The event was noteworthy for drawing together Dirshu attendees from all over Europe, and from all streams

Photos: Yossi Goldberger

When the Copper Box Arena in London was built for the 2012 Olympic Games, planners probably never imagined that it would play host to 10,000 lomdei Torah for a single event. Said planners might also have failed to appreciate the historic resonance of a massive pre-Chanukah celebration of Torah learning in a venue that featured a symbol of ancient Greece. But to the participants in Dirshu’s grand siyum on Maseches Shabbos in their Amud Yomi program two weeks ago, that resonance would have been obvious from the second chapter of the masechta, which deals with Chanukah.

History aside, the event was noteworthy for drawing together Dirshu attendees from all over Europe, and from all streams. Mainland Europe is very different from Britain, but contingents from Antwerp and Zurich indicated that in terms of Torah life, there’s a Europe-wide Torah world that shares a common language.

One participant was Avi Steinhart from a chassidic family, who learned in Brisk, and has since gravitated back to his roots due to the giant Torah organization.

“I’m a chassid of Dirshu,” he says with a smile. “My father, who was a Pshevorsker, would be very happy with this.”

Avi learned Dirshu Chaburas HaShas, a special track for kollel yungeleit, and then integrated into the Amud Yomi program when it began a bit more than a year ago.

“Daf Yomi effected a revolution in Am Yisrael, but I personally never connected to it,” he says. “The urgency and the rigid pace is something I struggle with. I felt like they were learning just to finish. There are some who love it, but I want to learn in order to understand, and only then to be mesayeim.

“There’s a phrase that Dirshu nasi Rav Dovid Hofstedter repeats all the time — yedias haTorah, knowing the Torah. The limud is important, but each person needs to ask himself honestly if he knows the Torah.

The orchestra begins to thunder in the hall, and Avi’s 15-year-old son, who is also part of a Dirshu track, urges him to come inside.

There, Rav Shimon Galai — who has traveled to London for just a few hours and will be flying right back to Bnei Brak for the shloshim of his son-in-law, Rav Dovid Wertheimer — takes a moment to speak with Mishpacha.

“Dirshu is the neshamah of Am Yisrael,” he says in the rabbanim’s room. “There are organizations for everything. You need a pillow for a bris? You have one. You need kimcha d’Pischa? You have it. But there is one organization in the world that does everything to enable you to get to Shamayim after 120 years with baskets full of spiritual wealth, and that is Dirshu. Therefore, I make a great effort to go where they call me.”

Maariv begins and thousands stand up to daven. Then the massive orchestra cues up a majestic march, and the rabbanim ascend the stage. This type of mass Torah spectacle has practically been trademarked by the organization, but its origins are not well known.

The concept behind these high-end events was born from a meeting 15 years ago between Rabbi Dovid Hofstedter and Rav Aharon Leib Steinman ztz”l. It was shortly before the Siyum HaShas, and Rabbi Hofstedter was consulting with Rav Steinman about how much to spend on the event.

“Invest as much as you can,” Rav Steinman told him. “When a wealthy man makes a wedding, he books the best band in the finest hall. And when we want to honor the Torah, we do it in an underground hall, without honor and without grandeur? The Torah is our biggest wedding, and that is where we need to invest the most.”

Rabbi Hofstedter carried out this instruction faithfully, and thus was born the classic Dirshu feel which the London siyum adhered to, featuring such well-known performers as Motty Steinmetz, Baruch Levine, Hershy Weinberger, and Zanvil Weinberger, alongside legendary conductor Mona Rosenblum, along with the Malchus Choir and a 30-piece orchestra.

The production team also went local, with a beautiful medley of Yigal Calek classics, a tribute to the recently-niftar composer who uplifted so many worldwide. As a continent-wide celebration of simchas haTorah deep in the European winter, the event left a glow in hearts from Gateshead to Manchester, Stamford Hill, and Antwerp to sustain them through the next leg of the long journey through Shas.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1043)