אור החיים הקדוש

The Ohr HaChaim HaKadosh, Rabbi Chaim ben Attar, is the sage of Morocco whose commentary on the Torah burns with a fire of love. Born in Salé in Morocco, great in law and in Kabbalah, he wrote a commentary on the Torah, 'Ohr HaChaim,' which became so beloved that it is printed in most Chumashim, and is studied on the eve of Shabbat as preparation for the holiness of the day.

His commentary is not only explanation but exhilaration: he uncovers in every verse layers of plain meaning and secret, and his burning heart pours into the words. Chassidut saw in him a great soul, and the Baal Shem Tov, his contemporary, sought by tradition to meet him, as if two centers of light, East and West, wished to join.

All his life he carried in his heart the longing for the Land of Israel, and at the end of his days he left Morocco, wandered through Italy, and reached Jerusalem, where he founded a yeshiva. He died relatively young, but tradition tells that on the day of his passing, the 15th of Tammuz, Rabbi Nachman of Breslov was born, as if the light was handed from one to another.

What do we learn from him? That the study of Torah can be an act of burning love, not only of intellect. The Ohr HaChaim teaches that a sage of the East can illuminate the whole people, that the longing for the Land of Israel drives a person to rise and ascend, and that the light is not extinguished at death but passed on, from generation to generation.