Menachem Mendel Schneerson

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For the third Rebbe of the Chabad Lubavitch dynasty see Menachem Mendel Schneersohn (with an "h")
Menachem Mendel Schneerson
Lubavitcher Rebbe
The Rebbe
The Rebbe
Term 1951-01-17 – 1994-06-12
Full name Menachem Mendel Schneerson
Main work Likutei Sichos
Born 1902-04-05 OS (11 Nissan 5662)
Mykolaiv
Died 1994-06-12 NS (3 Tammuz 5754)
Brooklyn
Buried Queens
Dynasty Chabad Lubavitch
Predecessor Joseph Isaack Schneersohn
Father Levi Yitzchak Schneerson
Mother Chanah, née Yanovski
Wife 1 Chaya Mushka Schneerson

Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson (April 18, 1902 – June 12, 1994), often referred to as simply The Rebbe by Lubavitcher Hasidim, was a prominent Charedi (traditional Orthodox) Jewish rabbi who was the seventh (and to date, final) Rebbe (spiritual leader) of the Chabad-Lubavitch branch of Chassidic Judaism. He was fifth in a direct paternal line to the third Chabad-Lubavitch Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneersohn (known as the Tzemach Tzedek), his namesake.

In 1950, upon the passing of his predecessor, father-in-law, and cousin Rabbi Joseph Isaack Schneersohn, Rabbi Menachem Mendel assumed the leadership of Chabad-Lubavitch. He led the movement until his passing in 1994, greatly expanding its worldwide activities and founding a network of institutions to promote outreach to as-yet unaffiliated Jews through encourage them to increase in Torah study and Mitzvah observance. He raised the issue of Jewish messianism to the forefront of the Jewish world, and was hailed by some Lubavitchers as the long awaited Moshiach (Messiah). He had no biological children, but his legacy lives on with over 2,600 institutions he initiated throughout his lifetime[citation needed]. (The latest official numbers place the number of worldwide Chabad-Lubavitch institutions at over 4,000.[citation needed] ) It is a notable saying amongst Chassidim that "every Jewish person is the Rebbe's spiritual child".

Contents

[edit] Biography

[edit] Early life

Born in Nikolaiev, Ukraine, Rabbi Schneerson received mostly private education. He had two younger brothers, Dovber and Yisroel Aryeh Leib. He was enrolled in the secular Yekaterinoslav University for part-time study of mathematics at the age of 16.[citation needed] His father, Rabbi Levi Yitzchak Schneerson, a renowned kabbalist who served as the Chief Rabbi of Yekaterinoslav (Dnepropetrovsk) from 1907–1939, was his primary teacher. He studied Talmud and rabbinic literature, as well as the chasidic view of Jewish mysticism and Kabbalah. He received his rabbinical ordination from Rabbi Yosef Rosen (the Rogatchover Gaon).[citation needed] He became engaged to Chaya Mushka Schneerson in Riga in 1923 and married her five years later in 1928, after being away in Berlin. During those two years in Berlin his landlord was his distant cousin, a secular Jew, Dr. Michael Wilensky. He returned to Warsaw for his wedding, and in the announcement of his marriage in a Warsaw newspaper,"a number of academic degrees" were attributed to him. Following the marriage, the newlyweds went to live in Berlin, Germany, to study mathematics and philosophy at the University of Berlin.[citation needed]

In a hagiographic biography, Laufer, citing a rabbi who heard from Soloveichik himself and a Kfar Chabad rabbi who heard it from associates of Soloveichik, says that "even though Rabbi Schneerson did not spend much time at his studies, his marks were always higher than Soloveichik's". Laufer also noted "the Rebbe was known to have received several advanced degrees in Berlin, and then later in Paris."[citation needed] The chabad account has been called into question by some scholarly research on Schneerson's early life. Professor Menachem Friedman, on a trip to Berlin 70 years later, was only able to find records of classes taken for one and a half semesters. Rabbi Schneerson's attendance was recorded at the University of Berlin in a "record of the students who audited courses at the university without receiving academic credit." However, he was unable to find any records for the other six years that Rabbi Schneerson was in Berlin.[citation needed]

