As we wrote last month, Rebbetzin Weinberg, zt”l, was an integral part of Baltimore for as long as anyone can remember. During those many years, her door – and her heart – were open to all. Not just to those from any one narrow segment of the community, not just to those who were influential, not just to those who were charming and talented. She truly reached out to everyone. “Who is honored?” it asks in Pirkei Avos, replying, “one who honors others.” Rebbetzin Weinberg embodied that dictum. She saw and honored the tzelem Elokim in each person. She was beloved, in return, and became a true leader of our community.
It is in the spirit of honoring her memory that we reprint this interview, published in these pages many years ago. Readers who knew Rebbetzin Weinberg well will delight in recalling her vibrant personality. And those who came to Baltimore more recently, and did not know her personally, will be “introduced.” What better way to describe the Rebbetzin and the themes of her life than through her own words? The insight, experience, and wisdom she expresses here continue to be relevant today.
We repeat our request for readers to write their personal reminiscences for a future article. Please send your contributions to adswww@aol.com.
Rebbetzin Chana Weinberg gets into trouble wherever she goes. Well, not exactly. What really happens is that trouble finds her. Her warm, accepting personality has always drawn people to share what is on their hearts. And, after a lifetime of extending an open hand, an understanding ear, and a shared sigh, her reputation precedes her.
You would think that Rebbetzin Weinberg needs no introduction in Baltimore. She has lived in our city most of her life and played a part in nearly every chesed initiative of the past 60 years. Moreover, her name is synonymous with the city’s great Torah institution, Yeshivas Ner Yisrael, founded by her parents, and headed by her great father, Harav Yaakov Yitzchok Ruderman, zt”l, and, later, by her great husband, Harav Shmuel Yaakov Weinberg, zt”l. Rebbetzin Weinberg is well known around the world in her own right for her work on domestic abuse. Yet, though she is very approachable, most of us view “The Rebbetzin” in awe from afar and wonder: Who is the woman behind that regal public persona?
One thing is certain: You cannot pigeonhole Rebbetzin Weinberg. She is a woman of her generation – a more genteel generation – yet she is thoroughly modern in her thinking. She is a doer and an innovator, a model of creativity in chesed. She relates to individuals with empathy yet is able to create and administer entire systems. Most of all, she integrates deep emuna and love of Yiddishkeit with knowledge of the world and of human nature.
Rebbetzin Weinberg spent her first four years in Lithuania. Her father, a talmid of the Alter of Slobodka, came to America in 1930 to teach in New Haven, Connecticut. There, his father-in-law, Rav Sheftel Kramer, was mashgiach in the first yeshiva outside of New York City. Mrs. Ruderman and the four-year-old Chana arrived not long afterwards. Soon the family moved to Cleveland and, finally, to Baltimore. Although Switzerland and Boston had also been possible destinations, the Rudermans chose Baltimore, because they felt the city offered the greatest opportunities for sowing Torah knowledge.
Baltimore of the 30s and 40s was a very different place from today’s community. A nucleus of frum Jews lived downtown, near the shuls clustered around Broadway and Lombard Streets. Other Jews had started to move to North Avenue, Lower Park Heights, and Forest Park. Young people were drifting away from Yiddishkeit; the spirit of the times demanded acculturation to the American scene and moving up the ladder of economic opportunity through education. The few parents who wanted Orthodox Jewish schooling sent their boys to the Talmudical Academy.
When the Rudermans came to town, they found most Baltimore Jews uninterested in a European-style yeshiva. Some of them were vehemently opposed. They found some support, however, from people like the Friedlanders, the Jacobsons, and the Nathan Adlers. In 1933, Ner Israel came into being in a shul in Forest Park – its name, “light of Israel,” having been pronounced by Rebbetzin Ruderman. The early years were hard. As the Rosh Yeshiva taught and inspired, his wife canvassed local businessmen to contribute food and linens for the yeshiva’s handful of students. She also took care of them when they were sick.
Meanwhile, Chana Ruderman grew up, the only daughter of idealistic parents. She watched them through the years being devoted to, and conscious of, building a historic institution of Torah continuity. She returned from school each day to find great personalities of the Torah world as well as the mass of humanity passing through her home. She observed the founding meetings of Torah U’Mesorah. She saw her father sending American immigration papers to rosh yeshivas in Europe, only to be told that they would not leave their talmidim (students).
