I felt a special thrill when I saw a new sefer Maaseh Chazon Ish compiled from the notes of Rav Shraga Feivel HaLevi Steinberg ztz”l one of the closest talmidim of the book’s namesake whose yahrzeit falls this Shabbos. It took me back 55 years when I then a kollel yungerman in Ponevezh was asked to take part in the massive project of collecting personal testimonies from people all over Israel for a biography of that giant among gedolim who had left This World a few years previously.
And so I soon I found myself seeking out and meeting with anyone who had come into contact with the Chazon Ish and had even a brief story to tell about him. I set out to gather as much information as I could knowing that the material I collected would be sifted through by the members of the editorial committee which was headed by Rav Shlomo Cohen who was already close to the Chazon Ish while both men were still in Vilna. Other members of the committee were Rav Shlomo Karelitz Rav Chaim Shaul Karelitz and Rav Shlomo Berman — great scholars in their own right who took upon themselves the imperative of preserving the memory of the most extraordinary Torah personality of modern times.
Eager to perform my part of the task faithfully I began traversing Eretz Yisrael hearing about people’s encounters with the Chazon Ish. And no matter who they were — talmid chacham yeshivah bochur or even secular they all expressed the feeling that “he was my friend.” So tremendous was his middah of ahavas Yisrael that he made everyone feel important and beloved.
Yet of all those interviews the most enlightening were the several meetings I had with the gaon Rav Shraga Feivel Steinberg ztz”l who took out his own extensive notes and reviewed them with me. He was my guide to the whole abstruse subject of the Chazon Ish. Not only did he share what he personally knew but I also went over with him the testimonies I had gathered from my many contacts getting his perspective on those anecdotes before handing them over to the committee. Eventually the material I gathered and refined with Rav Shraga Feivel’s help made its way into the biography Pe’er HaDor.
