‘The Story of Rabbi Yehuda Amital’ by Elyashiv Reichner

Yair Sheleg writes:

Over the years, Rabbi Yehuda Amital, head of the Har Etzion hesder yeshiva (where students combine compulsory military service with their Talmudic studies) in Alon Shvut, has become one of the rabbis that even secular Jews (including those on the left) love to love. There are two reasons for this. For one, he has a sunny personality. Even more critical, however, are his political views It was Rabbi Amital who in the late 1980s founded the Meimad movement, which, from its inception, has advocated moderation in both the religious and political spheres. Nor is he afraid to attack his colleagues, who are rabbis affiliated with the right-wing religious Zionist camp, for their views.

Journalist Elyashiv Reichner’s biography of Amital, 83, unfolds the fascinating, complex story of this man. For many years, he taught at Yeshivat Hadarom in Rehovot, which was headed by his father-in-law, until, in 1965, he decided to move to Jerusalem. Two years later, he was offered a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. It was in the period immediately following the Six-Day War, and the leaders of the movement to renew Jewish settlement in Gush Etzion, in the West Bank south of Jerusalem, were inviting him to head the yeshiva that they were establishing there. (I myself studied at that yeshiva under Amital’s leadership.)

The book speaks extensively of Amital’s personality and educational approach, for good reason. These are the real reasons he is so beloved by students and friends alike, including those who disagree with his views. Amital is an open-minded, original thinker, difficult to pigeonhole, and his character is reflected in his work as an educator.