As a teenager, the young Rebbetzin Weinberg met other religious girls at her Bnos group. The 16 of them would get together Sunday mornings at the Glen Avenue shul to hear Rabbi Shimon Schwab talk about Jewish history. Gradually, the Yeshiva grew and Forest Park became a more religious area. By 1941, it had built a beautiful building on Garrison Boulevard. Rebbetzin Weinberg remembers people walking up on Simchas Torah from Lower Park Heights. When they were exhausted and hoarse from the singing and dancing, at 2 o’clock in the morning, they would drop in to the Rosh Yeshiva’s house for “gogelmogols,” an eggnog-like concoction of hot milk, egg, and honey.
Rebbetzin Weinberg married young. Her husband, Rabbi Weinberg, was a student of Rabbi Yitzchok Hutner at Yeshivas Chaim Berlin. The marriage was blessed with six children. Many years of learning and teaching followed. The Weinbergs continued their parents’ mission for close to 50 years, educating thousands of talmidim and helping to build Ner Israel into a world-renowned bastion of Torah. In 1987, when Rabbi Ruderman was niftar (passed away) after long, fruitful service to the Yeshiva and, by extension, to American and world Jewry, Rabbi Weinberg became Rosh Yeshiva.
Rebbetzin Weinberg began her life of chesed and community activism even before she was married, when she and her Bnos friends sent hundreds of pounds of clothing to Palestine. “That really was the beginning of my acquaintance with veltschmertz, the pain of the world,” she says. She continued as a newlywed, helping 32 young couples, Holocaust survivors whom Ner Israel sponsored to come study in the Yeshiva, to start a new life. Together, the young Weinbergs traveled to Lexington Park, Maryland, every Wednesday evening for seven years. While Rabbi Weinberg gave classes and davened with the men, the Rebbetzin taught the children to read Hebrew and prepared the boys for their bar mitzvas.
As founder and coordinator of Bikur Cholim of Baltimore, Rebbetzin Weinberg dispenses funds for medical bills, prescriptions, and other urgent needs. The large and comprehensive group, which she organized and directs, is just the most prominent example of her accomplishments in easing the lives of others. Around the same time that Bikur Cholim was formed, she started concrete projects to help victims of domestic abuse, an area she had been dealing with informally for many years. Her efforts broadened as she was invited to speak at the Jewish Taskforce of the Center for Domestic Violence conference in Seattle. That led to speaking tours to Jewish communities around the world, where the Rebbetzin raised people’s awareness of the problem. She also had a hand in establishing the Ahava home for disabled men and Gevuras Yarden/Jewish Caring Network. She is on the board of CHANA and Jewish Hospice.
Rebbetzin Weinberg taught Hebrew school at Liberty Jewish Center for over 20 years. After her children were grown, she returned to school and earned certification in geriatrics; she worked as the director of volunteers at the Jewish Convalescent and Nursing Home for almost 10 years. And of course, the Rebbetzin is the Where What When’s long-time columnist, with her monthly “Shalom Bayis” column.
Yes, Rebbetzin Weinberg is in a class by herself. Combining the traits of compassion, moral strength, and focused action, she represents the best in Jewish womanhood. Here, Rebbetzin Weinberg gives us a glimpse into her world and her views.
Where What When: Rebbetzin Weinberg, people call you day and night. How do you choose which causes and cases to get involved in? And how do you cope with so many problems and projects?
Rebbetzin Chana Weinberg: It’s not a question of choosing. If anybody approaches me about a problem, I try to do what is needed. When something is pressing, I find it difficult to just pass it by. And there is not time to consider how to cope.
WWW: Should busy mothers with many children of their own devote time to chesed outside the home?
Reb W: If you ask a busy person, he or she will always find the time. It’s the ones who have more children and more responsibilities who are willing to do for others. I’ve also seen that you have more fulfillment in life if you help others, rather than just concentrating on your own family’s needs – although priority number one must be your husband and children.
WWW: Do you think the children resent it if the mother is always running to do chesed?
Reb W: I asked my children if they remembered me going off and leaving the dishes in the sink. They said they thought it was a natural thing to do: If you had a mitzva to attend to, you just went. And I think it rubbed off on them, because I remember once the children came running in to tell me that a woman in Danon’s grocery store on Garrison Boulevard was looking for our house, and my daughter Aviva said, “Oh, she can stay here.” It turned out that this woman could have murdered us in our beds. We ended up having her committed to the State mental hospital in Catonsville, for which the family in New Jersey wrote to thank us.
