My Eulogy for Rabbi Daniel Rosenthal: the Johnny Appleseed of Torah

Rabbi Daniel Rosenthal passed away on Tu bi’Shvat 5784. You may not know who he was, but all the Torah I teach is thanks to him. If you've learned from me, I implore you to read or listen to this.

This eulogy is dedicated to the memory of Rabbi Daniel Rosenthal, zt"l, whose Torah changed worlds.

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Never have I written a eulogy for a person about whom I know so little, but when Rabbi Daniel Rosenthal (zt”l) passed away this Thursday, January 25, 2024 (Tu bi'Shvat 5784), and I listened to the eulogies via the livestream of his funeral in Eretz Yisrael, I felt I had to write something. I request the Rosenthal family's understanding if this eulogy contains any inaccuracies.

My Eulogy for Rabbi Daniel Rosenthal: the Johnny Appleseed of Torah

My students are familiar with the name of my rebbi, Rabbi Morton Moskowitz (zt”l). They are well aware that all the Torah they have learned from me is directly thanks to him. However, I suspect few (if any) of them realize that if it weren’t for another talmid chachamim (student of the wise), I wouldn’t be who I am or where I am today, and I certainly wouldn’t be a teacher or student of Torah.

I am referring to Rabbi Daniel Rosenthal: a man I have long thought of as “the Johnny Appleseed of Torah.” Like the famed American pioneer horticulturist who planted apple trees across vast swaths of the North American continent, Rabbi Rosenthal transformed the landscape of Torah education in America. He founded Jewish schools, led institutions of Jewish learning, and spread Torah wherever he went.

Rabbi Rosenthal’s impact on my life and my Torah stems from his momentous decision to start a Jewish high school in Seattle. He had been the dean of the Seattle Hebrew Academy (SHA) for several years and believed the city needed a Jewish high school. In 1974, against all odds, he founded Yeshivat Or Hatzafon (YOH), which eventually became Northwest Yeshiva High School (NYHS). In 1979, he persuaded Rabbi Moskowitz to move there from the East Coast to become the Rosh ha’Yeshiva. Rabbi Fox and Rabbi Zucker, two of my most influential teachers, followed soon thereafter. The rest, as they say, is history.

The number of minds and lives shaped by the school he created is staggering. We’re talking about multiple generations — children of children who attended NYHS, as well as students of those students, who now have students of their own. It is no exaggeration to say that thousands of people’s Jewish identities would be fundamentally different, or nonexistent, without Rabbi Rosenthal’s efforts.

The central event in my personal journey to Torah was not my decision to convert to Judaism, but my encounter with NYHS students. Their contagious love for learning – undoubtedly inherited from Rabbi Moskowitz, Rabbi Fox, and other teachers at the yeshiva – inspired me to leave my life and hometown to enroll in NYHS as an 11th grader and begin my Jewish education. Without Rabbi Rosenthal’s vision and sacrifices, this pivotal event in my life would not have happened, and I would not be who I am today.

NYHS wasn’t an anomaly. After leaving Seattle, Rabbi Rosenthal founded the Torah Academy of Suffolk County (TASC) on Long Island — another institution that changed lives and inculcated generations of students with a love of Torah. Along with Rabbi Reuven Mann, he founded the Masoret Institute for Advanced Jewish Studies for Women, which continues to teach generations of women to this day. I also learned today that he was the dean of the Margolin Hebrew Academy in Memphis, TN. I’m sure there is much more he has done for the world of Torah learning that I’m not even aware of.

Although I have benefitted from the fruits of Rabbi Rosenthal’s labor, I knew little about him as a person. Most of what I know, I only heard today in the eulogies given at his funeral.

To my recollection, I had only one conversation with him. Early on in my seven years of learning at Yeshiva Bnei Torah — I don’t remember exactly when, but I must have been 19 or 20 years old — I came downstairs one evening, on my way to the Beis Midrash via the kitchen on the main floor. Standing there was a man of average height with white hair and a white beard, engaged in a lively discussion with two or three other yeshiva guys, which I quickly joined. I had no idea who he was, but I quickly gathered that he knew Rabbi Yisroel Chait, our Rosh ha’Yeshiva, on a personal level. I can’t recall the details, but I remember one thing he said:

I’ve learned Torah all over the world, but Rabbi Chait is absolutely unique. There are some talmidei chachamim who learn the Rambam of the Mishneh Torah. There are others who learn the Rambam of the Moreh ha’Nevuchim. Rabbi Chait is the only one I know who holds that the Rambam of the Mishneh Torah and the Rambam of the Moreh ha’Nevuchim are one and the same and who uses the same rational, analytical, Brisker methodology to approach them both.

I’m sure there was a lot more in that conversation, and I wish I could remember what was said. What I do remember was his youthful energy. I remember the clash between his white hair and his bodily posture. He stood like a teenager — sometimes leaning against the counter with his arms and feet crossed, and at other times hunched forward, gesticulating wildly. I remember the feeling I had when talking to him: “I don’t know who this guy is, but he’s clearly one of ours, and I’m enjoying this conversation!”

His son, Rabbi Pinny Rosenthal, mentioned in his eulogy how his father would approach groups of random kids in Israel and ask them what they were learning. Despite being a total stranger, the kids would respond. There was something about his smile, the glint in his eye, and his genuine curiosity that created an instant connection. I’m grateful that I was able to experience this, even if only once.

I tuned in to the livestream of the levaya a few minutes late, as Rabbi Mann quoted a pasuk from Mizmor Shir l’Yom ha’Shabbos. Here is the pasuk in context:

A righteous person will flourish like a date palm, and like a cedar in the Lebanon he will grow tall. Planted in the house of Hashem, in the courtyards of our God they will flourish. They will still be fruitful in old age, vigorous and fresh they will be, to tell that Hashem is upright, my Rock in Whom there is no injustice. (Tehilim 92:13-16)

I don’t know whether Rabbi Mann’s choice of this pasuk related to Rabbi Rosenthal’s passing on Tu bi’Shvat, but it reminded me of another tree analogy: “From the fruit of a man’s mouth he will be sated with good, but the recompense of a man’s handiwork He will repay” (Mishlei 13:2). Radak explains that this is an allegory for a chacham (wise man) who [not only] is wise himself, but who makes others wise.

Rabbi Rosenthal was a chacham who made others wise. He created schools that produced chachamim, who in turn produced other chachamim. He was, indeed, the Johnny Appleseed of Torah, producing more fruit than anyone I know.

I didn’t have the zechus of a personal relationship with Rabbi Rosenthal. Yet, from the remarks at his funeral, it seems “he was sated with good.” Like Avraham Avinu, who “made souls in Charan” (Bereishis 12:5) – which Onkelos interprets as bringing people under the influence of Torah – I have to imagine that Rabbi Rosenthal “died at a good old age, elderly and sated” (ibid. 25:8).

May his memory be blessed, and may his soul be bound up in the bundle of life.

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If you have any thoughts or memories of Rabbi Rosenthal, I’d love to hear them.

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