The stage is beautifully set. Young boys, peyos curled along their cheeks, sit proudly on the dais. Before them, the hall is filled with parents, siblings and rabbanim.
At first glance, it looks like a Mesibas Chumash, the traditional celebration marking a child’s first steps into learning Chumash. But this is something far greater. This is a siyum, not on Sefer Bereishis but on the entire Chamishei Chumshei Torah.
What might sound like fantasy is, in fact, reality. On a regular basis, boys as young as eight years old are not only completing the entire Chumash but also demonstrating their mastery when tested by rabbanim.
How does such a remarkable feat come about?
It all started in a small, dim basement in Yerushalayim. The room had no running water, no bathroom, one lamp, and no other electricity. There, Rav Moshe Kletzkin founded his talmud Torah, Zichru Toras Moshe, the seed of what would become the Zichru method of learning.
Rav Kletzkin launched that cheder with his own children and a few others after feeling dissatisfied with what local chadarim offered. After years of hardship, trial and persistence, the method took root. Today, Rav Kletzkin is a sought-after mechanech, invited around the globe to share and implement his system. What began as a tiny cheder has grown into a network, almost a franchise, of schools. In these schools, talmidim master the entire Chumash in just three years. By the end of elementary school, they have also learned substantial portions of Tanach and two sedarim of Mishnayos.
“This approach helps a child truly understand what he learns and feel connected to it,” Rav Kletzkin explains.
Here is the story of how it all came to be.
Born in Yerushalayim in 1969 to Reb Benzion Kletzkin, Rav Moshe’s family was deeply rooted in Yerushalayim. From his mother’s side, he is a seventh-generation Yerushalmi, and on his father’s side he’s the fourth generation there.
Rav Kletzkin’s childhood was a typical Yerushalmi one. As was common in Yerushalayim of those days, he remained in cheder until he was 16, after which he attended Yeshiva Liflagos Reuven, named for the monumental multi-volume work of Rav Zelig Reuven Bengis, the gaavad of the Eidah Hacharedis.
“In those days, there was no such thing as learning Mishnayos in cheder,” Rav Kletzkin recalls. “We went straight from Chumash to Gemara. Until today, I can still remember the first Gemara I learned in cheder, Eilu Metzios in Bava Metzia, along with the sing-song tune my rebbi taught it with, and the translation.”
But while the words and even the melody remain etched in his memory, something else is equally unforgettable. What was missing.
“We repeated word after word from the melamed, but we had no idea what we were actually saying,” he recalls. “I remember that once our teacher used the term mimah nafshach (a term that is loosely translated as ‘in any case’). We children had no idea what it meant, and we were too afraid to ask. We knew we’d have to recite the Gemara back later in the week, so we spent the whole week just repeating the words ‘mimah nafshach…’ without any clue what it meant.
“We didn’t know Chumash or Gemara…”
After studying in yeshivah and getting married, Rav Kletzkin learned for a period in the kollel in the Old City of Yerushalayim headed by Rav Yitzchak Shlomo Zilberman. Later, Rav Zilberman would go on to lead a yeshivah and community that followed the derech of the Vilna Gaon. He also pioneered a new educational approach, famously known as the Zilberman method. This method emphasized extensive review and clear, basic understanding, with a goal of completing each section of Torah—Chumash, Nach, and Mishnah—before moving on to the next stage.
Around that time, Rav Zilberman, who did not yet have his network of institutions, was searching for a suitable cheder for his son. He was troubled that none of the available schools taught Torah in the way he felt Chazal intended. Initially, he helped establish Yeshiva Kamenitz in Yerushalayim and later was involved in founding Talmud Torah Hadar Tziyon. The menahel of Hadar Tziyon was Rabbi Gamliel Batelman, an uncle of Rav Kletzkin’s wife. Rav Kletzkin served as a teacher in Hadar Tziyon for several years.
At Hadar Tziyon, the children learned Chumash with the trop but retained the standard taitch method, translating the text word-for-word, which Rav Kletzkin explains is a serious problem.
“You teach the children word by word: Bereishis, in der unfang (in the beginning), bara Elokim…” Rav Kletzkin explains. “But when you stop and ask the child, ‘What did we just learn in the pasuk?’ they won’t be able to tell you.”
“So what did you accomplish?” he asks. “You repeated the pasuk in another language? When did Hashem create the sun? Many times, neither the students nor even the melamed can answer.”
Rav Kletzkin recalls asking some of the prominent bnei Torah in Yerushalayim whether this approach truly fulfilled the mitzvah of learning Torah.
“They told me the mitzvah really begins at bar mitzvah, when a boy starts learning Gemara. Until then, they felt a child couldn’t truly understand Torah. So the goal was to keep him off the street, read the pesukim with him, and if he remembers something, all the better.”
According to Rav Kletzkin, his uncle Rabbi Batelman was aware of this flaw as well. Once, walking down a street in Yerushalayim, he overheard a melamed teaching Shiras Hayam in Parshas Beshalach. The melamed said the word b’richbo and translated it into Yiddish as reitvegener.
“Reb Gamliel got upset,” Rav Kletzkin recounts. “He walked into the classroom and asked the children, ‘Do you know what b’richbo means?’ Of course, they all answered reitvegener. Then he asked, ‘What does reitvegener mean?’ And they said b’richbo. Not one child knew what the word actually meant!” (It means chariots.)
Additionally, the pace of study did not meet Rav Kletzkin’s expectations. So when it came time for his eldest son to enter cheder, Rav Kletzkin made a bold decision: he would establish his own.
“The learning method in this new cheder was completely different,” Rav Kletzkin explains. “Before opening a Chumash, I first taught the children the background of what we were about to study. I gave them the full picture.”
When he began his cheder, the class had reached Parshas Miketz. So Rav Kletzkin began by telling them: “It was two years after Yosef was thrown into the pit, and Pharaoh had a dream…” Only then did he proceed to teach the meaning of each word: Vayehi, miketz…
Another innovation was in the taitch method. Instead of the melamed repeating the entire pasuk over and over, Rav Kletzkin had the class focus on the words they didn’t yet know. Those became the center of attention, while familiar words were not drilled unnecessarily.
“With this approach, we could complete the entire Chamishah Chumshei Torah in just three years,” Rav Kletzkin says, his enthusiasm unmistakable. “The children belong to what they’re learning. They feel connected. They can tell you what they studied! They aren’t just parroting information; they truly understand.”
When asked to describe his exact methodology, Rav Kletzkin resists. Time and time again, he says that he teaches his methods to teachers over several months, and it can’t be given over in a single sitting.
But when pushed, he describes some of the framework and schedule they use, built on several key pillars.
The first is constant recitation, which they call mikra. At the start of each week, the rebbi assigns a specific perek or section. Each day, the children read the entire section three times with the trop. By the end of the week, they will have recited the text at least 15 times, making the words familiar even before they begin to understand their meaning.
Next comes the rebbi’s overview of the story or central ideas. This ensures that the students grasp the broader picture before diving into details and prevents them from “losing the forest for the trees.”
Only on Tuesday, after the students have already recited the pesukim many times and absorbed the general storyline, does the rebbi begin teaching word by word. At this stage, no detail is glossed over. If a pasuk lists several objects or uses multiple adjectives, each is explained carefully and placed in context. Every word receives full attention and exploration.
Finally, on Thursday, once the students are fluent in the words and explanations firmly, the rebbi leads a full review of that week’s material. This time, the students themselves supply the translations, reinforcing comprehension and strengthening long-term retention.
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