On the map, Rakishok, a small town in Lithuania, was difficult to locate. However, in the rabbinical-yeshiva world, Rakishok was famous due to the fact that it was the birthplace of my father, Reb Zelig Rakishker, born 1879 to Michel and his wife Pere o.b.m, plain, ordinary but honest folks.

Very few details of his early childhood are known to us except that when he reached adolescence, his strong personality traits began to manifest themselves. He was gripped by an insatiable desire to study Torah, unusual for a boy his age, even in those times. Already as a bar mitzvah boy he showed signs of greatness, and his fame as an illuy--a child prodigy--was acknowledged with pride by the entire community.

The very next week, after he had a serious discussion with his father as to whether to continue on a Torah course or begin planning for a more pragmatic career, he left Rakishok for the world-renowned Slabodka Yeshiva. The distance in miles between Rakishok and Slabodka, a suburb of Kovno, is a relatively short one, but in matters of Jewish Weltanschaung, they were worlds apart. Rakishok was considered to be a fortress of the Lubavitch branch of the Hasidic movement in Lithuania. Hasidism, of which Lubavitch is an integral part, did not stress the pre-eminence of Torah study in its broader connotation, when it first formulated the basic principles upon which its ideology rests. Not that it put Torah study on the back burner, but rather it argued that proficiency in Talmud alone should not be the ultimate goal. Character building and developing a positive attitude toward one's fellow men were equally important. Slabodka, on the other hand, being the recognized Torah center of Lithuania, championed Talmudic erudition as the highest achievement that a yeshiva student should strive to attain.

When the dean of the Slabodka Yeshiva, Rabbi Nata Hirsh Finkel, known as Der Alter, examined the newly arrived student from Rakishok, he was deeply impressed by his knowledge and acumen. As already mentioned, Rakishok was a bastion of the Chabad brand of Hasidism, and Der Alter couldn't help wondering why the young prodigy was drawn to Slabodka in preference to a Lubavitch institution more in line with his upbringing.

The Rakishoker yeshiva bocher got so engrossed in his studies that he seldom took time to visit his family in Rakishok. Another reason that kept my father in Slabodka was that the dean, Rabbi Finkel, found in him a staunch supporter for his pioneer work to introduce a new subject to the Lithuanian yeshivas--Musar. Musar is the 19th-20th century Jewish religious movement which stresses moral and ethical edification. Rabbi Finkel's motive in expanding the yeshiva curriculum to include Musar was to produce scholars not only equipped with extensive Talmudic knowledge but men also possessed of high moral fiber, for these students were to be the future community leaders either as rabbis or as learned laymen.

Ever since childhood, Zelig Rakishker was brought up in a Lubavitch atmosphere and imbibed its moral teachings, and therefore he was no stranger to Musar, which explains why he became one of the dean's most devoted followers in his endeavors to popularize the Musar movement.

At this time the mystery as to why Zelig chose Slabodka began to unravel. Now it became clear to Rabbi Finkel that what the Rakishker prodigy sought was a synthesis of Chabad and Slobodka.

Some of the other Rosh Hayeshivos (deans) opposed Rabbi Finkel's Musar idea, arguing that making Musar an integral part of the regular yeshiva program would interfere with the Talmudic studies which require much concentration, and would defeat the very purpose for which these higher Jewish educational institutions were founded. However, in spite of the strong opposition, in the course of time, this issue also won many proponents in the yeshiva community, resulting in the formation of two mutually contending camps. Gradually the dispute grew into a conflagration, with the main frontlines positioned in the Telz and Mire yeshivas. Rabbi Finkel felt that since he was basically the cause of the uproar, it was his moral duty to douse the fires of controversy and mediate a peaceful solution.

Now Der Alter was faced with the difficult task of selecting a qualified emissary whom he could entrust with executing this extremely important assignment. As you may have guessed, Der Alter's choice for this mission was none other than Zelig Rakishker. Reb Zelig spent several months in Ponevez and Mir respectively, and succeeded in calming the raging conflict. His fame as a Talmudic scholar extended far beyond the precincts of Slabodka. The Torah prestige that he personified with his charming personality played a major role in winning over the opponents. No wonder then that Rabbi Eliezer Shulowitz, known as Reb Lazer Lomzer, chose Zelig to be his son-in-law, and simultaneously appointed him to the position as Lomzer Rosh Hayeshiva.

