[Page 220]

It is nearly impossible to write, from a Jewish standpoint, about a city with a large Jewish population without giving a rightful place to the rabbis who played a large role in bygone Jewish life. In our old home, when the rabbinate was an institution, when the rabbis were the leaders of a kehillah–when the religious leaders made a mark on all Jewish institutions, on all Jewish fellowships, and generally on all Jewish life, it would be a terrible mistake to ignore the intervention of the rabbis in the collective life of Eastern European Jewry and to treat them as worthless. If it were not for the brilliant figures of R` Dov Berish Meizlish, R` Yitzchak Elkhanan, R`Elihu-Chaim Meisel, R`Chaim-Ozer Grodziensky, Dr. Rubinshteyn, R` Naftali-Zvi Yehuda Berlin, R`Chaim Soloveitchik, R`Elikum, and many others–the kehillahs of Warsaw, Kovno, Lodz, Vilna Volozhin, Brisk, Grodno, and other large Jewish cities would not have attained their luster that endured until the last World War, in which were destroyed thousands and

[Page 221]

thousands of Jewish settlements, along with six million of our brothers and sisters. God should avenge their blood.

The great rabbis of former times participated in all the movements that related to the lives of the kehillahs, and the initiatives that bore a collective character felt rabbinic authority. Seldom did a movement succeed without the approval of the great rabbinic figures. Initiatives of a religious, social, economic, education, or philosophical character were conducted only when they were sanctioned by the great religious leaders of their generation. Otherwise they were bound to fail. The history of Russian and Polish Jewry in different eras is full of examples that bear this out, and it would require a huge work to cite them.

But it is appropriate to cite some examples that can represent all times.

In the time of Nicholas I (1825-1855), when the Russian government had undertaken the project to “educate” Jews, with the intention not of teaching them but of bringing them to apostasy–as later became evident–they began by establishing schools for Jews in all cities, where they taught large masses. To this end, the Education Minister of that time, Uvarov, named Dr. Menachem Mendel Lilienthal as “government rabbi” for the city of Odesa and as the defender and propagandist for the city educational system for Jews in Russia. At that time were founded the non-Orthodox schools in Vilna and Zhitomir, which produced, truthfully, many educated Jews, but, unfortunately, many who were assimilated or converted.

[Page 222]

Uvarov understood that to achieve his goal, it was absolutely necessary to get the approval of the rabbinic authorities so that Jewish parents would send their children to the non-Jewish schools. To this end, he tried to ensnare R` Yisroel Salanter, ordering him to direct the Vilna Rabbinic Seminar. The great Jewish spiritual leader of Lithuanian Jewry at that time, who was considered the greatest personality of Jewish morality, felt, with his ideal Jewish sense, that the intention of that persecutor of Jews, Nicholas, was not to educate Jews but to convert them. Therefore he categorically refused to authorize that Jews should willingly send their children to those so-called educational institutions. And even less did he intend to become the leader of such a school. And fearful of coercion from Nicholas' government, he left Russia. The decree concerning conscription of Jewish boys–a particularly awful chapter in the history of Russian Jews at that time–showed the foresightedness of that great Jew, R` Yisroel Salanter

As I said, the Russian government named Dr. Lilienthal to carry out its plan “to teach Jews other subjects besides Torah.” The large Jewish city of Minsk was “crowned” with his greatest failure. People pelted him with tones while shouting, “We don't want to know. We don't want such schools.”

Dr. Lilienthal understood that he had to find a great Jewish authority to back his plan, and he barely escaped from Minsk, at night, with his life. He went to Volozhin, where the greatest scholar and yeshiva

[Page 223]

head, R` Itzele, lived. He was the son of R` Chaim, the founder of the Volozhin yeshiva. R` Itzele was the greatest Jewish religious authority of his time, recognized as such even in the highest government circles thanks to his great influence on Russian Jewry, as well as for his knowledge of Russian and secular subjects. He was also not opposed to Jews learning secular subjects.

It would take too long to describe how Dr. Lilenthal dealt with the Lithuanian scholar on the subject of his “sacred” mission. The result was that soon after his Yom Kippur sermon, in which R` Itzele stated his opposition to Dr. Lilienthal, the latter rose from his seat, approached the Aron Kodesh, and said, “I swear in the name God and the Torah that my intentions are good, and I believe that the government also looks to the benefit of the Jews. And I swear that if I find that I am mistaken, I will withdraw from my mission.”

The result was that Dr. Lilienthal fled from Petersburg to America. He realized that R` Itzele of Volozhin and other rabbis were correct in their suspicions. The great rabbinical authorities triumphed over the great and mighty Nicholas. Jews did not send their children to the government schools because those schools lacked the approval of their spiritual leaders. (See A.Y. Fefirna, “Memories and Reports,” in “Reshumos” 1: 43, 148, and the historical work of Shaul Ginzburg, vol. 3.)

It is also appropriate to mention the shameful and tragic epoch of the Cantonists [young boys kidnapped for military duty] and their kidnappers in the days of Nicholas I. Small children were horribly torn

[Page 224]

from their Jewish homes and were sent to distant Russian gubernias and oblasts so that they would apostasize in the hands of their Russian overseers and “instructors.” In the Jewish literature of the prior century, much was written about that terrible time for Russian Jewry–in Russian, Hebrew, and Yiddish. The author Yehuda Shteynberg described that terrible time in his work “Bayamim ha-Heym” [“In those Days”]. Shaul Ginzburg and others also wrote about those times.

It is now not a secret to anyone that in the so-called Russification education epoch of Russian Jewry in the reign of Nicholas I, many Jews collaborated, and the greatest kidnappers of the poor little Jewish children were from among our brothers, the Children of Israel, supported by the kahal's ringleaders and power brokers of that time.