WWW: Did you try to protect your children from knowing about some of the realities you were dealing with? How did you balance work and family?
Reb W: You try to balance work and family as best as possible. Since Rav Weinberg was giving shiurim in the Yeshiva, our home was always open to the students, and we also had to entertain their parents. Of course, you can never do anything 100 percent. There was no way my children could not have known when I tried to help people in bad situations, although I sometimes asked them to please leave the room when I was on the phone. We tried to protect them as much as we could. Sometimes the children would come home and say that their classmates were “talking about what you do.” I would tell the children, “Listen! Nobody talks about a nobody. So if they talk about you, you’re a somebody!” I didn’t want them to feel there was something wrong with doing what had to be done.
WWW: Is there anything you learned in your childhood that helped you in all your years of chesed work?
Reb W: When we came to America, I was four years old, and we lived in Cleveland with my grandparents. There was a kitten that used to come around, and I gave it milk every day. One day it scratched me. I still remember the feeling of betrayal. My grandfather took me on his lap and told me that, in life, there would be people whom I would try to help and that they would hurt me. But, he said, I would have to make up my mind that I would continue to help them. I’ve kept that as my motto.
I also learned a lot from my father. He was always optimistic. He used to tell me that there are times in life when you feel like you’re in a tunnel, but you just have to look for that little speck of light and follow it in order to get out.
WWW: When you look back on your life, is there anything you would change?
Reb W: Oh yes, many things. When the children were younger, I made the mistake of going out to teach Hebrew school in the afternoon, thinking that in the morning I should take care of the house and make supper. I realized later that I should have been there when they came home, so they wouldn’t have had to tell the babysitter what happened in school. Nobody told me. I looked at it as helping the family financially, but it was at the expense of losing that first contact when they came home.
WWW: What would you say to people who are overwhelmed by regret or guilt about a mistake they made in their life?
Reb W: I have always felt that guilt is a wasted emotion. Whenever you see the necessity for change, just do it, if it can be done. Instill in the children and grandchildren that you love and care for them, that they are the number one priorities. Care for each other, and look for the good in people.
WWW: You are the head of Bikur Cholim, which is full of volunteers helping people on a regular basis. Which is better: doing everyday chesed for neighbors and friends or working for an organization?
Reb W: Doing chesed individually or through an organization are both needed. Bikur Cholim was started at a certain point because the city was much bigger than it used to be. People who wanted to do for others didn’t know who needed the help. And people who needed help didn’t know whom to call. Bikur Cholim matched them up.
Sometimes there is a tendency to set aside certain hours for mitzvos, to “schedule” chesed. A better way is to just do whatever has to be done as it comes up. For example, I was once at a tahara. After we were finished, the shomer was late and everybody had to leave, so I was the one who stayed. It was so scary to stay alone with the meis. I did not not anticipate this – it just happened – but it had to be done. Chesed is not separate from your life; it should really be intertwined with your day, moment by moment.
WWW: What kind of chesed opportunities come your way nowadays?
Reb W: People who want to talk about what’s pressing on their hearts. There are young people worried about shidduchim or can’t make up their minds about a shidduch. Others come for Bikur Cholim, including people who need money for medical bills – and, for almost 18 years, getting calls about domestic abuse.
WWW: How did you get involved with domestic abuse?
Reb W: Women would come to Rav Weinberg, and he would call me in to see what I could do. What I did was to approach a State-run facility, where they gave us a room with a bed, a bureau, and a crib, and let us put in a microwave. Later, we had a “safe house” outside the community. Everything was done very quietly. Several people with very closed mouths helped me. Eventually, we had a system of safe houses in different cities, like the Underground Railroad, where the women could go. Today, through the Associated’s Project CHANA (Counseling Helpline and Aid Network for Abused Women), we have a safe house under police protection. The women can stay there and get help from a social worker.
WWW: What do you consider your biggest accomplishment in the field of domestic abuse?
Reb W: I would say the most difficult thing I did was to help make our leaders more responsive to the problem. When I went to conventions where Rabbi Weinberg was speaking, I would use the opportunity to talk to roshei yeshiva, trying to get them to be aware of domestic abuse, so that they could talk to their students about the proper way to act with a wife.
