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Contributor: Shmuel Lesher

Can Orthodoxy Decide Its Own History?

Can Orthodoxy Decide Its Own History?

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In his 2004 review of Rabbi Nosson Kamenetsky’s controversy-sparking Making of a Godol, Professor Mordechai Breuer notes a marked change happening within haredi culture, specifically book culture: The contents of the traditional Haredi bookshelf have expanded and transformed beyond recognition in recent generations. Alongside … the rabbinic classics … the shelves are now filled with books of types our ancestors could not have imagined. Breuer is referring to the proliferation of a new form of biography, or hagiography, of gedolim,…

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Rabbi Yitzhak Hutner’s View of Torah Im Derekh Eretz and a Hidden Haskamah Rediscovered

Rabbi Yitzhak Hutner’s View of Torah Im Derekh Eretz and a Hidden Haskamah Rediscovered

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Shmuel Lesher is the assistant rabbi of the BAYT (Toronto). He can be reached at shmuel.lesh@gmail.com *Thanks to my father-in-law, Rabbi Hanan Balk, for sharing many of the works used to research this topic with me from his vast and eclectic personal library. Thank you to Rabbi Dr. Jacob J. Schacter, Rabbi Moshe Lieber, Rabbi Daniel Korobkin, Ezer Dienna, and Rabbi Ken Stollon for greatly improving this article. Thank you to Simmy Zieleniec for connecting me with the Levi family….

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Tikkun Olam Revisited

Tikkun Olam Revisited

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Shmuel Lesher is the assistant rabbi of the BAYT in Toronto, Canada. You may reach him at shmuel.lesh@gmail.com. Tikkun Olam, translated as either “healing the world” or “repairing the world” is a phrase that evokes a variety of reactions today. This two-word Hebrew phrase has become known to many even outside of the Jewish world as the Jewish term for social action. In fact, while President of the United States, Barak Obama invoked tikkun olam in a speech he delivered…

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Hirschian Humanism After the Holocaust: An Analysis of the Approach of Rabbi Shimon Schwab

Hirschian Humanism After the Holocaust: An Analysis of the Approach of Rabbi Shimon Schwab

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Rabbi Shmuel Lesher is a Machon Beren Kollel fellow at RIETS / Yeshiva University. Prior to completing his rabbinic ordination at RIETS, Rabbi Lesher studied at the Mirrer Yeshiva in Jerusalem and Yeshiva of Greater Washington in Silver Spring, Maryland. Rabbi Lesher lives in Washington Heights, with his wife Leora and their three children. This is his first contribution to the Seforim Blog. In 1959, Rabbi Shimon Schwab made a unique contribution to the way his community and others commemorate…

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