Rav Avraham Elya Kaplan and the Fear of Heaven

Some names dominate our consciousness not only because of their outsized stature but, simply, because of their longevity. Others would have come to dominate our consciousness based on their stature, but their lives were short. One such person was the son of the Alter of Slobodka; he dominates our consciousness, his son does not, only because his life was cut short. Another such person, without doubt, was Rav Avraham Eliyahu Kaplan. It is hard to imagine how one person achieved so much is so short a lifespan: creative talmid hakham, academic scholar, poet, powerful pedagogue, inspiring persona, bridge figure between East and West European Orthodoxy. His 100th yahrzeit will be marked tomorrow—15 Iyyar (May 23)—and beckons us to sustain our continued memory of him to honor his life and teachings and to elevate and inspire us to push beyond our own boundaries.

Read Hillel Goldberg’s “Avraham Eliyahu Kaplan’s Be-Ikvot ha-Yirah: Steps Toward the Fear of Heaven” (Fall 2020).