Several months ago I wrote in this paper about the Gemara Shelema on tractate Pesahim and on its brilliant author, Baruch Naeh.
I permitted myself then to say a few words not only about the work itself – the examination of the text of the Gemara on the basis of many manuscripts, early prints and on readings found in early authorities; the tracing and explantion of the views of these authorities and the edition and annotation of their commentaries but also about the author himself and about his constant worries, which did not prevent him from persevering in his work.
Baruch Naeh has come now for a short visit to this country. I met him this week. If I would have to describe him in a few words, I would call him the “living Gemarah Shelema.”
….His beard has become greyish but his mind is agile and young as ever. He is also full of fire, as he always used to be.
His talk flowed with “Chiddushim,” He also told me of his work and of his plans. He has ready much material for the continuation of the Gemara Shelema, but he cannot go on with the work because not only does he lack the means to publish an additional volume but also the minimum required to support him and his family during the time he is engaged in its preparation.
Listening to him you become even more conscous of the tragedy of real and great Jewish scholars of our day. How many are there, much smaller than Naeh, who occupy well paying positions, who have all the time in the world to pursue their researches and no financial worries to cloud their minds – and when they wish to publish their mediocre books, they do not lack the funds to do so. Because even if they are not too energetic and too bright in the fields of jewish learning, they are exceedingly well adept in public relations and are experts in organizing committees and in recruiting individuals to help publish their outpourings.
And here is he, Baruch Naeh, the brilliant but poor Talmid Chacham of Jerusalem – who has nothing, absolutely nothing, but wide and deep knowledge and love for our Torah. He, despite all of his worries and distress, spends much time on every work he writes, is careful with every comment he offers because not the ambition to see his name in print, but the desire to communicate to others his exceptional knowledge is the driving force of his literary activity. He, evey cells of whose body breathes learning, has the desire and ability to create a great, a very great work, but lacks the means to do so. He had to leave his family and to travel to a far off country. He has to knock at the doors of people who do not know him and therefore cannot appreciate him, to beg them for financial aid so that he could continue to offer on the altar of Jewish scholarship his wide and profound knowledge and long hours of the day and of the night filled with painstaking study and research!
Yes, Naeh has come here to seek support for the continuation of his Gemara Shelema. He knows that this is not an enterprise for one man and not for one generation, but he also knows that there is no one besides him today, who could set down the first letters for this great work, and for this reason he wants to continue and to do as much of the Gemara Shelema as is given him to do.
I knew Naeh’s father, Reb Abraham Hayim. He was one of the great scholars of the Land of Israel. He was a clever and original man. He was mild but stubborn and strong in his convictions and views. He wrote several volumes of “Ketzoth HaShulchan” on the Shulchan Aruch of the Tanya and the well known, “Sheure Torah.”
When he completed Sheure Torah, he went to the tomb of the Rambam in Tiberias and said, “Rabbi Moshe Ben Maimon, I have come to bring you the book of the course of whose writing I had labored much on your words.” His son Baruch Naeh, has now brought here the first part of his Gemara Sheleimah on Pesahim. He too has come to a tomb – the cemetery of Jewish scholarship in America, where not only the Rambam but other great authorities are “deeply buried.” Let us hope whe will find here people who sincerely mourn the degeneration of Jewish learning and who will offer him the support he so much needs and deserves.
The Jewish Press, Friday, January 5, 1992 p. 19