In 1931 Rabbi Schneerson's younger brother, Yisroel Aryeh Leib, joined him in Berlin.[citation needed] He arrived and was cared for by the family as he was seriously ill with typhoid fever. He soon changed his name to Mark Gurari and attended classes at the University of Berlin from 1931 to 1933. In 1933, after Adolf Hitler took over Germany and began instituting anti-Semitic policies, Rabbi Schneerson helped Gurari escape from Berlin, but with Gurari's increasing secularism and his relationship with Regina Milgram, a secular woman, the brothers grew apart. Gurari escaped to Mandate Palestine in 1939 with Milgram where they married. (ISBN 0-9647243-0-8) Vol. II, p.134, quoted: [2])

[edit] France

In 1933 Rabbi Schneerson moved to France. According to several books, he attended classes at the Sorbonne in Paris.[citation needed] Israeli anthropologist Menachem Friedman, on a visit to France in 1996 was unable to find any documentation from the Sorbonne records, but found that from 1935 to 1938 he studied at the École spéciale des travaux publics, du bâtiment et de l'industrie (ESTP), a Technical College in the Montparnasse district. He completed a diploma in electrical engineering, and received a licence to practice.[citation needed] He lived for most of his time in Paris at 9 Rue de Boulard in the cosmopolitan 14th arrondissement in the same building as his brother-in-law Mendel Hornstein. They also studied together at ESTP, however Hornstein failed the final exams. He did not escape the Holocaust and ultimately perished in Treblinka.[citation needed]

Rabbi Schneerson learned to speak French, which he put to use in establishing his movement there after the war. The Chabad movement in France was later to attract many Jewish immigrants from Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia.[citation needed]

[edit] America and leadership

In 1941 Rabbi Schneerson escaped from France on the Serpa Pinto, the last boat to cross the Atlantic before the U-boat blockade began,[citation needed] and joined his father-in-law, Rabbi Joseph Isaac Schneersohn, in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn, New York. He spent some time working in the Brooklyn Navy Yard.[citation needed] In 1942, his father-in-law appointed him director of the movement's central organizations, placing him at the helm of a budding Jewish educational and chasidic outreach empire across the United States, Canada, Israel, and North Africa.[citation needed]

Rabbi Joseph Isaac Schneersohn died in 1950. His followers immediately began pressuring Rabbi Schneerson, then known as the Rama"sh (an acronym of his name) to succeed his father-in-law.[citation needed] At first he steadfastly refused, saying that his father-in-law "lived on." At the same time there was another candidate for leadership, Rabbi Shemaryahu Gurary, Joseph Isaac Schneersohn's elder son-in-law, married to his elder daughter. Gurary, known as the Rasha"g, failed to capture support among the chasidim,[citation needed] who continued pressuring Rabbi Schneerson to relent and accept the position of "Rebbe". The Rebbe's wife, Chaya Mushka (daughter of R' Yosef Yitzchok) strongly encouraged her husband to continue her father's works.[citation needed] On the first anniversary of his father-in-law's passing he delivered a Chassidic discourse (Ma'amar) and officially became The Rebbe.[citation needed]

Rabbi Schneerson made great efforts to intensify the outreach program of the movement, bringing in new "recruits" from all walks of life, and aggressively sought the expansion of the baal teshuva movement.[citation needed]

Other Orthodox Jews were bothered by the fact that Lubavitch outreach efforts extended to them as well as to non-affiliated Jews.[citation needed] The Satmar sect criticized him for not sufficiently opposing Zionism, a philosophy considered heretical by that group.[citation needed] The proximity of Crown Heights to Satmar enclaves in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, and the "conversion" of some prominent Satmar chasidim to Chabad[citation needed] caused friction, culminating in an incident in which a group of Lubavitchers walking through a Satmar neighborhood were set upon and beaten by a mob.[citation needed] Nonetheless, Rabbi Schneerson and Rabbi Joel Teitelbaum, the Satmar Rebbe, held each other in high esteem.[citation needed]

[edit] Vision

Part of Rabbi Schneerson's work included the training of thousands of young Chabad rabbis and their wives, who were sent all over the world by him as shluchim (Hebrew: "emissaries") to further Jewish observance.

