Rav Leib Malin was a young talmid in prewar Mir when he heard the words that would become his mission

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Part 1: Lion of the Mir

It was the summer of 1940 in Lithuania. The students of the Mir Yeshivah, who had escaped from occupied Poland, were in turmoil. The Soviet takeover of the region meant that their lifeblood — Torah learning and observance — was in imminent danger. Yet a savage war was raging. How could they risk leaving their refuge and incurring the very real possibility of a punishing Siberian exile?

Then, from amid the confusion and uncertainty, emerged a voice of clarity. A small group of talmidim — bearing no official titles but accorded respect and deference by the entire yeshivah — had determined that the yeshivah could not remain in Lithuania, subject to antireligious Soviet domination. They had to escape. And they had to escape together, as a single unit.

The vision, the authority, and the tenacity behind the escape plan traced back to a talmid who was the “leader of the lions.” He was unmarried and clean-shaven and held no official position. But Rav Leib Malin had long gained renown as a leader. And with the ensuing decades, he would demonstrate his capacity to build, save, preserve, and recreate the essence of the yeshivah.

“Stand By Your Decision”

Rav Aryeh Leib Malin, widely known as “Rav Leib,” was born near Bialystok in 1906 to Rav Avraham Moshe Malin, who served as the local dayan. The Malins originated in Brisk, where Rav Leib’s ancestor, Rav Isser Yehuda Malin, was one of the town’s rabbinical leaders. Young Leib Bialystoker began to gain repute as a serious Torah scholar during his formative years in Grodno’s Shaar HaTorah Yeshivah. “Just as one breathes air, we breathe Torah in Grodno,” was the mantra during the yeshivah’s interwar golden age. It was in this environment that he quickly made a name for himself, as he gravitated toward the rosh yeshivah, Rav Shimon Shkop.

While studying in Grodno, Rav Leib and his close friend Rav Dovid Lifshitz (later the Suvalker Rav and rosh yeshivah at RIETS) approached Rav Shimon Shkop to discuss a personal matter. After a lengthy and fruitful discussion, they apologized for taking precious time that he could have otherwise spent learning. Rav Shimon countered with the statement of Chazal: “ ‘Aser bishvil she’tis’asher — Tithe your earnings [aser] so that you will become wealthy [tis’asher].’ This principle isn’t limited to monetary contributions, but includes spiritual ones as well. Thus, a rosh yeshivah who spends time with his students only gains, and will ultimately see more success with his shiurim.”

Those prescient words would later shape Rav Leib’s outlook.

Rav Leib spent some time learning in Baranovich under Rav Elchonon Wasserman, but it was in the Mir Yeshivah that he found his mandate. In the Mir, young Leib Malin found his place among the other senior talmidim — the “lions of the Mir” — eventually emerging as the leader of the lions, in keeping with his name “Leib.” And it was in the Mir as well that he grew enraptured by the rebbi who would define the rest of his life and educational approach, the great mashgiach Rav Yerucham Levovitz. His esteem for Rav Yerucham was so great that Rav Leib referred to him as “the teacher and leader of the yeshivos during the prewar time period.”

Unlike most yeshivos of the era, Mir was unique in the role the mashgiach played in the internal affairs of the yeshivah, its curriculum, and the education of its students. In his modesty and greatness, Rosh Yeshivah Rav Leizer Yudel Finkel assumed financial responsibilities for the yeshivah while deferring these spiritual responsibilities to Rav Yerucham, whose charisma drew the elite of the yeshivah world to Mir.

Rav Shmuel Berenbaum arrived in the Mir after Rav Yerucham’s passing, yet the reverence for the venerated Mashgiach was still palpable. He related how Rav Leib saw Rav Yerucham as such a towering figure that he was like dust before him, “to the point where had the Mashgiach instructed him to go into a fire, he would have done so!”

In Rav Yerucham’s mussar shmuessen, Rav Leib found not just ethical and educational messages, but also a derech halimud. The incisive analysis that Rav Yerucham would apply to the words of Chazal, he explained, was a lesson in how one should plumb the depths of every word of Torah.

Rav Leib was once so bothered by something that occurred in yeshivah that he felt compelled to register a mecha’ah (protest). He gathered several other bochurim, and they rose to walk out of the beis medrash to declare their disagreement. Suddenly, they caught the eye of Rav Yerucham standing at the door of the beis medrash, arms crossed and eyes flashing fire, clearly willing them to sit back down. The group backed down and returned to their seats.

Later on, Rav Yerucham called in Rav Leib. “I didn’t agree with what you wanted to do,” he said, “but you had obviously made the cheshbon and felt it was the correct decision. So why, then, did you change your mind when you saw me? If you felt that it was right, then you should have been prepared to stand by your decision. You have to take achrayus [responsibility].”

Those words encapsulated Rav Leib’s mission for decades to come. His outsized sense of responsibility would fuel him to arrange the rescue of an entire yeshivah, and later to rebuild the quintessential beis medrash on new shores.