"I really wanted to capture the Rosh Yeshivah in his kittel and post-Yom Kippur radiance"

Photo: AEGedolimphotos.com

It was just after Maariv on Motzaei Yom Kippur, when Mishpacha’s Avraham Elbaz approached BMG Rosh Yeshivah Rav Malkiel Kotler, who was headed to his home a block away from the yeshivah to make Havdalah and break his fast. “I really wanted to capture the Rosh Yeshivah in his kittel and post-Yom Kippur radiance, so I asked if I could come with him to hear Havdalah,” Elbaz says. “He graciously agreed, and noticing my camera in hand, quipped, ‘It looks like you made Havdalah already.’ ”

The enterprising photographer continued to push his luck, telling the Rosh Yeshivah about the beautiful Succah posters he produces and that he’d love for the Rosh Yeshivah to have some of them. Following Havdalah, Rav Malkiel graciously looked at the photographer’s latest poster, a collage of various images of Rav Aharon Kotler ztz”l, and studied one image of Rav Aharon walking to some destination.

“Mistameh,” Rav Malkiel commented in the spirit of the time, “the Zeide is going to buy a lulav…”

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 880)