One time, I received a fax in Baltimore about a certain very difficult case in New York. That week I happened to go to a convention with Rabbi Weinberg and met the rosh yeshiva who knew this couple. I decided I had better speak to him, and so I did. I said, “Rabbi ____, apparently you heard of this case?” He said, “Yes, yes, I heard but I wasn’t listening.” So I took the bull by the horns, as the saying goes, and said, “Yes, Rabbi, but I think now you have to listen.” He opened his eyes wide – here I am talking to him like that – and I said, “If you would just let me speak to you for a few minutes…” which he did. After I spoke to him, he was very kind. He said to me “Rebbetzin Weinberg, I not only am listening, I’m hearing,” and 10 days later, this woman had a get – a Jewish divorce.
At first the rabbis didn’t want to hear these painful things; they didn’t want to get involved. But little by little, from speaking to them one on one, things changed. Later, when there was a conference on domestic abuse, over 200 rabbis came and spoke. So, that was very good.
WWW: Has the situation gotten any better since the shocking news came out about 20 years ago that domestic abuse exists in our community?
Reb W: I don’t think it’s gotten better. People are just more used to it now. At one time, it was hidden, and now it’s more in the open. People are aware that there are things you can do, people you can speak to, that you don’t have to be alone in such a situation. But the problem is still there and it always will be, because there will always be people who don’t know how to treat a spouse.
It’s not always men, either. The way women sometimes push their husbands can also make trouble in a marriage. They have to have a better kitchen; they have to have a piece of jewelry. In marriage, if you put the “you” before the “I,” you don’t reach the stage where you need to have something because your neighbor has it.
WWW: What are the most common problems you see in marriages?
Reb W: I think one of the biggest problems is that men and women don’t sit down and communicate with each other. Life is in a fast lane. Most people never say, “Whoa, what are we talking about? What do we mean?” If you really listen to your spouse, you can get beyond what he or she is saying to understand the kernel of the problem. What is really bothering him or her? If you don’t listen, if you’re too busy proving your point of view, you never get there.
Another thing I feel very strongly about: Many young people today don’t know what it is to ask daas Torah. If every young couple that gets married today had someone to go to for advice, what a difference that would make. Either they think they don’t need it, which, of course, is the wrong attitude, or they don’t know how to ask. This a terrible lack in one’s life. We are not utilizing our rabbanim and not educating our youngsters, our people, to really live our lives in a Torah way.
WWW: It seems that domestic abuse has taken the back seat to newer and even more shocking problems, like children off the derech and all that’s associated with that. Why are these distressing things happening to us?
Reb W: We don’t give children a childhood. They have to learn Chumash by a certain age, and we spoon it to them. Fathers are so intent on getting the kids on this level or that level. Where is the joy in getting them on that level? We take little kids and saddle them with homework. Do they do it? No, we have to do it with them. I feel that children should learn during the hours they are in school, and after school, they should be interacting with each other and their families. We then rush to get them to shul. Do we explain to them why we are in shul? What the davening means? To Whom we are davening? Where is the joy of welcoming in the Shabbos? This is what Hakadosh Baruch Hu is waiting for. We’re losing touch with the ability to do mitzvos with joy. We’re told that the Aibishter (Almighty) doesn’t give us more than we can bear. If that’s true, why can’t we act with hakaras hatov (gratitude), rather than feeling it’s a duty and a heavy yoke?
WWW: What can we do?
Reb W: We have to stop and look at ourselves. We have to get together as a people and change our basic way of living to the way the Aibishter wants us to live. It’s not just having the children that’s important – it’s teaching them the proper way, to know how to behave in the home and in business. Raising children is very hard nowadays when the world is in such flux, not just politically but also socially. I’m very concerned about the terrible and growing lack of derech eretz, respect for one another, the lack of kindness and thoughtfulness. We go to our stores and expect immediate attention. I see more pushing and more horn blowing and more children not being taught the basics of proper conduct. We’re too busy to know when our neighbors need something.
I sometimes wonder if parents have given up teaching their children middos. Perhaps they feel it’s something the schools should do. But I think it is our responsibility as parents. Remember, if there’s one dysfunctional family of five children, when they get married, that makes five dysfunctional families. Generations of dysfunctional families can result, so it is important to nip it in the bud. Each and every one of us has a responsibility, when we see a family having trouble, to show them what to do and how. We are responsible one for the other.
WWW: You mentioned learning from older people. You worked with the elderly in the nursing home. What did you learn from them?
