[Avodah] Reb Shraga Feivel Mendlowitz on RSRH's 19 Letters

[Moshe Y. Gluck]

R' YL:
First of all, what does TTBOMK stand for?  Secondly, it appears that his son
and son-in-law did not follow in his derech! The following is from his bio,
pages 37-38:

He was alive to every facet of genuine Torah expression. "Some
souls," he used to say, "drink from Tanya. Others from the Ramchal.
Still others from Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch. I drink from all of
them, though at any given time, I might drink from one in particular."
He had the genius to draw from every strand of authentic
Jewish thought, to place those various strands in relation to one another,
and to see each of them as simply another path to knowledge
and service of the Divine. Who else could have used the works of
Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch to explain a difficult passage in a
classic chassidic work such as Tanya, or vice versa.
<SNIP>

In a subsequent post, R' Akiva Blum posted: 
Did RSFM teach fully all these approaches? Do his son and SIL need to, or
can?
-------------------

His son and son-in-law most certainly did follow in his Derech. You are,
inadvertently I'm sure, misunderstanding R' SFM's Derech. It was that a
person should have a synthesis of the derachim that worked best for _him_,
and not to wholly adhere to one Derech even though it had addressable
faults. R' SFM's personal Derech, IIRC, was based on Nefesh HaChayim, Tanya
(which he learned differently than Chabad did), RSRH, and Ramchal. (I may be
misremembering - I think I have it right, though...) So his talmidim
followed in his path, and ended up differently, Mar K'd'is Lay, u'Mar K'd'is
Lay. If you read again the above passage in that light, I think you'll see a
different meaning than the one you understood. R' SFM would not have, I
guess, made someone learn RSRH who didn't appreciate him.

KT,
MYG