Just Like His Children 

Until his father’s passing, Rav Shmuel served as the yeshivah’s first-year maggid shiur, in addition to giving multiple other shiurim and chaburos to various age groups throughout the yeshivah. When his father was niftar, he assumed the mantle of leadership, and began delivering the yeshivah’s highest shiur.

But not only. “When he initially became rosh yeshivah,” one talmid recalls, “he would give two shiurim daily. He continued to give the shiur to the first-year bochurim, and then gave a second shiur to the older bochurim. He did this until the final arrangements for a new maggid shiur were in place.”

This setup was extremely difficult for Rav Shmuel, whose schedule was amply taxing as it was; he was also well aware that the convenient thing to do would be to combine the two shiurim together for the time being. But he wouldn’t. He felt that a shiur must be tailored to the students’ level — not any higher, not any lower.

This doesn’t really surprise anyone who knew him. That he treated each talmid like his own child is a theme that was raised multiple times during the hespedim, and it was a reality that his talmidim could tangibly feel.