Reb W: I learned that I had a lot to learn. I saw that some families came to visit every day and others seldom came. And it seemed to me that even among the people who came every day, some did it out of love and caring, and another group that, although they visited regularly, were coming out of a sense of duty – and the parent knew it. These residents were not at peace when their children came; they were more irritated than usual.
I also noticed that the residents whose children were most happy to come were the ones who were happy to see their children and did not discuss themselves. They were more interested in what the families had to say. I learned that it has a lot to do with attitude. Those residents who were pleasant and hopeful enjoyed their families, and their families enjoyed them. Then there were the ones who were bitter or cynical or had old family issues that were never resolved. You can learn a lot by just observing. I also had one of the most meaningful experiences of my life in the nursing home.
WWW: What happened?
Reb W: We were all ready for Yom Kippur – a man was going to come in to conduct the services – when there was a bad outbreak of salmonella. The patients were not allowed to come out of their rooms. The thought of them spending Yom Kippur with just the non-Jewish staff, and not understanding the seriousness of the day, really bothered me. I asked the Rosh Yeshiva if he would mind if I stayed there for Yom Kippur. He said to do what I felt was necessary. And I did. I took along the recording of Richard Tucker singing Kol Nidre and played it on each floor on the morning of erev Yom Kippur. Then I spent the day going into the rooms. I had to change my gown and mask before entering each room. Whatever the resident asked for, I tried to do, whether it was Yizkor or Al Chet, or any part of the davening. Yom Kippur night, I went into the auditorium by myself and davened. Then in the morning, I started doing the rounds again. I only made it through 45 rooms, and I was very, very tired, but it was so rewarding to me that I could help them feel a little bit of Yom Tov. I came back numb with fatigue, but I never had such a feeling that I had done the right thing.
WWW: I think everyone would like to know how it feels to have grown up with a great man, and to have been married to a great man. What was it like?
Reb W: When I was little, I didn’t know what the outside world thought of my father. To me, he was great because he was my father. He would tell me stories from Tanach or the gedolim. Of course, when I got older, I saw other people come for advice, and I began to see him in a different way. But to me, he was Papa.
He taught me a lot. I especially remember an incident when I was maybe 20 years old. I opened up the Jewish Times, and I saw that Ner Israel was going to honor two shuls. Everybody knew that one of the two was turning Conservative. I ran to my father, a hot-headed teenager, so to speak (even though I was already married), and I said, “How could you do that? Such a busha (shame)!” He let me rant on, and then he said, “Are you finished already?” He continued, “A rosh yeshiva has to think not only for the moment; he has to think what the reaction will be 25 years from now. How do you know that the fact that we are honoring them won’t stop them from doing what they shouldn’t be doing?” I said, “Well, I think it’s disgusting, and I’m not going to go the banquet.” Imagine! That’s the way I spoke. He smiled, and said, “We’ll see.” I said, “Oh, no, I’m not going.”
When I came home, I told my husband about the incident. He just smiled and didn’t say anything. A few days later, he said, “You know we have to go to the banquet.” I said, “I’m not going.” He smiled again and said, “Well, we’re going.” So we went. Unfortunately, I was sitting at the table of the honorees. I was miserable; I really wished I were someplace else. Well, they called up the two presidents. I’ll never forget this. The men went up there and got their plaques and came back to the table. Then one of them took his glass and banged it on the table and said, “Now we have to stay Orthodox!” That was a lesson to me, one that I still remember today. The lesson is, think of the consequence, of the result.
WWW: I heard that your mother was also a great personality. What did you learn from her?
Reb W: I learned that you put aside your personal wants to work for the good of the klal. She also showed me that a woman is there to be a support and a partner in the true sense of the word to her husband. She was my father’s sounding board; she tried to ease his problems and to make the people who came to see him comfortable. At the same time, she gave him “space,” so he could rest and renew himself.
WWW: What about your husband, the great rosh yeshiva?
Reb W: One thing I can tell you: he didn’t have any ego. He didn’t consider himself great or important. That just didn’t enter into the picture. If he saw something that had to be done, he just did it. I don’t know how to express it. It was just a way of life – that you do not what’s convenient for you but you do for others. His whole being was emes, truth. He acted according to the emes, even if it was hard. That was his philosophy.
