Letter of Rabbi Moshe Feinstein – On the Rift Between the Israeli and American Branches of Peilim – Chanukah 1963

Letter of Rabbi Moshe Feinstein – On the Rift Between the Israeli and American Branches of Peilim – Chanukah 1963

Letter handwritten and signed by R. Moshe Feinstein. New York, first day of Chanukah [25th Kislev] 1963.

Addressed to "my friend the great Gaon" R. Yechezkel Abramsky, a leader of the Moetzet Gedolei HaTorah in Eretz Israel, in response to his letter on the rift that had formed between the Israeli branch of Peilim and the committee of its American branch (which later established a separate American Peilim organization).

R. Moshe writes to him that he received his letter along with that of R. Elazar Menachem Man Shach, and he writes in response to both: "…You must know that having two organizations with the same name and the same goal is something that cannot be done in a peaceful way, especially after having already begun in a contentious way by writing denigrating letters, and there will also come nothing of this, neither for the Israeli organization nor for the American organization. Therefore it is incumbent on you to inform the directors of the Israeli organization that when they come here, they should first address the yeshiva deans here to divide the two organizations in a way that distinguishes them both by name and by role, in which case it can be hoped that peace will prevail, with G-d's help… His friend since always, Moshe Feinstein". In the margins of the letter he adds: "Everything that I wrote is also the opinion of my friend R. Yaakov Kamenetsky, and he inquires after your welfare…".

R. Moshe Feinstein (1895-1986), foremost halachic authority in the United States. A leader of Orthodox Jewry, he served as president of the Union of Orthodox Rabbis of the United States and Canada, and chairman of the Moetzet Gedolei HaTorah. He was the dean of the Tiferet Yerushalayim yeshiva in New York. He authored Responsa Igrot Moshe, Dibrot Moshe – Talmudic novellae, and Darash Moshe – novellae on the Torah.

R. Moshe Feinstein had served as Rabbi of Lyuban, Belarus in 1921-1936 under the Bolsheviks, and it was during this period that he met R. Abramsky (1886-1976), who served as Rabbi of Slutsk from 1923-1930 until his arrest and exile to Siberia.

[1] leaf. Official stationery. 28 cm. Good condition. Stains and folding marks.