One facet of Brisk not having been a yeshiva as we know it is the light this casts on the great succession controversies at Volozhin. As Shaul Stampfer shows in the new, revised edition of his extraordinary history of Lithuanian Yeshivot, the agitation on behalf of Rav Haim Soloveitchik's seems largely to have come from the students and not Rav Haim, as witnessed by the fact that he himself never started a yeshiva in Brisk.
Lo Bashamayim Hi | 08.17.05 - 3:45 pm | #

Schneur - I was surprised to see you write it as Metz. As I recall, R. Nosson Kaminetsky in 'Making of a Godol' says that in Lita they called that position (mayreh tzeddek) Matz, while elsewhere (among Chagas Chassidim perhaps - I don't recall exactly) they called it Motz (lichayra perhaps Litvaks avoided Motz, because of 'Harishoim. Ki im kaMotz...' in the first kapital Tehillim). Ober fun vanent kumt Metz ? Metz iz geven in Frankreich ! ;-) Then it occurred to me that maybe Metz is just a way some Litvaks may have pronounced Matz - like some might say Shabbes, instead of Shabbos.
FOS | 08.18.05 - 2:13 pm | #

My father always used the term meyre horoeh Never Meyre zedek.
In Kurnitz there was such a person Reb Ure HaYaD .
Schneur | 08.31.05 - 12:35 pm | #