Early American letter by Rabbi Shlomo Heiman, Rosh Yeshiva Torah V'Dass. 1937.

Early American letter by Rabbi Shlomo Heiman, Rosh Yeshiva Torah V'Dass. 1937.

R. Shlomo Heiman (ca. 1890-1945), leading Lithuanian yeshiva dean, was a student of the Radin yeshiva and a disciple of R. Baruch Ber Leibowitz in the Halusk yeshiva. He served as lecturer in R. Baruch Ber’s yeshiva - Knesset Beit Yitzchak, when it relocated from Slabodka to Kremenchuk during WWI.

He was then summoned by his teacher the Chafetz Chaim to the Smilavichy yeshiva founded by R. Elchanan Wasserman. After the Chafetz Chaim and his yeshivot returned to Lithuania, R. Shlomo went back to disseminating Torah in Kremenchuk (in the yeshiva of his brother-in-law, R. Eliezer Yitzchak Berman). In 1923, he was appointed lecturer in R. Elchanan Wasserman’s yeshiva in Baranovich.There he became famous as one of Lithuania’s most outstanding lomdim and Maggidei Shiur.

In 1926, he was invited to serve as rabbi of Vornyany (a town near Vilna), yet this appointment was never realized, since concurrently, R. Chaim Ozer summoned him to Vilna to head the Ramailes yeshiva. n 1935, R. Shlomo was invited by R. Shraga Feivel Mendelowitz to serve as Rosh Yeshiva in Torah Vodaas in New York, a position he accepted with the approval of R. Chaim Ozer, and where he remained until his passing.

During that time, he met Rebbe Rayatz of Lubavitch, who was very impressed with R. Shlomo’s refinement and glowing personality, and remarked to his associates that it is rare to meet such a person, who is "entirely Torah" (Yeshurun, VIII, p. 167). See also a letter from the Rayatz in Igrot Kodesh (VIII, 2,162), in which he addresses him with exceptional terms of friendship and veneration.

His novellae were published by R. Michel Yehuda Lefkowitz (his disciple in the Ramailes yeshiva), in the two volumes of Chiddushei R. Shlom