“I preserve and look forward to a time of peace” – letter from the Ra’avad Rabbi Yisrael Zeev Minzburg, to members of the Eida Charedit, attempting to create peace between the Eida and those supporting the Chief Rabbinate.
Background: the letter, sent in 1919, is from the height of the split between the Eida and the Vaad HaIr Haredi-Ashkenazi, which supported the appointment of Rav Kook to the position of Rabbi of Jerusalem. The letter’s author writes: “We hereby wish you to know that both of us are true to the Eida Ashkenazit , but in my opinion we need to find a way to support peace and I expect a time to come and then the two groups will be able to meet”. The letter ends: “your friend, expectant of tidings of peace”. In the end, the author joined the BAdatz Chassidim of the Rabbinate’s beit din and only several years later (because of the “Parshat HaShechita”) returned to serve as a dayan in the Eida.
14x11cm. Filing holes, good condition.
Rabbi Yisrael Zeev Minzburg (1872-1962) was a famous gaon of Jerusalem. He served as Ashkenazi rabbi of the Old City, as Ra’avad of the Beit Din Kolelot HaChassidim, the Rabbinate Beit Din, and the Eida Charedit beit din. He was known for his extreme proficiency—even in old age he could recite entire Judaic books from memory. A famous picture of his depicts him meeting the Jordanian Legionnaires at the fall of the Jewish Quarter, together with Rabbi Ben Zion Chazan. He later told the story that when he went out to meet the Legionnaires the bullets did not stop raining but that he risked his life in spite of the danger—he told them that “I am an old man but inside the city are trapped hundreds of men, women, and children, it is better that I take the risk and not lose such a large number of Jews, Gd forbid…”