But the great rabbis of that time strongly protested against the terrible deeds of the “kahal traitors” who helped the czarist government in “recruiting” and “instructing,” although they often put their lives in danger at the hands of those who served Nicholas.

The protest of R` Tevele Minsker against the kidnappers of Jewish children is well known. He cried out in shul, “Anyone who kidnaps someone and sells him or holds him captive should be put to death” [citing Exodus 21:16]. And there is a legend that right after he said this, two of the kidnappers fell dead in the shul courtyard.

It also happened that a great Lithuanian scholar from that sad time (R` Eliezer Lieder, I think) opposed a certain powerful man who had ordered the sexton to expel from shul a woman whose only son

[Page 225]

had been taken, because she was protesting tis terrible injustice. That rabbi shouted, “Murderer! You recall the passage, ‘You may take the young but let the mother go’ [Deuteronomy 22:7].” Then he grabbed an axe and ran to the house where the innocent children were being held, broke down the door, and freed the children.

Such strength of authority belonged to each rabbi because the whole people stood behind them. They worked to save the poor masses and they sanctified God's name when they had to rescue Jewish souls from the Jewish and non-Jewish robbers and thieves. Seldom would they support the strong and wealthy when those people opposed the interests of the poor and the oppressed. And such great spiritual leaders were also in the city of Grodno, or Horodno, as it was known among Jews.

It would be my wish to provide extensive descriptions of all the rabbis of Grodno since Jews settled there. Unfortunately I lack all the materials necessary for that purpose. In particular I lack questions-and-responses of certain rabbis and religious rulings from the 16^th century that would illuminate that era. I rely mostly on my memory and on partial encyclopedic data.

I will only try to glance at the great rabbi who occupied the rabbinical chair for many years

[Page 226]

in Grodno. And I will take the opportunity to emphasize that it used to happen in our old home that even smaller cities had rabbis famous for their Torah and their wisdom, just like much larger cities. In fact, it seems that the rabbis would make the cities great through their Torah rather than the cities making the rabbis great. The Warsaw rabbinate, for example, was not as important as that of Vilna or Kovno. And Bialystok was more famous as a center of Torah than the more populous Odesa because its prominent great rabbis, like R` Chaim-Ozer Grodziensky, R` Yitzchak Elkhanan, and R` Shmuel Mohilever, z”l, brought glory to the aforementioned cities. It often happened that the rabbinical chair in larger cities was offered to rabbis from smaller cities; but those rabbis refused to leave their cities, although the larger kehillahs would offer much higher and more significant salaries than the smaller cities. R` Eliyahu-Chaim Mayzel from Lodz, R` Chaim Soloveitchik from Brisk, R` Shmuel Mohilever from Bialystok, R` Chaim-Ozer Grodziensky from Vilna, and others remained where they were, and their rabbinates made their towns famous.

We find many large cities, especially in present-day Lithuania, that had no “official rabbis.” Their religious representatives, or spiritual leaders, bore the title Av Beis-Din [Head of the Rabbinical Court], Moyre Hoyro'e [someone able to make rabbinical decisions], Rosh ha-Dayanim [Head of the Judges], Gadol, or Teacher of Righteousness, but not rabbi. So it was in Minsk. The highest religious representative there was known as the Gadol [Great One]. The reverence for deceased rabbis was so great that that candidates were afraid to take their places, lest they somehow modify a ruling by the earlier rabbi or somehow make a

[Page 227]

ruling that did not agree with the thought pattern of their predecessor.

The subject of upholding or rebelling for new rabbis replacing the departed G'dolim was, as the Talmudic regulation shows: “A rabbinical court cannot nullify the words of another rabbinical court unless it exceeds that court in wisdom and number” (Megillah 2). The rabbis who respected this statement would prefer not to take the rabbinical positions. But there were rabbis of great authority who said, “We feel stronger than the departed, and we replace them.” Such a case happened in my birth city of Amdur after the death of the great rabbi R` Issar, when my great-grandfather R` Avraham-Ezra said, “I take the position upon myself because I feel strong enough to continue the rabbinate of my great predecessor.”

But in most such cases the cities would remain without official rabbis, and all the larger and important religious questions and problems would be answered by the scholars, judges, and other Talmudic authorities. It is understood that these so-called replacements, the rabbinic substitutes, were always great scholars, and their deep knowledge of the sea of Talmud resounded in Jewish circles.

The first thing that was demanded of a rabbi in a large city or kehillah was Talmudic knowledge and scholarship. No one cared if the candidate knew the local vernacular, and it was often not considered a virtue if the candidate was proficient in the Russian

[Page 228]

or Polish language. It is known that R` Yitzchak Elkhanan and R` Chaim Soloveitchik, z”l, did not understand and could not speak a word of the local language. The same was true of R` Shmuel Mohilever.

In the last years of the previous century, a “gathering of rabbis” was called in Warsaw, and among other vital problems that interested the Russian and Polish rabbis, the question arose of whether some facility in the vernacular should be required of the relevant rabbis. Many young rabbis argued that the religious representatives must know the official language of the country. R` Chaim Soloveitchik arose and said, sarcastically, “Who cares what a rabbi must and should know? Why should he know how to learn if he can't learn?…Naturally the suggestion by the young rabbis was unsuccessful at that rabbinical assembly and things went on as usual in Russian Jewry.

But do understand that there were exceptions, especially in the first decades of the current century. So we find R` Rubinshteyn, z”l who knew Russian, Polish, German, and French in addition to his great knowledge of Talmud and commentaries. We should also remember R` Y.L. Tzirelzon, a”h, who was a senator in the Romanian parliament and was fluent in Russian and Romanian.

