Dr. Atarah Twersky daughter of Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik passes away at 90

The Rav's daughter Atarah passed away recently. I met her in Boston and corresponded with her a bit. She was very gracious to me. I was very impressed by her. She was a very intelligent and unpretentious woman.  Article from Arutz Sheva:

Dr. Atarah Twersky daughter of Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik passes away at 90 | ערוץ 7 (israelnationalnews.com)

Dr. Atarah Twersky, the widow of Professor Isadore Twersky, daughter of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik, passed away on Friday afternoon at 90.

Dr. Twersky was the sister of Dr. Tovah Lichtenstein, YU Professor of Jewish History Dr. Haym Soloveitchik, and mother of RIETS (Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary) Rosh Yeshiva Rabbi Mayer Twersky, Tzipporah Rosenblatt, and Rabbi Moshe Twersky, who was murdered in his synagogue in Jerusalem by a Palestinian terrorist in 2014.

The funeral in the US will take place on Saturday evening at 8:15 PM at JFK Airport: EL AL Cargo,123 North Hangar Road Jamaica, New York.

The funeral in Israel will take place Sunday at the Jerusalem Municipal Funeral Parlor (Shamgar) 2 hours after the arrival of LY 008, scheduled to arrive at 5:10 PM.

Samples from the Mesoras Harav Chumash

 Chumash Mesoras Harav (ohrpublishing.com)

cleaving to God

 Mystical philosophers long for immersion in the silence of absolute unity. The Greek philosopher Plotinus and all those who followed him were filled with such secret longings. But Judaism’s goal is not the same as that of the mystics with their via negativa, or negative way. The latter aspired to overcome the variety and uniqueness of man’s personality, recommending the negation of people’s variegated mental and physical existence for the sake of attaining pure, simple unity with no objective content. In denying the ontic independence of human beings, they came to deny their essence as well. They therefore recommended the via purgativa (method of elimination), which leads to unio mystica (mystic unification). The individual must empty out the content of his variegated life and freeze into a focal eternal point, lacking all dimension and context, and confine himself to the One.

But Judaism, directed by the Halakha says, “This is not the way.” First of all, one cannot speak of man uniting with God, but only of man cleaving to God. Second, man does not cleave to God by denying his actual essence, but, on the contrary, by affirming his own essence. The actual, multicolored human personality becomes closer to God when the individual lives his own variegated original life, filled with goals, initiative, and activity, without imagining some prideful insolent independence. Then and only then does the personality begin to have a divine existence. Judaism insists that destroying man’s uniqueness and originality does not bring man closer to God, as the mystics imagined. Man’s road to God does not wind among faraway hidden places – in which man concentrates on a mysterious pyre in which his individuality goes up in flames – but, rather, among the spaces of real being, filled with movement and transformation. (Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik, And From There You Shall Seek, MeOtzar HaRav, pp. 87-88)

the importance of mitzvos

What do we mean by תלמוד תורה כנגד כולם?

DH: What do we mean by תלמוד תורה כנגד כולם?

Rabbi Soloveitchik: It is not that this mitzvah is equal to all the mitzvos, but rather that it brings the person to do all the other mitzvos. The whole purpose of the limud is that it comes to asiah and asiah is the ikur.

The Rav Thinking Aloud, p. 69

And From There You Shall Seek, p. 104

Bottom line: Hashem acts, so we must act. 

 

Hebrew at the Maimonides School

 Jewish schools all over chutzeh l'aretz either don't put enough effort into teaching the Hebrew language or don't do it all. However, the Rav's Maimonides School in Brookline, MA appears to take it very seriously as all schools should.

 

About Our Hebrew Curriculum

Knowledge, performance, and competency of any foreign language include two independent systems that complement each other in many ways: The acquired system and the learned system. The acquired system, or acquisition, is the product of a subconscious process very similar to the one children undergo when they acquire their first language. It requires meaningful interaction in the target language – natural communication – in which speakers concentrate not on the form of their utterances, but on the communicative act. The learned system, or learning, is the product of formal instruction and comprises a conscious process which results in conscious knowledge about the language, for example knowledge of grammar rules. A deductive approach in a teacher-centered setting produces learning, while an inductive approach in a student-centered setting leads to acquisition. Learning Pathways At Maimonides School our students acquire the Hebrew language through four diverse and unique pathways.   Our wish and goal for our students is to test their knowledge and proficiency level through the International Hebrew Exam during 11th or 12th grade. This new initiative is a university-level course and test, taught and conducted by our Hebrew department teachers in collaboration with Bar-Ilan University in Israel. In order to achieve the goal of succeeding in the International Hebrew Exam, all Maimonides students are exposed to and being taught the following learning pathways: First Pathway: Bishvil Ha-Ivrit Curriculum The Middle and Upper School curriculum is divided into three levels, and each level has two parts: Beginner – Bishvil Ha-Ivrit books 1 and 2 Intermediate – Bishvil Ha-Ivrit books 3 and 4 Advanced – Bishvil Ha-Ivrit book 5 and NETA books 21-25 Second Pathway: Independent, Authentic Learning Units Every year, the Hebrew Language Department continues to develop learning units for all grades and levels (beginner, intermediate, and advanced). These units are created and developed through personal connections and familiarity with our students and their interests. The units are not only student-centered, but also based on second language acquisition theories and research-based assessment tools. These units differ in content, function, scope of sequence, complexity, and language objectives, and strive to make use of as many authentic materials as possible. Third Pathway: Reading Books and Reading Journals The “People of the Book” (Am Ha-Sefer) need no justification for the importance of reading. Nevertheless, in recent years few leading applied linguistics researchers have identified reading books in the target language as a critical component of second language acquisition. For these reasons, our department has developed a unique reading program: Each year students will read two books that are aligned with their proficiency level in content, length, complexity, and cognitive development. For each book we developed a supportive assessment and understanding mechanism, which is the reading journal. The reading journal is also our basis for class discussions, projects, and knowledge enrichment.  The books for the beginner and intermediate levels were written for those learners, whereas our goal is that the advanced level will read authentic books during this time. Fourth Pathway: Israeli High School-Oriented Proficiency We take pride in each of our students for their achievements and individual strengths. This is why we choose to further challenge the advanced level students in three areas of content which form the core of our shared identity: Literature, citizenship, and Judaism.

 

https://www.maimonides.org/middle-school-curriculum