Elazar Menachem Man Shach (, Elazar Shach; January 1, 1899 O.S. – November 2, 2001) was a Haredi rabbi who headed Lithuanian Orthodox Jews in Israel and around the world from the early 1970s until his death in 2001. He served as chair of the Council of Sages and one of three co-deans of the Ponevezh Yeshiva in Bnei Brak, along with Shmuel Rozovsky and Dovid Povarsky. Due to his differences with the Hasidic leadership of the Agudat Yisrael political party, he allied with Ovadia Yosef, with whom he founded the Shas party in 1984. Later, in 1988, Shach criticized Ovadia Yosef, saying that, "Sepharadim are not suitable for leadership positions",'Haaretz' daily newspaper, Shachar Ilan, November 2, 2001 and subsequently founded the Degel HaTorah political party representing the Litvaks in the Israeli Knesset.
Biography Elazar Menachem Man Shach was born in Vabalninkas (Vaboilnik in Yiddish), in northern Lithuania, to Ezriel and Batsheva Shach (née Levitan). The Shach family had been merchants for generations, while the Levitans were religious scholars who served various Lithuanian communities.Batsheva's brother, Osher Nisan Levitan, later became an important figure in the Union of Orthodox Rabbis in the United States. As a child, Shach was considered an illui (child prodigy)Rabbi Eliezer Schach, Torah giant, dies at age 103 Ilan, Shahar. Canadian Jewish News. Nov 8, 2001. Vol. 31, Iss. 46; pg. 41 and in 1909, aged 11, went to Panevėžys to study at the Ponevezh Yeshiva which was then headed by Isaac Jacob Rabinowitz.Also known as Rav Itzele Ponovezer. In 1913 he enrolled at Yeshivas Knesses Yisrael in Slabodka.
When World War I began in 1914, Shach returned to his family, but then began traveling across Lithuania from town to town, sleeping and eating wherever he could, while continuing to study Torah. During this period he suffered considerable deprivation, living with inadequate sanitation and being compelled to wear tattered clothing and worn out shoes. He reportedly sequestered himself in an attic for two years not knowing where his parents were. In 1915, following the advice of Yechezkel Bernstein (author of Divrei Yechezkel), Shach traveled to Slutsk to study at the yeshiva there.
In 1939, Shach went to Vilna, where he stayed with Chaim Ozer Grodzinski. Later that year, Shach's mother and eldest daughter died. In early 1940, Shach's maternal uncle, Aron Levitan, helped him get emigration visas to the United States, but after consulting with Yitzchok Zev Soloveitchik and Grodzinski,Harav Schach: Shehamafteach B'yado by Moshe Horovitz. Keter Publishing House, Jerusalem. 1989. page 56 Schach decided to immigrate to Mandatory Palestine. Shach later served as a rosh yeshiva in Jerusalem.
Pedagogic and rabbinic career At Lomzha Yeshivah in Petach Tikvah, Shach served as the main Talmudic lecturer, while Rabbi Moshe Shmuel and Rabbi Shmuel Rozovsky delivered specialized lectures in Talmud.
Several years after the re-establishment of the Ponevezh yeshiva in Bnei Brak, Shach was invited by Yosef Shlomo Kahaneman to become one of its deans, and, after discussing the proposal with Soloveitchik, he accepted the offer.HaRav Schach: Shehamafteach B'yado by Moshe Horovitz. Keter Publishing House, Jerusalem. 1989. page 60 Shach served in that capacity from 1954 until his death.
Shach received semikhah (rabbinical ordination) from Isser Zalman Meltzer,Path to Greatness – The Life of Maran Harav Elazar Menachem Man Shach, Vol I: Vaboilnik to Bnei Brak (1899–1953) – pg. 262 and served as chairman of Chinuch Atzmai and Va'ad HaYeshivos.In Their Shadow: Wisdom and Guidance of the Gedolim Volume One: Chazon Ish, Brisker Rav, Rav Shach pg. 282 In the mid-1960s, Samuel Belkin offered Shach the position of senior rosh yeshivah at Yeshiva University in New York, which he declined. Shach's wife died in 1969 from complications connected to diabetes. From 1970 until his death, Shach was generally recognized by Lithuanian Haredim and other Haredi circles as the Gadol Ha-Dor (great one of the generation).Encyclopedia Judaica – Macmillan Reference USA; Second edition (2006) During his lifetime, Shach was a spiritual mentor to more than 100,000 Orthodox Jews.
Political career Shach fought those who deviated from what he believed was the classical Haredi path. At the behest of Aharon Kotler, Shach joined the Moetzes Gedolei HaTorah. When Zalman Sorotzkin died in 1966, Shach became president of the Moetzes Gedolei HaTorah, before later resigning from the Moetzes after the other leading rabbis refused to follow him.PONOVEZER ROSH HAYESHIVA RAV ELAZAR MENACHEM MAN SHACH, ZT"L (1894–2001) The Jewish Press – Saturday, December 08 2001 – by Rabbi Gershon Tannenbaum with Rabbi Yaakov Klass Shach wrote strongly in support of every observant citizen voting. He felt that a vote not cast for the right party or candidate was effectively a vote for the wrong party and candidate. This theme is consistent in his writings from the time that the State of Israel was established.
Shas ran for the 11th Knesset in 1984, and Shach called upon his "Lithuanian" followers to vote for it in the polls, a move that many saw as key political and religious move in Shach's split with the Hasidic-controlled Agudat Yisrael. While initially, Shas was largely under the aegis of Shach, Ovadia Yosef gradually exerted control over the party, culminating in Shas' decision to support the Labor party in the 13th Knesset in 1992.
