Brisk yeshivas and methods
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The Brisk yeshivas and methods refers to the movement and to the adoption of the Brisker method of Talmudic study, originated by the Soloveitchik dynasty of rabbinic scholars and their students. It is so called because of the Soloveitchiks' origin in the town of Brisk, or Brest-Litovsk, located in what is now Belarus. Many of the first Soloveitchik rabbis were the official rabbis of Brisk, and each in turn was known as "the Brisker Rav." Today, Brisk refers to several Haredi yeshivas in Israel and the United States founded by members of the Soloveitchik family.
Acceptance into the Brisk yeshivas in Israel is usually dependent on two factors: a personal reference from someone known to the yeshiva's administration, and meeting its (unpublished) criteria for entrance. Its graduates often continue their studies after marriage in the Brisk Kollel ("graduate school").
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[edit] The Soloveitchik dynasty
The Soloveitchik family includes many significant rabbinical forbearers, most notably Rabbi Chaim Volozhiner, famed Talmudist and founder of the Volozhin yeshiva. Rabbi Chaim Volozhiner was a student of the Vilna Gaon, and thus some students of Brisk talk of a line of tradition extending "from Moses at Sinai, to Joshua, to the Elders ... to the Vilna Gaon, to Rabbi Chaim Volozhiner, and then to the Soloveitchik dynasty."
Most scholars, however, begin the Soloveitchik dynasty with Rabbi Joseph Dov (HaLevi) Soloveitchik known as the Beis HaLevi (see below), as he was the first rabbi of Brisk surnamed Soloveitchik. More significantly, the "Brisker style" described below can already be found to some degree in the Beis HaLevi's works, which is not the case for earlier ancestors.
[edit] The Beis HaLevi
Rabbi Joseph Dov (HaLevi) Soloveitchik (1820-1892) who is known by his pen name for his work the Beis HaLevi served as rabbi of Brisk for much of his life. All members of the Soloveitchik family are descended from the tribe of Levi and thus sometimes go by the surname "HaLevi". The surname "Soloveitchik", in fact, is Polish for "nightingale"; it was chosen by the family because the primary duty of the Levites in the Temple in Jerusalem was singing. (Note that the surname "Soloveitchik" can be spelled either as presented, or as "Soloveichik", without the "t". Throughout this article, "Soloveitchik" is used as the default, with the alternate spelling used for those rabbis -- such as Moshe and Ahron -- who spelled their names that way in English.) The works on the Mishnah Torah and first five books of the Hebrew Bible which Rabbi Joseph Dov Soloveichik authored were titled Beis HaLevi (Hebrew for "House of the Levites"). Many people therefore refer to him simply as the "Beis HaLevi", which also avoids the confusion with his two great-grandsons of the same name: (1) the son of Rabbi Moshe Soloveichik, Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik (1903-1993) who moved to the United States; and (2) the son of Rabbi Yitzchak Zev Soloveitchik, Rabbi Berel Solovetichik, who lived in Israel. The Beis HaLevi succeeded Rabbi Yehoshua Leib Diskin as rabbi of Brisk when the latter moved to Jerusalem in 1876. The Beis HaLevi had previously served as the rabbi of Slutzk, and before that, on the faculty of the Volozhin yeshiva.
[edit] Rabbi Chaim Soloveitchik
Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik I, i.e. "the Beis HaLevi", was succeeded as rabbi of Brisk by his son, Rabbi Chaim Soloveitchik (1853-1918). He is most commonly known as "Reb Chaim Brisker" (Rabbi Chaim from Brisk). His primary work was Chidushei Rav Chaim HaLevi, a volume of insights on the Mishneh Torah which often would suggest novel understandings of the Talmud as well. He had two famous sons, Yitzchak Zev and Moshe.
[edit] Rabbi Yitzchak Zev Soloveitchik
Rabbi Yitzchak Zev Soloveitchik became known as The Brisker Rov when he succeeded his father as rabbi of Brisk. He was often known by his nickname, Velvel', a Yiddish nickname for "little wolf". (Zev is Hebrew for "wolf".) He is also commonly known as the "GRYZ", an acronym for Gaon Rabbi Yitzchak Zev ("genius rabbi Isaac Wolf"). He became famous enough that many people, however, refer to him simply as Der Brisker Rov ("the rabbi of Brisk"). Like his father and grandfather, he published works based on the Mishneh Torah, often suggesting novel insights on the Talmud in the process. He fled the Holocaust and moved to the British Mandate of Palestine. His children and grandchildren live in Israel today, and have founded several Yeshivas there, all known as "Brisk" based in Jerusalem.
