Epitaph on Tombstone of Rabbi Eliezer Don Yahya in Ludza (Lutzin) |
צנא מלא ספרא
כלו ספרא מבעל —-מגזע רבני מחבר אבן שתיה הרב הגאון ר’ אליעזר בהרב ר’ שבתי דון יחייא
ויאסף אל עמיו ד’ ימים לחדש תמוז שנת תרפו
from the SefarimBlog
by Bezalel Naor
In 1901 there appeared in Vilna a 32-page booklet entitled, Ha-Tsiyoniyut mi-nekudat hashkafat ha-dat (Zionism from the Viewpoint of Religion). The author was Yehudah Don Yahya. The final eight pages of the work contain a supplement (Milu’im) by one Ben-Zion Vilner, criticizing the anti-Zionism of the Rebbe of Lubavitch. (One ventures that “Ben-Zion Vilner” is a pseudonym.)
What is remarkable about this manifesto that argues that Zionism is totally compatible with traditional Judaism, is that the author, Rabbi Yehudah Leib Don Yahya, was an intimate student of Rabbi Hayyim Soloveitchik, a most outspoken opponent of the Zionist movement.
To add to the intrigue, Don Yahya’s grandfather, Rabbi Shabtai Don Yahya of Drissa, had been an ardent Hasid of Rabbi Menahem Mendel of Lubavitch (known by his work of Halakhic responsa as “Tsemah Tsedek”). Yehudah Leib himself would go on to serve as rabbi of the Habad Hasidic community of Shklov. Although, as we shall see, within the Habad community, there were differing responses to Zionism along the fault line of the Kopyst—Lubavitch dispute.