Remembering Rav Nota Schiller ztz”l on his yahrtzeit

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hortly before Purim last year, talmidim of Yeshivas Ohr Somayach from the past 50 years lost their father and leader, the Rosh Hayeshivah, Rav Nota Schiller ztz”l. In the months after his petirah, close talmidim and Torah leaders worldwide eulogized him and memorialized his teachings. I cannot hope to add to their words of wisdom.

But I had a different vantage point. For a brief period, I had the merit to serve as gabbai of the Ohr Somayach beis medrash. That position afforded me something rare: a glimpse behind the curtain, a chance to observe gadlus from the inside.

Rav Schiller was a person who knew how to live in multiple realms simultaneously. He would quote this idea from the Chazon Ish, “A Jew has to be able to live with stiros, with contradictions.” He was modest, yet undeniably noble. He carried himself with a humility that was genuine, never seeking honor, but he was profoundly authoritative. When he entered a room, you felt leadership. When he rose to speak, he commanded attention, not through volume but through presence. There was an aristocracy of spirit about him.

On Erev Yom Kippur, before Maariv, the Rosh Yeshivah would collectively bless the talmidim with the same words of brachah parents give their children. Many of the students had never received such a brachah from their own parents, who were mostly unaffiliated or disinterested Jews. He saw his role as being a father figure, and filled it entirely.

He would listen closely to a baal teshuvah’s questions with the same focused attention you would expect to see if he had been speaking with a gadol b’Yisrael. And when he answered those questions, he spoke with the weight of mesorah, the confidence of someone who had spent decades mining the depths of Torah and drinking in the words of the leaders before him.

Perhaps most striking was how he related to his talmidim who had later become major supporters of the yeshivah. These were men who owed him everything, their entire lives as bnei Torah, their marriages, their children’s chinuch. They were devoted to fueling the same revolution in which they themselves had been foot soldiers.

Rav Schiller would express genuine hakaras hatov for their generosity. But he would never allow a donor to think that his financial contribution absolved him of personal responsibility in learning. A check, however generous, was not a substitute for a cheilek in Torah.

The Speaker, The Architect

Occasionally, I would enter the main yeshivah office to handle some “gabbinic” matter. On several such occasions, I witnessed the Rosh Yeshivah dictating correspondence to his secretary. In that scenario, I imagine most people would sketch out the general idea, provide the key points, and let the secretary craft the actual letter.

The Rosh Yeshivah didn’t work that way. He would dictate word for word. Not in fragments or rough drafts, but in complete, perfectly constructed points. He would pause and take his time, clearly considering the precise term, the exact phrasing, and the tone that would resonate with the recipient. He thought through the entire message before conveying it, holding the full architecture of the letter in his mind. I never once saw him correct himself.

When addressing donors, talmidim, or the wider community, there were no throwaway lines, no verbal placeholders, no “ums” or “what’s-it-calleds” that pepper most people’s speech. He was extraordinarily eloquent, with a command of English that made even educated people reach for a dictionary. But more than that, he approached communication with respect for the listener, the language, and himself. Every word mattered. Every sentence carried weight.

Rav Schiller was uncompromising in his commitment to the truth of Torah. The yeshivah’s very existence was predicated on that unapologetic clarity. Ohr Somayach was to be a “regular, real yeshivah” that happened to serve baalei teshuvah, not a kiruv program that dabbled in learning. The product was Gemara b’iyun, serious lomdus, the ability to independently prepare a sugya with mefarshim.

But within that framework of absolute fidelity to mesorah, he recognized Torah’s inherent flexibility, its capacity to speak to every generation in every circumstance.

“The Torah didn’t stay in the desert,” he would say. “HaKadosh Baruch Hu makes it a point to bring Torah with us throughout the galus. The principles that guide us are eternal and unchanging. But it is our responsibility to apply ourselves to understanding how to act in our particular time and place.”

He illustrated this with stories from the darkest chapter of Jewish history. He would speak of the greatness of Jews during the war, and the halachic questions (many recorded in various responsa) they managed to ask even in those circumstances.

One story in particular has stayed with me.

A group of men hiding in a bunker had managed to smuggle in a single pair of tefillin. Each morning, in the brief interval before the Nazis began their morning barbarism, the men would pass the tefillin around. Each would put them on for just long enough to say Shema and then pass them on. They were risking their lives for those few seconds of connection. Then Tishah B’Av arrived, and one of the men posed a question: Should they continue their practice of donning tefillin in the early morning, which was objectively safer? Or should they observe the general custom and wait until after chatzos, when the risk of detection was much higher?

“The fact that a Jew could have the presence of mind to ask such a question,” he would say, “that was the true moment of victory over the Nazis. That was proof that the Jewish People will always survive galus, so long as we remain engaged with the Torah.”

Torah is both timeless and timely, both absolute and adaptive. The principles never change, but the application requires wisdom, sensitivity, and deep awareness with both the text and the reality in which we find ourselves.

The Fueling Station

When the Rosh Yeshivah was niftar, as Klal Yisrael was preparing for Purim, many noted the profound appropriateness of the timing. “The king of teshuvah,” one hesped proclaimed, “leaving us during the time when we accept the Torah anew, this time out of love.”

The Rosh Yeshivah himself had spoken often about Purim’s unique role in Jewish history. He described it as a “fueling station,” a gift from Chazal designed with the foresight that we would need regular influxes of kedushah to survive our time in exile.

Purim commemorates a moment when Jews faced annihilation and responded not with despair but with renewed commitment. When external circumstances were at their worst, internal resolve was at its strongest. When the future seemed darkest, the nation found light.

In a sense, the Rosh Yeshivah’s life work was pioneering that same art, of staying connected to Torah throughout exile. The skill of accessing the depths of Torah with such intensity that it became impossible to leave.

I arrived at Yeshivas Ohr Somayach at 18, a kid from America with more questions than answers, more curiosity than commitment. Today, I live in Eretz Yisrael. I learn Torah daily. I am raising children in that same mesorah, children who daven and learn and grow.

I am one of thousands, perhaps tens of thousands, who can trace the architecture of their lives back to decisions made in the alcoves of that beis medrash at Shimon Hatzaddik 22, under the guidance of a man who spoke with precision and believed unshakably in the power of truth.

A year has gone by. And what remains is not just what was built, but what continues to build itself, student by student, family by family, generation by generation.

Yehi zichro baruch.

Danny Louis is a writer and musician living in Ramat Beit Shemesh.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1100)