Rav Gavriel Noach Holtzberg – A Tribute
By Eli Willner
(As published in Yated Neeman, 12/10/2008)
It is motzai Shabbos parshas Toldos and I am in Eretz
Yisroel. I’m here on business but, like many other yidden, I spent
Friday glued to the news, hoping against hope for good news out of Mumbai. I
went into Shabbos with a sense of foreboding. The latest news, right before
candle-lighting, was not encouraging. After havdala our worst fears were
confirmed. Gavriel Noach Holtzberg and his Rebbetzin, h”yd, were no
more.
After my initial shock wore off I decided to express my
feelings in writing. I’m an unlikely
candidate to be writing a tribute to a Chabad sholiach. My background
isn’t Lubavitch. And there are doubtless plenty of people who appreciated
Gabi’s gadlus better than I, who merely spent several Shabbosos over
several years as his guest and exchanged occasional emails with him.
Nonetheless, Gabi made a profound impression on me. I
considered him a good friend and had the sense that the feeling was mutual. I
don’t doubt that there are dozens, or maybe hundreds of people who feel the
same – that was part of Gabi’s gadlus. If so, there will be other
tributes, and kain yirbu, he deserves them all.
Let me begin by sharing my impressions of Gabi after my first
trip to Mumbai, nearly four years ago. The following is an excerpt from a
letter to a mutual friend after my return.
Hi, Reb Moshe. I am in the process of
getting back into things here, after my trip…
Rabbi Holtzberg is an amazing person… he's
about 27, two babies, yet he and his wife hosted about 40 people Friday night,
and there is no take-out in Mumbai – if you want to eat it, you have to start
from scratch (which means shechita, if you want meat or chicken)! I was
impressed by the fact that he accepted with complete aplomb the fact that his
home (which doubles as the Chabad House) constantly has people coming and
going, sleeping on the couches, whatever, and that completely non-religious yidden
are drawn there for reasons they can't put their finger on, and that Rabbi
Holtzberg has the knack of talking to each individual on his own level (which
implies also the ability to assess that level).
Here's a little excerpt from my trip
diary:
I spent Shabbos with Rabbi Holtzberg,
who is the Chabad sholiach in Mumbai. It was a wonderful experience. His
home is on the top floor of a quaint, old-fashioned - but clean and comfortable
- hotel overlooking the Indian Ocean, on a very swank street in the classy part
of town [This was before the Chabad House moved to its current five-story
structure]. He has the entire floor, including a huge balcony which overlooks
the ocean. He makes his Friday night seudah on the balcony (and he had
about forty people there, so you can get an idea of its size). The other seudos
he makes inside, since it's too hot to eat on the balcony when the sun is
out. The Rabbi (who is now
"Gabi" to me) is a very warm and hospitable man, with two young kids
and a Rebbetzin who really has her hands full (although she does have local
help). He holds dual American/Israeli citizenship; he was born in the Israel
but moved to the USA in his youth. He's most comfortable in Hebrew, but speaks
a colloquial American English as well.
His crowd was a mixed bag; about 70%
Israeli, divided between post-army kids seeing the world and business people;
the rest were from all over the place (even another guy from Brooklyn, if you
would believe it). The Israelis were mostly not frum, and mostly not shy about
being not frum. They came to the shabbos seudah complete with handbags,
wallets and cell phones. However, given their backgrounds, the amazing thing is
that they came at all - and came back Shabbos afternoon, and hung around after
the seduah, and seemed to enjoy the ruach of Shabbos and talking
with Gabi, who handled it extremely well…
The Chabad house doesn't have its own minyan,
they daven at the Sasson shul, which is the oldest (and now I think one
of the only two) shuls in Bombay. It's officially a frum Sephardi shul, but
they have no Rav, and haven't for years, and things seem to have slipped
somewhat. Most of the local mispallilim, Gabi tells me, are not frum. The
baal koreh is looking back and forth between the sefer Torah and
a chumash, and might be laining from either one of them at any
given moment in time. Gabi is in a delicate position because although they
accept his superior knowledge, and defer to him as a Rabbi, he has no authority
to institute changes. He is trying, but has to tread carefully. He took over laining
for a while, but then the "regular" guy decided he wanted his job
back, so that was that. Cell phones ring during davening, and yes, I
mean Shabbos davening (but hey, at least they go outside to answer the
calls!) There is a kiddush after davening, which Gabi suggested
we skip. Until he arrived, people did their own shechita. He himself is
a shochet and now supplies poultry to whoever wants, but some of the
old-timers still do their own, and since these are the same guys carrying
around their cell phones during davening, there is a problem. So, we
skipped the kiddush.
Some background on the Jewish community in Mumbai is in
order. Mumbai is better known by its original name: Bombay. It’s Jewish
presence dates back to the 1700’s but the community began to bloom in the early
1800’s with the arrival of David Sasson, a Sephardy Jew from Bagdad, who
established a vast mercantile empire and built many Jewish institutions,
including shuls, Yeshivos and mikvaos. At its height the community
numbered over 15,000 people but began a steep decline in the 1940’s, as
economic conditions deteriorated and much of the community moved to the west or
to Israel. Today the community numbers approximately 5,000 people but the
Sasson shul – one of the largest of the seven or eight shuls originally in
Mumbai – is in disrepair and barely scrapes together a minyan on
Shabbos.
