Novardok Yeshiva

The Novardok yeshiva in Novardok, then Lithuania, was one of the biggest and most important yeshivas in pre-World War II Europe, and a powerful force within the Mussar movement. The yeshiva was established in 1896, together with a Kollel for married men, under the direction of Rabbi Yosef Yoizel Horowitz, an alumnus of the Kovno Kollel and pupil of Rabbi Yisrael Salanter. In the footsteps of his mentor, he was a staunch advocate of the Mussar approach. He was known as the der Alter fun Novardok, a Yiddish term meaning "the elder of Novardok".

The yeshiva opened with ten students. A few months later there were already fifty. A year after the yeshiva's establishment, great criticism was levelled at the study and practice of Mussar, and the opponents of that philosophy sought to close the yeshiva. They didn't succeed. By 1899, the yeshiva had swelled to 200 pupils.

After the Bolshevik takeover of Russia, the Alter ordered his students to cross the border into Poland. Many of the students were shot in the attempt; others were sent to Siberian prison camps, but six hundred made it across the border. Novardok yeshiva was re-established in Białystok under the leadership of the Alter's son-in-law, Rabbi Avraham Yoffen, it soon became the center of an entire movement. Following the doctrine of "springs flowing outward", in a few years Novardok established yeshivas all over the region, in major cities such as Kiev, Kharkov, Odessa Kherson, Nizhny Novgorod, Rostov-on-Don, Zhitomir, Berdichev, Tsaritsyn, Saratov, Plogid, Chernigov, Pinsk, Cherson, Mogilev, Kamieniec-Podolski, Nikolaev, Bălţi and Od.

The Novardok Philosophy

Self Improvement

Novardok had its own unique outlook, stressing the wearing of tattered clothing and total negation of ego and the physical world. Like other Mussar schools, Novardok demanded the complete shattering of personal desires, eradicating any vestige of evil habits. For that purpose, students would carry notebooks, in which they would daily enter records of failures and achievements. Before bedtime they would check their "bookkeeping" and make plans-of-action for correcting faults. One method of "breaking" oneself was by denying oneself the rewards of a sin.

Students of Novardok participated in deliberately humiliating behaviour, such as going to a bakery and asking for a box of nails, or wearing a tie made out of hay. One pupil related that the purpose of these exercises were not to "put yourself down", as is commonly thought. The training, in fact, promoted the opposite; it gave the students the emotional freedom from the chains of public approval. They discovered that the fear of embarrassment was actually much greater than the reality. This strengthened their confidence to do the right thing, oblivious to what others might think.

Novardok Network

An extension of Novardok's unconventional approach entailed the establishment of numerous branches of the yeshiva. The most elite students of the yeshiva would set out on foot to strange communities without a penny in their pockets, simultaneously abstaining from speech and not asking for a ride or even food. Upon reaching a town, they would enter the Beth Midrash, and without a word to anyone, study Torah.

With this method, Novardok established in Poland alone no less than seventy yeshivas of varying sizes. Dispatched from the yeshiva base in Białystok, teams would investigate towns and cities and evaluate their suitability for a yeshiva. The extensive Novardok network supplied half of all the students to Eastern Europe's other famous yeshivas.

Army Service

In another approach to forging strength of character, the Novardok philosophy saw army service in a different light to other yeshivas. While all other yeshivas in Poland gave their students of army age permission to transfer to yeshivas in neighbouring countries, the administration of the Novardok yeshiva saw the year and a half of required army service as beneficial in helping to produce a physically stronger and more mature student. The experience could enhance his spiritual growth, and his ability to be of service of his community, which was a central part of the Novardok philosophy.

Post World War II

After escaping Nazi Europe, Rabbi Avraham Yoffen settled in Brooklyn, New York where he re-established his yeshiva. The faculty consisted of Rabbi Yoffen as dean, his son Rabbi Yaakov Yoffen as a lecturer, and his son-in-law Rabbi Yehuda Leib Nekritz as Mashgiach ruchani.

During the 1960's Rabbi Avraham Yoffen moved to Jerusalem and established a branch of his yeshiva in Meah Shearim. Under the leadership of the younger Rabbi Yoffen and Rabbi Nekritz, the Brooklyn branch continued to thrive and became reknowned as a center for very advanced Talmudic studies.

Following Rabbi Avraham Jofen's passing in 1970, leadership of the Jerusalem branch was assumed by his grandson the brilliant Talmudic scholar Rabbi Aaron Yoffen, the editor of the Kook Ritva on Yevamot. Yearly, Rabbi Yaakov Jofen would travel to Jerusalem to teach the students of his father's yeshiva. Both Rabbi Yaakov, and Rabbi Aaron were known as Talmudic geniuses.

Following Rabbi Nekritz's death and Rabbi Yaakov Yoffen's passing in 2003, the leadership of the Brooklyn-based yeshiva fell to their sons' Rabbi Mordechai Yoffen and Rabbi Tzvi Nekritz. They chose to move the Yeshiva to the Flatbush neighborhood of Brooklyn, and bringing in the famous Rabbi Yaakov Drillman of Yeshiva Chaim Berlin as a Rosh Yeshiva.

The Jerusalem branch is headed by Rabbi Shmuel and Rabbi Eitan Yoffen, sons of Rabbi Aaron Yoffen.

Famous Alumni

• Rabbi Meir Bar-Ilan
• Chaim Grade
• Rabbi Yosef Shlomo Kahaneman
• Rabbi Yaakov Yisrael Kanievsky
• Rabbi Selig Starr

References

• Novogrudok reminiscences
• Rabbi Yosef Yoizel Horowitz, the Alter of Novardok