Letters from the Devar Avraham and Rabbi Chaim Mordechai Katz of Telz - Regarding Support of Institutions in Eretz ...

Letters from the Devar Avraham and Rabbi Chaim Mordechai Katz of Telz - Regarding Support of Institutions in Eretz Israel, Following the 1929 Riots - Telz and Kovno, 1930
Letter sent from the "Special Committee for Eretz Israel in Telz", addressed to R. Avraham Dov Ber Kahana Shapiro Rabbi of Kovno. Telz (Telšiai), Shevat 1930. At the foot of the letter, 5 lines handwritten and signed by R. Avraham Dov Ber Kahana, confirming transfer of funds. Kovno (Kaunas), Shevat 1930. The letter sent from Telz, signed by R. "Ch.M. Katz - son-in-law of R. Y.L. Bloch" and by R. "A.D. Levin", states: "To the United Central Committee for Eretz Israel in Lithuania under R. A.D. Shapiro, Kovno. Apart from the 3000 litas we have already sent on behalf of the victims of the massacres in our Holy Land, we are now sending the committee 700 litas, to be transferred to Eretz Israel… 500 litas for the benefit of the Hebron yeshiva and 200 litas for R. Diskin's large orphanage…". At the foot of the letter, the Devar Avraham writes a confirmation to the senders: "…On the basis of this letter, I am sending today through the bank this sum to be divided between the two designated institutions. Peace and blessing, Avraham Dov Ber Kahana Shapiro. R. Avraham Dov Ber Kahana Shapiro (1871-1943), author of Devar Avraham, an eminent rabbi in his times, son of R. Zalman Sender Kahana Shapiro and son-in-law of "the Gadol of Minsk", R. Yerucham Yehuda Leib Perelman. A student of the Volozhin yeshiva. His scholarly book Devar Avraham, the first part of which was first printed in 1906, earned him worldwide fame and already in his times, leading rabbis discussed its contents. He was renowned as a prominent leader of Lithuanian Jewry. In 1924, he joined the famous expedition of rabbis to America together with the Kli Chemda, R. Kook and R. Epstein. The outbreak of WWII caught him on a visit to Switzerland, yet he returned to Kovno, stating that a captain does not abandon his ship during a storm. He perished in the Kovno Ghetto and thousands of Jews attended his funeral. R. Chaim Mordechai Katz (1894-1964), a dean of the Telz yeshiva in Lithuania and the United States. He was the son-in-law of R. Yosef Leib Bloch, dean of the Telz yeshiva. Renowned from his youth as an outstanding Torah scholar, he headed the Kollel in Telz and after the Holocaust founded and headed the Telz yeshivot in Cleveland and Chicago. In 1940, R. Chaim Mordechai travelled to the USA together with his brother-in-law R. Eliyahu Meir Bloch, on a perilous journey via Siberia and Japan, to attempt to rescue the yeshiva students and their families who remained in war-ravaged Telz. Upon their arrival in the US, they decided to establish a new yeshiva there, and in Cheshvan 1941, Telz yeshiva was opened in Cleveland, Ohio. Until 1945, they were not informed of the extent of the destruction and horrific annihilation, and only after the war did they discover that most of the rabbis and students of the yeshiva as well as their families were brutally murdered upon the German invasion of Lithuania. However, Telz Torah was saved by their tremendous efforts to strengthen and glorify the Torah. [1] leaf. 18X23 cm. Good condition. Filing holes. Creases and folding marks.