By COLlive reporter
Rabbi Yoel Kahn, the preeminent Chabad scholar who served as the chief reviewer (“choizer”) of the Rebbe‘s teachings, concluded the Shiva mourning period after his sister on on Thursday.
Sitting in his modest home in Crown Heights, Reb Yoel was visited by community members who knew his sister Mrs. Gita Gansburg OBM, the beloved dorm mother of Machon Chana school.
Reb Yoel and his sisters Gita, Mrs. Chasya Paris and Mrs. Freida Segal were born in Russia and immigrated to Israel in what was then a developing Chabad community in Tel Aviv and Ramat Gan.
Their father, R’ Refoel Kahn, was legendary for the books he authored and his self-sacrifice for sustaining Judaism which made him a target of the OGPU secret police of the Soviet Union.
Among those comforting Reb Yoel this week was Rabbi Leibel Groner, secretary of the Rebbe, and many bochurim who regularly study chassidus with Reb Yoel and learn about Chabad customs and history during his farbrengens.
But Reb Yoel is not taking a break from his many responsibilities and activities. Along with teaching, editing the Sefer Ha’erechim encyclopedia of chassidic concepts, he films the Chassidic Perspective webcast aired on COLlive.com.
And on Monday he will be boarding a flight to Tel Aviv for a week-long whirlwind tour around Israel to celebrate the Rosh Hashana of Chassidus on the 19th and 20th of Kislev.
“He is flying out on Monday and returning to New York the following Sunday,” a person close to him told COLlive.com. “Every evening there is another farbrengen, lecture or meeting booked for him, including a Siyum Harambam.”
The largest event he will be heading is a central Yud Tes Kislev Farbrengen next Motzoei Shabbos in the International Convention Center in Jerusalem, commonly known as Binyenei HaUma.
Joining him on stage will be the chassidic mashpia Reb Elimelech Biderman of Lelov and Rabbi Benayahu Shmueli, Rosh Yeshiva of the Kabbalistic yeshiva Nahar Shalom in Jerusalem.
We owe much to REB YOEL in so many ways.
Most of all learning CHASSIDUS by him in OCEAN PARKWAY Tomchei Tmimim.
The excitement of his class was always palpable.
He would teach us 15 year olds as he would teach the SHLUCHIM from 770.
The same brilliance the same passion the same love of CHASSIDUS and most of all his concern for us his students.
Hashem please give REB YOEL much much KOCHOS and to his Rebetzin so that for many more years he may teach us the REBBE’s Torah and bring about the GILU HAMOSHIACH in ACTUALITY, Amen