Once, it was very late and I had already retired for the night. He woke me up, which was very unusual, and said, “You have to come out. Someone is here.” It was a case of domestic abuse. I said, “I’ll call them in the morning.” He said, “Chanele, no, you have to talk to them now.”
In the 70s and 80s, when Ner Israel kollel couples went to other cities to start kollelim from scratch, we used to go visit them – to keep up the kesher (connection) and to give them chizuk (encouragement). Rabbi Weinberg would talk to the men, and I would speak to the women. Then we went to Los Angeles for 18 years, to many Shabbatons of the Iranian community there. They look upon the Rosh Hayeshiva as their father. I still go every year.
I think he helped create the idealism that kollel people show today. Now, when a young man is approached to go out to a midbar (desert) to start a kollel, he goes. At one time, in the 60s, they were not so anxious to go. A rabbi from Torah u’Mesorah came down to speak to the kollel couples about going out to save neshamas, and he came to our house very upset because one of the wives asked if there was a pizza place in that faraway city.
So, it wasn’t like you were living with a “great man.” It wasn’t anything like that. It was just the ability to learn all the time from his way of relating to people. Even when Rav Weinberg was quite ill, at the end, he was always seeing what he could do for somebody. That was the way he was.
WWW: Some people revere gedolim even without knowing them, while others say, they’re just human, like everyone else. You interacted with these great men and knew them well. In your opinion, what should be our attitude towards them?
Reb W: The truth is that in everything the gedolim do, there’s a lesson. I always saw my father full of respect for gedolim. And I saw gedolim full of respect for all people. When R. Aharon Kotler came to America, he stayed with us in Baltimore for three months. (I remember, because I slept in the living room!) I saw him go down every morning to meet the mailman and say, “Vus macht a Yid? (How are you doing?)” My mother asked him, “Why do you do that?” He answered, “Because, even though he doesn’t keep anything, he has a pintele Yid, the dot of a Jew. He’s a mensch. I have to greet him.” This made an impression on me.
I saw many great men on an everyday basis and in all circumstances, when they came to speak to my father on various topics. They were on a very high level, but when they got together, they were human. Also, not everybody is the same; if someone became a rosh yeshiva, it doesn’t mean he is perfect. But the ones who are really for people are truly special, like R. Aharon Kotler. I can’t explain it. When he spoke to you, he had such sharp eyes. I felt them boring into my brain, as though he knew exactly what I was thinking. So, to answer your question: Yes, gedolim are human, yet when they are needed for something, they have a totally different look. They rise to the heights.
WWW: Are you saying that it is not only our leaders’ learning; it’s their caring that makes them great?
Reb W: It’s their caring, and their consideration. The consideration my father had for my mother is a lesson that I wish all the bachurim would emulate. He once left the davening on Yom Tov and walked all the way back to the house because he had promised my mother a Machzor and forgot to leave it. So, the respect for gedolim was not anything we were formally taught. We saw it. It was the same with my husband: unbelievable caring. It was on a different plane.
WWW: How can others learn that quality?
Reb W: A person has to have a personal connection with a rebbe. I can’t say that strongly enough. Those bachurim (students) who have that connection invariably find that something of the rebbe’s qualities rubs off on them. I think that most men, and most people in Baltimore, have many opportunities for learning about these subjects. Young men in yeshivas realize that they have to put effort into a marriage. The rebbeim in Ner Yisrael try to instill this into their students. Not only can they talk to their rebbeim “in learning” but also in how they should run their lives. The rebbeim are there for the bachurim. Their homes are open for them to come and observe. I think one of the pluses of Ner Yisrael is rooted in the way my father started the Yeshiva; he wanted the boys to feel it was their home. And I know from personal experience how closely the Rosh Yeshiva, zt”l, and his talmidim were in touch.
WWW: I’ve heard you speak many times about the importance of respect. Should a person be respected because of his or her role or status in life? Or because of that person’s actions?
Reb W: I think there’s a certain element of learning to respect people that starts in the home. A child learns to know that you don’t sit in Tatty’s or Mommy’s chair, for instance. Not because their chairs are any different. It’s just the idea that this is your parent’s place. If you think of your parents in that way, it is ultimately going to affect the way you speak to them, the way you regard them. This is a very important part of chinuch.
It’s the same with teachers. Getting up when the principal comes into the room is a symbol of respect for the position. But the symbol only reminds you of the real respect: being aware that this person has something to teach you for life. So, it’s a combination of respect for the position and for the individual, who has earned respect because of the way the person conducts his or her life.