At the outbreak of World War I, when my father and family were evacuated deeper into Russia, a large number of his students of the Lomza yeshiva went along and stayed with him in the town of Priluki near Poltava for the duration of the war. Here in Priluki, under the most adverse circumstances brought on by the war, my father's paternal devotion and concern for his students revealed the high quality of his character.

At the end of the war, many yeshiva students from Minsk, Kiev, Charkov, and other cities joined Zelig in his return to Lomza. This was not unexpected, for my father's students also felt warmly towards him, and regarded the yeshiva as their home. On the way back to Lomza, my father stopped for a short stay in his birthplace, Rakishok, and visited his brother Reb Pesach and family.

The glorious period of the Lomza yeshiva began with the end of World War I. When the displaced Jews returned to their homes and life normalized again, the quest for advanced Torah education increased rather than decreased as is usually the case in unsettled times. Hundreds of students from distant parts of Poland and Lithuania flocked to the Lomza yeshiva either to begin or to resume their studies disrupted by the war. Because of this increase in the student body, the main lecture hall of the yeshiva could not accommodate such a large number, and so the synagogue magnanimously opened its doors for the student overflow. Other communities reacted in like manner in similar situations. For the Lomza Jews who helped maintain the yeshiva, this was another occasion to demonstrate their high regard for the Rosh Hayeshiva who, in a manner of speaking, had put their city on the map.

In his later years, my father's father-in-law made aliya to Eretz Yisroel, and there founded a branch of the Lomza yeshiva in Petach Tikvah. My father followed, bringing with him fifty of his best students for the opening of the branch, and remained there to serve as its first Rosh Hayeshiva. But despite his boundless love for the land of Israel and his enthusiasm for the yishuv (the Jewish settlement), he was impelled to return to his students in Lomza.

In the thirties, when Poland experienced an economic depression, the yeshiva's finances were seriously affected. At this juncture, my father decided to go to South Africa for the purpose of collecting sufficient funds to keep the yeshiva functioning until the economy improved. He undertook the trip primarily because he felt that, as head of the yeshiva, it was his moral responsibility to do all in his power to safeguard the yeshiva's financial stability. By temperament, the task he undertook was out of character for him. Rabbi Cahanman, the world-renowned Rabbi of Ponevez, characterized him best when he said: "The Lomza Rosh Hayeshiva lacks the ability to make money. His virtues stand in his way." Yet, according to my father, he accomplished far more than others in South Africa. Upon his return to Lomza he said: "Thank God my trip was successful. I influenced one Jewish man to put on teffilin and another to keep his store closed on the Sabbath...." He won people over with his impeccable honesty and naivete. A Jewish man in Johannesburg told me that "to this day I keep my store closed on Shabbos Shuva--the Sabbath between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur--in memory of your father."

A few years prior to the outbreak of World War II, his health began to fail. He ignored the doctors orders not to deliver any lectures or to continue bearing the heavy burden of the yeshiva. Eight months later he suffered a heart attack and became weaker by the day. When the Germans entered Lomza in September 1939, their first "order of business" was to cut off the beards of all jews. When they were done with this contemptible act on my father, he said to them, "danke sehr"--thank you very much. I am certain that this was the only ironic thank you he ever uttered.

A few days later when Lomza was taken by the Russians, he had the opportunity to escape with his family to Lithuania where living conditions were still relatively normal, but he categorically refused to leave as long as a number of his students were unable to join him. No amount of pleading by his family and students were of any avail--he remained steadfast in his resolution to stay on as sole guardian of the now empty Torah citadel which the Russians converted into a tailor shop. They then hermetically sealed the Polish-Lithuanian border. Several months later, prior to the wholesale slaughter of Europe's Jewry at the hands of the eternally cursed Nazis, a group of his closest and most loyal students jeopardized their lives and brought their teacher and his family to Vilna.

Old and physically broken, he paid his final visit to Rakishok. The town of his birth, though now impoverished and on the brink of destruction, tendered her favorite son an enthusiastic welcome. His stay in Rakishok was a brief one, and he returned to Vilna to be with his students who died martyrs' deaths together with their teacher, and of whom it may be said: "The beloved and dear in their lives were even in their death not parted." (Samuel II , Chapter 1, Verse 23).

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Updated 27 Feb 2002 by LA