Muddy Boots and Torah Values: A Father’s Powerful Message

A wealthy man teaches his daughters that no luxury compares to honoring Torah and those who live by it

In the city of Baranovitch, before the Holocaust, Rabbi Elchanan Wasserman, a great Torah leader of his generation, founded a yeshiva for young men who wanted to immerse themselves in Torah study. The financial situation in the yeshiva was very difficult. To support his students, Rabbi Elchanan often went door to door, collecting donations to help meet their most basic needs.

At one point, he even traveled to the United States to raise funds from American Jews. While he was still aboard the ship, World War II broke out. His closest supporters begged him to stay in America, where he would be safe. But Rabbi Elchanan refused. He said, “A captain does not abandon his ship,” and returned to Lithuania to be with his students. He was later killed al kiddush Hashem, for the sanctification of God’s name at the Ninth Fort on the 11th of Tammuz, 1941.

The story that follows happened during one of his many fundraising trips.

On a rainy day, Rabbi Elchanan arrived at the home of a wealthy man named R’ Shraga Feivel Frank to ask for support for the yeshiva. Concerned about bringing mud into the elegant home with his wet and dirty boots, the Rabbi didn’t go to the front door. Instead, he respectfully made his way to the back kitchen entrance, where the floor was simpler and easier to clean.

But when R’ Shraga Feivel opened the door and saw the great Rosh Yeshiva standing there, his eyes filled with tears.

Without offering any explanation, he softly pleaded, “Please, Rabbi I beg you, go back to the front entrance. Let me welcome you properly into my home.”

Seeing Rabbi Elchanan hesitate, still worried about making a mess, the wealthy man gently insisted, “With the boots!”

Rabbi Elchanan turned around and walked to the front door. As soon as he knocked, R’ Shraga Feivel opened it with great respect and brought him into the main room of the house. The Rabbi’s coat was dripping wet onto the sofa. His boots left stains on the expensive carpets. Embarrassed by the situation, Rabbi Elchanan tried to apologize, but the host sat down across from him with a serious and heartfelt expression.

“Rabbi,” he began, “I have three daughters. I wasn’t blessed with sons, but I want each of my daughters to marry a ben Torah, a man who is truly dedicated to learning Torah.

“But we live in luxury. My daughters have grown up in a mansion, surrounded by comfort. And I worry that when the time comes to choose husbands, they might see Torah as something nice but not essential and not worth sacrificing for.

“I’ve spent their whole lives trying to teach them that Torah is everything. That it's more precious than wealth, more important than comfort. That the honor of Torah should be above all else.”

He paused, then looked the Rabbi in the eye.

“When you came in through the kitchen door, to avoid dirtying my carpets, you meant well. But had my daughters seen that, if they had seen that honoring Torah was not worth the risk of a dirty rug, it could have undone everything I’ve tried to teach them.

“That’s why I insisted you enter through the front. With your muddy boots. With your wet coat. So they would see clearly and forever that the Torah, and those who learn and live it, are more valuable than any carpet or couch. Let the carpets be stained,” he said, his eyes shining. “Let them be ruined if it means my daughters understand that nothing in this world is more precious than our holy Torah.”

And in the end? R’ Shraga Feivel’s daughters did marry Torah scholars. Two of his sons-in-law became leaders of the Jewish people: Rabbi Isser Zalman Meltzer and Rabbi Moshe Mordechai Epstein.