We should also remember the case of R` Rubinshteyn, who was a candidate for the position of general rabbi in Vilna, under Polish rule. His secular knowledge qualified him for that post, according to the rules of Pilsudski's regime. But his learning was weak according to his

[Page 229]

great adversary R` Chaim-Ozer Grodziensky, and the Vilna kehillah sided with the latter because he was the great scholar, the “master of the Torah.”

I will now offer some statistics about the number of Grodno Jews at different times. The city itself was founded in the eleventh century, and Jews were found there already in the fourteenth century. A hundred years later, the Jews were expelled, as decreed by Alexander Jagiellon, Grand Duke of Lithuania. A hundred years later there were restrictions on Jewish rights. In 1547, the Jews of Grodno received permission to hire a rabbi. The situation of the Jews changed according to the assumption of the throne by this or that Grand Duke and according to the temperament or the craziness of each ruler.

In 1560 there were 60 Jewish families in Grodno among 543 households. The Jews at that time lived on the Jewish street, with a shul and with their own hospital on Peblanski Street.^[b]

In the sixteenth century, Grodno had as its rabbi the great and well-known scholar R` Mordechai Yoffe, the author of “Levushim” [also called “Levush Malchus,” “Robe of Royalty”], who built the great, beautiful shul that bore his name until the last years of the previous century. On the wall of the shul was inscribed, “This second bayit [Temple] in miniature was established and built by the scholar of the Levush” (1578).”

[Page 230]

In 1790 there was an accusation of ritual murder in Grodno, propagated by the Jesuits. On the second day of Shavuos of that year, R` Eliezer son of Shlomo from Werbolov was executed, his body quartered under the sign of the cross.

In 1795, Amdur came under Russian control; 2,000 Jews lived there then. At that time, Grodno was nearly a Jewish city. In 1816 there were already 8,422 Jews and 2,451 non-Jews. In 1907, Grodno had a general population of 46,871, of whom 25,000 were Jews.

The first rabbi who is known from Grodno was R` Nosson Spira Ashkenazi. Nothing is known about his activities. The only thing we know is that he was the author of the book “Mavo She'arim” [“Introduction to the Gates”]–a commentary on the work “Sha'arei Duma” [“The Gates of Duma”] by the religious authority R` Yitzchak of Dura, who lived 600 years earlier. People also ascribe to him the book “B'urei Rashi” [“The Wells of Rashi”], but that is not confirmed. According to the book “Beer Sheva”–mentioned in “The Name of the Great Ones” by R` Chaim Yosef Asulai, the author of “B'urei Rashi” was a different authority. R` Nosson Spira Ashkenazi died in 5337–1577. People saw that the Krakow rabbi and mystic, author of “Megillah Amukos” [“Scroll of Secrets”] was the grandson of R` Nosson Spira and had the same name.

The second known rabbi in Grodno was the aforementioned authority R` Menachem Yaffe, known in the world of commentaries as the “Baal ha-Levush.”

His birthdate is not known for sure, but according to conjecture, he was born in 1530 in Prague. He died in Pozen

[Page 231]

on 3 Adar 1612, which means he lived a long life, to age 82. Aside from his deep learning in Talmud and commentaries, he was a great student of philosophy, mathematics, and astronomy. He was also interested in Kabbalah. According to what he himself wrote in the introduction to his book “Ohr Yeharos,” his teachers were Rashal and Rama (abbreviations of R` Shlomo Luria and R` Moshe Isserles), the two greatest authorities in Polish Jewry in the sixteenth century, and R` Matisyahu son of R` Shlomo Delkrut (the first two in Talmud and commentaries and the third in Kabbalah).

We find R. Mordechai Yaffe as head of the Prague yeshiva even when he was young. In 1561 he left Prague, along with all the Jews, because of the “expulsions from Prague” ordered by King Ferdinand of Bohemia. He stayed for a long time in Venice (Italy). It appears that he studied mysticism with the mystic Delkrut.

There is also an opinion that the Levush” must have been the founder of the “Council of the Four Lands” that included Greater Poland (Pozen), Lesser Poland (Krakow), and Ukraine or Russia (Lemberg), and later Lithuania. This theory is held by Prof. Graetz and other Jewish historians, but Shaul-Pinchas Rabinovitsh, translator into Hebrew of Graetz's German work “The History of the Jews,” does not agree. Eliyahu Harkavy in his great work called “Sacred and Ancient”, published as an addendum to the Hebrew text of Shaul-Pinchas Rabinovitsh, also agrees with him, basing himself on extracts from the town records of the “Council of the Three Lands,” the “Council of the Four Lands,” and the “Council of Lithuania.” But one thing is certain, that Levush was one of the strongest tone setters in the “Council of the Lands,” and his word was authoritative. And so

[Page 232]

we find in the book “Netivos Olam” by the Maharal of Prague–about whom was created the legend of the Golem–an excommunication decree signed by the Levush against the people who defamed the honor of a certain illustrious family of that time. And in the annals of Poznan we find translated into Yiddish an appeal that was made at the Yaroslav fair, in 1640, a confirmation of a rule from fifty years earlier in the city of Lublin–the site of the “Council of the Four Lands”–and on which the first signature is that of R` Mordechai Yaffe. This rule, or proclamation, is related to the prohibition for the kehillah to obtain a rabbi through bribery. The rabbis of that time forbade activity through curses and excommunications. It appears that at that time, it was common to get a rabbinical position by giving a “gift” to the head of the kahal, which dishonored the institution of the rabbinate. This makes understandable the excommunication and the tone of its contents.

