Editing Joseph Dov Soloveitchik (Boston) (section)

==== The Rebbe is Completely Hidden ====
Rabbi Shalom Dovber Kowalsky, who was close to Rabbi Soloveitchik, heard from him that while in Berlin, he used to meet with the Rebbe at the home of the Gaon Rabbi Chaim Heller. Rabbi Soloveitchik said to Rabbi Kowalsky: "What do you think? Why do I admire the Lubavitcher Rebbe so much, even though I'm not a Chassid? It's because I knew him from Berlin. What occupied his mind then in Berlin: BaHaB fasts [Monday-Thursday-Monday fasts after the festivals] and immersions in the mikvah. These things began to develop in me a sense of admiration for this great man." He also expressed: "I have never seen a person with such memory power and such wonderful knowledge of Torah. We from the house of Brisk do not hold by the pilpul [dialectical] method of Poland, but the Lubavitcher Rebbe has a gevaldike [tremendous] understanding of Torah."

When Rabbi Eliyahu Friedman from Safed visited Rabbi Soloveitchik to receive an approbation for his book "V'chiper Admaso Amo," Rabbi Soloveitchik told him that whenever he had a question in Berlin regarding Torah and halacha, or secular studies, he would go to the Rebbe's apartment to clarify matters with him. He made these visits frequently, sometimes several times a day, and always found the Rebbe engaged in Torah study, either revealed or mystical. He never saw the Rebbe studying secular subjects, yet the Rebbe was knowledgeable in academic topics. Rabbi Soloveitchik concluded: "I saw this as a sign of divine assistance for one whose actions are solely for the sake of Heaven, and whose entire life is in holiness and purity."

Eliyahu Reichman, a brother of the Reichman family from Toronto, related what he heard from Rabbi Soloveitchik about the period when he studied with the Rebbe at the university: "The Rebbe would always sit in class with a book of Mishnayot or Gemara and study it throughout the lecture. In one particularly difficult and heavy lecture, the professor noticed that the students were not listening and were distracted from the subject matter. To awaken them, the professor began asking them about the material he had covered, and none of them managed to answer. Then the professor said with poisonous courtesy: 'Perhaps Schneersohn can repeat the point we discussed?' The Rebbe, although busy at that moment studying Tractate Temurah, stood up and repeated the lecture before everyone with precision and depth.

"Since then," concluded Rabbi Soloveitchik, "the professor never disturbed the Rebbe in any lecture."

On one occasion, Rabbi Soloveitchik said: "After the Rebbe accepted the leadership to be the leader of Chassidim, and one sees his behavior in tangible and public ways, and hears the talks, discourses, and Torah words at gatherings, the Chassidim think that now his greatness and mighty powers have finally been revealed, and that he is like an ever-strengthening spring. But know the truth, that even now the Rebbe is at the level of being completely 'hidden.' The Rebbe was always completely hidden, and now only a glimpse and something of his qualities and essence has been revealed. But there is never any conception or comprehension at all of the depth of his greatness, and he is truly hidden within the vessels. That's how he always was, and so he is now."

The Previous Rebbe writes about Rabbi Soloveitchik: "Regarding Rabbi J.D. in his essential nature - I have known and recognized him for many years, since he was in Berlin. And my son-in-law, the true Gaon, the Chassidic Rabbi, man of many talents, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneersohn, told me much about his greatness in learning and energy..."