YU's Chasidic Revolution - A Pioneer Reflects

Over four years have elapsed since Rabbi Moshe Weinberger was brought back to YU/RIETS to spread Chasidus, sufficent time for students to have entered and graduated YU with him there for their whole tenure. As such, sufficient time has passed to take a hard look at what has occurred there, and on the neo-Chasidic front in general, in the last few years.

Fortunately, we are ב"ה aided in this vital work by reflections (last four paragraphs) shared by veteran RIETS Rosh Yeshiva and YU Chasidic pioneer R. Hershel Reichman, recently published in Kol Hamevaser, The Jewish Thought Magazine of the Yeshiva University Student Body.

Let us focus on a few important, fundamental points.

1) Neo-Chasidus at YU is a revolution, a revolutionary development. That cannot be denied. While some people may have wanted to (and still try to) pretend that bringing in R. Moshe Weinberger with special custom-designed provisions catering to him (special, limited, tailored hours, the new Chasidic title of mashpia, after starting first as mashgiach, etc.) and rolling out a red carpet for him, was just adding another faculty member, and nothing out of the ordinary, that is patently false. Such efforts to obscure the magnitude and significance of the move are diversionary and misleading.

2) The Rav (R. Yoshe Ber Soloveitchik) is old, neo-Chasidus at YU is new and hip. For many years, Modern Orthodoxy and RIETS/YU was dominated by the Rav, R. Yosef Dov Solovitchik z"l, and his Torah. Now, the pendulum has swung in a different direction. While the Rav and his legacy is still a giant presence in the YU/RIETS world, especially among older talmidim and staff, among some younger ones there is a significant shift, led by Rabbi Weinberger and others, away from Brisk, to locales like Medzhibozh, Uman, and Lubavitch.

3) R. Reichman, a devout Chasid himself, expresses disappointment at a decline in high level, intellectual, rigorous talmud Torah concomitant with the rise of neo-Chasidus.

Rabbi Reichman says that many talmidim leave the yeshiva knowing little of the Rav's Torah.

 And that is a key in a discussion like this. We need to look at the younger students, the future. What are the trends among the younger students?

The bringing in of R. Weinberger was done under Richard Joel, the first YU President lacking semicha,  and not simultaneously Rosh Yeshiva of RIETS. It was also done after the departure of longtime RIETS dean R. Zevulun Charlop. It is not coincidental that such a radical break with RIETS history and tradition took place took place under such a new regime.

With R. Weinberger on an extended trip to Eretz Yisrael (perhaps he is contemplating aliyah?), now seems like a good time for a cheshbon hanefesh, to sit down and assess the results of R. Weinberger's appointment and the YU/RIETS Chasidic revolution, and think about adjustments that may be in order after this extended period of revolutionary experimentation.

Let us hope that any corrections that need to be made are seriously considered, rather than ignored, or kicked down the road.