Rabbi Schneerson oversaw the building of schools, community centers, youth camps, college campus centers (known as "Chabad houses"), and reached out to the most powerful Jewish lay leaders and non-Jewish government leaders wherever they found themselves. The United States Congress and President issue annual proclamations declaring that the Rebbe's birthday, usually a day in March or April that coincides with his Hebrew calendar birth-date of 11 Nisan (a Hebrew month), be observed as Education and Sharing Day in the United States and a few other countries around the world.[citation needed]

Schneerson instituted a system of "mitzvah campaigns" called mivtzoim; these encourage Jews to increase their level of Jewish religious practice, and gives the opportunity for another Jew to do a mitzvah. They commonly centered on practices such as keeping kosher, lighting Shabbat candles, studying Torah, the laying of tefillin, helping write Torah scrolls and teaching women to observe the niddah laws of Jewish family purity (laws pertaining to menstruation and ritual immersion afterwards in a pool of water known as a mikveh). Lubavitchers went to street-corners, and rode in "Mitzvah tanks", mobile outreach centers, encouraging Jews to increase their religious observance. He also launched a campaign to promote observance of the Noahide Laws among gentiles.[citation needed]

Rabbi Schneerson's activities spread to many far-flung areas of the Jewish world. Since the time of the fifth Rebbe of Chabad, Sholom Dovber Schneersohn, Chabad had been involved with the Sephardic world.[citation needed] Schneerson was revered by Rabbis Israel Abuhatzeira[citation needed] (known as Babba Sali), Meir Abuhatzeira, Yitzchak Kadouri[citation needed] and Mordechai Eliyahu[citation needed] (a former Chief Rabbi of Israel).[citation needed] The latter two often visited him in Brooklyn, while the others maintained a correspondence with him. In the late 1970s, Rabbi Schneerson joined with other organizations to orchestrate an exodus of Jews from countries such as Iran.[citation needed] This also laid the framework for Sephardic Hasidim. There are currently several Sephardic Chabad congregations.[citation needed]

Scientists who met with him, such as Herman Branover, professor of physics at Ben-Gurion University in Beer-Sheva, Israel, noted that he had a keen understanding of scientific issues.[citation needed] Branover himself, a Russian-Israeli authority on solar energy, is an active member of the Lubavitch movement.[citation needed] He frequently turned to Rabbi Schneerson for advice on his scientific research. According to the millionaire mining magnate Joseph Gutnick of Australia, it was Schneerson who pointed out to him the precise geological points on a map of Australia to commence mining for gold.[citation needed] He was also given guidelines in his search for diamonds.[citation needed] Gutnick was subsequently appointed by Schneerson as his main representative to the Israeli government.[citation needed]

Rabbi Schneerson rarely chose to involve himself with questions of halakha (Jewish law). Some notable exceptions were with regard to the use of electrical appliances on the Sabbath, sailing on Israeli boats staffed by Jews, and halakhic dilemmas created when crossing the International Date Line.[citation needed]

Rabbi Schneerson rarely left Crown Heights in Brooklyn, except for frequent lengthy visits to his father-in-law's gravesite, the ohel ("tent"), in Queens, New York. A year after the passing of his wife in 1988, when the traditional year of Jewish mourning had passed, he moved into his study above the central Lubavitch synagogue at 770 Eastern Parkway, Brooklyn (commonly referred to as either "Lubavitch World Headquarters", or as "770").

It was from "770" that Rabbi Schneerson directed his emissaries' work. He would involve himself in every detail of his far-flung movements' developments, being known as a man who did not sleep much (usually only 2-4 hours nightly at most). People who had appointments with Rabbi Schneerson were commonly summoned to see him at extremely late hours.[citation needed] The highlight of his public role would be displayed during special celebrations called farbrengens ("celebrations") on Sabbaths, holy days, and special days on the Chabad calendar when he would lead the packed hall with long talks called maamorim ("[scholarly] talks") or sichos ("[scholarly] discussions"), and with songs called nigunim, that would last all night. They would often be broadcast via satellite to Lubavitch branches all over the world.

