Torah Ore

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Torah Ore is an Orthodox post-high-school yeshiva and kollel located in the Kiryat Mattersdorf neighborhood of Jerusalem. It was founded in 1960 in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, by Rabbi Chaim Pinchas Scheinberg and moved to Jerusalem in 1965, settling in its current building at 3 Sorotzkin Street in 1971. As of 2013, it enrolled about 300 undergraduate students and 600 married (kollel) students, with thousands of alumni who have become prominent rabbis and community leaders.

Rabbi Chaim Pinchas Scheinberg led Torah Ore for more than five decades until his death in 2012; he was succeeded by his son, Rabbi Simcha Scheinberg. The yeshiva’s name comes from a verse in Proverbs: “For the commandment is a lamp and the Torah is light.” Scheinberg had previously served as a spiritual supervisor at Yeshivas Chafetz Chaim in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, and opened Torah Ore with help from his brother Shmuel Scheinberg and son-in-law Chaim Dov Altusky. It began in Bensonhurst with six students and became known for deep learning and personal care for students.

In 1963, Scheinberg’s wife Bessie expressed interest in moving to the planned Haredi housing development of Kiryat Mattersdorf in Jerusalem. After a pilot trip, they relocated in May 1965 with their family and more than 20 students. Rabbi Akiva Ehrenfeld encouraged the move by offering favorable terms for apartments and land for the yeshiva. In Jerusalem, Torah Ore initially operated in the Diskin Orphanage building in Givat Shaul. During the Six-Day War in 1967, Scheinberg encouraged his students to stay, and none left. After the war, plans were made for a permanent home, and the yeshiva moved to its present building in 1971. Scheinberg traveled to raise funds until almost the age of 100 and died in 2012; tens of thousands attended his funeral, and he is buried on the Mount of Olives. His son Simcha Scheinberg succeeded him as rosh yeshiva.

The school is organized into 24 chavrusas (learning groups): 12 meet in the morning and 12 in the afternoon, each led by an advanced scholar with its own Talmud and Halakha curriculum. There is also an American beis medrash program for post-high school students.

Numerous yeshivas named after Rabbi Chaim Pinchas Scheinberg were founded by his students, including Yeshiva Derech Chaim in Brooklyn and several in Israel (such as Yeshiva Tiferes Chaim, Kollel Nefesh Hachaim, Kollel Ruach Chaim, Kollel Toras Chaim, and Yeshiva Shaarei Chaim, which meets in Torah Ore’s building).