11 Jul BLIND FAITH Q & A WITH RABBI LAVI GREENSPAN IN THE CATSKILLS

Rabbi Lavi Greenspan is known for
five things:
1- He became blind at the age of 26,
after developing a tumor.
2- His life has taken many twists, but
he has more faith in Hashem
than any man you’ve ever met.
3- He passed the bar, became a lawyer,
and received smicha after he
lost his vision.
4- Everyone that meets him, loves him!
5- He never found a partner with whom
to live his life; one centered
around Torah and mitzvos.

For years, Lavi would talk about his
loneliness. He wanted nothing more
than to share his faithful life with
his soulmate. But, for many obvious
reasons, it became very difficult for him
to find a woman with whom to spend his
life.

After 25 years of searching, that stage
in his life had finally come to an end,
and he got married this past November
to his eishes chayil, Nechama, who
clearly brings comfort to his life as
her name suggests. Together they have
an unshakable faith and a resolute
determination to find the good in
everything life presents to them.

This past weekend, R’ Lavi was in the
Catskills for Shabbos at Yeshiva of
South Fallsburg & Ari Hirsch from the
Country Vues had a chance to catch up
with R’ Lavi in Woodbourne.

In your mid-twenties your life
completely changed. Can you please
tell everyone the story about how you
lost your vision?
At the age of 24, I found out I had a tumor
in my pituitary gland. I went to Mount
Sinai hospital in Manhattan, and they
told me I needed two operations because

it was so big. One was a nine hour open-
head surgery and the other was a six hour

surgery through my nose. Two weeks
later, my surgeon told me I had a CSF
leak, a cerebral spinal fluid leak, that
required a four hour surgery through the
nose to close it up, as well as a 4-6 hour
open-head surgery. Everything was going
okay until about 8-9 months later. Around
March of1996, I started to notice that
some food would come out of my mouth,
so I went to Dr. Buchbinder at Mt. Sinai
hospital and he told me that there was
some scar tissue that was wrapped around
my jaw because of all the operations. I
needed another hour and a half of surgery
to go in and cut all the tissue out. At that
point, there was very little radiation and
I had very little hair loss. In September
of 1997 I was driving on the Van Wyck
toward Kennedy airport and I ended up
driving in front of another car. I didn’t see
him and I knew something was wrong. I
went to one eye doctor after the other, and
they told me I was fine. They told me to
come in once or twice a week to the office
to do some computer exercises to see if
my vision improved, but my vision was
getting worse. I went to a doctor named
Dr. Joe Mingo from Mt. Sinai hospital;
he was a new ophthalmologist, but by the
time I went to see him, I could no longer
see out of one of my eyes. He told me
I was probably going to go blind in my
other eye, which I believe was my left
eye. My family did some searching and
found Dr. Scott Fulman from Westchester
County Medical Center who used a
different method called a hyperbaric
chamber. You lie in a glass chamber for
two hours a day, twice a day, and you
receive oxygen. Dr. Fulman told me that
undergoing this oxygen procedure twice
a day will only keep what I had left, not
bring back what I had lost. Every time
I left the hyperbaric chamber, a nurse
would take my temperature. One time,
my temperature rose to103. I don’t fully
recall, but I believe she said she had to
tell my family, and I think I told her I was
an adult and I could take care of myself.
I thank Hashem that she didn’t let me go

home because my temperature went up to
105 and I passed out. I later found out I
had meningitis and was unconscious for
two and a half days. When I woke up, I
was in Mount Sinai hospital and was told

I had to undergo another six hour open-
head operation, and Dr. Fulman told me

there was nothing more he could do. By
Chanukah of 1997, when I was 26 years
old, I was completely blind and couldn’t
see a single thing.

What was your first year without
having your vision like?
To be honest I can’t really recall. I can
tell you this: I became blind in December
and by January I would thank Hashem
because he gave me a test. He gives us
tests that he knows we can pass. From
January through May I had law school
finals and I was studying for them. My
sister, Mireet Wolf, is a lawyer and she
helped me out with one. My friends
Dovid Becker and Seth Berkowitz, one
who was in law school and the other
who had graduated, helped me study for
the other tests. Baruch HaShem I passed
them, but I didn’t really have time to
think. Then the Lighthouse for the Blind
came over to my house and adapted my
house for being blind,
and then I had my bar
test. I took a course
called Barbery, to help
prepare me for the bar
exam. Rebbetzin Esther
Kraus & an anonymous
friend helped get
lawyers to assist me.

