My friend, Rabbi Moshe Kwalbrun, zichrono livracha, passed on.
Rabbi Kwalbrun was a Talmid Chacham in several ways.
He was first and foremost a Talmid, a student of Torah and Talmud. A Talmid of the human psyche as a result of his university training.
He was a constant Talmid, reading and studying daily, ever looking forward to giving a Shiur even after leaving the active rabbinate, having served the Bell Park Jewish Center of Queens NY for more than 4 decades.
He was a Talmid for decades in the weekly shiur of Rav Dovid Cohen, one of the outstanding present-day Talmidei Chachamim.
He was a Chacham, an intelligent observer of the social and political reality of a society that is constantly questioning what was for centuries accepted.
On many an occasion, I would call him for a “vort”, a thought about the weekly reading of the Torah, or an insight for a forthcoming Jewish Holy Day. Rabbi Kwalbrun had an inexhaustible treasure of ideas and was ready to share them. I did not always admit publicly the source of an insight I delivered from the pulpit, an idea I had gotten from Rabbi Kwalbrun, and that I later tried to give some additional content.
I met him first when he was an Assistant to Rabbi Israel Mowshowitz, a Rabbi’s Rabbi who served for decades in Queens NY. Rabbi Kwalbrun was a great associate to Rabbi Mowshowitz, and as an insightful Talmid, Rabbi Kwalbrun learned much from the elder Rabbi whom he loyally served.
Rabbi Kwalbrun was tireless and worked years beyond his retirement from the Bell Park Jewish Center. He was a practicing psychologist and a prison Chaplain.
However, foremost and above all, he was the loving husband of Shirley and devoted father to the other women in his life: his 3 daughters, and the grandchildren he adored.
Rabbi Kwalbrun did not pass unnoticed, he contributed to every gathering and conversation and left his indelible mark in the hearts of all who heard him, read him or met him.

Rabbi Kwalbrun was already in the decade of Gvurot and was a Gibor Chayil, a solider and servant in Tsivot HaShem.

Nishmato tsrurah bitsror hachayim.