Editing Yitzchak Hutner (section)

== Rabbinic and teaching career ==
[[File:Yeshiva Mesivta Chaim Berlin Kollel Gur Aryeh, Sept 2020.jpg|thumb|New building of [[Yeshiva Rabbi Chaim Berlin]]. The building was constructed after Hutner's death.]]
In March 1934 Hutner moved to the United States<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:24NT-XLN|title=FamilySearch: Sign In|website=[[FamilySearch]]}}</ref> (his wife having preceded him by six months)<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:24VC-K7J|title=FamilySearch: Sign In|website=[[FamilySearch]]}}</ref> and settled in [[Brooklyn]], where Hutner joined the faculty of the [[Rabbi Jacob Joseph School]]. Sometime between 1935 and 1936 he was appointed office manager of the newly established high school division of the [[Yeshiva Rabbi Chaim Berlin]] known as [[Mesivta Yeshiva Rabbi Chaim Berlin]]. 

In 1940, after receiving permission from the rosh yeshiva, Yaakov Moshe Shurkin, he began to give a class to the 4th year of the post high school program.{{citation needed|date=December 2019}} Founded in 1904, it was the oldest elementary yeshiva in Brooklyn. Over the years he built up the yeshiva's post-high school [[beth midrash]] division and became Yeshiva Rabbi Chaim Berlin's senior [[rosh yeshiva]] (dean). In this effort he also received the help of [[Shraga Feivel Mendlowitz]] who headed Brooklyn's [[Yeshiva Torah Vodaas]]. Hutner was able to construct an environment that produced young Talmudic scholars in the model of their compatriots in Eastern Europe. By 1940 he had established a post-high-school beth midrash with hundreds of students.<ref name="Religious">{{cite journal |last1=Mayse |first1=Ariel Evan |title=Religious Education and Sacred Study in the Teachings of Rabbi Yitshak Hutner |journal=Religions |date=15 May 2019 |volume=10 |issue=5 |pages=327 |doi=10.3390/rel10050327|doi-access=free }}</ref>

At Chaim Berlin, students were allowed to combine their yeshiva study with afternoon and evening classes at college, mainly [[Brooklyn College]] and later [[Touro College]]. Hutner took great pride in the secular accomplishments of his students insofar as they fit into his vision of a material world governed by the principles of a spiritual Torah way of life. Thus, many alumni of Hutner's yeshiva have attained success as attorneys, accountants, doctors, and in information technology.{{citation needed|date=October 2020}} One of his closest disciples, [[Israel Kirzner]], is an [[economist]] who edited Hutner's written works, ''Pachad Yitzchok''. Many of Hutner's disciples earned [[doctorate]]s, often with his blessing and guidance. This includes his daughter and only child, [[Bruria David]], who obtained her [[Doctor of Philosophy|PhD]] at [[Columbia University]]'s department of [[philosophy]] as a student of [[Salo Wittmayer Baron|Salo Baron]]. She subsequently founded and became the dean of [[Beth Jacob Jerusalem]], a prominent Jewish women's seminary that caters to young women from [[Haredi Judaism|Haredi]] families in the United States. Her dissertation discussed the dual role [[Zvi Hirsch Chajes]] as both a traditionalist and ''[[Haskalah|maskil]]'' (follower of the [[Age of Enlightenment|enlightenment]]). The list also includes [[Ahron Soloveichik]] (law) rosh yeshiva, [[Aharon Lichtenstein]] (literature) rosh yeshiva, [[Yitzhak Aharon Korff]] (law, international law and diplomacy), and [[Yehuda (Leo) Levi]] (physics) professor and rector. 