The Baal ha-Levushim. As I said, R` Mordechai Yaffe is designated in the commentary literature by the title Baal ha-Levushim. The name is based on the verses from the Megillah of Esther (8:15-16): “And Mordechai left the king's presence in royal robes of blue and white, and a great golden crown, and a mantel of linen and purple wool. And city of Shushan rang with shouting and joy. The Jews had light and joy and happiness and honor.” His name was Mordechai and he called his book “The Clothing of the King,” divided into ten smaller books, branches, or divisions with the following names:

1. “Blue Robe” in which he considers all the laws of the “Tur” and the “Shulchan Aruch” up to the laws about Shabbos, following the order of the earlier decisors;

2. “White Robe” contains all the laws about Shabbos;
3. “Golden Crown”–all the laws of the Yoreh De'ah: kosher and non-kosher, meat and dairy, mixtures, and so on;
4. “Linen and Purple Wool” on the laws of family life that are found in “Shulchan Aruch Even ha-Ezer”
5. “City of Shushan”–on all the laws of jurisprudence, according to the “Choshen Mishpat”;
6. “Light”–a supercommentary on Rashi and other commentators on the Torah;
7. “Joy and Gladness”–sermons for the High Holidays, weddings, and brises;
8. “Precious Light”–divided into smaller sections under the headings “Expensive Clothing” based on Rambam's “Guide for the Perplexed”;
9. “Precious Treasure” on astronomy;
10. “Precious Stone” on Kabbalah;

R. Mordechai Yaffe had long considered condensing and codifying all of the rules and halachos that are found in the sea of Talmud in an unsystematic fashion. The first person who tried to do so was R` Yitzchak Alfasi from the city of Fez (Africa), who reduced the Talmud to its halachic sections and the laws that were still operative after the destruction of the Temple, omitting those that were in force before the destruction. His work was called, in rabbinic literature, the “Alfasi” or the “Rif”–from the initials of R` Yitzchak Fas (born 1013, died 1103).

More daring in this effort was R` Moshe ben Maimon–the Rambam (1135-1205)–who wrote the great and huge “Mishneh Torah” or “Strong Hand”; it is divided into fourteen volumes [and called the “Strong Hand” because the numerical value of the Hebrew word for “hand” is fourteen]. In this work he includes all the laws and halachos from the Babylonian and Jerusalem Talmuds and the responses of earlier authorities. All of the Rambam's books were written in Arabic with the exception of the “Mishneh Torah”, which was written in Hebrew, which is the basis of its popularity among all classes of students. If this book, Heaven forfend, had been written in Arabic and had to be translated into Hebrew by the ibn Tibbons or Alharizi [who had translated Rambam's Arabic works], it would not have achieved its popularity in the scholarly world and would have been reserved for particular individuals, like “The Guide for the Perplexed” and other books of the Middle Ages.

The great authority R` Mordechai ben R` Hillel Ashkenazi wrote the “Sefer Mordechai” based on the halachos of Alfasi, including all the laws of the Gemara, Rashi, and Tosafos. He lived in the thirteenth century. He was born in Austria and died as a martyr along with his wife and children in the abominable city of Nuremberg on Erev Shabbos in the month of Av, 1293.

That date is not certain, because some Jewish historians believe that he was killed fifty years earlier.

The same path was taken by R` Asher ben R` Yechiel. Abbreviated as the “Rosh”. He was born in Germany

[Page 235]

in 1250 and died in Toledo in 1328. The “Shortened Talmud” by the Rosh is united with the Talmud text in the large editions. The Rif, Rambam, and Rosh are considered the greatest of the codifiers and are called “the three pillars of instruction.”

Another colossal work in the same area was written by the great authority by R` Yakov ben R` Asher, the son of the Rosh, under the title “Turim” [“Rows”]. This work is divided into four large books, called: Tur Oreach Chaim, Tur Yorah De'ah, Tur Even ha-Ezer, and Tur Choshen Mishpat. They contain all the laws in the Babylonian and Jerusalem Talmuds, authoritative commentaries, and the halachos of his father, the Rosh. The Tur is considered the greatest decisor in the rabbinic world. He also wrote a commentary on the Torah called “Baal ha-Turim, which is printed in an abbreviated form in all large versions of the Chumash. R` Yakov Baal ha-Turim was born in Germany and died in Toledo in 1340. The year of his birth is not known, and the date of his death is not firmly established. It is only known that in 1305 he left Germany for Spain together with his father the Rosh, z”l. On his tombstone is engraved the Torah portion and the month of his death, but not the year.

After the Baal ha-Turim came the colossal decisor R` Yosef Caro, whose great work was the “Shulchan Aruch” [“The Prepared Table”], a digest of all the laws that were selected by his predecessor R` Yakov Baal ha-Turim and from his own other work, the “Beis Yosef.”

The author of this latter and of the Shulchan Aruch is considered the last great decisor among the

[Page 236]

Rishonim [the earlier rabbinical authorities] and among the greatest rabbinical authorities in the area of Jewish law, especially among Sephardic Jews.

R` Moshe Isserles, abbreviated as Rama, made a shorter version of his book “Darchei Moshe” [“The Ways of Moses”] and added to the Shulchan Aruch the laws that he “Beis Yakov” had omitted.

In the world of commentaries, this author is called “The Tablecloth”, because he covered the table of his contemporary [that is, of the author of “The Prepared Table”].

R` Yosef Caro was born in Spain in 5248 according to the Jewish reckoning and died in Tzfat in Eretz Yisroel in 5335 according to the numbering system since the creation of the world, or in 1574 according to the Christian calendar.

The Rama was born in Krakow in 1520 and di8ed in 1572. The former lived 72 years and the latter 52. Also, the birth and death dates of the latter are unclear, as some mention that he died earlier. A legend says that he died when he was 33–on Lag b'Omer in the year 5733, on which day, they say, that it snowed in Krakow..[This passage depends on the fact that the numerical value of the Hebrew letters in “Lag” is 33 and that the letters that comprise the year 5733 are the same as the letters in the Hebrew word for “snow.”]. This is, of course, nothing more than a legend, because it would be unnatural for snow to fall in Krakow on the 18th day of Iyar, the date of Lag b'Omer.