[edit] Rabbi Moshe Soloveichik
Rabbi Chaim Soloveitchik's other son was Rabbi Moshe Soloveichik. His works on the Rambam are known as the Chiddushei haGram haLevi and "Chiddushei haGram ve'haGrid." He served as the Rabbi of Rasseyn and then of Chaslavich. He then moved to Warsaw where he served as Rosh yeshiva of Tachkemoni. He moved to America in 1929 and was appointed as a rosh yeshiva at Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary (RIETS). (While RIETS has at no point ever called itself a "Brisk yeshiva" per se, it was home for many decades to Rabbi Moshe Soloveichik and later his sons). His sons were the famous Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik, who lived in Boston and commuted to teach Talmud at Yeshiva University in Manhattan; Rabbi Dr. Shmuel Soloveichik, a chemist as well as a Talmudic scholar; and Rabbi Ahron Soloveichik, who taught at Mesivta Rabbi Chaim Berlin and then at Yeshiva University.
[edit] Rabbi Yosef Dov Soloveitchik
Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik was a son of Moshe Soloveitchik. He succeeded his father as the senior Rosh Yeshiva of RIETS in New York. As Rosh Yeshiva of RIETS at Yeshiva University, "The Rav," as he came to be known, ordained close to 2,000 rabbis over the course of almost half a century. He served as an advisor, guide, mentor, and role-model for tens of thousands of Modern Orthodox Jews as their Talmudical scholar and religious leader.
[edit] Rabbi Ahron Soloveichik
Rabbi Ahron Soloveichik was a son of Moshe Soloveitchik. He taught at Mesivta Rabbi Chaim Berlin and then at Yeshiva University. He eventually moved to Chicago and became Rosh HaYeshiva at the Hebrew Theological College and later founded his own yeshiva there known as "Yeshivas Brisk." After the death of his brother Joseph in 1993, he began to commute to New York City to lecture at RIETS as well. Rabbi Ahron Soloveichik died in 2001, and the Chicago Brisk Yeshiva became defunct a few years later.
[edit] Rabbi Meshulam Dovid Soloveitchik
Rabbi Meshulam Dovid Soloveitchik (known as Reb Dovid) is the son of Rabbi Yitzchak Zev Soloveitchik. He is Rosh HaYeshiva of Yeshivas Brisk in the Gush Shemonim section of Jerusalem. He has yet to publish any works on the Talmud, but many of his works have been published by his students, especially in the latest Mishor prints of his father's works. He is considered by Briskers to be one of the last authentic remnants of a pre-WWII Jewish Lithuania. Nonetheless, some give more prominence to the Yeshiva of his nephew, R' Avraham Yehoshua.
[edit] Rabbi Avraham Yehoshua Soloveitchik
Rabbi Avraham Yehoshua Solovetichik is the grandson of Rabbi Yitzchak Zev Soloveitchik. He succeeded his father, Rabbi Berel Solovetichik as the Rosh HaYeshiva of Yeshivas Brisk in Jerusalem. This is the most prestigious of the Yeshivas which bear the "Brisk" name and has even been called the Harvard of the Yeshiva World. Rabbi A.Y. Solovetichik is a somewhat controversial figure as he has criticized some of the more modern right-wing Jewish organizations and figures (such as the Novominsker Rebbe and Rabbi Shmuel Kaminetsky). He is reputed to mimic his famed grandfather both in mannerism and Torah learning.
[edit] Family tree
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[edit] Philosophy
[edit] General
In contrast to the Hasidic movement, all of the Soloveichik rabbis were a part of the Mitnagdish Lithuanian yeshiva movement, and thus were strong believers in a traditional Talmudic education and, to a certain degree, intellect over emotion. However, Rabbi Joseph Dov Soloveitchik made it clear that he was very much in touch with Hasidism, having lived for several years in Chaslavich, which was mostly Hasidic. Rabbi Soloveitchik once heard a certain Lubavitch chasid who was a Kohen describing how torn he felt about his Kohen status prohibiting him from contact with the dead, when he so dearly wanted to visit the grave of the fifth Lubavitch Rebbe, Sholom Dovber Schneersohn. Rabbi Soloveitchik replied in a letter which described his sympathy with the fellow's plight, stressing that he understood why visiting the rebbe's grave means so much to a Hasid.
[edit] Halachic
The "Brisk dynasty" and their followers are known for a tendency towards strictness in the Halakha ("Jewish law"); if there is ever a doubt between two rabbinic opinions, the "Brisk way" is more likely to follow the more stringent one. For example, many yeshiva students will not only grow their sideburns as required by the Torah, but will also grow a sidelock of hair above, which they tuck behind their ears. These are known as "Brisker Peyos", or "Brisk-style sideburns."
