Tag Archives: Warsaw

Jew of the Week: Temerl Sonnenberg Bergson

Europe’s Greatest Jewish Businesswoman

Tamar “Temerl” bat Avraham of Opoczno (c. 1765-1830) was born in Poland to a wealthy and deeply religious Jewish family. She married young, but her first husband tragically died soon after. She got remarried to a young businessman named Dov Ber (“Berek”) Zbytkower. He went on to become immensely wealthy, and supplied the Polish and Russian armies. He took on the last name “Sonnenberg”, and was nicknamed the “Polish Rothschild”. Meanwhile, besides being a devoted mother of six children, Temerl was busy supporting the nascent Hasidic movement, founded just a few decades earlier by the Baal Shem Tov. Temerl played a huge role in bringing Hasidism to Poland. In fact, she financed the construction of Warsaw’s first Hasidic synagogue. She paid the salaries of numerous Hasidic rabbis in Poland (along with non-Hasidic rabbis), including the great Simcha Bunim of Peshischa. Temerl was a huge philanthropist and gave to all kinds of other causes as well. In 1818 alone, she donated some 54,000 rubles to Polish charities. After her husband passed away, Temerl took over his business. (In honour of their father, her children changed their last name to “Berekson”, or “Bergson”, which is why she came to be known as Temerl Bergson, too.) She also founded her own new bank. Temerl was one of the top businesswomen in all of Europe at the time. She was so influential that the Russian government gave her special permission to buy an estate, making her only the third Jew to own property outside the ghettos. She continued to do everything she could to assist the plight of the Jews. In 1824, she used her influence to rescind a government decree against Jewish pilgrimages. In fact, some Hasidic leaders came to refer to her as Reb Temerl! (A title traditionally reserved for men.) In her will, she left 300,000 zlotys to charity. Temerl was called the “Polish Hasidah”, and her tombstone states: “To her nation she was a protector against oppression—a helper during distress. To the poor she was a mother. She was a virtuous woman, powerful and famous.” The renowned philosopher and Nobel laureate Henri Bergson was her great-grandson.

Chanukah Begins Sunday Night – Chag Sameach!

18 Incredibly Brave Women in Jewish History

Archaeologists Find 2200-Year-Old Coins Confirming Chanukah

The Peruvian Villager Who Led Hundreds to Convert to Judaism

When Jews & Greeks Were Brothers: The Untold Story of Chanukah

Words of the Week

The Sabbath is the day we focus on the things that have value but not a price, when we neither work nor employ others to do our work, when we neither buy nor sell, in which all manipulation of nature for creative ends is forbidden and all hierarchies of power or wealth are suspended.
Rabbi Jonathan Sacks

Jews of the Week: Nathan, Benzion and Yoni Netanyahu

Nathan Mileikowsky (1879-1935) was born in what is now Belarus to an Orthodox Jewish family descended from the great Vilna Gaon. When he was ten, he joined the famous Volozhin yeshiva and after eight years of diligent study was ordained as a rabbi. During this time he became drawn to Zionism and soon dedicated his time to the Zionist cause. He traveled across Europe, Russia, and later the United States to raise support for Zionism – becoming one of the world’s most popular Zionist speakers – as well as to raise money for the Jewish National Fund. In 1920, Mileikowsky made aliyah to Israel. He headed a school in Rosh Pina, promoted settlement of the Galilee, and wrote articles for the Hebrew press – often under the pen name “Netanyahu”. He continued to tour globally, at one point giving over 700 lectures in under 9 months, and publishing some of these talks in a popular book. Towards the end of his life, Mileikowsky settled in Herzliya and established a farm.

