Nov 9, 2007 -- Considered one of the most distinguished poskim (halakhic decisors) of our time, HaRav Gedalia Dov Schwartz, the Av Beth Din of the Chicago Rabbinical Council (CRC) and a graduate of Yeshiva College and the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary (RIETS), was honored for his 20 years of service to the CRC and to the Chicago Jewish community during a national dinner on Oct. 28. Dr. Norman Lamm, Yeshiva University chancellor, was the keynote speaker. “Rabbi Schwartz is a full product of YU,” said Rabbi Lamm in his address, adding that Rabbi Schwartz also received a YU Kollel fellowship and an honorary Doctor of Divinity degree. “He has attributed his success in elevating the spiritual and intellectual level of modern Orthodoxy in Chicago to his rabbis and teachers at YU. The fact that Rabbi Schwartz is the recognized halakhic authority for all groups in the Chicago area is a tribute to his accessibility, friendliness, and YU education.” Since 1991, Rabbi Schwartz has also been the Rosh Beth Din, chief presiding judge, of the National Beth Din of the Rabbinical Council of America (RCA), of which he has been a member since 1972. Under his leadership, and with the assistance of learned colleagues, he is the posek for thousands of people who turn to the Beth Din for adjudication of financial disputes, kashruth supervision and family law. This united Beth Din — active in both New York and Chicago — is widely recognized as the most reliable Beth Din in the country. “Rabbi Schwartz’s greatest communal achievement is this prestigious Beth Din,” said Rabbi Lamm. “His greatest personal achievement is his warmth, his utter lack of prejudice, his vast learning — and his fame as a warm and compassionate advisor to all who seek his succor in their personal as well as religious lives.” Born and raised in Newark, NJ, Rabbi Schwartz is the first second-generation American rabbi to publish an original halakhic work, Divrei Regesh, which received the endorsement of the late Gaon HaRav Aaron Kotler, of blessed memory. His second sefer, Migdanos Eliezer, was endorsed by HaRav Dovid Lipshitz. A third, soon-to-be-published sefer, Shaarei Gedulah, contains questions and answers from the Rav, a historical perspective of the Orthodox American scene from 1850 to the present, as well as an extended biography. Since 1972, Rabbi Schwartz has also been the editor of the RCA Torah journal HaDarom. “Above all, and encompassing these achievements, is Rabbi Schwartz’s quality of chesed,” says Rabbi Lamm. “This is an essentially untranslatable term which embraces goodness, love, humility, sweetness, and gentleness. How fortunate are we, in New York and especially in Chicago, to be blessed with his presence.”