It Is appropriate to recall that the great authority R` David Segal, author of the “Turei Zahav” (abbreviated as “Taz”), a commentary on all four parts of the Tur and the Shulchan Aruch, writes about the “Orach Chayim” that the Rama died on Lag b'Omer in 5333. But he derives this, naturally, from the combination of the numbers 33.

I will here remark that with the aforementioned decisors

[Page 237]

I have not exhausted the number of authors of halachic commentaries that were written both before and after that time, especially the authorities of the Tosafos, but the purpose of this work is not to provide a history of the decisors nor a study of their works.

R` Mordechai Yaffe knew all the authors of the halachic codes, and he was not pleased with some of them. He therefore planned to write a book on the same subject in order to complete what his predecessors had left undone. Finding himself in Italy, he learned that Yosef Caro, the author of “Beis Yosef,” chose to publish his book “B'rurei ha-Poskim” or “Shulchan Aruch” according to the performance of his “Beis Yosef,” and R` Mordechai abandoned the idea of writing his own work. In the meantime, the Shulchan Aruch was published and R` Menachem discovered that it was not complete because of its condensed form and for not explaining the themes and motivations for all of its listed laws, so he sat down again to write his projected book in which he would provide all the laws from the sages of Ashkenaz. (The author of Beis Yosef was Sephardic and therefore arranged his work according to the laws and customs of the Sephardim.). He knew, however, that his rabbi, R` Moshe Isserles, the aforementioned Rama, already did this work in relation to haacha, so he began to write his work, “Levush Penat Yakeret” on the Rambam's Guide for the Perplexed. He finished in the month of Av in 1588 and published it for the first time six years later in 1594, along with other books.

But when he received the Shulchan Aruch of Yosef Caro, published along with the “Tablecloth” of Rama, he decided to write his great work under the name “Levushim, which was a kind of middle

[Page 238]

between the long “Beis Yosef” and its shortened form, the Shulchan Aruch. Of his Levush, only five sections were published: The Blue Robe, the White Robe (on the laws of Orach Chaim), the Golden Crown (on Yoreh De'ah), Linen and Purple Wool (on Even ha-Ezer), and City of Shushan (on the Choshen Mishpat). It is appropriate to take this opportunity to remember that the great scholar R` Yom-Tov Lipman Hellerr, the author of that great book “Tosafos Yom-Tov” on the Mishnayos (born in Wallerstein in 5339-1579 and died in Krakow in 5414-1654) wrote a criticism of the Levush entitled “The Clothing of Yom-Tov.”

R` Mordechai wrote in his introduction to the first five sections of the “Levush”: he wanted to work after the “Tur” was published because he thought that for the great authority R` Yakov Baal ha-Turim it was a summary of the laws, but for us it is still too long, so that he, R` Mordechai, wanted to write a shorter work. But R` Yosef Caro did so first. But the Shulchan Aruch did not please him, because he had made it too short, making it like a closed book or a dream without an interpretation, as though everything was a law from Mt. Sinai, without any explanation.

About the book of his rabbi, the Rama, he wrote: “Their ways are not mine. They wrote their words without charm; they prepared a table laden with food, well-seasoned, but without salt, because a law without reason is like something cooked without salt.”

The Levush uses very clear and precise language.

[Page 239]

His interpretation of the laws is full of sound logic. He was opposed to pilpul [Talmudic hairsplitting] that “cripples thought.” To the contrary, he was a person of clear intelligence, strongly systematic in his learning and writing.

However, the “Levush” was not taken up in the world of rabbis and commentaries. The true authorities in the matter of “halachic commentaries” remained for Jews throughout the word the “Tur” and the “Shulchan Aruch.”

But much depends on luck, even in matters of Torah. Many Jewish historians deal with the question of why the Baal ha-Levush did not merit having his halachic commentary accepted by the rabbinical world even though as a decisor he was clearer and more precise than his predecessors, keeping in mind that he gave the source for every law and the purpose of each mitzvah according to the Talmud and the authorities. He himself writes in the second introduction to his books The Blue Robe, The White Robe, and The Robe of Light about the laws of Orach Chaim that a certain wise man named R` Yosef Kalban brought his own book, written in the same spirit as the “Levush” and written from the same motive, because the “Shulchan Aruch” of Yosef Caro is too short and lacking in appeal. And after the two of them discussed their books, R` Yosef Kalban acknowledged that the “Levush” was more important and systematic than his own was, and he therefore decided to abstain from his work. But so that his efforts should not be wasted, he proposed that in his book the Levush should cite the laws that he had discovered and that the Levush had overlooked. The latter accepted the suggestion. (See volume 3 of “Toldos ha-Poskim” by the young rabbi Chaim Czernovitz, p. 110.)

The Baal ha-Levush was also the rabbi in Pozen, Lublin, and Kremenitz. But we will focus only on is work regarding the situation in Grodno. In 5732 (1572) [The Hebrew date in the text is obviously a misprint for 5332.] he was hired as the city rabbi in place of R` Nosson Shapiro Ashkenazi, but because of the conflict between him and the head of the yeshiva, R` Moshe (the brother of R` Shlomo Ephraim of Luntschitz, the author of “Kol Yakar” on. The Chumash and of “Olelos Ephraim” and also the rabbi in Prague along with the “Shelah haKodesh” [another rabbi in Prague]), he left Grodno. In 1588 he was hired as the rabbi in Lublin, which was then the center of the Council of the Three Lands and was considered the location of the greatest rabbis and scholars. Through the influence of the Levush, the “Council of Lithuania” was included in the Council of the Four Lands.

