If you study Torah via any of the new media, you owe it to the late Rabbi Berel Wein. Others did it before him, but he mass produced it. He showed it could be done worldwide. He became the model. His Jewish history series garnered hundreds of thousands of listeners. He broke open the new medium of Torah instruction.
That would be achievement enough for most people, but Rabbi Wein also left his mark as a guest speaker. His presence could make a convention, and his absence could break it.
Teacher. Speaker. Add to that the many bestselling books on Jewish history that Rabbi Wein wrote. Add to that his stellar service as a influential pulpit rabbi in demand, in Florida, then in New York, then in Jerusalem, where the competition is particularly stiff.
Teacher. Speaker. Author. Rabbi. Now, add to that the yeshiva high school that Rabbi Wein founded, and his pioneering service to the world of kashrut supervision with the OU, and his fundraising for outreach synagogues led by young rabbis he hardly knew, and his many years as an attorney, and his creative Jewish educational videos for younger people. And . . . and . . .
Such are the achievements of a massive committee, not of an individual.
We have not even mentioned the bridges that Rabbi Wein built, the lines he crossed, the communities he connected.
Nor have we mentioned the Hebrew volumes of halachic scholarship he wrote, nor the federations and other Jewish organization that he influenced, nor the accomplished children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren he leaves behind.
Oh, did we forget Rabbi Wein’s sardonic sense of humor, his pungent way of making a point without offending a soul? He was sitting on a plane returning from a speaking engagement, sitting next to a rather standoffish gentleman of an obviously different religion, also returning from a speaking engagement. Rabbi Wein told his wary seatmate that they had a lot in common. Which, of course, they didn’t seem to. The seatmate gave the rabbi a puzzled look, whereupon Rabbi Wein said: “Neither one of us paid for our ticket!”
Which broke the ice and a wonderful conversation ensued.
Rabbi Wein knew how to talk to people. He learned from his father-in-law, whom the legendary sage, Chofetz Chaim, told to go to America “to talk to Jews.”
Rabbi Wein observed real time human failings and used them powerfully to make pertinent moral points, such as the one about the wealthy man in his city who expanded his home onto an adjoining lot, not because he needed the space, but because he didn’t want his neighbor to have it.
Teacher. Speaker. Author. Rabbi. Kashrut leader. Fundraiser. Attorney. Bridge builder. Communal force. Humorist. Ethicist.
And friend.
We, along with countless others, miss you, Rabbi Wein.
© IJN 2025
