His Portion Was Sweet

Among the most important players in those first months were Rabbi Ze’ev Kraines, who passed away last week, and his rebbetzin, Nechama. Indeed Reb Ze’ev taught the first class I ever walked into at Ohr Somayach, on ikar v’tafel in blessings. Nechama quickly set up a chavrusa in Hilchos Shabbos with my wife, Judith, and, no less important, gave her the challah recipe that has served us well for 40 years.

My wife and I were given an apartment among a group of young Ohr Somayach kollel couples. The couples were approximately our age, but the husbands were already learning with Rav Berel Schwartzman ztz”l while I was trying to master Rashi script. Those couples — the Kraineses chief among them — became our models for the journey ahead.

Ze’ev had entered Shema Yisrael (the predecessor of Ohr Somayach) six years earlier, after experiencing Simchas Torah in the yeshivah. As his introduction to the dorm, his guide took him to the basement to find a metal bed, which he then sprayed and set on fire to rid it of bed bugs. Ze’ev could not help but be struck by the contrast to the rosewood paneled Telluride House at Cornell University, with its winding grand staircase and chandeliered ceiling, in which he had he spent his freshmen year in college in the “young genius” program.

Yet he made the leap with enthusiasm. Once he perceived truth, he acted. Rabbi Noach Orlowek, who learned together with Ze’ev in his early days at Ohr Somayach, said at the shivah that Reb Ze’ev possessed a particular balance that he had only seen in one other person — a world-renowned mashgiach. Usually, said Rabbi Orlowek, someone who follows through immediately as soon as he sees the truth will be very intense and run over others in his pursuit of the emes. Not Ze’ev. Serenity was the middah most frequently mentioned by his children during shivah, and a smile was his constant companion.