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A special visit to the book collection in the holy dwelling of our Rebbe Rav Eliezer Berland shlit”a
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What bookmarks does Rav Berland place in his books?
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What is the explanation of the emphases inside the books?
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What lies in the closet which appears to be a clothes closet?
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Why isn’t there padding on the seats in the living room?
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The first part in a fascinating series on the greatness of Rav Berland in learning Torah
Shulchan Tamid
If a man gives all the wealth of his house in exchange for the awesome love of our Rebbe Rav Berland for Torah, they would scorn him to the extreme. “If people would feel the sweetness and pleasantness of Torah,” the holy Or HaChaim says, “they would go crazy and burn after it, and a worlds-full of silver and gold would be considered nothing for them, because the Torah includes all the good in the world.” Anyone who wants to, for example, live and experience this should look at a rabbi who resembles an angel – behold, this is our Rebbe Rav Berland shlit”a. His incredible love for the holy Torah knows no bounds – no bounds of time, no bounds of body. “Because they are our lives and length of days” – literally. “You will always be intoxicated with her love…” Every book, anthology, journal, and pamphlet which contains words of Torah are seized upon by our Rebbe Rav Berland and consumed with fervor.
In order to receive a small taste of the sweetness of and persistence in Torah, we made our way a year ago to the holy dwelling of our Rebbe Rav Berland on Rechov HaHoma HaShlishit in Jerusalem, escorted by Rabbi and Dayan [Torah judge in monetary disputes] Rav Yosef Man shlit”a, who has merited for decades to be responsible for the book collection in the home of our Rebbe Rav Berland and for the printing of tens of books especially for our Rebbe Rav Berland at his request. We are entering the inner sanctum – the living room with the legendary table which we all merit to see during the times that we merited to enter and appear “before the king,” with the entire table full to the extreme with holy books in all areas of Torah. As said, we conducted the visit last year, when in our many sins the Shechinah (Divine presence) was in exile, and the Tzaddik who took upon himself endless scorn for the sake of the Jewish people, was exiled from his home. Then the table here was empty of books. With Hashem’s kindness, we merited to see in a great miracle the return of Rav Berland to his home and the return of the awesome light and splendor many times over, and again we merit to see here the stacks of holy books and the burning love of Torah which emanates from this holy home.
Now we take the special tour
Along the whole length of one wall lies a giant bookcase, big and long, full of holy books. On the other wall also lie a number of bookcases which are also full. We approach with fear and love, contemplating the many books. In every book are a number of bookmarks similar to the legendary yellow pages of the prayers of the Rav, or white tissues, and also kvitle’s [prayer requests] of people…
Bookmarks from prison
“After our Rebbe Rav Berland left prison,” Rav Yosef says, “I saw bookmarks of another sort… papers from the prison inscribed with meal times of the prisoners and the like, green tea wrappers and more…” We notice books missing in the bookcase in many places – Rav Man explains, “These are books that we took from here and the table to Rav Berland at the place that he is staying, according to his request.”
The room of Kabbalah books
From the living room, we move on to another room which is also full of books – a bookcase which is packed-full through its entire length with books. “Here is mainly books of Torat HaSod [e.g. kabbalah],” Rav Yosef tells us. Likewise, we find there a wide variety of kabbalah books of all types and categories. Also here, the books are full of bookmarks. Through the width of the room stands a closet which appears to be a clothes closet, only it also is full of holy books. “The books which our Rebbe Rav Berland studies and involves himself with,” says Rav Yosef, “are so plentiful, to the point that already there’s no place in the house to contain them… We already have to fill up also closets such as these…” We uncover amidst the books also the books of the Kabbalaist Chacham Rav Yitzchak Kaduri ztz”l, with a copy of his holy handwriting appearing on one side of the book.
Another room which we come to is in essence a waiting room. Here people would wait during kabbalat kahal (reception of the public) to enter to see the Rav. Also this room is filled from every direction with bookcases and holy books… The fire of the love of Torah, the desire and thirst for what is more desirable than gold, than even much fine gold, are tangible in this holy home.
Lines of fire
In many books, we encounter emphasized lines. We close our eyes and try to imagine the torch of fire involved with flames of fire in Torah; it reaches sections where the flame gets stronger and larger – fire eats fire. It takes the pen and marks in black fire upon white fire, and the letters fly into the air…
“There are many books here,” Rav Man returns us to the ground, “which were printed especially for our Rebbe Rav Berland. Those books whose writing was small, crowded and old, and very hard to read… We saw the Rav’s grief and decided to reprint them.”
When Rav Berland asked to change the seats
We return to the living room, taking a number of additional photographs. Rav Yosef turns our attention to the wooden chairs which surround the long table, seats without padding. “There was a period where there were padded seats here, but Rav Berland requested to switch them. The Rav asserted that padded seats could cause sleep, as opposed to an unpadded seat… The Torah is acquired through minimization of sleep…”
Pillar of Torah
Among the things that we understand is that Rav Yosef is the one who merited, over the course of decades, to be responsible over all this “true good.” According to the request of Rav Berland, he merited to be the one who purchased, organized and also printed… He says that he is aware of endless stories in which he saw the love of Rav Berland for Torah and his greatness in all its secrets. Likewise, Rav Man shares with us a small glimpse into the awesome greatness of our Rebbe Rav Berland shlit”a, to which he merited to be witness:
“I want to precede with a small preface,” Rav Yosef begins. “It’s written, ‘On three pillars the world is founded – on Torah, on Avodah [e.g. prayer], and on acts of kindness.’ Rabbeinu [Rebbe Nachman] reveals that there is another pillar – humility and modesty – but this isn’t written, because humility and modesty are nothingness – this is something which you don’t write.
“Rabbi Pinchas of Koretz zy”a says, ‘Few are the people who are truly involved in Torah. Even fewer are the people who are involved in true Avodah – the Avodah in the heart – prayer. Even fewer are those who are involved in acts of kindness.’ When we look at our Rebbe Rav Berland, we see how each one of these pillars the Rav took completely, to the ultimate degree. Therefore, we need to understand that we are focused now on one pillar – the pillar of Torah, and also this is the outer point of the ways of the Tzaddik, because, for example, there is no way to define what is ‘Torah for its own sake.’ We have no idea or way to describe [what is the] learning for its own sake of Rav Berland… And as I said, we are focusing only on one area, which is learning Torah. If we further take, for instance, the service of prayer of our Rebbe Rav Berland, also there the stories won’t end. I, for instance, remember how the first time that I came to our Rebbe Rav Berland in his home in the Old City, the Rabbanit said, ‘Wait, the Rav is in the middle of prayer.’ How much time did I wait? Four hours! A four-hour Amidah in the Shacharit prayer of a regular day – from eight in the morning until twelve noon. And all of this was after the previous day when the Rav was fasting. This was during the days of Shovavim, and Rav Berland fasted Monday and Thursday, and the Rav didn’t break his fast at night, and now the Rav was still in Shacharit. So we see here what is service in the heart, and despite this, also the Torah learning wasn’t hurt.”
