In my teenage years I had absolutely no appreciation of the greatness of the Torah giant with whom I interacted daily

Talmid Chacham, rav, rosh yeshivah, rebbi, and yerei shamayim are the primary appellations of Harav Dov Berel ben Harav Zev ztz”l, hareini kapparas mishkavo. Forty-seven years ago I had the great fortune to walk through the doors of Yeshiva Shaarei Torah in Monsey. I was in the yeshivah for high school, beis medrash, and the semichah program and maintained my connection with Rebbi until today. I’m not sure I can say that these 40-plus years of connection and learning were enough to really understand his teaching, but I can definitively state that in my teenage years I had absolutely no appreciation of the greatness of the Torah giant with whom I interacted daily.

Rebbi presented a weekly shiur klali on the sugya that we were studying. Those of us who entered the semichah program were treated to shiurim on Yoreh Dei’ah twice weekly, in which the world of halachah and rabbanus was opened up to us. My final draft of the ten semichah bechinos consisted of 657 handwritten, single-spaced pages, and Rebbi read every word, complete with check marks, comments, spelling, and grammar corrections.