Within two days, thirty-
four lawyers came over

to help me study. The
bar is usually a two day
exam but I ended up getting four days
because of my situation. You’re allowed
to have family or friends ask you the
questions as long as they aren’t lawyers
or law school students. There were about
ten or eleven people who volunteered to
take the test with me, and so it was me,
my test person, and the proctor in a hotel
room. Whoever was volunteering at the
time would ask me the questions and the
proctor would watch us. Baruch Hashem,
I passed the New York State Bar Exam
on the first try.
The next year I was training to use a
talking computer at night while finishing
my smicha at YU during the day. I was
then hired by a company that I worked

for, for six years. In 2007 during the
recession, a bunch of people were let go,
but the company was very nice to me.
I was one of the last people to be laid
off and they gave me a nice severance
package. I went to LIU’s Social Work
school, and now I work as a social worker
at Yeshiva Tiferes Moshe
in Queens. My wife
sometimes drives me, or
I take a cab, or an Uber.

Mazel Tov!! This past
November, you had
some big news: You got
married. How did you
meet your special eishes
chayil, Nechama?
Last year a friend of mine
told me his sister had gone to a Kever
of a tzadik in Buffalo, Rabbi Eliyahu
Yoseph Rabinowitz. This guy named
Meir Begun was very nice and paid for
my friend and I to go up there in March;
you could see people had been there since
there were candles lit. We only had about
15 minutes since we had to get back for
Mincha and Maariv, but we only made
it to maariv and had to daven mincha
b’yechidus. Two weeks later the guy calls
me up and says “Lavi we have to get you
married.” So after Pesach, I hired a team
of five shadchanim and they suggested
Nechama. Two weeks into dating

Nechama, a friend of mine met a 13-year-
old kid who was in a situation that left

him embarrassed and feeling very bad.

His friend said, “Stop. Don’t say a word.
Give Lavi a bracha that he should get
married.” It was going okay, but there
were sometimes that I was going to end
it. This past summer I went to NCSY
Kollel, which I’ve been doing for several
years and I talk about my blindness.
While I was there an nineteen year old
girl asked me to daven for her to get a
shidduch. I davened for her. I didn’t focus
on myself. After I focused on davening
for her and working on different things,
things started turning around for me.

How long did you actually go out with
Nechama?
We went out for about three months.
She’s from Denver so it was mostly on
the phone. We may have gone out six
times physically when she came to New
York.

Please tell everyone a little bit about
Nechama.
Nechama was born and lived her whole
life in Denver, Colorado. She was born
and raised as a Protestant Christian and
becoming frum was a long process.
Through her search and desire to find the
emes, she had a passionate yearning to
find Hashem and eventually live a Torah
life.

Who walked Nechama down the aisle?
Rabbi Tzvi & Rebbetzin Bracha
Steinberg from Denver, presently a
Rav in Jackson, New Jersey. They were
both very instrumental in learning with
Nechama and helping her with her
journey to conversion over the last few
years.

What is Nechama doing presently?
Right now she’s busy being my personal
secretary. Believe it or not that’s a hard
job! Before that she was working at
Yeshiva Toras Chaim in Denver. She’s
going to be looking for something here in
New York, but for now she’s just getting
used to living in New York.

How amazing was your chasuna?
I can’t tell you fully; it was so
overwhelming.

Is it true that both Rav Yeruchem
Olshin from BMG & Rav Hershel
Schachter from YU were there?
What’s your connection to them?
Rav Olshin was the Mesader Kiddushin
& Rav Schechter read the kesubah.
I’ve always made an effort to develop
a relationship with many of the leading
rabbis in Eretz Yisrael and America,
calling one daily to hear words of Torah
and inspiration. Rav Schechter is my main
posek that I call when I have an important
shailah. Rav Olshin I call almost every
day. At the chasuna was Rav Malkiel
Kotler, Rabbi Ephraim Wachsman Rav
Elya Ber Wachtfogel, Rav Yitzchok
Lichtenstein from Torah Vadaath,
Rav Eliezar Ginsberg, Rav Binyamin
Carlebach, Rav Dovid Goldwasser, Rav
Mordechai Jungreis and too many to
mention, that I can’t even mention them
all. I enjoy “collecting” and speaking to
Rabonim. In Israel, I’ve eaten by Rav
Usher Arieli, and Rav Dovid Cohen
from Chevron, and had regular meals
by Rav Noson Tzvi Finkel zt”l, and the
Novominsker Rebbe zt”l.

What keeps you going?
Hashem. I feel that He’s holding
me in His hand. I can tell you
two stories you’re not going to
believe. I sometimes listen to the
news, and I dropped the radio in
my parent’s house in the kitchen
where the floor was flat. I was
able to reach one piece, but the
other started rolling under the
table. I said, “Hashem, I know
this is a test from You.” The
minute I said it, the battery started
rolling right back. Another time
there was a sucking candy that
fell under the table, and no one
was in the house with me. I went
to get it and I couldn’t find it. I
went around the dining room
table, but nothing, so I sat on the
couch wondering where it could
be. Then, I’m not lying to you, in
my head I saw a hand pointing

in the direction it had rolled, next to
the couch. Hashem was showing me
in my head where the candy had gone.
It reminds me that Hashem is always
holding my hand.
Another story: I was with my friends
on Taanis Esther and we were going to
collect tzedakah for poor people. We
were in Kew Gardens Hills and I was on
the phone trying to find out what house
we should go to first. I didn’t realize
it, but a guy had put a gun to my head
and put his hand in my pocket trying to
get my wallet. I was being mugged and
didn’t know it. I thought my friend was
playing a joke, and I started fighting
with him. Later that night he got arrested
because he had killed a Pakistani woman
who fought them also. I felt that
they couldn’t kill me because
Hashem said, “You’re not
touching my child’s life.”