It’s important that children not hear the adults in their homes making leitzanus (mockery) of teachers and rebbeim. I don’t think people realize what they’re doing when they make fun of rebbeim and rabbanim. Their children lose out, because they won’t be open to respecting them or gain from their presence.
By the way, it’s not a lack of respect for children to know that our leaders are human. In fact, I think it’s very important for them to know that. Part of the problem today is the biographies of gedolim. Children read these books, where it says that a gadol knew Shas when he was 14 years old, and the boy thinks, “I can’t do that. I won’t even try. What’s the use?”
WWW: Where can those of us not in yeshiva find role models?
Reb W: I don’t think you have to look very far to find them. If you look at people with an eye towards seeing them in a positive way, then your whole attitude becomes different. It’s not, what can I get out of so and so? Rather, you ask yourself, what it is about this man that makes him command the respect of his children? Or how can I emulate that woman’s special way of saying good Shabbos, which made such a difference to that lonely person walking down the street? In this way, you can always find someone – a next-door neighbor, a minyan mate, a fellow worker – from whom you can learn.
WWW: The difficulties of many children in our community, which has been revealed in the last several years, has caused young parents a lot of fear. In addition to love and patience, can you give us a few key ideas to guide us in bringing up children in today’s world?
Reb W: The basic things are honesty and trust and proper behavior. And we need to teach by example; that’s the best way. It’s not what I say but what I do that counts. This is so important for young people with young families to know. If children see that parents respect each other and work together as a unit, they observe, and they grow up to do the same thing. A parent needs to have self-respect. I also think it’s very important for parents to give children hope. As long as you can walk and talk and hear and breathe, there is hope to improve and grow. And we should teach our children to take responsibility for helping each other.
WWW: You’ve gone through the very painful experience of losing your beloved husband. What do you understand now that you didn’t understand before?
Reb W: I think that losing a husband or wife makes you recognize what you had, aware of the opportunities that you didn’t use and that you can never have again. It’s a regret and a pain over those wasted opportunities. The ache grows and spreads and covers you like a blanket. It’s difficult to keep concentrating and stay focused. All you can do is go back in your memories and try to pick out as much as you can. I’ve seen this among his talmidim, as well. They tell me they feel like orphans without Rav Weinberg, zt”l, that they didn’t take advantage of being with him. Why didn’t they walk back from yeshiva with him? Spend more time with him?
I think, also, that when you sit down at a meal, and you want to talk about family or about an event you heard about on the radio, and there’s nobody there to answer, that’s a terrible realization. In general, the whole experience makes you more patient with people. If they’re alone or have problems, you’re more in tune with what it’s like. Of course, you have to keep going; that’s what your spouse would want you to do.
WWW: It seems that the thrust of your activities has always been to alleviate people’s pain.
Reb W: I think so. The difference is that now I feel that I have to be an activist, which really is contrary to my nature. In order for me to live with myself, in order to sleep well, I have to speak my piece. I can’t just say, “Well, this is the way it is.” I have to talk about it.
WWW: What do you mean?
Reb W: From all the years that I’ve been working with people, there are several things that stare me in the face. I don’t know if I can make my words strong enough, but I’ll try: We, as a people, have no right to thrust our children into situations they’re unprepared for. You cannot take a 19-year-old girl and expect her to know how to act as a mother and as a wife without training. You can’t expect a boy who’s been sitting and learning to understand what it’s like to care for another human being without teaching him – that he has help his wife, and that it takes time away from learning. You have to show a wife that you care for her. The men are not going to learn that by simply telling them, “Well, it’s time for you to get married.”
I think it’s a crime! I think we’re pushing our kids too early. We’re not training them. We have so many young people who are getting married and have no idea what marriage is. It’s not a lark. It’s a responsibility from the Aibishter. How can you get married if you don’t know what to do and how to do? And who are the korbanos (sacrifices)? The children.
Our schools need to give teenagers the tools with which to make a proper marriage. Not only that. If at all possible, I would like to see the rabbanim insist that they will not officiate at a wedding unless they have spoken to the couple at least twice. Young people should not be simply thrust into marriage, concentrating on the wedding details rather than the life after the wedding.
There are many many nights when I don’t sleep well, thinking of problems that could have been alleviated by having the young people prepared.
WWW: What if he thinks they’re not ready?