On the eve of the November 1988 election, Shach officially broke away from Agudat Israel. His primary complaint was the joining up with PAI, after this partnership has been rejected in previous election campaigns. Other complaints included Hamodia publishing a series of articles based on the teachings of Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneersohn (the Lubavitcher Rebbe). Shach criticized The Rebbe for his presumed messianic aspirations. Shach wanted the Aguda party to oppose Lubavitch; however, all but one (Belz, which also eventually dropped out) of the Hasidic groups within the party refused to back him. Shach and his followers then formed the Degel HaTorah ("Flag of the Torah") party to represent the non-Hasidic Ashkenazi Haredim.
Following a visit by Shach in Jerusalem to the leading rabbis and halachic decisors of the day, Yosef Shalom Eliashiv and Shlomo Zalman Auerbach, in order to seek their support for the new party. Rabbi Auerbach refused to lend his support.
In a speech delivered prior to the 1992 elections, Shach said that Sephardim were not fit for leadership and aroused great anger among Sephardi voters. Following the elections, Shach instructed Shas not to join the government, while Ovadia Yosef instructed them to join; this precipitated an open rift between the parties. Shach then claimed that Shas had "removed itself from the Jewish community when it joined the wicked...".'Haaretz', Shachar Ilan, November 2, 2001
Around 1995, Shach retired from political activity.
Views and opinions Shach was opposed to Zionism, both secular and religious. He was dismissive of secular Israelis and their culture. For example, during a 1990 speech, he lambasted secular kibbutzniks as "breeders of rabbits and pigs" who did not "know what Yom Kippur is". In the same speech, he said that the Labor Party had cut themselves off from their Jewish past and wished to "seek a new Torah". Labor Party politician Yossi Beilin said Shach's speech set back relations between religious and secular Israelis by decades.Los Angeles Times – November 3, 2001, from the Associated Press. Other secular Israelis, including residents of the kibbutz Ein Harod, were said to have found the speech inspirational, so much so as to bring them closer to religious practice.
Shach taught that the Holocaust was a divine punishment on European Jews in response to their abandoning of religious observance for the Enlightenment and Zionism. He said "The Holy One Blessed Be He kept score for hundreds of years until it added up to six million Jews." This caused outrage in the secular Israeli media and a robust response from the Lubavitcher Rebbe.Yated Neeman 29/12/90. Mussar Iru'ay HaTekufah (מוסר אירועי התקופה) (2011). pg. 36 In his defence, Haredi MKs said his comments had been misconstrued and were not meant to justify Nazi atrocities. Wishing to prevent deviation from the established order of prayers, he opposed the composition of new prayers to commemorate the victims of the Holocaust. Shach believed that the secularism of Israel society could cause another Holocaust and he once said that if the Education Ministry were to be placed in the hands of Meretz MK Shulamit Aloni, it would result in "over a million Israeli children being forced into apostasy, and that would be worse than what had happened to Jewish children during the Holocaust."
In 1985, four years after the Labor Party supported a liberalized abortion law, Shach refused to meet with Shimon Peres and said he would not speak with a "murderer of fetuses".Yair Sheleg: Chabad's Lost Son Ha'aretz, December 26, 2002.
In Haaretz, Shahar Ilan described him as "an ideologue" and "a zealot who repeatedly led his followers into ideological battles".
Shach never seemed concerned over the discord he provoked: "There is no need to worry about machlokes [dispute], because if it is done for the sake of Heaven, in the end, it will endure... One is obligated to be a baal-machlokes [disputant]. It is no feat to be in agreement with everybody!"http://www.nrg.co.il/online/11/ART/936/156.html and The Man of Vision: The Orthodox Ideology of Rabbi Shach (Ish HaHashkafah: HaIdeologia HaHaredit al pi HaRav Shach) by Avishay Ben Haim, pg. 17. Entire context of statement can be seen in video here and in print in Vezarach Hashemesh:Yesodah Umishnatah shel Agudat ha-Charedim—Degel ha-Torah (Bene Beraḳ:Ha-Makhon le-tiʻud hisṭori, 1990) pages 136–139
Shach was also critical of Western democracy, once referring to it as a "cancer", adding that, "Only the sacred Torah is the true democracy."How do you like your halakha? (Haaretz) September 28, 2006.
Position on army service
In May 1998, following talk of a political compromise which would allow Haredim to perform national service by guarding holy places, Shach as well as many other Orthodox leaders told their followers in public statements that it is forbidden to serve in the army, and that "it is necessary to die for this".The Jewish Week, May 29, 1998 'From Yeshiva To Army' This is a case, Shach said, in which, halachically, one must "be killed, rather than transgress".Israel and the Politics of Jewish Identity: The Secular-Religious Impasse by Asher Cohen and Bernard Susser. The Johns Hopkins University Press (May 24, 2000) - pg. 83 This position was expressed in large ads placed in all three of Israel's daily newspapers on May 22, 1998.Israel and the Politics of Jewish Identity: The Secular-Religious Impasse by Asher Cohen and Bernard Susser (May 24, 2000) – note 19 on page 148 Shach is quoted as saying that, "Any yeshiva student who cheats the authorities and uses the exemption from service for anything other than real engagement in Torah study is a rodef (someone who threatens the lives of others)",The Jewish Press - Secular Fear of Haredim Drove Court's Rule on Service Deferments, by Yori Yanover - February 22nd, 2012 - http://www.jewishpress.com/news/breaking-news/secular-fear-of-haredim-drove-courts-rule-on-service-deferments/ and that "those who are not learning jeopardize the position of those who are learning as they should".
Position on territorial compromise