Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary

It's great to be with you again, David.

Aside from the fact that you have written works in both Hebrew and English on the kind of the daily practice of Jewish life, aside from the fact that you are the dean of the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary, uh, which is Yeshiva University's, uh, Smicha program for rabbinic ordination, today I wanted to talk to you about Tractate Berakhot, which is the first tractate in all of the Talmud.

And I wanted to begin with kind of a general question about the daily life and practice in Jewish life, and there is a passage in Talmud which I think if anybody came across it, it's very strongly worded.

It is on page, I believe, 8A, Ches Ed Alef in Tractate Berakhot.

Much to the credit of our great rosh yeshiva as well as, uh, our talmidim, over the years, the yeshiva changed.

Rav Eli Brodny once told a friend of mine that he believes that Yeshivas Rabbeinu Yitzchak Elchanan is where it is today, producing the kinds of serious bnei torah that are sitting in front of me right now that any yeshiva would be proud of because of Rav Schachter and Rav Willig, among many other amazing roshei yeshiva who model what a life of Torah can look like.

This got me thinking.

It's difficult and it takes a lot of time to change a culture.

But it's funny, right before Ema Bonim Semikhah fell into my lap, I had decided, you know, I had finished Semikhah.

I got Semikhah from, from Yeshiva University, RIETS, and I also got Semikhah from the Rabbonut, which is, there's four basic tests, and the lowest level of Semikhah is called Rav Shchuna, the Rav of a neighborhood.

And the next level is Rav Ir.

So you have to take a few more tests.