Yitzchak Elchanan Spektor
Encyclopedia
Posek
Posek is the term in Jewish law for "decider"—a legal scholar who decides the Halakha in cases of law where previous authorities are inconclusive or in those situations where no halakhic precedent exists....
and Talmud
Talmud
The Talmud is a central text of mainstream Judaism. It takes the form of a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Jewish law, ethics, philosophy, customs and history....
ic sage of the 19th century.
Early struggles
Spektor was born in Resh, government of GrodnoHrodna
Grodno or Hrodna , is a city in Belarus. It is located on the Neman River , close to the borders of Poland and Lithuania . It has 327,540 inhabitants...
, then part of the Russian Empire
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...
. His father, Israel Issar, who was rabbi of Resh and had a leaning toward Hasidism, was his first teacher. Young Isaac Elhanan made remarkable progress in his Talmudical studies, and was soon famous as an "ilui", or prodigy. At the age of thirteen he married, and settled with his wife's parents in Vilkovisk, where he remained for six years. He was for a short time the pupil of R. Elijah Schick, and later he studied under Benjamin Diskin, rabbi of Vilkovisk, who, much impressed by his agreeable manners and great ability, accepted him as a pupil and as the fellow student of his son Joshua Leib Diskin, afterward rabbi of Brisk
Brisk
Brisk may refer to:* Brest, Belarus Brisk is the city's name in Yiddish* Brisk tradition and Soloveitchik dynasty, a school of Jewish thought originated by the Soloveitchik family of Brest...
.
Spektor received his "semikah", or ordination, from Benjamin Diskin and from R. Isaac Ḥaber of Tiktin (later of Suwałki). The 300 rubles which his wife had brought him as dowry having been lost through the bankruptcy of his debtor, Spektor, being unable to rely any longer on his father-in-law for support, became in 1837 rabbi of the small adjacent town of Sabelin, with a weekly salary of five Polish gulden. He remained there in great poverty for about two years, when he went to Karlin
Karlin
Karlin may refer to:Places:* Karlín, Prague* Karlin , Belarus* Karlino, Białogard County, Poland* Karlin, Łódź Voivodeship * Karlin, West Pomeranian Voivodeship People:* Ben Karlin* Joyce Karlin...
and introduced himself to R. Jacob of that town (author of "Mishkenot Ya'aḳob"), then considered one of the foremost rabbis of Russia. Jacob was so favorably impressed by the extensive learning and the carefulness of the young man that he recommended him to the first community desiring a rabbi, namely, that of Baresa
Biaroza
Biaroza is a town of 31 000 inhabitants in Western Belarus in Brest voblast, center of the Biaroza rayon.- History :The village of Biaroza was first mentioned in 1477 as part of the Slonim paviet. In the 15th century, the village probably received the town charter. Between 1538 and 1600 it was...
(Biaroza), where the salary was one ruble a week. Spektor entered upon his new charge in 1839, and made rapid progress. A dispute which he had with Rabbi Isaac of Shavel concerning the formula of a document relating to divorce ended when Isaac, who was much older and better known than Spektor, acknowledged the latter to be in the right.
Rabbinical positions
In 1846 Spektor was chosen rabbi of Nishvez, government of MinskMinsk
- Ecological situation :The ecological situation is monitored by Republican Center of Radioactive and Environmental Control .During 2003–2008 the overall weight of contaminants increased from 186,000 to 247,400 tons. The change of gas as industrial fuel to mazut for financial reasons has worsened...
, but the community of Baresa was unwilling to let him go, and he was obliged to leave the town at night. The salary of his new position, four rubles a week, was a munificent one for those days; and at first many of the older members of the community objected to so young a rabbi. After he had become known, however, his popularity was such that when he decided to accept the rabbinate of Novohrodok (government of Kovno), whose community had exonerated him of a false charge made against him by an informer of Nishvez, the people of the latter town wished to restrain him; he had to leave it, as he had left Baresa, stealthily at night. He went to Novohrodok in May, 1851, and remained there until the same month in 1864, when he was appointed chief rabbi
Chief Rabbi
Chief Rabbi is a title given in several countries to the recognized religious leader of that country's Jewish community, or to a rabbinic leader appointed by the local secular authorities...
of Kovno, which he occupied until his death.
