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By Alan Morinis This February edition of Yashar comes to you on the 25th of Shevat, 5768. This date on the Hebrew calendar marks the 125th anniversary of the passing of Rabbi Yisrael Salanter, who founded the Mussar Movement in Lithuania in the 19th century. I have recently been giving a lot of thought to the life story of Rabbi Yisrael Salanter, for reasons I will get to in a moment. R’ Yisrael was born as Yisrael Lipkin in Zhagory, Lithuania. The year was 1810. After his marriage at age 23, he settled in the town of Salant, where he came under the influence of Rabbi Yosef Zundel, who directed him into the study of Mussar. R’ Yisrael took the name Salanter after his time in that town. At the age of 32, he was appointed to head a yeshiva in Vilna where he founded his first Mussar group. In 1848 he was forced to move away from Vilna when he refused to accept a post in a government-run seminary, which had a thinly veiled objective of separating Jews from Jewish tradition. He continued to propagate Mussar studies and practice, when in 1858, he suddenly left Lithuania. He lived the next 25 years of his life outside the country of his birth, spending periods of time in Paris, Berlin and Memel. He died in Koenigsberg, then part of Germany, in 1883. The secular date was February 2. R’ Yisrael has provided the model for my own activities of writing and teaching Mussar. He was a spiritual giant, and I recognize that I will never stand taller than his knees (if that), but that reality does not discourage me, as I look to learn and apply what I can from his example. The most important point I draw on is his clear recognition that the Jewish community of his time needed the spiritual strengthening that Mussar provides. He undertook to serve this need. No doubt the same can be said for our time as well. In fact, it appears to me that we who are living in this materialistic and corrupt age likely have an even greater need for spiritual guidance than was true in his time. We need Mussar as much if not more than his generation did. I am wondering about Rabbi Yisrael’s life story because the issue of creating and sustaining institutional support for Mussar activities is front and center in my thinking these days. Why didn’t he himself create any institutions to support or maintain Mussar studies or practice? He was 48 years old when he picked up and left Lithuania, and it then fell to his students and their students to create the institutions that would make Mussar widely available. This they began to do in the 1860s. But why didn’t Rabbi Salanter endeavor to do this himself? Why did he abandon his land, students and work? Maybe he became depressed, as some sources suggest. Or maybe he grew discouraged when the masses did not get caught up in the “wildfire” of spirituality he envisioned. Or maybe he saw another priority that called to him. Or maybe he was a typical charismatic leader who was a great innovator, but unsuited to the role of institution-builder that comes at a later stage of any movement. I wonder about this and speculate, but the record provides no certain answers. At this moment in my life and work, the issue of building The Mussar Institute is very present for me. I see the need so clearly because so many Jews are suffering for lack of spiritual guidance in their lives. Barren lives, misguided lives, painful lives, wandering lives all call out. And I see that our efforts yield enormous results. I get emails every week from students who want to tell me how their lives have been transformed by Mussar practice. But we have not yet built a sustainable institution that can reach out to be useful to more and more people. That is the cusp we are on right now, and I cannot say with any certainty that we will succeed in making that happen any more than did R’ Yisrael. I approach my role in the future of The Mussar Institute by looking at how what is called for fits into my own personal spiritual curriculum. That’s the Mussar way. Before me is a challenging opportunity that will surely cause me to stretch and grow in inner traits—but are the inner traits that will be called upon ones that are high priorities for my spiritual growth at this point in my life? If yes, then that’s what I must do. But if not, then I must responsibly do what I can to get the job done without undertaking it myself. Rest assured that I am not planning to move to Paris or Berlin. But by the same token, I can see that I am not the single person who can build The Mussar Institute into what it can and should become. That’s why we have a board of directors, and I am grateful to every one of these fine people who have been my companions on this journey thus far. But will this board lead the institution-building process that is called for? I ask the question: whose shoulders will carry this work into the next phase? I pray to HaShem that an answer will come. Maybe that answer will come through you. What do you think? What can you offer? How will we do it? My ear is turned to listen. In whatever form our activities may happen, I invite all of us to commit to making everything that we do be an honor to the memory of Rabbi Yisrael Salanter, tz”l, our great teacher and leader, whose yarzheit is today. |
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