Auction 47
Lot 132:
Letter written entirely by hand and signed by Rabbi Zalman Rotenberg, to Rabbi Hillel Medaliya, the Chief Rabbi of Antwerp. The author asks the recipient about how he is doing and blesses him with a refuah shlema after many had davened for him. “And now I want to request that he not feel obligated in any way to answer my letter since I fear that it is presently forbidden to occupy him any further.”
28x21cm. Good condition.
Rabbi Zalman Rotberg (1913-2002) was the head of Beit Meir in Bnei Brak and a member of the Council of Torah Sages of Degel HaTorah. He was born in Lipshinok (Belarus) to the town’s rabbi, Rabbi Tuvya Rotberg. He studied as a boy in the Shaar HaTorah yeshiva under the Rosh Yeshiva Rabbi Moshe Mordechai Shkop, son of Rabbi Shimon Shkop. At the end of the 1920s he moved to study in the Mir yeshiva. In 1936 he moved to Israel with his close friend and later father-in-law, Rabbi Shmuel Rozovsky. The two studied in the Lomja yeshiva led by Rabbi Reuven Katz, who even got them the permission to move to Israel. In 1942 he married Sarah, daughter of Rabbi Meir Karlitz. The suggestion of the shidduch was made by the Chazon Ish, the bride’s uncle.
Rabbi Dr. Hillel Medalia (1916 – 1977), left Russia in 1922. He received a Torah and general education, and received a doctorate in philosophy. He was one of the leaders of the Mizrahi movement in England, served as rabbi of Leeds (England), Dublin (Ireland) and Antwerp (Belgium). He published a book, which he called ‘Sheila’, which alludes to the name of his father – Shmaryahu Yehuda Leib, in conjunction with his name – Hillel. He also exalted the Shulchan Aruch with an English translation.
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