From the Heart of the Mir
For many years, Rabbi Nissan Kaplan was one of the most beloved English-language maggidei shiur in the Mir Yeshiva of Yerushalayim — the largest yeshiva in the world — where waves of bochurim from America, England, and beyond passed through his shiur and his vaadim. For a generation of English-speaking talmidim, his voice is the sound of their years in Eretz Yisroel.
Today he stands at the head of his own yeshiva in Yerushalayim, Daas Aharon, continuing the same work: building serious lomdim who carry both depth in learning and warmth in avodas Hashem.
Torah With a Pulse
What made Rabbi Kaplan's shiurim famous was never dry analysis. The lomdus is real and rigorous — but it arrives with urgency, humor, and story, delivered in his unmistakable accent and rhythm that listeners find themselves imitating affectionately for years afterward.
His Gemara shiurim walk the sugya honestly, building the question until it genuinely bothers you and the answer genuinely satisfies. It is learning that treats the listener as a partner in the sugya, not an audience.
Davening Like It Matters
Perhaps his widest fame comes from his talks on tefillah — on davening with fire. In vaadim that have traveled far beyond the walls of any yeshiva, he confronts the deadness that creeps into daily davening and rebuilds it: what it means to stand before the Ribbono Shel Olam, how to mean the words, how to fight for kavanah one bracha at a time.
These talks endure because they are practical. He does not scold; he equips — with images, exercises, and honest admissions of struggle that make real avodah feel reachable for a regular person.
Mussar for Real Life
Rabbi Kaplan's vaadim range across the whole terrain of character and conduct — anger and patience, honesty, simcha, bein adam lachaveiro — always anchored in Chazal and the baalei mussar, always landing in concrete practice.
For families and working people, these recorded vaadim offer a taste of what a yeshiva's mussar seder gives its talmidim: a regular, honest appointment with becoming a better Jew.
Finding kosher Torah video for your family
FilteredTube is a kosher video service built for Jewish families — every single video is approved against one written standard before it can appear, with no open feed, no comments, and no surprises. It is a calm, safe place to look for the Torah and Jewish music you love.
If your family enjoys teachers like Rabbi Nissan Kaplan, search FilteredTube for the speakers and topics that matter most to you. With a daf yomi shelf, a weekly parsha shelf, topic shelves, audio-only listening for the car, and a kids mode with a PIN, kosher Jewish video is easy to reach — and the approved catalog keeps growing every day.
At a glance
Key takeaways
- Rabbi Nissan Kaplan was for years a beloved English-language maggid shiur at the Mir in Yerushalayim.
- He now leads his own yeshiva in Yerushalayim, Daas Aharon.
- His famous talks on davening with fire rebuild daily tefillah into a living avodah.
- His mussar vaadim turn character work into concrete, reachable practice.
- Search FilteredTube for kosher, approved Torah video — the catalog grows every day.