Review every chapter of Gemara (Talmud) ten times was a theme in Far Rockaway -Shar Yashuv yeshiva. But somehow this idea got over to Brooklyn to the Mir in NY. There was I recall a store owner around the corner of the Mir that was known to have reviewed the third chapter of tractate Shabat ten times. I think I never did that except for the fifth chapter of Ketuboth I vaguely recall that I did a few times but if it ever got to ten I do not know.
In any case I do remember that Moti Freifeld used to make a big deal about the importance of review.
But I had also the Musar book אורחות צדיקים Ways of the Righteous about the importance of covering a lot of ground. And that certainly was mentioned a lot in the Litvak yeshiva world-. The question always was "Did that guy finish Shas?" If not then who is he to have an opinion?
My own approach at that point was to do review on anything I was learning mainly twice and then to go on. I see now that that surely was not enough but at the time it seemed like a good compromise. The only times I recall that I deviated from that was when I was learning the Pnei Yehoshua. There I needed to review each paragraph at least ten times before I would get what he was saying.
In the Gemara itself you do have this idea of review forty times. And in fact Rav Shick [of Breslov] did talk about learning things forty days in a row. He was talking about the book of Rav Nahman but I found this idea to be helpful for other things. For example--when I was learning with my learning partner David Bronson, I always came to the learning session unprepared. But he always was well prepared. But when I needed to do learning on my own of Tosphot and I was not learning with him anymore--but I still wanted to get to some comparable depth I used to review each Tosphot or chapter in Rav Haim from Brisk or Rav Shach about forty days in a row.
So after that whole introduction I want just to say that as is well known in the Litvak world --there is a need for intense review but also to have a session of learning fast.
In any case I do remember that Moti Freifeld used to make a big deal about the importance of review.
But I had also the Musar book אורחות צדיקים Ways of the Righteous about the importance of covering a lot of ground. And that certainly was mentioned a lot in the Litvak yeshiva world-. The question always was "Did that guy finish Shas?" If not then who is he to have an opinion?
My own approach at that point was to do review on anything I was learning mainly twice and then to go on. I see now that that surely was not enough but at the time it seemed like a good compromise. The only times I recall that I deviated from that was when I was learning the Pnei Yehoshua. There I needed to review each paragraph at least ten times before I would get what he was saying.
In the Gemara itself you do have this idea of review forty times. And in fact Rav Shick [of Breslov] did talk about learning things forty days in a row. He was talking about the book of Rav Nahman but I found this idea to be helpful for other things. For example--when I was learning with my learning partner David Bronson, I always came to the learning session unprepared. But he always was well prepared. But when I needed to do learning on my own of Tosphot and I was not learning with him anymore--but I still wanted to get to some comparable depth I used to review each Tosphot or chapter in Rav Haim from Brisk or Rav Shach about forty days in a row.
So after that whole introduction I want just to say that as is well known in the Litvak world --there is a need for intense review but also to have a session of learning fast.