The “tovai ha’ir” are gone and before Rabbi Holtzberg
arrived in 2003 the community was essentially leaderless and on a steep
decline.
To know Rabbi Holtzberg was to love him – he exuded self-effacing
kindness and goodwill and had a knack of making everyone comfortable in his
presence. The community might have rejected the arrival of an “outsider” – a
foreigner, an Ashkenazi – and, moreover, someone whose presence implied the
less than adequate state of their religious observance. But, they welcomed him
with open arms. And, with tact, Gabi began the process of raising the standard
of religious observance in Mumbai, while at the same time providing a haven for
the many Jewish visitors to Mumbai.
The visitors loved Gabi just as the residents did and their
diversity was amazing. They included Israeli backpackers, and tourists and
business people ranging from Bnai Brak diamond dealers, to Chaim Berliners from
Brooklyn, to high-tech Israeli entrepreneurs, to crusty British gentlemen and
every kind of Jew in between. Gabi was
able to relate to all of them, and – astoundingly – got us to relate amongst
ourselves as well.
His “MO” seems simple but it takes a person of stature to
pull it off successfully and consistently. Kiddush, some good food, and a
little “mashke”, and Gabi announces his “minhag hamakom”. All the
guest will introduce themselves, and say a shtikel Torah, or tell over
an inspiring maiseh, or suggest a zemira. Gabi’s sure but subtle hand guides
the process to assure that halacha is observed, people’s sensitivities
aren’t violated and everyone’s interest is continually engaged. Indeed, the seudah
is long but no one is bored, and many linger afterwards, reluctant to break the
spell.
I remember one visitor in particular, a
distinguished-looking non-frum Israeli who didn’t say much, but who seemed
familiar with Gabi’s tisch. When it was his turn to speak he introduced
himself – he was a diplomat from the Israeli consulate in Mumbai and he came to
tell Gabi and all assembled some good news. An Israeli who was arrested and
held in an Indian jail was just released and was on a flight back to Lod. The
diplomat wanted to thank Gabi for his role in obtaining the release and to
publicly acknowledge it. Then he smiled, said “Shabbat Shalom” and left. Gabi,
though obviously elated at the news, simply moved on to the next participant.
I had already known that Gabi was the local shochet,
mohel, Rav, mechanech, baal korah, baal tokeah and more, but I had
no idea of his pidyon shvuyim activities. Gabi didn’t believe in
self-aggrandizement, he believed in doing what was necessary to help his fellow
yidden in whatever way was needed, and if that included diplomacy, so be
it.
Kiruv was one of Gabi’s primary activities and one of
the most impressive things about him, to this litvishe Jew, was that
Gabi was concerned about bringing Jews closer to Torah Yiddishkeit, but
not to any particular “brand” of Torah Yiddishkeit, including his own.
His divrei Torah by the Shabbos tischen, and by his wonderful melava
malkos, naturally reflected his background, drawing from the Torah of the
Lubavitcher Rebbes and other gedolei chassidus. But he was delighted when I shared with him
afterwards divrei Torah from litvishe sources on similar inyonim.
Indeed, I discovered as I spoke with him in learning on
various occasions that Gabi was a talmid chochom of stature with a broad
and deep knowledge of many areas of Torah. When we were talking one-on-one his
eyes would light up and his entire being would become animated with his “bren”
for Torah, and I had the feeling that I was seeing the real Gabi Holtzberg, the
“pnimius” that defined and motivated all his other activities.
About three years ago Chabad of Mumbai outgrew its original
location on the top floor of that hotel and Gabi ambitiously decided to raise
funds for, buy and refurbish a five-story building that would enable him to
broaden the scope of his activities. I remember visiting him shortly after he
moved into that building. It wasn’t completely finished yet, but the “ikkar”
was there – a bais medrash, and a dining hall for the guests. Gabi
described with pride his plans to add a “hostel” so that his guests would no
longer have to walk from the area hotels – and pay their steep rates – but
could make his Chabad House their base of operations. That visit, I stayed at
the Taj Mahal hotel and davened and ate with Gabi.
My most recent visit was a few short months ago. The
refurbishment was complete and Gabi welcomed me with pride to the hostel –
clean and comfortable, not quite as high-end as the Taj, but infinitely more heimish.
Friday night Gabi announced that we were going to the Sasson shul to daven
– about a 25 minute walk through the smelly streets of Mumbai. “Why?”, I asked
him. “You have a beautiful new bais medrash, we have a minyan
here – and it’s 100 degrees outside, in the shade!” “Because”, he answered me
with a smile, “we have a minyan, but without us, they
may not!” Classic Gabi!
That visit, when it was my turn to speak, I said, “Rabboisai,
my business has offices in Yerushalayim and in Mumbai, and I travel to both
several times a year. Traveling to the kedusha of Yerushalayim is always
a joy. Traveling to the tumah of Mumbai would be intolerable, if not for
this wonderful microcosm of Yerushalayim that Gabi has somehow managed to
transplant right here.”
The loss of Gabi to Mumbai is incalculable. Gabi was one of
a kind. His loss to klal yisroel is incalculable as well. Yehi zicho
boruch.