[edit] Later life

In 1977 Rabbi Schneerson suffered a massive heart attack while celebrating the hakafot ("circling" [in the synagogue]) ceremony on Shmini Atzeret. Nonetheless, he hardly made a sound or flinched, and insisted on finishing the ceremony with the customary dancing.[citation needed] Despite the best efforts of his doctors to convince him to change his mind, Rabbi Schneerson refused to be hospitalized. This necessitated building a mini-hospital in "770." Although he did not appear in public for several weeks, he continued to deliver talks and discourses from his study via intercom. On Rosh Chodesh Kislev, the first day of the Hebrew month of Kislev, he left his study for the first time in over a month to go home. His followers celebrate this day as a great holiday each year, for his miraculous recovery.[citation needed]

In 1983, on the occasion of his 80th birthday the U.S. Congress proclaimed Rabbi Schneerson's birthday Education Day, USA, and awarded him the National Scroll of honor.[citation needed]

As the movement grew and more demands were placed on Rabbi Schneerson's time he ended the practice of meeting followers individually in his office. In 1986 Rabbi Schneerson replaced these personal meetings, known as Yechidut, with a weekly receiving line in "770". Almost every Sunday thousands of people would line up to meet briefly with Schneerson and receive a dollar, which was to be donated to charity. People filing past Schneerson would often take this opportunity to ask him for advice or to request a blessing. This event is usually referred to as 'Sunday Dollars'.[citation needed]

Following the death of Rabbi Schneerson's wife in 1988 he withdrew from some public functions and became generally more reclusive. In 1991, he stated that: "I have done everything I can do to bring Moshiach (the Jewish Messiah), now I am handing over to you (his followers) the keys to bring Moshiach."[citation needed] A final campaign was started to bring the messianic age through acts of "goodness and kindness" and his followers placed advertising in the mass media such as many full-page ads in the New York Times urging everyone to contribute toward the messiah's imminent arrival, by increasing in their good deeds.[citation needed]

In 1991, Rabbi Schneerson faced a riot with anti-Semitic overtones in his neighborhood of Crown Heights which became known as the Crown Heights Riot of 1991. The riot began when a car accompanying his motorcade returning from one of his regular cemetery visits to his father-in-law's grave accidentally struck two African American seven-year-old children, killing one boy. In the rioting, Australian Jewish graduate student Yankel Rosenbaum was murdered, many Lubavitchers were badly beaten, and much property was destroyed; also, Lubavitchers and blacks reportedly hurled rocks and bottles at one another over police lines.[1] The driver of the car fled to Israel and his extradition was not sought.[citation needed]

In 1992 Rabbi Schneerson was felled by a serious stroke while at the grave of his father-in-law. The stroke left him unable to speak and paralyzed on the right side of his body. Nonetheless, he continued to respond daily to thousands of queries and requests for blessings from around the world. His secretaries would read the letters to him and he would indicate his response with head and hand motions.[citation needed]

Despite his deteriorating health, Rabbi Schneerson once again refused to leave 770. Several months into his illness, a small room with tinted glass windows with an attached balcony was built overlooking the main synagogue. This allowed him to pray with his followers, beginning with the Rosh Hashana services and after services, to appear before them by either having the window opened or by being carried onto the balcony.

During these appearances his followers would chant the traditional salutation of a Rebbe and, generating some controversy, append to it the title of Moshiach: !יחי אדוננו מורנו ורבנו מלך המשיח לעולם ועד (Yechi Adonenu Moreinu v'Rabbeinu Melech Hamoshiach l'olam voed!) - "Long live our Master our Teacher and our Rabbi King Messiah forever and ever!"

When sung before him in his last months, Rabbi Schneerson, whose motor coordination had been impaired due to his stroke, at times swayed to and fro and swung his hands. Some followers of the Rebbe interpreted this as encouragement, but sources close to the Rebbe say that the motions were involuntary, and not a departure from earlier public statements that he was not the "King Messiah". Some of his followers interpreted the movements as similar to those done during the singing of other songs at the numerous farbrengens over the years.[citation needed] From this and various previous public statements, some of his followers extrapolated that he acceded to their wish that he be the Moshiach.[citation needed]

[edit] Death and Legacy

He passed away in 1994 at the Beth Israel Medical Center,[2] having finally agreed to hospitalization, unable to verbalize and say anything to confirm or deny his followers' longed-for dream that he be the actual long-promised Jewish Messiah. However, many believe that he continues to be the Messiah, and that he will lead the Jewish people to redemption, though this matter is controversial (nd invites comparisons to Christianity. (See main article: Chabad messianism.)

