Bidspirit auction | “It Pains Me Deeply That

“It Pains Me Deeply That Such a Precious Soul Should Suffer So” — A Moving Autograph Letter by Rabbi Dov Berish Weidenfeld of Tchebin on Behalf of a Destitute Holocaust Survivor Rabbi | Jerusalem, 5709 [1949] - “It Pains Me Deeply That Such a Precious Soul Should Suffer So” — A Moving Autograph Letter by Rabbi Dov Berish Weidenfeld of Tchebin on Behalf of a Destitute Holocaust Survivor Rabbi | Jerusalem, 5709 [1949] A rare and deeply moving letter, entirely handwritten and signed by Rabbi Dov Berish Weidenfeld of Tchebin, one of the foremost Torah authorities of his generation, passionately appealing for assistance on behalf of a fellow rabbi and Holocaust survivor who had arrived in Eretz Israel utterly destitute. Jerusalem, 5709 [1949]. The letter was addressed to the Mifal HaRabbanim of the Mizrachi movement. Rabbi Weidenfeld, who himself had reached Eretz Israel only a few years earlier after escaping the horrors of the Holocaust through a harrowing journey via Siberia and Bukhara, writes with heartfelt concern on behalf of Rabbi Akiva Grosses, former Av Beit Din of Gleiwitz, who survived the war but arrived in the Holy Land bereft of family, position, and financial support. With the sensitivity and nobility for which he was renowned, the gaon of Tchebin found it unbearable that a distinguished Torah scholar, who had once stood at the head of a flourishing Jewish community, should now live in deprivation. In particularly moving language, he pleads: “It pains me greatly that such a precious soul should suffer so much. Please extend a thread of kindness toward him and support him appropriately, as befits a great Torah scholar such as he.” The story appears to have had a happy conclusion. Following Rabbi Weidenfeld’s intervention, Rabbi Akiva Grosses was apparently appointed to a rabbinic position in Jerusalem’s Baka neighborhood. In later years, responsa addressed to him were published in the renowned responsa work Dovev Meisharim. Rabbi Dov Berish Weidenfeld of Tchebin (1881–1965), celebrated throughout the Torah world as the “Sar HaTorah”, was among the greatest rabbinic authorities of Galicia and one of the outstanding halachic figures of the twentieth century. After losing his sons—prominent Torah scholars—in the Holocaust, he rebuilt his life and legacy in Jerusalem, where he reestablished the famed Tchebin Yeshivah. Revered across all segments of the Torah world, both Chassidic and non-Chassidic, he was held in extraordinary esteem. The Gerrer Rebbe, Rabbi Avraham Mordechai Alter, author of Imrei Emes, once remarked after honoring him with an aliyah: “Today we called the Torah itself to the Torah.” [1] leaf, official stationery, 27 × 21 cm. Entirely autograph, handwritten and signed by Rabbi Dov Berish Weidenfeld. Condition: Good. Fold marks. Filing holes. Minor marginal tears, without loss of text. A poignant post-Holocaust document reflecting both the personal nobility of Rabbi Weidenfeld and the difficult realities faced by surviving European rabbis as they struggled to rebuild their lives in Eretz Israel after the devastation of the Holocaust.