R` Mordechai Yaffe devoted himself heart and soul to matters of religion and kehillah life. Two days before his death, he wrote a response to the Council of the Four Lands, concluding with these words: “I lie now in my sickbed–it shouldn't happen to you–and I await the decree of the King of all Kings, and I write with trembling hands.” Because of his condition, his writing is illegible, and two witnesses confirm his signature.

On his broken tombstone in Pozen one can barely read the writing. (Who knows if the tombstone is even still there after the way the filthy hands of the unclean Nazis defiled the graves of our martyrs?). “This is the grave of the great scholar, Head of the Beis Din, our teacher Mordechai Yaffe, z”l. 3 Adar 5372.” (See

[Page 241]

“Toldos ha-Poskim” by Shimon-Moshe Hannes, p. 136, published recently in New York.)

All the legends that were created among the people about great personalities almost always cast a light on the importance or greatness of those major figures. The Jews of Grodno have unearthed or created many legends about R` Mordechai Yaffe. Here are some of them:

1. Why the name Levush? Old Grodno scholars used to tell this legend between minchah and maariv. The Levush was a distinguished person, as if the Shekhinah rested upon him. A certain Lithuanian princess loved him for his attractive appearance. She once invited him to her to discuss with him the improvement of the situation of the Jewish inhabitants of Grodno and its surroundings. But when he arrived, she revealed her ugly, abhorrent plan; and when the Levush understandably rejected her immoral suggestion, she had him confined in her castle, hoping thereby to convince him to give in to her desires. The great Tzadik, finding himself in such a terrible situation, decided to forfeit his life and uphold the commandment that it is better to die than to submit in such a dreadful case, so he threw himself into the filthy pit of the toilet. He hid there at night, and he emerged, understandably, covered with filth. On the next night, it was revealed to him in a dream: “You have shown your righteousness and reverence for the Holy Name by letting your body become filthy. Therefore you will write a book called “Levush”–clothing. Immediately thereafter he began to write the book “The Ten Garments” and he was given the name Baal ha-Levush.
2. We mentioned earlier the great shul that R`Mordechai Yaffe had built in Grodno. This legend is told about it. In the sixteenth century, when the Levush officiated in Grodno, the Jesuits ran rampant in Lithuania and arranged that no shul building could be taller than the churches. R` Mordechai also had a talent for architecture. He was also not a stranger to secular knowledge and other languages–so he built that shul, so that its towers, or its pinnacle, could be higher than any other building in the city, as is the rule for the building of a synagogue. Although Grodno had many churches at that time, he planned it so that the eastern wall would not abut a church. And truly, those who remember the building of that historic shul will recall that the eastern wall was built with many angles and deviations, which shows clearly that the person in charge had the clear intention of giving it that form that we recall.

[Page 243]

given you strength to live many years.” The legend goes on to say that the butcher lived to over a hundred thanks to the blessing of that great Tzadik, the Baal ha-Levushim…

The Levush's shul burned in 1599, but it was quickly rebuilt in its original style. Once, when I was very young, I saw the shul and I was greatly influenced by the holiness of that legendary building. In 1895 I left Grodno, which then belonged to Russia, and several years later, when I was already in Argentina, news came that the building had been destroyed by fire. My father, z”l, groaned and said only, “Oy, the Levush's shul,” and he was as if in mourning. In his groan I felt something of a prophecy, as if the destruction of the Levush's shul meant the destruction of the Jewish spirit of Grodno, which past rabbis used to call “God's mountain.”

Let me repeat: Almost always it was the rabbis who made a city great through their Torah–the city did not make the rabbis great. The Levush, in relation to Grodno, confirms this. When Jewish scholars speak of Krakow, Prague, Pozen, Lublin, Vilna, Brisk, Kherson, and others, they remember where they produced effects: the Bach (R` Yoel Sirkis), the Maharsha (R` Shmuel-Eliezer Eidels), the Rama (R` Moshe Isserles), the Maharal (Yehuda Lowe ben R` Bezalel), the Maharshal (R` Shlomo Luria), the Maharam (R` Meir of Lublin), the Shelah–the “Two Tablets of the Law” (R` Yeshaya Hurvitz), the Tevuos Shor (R` Ephraim Zalman Shor), Siftei Cohen, the Shach (R` Shabtain Cohen), the Turei Zahav (R` David ha-Levi Segal), the Vilna Gaon (who was not a rabbi), the Malbim (R` Meir Leibush ben Yechiel-Michel, and many others. In earlier times

[Page 244]

the importance of each city was tied to its rabbi, or luminary, who served there. Our forebears would have understood nothing else. This opportunity reminds me of the anecdote that Lithuanian Jews used to tell about R` Eizele Kharif, the Slonimer rabbi, in relation to the rabbis: in a city there was a dispute between the local rabbi and the balabatim, who alleged that, in their opinion, the rabbi was not learned enough. When that dispute came to R` Eizele and he decided that the argument of the balabatim was justified, he said to the rabbi, “You are a fine Jew, but how can you live in a city where there is no rabbi?”

The rabbi, therefore, gave luster and greatness to his city. But he had to have the required characteristics. When people think of the city of Grodno, the names of its great rabbis come to mind, those who exercised their influence. From the Middle Ages until the Third Destruction of our people. And in first place is R` Mordechai Yaffe, the Baal ha-Levush.