After his death, a bill was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives sponsored by Congressmen Chuck Schumer, and cosponsored by John Lewis, Newt Gingrich, and Jerry Lewis, as well as 220 other Congressmen, to bestow on Rabbi Schneerson the Congressional Gold Medal. On November 2, 1994, the bill passed both Houses by unanimous consent, honoring Rabbi Schneerson for his "outstanding and enduring contributions toward world education, morality, and acts of charity'". [3]

US President Bill Clinton spoke these words at the Congressional Gold Medal ceremony "The late Rebbe's eminence as a moral leader for our country was recognized by every president since Richard Nixon. For over two decades the Rabbi's movement now has some 2000 institutions; educational, social, medical, all across the globe. We, (The United States Government) recognize the profound role that Rabbi Schneerson had in the expansion of those institutions."[citation needed]

The Rebbe was laid to rest on the 3rd of Tammuz 5754 (June 12, 1994), next to his father-in-law, the sixth Rebbe. The Ohel is built over their graves. When entering the Ohel, the sixth Rebbe is buried to the right, and the seventh Rebbe is buried to the left. Established by philanthropist Rabbi Joseph Gutnick of Melbourne (Australia), the Ohel Chabad-Lubavitch Center on Francis Lewis Boulevard, Queens, NY is located adjacent to the Rebbe's Ohel.

[edit] Succession

Chabad Hasidim believe that there is no successor to Rabbi Schneerson,[citation needed] and that he is in that sense still their leader. Many believe that he will return as the Messiah; this view has led to controversy with other Orthodox groups and within Chabad itself. Many, quoting Talmudic passages such as Ya'akov avinu lo meis ("our forefather Jacob did not die") (Talmud Ta'anit 5b), and statements that the Rebbe himself made, refuse to put the typical honorifics that Jews normally use for the dead (e.g. zt"l or Zecher Tzaddik Livrocho, "may the memory of the righteous be for a blessing") after his name.[citation needed] All, however, still consider him to be the Lubavitcher Rebbe.[citation needed]

Since the early 1980s some followers have been claiming that Schneerson was the Messiah. Evan after his death some Chabad adherents continue to argue that Schneerson is to return as the Messiah. Chabad Messianism based around Schneerson has been a major cause of fracture within the Chabad movement since his death.

[edit] Political activities

[edit] United States

Both Democrats and Republicans politicians sought his support.[citation needed] Generally, Lubavitch tends to support more conservative politicians such as those who back school prayer, are anti-abortion, pro-Israel, and are generally supportive of Bible values, about which Rabbi Schneerson was publicly vocal. Aspirants for the job of mayor, governor, congressman, senator, in the states of New York and New Jersey would come calling and have their pictures with the rebbe published in newspapers with large Jewish readerships and voters.[citation needed]

Rabbi Schneerson predicted, paid close attention to, and rejoiced in, the fall of communism in Eastern Europe starting in 1989.[citation needed] Under the Bolsheviks his father-in-law had been imprisoned and tortured and had his massive collection of writings confiscated, and the movement banned on pain of exile to Siberia. So too his father Rabbi Levi Yitzchock Schneerson was imprisoned and sent to live in exile in Alma Ata, Kazakhstan. His father was never freed and died in Alma Ata. Throughout the years of Communist repression of religion, Rabbi Schneerson maintained intensive contacts with an underground network of his followers in the Soviet Union.[citation needed] Once the Iron Curtain fell, he quickly sent hundreds of new emissaries, known as shluchim, to the former Soviet Union.[citation needed] During the Desert Storm war against Iraq in 1990–1991, messianic fever ran high as Rabbi Schneerson interpreted events in the light of Torah and midrash, declaring that: "Moshiach is already here, all we need to do is to open our eyes to see him."[citation needed]

