A series devoted to Pirkei Avos
This collection is a focused series: Rabbi Zev Leff teaching Pirkei Avos, the tractate of the Mishnah known as Ethics of the Fathers. Rabbi Leff, the longtime rav of Moshav Matisyahu in Israel, is among the most widely heard English-speaking teachers of his generation, valued for the clarity and structure he brings to whatever he explains. Here that gift is turned to a work every Jew encounters but few study in depth.
Pirkei Avos is unusual among the tractates. It contains no halachic give-and-take, but rather the guiding wisdom of the Tannaim on character, humility, learning, and how to live. A dedicated series lets a teacher move through it mishna by mishna, unpacking maxims that are easy to recite and hard to truly absorb. Rabbi Leff's approach gives each one room to be understood rather than merely quoted.
Wisdom for how to live
The subject matter of Pirkei Avos is character and conduct: how to speak, how to judge others favorably, how to approach Torah study, how to hold wealth and honor lightly. These are lessons that resist quick treatment, because their difficulty is not in understanding the words but in living them. A slow, careful series is exactly the right vehicle — it gives a listener time to sit with a single teaching and consider where it touches their own life.
Rabbi Leff is known for making the classical sources accessible without flattening them. In a work as compressed as Pirkei Avos, where a single line can carry a great deal, that ability matters. He draws out the depth behind a familiar mishna and connects it to the way a person actually behaves — with family, in business, in the beis medrash — so that the tractate reads as practical guidance rather than distant aphorism.
A fitting learning for the summer
There is a long-standing custom in many communities to learn Pirkei Avos on Shabbos afternoons through the summer months. A recorded series maps neatly onto that practice: a family or an individual can follow along week by week, matching the perek being learned in shul or simply keeping a steady pace through the tractate. It turns a familiar seasonal custom into an opportunity for real study.
Beyond any season, Pirkei Avos rewards return visits — its teachings land differently at different stages of life. A series like this becomes a resource a person can come back to, hearing a mishna they have known for years and finding something new in it. For a household trying to build character alongside knowledge, Rabbi Leff's treatment of the Fathers offers a warm and dependable place to begin.
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 Zev Leff, 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
- A focused series of Rabbi Zev Leff teaching Pirkei Avos, the Ethics of the Fathers.
- Rabbi Leff, rav of Moshav Matisyahu, is a leading English-speaking teacher known for clarity.
- Pirkei Avos is about character and conduct — lessons easy to recite and hard to live.
- It fits the widespread custom of learning Pirkei Avos on Shabbos afternoons through the summer.
- Search FilteredTube for kosher, approved Torah video — the catalog grows every day.