Rabbi Noah Weinberg, the renowned founder and Dean of Yeshiva Aish HaTorah in Jerusalem, passed away Thursday morning in Jerusalem at the age of 78.
The funeral will begin at the Ahavat Torah synagogue in Kiryat Zanz in Jerusalem at 1:30 PM. It will then proceed to Har HaZeitim (Mt. of Olives) for the burial.
A graduate of two prominent yeshivot in the United States – Rabbi Chaim Berlin in New York and Ner Yisrael in Baltimore – Rabbi Weinberg founded or co-founded the two most famous yeshivot in Jerusalem for beginners, Ohr Somayach and Aish HaTorah.
Students of Rabbi Weinberg, who number in the thousands, say his teachings emphasize a close relationship with G-d, as well as maximizing one's contentment in this world through meaningful activities. His book “What the Angel Taught You” and his tape series "48 Ways to Wisdom" are popular throughout the Jewish world.
Many hundreds of loving and thankful tributes from his students can be read here. The letters thank for him for “changing my life,” “bettering my life and enriching it with Torah,” “G-d gave you a life filled with purpose,” and the like.
Rabbi Weinberg was slowly recuperating late last year from chemotherapy and radiation treatments, when he fell and broke his thigh bone and shoulder. Throughout these difficult periods, however, he continued arriving at Aish HaTorah in the Old City whenever possible.
The Aish.com website, arguably the world’s largest Jewish learning website, states that Aish HaTorah “is dedicated to revitalizing the Jewish people by providing opportunities for Jews of all backgrounds to discover their heritage in an atmosphere of open inquiry and mutual respect.”
Rabbi Weinberg's Aish HaTorah now operates 27 full-time branches on five continents, with 100,000 people attending Aish programs annually - including Discovery, Hasbara Fellowships, Jerusalem Fellowships, Jewel, and more - in 77 cities in 17 countries. Aish features a large Rabbinical training college at the Western Wall in Jerusalem, as well as a Hesder Yeshiva where students combine their military service with Torah learning.
Aish.com receives over two million visits each month, and some 50,000 hours of Torah tapes and MP3s are listened to each year, and the site features articles and audio segments on spirituality, parenting, dating, weekly Torah portion, Holocaust studies, and Ask the Rabbi. The site operates a 24-hour live webcam from the Western Wall, which has registered 20 million visits. Spin-off sites in Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, French and Russian are all leading websites in their respective languages.