When HaGaon HaRav Yitzhak Yosef shlita, former Rishon L’Tzion and son of the legendary Maran HaRav Ovadia Yosef zt”l, recently landed in the United States, it wasn’t part of a speaking tour or rabbinic conference. The Rav had just concluded a scheduled chizuk trip in Italy and planned to return to Eretz Yisrael, when news broke of missile strikes and the sudden closure of Ben Gurion Airport. Without hesitation, he rerouted his journey – not to wait idly in exile, but to bring inspiration to American shores.
On Sunday, the Rav was seen in Forest Hills participating in a hachnasas sefer Torah, and by evening had arrived in Great Neck, where he delivered a powerful and emotional shiur at Congregation Torah Ohr. The following day, he presided over a Chazaq parlor meeting, drawing urgent attention to the plight of Jewish children in public school – an issue that was dear to his father and burns strongly in his own heart.
In a voice both warm and resolute, Rav Yosef addressed a crowd of hundreds. What unfolded that night was far more than a halachic lecture. It was a journey: through the legacy of g’dolei Yisrael, through the spiritual struggles of Sephardic Jewry, through the fragility of our present moment, and through the hope that still pulses within our people.
He began with halachic clarity, discussing complex questions like instructing a non-Jew to perform m’lachah on Shabbat, or relying on an eruv in questionable circumstances. These topics were delivered with scholarly precision, yet were always grounded in m’sirut nefesh for the tzibur. “Sometimes,” he explained, “we must act in ways that seem to go against Maran. But they’re not against the Torah; they’re because of the Torah. When you’re responsible for an entire people, you must see the full picture.”
What followed was personal. Rav Yosef reflected on his early years in yeshivah, when Sephardic Torah scholarship was barely visible. “We didn’t have our own institutions,” he said. “There were barely any Sephardic yeshivot. I learned among the Ashkenazim, with humility, and also with pride.” He chuckled as he recalled how his father would be mocked by Ashkenazi peers who didn’t recognize the names of the Sephardic g’dolim he cited, confusing Rav Abdallah Somech with the King of Jordan.
But then he grew serious. “I remember standing with my father, looking at a sea of Ashkenazi yeshivah students, and he turned to me and said, ‘Yitzhak, one day, the Sefardim will have their own yeshivot—and they will be full.’” With emotion, Rav Yosef looked out at the audience and declared, “Today, we have over 70,000 talmidei chachamim learning in Sephardic yeshivot across Eretz Yisrael. That dream has become reality.”
He told how the Chazon Ish, the towering Ashkenazi leader of a generation, once confessed that he had never before met a true Sephardic talmid chacham. That changed when he visited Porat Yosef and sat down privately with Rav Ezra Attiya. After their conversation, the Chazon Ish emerged and said simply: “His Torah is like the Rashba.” That moment, Rav Yosef said, marked the beginning of a shift: a recognition that Sephardic Torah is not only legitimate, but luminous.
From Torah to tefilah, the shiur moved more deeply into the soul. Rav Yosef told the story of his father weeping during Vidui on Yom Kippur, with Shimon Peres and the President of Israel standing beside him. After the t’filah, they asked, “Why were you crying so intensely?” Maran answered: “I wasn’t crying for myself. I was crying for the aveirot of all of am Yisrael.” That moment, Rav Yosef said, taught him what it means to carry a nation in your heart.
Then came his message to the present. With deep anguish in his voice, Rav Yosef described the missile attacks in Eretz Yisrael – including the burning of a shul near the Kosel, with sifrei Torah set aflame. “You ask how Israel is still standing?” he said. “It’s not just the Iron Dome. It’s the Torah. It’s your t’filot. That’s what gives koach to the soldiers, to the commanders, to our people.”
He spoke of the 72 rockets that were intercepted before they could even launch – a military miracle that Rav Yosef attributes to z’chus haTorah. “They were all stopped,” he said, “because of the limud haTorah, the kollel yungeleit, the women saying T’hilim, the boys learning Mishnayot. Every pasuk counts. Every Avinu Malkeinu echoes in Shamayim.”
Notably, Rav Yosef’s brother – HaRav David Yosef shlit"a, the current Rishon L’Tzion – was scheduled to visit the United States last week. That trip, however, was postponed due to the ongoing situation in Eretz Yisrael, where his leadership is critically needed. Rav Yitzhak Yosef’s own unexpected visit reflected the sense of achrayut felt across klal Yisrael – that in times of peril, Torah leadership must stand firm, whether in Yerushalayim or in Queens.
As the night drew to a close, Rav Yosef offered blessings to the crowd for health, for peace, for spiritual strength. But more than that, he made a plea: Strengthen your t’filah, deepen your limud Torah, and remain bound to klal Yisrael. “This Torah,” he said, “is not a theory. It’s not just halachah. It’s our survival. It’s our future.”
And with that, he turned to leave – not with applause, but with silence. A silence filled with awe, with gratitude, and with the quiet strength that only a true rav b’Yisrael can leave behind.
With thanks to Rabbi Dovid Hirsch for recording this lecture on behalf of TorahAnytime.com.
By Shabsie Saphirstein
HaRav Yitzhak Yosef Undertakes Unexpected Chizuk Mission In America
Typography
- Smaller Small Medium Big Bigger
- Default Helvetica Segoe Georgia Times
- Reading Mode