Spektor was an indefatigable worker, and in the last forty years of his life, when he was steadily becoming more generally recognized as the foremost rabbinical authority in Russia, he maintained a large correspondence with rabbis, communities, philanthropists, and representative men in many parts of the world, who sought his advice and instruction on all conceivable subjects relating to Jews
Jews
The Jews , also known as the Jewish people, are a nation and ethnoreligious group originating in the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East. The Jewish ethnicity, nationality, and religion are strongly interrelated, as Judaism is the traditional faith of the Jewish nation...
and Judaism
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...
. He early began to take an interest in general Jewish affairs, and his sound reasoning, his liberal views, and his love of peace combined to establish him as one of the great leaders of Russian Jewry.
In 1857 he was the youngest member of a committee of rabbis chosen to regulate the management of the Volozhin Yeshiva
Volozhin yeshiva
The Volozhin Yeshiva, also known as Etz Chaim Yeshiva, was a prestigious Lithuanian yeshiva located in the town of Volozhin, Russia, . It was founded by Rabbi Chaim Itzkovitz, a student of the famed Vilna Gaon, and trained several generations of scholars, rabbis, and leaders...
. Ten years later he settled a quarrel which threatened to ruin the Mir Yeshiva
Mir yeshiva (Poland)
The Mir yeshiva , commonly known as the Mirrer Yeshiva or The Mir, was a Haredi yeshiva located in the town of Mir, Russian Empire...
. In 1868 he stood at the head of a committee to help the poor during a drought which almost produced a famine, and he allowed as a temporary measure the use of peas and beans in the Passover of that year. In 1875 he decided against the use of the Corfu Citron
Greek citron
The Greek citron variety of citrus medica was botanically classified by Adolf Engler as the "variety etrog". This is remarking on its major use for the Jewish ritual during Sukkot, due to its supposedly extraordinary natural beauty. It was also called Pitima, or the Cedro - Citron with a Pigolo -...
as Etrog
Etrog
Etrog refers to the yellow citron or Citrus medica used by Jews on the week-long holiday of Sukkot.While in modern Hebrew this is the name for any variety of citron, its English usage applies to those varieties and specimens used as one of the Four Species...
, because of the exorbitant price to which they had risen. In 1879 he arranged, through Prof. A. Harkavy, his former pupil, that three rabbis, Reuben of Dünaburg, Lipa Boslansky of Mir, and Elijah Eliezer Grodzenski of Vilna, should be added to the official rabbinical commission, which had thitherto consisted entirely of men of affairs and secular scholars.
Relations with the Russian government
Together with Rabbi Yisrael SalanterYisrael Salanter
Rabbi Yisroel Lipkin, better known as "Yisroel Salanter" or "Israel Salanter" , was the father of the Musar movement in Orthodox Judaism and a famed Rosh yeshiva and Talmudist...
, he bravely fought the harsh decrees of the Russian government and was active in confronting the numerous issues affecting Russian Jewry. Twice Spektor visited St. Petersburg to take part in the conferences held there to consider the situation of the Jews after the riots of 1881. During his second visit, in the summer of 1882, Kovno was partly destroyed by fire, and Spektor collected in the capital a large sum for those who had been ruined by the conflagration. He succeeded in his opposition to the proposed establishment of a new rabbinical school on the plan of those in Vilna and Zhitomir, but he failed in his attempt to induce the government to recognize as the real head of the Jewish communities the synagogue rabbi instead of the government rabbi, who was in reality only a civil functionary and a layman.
