was required was some good old-fashioned common sense.

Dr. Robin Wieder

East Rockaway