What is the role of material in the salvation process? Is the redemption process the redemption of the spirit, the soul, freedom, of breaking the yoke of foreign reign over us, learning torah and fulfilling its commandments, or is there a place for the redemption of the body, material, and money?
Rabbi Pilot Leads an Educational Institute
At first blush, Rabbi Baruch Gannot, a rosh yeshiva of a young and fervent hesder yeshiva, does not appear so out of the ordinary. But don’t let his long white beard fool you. Talk to him for a few moments and you’ll realize that this former fighter pilot for the Israel Air Force for 19 years with a degree in physics is no ordinary rosh yeshiva.
When asked about his eclectic accomplishments, the 58-year-old Rabbi Gannot said that he usually gives a pat answer: “I say that I haven’t decided yet what I’ll do when I grow up.”
Rabbi Gannot was born in Hungary in 1948 and made aliyah with his family in 1956. He studied at the Bnai Akiva Yeshiva at Kfar Haroeh and Yeshivat Kerem B’Yavneh. Before enlisting in the Air Force, Baruch Gannot received a bachelor’s degree in physics from the Technion in Haifa. During his 19 years as a fighter pilot, he rose to the rank of lieutenant- colonel.
After the IDF, Baruch Gannot entered the kollel of Eretz Hemdah to study dayanut. Rabbi Gannot received his ordination from Eretz Hemdah (he also has ordination from Rabbi Zalman Nechemia Goldberg), where he was still studying when an opportunity found him.
Truthfully, the opportunity was not something he was seeking, since he wanted to continue his studies at Eretz Hemdah. But, as the mishnah in Avot points out, when nobody is stepping forward, one must be “the man.”
Some families in Ma’ale Efraim, a small town in the Jordan Valley, north of Jerusalem, had the idea of starting a hesder yeshiva, where students combine army service with Torah study. When Rabbi Gannot and his wife Bella visited the town one Shabbat some seven years ago, he was offered the opportunity to become the first rosh yeshiva of the nascent Yeshivat Hesder Ma’ale Efraim. As the beginning of the first school year grew closer, and there were no other candidates, Rabbi Gannot accepted the position.
The yeshiva’s presence has helped change the face of the town. Before its inception, the overwhelming majority of the population was secular, with Chabad functioning as the only religious institution. In fact, beforehand, there were few if any yeshivot in all of the Jordan Valley. But now, half of the residents of Ma’ale Efraim are religious. The yeshiva has also helped turn Ma’ale Efraim from a hot desert town, from which residents would feel they needed to escape, into a bustling and desirous location. Just last year, 17 new families moved in (the entire town only has some 300 families).
The yeshiva, which started with 14 students, today boasts almost 80, including six kollel students. It has six full-time rabbis on staff, with another four teaching part time. When the students are not learning, they take part in communal chesed projects, such as serving as “big brothers” to children of the community, tutoring local school children, distributing food to needy families, tutoring boys for bar mitzvah and imparting Jewish values to new immigrants. In addition to honing the character of the students and allowing them to meet residents of Ma’ale Efraim, these projects also allow the residents a chance to meet the yeshiva’s students, which has increased the town’s Jewish unity.
