Yechiel Michel Feinstein

Yechiel Michel Feinstein (27 June 1906 – 17 May 2003) was a Haredi rabbi and rosh yeshiva in Israel and the United States.

Biography

Yechiel Michel Feinstein was born to Avrohom Yitzchok Feinstein in the town of Uzda, Lithuania, a town near Minsk, Belarus, then part of the Russian empire. He was orphaned of his father at the age of seven and went to live with and learn from his grandfather, Dovid Feinstein, the rabbi of Starobin Belarus. It was there that Yechiel Michel developed a close relationship with his uncles, rabbis Mordechai Feinstein and Moshe Feinstein.

From a young age, he was recognized as a prodigy. He was sent to Slutsk after his bar mitzvah to study under Isser Zalman Meltzer.

When the Bolsheviks revolted, the yeshiva was forced to flee from Lithuania to Kletsk, Poland. During his three years in Kletsk, Feinstein attended the famed Talmudic lectures of Rabbi Meltzer and his son-in-law, Rabbi Aharon Kotler. Then he transferred to the Mir yeshiva, where he became a leading student of Yeruchom Lebovitz and learned together with Yechiel Michel Schlesinger, future rosh yeshiva of Yeshivas Kol Torah in Jerusalem, and Yonah Karpilow of Minsk, who was killed in the Holocaust and whose ''Yonas Eilem'' was published posthumously. At this time, Chaim Shmuelevitz and Aryeh Leib Malin also studied in the Mir yeshiva. Despite being surrounding by notable scholars of the Torah, Feinstein was nonetheless thought of as "the genius of the yeshiva".

At the behest of his former teacher, Meltzer, Feinstein traveled to Brisk to study under the illustrious Yitzchok Zev Soloveitchik. It did not take long for Feinstein to earn his reputation as the genius in the Brisk yeshiva as well. However, during this time, he became eligible for conscription into the army, so he traveled to Grodno to obtain fake medical forms from a doctor and en route, consulted with Yisrael Meir Kagan (the Chofetz Chaim) in Radin about evading the army. Upon their meeting, Kagan was impressed by Feinstein's broad knowledge of Nezikin, Nashim, and Kodoshim. Feinstein stayed in Grodno for half a year, where he learned from Shimon Shkop. He afterwards returned to Brisk to continue studying under Soloveitchik, spending the summer months and the month of Elul at the Mir yeshivas. When World War II broke out, he traveled to Vilna with other students from the Mir to hear lectures from the Soloveitchik. Whilst in Vilna, Feinstein was lavishly praised by the leading ''posek'' of the generation, Chaim Ozer Grodzensky.

From Vilna Feinstein joined the Mir Yeshiva in exile in Japan, while helping other refugees escape the horrors of the Holocaust. Eventually, he arrived in the United States in 1941 with Aharon Kotler. While the latter opened a yeshiva in Lakewood, New Jersey (Beth Medrash Govoha), Feinstein served as ''mashgiach'' for Joseph B. Soloveitchik in Boston. Less than a year later, his uncle, Moshe Feinstein, summoned him to serve at his side as the head of Mesivtha Tifereth Jerusalem in the Lower East Side, Manhattan. During this time, he gained fame for his Talmudic lectures. He was appointed a member of the Agudas HaRabbonim and assisted the Vaad Hatzolah in rescuing Jews and aiding the war refugees in Europe.

Israel

In 1946, Feinstein visited Palestine. He immediately reunited with his former teacher Soloveitchik in Jerusalem, and married his daughter, Lifsha, in August of that year. Isser Zalman Meltzer officiated at the wedding. Following his marriage, he continued serving in the capacity of rosh yeshiva in America until 1952, when he and his family immigrated to Israel and he established Yeshivas Beis Yehuda in Tel Aviv. He consulted regularly with the Chazon Ish in Bnei Brak on important issues.

In 1973, the death of one of his daughters prompted Feinstein to move to Bnei Brak. In 1984, he inaugurated a new yeshiva building where he lectured to unmarried and married students, as well as gave ''shiurim'' in his home.

He died on Saturday night, 17 May 2003 (16 Iyar 5763) and was eulogized in both Bnei Brak and Jerusalem before being buried at Har HaMenuchos near the grave of his father-in-law, Yitzchok Zev Soloveitchik. He was survived by his wife, sons Chaim Feinstein and Dovid Feinstein, both rosh yeshivas at Beis Yehuda, and Avrohom Feinstein, and a son-in-law, Tzvi Kaplan, a rosh yeshiva in Jerusalem. His wife Lifsha died in October 2008.

Works

His only written works to have been publicly published were his novellae to the Talmudic tractate Kerisos which are printed in the back of the new editions of his father-in-law's novallee to that tractate. Other works of his were retained privately. More recently his family has published his works on most of the Talmud..

Family tree

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Feinstein, Yechiel Michel
20th-century American rabbis
20th-century Israeli rabbis
Rosh yeshivas
Haredi rabbis in Israel
1906 births
2003 deaths