[edit] Talmudic
The Brisk, or "conceptual" style of Talmudic analysis has become very popular in the world of yeshivas today. It challenges existing, simpler, understandings of Talmudic logic by breaking each Talmudic law down into conceptual components. Then, one component can be shown not to apply in a certain case, thus resolving a contradiction between two laws. For example, there may be a distinction between an actual exemption in the Halakha and a scenario where the Halakha simply fails to obligate someone. Occasionally such distinctions have significant practical implications.
Often an entire series of disagreements in the Rishonim (Talmudic commentaries from roughly the period 1000-1500) may stem back to a subtle difference in how to understand a line of Talmudic reasoning. Often what seems like one rule in the Talmud may be explained to in fact contain two separate rules for different scenarios. (See "tzvei dinim", below.)
As an extreme example, Rabbi Chaim Brisker observed that that the Talmud discusses the Sheva Brachot celebrations in the week following a Jewish wedding. The Talmud requires "panim chadashos" (meaning "a new presence" or "new faces"), i.e. a guest must be present at the Sheva Brachot celebration who had not attended the wedding. Elsewhere, the Talmud comments that once sacrificial meat has been burned to ashes, the ashes no longer have a sacrificial status, as "panim chadashos ba'u l'chan" -- "a new presence has arrived", meaning that the ashes are not the same as the meat. "So if you were at a Sheva Brachot party, and you looked around and everyone there had already been at this couple's wedding, why not just take some meat and burn it to ashes?", challenged Rabbi Chaim. Clearly, the phrase "panim chadashos" has different meanings in the contexts of wedding celebrations and sacrificial meat.
Rabbi Chaim is famous for the quotation, "One approach which answers three different problems is better than three different approaches to individually solve the three problems" (a corollary of Occam's razor).
Another classic distinction employed in Brisk Talmudics is: "is the principle stated here merely an application of a general rule, or is it a different principle, specialized to our context?" This was demonstrated in an episode involving Rabbi Yitzchak Zev Soloveitchik and witnessed by Rabbi Yehezkel Abramsky. A fellow came to the rabbis, explaining that a close relative of his had recently died, and that a few hours later, a more prominent, well-to-do member of the same city had died. The Chevra Kadisha (Jewish burial society), rather than follow the first-come, first-served policy mandated by Jewish ethics, buried the well-to-do individual first. The bereaved thus demanded an apology from the Chevra Kadisha. Rabbi Yitzchak Zev Soloveitchik consulted the Laws of Mourning from Maimonides' Code of Law (the Mishneh Torah) for just a moment before telling the individual, "the Chevra Kadisha were wrong, but that is between them and G-d. I will inform them that their conduct was improper, but you are not involved here." After the fellow left, Rabbi Soloveitchik explained to his colleague, Rabbi Abramsky, that the question at hand was this: certainly Judaism has a general principle of first-come, first-served, because of the rule that when faced with the opportunity to do a mitzvah, one should not pass it up. If this is the only reason that first-come, first-served applies in the case of burials, then one who violates it is no more in the wrong than one who has passed over any mitzva opportunity, and his/her offense is between himself/herself and G-d.. Or, instead, there may be a specialized notion of first-come, first-served when it comes to burials, to avoid offending the bereaved. Only according to the latter reasoning would an apology be required. Rabbi Soloveitchik found that Maimonides made no explicit mention of first-come, first-served in his Laws of Mourning, and thus extrapolated that only the generalized notion of first-come, first-served applies to burial. Therefore the bereaved could not demand an apology. Upon hearing this reasoning, Rabbi Abramsky exclaimed (in a positive way), "Rabbi Soloveitchik can deduce laws from the fact that Maimonides says nothing at all!"
The famed yeshiva of Volozhin, arguably the first modern yeshiva, favored a traditionalist approach towards Talmudics under the leadership of the Netziv, which often required absorbing a great amount of Talmudic material to acquire a "general Talmudic feel" before analyzing a topic. Later, however, Rabbi Chaim Brisker became a lecturer at Volozhin, and the yeshiva drifted towards the new "Brisk lomdus" approach. (Incidentally, the Volozhin yeshiva shut down when the government required it to incorporate secular studies to such a degree that there was no longer any real time for Talmudic study, though the details are far more complex. While the Netziv was still officially the yeshiva's head, the influence of Rabbi Chaim Brisker should not be neglected, and may have played a large role in the decision.)
As Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik suggested in his eulogy for the Brisker Rov, the full, true "Brisk approach" as we know it today was not developed until Rabbi Chaim Soloveitchik had been rabbi of Brisk for many years. The notes that Rabbi Chaim Soloveitchik had used for his lectures at the yeshiva of Volozhin (years before he assumed the Brisk pulpit) are still extant today, and the approach found there is not as well-developed as in (his and others') later published works. The notes could best be described as "proto-Brisk lomdus", a term which could be used regarding the works of the Beis HaLevi as well. Several modern scholars agree with this notion of "proto-Brisk", and it can be heard in the lectures of Rabbi Dr. Aaron Rakefet-Rothkoff. Nonetheless, as seen above, even "proto-Brisk" was already different enough and popular enough to cause the above tension at the Volozhin yeshiva.
