Lengthy letter from R. Chaim Ozer Grodzinski. Vilna, 6th Tamuz 1939.
Scribal writing, with several lines in his own handwriting and with his signature. Addressed to R. Eliezer Yehudah Finkel, dean of the Mir yeshiva who was traveling in London at the time on behalf of the Mir yeshiva. R. Chaim Ozer asks him to deal with some public affairs relating to funds raised from Africa.
He also asks for assistance for the medical expenses of R. Yitzchak Ze'ev Soloveitchik, the Brisker Rav, and mentions a letter on the matter he had sent to R. Yechezkel Abramsky.
He goes on the relate the proposal of R. Yechezkel Abramsky to send an agent to London on behalf of the yeshivas of Poland and Lithuania in tzedakah distribution. The agents he suggests are the "Rabbi of Krynki" [R. Chizkiyahu Yosef Mishkovsky] or R. Yosef Shuv [administrator of the Vaad HaYeshivot].
R. Chaim Ozer concludes with blessings and his signature.
On the margins of the letter, R. Chaim Ozer adds a handwritten blessing for recovery to R. David Sapira.
R. Chaim Ozer Grodzinski (1863-1940) was a foremost rabbi of his generation and leader of European Jewry. He was the son of R. David Shlomo Grodzinski, Rabbi of Iwye. He was renowned from his childhood for his exceptional brilliance. He entered the Volozhin yeshiva at the young age of 11, and became a disciple of R. Chaim of Brisk. At the age of 24, he was appointed rabbi and posek of Vilna, succeeding his father-in-law R. Eliyahu Eliezer Grodnansky, a posek in Vilna (son-in-law of R. Yisrael Salanter). He assumed the yoke of public leadership from a young age, and his opinion was conclusive on all public issues which arose throughout the Jewish world for close to fifty years.
The recipient of the letter,
R. Eliezer Yehudah Finkel (1879-1965), dean of the Mir yeshiva in Mir and Eretz Israel, son of the Alter of Slabodka and son-in-law of R. Eliyahu Baruch Kamai, dean of the Mir yeshiva. R. Eliezer Yehudah headed the Mir yeshiva and was a confidant of R. Chaim Ozer of Vilna. The Mir yeshiva fled to Vilna and Lithuania in the Holocaust at the instruction of R. Chaim Ozer. In 1941 R. Finkel left for Eretz Israel in order to bring the yeshiva there; while he was unsuccessful, the students managed to flee to Shanghai under the leadership of his son-in-law R. Chaim Shmulevitz and the mashgiach R. Yechezkel Levenstein. In 1943 he established the Mir yeshiva in Jerusalem, which is one of the largest yeshivas today, and he was one of the senior yeshiva deans of Eretz Israel.
[1] leaf. Official stationery. 27 cm. Good-fair condition. Wear and folding marks. Minor tears.
