The uncertainty was hardly resolved by the release early last year of a 20th Century Fox Movietone newsreel from the silent film days. The nearly five-minute clip, taken by Fox News cameraman Hans von Pebal, shows Torah personalities arriving for the Knessia Gedolah at the Zirkue Strasse Congress Building in Vienna on August 15, 1923, the first day of the historic ten-day convention.
The highlight of the film is footage of the Chofetz Chaim arriving at the gathering, where he spoke on two separate occasions to an audience of prominent rabbis and laypeople, including women.
Shown here as Exhibit 3 is a print made from a frame of the Movietone newsreel showing the Chofetz Chaim’s arrival. Perhaps reflecting and explaining the dearth of photographs of him, he seems uncomfortable being filmed; his head is bowed and his 84-year old features appear indistinct. There are differing opinions as to whether the Chofetz Chaim as seen in the newsreel bears a likeness to the famous and disputed picture of him. Obviously by the time of the Knessia Gedolah he was considerably older than the man depicted in the picture, but there are those who see a resemblance in terms of facial features and beard.
Many of the newspapers reporting on the Knessia Gedolah at the time invariably turned their coverage to and concentrated on the Chofetz Chaim. Even The New York Times, in an August 16, 1923 article reporting that 450 delegates, including 14 American representatives, were present on the first day of the gathering, recorded that “a remarkable address was made by the venerable Chofese Chaim [sic], 92 years old, greatest authority on Jewish ethics.” (Note that the Times got it wrong; he was actually 84 at the time).
The September 23, 1923 Jewish Daily Forward has a memorable description of the Chofetz Chaim at the Knessia Gedolah:
The rabbi of Sokolov, in the middle of his address, suddenly becomes silent. His hand remains outstretched in its gesture, as if frozen. The audience, the presidium, the journalists, the visitors in the galleries rise up all at once, distinguished rabbis too, devout and pious Jews all get up from their places. A restrained, soundless agitation begins – a hubbub of reverence and awe. The strident outcries of several ushers are heard: Make room! Make way there! And a passageway is cleared. People press in on one another, with bated breath, with a tremor in their hearts. They step back. Two rows of people form in the middle of the conference hall: two rows of rabbinic delegates in elegant morning coats, with long white beards; and between these two lengths of rabbis, several rabbis come leading – no, not leading; they come carrying on their hands – a small feeble old man, an aged bent-over human being with a short white beard, in a plain shabby long coat, with a cheap scarf around his neck….
When you see this short ninety-year-old [sic] sage for the first time, it makes a singular impression on you. You feel a quiver of awe and love in your heart – a tremendous reverence and respect, beyond any limit. When you take a closer look, you see the face of an angel, a ministering servant of God. The Shechina, the Divine Presence, rests on that face, and you have to shut your eyes against the radiance streaming from those two small gray intelligent eyes. When he stands on the dais, speaking, two rabbis support him under the arms. The entire assembly stands as it listens to him. His voice is weak, but clear. He summons the Jewish people to unity, to harmonious peace, to goodness, to religious observance, to love and good deeds. His short bent-over figure quivers as he talks. The small white beard glistens from afar, like fresh-fallen snow. Through his eyes the entire world shines with wisdom and goodness.
Gedaliah Bublick, editor of the New York Yiddisher Tageblatt, also brilliantly described the impact of the Chofetz Chaim at the Knessia Gedolah in the paper’s September 14, 1923 issue:
In the present day, there is no personage so revered and hallowed as the Chofetz Chaim…. He himself is short in height – an old feeble man. His voice is low, yet youthfully fresh. Over his face a tranquil, good smile is always playing. There is a good-natured laughter in his eyes. It seems evident that in all his life the aged tsaddik never flew into a rage. Every word of his, every gesture, breathes boundless goodness and immeasurable humility. There is not the slightest sign of envy in him. He is the very embodiment of peace. The Chofetz Chaim never wanted to be a leader, and he has no wish to be one now. He has only pleaded all his life: Dear Jews – be good, settled, pious, honest Jews. He is distant from all the politics of all the parties; but when the tsaddik was told that his attendance would strengthen the Jewish religion, he got up and came…. He speaks so softly that the delegates in the first rows can barely catch his words. Nevertheless, no one makes a move, even in the furthest corners of the hall. The audience cannot hear him, but from the distance the people drink in with their eyes the gestures of the Chofetz Chaim. They don’t have to hear the words. In their souls they hear what he wants of them, and they merge and blend with him in their emotions.
* * * * *
It is my hope that the beautiful words of the Chofetz Chaim’s blessing, handwritten almost a century ago, accrue this new year to all of Israel. May we all have “great peace from heaven, and all should be written and sealed for a good and peaceful life, and may we all merit a year of salvation and redemption, and may the Honor of Hashem fill the land, Amen v’amen.”
