Postcard sent to Rabbi Yosef Haim Zonenfeld by the Va’ad for the Celebration of the Rogachover’s Yovel. Dunaburg ...

Postcard sent to Rabbi Yosef Haim Zonenfeld by the Va’ad for the Celebration of the Rogachover’s Yovel. Dunaburg (Daugavpils), 1929.

Postcard from the Va’ad for the Celebration of the Rogachover’s (Rabbi Yosef Rosin shlita) Yovel, sent to Rabbi Yosef Haim Zonenfeld. This postcard is a follow-up postcard to leaflets sent by the committee, and the biographer of Rogachover, Rabbi Yair Borochov, writes - "An incredibly valuable national holiday.” At a time when the Rogachover’s name became known all over the Jewish world, tens of thousands of complicated halakhic questions were sent to him from various places, to which the genius replied on the same day.

This fact made the genius the actual "judge of the generation" and the most dominant figure who influenced the entire world of Torah and Halacha in that generation. An interesting affair resulted, a "Kol Koreh" produced in 1929, which marked the fortieth anniversary of Rogachev's tenure as rabbi of Dvinsk, from which it appears that a special committee was established to make this day a "valuable national holiday." The Kol Koreh was sent to Jewish communities and they were requested to mark this important event, using the following language: “In a short time the Gaon Rabbi Yosef Rosin (known as the Rogachover) will complete 40 years of service…in our city of Dvinsk…whoever has not heard about his genius, famous throughout the Jewish diaspora for his knowledge of the Yerushalmi and Bavli talmuds…for the kiyum of mitzvot and respect for elders, this elder made a kinyan on the Torah, wisdom, and knowledge here in Dvinsk, gather together to celebrate this Yovel and make a national holiday. Later the Va’ad requests anyone capable to help set up a public institution in his name and published all of his writings. In an additional letter sent by members of the committee to Jewish communities, they requested they set up such committees in their own towns for this holiday, and to put together celebrations to mark the important event.

Both letters were signed by the head of the committee, Leib Zelkind, and the secretary Mordechai Weitenberg. As far as was known, this initiative did not gain momentum, perhaps due to the events of the turbulent period in the whole world. This postcard completes the puzzle—the committee is forced to delay the celebrations and send notice to the Jewish communities who received the first messages. Instead, the committee asks that they fund the publication of the genius' books, and perhaps that was the goal in the first place… On the addressee label of the postcard is listed the English name of Rabbi Yosef Haim Zonenfeld, Palestine, Jerusalem.

9.5x14cm, very good condition.