Yahrtzeits – 7 Shevat
Rav Dovid Biderman, the first Lelover Rebbe (1746-1814), son of Rav Shlomo Biderman. A close follower of the Chozeh of Lublin, he was known for his extraordinary compassion for, and inability to see faults in, his fellow Jews. His main disciple was Rav Yitzchak of Vorki, whose son, Yaakov Dovid, was the first Amshinov Rebbe. Two printed collections of stories about Rav Dovid are Migdal Dovid and Kodesh Halulim.
Rav Mordechai Dovid Ungar, Dombrover Rebbe (c1770-1846). The son of Rav Rav Zvi Hersh Unger, Reb Mordechai Dovid was a disciple of RavElimelech of Lizhensk, Rav Avraham Yehoshua Heshel of Apt, the Chozeh miLublin, and the Kozhnitzer Magid. He was succeeded by his son, Rav Yosef of Dombrov.
Rav Yaakov Yitzchak Neiman, the Pupa Rav and the Belzer Dayan in Montreal (1919-2007)
Yahrtzeits – 8 Shevat
Rav Baruch ben Rav Shmuel of Pinsk (1834). In 1830, Rav Yisrael of Shklov, one of the closest of the disciples of the Vilna Gaon, began an effort to locate the “Ten Lost Tribes.” Rav Baruch ben Rav Shmuel of Pinsk served as the messenger and departed from Tzefas with a letter of introduction to the king of the Lost Tribes. (The Ten Tribes were believed to have an independent kingdom where they practiced true semichah of rabbis as handed down from Moshe Rabbeinu until the Fourth Century CE) Rav Baruch traveled through the Middle East for almost three years before he was murdered in Yemen.
Rav Yosef Meir Kahana, the Spinka Rebbe of Yerushalayim (1978), son of Rav Tzvi Hirsch Kahana. Rav Yosef Meir was succeeded by his son, Rav Mordecai Dovid Kahana.
Rav Menachem Breier, father of the Boyaner Rebbe (2007)
Today in History – 7 Shevat
· Bela Kuhn (real name Moritz Cohen), a communist dictator who ruled in Hungary for 133 days, was disposed of with the help of Rumania and Admiral Nicholas Horthy, 1919. Since Kuhn was a Jew, all the Jews were accused of being communists, and estimated five thousand Jews were killed.
Today in History – 8 Shevat
· Jews of Colmar, France arrested for well-poisoning, 1348.
· According to the terms of the capitulation protocol, Portugal which recently regained control of Brazil from the Dutch decreed that Jewish and Dutch settlers had three months to leave Brazil. Approximately 150 Jewish families of Portuguese descent fled the Brazilian city of Recife, in the state of Pernambuco. By September, twenty-three of these refugees had established the first community of Jews in New Amsterdam. Herzl met Pope Pius X and unsuccessfully tried to convince him to support the vision of Zionism, 1904.
· The first General Assembly of the United Nations convened in London, January 10, 1946
· Jews publicly executed in Damascus , 1969.
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