Part 1: Restoring the Crown: Shas and Sephardi Pride

In Part One of a two-part series, Gedalia and Rabbi Galinsky talk about Rav Ovadiah Yosef, the legendary posek and preeminent leader of the Sephardic world. Rav Ovadiah’s unique geonus and malchus were powers that were able to galvanize those around him to channel their energies into an untold number of efforts on behalf of the klal, leaving a legacy of the Sephardic baal teshuvah movement, the Sephardic chinuch movement, and a rich heritage of Torah and leadership in the rapidly growing Sephardic world. They discuss Rav Ovadiah’s involvement in the Shas party and his message of restoring Sephardic dignity to the public. Find out which gedolim prevented Rav Ovadiah Yosef from becoming a Machaneh Yehudah shopkeeper, and how Rav Ovadiah’s last name became his first name.

Part 2: “Maran”: The rise of a Halachic Revolutionary

In Part Two of this episode about Rav Ovadiah Yosef, Gedalia and Rabbi Galinsky discuss Rav Ovadiah’s fearless willingness to take on forces greater and older than he was, even from an extraordinarily young age. They discuss his passionate arguments in his teenage years against the prevalent view that the Ben Ish Chai should be considered the final authority in the Sepahrdi world. They discuss Rav Ovadiah’s rebbetzin, Rabbanit Margalit Ovadiah, who sacrificed everything for Rav Ovadiah’s Torah, both in Eretz Yisrael and in Cairo. Hear about halachic shoulders broad enough to free 950 agunos after the Yom Kippur War, and to give the heter for giving land for peace in Israel, despite Rav Ovadiah’s alignment with the political right. Learn what the single sentence was that Maran said to convince his wife to marry him, and why a shochet from Cairo hired an assassin to kill him.