Forever Young

Shortly after arriving in the yeshivah, I joined a chaburah led by a young Sheftel. One Motzaei Shabbos, he decided to make a Melaveh Malkah for the chaburah. As yet unmarried at the time, he made the Melaveh Malkah in the home of his father, the incomparable Rabbi Herman Naftali Neuberger z”l, the president of Ner Yisrael. I remember one line Sheftel said at the event.

“If at the end of the year,” he remarked, “you can go into Rosh Hashanah saying that you ate Melaveh Malkah every Motzaei Shabbos, that’s a tremendous zechus.”

That made such a deep impression on me that I met that challenge from that day forward. I may not be like Rav Chaim Kanievsky, going straight from Havdalah to washing for Melaveh Malkah no matter the hour, but due to this casual comment from an elter bochur named Sheftel Neuberger, a young kid named Yissocher Frand accepted to observe Melaveh Malkah on some level ever since.

Throughout my life, then, I enjoyed a close connection to Rav Sheftel, and I would like to share a few personal reflections on a life devoted to the klal.