A Living Sefer Torah

A tribute to Rav Baruch Ber Ziemba Zt”l

1. Brejt

The greatness of Torah is the way it spills over to other facets of life. It impacts and elevates every part of a person.

What happens when a person is steeped in Torah, when Torah is their cheshek, the focus of their life? The result is an adam hashaleim, a talmid chacham, a living Sefer Torah. In other words, Rav Baruch Ber Ziemba zt”l.

R’ Boruch Ber was born to Rav Moshe Avigdor and Rebbetzin Sarah Ziemba. As a child, his relationship with his grandfather Rav Yisrael Garber was exceptional. He learned with him, was meshamesh him, and was both a talmid and beloved grandson.

“Even back in yeshivah, he always had a bikush for growth,” a friend recalls. “A rebbi once saw him eating a bag of chips and remarked that the hechsher was not as ideal as it could be. A yeshivah bachur, he said, should have higher standards. From then on, R’ Boruch Ber never brought those chips into his house. It wasn’t fitting for a yeshivah’man.”

This was what defined his life: his love for Torah, his desire for growth, and his will to do everything to the fullest and in the best way possible.

The fire of Torah

“His whole life was Torah,” a chavrusa shares. “He would call me at midnight so excited because he just had a new kashe, a new terutz, and he just had to tell it to me. His excitement was so real, so genuine.”

When a chavrusa was in the hospital with a family member, R’ Boruch Ber, unwilling to give up on their treasured hours of learning, drove out to the hospital to learn.

“His retzifus was incredible,” another chavrusa reminisces. “He came every morning and learned straight the whole time, never getting distracted. I didn’t even know how many siblings he had because during seder the learning was his only focus.”

And yet he always had the time for everyone else during seder, anyone who wanted to talk or share a vort.

“He had a knack for reaching everyone on their level,” a member of the chaburah says. “Even if he was ten steps ahead of them in learning, he listened and helped them understand.”

Everything he did was done to fullest, especially when it came to giving over Torah. Before every chaburah, he would take the day off and prepare until four in the morning.

The chaburos were over an hour long, and the yungerleit who attended can attest that they were held spellbound the entire time. When he finally finished, they asked for more and discussed the chaburah with him and among each other for several days afterward.

The greatness of the chaburos and his style of learning in general wasn’t that they were splashy. Instead, the bikush ha’emes, the sweetness and the warmth, came through. It was his yashrus in Torah and his desire to teach, to help everyone learn and understand—not to impress—that made them so spectacular.

Although he could argue fiercely with anyone who attacked his point, it was never from anger. In fact, friends knew him well can’t recall ever seeing him angry. Instead, it was because he felt it was an attack on the emes of the Torah. On the other hand, when someone asked a good question, he was impressed and delighted, repeating it to the rest of the chaburah.

In yeshivah, he initiated a trend that carries through today: the idea of standing up when someone comes to learn with you. He felt that if someone comes to you, he deserves the respect of standing up to discuss the learning. This habit spread through the yeshivah world, with no one aware of where it came from.

He went through several difficult tekufos in his life, but his learning never wavered. He came in with a smile and threw himself into the sugya. He confided in a friend that the Torah he learned then was the most precious to him because it was Torah learned through hardship.

And the goals, the cheshek, and the energy only grew greater. “I once asked him how he focuses on so little sleep, and he didn’t give me a straight answer,” a chavrusa shares. “When he came to seder, his ahavas haTorah took over, and that was what kept him going.

Very few individuals knew that he planned to finish Shas b’iyun by age 40, and he was very close to his goal. He was held back somewhat by his preparation for his chaburos, but the prized moment was close.

At age 39, he was almost there. But now, what a loss for Klal Yisrael. Who can replace the level of Torah he learned?

An adam hashaleim

Torah refines and elevates the personality. His love of Torah was where everything stemmed from, and R’ Boruch Ber was exceptional in avodah and gemilus chasadim as well.

People were drawn to him; everyone felt close to him. They were pulled by his yishuv hada’as, by the way he was at peace with himself, his serenity.

As a rosh chaburah, he took a responsibility both for rabbim and yechidim. The yungerleit in his chaburah have large families, and when issues came up, he was an address in the most discreet and sensitive way. He raised money for medical issues and other needs and was there to offer advice.

