The Privilege of Hearing Criticism

Excerpt from an essay on Parshas Matos by Rabbi Y. Y. Jacobson

To read the full essay click here

Rabbi Yitzchak Meir (Reb Itche Meir) Alter of Gur (1799-1866), a small town not far from Warsaw (known today as Gora Kalwaria), was the brother-in-law and foremost student of the intensely brilliant Kotzker Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Morgenstern (1787-1859). He was known as the “Chidushei HaRim,” after the title of his Talmudic and Chassidic works. Following the passing of his own master, he founded a Chassidic dynasty, becoming (in 1860) the first Rebbe of Ger. He became an influential figure on the landscape of Polish Jewry and a greatly respected spiritual leader. Reb Itche Meir suffered greatly in his life, seeing 12 of his 13 children pass before him.

Since some of his grandchildren had been left as young orphans, he ended up raising his grandson, the young Yehuda Aryeh Leib (1847-1905), who would eventually succeed his grandfather as the second Gerrer Rebbe while still a young man of age 22. The Sefas Emes, as he is known, became one of the most influential spiritual leaders of Polish Jewry. His brilliant five-part Chassidic homilies on the Torah that gave him his name, and his many volumes of commentary on the Talmud, have transformed him into one of the great Talmudic and Chassidic giants of the 19th century.

When he was still just a boy, he would often stay up late in the night studying Torah. At times, he stayed up almost the entire night immersed in Torah study with a learning partner.

And so it happened once, that at one such occasion, the Sefas Emes after staying up all night, fell asleep right before morning prayers and came late to the service. His grandfather, who raised him as his own child, noted the time his grandson had arrived to synagogue. After the prayers, the Gerer Rebbe, the Chidushei Harim, approached his grandson and rebuked him for sleeping in. He explained to him at length how the discipline to awake in the morning is crucial to human development; how allowing oneself to indulge in sleep numbs one’s spiritual growth and inhibits growth; how after sleeping a full night, a Jew ought to jump out of bed in the morning with passion and alacrity, with the joy of knowing that now he can approach G-d in prayer and study; how wasting one’s life in bed is a tragedy.

The Sefas Emes, who was a young boy at the time, kept quiet. He just listened to his grandfather rebuking him without offering the obvious excuse that he was up all night learning Torah. His study partner, who was up with him and knew what had happened, approached the young Yehuda Aryeh Leib and asked, "Why didn't you just tell your grandfather you were up all night studying?”

The young Sefas Emes answered his friend: "To hear criticism from my saintly Zeide is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. There was no way I was going to forfeit that privilege by offering justifications for my behavior!”