In 1889 Spektor was elected an honorary member of the Society for the Promotion of Culture Among the Jews of Russia
Society for the Promotion of Culture among the Jews of Russia
The Society for the Promotion of Culture among the Jews of Russia was a Learned society founded at Saint Petersburg, the Capital city The Russian Empire, in December 1863, by some of the most prominent Russian Jews, among which were Joseph Yozel Günzburg, who became president; his son Horace...
; in the same year he declared himself emphatically opposed to the proposed celebration of his rabbinical jubilee. His efforts to save the Volozhin yeshiva
Volozhin yeshiva
The Volozhin Yeshiva, also known as Etz Chaim Yeshiva, was a prestigious Lithuanian yeshiva located in the town of Volozhin, Russia, . It was founded by Rabbi Chaim Itzkovitz, a student of the famed Vilna Gaon, and trained several generations of scholars, rabbis, and leaders...
from being closed by the government proved unsuccessful, but his sponsorship of the institution known as "Kovnoer Perushim" assisted to provide a substitute. His other varied activities included participation in the Kovno kollel
Kovno kollel
The Kovno Kollel also known as Kollel Perushim of Kovno or Kollel Knesses Beis Yitzchok, was a kollel located in Kaunas, Lithuania. It was founded in 1877 by Rabbi Yisrael Lipkin Salanter when he was 67....
and membership of the Hovevei Zion
Hovevei Zion
Hovevei Zion , also known as Hibbat Zion , refers to organizations that are now considered the forerunners and foundation-builders of modern Zionism....
movement. He corresponded with the leading rabbis of western Europe, and was the anonymous friend who induced Samson Raphael Hirsch
Samson Raphael Hirsch
Samson Raphael Hirsch was a German rabbi best known as the intellectual founder of the Torah im Derech Eretz school of contemporary Orthodox Judaism...
to write Ueber die Beziehung des Talmuds zum Judenthum. In his later years he was revered by the Jews of Russia, and came to be considered the pre-eminent Halachic authority of his time; his death caused mourning in Orthodox communities throughout the world.
R. Yitzchak Elchanan died at Kovno on March 6, 1896. Various institutions were named after him, including the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary
Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary
Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary , or Yeshivat Rabbeinu Yitzchak Elchanan, is the rabbinical seminary of Yeshiva University, located in Washington Heights, New York. It is named after Rabbi Yitzchak Elchanan Spektor, who died the year it was founded, 1896...
(RIETS), part of Yeshiva University
Yeshiva University
Yeshiva University is a private university in New York City, with six campuses in New York and one in Israel. Founded in 1886, it is a research university ranked as 45th in the US among national universities by U.S. News & World Report in 2012...
. He had three sons: Chayyim, who was the son-in-law of R. Joseph Böhmer of Slutzk, and died in Kovno in 1874, aged forty; Benjamin Rabinovich; and Hirsch Rabinovich, who was maggid or preacher of Wilna, and later succeeded his father as rabbi of Kovno. An only daughter, named Rachel, died at an early age in 1876.
Works
Spektor was the author of the following works, which are considered authoritative by rabbinical scholars:- Be'er Yitzchak, (Königsberg, 1858), responsaResponsaResponsa comprise a body of written decisions and rulings given by legal scholars in response to questions addressed to them.-In the Roman Empire:Roman law recognised responsa prudentium, i.e...
- Ein Yitzchak, (part i., Wilna, 1889; part ii., ib. 1895), responsa
- Nachal Yitzchak, (part i., Wilna, 1872; part ii., ib. 1884), on parts of the Shulchan 'Aruk, Choshen Mishpat
External links
Yitzchak Spector is one of the four Rabbis featured in the "Heroes of the Torah" collectible series, along with R. Elizer Goldberg, A. Hildenseimer, and S.Y. Rabinovitch. See, e.g., http://www.spertusshop.org/heroes-of-the-torah-glasses-pr-345.html