HIS TREASURE To Rav Aryeh Finkel ztz”l “It didn’t make a di¬fference whether a person posed a major question or brought up a minor point – every word of Torah was like a treasure to him”

T

here are forces that are stronger than nature. Natural forces can make a person want to give up on something when facing adversity in attaining it even though he knows it’s right. A force stronger than nature was the smile of Rav Aryeh Finkel ztz”l.

Rav Aryeh Finkel had that glowing radiance that constantly shines from someone who knows he’s connected to his Creator at every moment. But no one is born with that level of connection and Rav Aryeh spent his entire life working on it helping thousands of talmidim stretch themselves beyond anything they thought possible.

Acclimating to Yeshivas Mir Yerushalayim can be a daunting challenge to say the least. Hundreds of people traverse the corridors at a rapid clip determined to reach their seats and begin their davening or learning. Enter into this hubbub a young bochur whose entire yeshivah back in America would represent a mere fraction of those packing themselves into the Mir’s main beis medrash for Shacharis on a regular weekday morning. He spots a rare empty seat and dons his tefillin. No sooner has he finished reciting the brachos than someone walks over and politely but firmly informs him that the seat is his.

This experience repeats itself for several days as he wanders from place to place sometimes getting lucky enough to sit in one place for an entire Shacharis but then finding out that the person whose seat it was will be back the next day. He strongly considers going to daven in a small minyan elsewhere but doesn’t want to forfeit the experience of an Elul davening with 700 mispallelim.

Finally he comes up with a solution. He notices that some of the benches that are used for learning during sedorim are packed together too tightly to be used during davening when people need some free space to daven Shemoneh Esreh. He pulls one of those benches slightly into an aisle frees up a shtender and sits down on a newly created space — one that no one can claim is his.

The next day as he’s setting up his spot an elderly man who occupies the spot behind him comes to his aid helping him move the bench and get a shtender to daven on. Slightly embarrassed to be assisted by someone three times his age the young bochur tries to refuse the help but to no avail. Each day the elderly man jumps to help him a warm and encouraging smile welcoming this newcomer and making him feel at home.

A week or two into this daily exercise the elderly man is missing during Shacharis. One of the only yungeleit this bochur knows points to the empty spot behind him and motions as if to ask: “Is he here?” After davening the bochur approaches the yungerman and asks him to identify his daily benefactor.

“You really don’t know who that is?” the yungerman asks incredulously. “That’s Rav Aryeh Finkel the mashgiach of the Mir.”

I thought it was only me.

When upon hearing the news of Rav Aryeh’s petirah my mind immediately conjured up the memory of him rushing to help me with my shtender each morning some 18 years ago. I thought I was the only one whose image of Rav Aryeh would always carry that warm smile.