Tish in Yerushalayim with Rebbetzin Miriam Amital

On Shabbat Vayigash, a tish was held in Jerusalem with Rebbetzin Miriam Amital and a group of alumni of the Yeshiva.

Over the course of the evening, the Rebbetzin took the participants back in history to her days in Rechovot, to stories about her grandfather Rav Isser Zalman Meltzer and the writing of his classic Even HaEzel, and a host of other stories.

The participants also shared their own memories of our dearly beloved and revered teacher, HaRav Yehuda Amital, ztz"l.

Attached is a piece written by Yeshiva alumnus,  

Rav Daniel Gutenmacher 

An Evening in Katamon with Rebbetzin Amital:

What did it mean for us all to spend the evening together with Rebbetzin Amital, that precious woman who accompanied us during our years in the Yeshiva, who, as if stepping out of the shadows, spoke and talked to us much more than she ever did in our student days?

I didn't feel like I was sitting there with Rebbetzin Amital instead of sitting there with Rav Amital himself. I felt that we were given the opportunity to re-excite ourselves together, listening and giving voice to memories of deeds and statements that inspired us for life. Nachliel Disson reported a dvar Torah that he had heard from Rav Amital in those early years, and I found myself telling a story about Purim in Rav Amital's house with Hanan Porat, and we all heard from the Rebbetzin how Rav Amital educated his own children. All this created an atmosphere, not only of nostalgia, but of recognition that we are conducting our lives with shared messages, and even with the presence of a person who is no longer here, his spirit hovering in our spirit to this very day.

There was intimacy in the air. How can a woman create such an atmosphere among alumni, some or most of whom have not been in the Yeshiva for decades? And then I remembered how she came twice to the Bar Mitzva celebration of the same son because she and the Rav had mistakenly come to the hall on the Motzaei Shabbat a week earlier than what was written in the invitation.

There was also holiness in the room, because we knew then and we experienced once again through the Rebbetzin that Rav Amital instilled in us a Torah of life that was rooted in Europe and underwent revolutionary changes on the way to and in Israel, a melting pot that included wars and the sound counsel of Rav Meltzer and the Hazon Ish.

We wish to thank the Rebbetzin as well as the organizers of the event. And once again we wish to express our gratitude to Rav Amital whom we so sorely miss.

Dani Gutenmacher