The Torah ideas in this volume focus on religious-philosophical themes. Central among these are: the need for humility and inwardness in our behavior, avoiding routinization in our religious life, developing sensitivity to God's role in our daily encounters, and the centrality of holiness and our responsibility to generate it within society.

There was congruence between the Talner Rebbe's teachings and his behavior. To read his divrei Torah is thus to encounter him personally.

 

Rabbi David Shapiro received rabbinic ordination from Yeshiva University's Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary, and an M.A. degree in Jewish History from its Bernard Revel Graduate School. He received a second M.A. degree in Jewish History from Harvard University under the tutelage of the Talner Rebbe, Prof. Yitzchak (Isadore) Twersky. He was a member of the faculty and then Principal of Maimonides School in Brookline, Massachusetts from 1970 until 2011. During that period, he was associated with the Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik Institute, under whose auspices he wrote Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik on Pesach, Sefirat ha-Omer and Shavu'ot (Urim Publications). Throughout those years, he and his family were regular mispallelim in the Talner Beis Midrash. He and his wife, Miriam, now live in Jerusalem.