Editorial: Lonely man of faith

Issue of Nov. 28, 2008 / 1 Kislev 5769

Known to his many talmidim simply as ‘The Rav,” Rabbi Yosef Ber Soloveitchik was among the few most famous personalities of the observant Jewish world of the 20th century.

Many students had the opportunity to interact with Rav Soloveitchik during his decades at Yeshiva University, but younger people who may have attended YU or even MTA after failing health forced the Rav to withdraw from teaching missed out on those opportunities, or even of the chance to catch a glimpse of him in a hallway.

Many of those younger people suffer gaps in their knowledge of just who the Rav was and what made him a standout in the yeshiva world in which he was raised and in the world of Modern Orthodoxy he would later define.

To truly understand the Rav is unlikely, at best — after all, a man who could write an essay such as his “Lonely Man of Faith” may well have been unknowable. Still, a dedicated student of his writings, which have been published at a steady pace in the nearly 15 years since his death, can hope to gain a measure of insight.

For the rest of us, a new documentary is a highly unusual but very effective way to learn a great deal about the Rav.

“Lonely Man of Faith: The Life and Legacy of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik,” by Ethan Isenberg and Second Look Productions, screened last week in Woodmere, and will be shown again next month in Great Neck.

Here at our offices, the film was viewed late Monday and we found we couldn’t turn away to get back to work.