“I give you a brachah that you should never again have to leave Lakewood for Shabbos!”
L
ast week, Lakewood rosh yeshivah Rav Yeruchem Olshin participated in an Adirei HaTorah fundraising event hosted by the Clifton-Passaic community. Mr. Barry Lebovits, who chaired the event, recounted the now-familiar origins of the Adirei HaTorah movement: A small group of dedicated balabatim, led by Leizer Scheiner, were aghast at the paltry $300 monthly kollel stipend Lakewood’s kollel yungeleit were receiving. Determined to restore stability and dignity to lomdei Torah, they launched an ambitious initiative to raise the monthly kollel stipend to $1,000 (a goal that has since been surpassed, with the checks now standing at $1,140 a month), revolutionizing the model for hachzakas haTorah.
Yet there was a prelude to this story, Mr. Lebovits told his audience, one that took place right there in Passaic. In the years before Adirei HaTorah, Lakewood’s roshei yeshivah, who bore the responsibility to fundraise for the yeshivah, would frequently travel to communities across the country for Shabbosim of chizuk. Week after week, the papers carried ads for another such Shabbos: Cleveland, Chicago, Los Angeles… and Passaic.
On one such Shabbos in Passaic, Mr. Lebovits accompanied Rav Dovid Schustal to visit the Passaic rosh yeshivah, Rav Meir Stern. When Rav Meir heard that Rav Dovid was in town to raise funds for Lakewood, he was taken aback.
“What about the yeshivah?” asked Rav Meir. “If the roshei yeshivah are traveling all over the world to raise money, spending every Shabbos away from the yeshivah, what’s happening to the yeshivah itself?”
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