EDUCATION
generation, but in the second Beis
HaMikdash, the Kohen Gadol was merely
a political appointment – and the way
you got the political appointment was
that you paid for it. This is what the
mishna means when it says that you
could have a Kohen Gadol who didn’t
know the service. The gemara then gives
a remarkable example of such a Kohen
Gadol: there was a woman who gave
money to the non-Jewish ruler in order
to have Yehoshua ben Gamla appointed
the Kohen Gadol, despite the fact that he
wasn’t fit for the job.
Our Sages ask a question: what do you
mean Yehoshua ben Gamla wasn’t fit for
the job? The gemara8 says elsewhere that
if it wouldn’t have been for Yehoshua ben
Gamla, we wouldn’t be here today! It used
to be the case that a person’s father
taught him Torah. But what would happen
with children who didn’t have a father or
whose father wasn’t capable of teaching
SUCCESS BREEDS SUCCESS
them Torah? So Yehoshua ben Gamla established the first Torah day schools in Jerusalem – and the idea spread throughout
Israel. One of Our Sages9 asks: we see that
Yehoshua ben Gamla’s actions saved the
Jewish people, so how can we impugn his
reputation, suggesting that he was some
kind of con man who bought his position?
Another one of Our Sages10 offers an answer that teaches a profound lesson: Yehoshua ben Gamla indeed started out as a
con man, but when he became the Kohen
Gadol, people treated him like he was the
Kohen Gadol. They gave him the kavod
I remember my history teacher, Mr Gabe….The first test I got an
A. The second test I got a B. He called me in after class and asked me
what was the matter and I told him that a B wasn’t bad. He looked me
straight in the eye and made me believe that there was no excuse for
me not getting an A. It was an extraordinary moment – to have
someone believe in me like that. *
If there’s one book you should read, it’s “Reb Shlomo”
about Rabbi Shlomo Freifeld11, z”l. Rav Freifeld had a
motto: “Success breeds success.” Teach them one verse at
a time, teach them one mishna at a time, and make them
understand it. And when they’ll know that one mishna,
they’ll want to know another mishna. Part of the problem
that he fought against is the constant push to keep going
forward in learning, despite students not knowing what
the last line of gemara said, not knowing what the last
section in the gemara was about, and therefore not knowing the next one – and, as a result, we lose these students.
There was once a student who came to Rav Freifeld’s yeshiva when they were learning Bava Basra – a mesechta
(volume) that’s 176 pages long. So this student says to his
roommate: “I’m outa here tomorrow! Did you see the size
of that?! I’m never gonna learn that!” The roommate went
to Rav Freifeld and told him that this boy wanted to leave
because Bava Basra was too overwhelming. So, Rav Freifeld went to the bookbinder of the yeshiva and told him: I
want you to cut off the covers of a gemara and I want you
to bind me one page – the first page of Bava Basra – between those two covers. The next day Rav Freifeld called
in this student who was planning to leave and he said:
“You see this? This is your Bava Basra. We’re gonna learn
this over and over and over again until you know this
page backwards and forwards, and then I’ll make a celebration for the entire yeshiva!”
64 JEWISH LIFE ■ ISSUE 85
(honour) of a Kohen Gadol, they asked
him questions like a Kohen Gadol, and
you know what happened to Yehoshua
ben Gamla? He became the Kohen Gadol!
And that, perhaps, is the most important
lesson that we can have. You treat a kid
like a klutz and he’ll become a klutz. But,
if you focus on seeing a positive quality in
a child – whatever it may be – and you
praise that quality and elevate it and you
treat the child accordingly – he becomes a
different person. We have to believe in our
students – that’s how they changed Yehoshua ben Gamla, they believed in him.
WHAT TEACHER DO I REMEMBER?
I remember Rabbi Yaakov Moshe Kulefsky, z”l. I never saw anyone who
enjoyed saying a vort (some words of Torah) as much as he did. He would
say the same Torah on Shavuos and on Purim every single year. And he
would say it with the same geshmak and enthusiasm as if it was the first
time that he’d said it – not the 40th! You know what the hardest day for
Rabbi Kulefsky was? Tisha B’Av (the 9th of the Hebrew month of Av, on
which we mourn all Jewish tragedies, especially the destruction of the
first and second Temples). You know why? Because he couldn’t learn Torah
on Tisha B’Av (due to it being a day of mourning). And I still remember
how he would go up to Rabbi Ruderman towards the end of the day on Tisha B’Av and say: it’s already after sunset, we can speak in learning – and
they did. He said a shiur like nobody else – with geshmak, enthusiasm,
passion, and excitement. I’m not the masmid (diligent student) that he
was, I’m not the talmid chochom (learned person) that he was, I’m not the
lamdan (someone who knows how to learn) that he was – I’ll never be any
of those things. But I got one thing from him and that