It wasn’t public knowledge, but he dealt with many sticky situations behind the scenes, uncomfortable issues that other were afraid to get involved in. He had a knack for saying what every person needed to hear and for fully listening and empathizing. R’ Boruch Ber acted as counselor, as a friend and lifeline of support for some families. When an acquaintance was going through a hard time, he learned with his sons so they wouldn’t fall through the cracks. For years, he drove a woman to work (after asking a she’eilah) since she had no other way to get there. And all his chessed was accompanied by tactful attitude and an understanding of people—and most importantly, a heart that felt for them.

“His tefillah in general was on an unbelievable level,” a friend shares, “but I remember once seeing him davening Shemoneh Esrei when someone he knew was going through a difficult time. During ‘Shema Koleinu,’ he gave a krechtz, a sigh of pain, and I knew where that was coming from.”

His dikduk hamitzvos was awe-inspiring. Every time he finished a sugya, he took on several new chumros in the area he had learned about, but he never forgot that they were chumros. He refused to put his chumros on anyone else. After going through the sugya, R’ Boruch Ber was makpid to only use wine for Kiddush, but when he was stuck in the hospital one Shabbos, he proudly made Kiddush on grape juice since l’halachah, there was no problem.

His relationship with his rebbi Rav Yosef Mermelstein was remarkable. Even years out of yeshivah, his chashivus for his rebbi, seen in his desire to teach Torah according to his mehalech, was clear.

For years, he davened in Yeshivah for Yamim Nora’im, but when the rav of his shul asked him to lead a minyan in the Ocean Pointe Sefard shul for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, he immediately agreed. He would have preferred to keep davening in Yeshivah, but if this was where he needed, this was where he went.

And like everything else, he did it to the fullest. Last Yom Kippur, he davened Neilah with 103 degrees’ fever, and nobody would have known because he gave it everything he had.

A woman who davened in the shul, despite her lack of scholarly leanings, related that she could repeat the speeches he gave by davening. Why? Because they came from the heart.

He was mekabel sever panim yafos; everyone who spoke to him felt like the most important person in the world. and everyone loved him. His energy came from Torah. It made him a happy person.

His ayin tovah made people feel comfortable talking to him. He was yeshivah’man, but people from all walks of life confided in him, and they never felt preached to, only respected.

The Torah he learned infused every aspect of life with a chein, with a completeness that made him beloved in the eyes of man and Hashem.

To the fullest

A hallmark of R’ Boruch Ber’s mehalech hachaim was doing things completely. There was no such thing as halves.

During the zman, he didn’t come home for bein hasedarim, didn’t get distracted from his sefer for anything. But as soon as the zman was over, he devoted himself completely to his family’s vacation, taking them upstate on hikes and other activities. His Shabbos seudos were full of joy, interactive for all the children.On the last morning of his life, he prepared a lavish breakfast for all his children.

Together with his wife, a true partner in all his activities, he raised children who are products of the home they were brought up in. His wife is and was moser lev v’nefesh to let him sit and learn, taking over all the responsibilities in the home so he could learn with yishuv hada’as. He became who he was because of her; she was behind it all.

His kibbud av v’eim was exceptional. Although he was in the middle of the family, he was the contact person for his parents, the one they turned to when in need. He spoke to each of them every day and constantly quoted them and credited his middos and hadrachah to them. He put them on a pedestal and revered them.

He would go to Chein Bais Yaakov and blow the shofar for the girls even though it was uncomfortable for him, because it was his mother’s school. He did it for her.

R’ Boruch Ber was a rosh chaburah, a night-seder rosh kollel in Ocean Pointe shul, and an assistant rav in Ocean Pointe shul. He accomplished everything by never wasting a moment, by living his life to its fullest, all in his drive to fulfill ratzon Hashem.

Behavior of a ben Torah

“He wasn’t born perfect,” his brother relates. “Rather, he lived life through the lens of Torah, constantly growing because he was a ben Torah. He was always working on himself to be makable more, to be greater.”

Recently, R’ Boruch Ber and a friend stayed over Shabbos with a mutual older friend in the hospital. At one point, R’ Boruch Ber turned to his friend and told him, “After Shabbos, everyone will tell us we’re such tzaddikim for doing what we did, but we can’t let it go to our heads. We did what we needed to do.” He approached life with an unusual clarity.

His bearing, his behavior, and his derech hachaim were those of a prince, of a ben Torah. He was taken from us too soon on August 26/21 Av. May Hashem bring nechamah to his family, his talmidim and all of Klal Yisrael.