Back to the Chasana, was
there anything special that
you needed to do as a choson?
Like under the chuppah,
when you said “harei at” did
you have to have someone
guide you? How did it work
exactly?
I don’t remember. I do remember
that when she was walking
around me I davened to Hashem

for other people. I can’t remember
exactly, because it was so overwhelming.

What would you say is the secret to
Simchas Hachayim when things seem
bleak?
You need to thank Hashem for everything
you have. There are people out there with
major tzaros, but the most important
thing is to appreciate what you have. If
you don’t appreciate what you have, you
could be a multi-billionaire and never be
happy.

Do you think you would have touched
as many people in your lifetime if you
didn’t lose your vision?
Probably not.

Are you scared that if you see them,
you might see something you don’t
want to see?
No, I don’t think so.

What do you miss most about your
vision?
I miss seeing Torah,
my Rebbie, my parents,
my wife, and of course
my family all together.
Another difficulty is
always depending upon
others to get places or to
read. Torah tapes are not
the same as looking into
the Torah. At the very
beginning, when I used
to get down, I heard a
story from Rabbi Paysach
Krohn, about a person in
Canada who was hit by
a bullet and he became
paralyzed from the neck down. How can I
complain? He can’t feed himself or dress
himself. He’s stuck in a wheelchair for the
rest of his life. Not that I was happy about
his situation, but at the very beginning
that’s what I used to do: Stop myself from
complaining by thinking that it could be
much worse. Afterwards I started to look
at what I did have, the positive instead of
the negative. There are many people who
have much worse problems than I do.

Are there any mitzvos that you’re
patur from because of your lack of
vision?
I once asked Rav Dovid Cohen from
Chevron about saying the bracha of
“Pokeach Ivrim ‘’ and he said I can say it
because people who can see can help me
out, so I have that as kavanah. I was told
once by Rav Dovid Cohen that I shouldn’t

light Shabbos candles because I can’t see
them. Rav Schechter said the same thing
about Chanukah candles, My father would
hold my hand when he made the bracha
on the menorah. With Havdalah candles,
it’s a machlokes because some say all you
need is to feel the heat of
the flame, so when I make
havdalah I have someone
else make the Bracha on
the candle. For Kiddush
Levana, I ask someone to
have me in mind because
they can see the moon.
The Chofetz Chaim says
I can get an aliyah except
for Parshas Parah and
Zachor because those are
Deoraysa. I can’t make
birchas ilanos on the
fruit trees in Nisan. Some
people have a minhag
to rip their clothes after
visiting the Kotel, but according to
Rav Eliyashiv, I’m not supposed to do
that because I can’t see it. For Shiluach
Hakan I can pick up the egg and make the
Bracha. Tzitzis doesn’t require eyesight.

What would you like to do going
forward in 5 to 10 years?
I’d like to learn a lot of Torah, I’d like to
expand my family. I’d like to have happy
and healthy children. Many children.

This past Shabbos you were in the
Catskills spending Shabbos at the
Yeshiva of South Fallsburg with the
Rosh Yeshiva, Rabbi Wachtfogel. How
was your weekend?
BH, amazing!!
I know that you have a lot of friends
upstate in the Catskills over the

summer. Do you go upstate a lot over
the summer?
Yes. I used to go a lot, to friends upstate
in the bungalow colonies, especially
Moonlight Cottages. I used to stay by
Jonathan Gellis a lot. I’m good friends
with Jeremy Goldzal, Yitzy Jacobowitz,
and Dovid Gottlieb. I have a lot of
speaking gigs. I plan on being upstate
girls’ month at Camp Kaylie for Shabbos
with kallah Nechama.

Is it true that you were a counselor at
Camp HASC?
Yes. I loved Camp HASC. I was actually
a counselor there before I became blind
& really enjoyed it! Lot’s of memories!

Is there anything else you’d like to tell
our readers about your journey?
You should know you’re never alone,
Hashem is always with you. Hashem is
with every Jew. Being part of the Jewish
people is like being part of one big
family, all brothers and sisters wanting
to help should you ever need them. The
greatness of the Jewish community is
incredible; there’s nothing like it. Mi
Kamcha Yisrael!!