An additional major influence on the "Brisk approach" was a Rabbi Mendel Epstein of Slutzk. Rabbi Chaim "Brisker" Soloveitchik spent several early teenage years in Slutzk, where Rabbi Epstein served as his melamed (Judaics teacher for pre-college levels). Rabbi Chaim later claimed that much of the 'brisker derech' attributed to him was founded on Rabbi Epstein's approach; however, as a small town's melamed, Rabbi Epstein and his ideas never achieved fame. Thus, Rabbi Mendel Epstein's contribution to the "Brisker approach" might be compared to that of Sir Isaac Barrow, Isaac Newton's mentor, to calculus.
In the late 1800s, some scholars denounced the Brisk approach as "chemistry", as it sought to analyze each Talmudic law by breaking it down into components, whereas a traditionalist approach focused more on the entirety of the laws.
While the "Brisk approach" ("Brisker Derech") has won acceptance in almost all yeshivas today, it has its opponents. These include Rabbi Avraham Yishayahu Karelitz (1878-1953) (known as the Chazon Ish), who felt that often the existing approach to a Talmudic portion was sufficient. Additionally, the approach of those yeshivas in the United States and Israel today which stem from the Mir Yeshiva, (originally from Russia) tend to stress single, unifying themes throughout Talmudic concepts, often focusing on only one Rishon if it is seen as the most "truthful" approach to a Talmudic passage. "Mir-style" yeshivas are thus seen generally as opposed to "Brisk-style" yeshivas, though there is very little personal animosity.
In Brisk Yeshivas, the tractates studied deviate from the normal Yeshivish tractates. Most Yeshivas learn the Talmudic laws of money, property, marriage, and divorce. In Brisk, there is a greater tendency toward Kedoshim tractates, as well as Nazir and Sotah (more ritually oriented) tractates in Nashim.
[edit] Political
A great deal of controversy has erupted regarding the political sidings of the rabbis of Brisk. Rabbi Yitzchak Zev and his descendants, who settled in Israel, have made their opinion clear that they oppose a secular Zionist state and thus show no support for the Israeli government. They are also opposed to yeshiva students having a secular college education as well.
In contrast, most of the Soloveitchiks who moved to the United States, including Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik and his brother Rabbi Aaron Soloveitchik, were generally warmly supportive of the current State of Israel as well as what they perceive as a well-rounded college education. Turning to their ancestors, Rabbi Chaim Brisker had made some harsh statements against Zionism, but it is hard to tell what his views may have been today, as many groups who had opposed Zionism in the 1800s changed their views after the Holocaust (1939-1945) and the founding of the State of Israel (1948). For more on this, see the anti-Zionism.
With regards to feminism, Rabbi Joseph Dov Soloveitchik was proud to point out that on his parents' wedding invitation, his grandparents are listed as "Chaim & Lifsha" on one line, with "Soloveitchik" on the next line, centered between their names. This could be seen as more feminist than the "Rabbi & Mrs. So-And-So" (or in Hebrew, "Ploni BenPloni V'Rayaso") seen in many haredi invitations today.
Thus, given how the world has changed in the twentieth century, and given the strong and varied views of their descendants, the views of Rabbi Chaim Brisker and the Beis HaLevi on Zionism, secular education, religious feminism, and modernism in general, are topics of current discussion.
[edit] Logic
Two popular logical sequences ("lomdus") used extensively by followers of the Brisker Talmud approach to resolve apparent contradictions between different passages are the tzvei dinim ("two laws") and cheftza/gavra ("object/person") answers.
- Tzvei dinim is used to answer contradictions by explaining that the two conflicting rulings are indeed talking about two different cases and the differences in the cases cause the conflict in the verdicts. An example of this is Rabbi Chaim Brisker's interpretation of (Bava Kama 88a) that there is one law for a man to circumcise his son and another that obligates the son himself to be circumcised. The two overlapping, but distinct, obligations can together explain a set of outcomes which could not be explained by a single logical principle.
- Cheftza/gavra is when a person is distinguished from his/her actions (or the actions done upon him/her). For example, the Brisker Rav states (Yevamoth 2a) that a forbidden incestual relative is considered a "forbidden person," while though a menstruating woman is not a "forbidden person," the sexual act performed with her is forbidden.
[edit] See also
- Aryeh Leib Malin (a proponent of the Mir, as opposed to Brisk, approach)
