Memory Lane: Rav Moshe Roginsky

By Y. S. Gold

It was in the aftermath of the Churban, and of the thousands of Novaradoker talmidim, from the dozens of Novaradoker yeshivos throughout Russia and Poland, a relative handful remained.

Rav Alter Moshe Roginsky of Boro Park not only a prime Novarodoker—permeated to his core with the movement’s mussar teachings—he was one of its Roshei Yeshiva in the prewar era. He was a ga’on in Torah and middos, and dedicated himself to chessed, through his three decades as the menahel of the legendary Ezras Torah, and in his private life.

A Lifelong Novaradoker

Rav Moshe was born in 1905, in the town of Mazyr, Russia, near the Ukrainian border. His father was Reb Levi, one of the chashuve balebatim in the town. We know very little about his youth, except that he was a frail child, and would suffer ailments throughout his eighty years on this earth—which makes his enormous accomplishments in Torah and chessed all the more remarkable.

As a youth, he entered the satellite Novarodoker yeshiva in his hometown, where his kishronos and cheishek in learning began to blossom.

Subsequently, he entered the main Novarodoker yeshiva in Bialistok, under the leadership of Rav Avrohom Jofen... and would remain a lifelong Novaradoker; he would do everything to hide his greatness in Torah and yiras Shomayim, and it would be a select few Gedolim and ovdei Hashem who had the eyes to appreciate him. In an article that he later penned on the history of Novaradok, we see glimpses of the world that he breathed and made his own; the purity, the forging of his character in the ways of mussar that would remain his hallmark for all his life.   

Following his marriage, he became a Rosh Yeshiva of the Novarodoker yeshiva in Vysokay, a Polish town near Brisk. Thus began his career in harbotzas Torah. He shaped many talmidim here. This blissful life of avodas Hashem was brutally interrupted with the arrival of WWII, and Rav Moshe and his wife fled to Vilna, where he continued learning Torah. He spent the war years on the run, and in Siberia.   

The Highest Calling  

Rabbi Menachem Gettinger was the Rov of Young Israel of the West Side, one of the leaders of Ezras Torah, and a son in law of the legendary Rav Rif of Camden—himself a pillar of Ezras Torah.

Rabbi Gettinger an anecdote that gives insight into the greatness of Rav Moshe’s character: “We were once together at a court case relating to Ezras Torah. After Rav Moshe testified, a gentile woman approached me excitedly, asking, ‘Who is this man? His face shines so brightly,’ and it brought to mind a similar story relating to Rav Yochanan (Nedorim, 21B), and the pronunciation of ‘the wisdom of man illuminates his countenance.’ 

“I thought to myself; Rav Roginsky endures yisurei Iyov... and accomplished all of these ideals.”

On 18 Tammuz, 1985, he was niftar following a lifetime of torah amid suffering.

Rav Dovid Liphshitz, the Suvalker Rov and leader of Ezras Torah proclaimed at his levaya that he was “A tzaddik yesod olam, a pillar of chessed, a gadol in Torah and chessed. His levaya in America and Eretz Yisroel were well attended, with many gedolei Torah in attendance, all of whom lauded his incredible efforts on behalf of Klal Yisroel—beginning in the backwoods of Russia, through suffering and tribulations of the World Wars, and providing relief to the needy of Klal Yisroel with selflessness and sacrifice.