Rabbi Dovid Luria – the Radal

From childhood, Rabbi David amazed everyone with his extraordinary abilities in Torah study. At the age of 5 he already knew the entire Tanach with the commentaries of Rashi and Radak, as well as the grammar of the Holy tongue.

At 6 he began studying Talmud with the commentaries of Rashi and Tosafot. His father hired special Talmud teachers for him, who were well-known rabbis. At 9 he already knew the first nine tractates of the Talmud. At 10 Rabbi David knew all six orders of the Mishnah by heart.

At the age of 9, the following incident occurred with him. One evening his father entered the room where he was studying Torah together with a certain Bykhov prince. With them was also a tutor whom the prince had brought from France for his son. The tutor examined little David and everyone was astonished by his knowledge of mathematics. The prince gave him a gift and arranged with his father that the foreign tutor would spend one hour each day with his son. This was exactly the time set aside for reviewing the Talmud. It was impossible to refuse. David, however, did not want to spend time on anything other than Torah. He cried the whole night. In the morning, the tutor was found murdered outside the town.

At 13, Rabbi David married the daughter of a prominent Vilna merchant and Torah scholar, whose grandfather had been a disciple of the Vilna Gaon. When he came to Vilna to meet his bride's family, his address in the city's Great Synagogue made a tremendous impression on those gathered. For the first period after his wedding, Rabbi David lived in Vilna, where there were many Torah scholars. Association with them had a great influence on him. He formed a particularly close relationship with Rabbi Shaul Katzenellenbogen. During the 4 years that Rabbi David spent in Vilna, he and Rabbi Shaul, despite the great difference in their ages, completed the full cycle of the Babylonian Talmud several times together. Rabbi Shaul's approach to Torah study had an enormous influence on Rabbi David.

At 17, Rabbi David had already completed his first work — a commentary on tractate Berachot of the Babylonian Talmud.

When he turned 18, Rabbi David returned with his family to Bykhov. So that he could continue his Torah study in a quiet setting, his father built a beit midrash especially for him. He did not even need to interrupt his studies for prayer. At the appointed prayer times, a specially invited minyan would come there, and after the prayers Rabbi David could immediately continue his studies. There he wrote a commentary on the entire Tanach, on the Midrash Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer and the book Mechilta, notes on the Babylonian and Jerusalem Talmuds, on the halachic responsa of the Geonim, the Rambam and the Shulchan Aruch, as well as a commentary on the Zohar — "Nefesh David" ("The Soul of David"). In addition, during this same period he wrote many responses to questions sent to him on the most varied areas of Jewish law. According to the testimony of his contemporaries, Rabbi David had a phenomenal memory. It was enough for him to glance a few times at a page of any book for it to be imprinted in his memory like a photograph. On one of his trips to Vilna, to his teacher Rabbi Shaul, he stopped, at his teacher's request, in Volozhin to visit the founder of the yeshiva, Rabbi Chaim. The latter was amazed by his guest's deep knowledge of Torah and blessed him with the words: "May your name become known throughout the world!" Despite his enormous standing in the world of Torah, the Radal refused to hold official rabbinic positions. In 1854 he was invited to the position of chief rabbi of Warsaw, which at that time was one of the largest cities of the Jewish diaspora. This invitation bore the signatures of the city's most eminent rabbis, including Rabbi Yitzchak Meir Alter. The Radal took an active part in resolving virtually all important questions of Jewish life. During Sir Moses Montefiore's stay in Vilna in 1846, he traveled there for negotiations with him. And when the reformers, who were already gaining social weight within the Jewish community, began attempting to change the order of prayers, the Radal opposed them sharply.

In 1835, at the age of 37, the Radal, following the example of the Vilna Gaon, set out on a voluntary exile ("galut") far from Bykhov, to the Volhynia region. Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin had earlier been in exile in these same places. Though 18 months away from his home, he nevertheless did not diminish the intensity of his Torah study.

In 1838 the Radal underwent, as a result of a false denunciation, one of the most difficult trials of his life — arrest and imprisonment in the Shlisselburg Fortress. Let us cite just one episode. Wishing to conceal from the man under investigation the content of their conversation during one of the interrogations, the investigators began speaking in French. The Radal rose from his seat and moved away so as not to hear them. The one conducting the interrogation immediately turned to the rabbi sternly, saying: "Who gave you permission to stand up?" "You apparently switched to French so that I would not understand you," the Radal answered in refined French. "But since I do not wish to mislead you, I moved away so as not to hear what you were saying." The investigators immediately changed their attitude toward him, and he was soon fully acquitted and released from the fortress.

Like his father, the Radal was deeply involved in charity. Like the Vilna Gaon, he was well versed in many sciences, including medicine, and had an excellent command of several foreign languages. But even for the sake of all this he never interrupted his Torah study. He acquired secular sciences and foreign languages in places where it is forbidden to study Torah, such as the bathroom. Many sick people came to him. If a person was unable to pay for medicine, the Radal, along with the prescription, would write a note to the pharmacist asking him to dispense the medicine free of charge and to put its cost on his own account.

Rabbi David Luria passed away in Bykhov at the age of 58. All the residents of Bykhov accompanied him on his final journey. Even the city police, in dress uniform, took part in the funeral. For the farewell, the coffin bearing his body was brought into the main synagogue of Bykhov and placed on the bimah — the place where the Torah is read. Only great Torah scholars are accorded this tremendous honor.

May the merit of the tzadik protect the people of Israel!