I was supposed to go to Dad’s grave in Tzfat, Israel, on Aug. 7 because it was my biological mother’s 43rd yahrzeit. I figured that would be the second-best choice if I couldn’t get to Mom’s grave in New York. I scheduled the day around a fun family trip — but life didn’t turn out as I had planned.
Sadly, a man so dear to the world and known as a scholar and luminary to many, Rav Adin Even-Israel Steinsaltz, died that morning at age 83. He was my friend’s dad, an author of many Torah books written specifically to help all people of various backgrounds and intellectual abilities better understand the Torah today.
It became obvious that I wasn’t “supposed” to be going to see Dad at all that day. Clearly, Steinsaltz’s was the funeral and grave to which I was to attend. This yahrzeit date of 17 Av now will forever be shared by his family and mine. I wondered if it was wrong to feel comfort by this, validated in some way.
My first encounter with Steinsaltz was when my husband, Yossi, and I were given the honor of carrying Steinsaltz’s grandchild, Moshe, to the mohel for his circumcision. I’m childhood friends with his daughter-in-law, Liza, and she graciously gave us this honor.
A few years later, when I was 25 and heavily pregnant with my first child, we met again at Liza and Meni’s for Shabbat lunch. It was to be the first of many times Steinsaltz would guide me forward in my life in the most loving but strong and meaningful way, making me dig deeper within myself, ask questions, stand up for myself, and know that I make a difference by my very existence — that I am a vessel of God worth investing in.
That day at lunch, Steinsaltz asked me if I knew what my name meant. I had never been asked that before. “Hindel, a hen, in Yiddish?” I guessed. He laughed and asked if I identified as a chicken. “Would you like to be like one? Or would you rather identify with the beautiful gazelle, the Ayala, because that’s what your name means in Hebrew. Hindel is not a hen. Hindel is the gazelle.” Well, I’ll certainly go through life differently as a gazelle than I would a chicken.
Since then, Steinsaltz and I met many times at family parties and different events. I’ve gotten blessings from him when he was “the godfather” — sandik — at friends’ children’s Brisim, and on Simchat Torah, when he often took the liberty to give blessings. I also had the pleasure to meet with him privately four times.
Steinsaltz was known for his soft-spoken tone and low voice while his eyes twinkled — all this while he straight-talked and gave dramatic, harsh examples to get his point across. He didn’t use kid gloves when he spoke with me, nor did he mince his words. He spoke to me much like my dad: full of love, and always in a judge-free zone, but with intention for growth.
Steinsaltz was known for his soft-spoken tone and low voice while his eyes twinkled — all this while he straight-talked and gave dramatic and harsh examples to get his point across.
One of my dad’s favorite lines was, “It’s not about you.” Steinsaltz would sweetly say the same. Steinsaltz had high expectations for me of how to move forward as my best self. He never criticized me, but he kindly pointed out why my train of thought or my actions was more about me and less about what I wanted to accomplish for others. He let me know when my ego needed to be moved to the side so I could make more space in my life for ideas larger than mine. He asked me questions with kindness to guide my thoughts until I discovered my own answers to paths I would need to take.
It’s shocking to think I so easily felt comfortable asking for his precious time to talk to me. I took him away from writing and teaching — his contributions to our earthly and mundane existence, changing the spiritual cosmic face of this world.
I went to Steinsaltz to cry and beg for clarity after my daughter Shula died. I had questions and I needed answers. He answered with love and wisdom as he sat in his cozy, hands-on museum of an office with one of his many pipes, very much focused on me as if he had all the time in the world. He smiled with sensitivity as he answered as much as a human can answer without speaking for or making excuses for God.
Three years later, I saw him at Meni’s birthday party and he immediately asked how I was really doing and brought up details of our private meeting three years before. I burst into tears and said that three years with Shula gone still felt impossible to survive. We chatted on the couch for 20 minutes (OK, I chatted), and this time, Steinsaltz spoke with me a bit more strongly. He told me I wasn’t doing enough to let Shula go, and although it’s important to never forget her, there is a healthy way to move forward with the grief. And clearly, I wasn’t doing that, and I was making my whole family suffer because of it.
This shocked me as I had been in therapy and I thought my progress in living in my “new normal” was exemplary. And I told him so. He humored me with a nod and made it clear he didn’t agree. He said that Shula was just a small girl of 3 and although she must have been great in her lifetime because she so quickly completed her purpose, she must have had a pretty small “bank account.” (He went into such detailed description here that I laughed loudly at his outrageous comments). So in all of the hard work — events and classes, having a Torah written and opening a children’s library — what I was trying to accomplish in her memory was more for me because her pure soul didn’t actually need it. He told me he was happy if it made me feel better. And then smirked.