Original footnotes:

1. We include in Yedidiah Efron's book of memoirs his work “Great Rabbis of Grodno” because, first of all, the city of Grodno was nearby (21 viorsts) and closely bound to Amdur, and second, because we do not want to omit this posthumous work. Return
2. See Eisenshteyn's “Otzer Hisroel,” vol. 4, p. 119. Return

[Page 245]

The historian and philologist Dr. Yitzchak Rivkind, z”l, (who lived in New York), was a descendant of Amdurers. We provide here, as an afterward, a fragment of his essay (published in 1937) about the history of that town that can serve as a complement to Yedidiah Efron's memoirs.

Although I was not born in Amdur but was, so to speak, an “honorary” Amdurer–I received my Russian passport there–so I always felt a closeness and comfort with the birthplace of my father, of his parents, and of his grandparents.

Amdur was a Jewish town with a historical past of several hundred years, from the sixteenth century. Exactly when Jews began to settle in Amdur and when the Jewish settlement began–is not exactly known. But there is already a document from 1539 regarding claims against Amdur Jews.^[a]

Therefore one of my chief duties remains to maintain and rescue all that remains

[Page 246]

of the past, everything that has not yet disappeared or been destroyed through wars and fires, as happened in the recent World War and mostly in the great fire of 1882, when the town and its antiquities, like the old shul, old records and books went up in flames.

After the great fire, one of our relatives, R` Eliezer Bregman, stood by his birthplace, Amdur, when it was in need and rebuilt the necessary city institutions, which cost him the sum of 10,000 rubles,^[b] if not more, which was, in those days, a considerable sum.

I myself had the following experience. Some years ago I requested people to photograph the gravestone of my great-grandfather R` Issar (born around 1800 and died there sixty-nine years later on Hoshanah Rabba, 5629). He was the religious judge there for his whole life. They could only decipher part of the tombstone that was legible. The rest was not. What can one expect from tombstones that are a couple of hundred years old–who knows if there is even a memory of them? And under those tombstones lie buried not only people but whole worlds. The tombstones are history.

Although Amdur is, as I said, an historic Jewish town, little has been written about it. Aside from a few lines in the Jewish Encyclopedia,^[c] it has merited no great work, let alone a monograph. Almost nothing.

[Page 247]

Amdur played a role in Jewish autonomy and played an eminent role in the Sejm in Lithuania and White Russia (“Council of the Four Lands”). The 37^th session of the Sejm, in the winter of 1720, was held in Amdur, and a number of important statutes and decisions were made at the meeting.^[d]

The Amdur rabbinical chair was preeminent and highly regarded. The Amdur rabbinate was not only for the city, locally, but for the whole district, all around. Thus, people used to say, “Amdur and the Grodno area.”

[Page 248]

Already the city rabbi, R` David the son of R` Yisroel, emphasizes the attachment of other kehillahs to Amdur.^[e] We have already mentioned R` Shmuel. He was called R` Shmuel, rabbi of the district. He was the rabbi in Amdur from (?) until about 1765,^[f] after which he went to Minsk. He died on 17 Iyar 5537 (1777). R` Shmuel was one of the greatest rabbis in the time of the Vilna Gaon, who thought highly of him. Having seen his writings, the Vilna Gaon said, “Among rabbinic arguments, his are very spicy”

R`Shmuel left many writings, but sadly they have disappeared over time or been lost. Some were stolen. (Once there was no lack of such things.) Only 80-90 years later did his grandchildren publish a small portion of his Torah insights and rabbinical responses in the book “Responses of Shmuel” (Vilna, 5619) and “Insights of Shmuel” (Vilna, 5627).

He was also the great-grandfather of a famous descendant, the great Yiddish writer and editor Avraham Liessen. After him, until 1769, the rabbi of Amdur was a certain R` Tuviah.^[g] It appears that other kehillahs liked to lure away the Amdur

[Page 249]

Rabbis, so that just as R` Shmuel was taken by Minsk, so R` Tuvalu went to Tiktin.

I do not think it necessary to point out that I am not describing all of Amdur's rabbis. I only wanted to recall a few of them and show their greatness in the Jewish world and their influences on Jewish life. Who the Amdur rabbis were before R` David and after R` Tuviah–at this moment, I do not know.

However, when I was a child, I heard from my father, a”h, various storis about R` Avraham-Ezra. In his time, my great-grandfather, R` Issar, was the rabbinical judge in Amdur; so various memories remain in the family. My [great] grandfather took no wages for his judgments. He only filled his head with questions, even more than the rabbi did. One time, he complained, “He (R` Avraham-Ezra) gets the salary and I get all the questions.”

My father also used to recall R` Avraham-Ezra's son, R` Avigdor-Mordechai. About him I have recently found certain details. And since he was possibly the most productive Amdur author, it is only right to recall him in a bit more detail. R` Avigdor-Mordechai was born around 1840.^[h] At the age of 23, he was already the rabbi in Grayeva and also the author of a book, but from his younger years on he was afflicted with heart disease. His illness, it seems led him to abandon the rabbinate and return to Amdur, where he felt at home, among his own people, as one can see int he following title

[Page 250]

and expression: “With my people I dwell in the city of Amdur.” This is found on the title page of his book “The Thanksgiving Offering.”

Ill, lying in bed, he would write Torah insights and prepared his books for publication. And so every year or two, he would issue a new book.^[i] Aside from Grava, he later held two rabbinic positions, first in Ostrin and then in Volp, where tuberculosis consumed him and he left the world, still a young man of about 40.

Among the later rabbis, one should recall Rabbi Reuven Katz, author of “The Flag of Reuven.” He went from Amdur to America (where he served as a rabbi for some years) and then went to the first and oldest Jewish colony in Eretz Yisroel, Petach Tikvah.

And this is the golden chain of Amdur rabbis. But not only in the rabbinic world did Amdur have an honored position. It was destined to play an important role in the history of Lithuanian Chasidism and in the bitter war between Misnagdim and Chasidim.