Reb W: If the rav thinks they are not ready, he should talk to them some more or send them to the proper professionals who have the skills to prepare them for married life. But certainly, he should not come to the chuppa until they understand what marriage is. Too many people say, “Oh, they’ll learn along the way.” But how many mistakes will they make?
Just last week, I had a young woman say to me, “If we can’t get along, I guess we’ll just have to separate.” Separate! When Hakadosh Baruch Hu gave you a gift of children! You’re going to destroy a family without trying? There’s something very wrong if our young people have that attitude. And then I asked her how her parents felt about this situation? This is the part that really put a knife into my heart: She said, “Well, they don’t like the idea of me getting divorced, because it’s a lot harder to marry off a divorced woman with children.” There was a total lack of understanding on her part of what marriage is. I was shocked that a girl who was brought up in Bais Yaakov should be so blasé about her marriage.
Then there was the mother and son who were shopping for his wedding. All this young man could say was that he wants this and he wants that. The mother asked him why he wanted those things? He said, “Well, you have them.” Look what he’s saying! It took the parents 25 years to accumulate whatever small luxuries they had. He wants it now. What did the parents lack when they were training him, that he should have that attitude?
WWW: You speak to the Bais Yaakov girls in twelfth grade each year. What do you tell them?
Reb W: First of all, I ask them to write down what they think marriage is and what they are looking for in a husband. I tell them to put away this piece of paper for five years and then to look back and see whether they have grown or whether they are at the same level. Many of the girls want to marry a kollel man. I tell them you can’t marry a kollel man because your friend married a kollel man. It’s a hard life. You’re not going to have an easy time of it. I tell it to them straight.
Some of them ask me very pointed questions. They want to know what’s the best way to prepare themselves, and what red flags to look out for. They’re sensible, more sensible than some of the mothers who are so frantic to get these girls married. I’m very concerned about that.
WWW: Do you blame the mothers, considering the singles crisis? What’s going on?
Reb W: I think it’s a vicious cycle, without a beginning or an end. It starts early, when the children are younger, and so many of us push them into learning this and learning that. The important thing is to learn middos! Start in the home. How do the parents treat each other? How do the siblings get along? Whatever they see in the home is what they will do themselves. But we’re so busy pushing them more and more. I feel that we’re making this crisis ourselves. And I think we have to stop and look at ourselves and think, what is going to be in the next generation? It’s not going to get better unless we make it better.
WWW: How? What should we do?
Reb W: All of us have to stop and think – think of what we say, what we do, how we can improve our day. The biggest thing of all is to have the joy of living, and I’ve said this over and over again: We have to have simcha. If you are well and you have your faculties and you can go run and do avodas Hashem, do whatever you want, what a joy! We have such a beautiful world around us.
Sure it’s hard when you’re faced with problems. But, instead of getting up in the morning and bemoaning a new day of troubles, why not take joy in a whole new day and feel that the Aibishter will help. But the Aibishter won’t help if you don’t extend your hand first. It makes a big difference when our children see that we approach life and its problems with an attitude of simcha. Instead of heaviness, cynicism, and bitterness, we can say to ourselves, “Baruch Hashem I’m alive and I can think and I can attack my problems. If we each had that attitude, wouldn’t life be different? There are two ways of looking at life: The glass is half empty or the glass is half full. It makes a very big difference which one you choose.
WWW: You’ve really gotten to the heart of what is going on in our community. What do you see in the future?
Reb W: Life as we know it won’t be much longer. I think we’re really living in mashiach tzeiten (messianic times). I could be wrong, but for the past six months, I have had a sense that we are getting ready for a different way of life, and it’s our own hands that will cause it. It is something we should look forward to with the right attitude, because I think the Aibishter is going to take His cues from us. I feel like there’s a pause, I can’t explain it. The way life is now is not the real life, and we are ready to do more and be on a totally different plane. Even physically, I don’t think it will be the same. It may sound crazy; I’m trying to verbalize what I feel. It’s as though Hakadosh Baruch Hu is waiting. He’s waiting to take us to another level. But whether it happens, and the direction it will take, is up to us – maybe not collectively, maybe individually. The main thing we can do – in our daily thinking and behavior – is to always keep our focus on avodas Hashem (service of G-d). We have to look forward. Things have to be different; they have to be beautiful, spiritually and physically.
WWW: That’s quite a statement. Thank you for a remarkable interview.
