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Rare Historical Booklet for the Support of Kollel HaGeonim in Slabodka under Rabbi Isaac Sher Kovno, 1922 * Beis Yisrael, containing essays for strengthening support of the important kollel 'Beis Yisrael, ' a kollel in which outstanding young scholars grew and developed — many of whom would later become the gedolei hador of the next generation, among them Rabbi Yaakov Kamenetsky. The kollel was founded by the Alter of Slabodka, Rabbi Nosson Tzvi Finkel, and led by his son-in-law Rabbi Isaac Sher. Before World War I, the concept of a “kollel” was almost unknown; there existed primarily yeshivos and chadarim. The first renowned kollel was established in Kovno by Rabbi Yisrael Salanter, but it was dissolved during the First World War. Kollel Beis Yisrael was intended to continue in the same spirit and may rightly be regarded as the successor to that famous Kollel Kovno. This important booklet may therefore be seen as one of the foundational documents that helped establish the very notion of the modern kollel avreichim. What began as a modest institution of only twenty young Torah scholars has, with time, grown into a vast and flourishing world — numbering over 100,000 avreichim in Eretz Yisrael alone! — where the sound of Torah study never ceases, even for a moment. The booklet is divided into two parts: the first with essays urging support for the yeshivah, and the second containing essays on the importance and virtue of maintaining a kollel. It includes:  – A letter from Rabbi Chaim Ozer Grodzןnski;  – A letter from the Rosh Kollel, Rabbi Yitzchak Isaac Sher;  – A letter from the Rosh Yeshivah of Slabodka, Rabbi Moshe Mordechai Epstein;  – An essay by Rabbi Yisrael Salanter (previously printed in Etz Pri, Vilna 1881);  – A defense of Kollel Kovno by Rabbi Naftali Amsterdam (first published in HaLevanon newspaper). Rabbi Naftali himself had been a member of the kollel. At that time, twenty exceptional scholars studied in the kollel (leaf 2b), among them future Torah giants: Rabbi Yaakov Kamenetsky; Rabbi Yosef Ferber; Rabbi Avraham Ze’ev Heller, Av Beis Din of Mariampol; Rabbi Yechezkel Bernstein, author of Divrei Yechezkel; Rabbi Dovid HaKohen Leibowitz, Rosh Yeshivah of Chofetz Chaim (RSA); and others. Kovno, 1922. Rare. Page Count: [5] pp., 24 leaves. Size: 20.4 cm. Condition: Good; light corner creases. Old binding from the time of printing, slightly worn.