Steinsaltz was a tough-love but loving grandpa who objectively advised those who asked.
He continued, saying that the only way I would truly affect her soul was by my happiness and the happiness I perpetuated around me. I needed to make a daily choice to be optimistic and positive because Shula no longer needed me. “Her job title in her new life” was no longer as my daughter. She needed permission from me to be free to live life in another capacity, and I had to stop “dragging her down here.” (The detailed description of what her life may look like away from me was so outlandish that he had me laughing hard again.)
He explained to me what the process of visiting a grave does to the deceased soul, and how I must stop visiting Shula’s grave so often. He went into dramatic detail here of comparisons. “You’re like the shvigger, mother-in-law, that keeps repeating stories of the good life when her son lived with her and how much love they shared before you came ’round and took him away.” He said I needed to “stop behaving like a child who keeps picking his scab off his leg just to glorify in the blood dripping down again and again.” I just needed to let the healing begin.
He explained where God came into the picture and where my lack of faith — although I thought I had plenty — was a testament to my hanging on to grief.
I fought him hard on this. But he smiled and repeated his mantra as many times as I fought him. “We only survive in this world because HaShem’s efforts make it possible daily. It has almost nothing to do with the level of our mourning or our trying to survive. We need to do our part but, ultimately, it is our faith that trusts in Him that life is good and meaningful — and if we indeed believe that, our grief would be lessened and we can move forward. Because if I have faith that He is all good, then what He does is surely good as well. If I’m grief-stricken, I don’t truly believe that God is good.”
He relentlessly continued by telling me we are capable of surviving while holding memories and love for our deceased loved one. He explained that the Lubavitcher Rebbe has guided us through so much of his teachings of how to do this. “Let go, but still live with them as if they are part of your own body. By doing good deeds for their soul — which they don’t need but we do — we connect them to ourselves physically by becoming their hands and feet or mouths that do the mitzvah in their merit.”
This was a revolutionary thought for me. I spent years in therapy and read many books on grief, yet no one had the guts to say to me, let go of the grief. Move on! It’s time! I didn’t realize I could let go while still maintaining a relationship with Shula. Steinsaltz empowered and liberated me by demanding I step up and be productive without all the self-pity.
Steinsaltz obviously saw deep within me that I was ready to hear this — and he went for the jugular. What’s most fascinating is that I found his tough-love talk so beneficial that I sent three other bereaved moms to him. Not one of them had the same experience as me. He specifically catered his answers to each mom who came with questions. And to none of them did he use that method of authority with his psychological Torah guidance. He just listened kindly, and told them they were on the right path for healing, etc. Amazing to think that he really talked soul-to-soul to each individual who came to visit him. He knew what each person can handle and which direction he was able to encourage him or her.
When my father died, I marched right back into his office for a third visit.
He cried with me as I cried and begged for fatherly love. He didn’t look away, embarrassed by my show of emotion, didn’t get impatient with all my psychological drivel.
He smiled at me with such love and devotion as I bragged about myself, my husband, my children and my recent accomplishments — details I could no longer share with my own father. He advised me about which yeshivas to send my boys, which jobs I should take on or drop (“Would I benefit the most, or would the world benefit more?” he asked), which way to encourage my husband in different endeavors, etc.
After he was no longer able to speak because of a stroke, I had the audacity to visit him again and speak for 45 minutes straight. I would write out my questions for him and make little boxes for him to tick: yes, no or other.
Steinsaltz was a tough-love but loving grandpa who objectively advised those who asked. That’s how I personally saw Steinsaltz. Much of the world knows him as one of the most impressive scholars of his generation, but I wonder how many know the humane, flesh-and-blood, kindest soul, nonjudgmental side to this great rabbi who had a great sense of humor and biting wit.
During the week of shivah, as various parts of his soul hovered over his home, his place of study, the place he did his good deeds, I wished his family so much love, comfort and strength to believe that Moshiach is one giant step closer to bringing back the beacon of light that was Rav Adin Even Israel Steinsaltz.
To his wife, children, in-laws, grandchildren and all of his students, I say,
“Hamakom Yenachem Etchem Bitoch Shaar Aveilei Tzion Byerushalayim.”
Hindel Schwartz Swerdlov grew up in Los Angeles as one of 12 children of the Chabad campus rabbi and rebbetzin of UCLA, Rabbi Shlomo Schwartzie and Olivia. She has been liveding in Jerusalem for the past 23 years with her husband, Yossi, and seven children. Schwartz Swerdlov is the founder and director of Shula’‘s Library, and is a contributing writer for Our Tapestry magazine. She is a teacher of CChassidut on self-growth at Mayanot Women’s Yeshiva.
