Moshe Moch
Age: 21
Johannesburg, South Africa
Yeshivat Ohr Somayach: Jerusalem Pisgah Program, Center Program and Beit Midrash Program, 2013-2016
Yeshivat Toras Chaim in Jerusalem, 2016 to present
Most yeshiva students who go home on vacation for the “Pesach Break” slow down and unwind from the pace of their studies and activities during the “winter zman”. They get up a bit later in the morning, eat a larger and more leisurely breakfast and spend quality time with family and friends. Not so Moshe Moch.
Moshe is a high achiever from a family of high achievers. His mother is a lecturer at University of Witwatersrand and his father is a psychiatrist. At the Torah Academy High School in Johannesburg, Moshe was a class leader and the captain of both the school soccer team and the cricket first team.
This past Nissan, Moshe flew to Johannesburg, his hometown, with a mission. He organized a “Chodesh Nissan Bein Hazamanim” program at the Ohr Somayach Beit Midrash there for yeshiva students who were coming home to South Africa from yeshivot all over the world for the Pesach vacation. This would be a daunting task for any experienced professional administrator. Moshe is 21 and a bachur (unmarried young man)in Yeshiva in Jerusalem. Apart from organizing the program, advertising it, recruiting students, getting speakers and catering, etc., he also did the fundraising to pay for it.
The bein hazamanim (intercession) program was a huge success. There were about 100 yeshiva students participating in it every morning. They came to Ohr Somayach to daven, have breakfast, learn, and to hear inspiring lectures from the Av Beit Din of Johannesburg, the Chief Rabbi of South Africa, HaRav Shimon Wolpe, the Rosh Yeshiva of Ohr Somayach-South Africa, and from HaRav Yechezkiel Auerbach, the Morah D’Asra of the Ohr Somayach Community of Johannesburg. Rabbi Avi Ziskind, the son of Rabbi Ivan Ziskind (presently of the JLE in London and formerly part of our staff here in Jerusalem), who is a magid shiur (teacher of Talmud) in the Yeshiva of Rav Tzvi Kaplan of Jerusalem, was a featured lecturer at the program, teaching classes every day for a week on various topicsin the Talmud.
By way of explaining his extraordinary service to Torah and his community, Moshe says: “It’s a small payback for all the hakaras hatov (gratitude) I have for the unbelievable experience I had at Ohr Somayach.”
Kudos to Reb Moshe Moch – a real macher.
