Video: Chazon Ish Did Not Give Up on At-Risk Student

At a private event for Shuvu held in Flatbush last night, noted speaker Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Jacobson, spiritual leader of Congregation Beis Shmuel Chabad in Crown Heights and dean of TheYeshiva.net, spoke passionately about the importance of valuing each and every Jew, no matter what their affiliation or their current state of religiosity.

Stressing the importance of reaching out to off the derech children and the importance of seeing the potential in each and every child, Rabbi Jacobson recounted a story of the Chazon Ish who believed that expelling a talmid from a yeshiva was the equivalent of spiritual capital punishment and could only be done if a Beis Din of twenty three dayanim agreed that removal from the yeshiva was the appropriate course of action.

In this particular instance, a bochur had been expelled from a yeshiva in Bnei Brak in the 1930’s after two witnesses reported to the Rosh Yeshiva that he had been seen smoking on Shabbos. The Rosh Yeshiva asked the bochur to leave the yeshiva but when word reached the Chazon Ish, founder of the yeshiva, he questioned whether the Rosh Yeshiva had convened the proper Beis Din, explaining that sending a boy out of yeshiva falls under the category of dinei nefashos and insisted that this was not a decision that fell under the Rosh Yeshiva’s purview.

The Rosh Yeshiva insisted that in order to run the yeshiva he needed to have full authority to deal with the bochurim as he saw fit and absent that, he would be handing in his resignation.

The Chazon Ish told the Rosh Yeshiva that his resignation fell under the category of dinei mamonos and as such, only required a decision by either a Beis Din of three or just one expert and since he himself qualified as an expert, the Chazon Ish told the Rosh Yeshiva that he would accept his resignation. Not only did the Chazon Ish take on the duties of Rosh Yeshiva for several weeks, but he readmitted the bochur who had been let go.

According to Rabbi Jacobson that bochur is now a respected leader in Israel’s Litvishe community who fully understands the importance of valuing each and every child.