Saturday, February 23, 2008

The Three Kol Toreh'niks

An Interview with Reb Shabtai Slavaticki, HaRav Boruch Lesches, and HaRav Menachem Volpe, 3 Bochurim who left Yeshivas Kol Torah in Yerushalayim and went to learn in Lubavitch. Quite a read, especially if you happen to know any of them.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Is Lesches your rov in Monsey?
I've read many versions of the story by Slavaticky, including him agreeing to be the spy for the hanholo telling them who attends the Tanya shiur and also his studying one Elul in Ponovizh, none of this was mentioned here.
Is this Volpo the brother of the 'infamous' one??Seems like it, whatever the case it was a bit silly using him in the interview.He never studied in the Bais Medrash part of Kol Toiro, he was only in the Yeshiva Ketana, (though Kol Torah was a bit unique at the time, giving the shiur gimmel boys a status of 'yeshiva gedolah')R'Shloma Zalman had very little to do with the younger boys, besides a simple monthly farher.Even boys in the Beis Medrash had little to do with him.He was a 'hired' rosh yeshiva had nothing to do with the financial and 'ownership' which was under Rabbis Schlesinger (who was recently featured in an interview about his son who was knifed to death 20 years by a terrorist)and Kunsdat.Basically if they needed to use a kid who had zero to do with the rosh yeshiva its pushing things quite a bit.Also there is an implication that it was terrible for the yeshiva not to allow a Tanya shiur:Well, would Lubavitch allow a shiur in Pachad Yitzchok which would end up in boys moving to Chaim Berlin??It's irritating to read this kind of stuff, when it makes the reader feel that he is some kind of fool.