In the 1950s, Hutner established a ''[[kollel]]'' (post graduate division for married scholars) to continue their in-depth Talmudical studies. This school, [[Kollel Gur Aryeh]], was one of the first of its kind in America. Many of his students became prominent educational, outreach, and pulpit rabbis. He stayed in touch with them and was involved in major communal policy decision-making as he worked through his network of students in positions of leadership.{{citation needed|date=October 2020}}

Hutner established [[Yeshiva Pachad Yitzchok]] in [[Har Nof]], Jerusalem, which he named for his book of the same name.{{citation needed|date=September 2019}} He died in 1980, and was buried in the [[Mount of Olives Jewish Cemetery]] in [[East Jerusalem]].<ref>{{cite web |url=https://harhazeisim.org/notables/ |title=Notables |author=<!--Not stated--> |website=harhazeisim.org|publisher=International Committee of Har HaZeitim|access-date=October 22, 2020 |quote=Yitzchok Hutner, rosh yeshivas Yeshiva Rabbi Chaim Berlin, Brooklyn, New York}}</ref>

=== Methodology ===
Hutner's methodology and style was complex, controversial, and difficult to pigeonhole. While placing great emphasis on intellectually penetrating Talmudic study and analysis, emotionally he veered towards the Hasidic-style, and more-so than his Lithuanian-style colleagues reared as [[Misnagdim]] could tolerate. Ultimately though, he saw himself more as a traditional [[Lithuanian Jews|Litvish]] rosh yeshiva.<ref name="5TJT">Gordon, Yochanan (March 19, 2019) [http://www.5tjt.com/rabbi-hutner-and-the-rebbe/ "Rabbi Hutner And The Rebbe"], ''Five Towns Jewish Times''. Accessed July 31, 2022.</ref> 

The core of Hutner's synthesis of different schools of Jewish thought was rooted in his studies of the teachings of [[Judah Loew ben Bezalel]] (1525–1609) a scholar and mystic known as the ''Maharal of [[Prague]]''. Various pillars of Hutner's thought system were likely the works of the [[Vilna Gaon]] and [[Moshe Chaim Luzzatto]]. He would only allude in the most general ways to other great ''mekubalim'' (mystics) such as the [[Baal Shem Tov]], the ''[[Isaac Luria|Ari]]'', [[Shneur Zalman of Liadi]], [[Mordechai Yosef Leiner]] of Izbitz and many other great Hasidic masters, as he did with the works of [[Kabbalah]] such as the [[Zohar]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://hyperleap.com/topic/Yitzchok_Hutner|title=Yitzchok Hutner}}{{Dead link|date=November 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref>

Hutner initiated a number of changes in Yeshiva Rabbi Chaim Berlin that differed greatly from the ''[[Mussar movement|mussar]]'' (ethics) yeshiva practice in Slabodka. He abolished the half-hour learning session in ''mussar'' and replaced it with one of ten or fifteen minutes.{{citation needed|date=December 2019}}

Hutner viewed secular studies as essential for attending college, learning a profession and becoming self-supporting. He obtained, together with Shraga Feivel Mendlowitz, a charter from the [[University of the State of New York|New York State Board of Regents]] to set up a combined yeshiva and college. However, this plan was dropped at the insistence of [[Aharon Kotler]].{{citation needed|date=February 2022}}

Hutner developed a style of celebrating [[Shabbat]] and the [[Jewish holiday]]s by delivering a type of discourse known as a ''ma'amar''. It was a combination of Talmudic discourse, [[Hasidic Judaism|Hasidic]] celebration (''[[Tish (Hasidic celebration)|tish]]''), philosophic lecture, group singing, and when possible, like on [[Purim]], a ten-piece band was brought in as accompaniment. Many times there was singing and dancing all night. All of this, together with the respect to his authority that he demanded, induced in his students an obedience and something of a "heightened consciousness" that passed into their lives transforming them into literal Hasidim of their rosh yeshiva, who in turn encouraged this by eventually personally donning Hasidic garb (''levush'') and behaving like something of a synthesis between a rosh yeshiva and a [[rebbe]]. He also instructed some of his students to do likewise.<ref name="Religious"/>