R` Chaim Heikel settled in Amdur, a student of R` Dov Ber, the Mezritsh Magid, and of Aaron

[Page 251]

of Karlin. R` Chaim Heikel was famous in 1772-1787 as the Amdur Tzadik and a Chasidic rabbi, to whom Chasidim flocked from every corner of Lithuania. Against him and his court were aimed the sharpest arrows of the Misnagdim. He was the target of much Chasidic literature.^[j]

When the battle between Misnagdim and Chasidim again broke out, at the great fair in Zelva in 1781 (Rosh Chodesh Elul 5541), an excommunication was declared against the Chasidim and they were particularly forbidden to travel to the Amdur Tzadik: “And so on one should travel from our kehillah to a place where there is a sect of Chasidim, may their names be blotted out, the accursed and disgusting, in order to join with the unclean ones, and in particular no one should change in Amdur a single thing that we have decreed.”^[k]

How bitter and sharp the war between Misnagdim and Chasidim became can be seen in the fact that in certain Amdur families–my father used to tell, though sadly I have forgotten the details and the names–if anyone joined the Chasidim, people would sit shiva as if for the deceased or for someone who left the community of

[Page 252]

Jews.

Such a thing was fully in the spirit of excommunication, which demanded and justified such a thing.

On 23 Adar 5547, R` Chaim Heikel died in Amdur. One of his two sons remained in Amdur, R` Shmuel, whom the Misnagdim also did not treat gently.^[l]

It took a hundred years until his grandchildren published his remaining writings with the title “Life and Kindness” in Warsaw in 1891.

We already find in that book testimonials not only from Chasidic rabbis but also from Misnagdic rabbis, who are not stingy with praise for the Amdur Tzadik. Thus did time make peace between the bitter enemies and combative opponents.

Original footnotes:

1. Registration and Inscriptions 1, no. 3, 278. Return
2. See the correspondence in “Ha-Melitz,” 1883, p. 685, and in “Ha-Tzefirah,” 1884, p. 291. The latter was written by Avraham, the son of the great rabbi Yitzchak Eizik Bachrach. Return
3. See in the “Jewish-Russian Encyclopedia,” vol VIII, p. 172 [page 247, bottom], the German encyclopedia “Judaica,” vol. VIII, p. 414, and “Eshkol,” Israeli Encyclopedia, vol. 2, p. 827. Unfortunately not mentioned in all bibliographies of these encyclopedias is the important article about Amdur written under the initials YBYAKh (Yehuda ben Yitzchak Bachrach, father of Mara Zak–ws,), “History of the Amdur Kehillah,” in “Ha-Tzefirah” in the seminar library. I first received it when my article was already prepared for publication, so I could not use its facts and details. Return
4. See Dubnow, “Record of the State,” Berlin, 5685, pp. 243-248; Yisroel Halprin, “Additions to the “Records of the State of Lithuania,” Lithuania, 5695, pp. 50-55, 88. Certain Amdur statutes are missing . Lacking in both of these sources is a statute from 6 Shevat on which the then Amdur rabbi, R` David ben R` Yisroel, is the first signer. Compare: “Knowledge of the Martyrs,” Petersburg, 5657, 58, p. 12. Also to be noted is a recommendation from 4 and 7 Shevat 5480:: “Here the holy kehillah of Amdur at the assembly of the Holy Land, may it be rebuilt” in the “Pesach Haggadah with the Avodas ha-Gefen Commentary,” published in Offenbach, 1722–5482 (Sh. Wiener's list, no. 62). Return
5. In a recommendation that he wrote on 17 Elul 5488 (1728) for the book “Words of the Covenant” by R` Avraham Tzvi Hirsch son of R Meir, published in Zolkov in 5489, he signs himself, “The words of David–he is the holy rabbi, light of the exile, rabbi of rabbis in Yisroel, his light is fixed in Amdur and nearby communities.” Return
6. His responses to inquiries that he wrote in Amdur are from 5515, 5521, and 5522. His signature from 5524 can be found in the Minsk record book. Return
7. “Da'as Kedoshim,” 7, 35. Return
8. On the title page of his book “Beautiful Fruit” (see the following note), he describes himself as a twenty-eight year old. Return
9. Right now I know of the following books:
   1. “Grapes of the Vine,” a commentary on the Five Megillas, Leek [?], 5623 [1863];
   2. “Branches of the Fig Tree,” a commentary on the Pesach Haggadah, Leipzig 5624 [1864];
   3. “Thanksgiving Offering,” part of a larger work on the Talmud, Vilna, 5625 [1865]
   4. “Beautiful Fruit,” on the Shulchan Aruch), Vilna, 5628 [1867];
   5. “The Torch of Avigdor” (on the Oreach Chaim), Vilna, 5631 [1870].
   He published the last two books while he was the rabbi of Ostrin. Return
10. Shimon Dubnow: “History of Chasidism,” vol 1, p. 212 and esp. 252-260. Dubnow mentions in passing on p 259, “from documents from the Andur record book that I have.” Return
11. A.Tz. Tzvifel, “Peace on Israel,” Zhitomir, 1869, part 2, p. 32; Dubnoe, op. Viy., p. 241. In Ha-Tzefirah 1888, supplement to no. 13, the prohibition is brought from another written source, in a milder tone and in a clearer style. “No one from all the cities of this area, under threat of discipline, should go where there is a Chasidic sect to befriend them, and especially to the holy kehillah of Amdur.” Return
12. Tzveifel, op. Cit., p. 48. Return

  Indura, Belarus     Yizkor Book Project     JewishGen Home Page

Copyright © 1999-2026 by JewishGen, Inc.
Updated 23 Jul 2026 by JH