[edit] Israel

Rabbi Schneerson never visited the State of Israel, where he had many admirers and critics. He held a view that according to Jewish law, it was uncertain if a Jewish person who was in the land of Israel was allowed to leave.[citation needed] One of Israel's presidents, Zalman Shazar, was a religiously observant person of Lubavitch ancestry, and his visits to Rabbi Schneerson were reunions of sorts.[citation needed] Prime Minister Menachem Begin, Ariel Sharon, and later Benjamin Netanyahu also paid visits and sought advice, along with scores of other less famous politicians, diplomats, military officials, and media producers.[citation needed] In the elections that brought Yitzhak Shamir to power, Rabbi Schneerson publicly lobbied his followers and the Orthodox members in the Knesset to vote against the Labor alignment.[citation needed] This was the only time he took a public political stance.[citation needed] It attracted the media's attention and led to articles in Time, Newsweek, and many newspapers and TV programs.

During the Six Day War in 1967 and the Yom Kippur War of 1973, Rabbi Schneerson publicly called for Israel Defence Forces (IDF) to capture Damascus, Syria and Cairo, Egypt.[citation needed] He was vehemently opposed to any IDF withdrawals from captured territories and opposed any concessions to Arabs.[citation needed] He lobbied Israeli politicians to pass legislation in accordance with Jewish religious law on the question Who is a Jew and declare that "only one who is born of a Jewish mother or converted according to Halakha (Biblically based Jewish religious law) is Jewish."[citation needed] This caused a furor in the United States. Some American Jewish philanthropies stopped financially supporting Chabad-Lubavitch since most of their members were connected to Reform and Conservative Judaism (Reform Judaism has a policy that anyone with a Jewish parent and a Jewish education is Jewish).[citation needed]

[edit] Responsa by Rabbi Schneerson

Rabbi Schneerson is known for authoring a voluminous collection of responsa. They touch on a wide array of topics. He addresses several modern issues, such as matters pertaining to outer space, fossilization, science, human behaviour, anatomy, geology, psychiatry, cosmetology, Torah subjects, Jewish holidays and Jewish education.

The majority of his responsa are printed in Igrot Kodesh (Hebrew and Yiddish) and Letters from the Rebbe (English).

[edit] References

  1. ^ Hasid Dies in Stabbing; Black Protests Flare 2d Night in a Row By JOHN KIFNER New York Times (1857-Current file); Aug 21, 1991; ProQuest Historical Newspapers The New York Times (1851 - 2003)pg. B1
  2. ^ The New York Times, June 13, 1994, p. A1
  3. ^ [[1]] Public Law 103-457

[edit] Books by Rabbi Schneerson

This list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it.
  • Likkutei Sichot - 39 volume set of Schneerson's discourses on the weekly Torah portions, Jewish Holidays, and other issues. (16,867pp)
  • Igrot Kodesh - 28 volume set of Schneerson's Hebrew and Yiddish letters. (11,948pp)
  • Hayom Yom - An anthology of Chabad aphorisms and customs arranged according to the days of the year.
  • Haggadah Im Likkutei Taamim Uminhagim - The Haggadah with a commentary written by Schneerson.
  • Reshimot - 7 volume set of Schneerson's personal journal discovered after his passing. (2,190pp)
  • Hadran al HaRambam - Commentary written by Schneerson on Mishneh Torah.
  • Sefer HaSichot - 10 volume set of the Schneerson's talks from 1987-1992. (4,136pp)
  • Sefer HaShlichut - 2 volume set of Schneerson's advice and guidelines to the shluchim he sent.
  • Torat Menachem - 30 volume set of Maamarim and Sichos from 1950-1959. (Based on participants' recollections and notes, not proofread by Schneerson.)
  • Torat Menachem Hitva'aduyot - 43 volume set of Sichos and Maamarim from 1982-1992. (Based on participants' recollections and notes, not proofread by Schneerson.)
  • Letters from the Rebbe - 5 volume set of Schneerson's English letters.

[edit] Time-line of Lubavitcher rebbes

Preceded by
Joseph Isaack Schneersohn		 Rebbe of Lubavitch
1951—1994		 Succeeded by
N/A

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

The Ohel
Writings available online
Biography
Historical sites
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