Benzion Netanyahu

Benzion Netanyahu

His son, Benzion Mileikowsky (1910-2012), was born in Warsaw while Nathan was head of its Hebrew Gymnasium. Growing up in Israel, he adopted his father’s pen name “Netanyahu”. Benzion studied at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, taking on a more hard-line approach to Zionism. He became editor of a number of Zionist newspapers, and later the chief editor of the Encyclopaedia Hebraica. In 1940, Benzion moved to New York to build American support for the Jewish state, serving as executive director of an American Zionist group. Later on, he became a professor of Judaic studies and medieval history at Cornell University. Benzion published five books on Jewish history, and edited a number of others. His three sons are: Iddo, a doctor and author; Benjamin, Israel’s longest-serving prime minister; and Yoni, the eldest son.

Last known photograph of Yoni Netanyahu

Last known photograph of Yoni Netanyahu

Yonatan “Yoni” Netanyahu (1946-1976) was born in New York, went to high school in Pennsylvania, and studied at Harvard. He first enlisted in the IDF in 1964, and fought in the Six-Day War, getting wounded while rescuing a soldier behind enemy lines. A few years later, he joined Israel’s special forces unit, Sayeret Matkal, and by 1972 became its deputy commander. For his heroic service during the 1973 Yom Kippur War he was awarded a distinguished medal. In 1976, now commander of Sayeret Matkal, Yoni led Operation Entebbe, successfully rescuing over 100 Israeli hostages held in Uganda. Sadly, Yoni was the mission’s sole casualty, and passed away during the flight back home. In 1980, his personal letters were published, and were described as a “remarkable work of literature”. Both a film and play have recently been made about his life.

Words of the Week

God treats a person the same way they treat their children.
– Rabbi Shlomo of Karlin

Jew of the Week: Rabbi Menachem Ziemba

Rabbi of the Warsaw Ghetto

Rabbi Menachem Ziemba

Rabbi Menachem Ziemba

Menachem Ziemba (1883-1943) was born in a Warsaw suburb in Poland, and raised by his grandfather, a Hasidic rabbi. As a young man, Ziemba quickly proved himself as a genius Torah scholar and Hasidic master. By 18, he was already married, and for the next few decades was wholly dedicated to Jewish studies, writing over 10,000 pages of his Torah-related thoughts, and teaching at the Mesivta Yeshiva. Out of both humility and devotion to Torah, he refused to take on more prestigious roles of rabbinic leadership, including an offer at being Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem. However, in 1935, at the request of his own rabbi, Ziemba started taking on community roles and obligations. He soon became world-renowned for his wisdom and took up a key position with Agudas Yisroel, the central organization of Ashkenazi-Orthodox Jews. Following the Nazi invasion of Poland, Ziemba was quarantined in the Warsaw Ghetto along with 400,000 Jews, in an area less than one and a half square miles. Despite the fact that he lost his wife in the Ghetto, Rabbi Ziemba constantly worked towards inspiring hope and optimism among the Jews. He laboured tirelessly to ensure that Jews could continue observing Torah law in the Ghetto, smuggling in provisions (including Kosher for Passover goods) and religious articles, secretly setting up areas of Torah study, and continuing to teach Judaism quietly. He even broke through his own apartment roof so that he could build a proper sukkah for the community. Rabbi Ziemba was given multiple opportunities to leave the Ghetto (including one by the Catholic Church) but refused to abandon his people. Though initially favouring passive resistance, after the 1942 deportations that killed hundreds of thousands of Jews, Rabbi Ziemba was convinced that the Jews had to fight back. He was an important supporter of the 1943 Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, and was himself the first to donate funds in order to purchase weapons. To quell the uprising, the Nazis began destroying the Ghetto and burning it down. Rabbi Ziemba was caught in one of these fires, and shot by SS troops while trying to escape. To great shock and sadness, he was killed on the 19th of Nisan, 72 years ago today. Following the uprising, the rest of his family was rounded up and taken to Treblinka, where they were also killed. The vast majority of his writings and teachings were burned in the Warsaw Ghetto, though three books survived, and are still studied today. In 1958, Rabbi Ziemba’s body was exhumed and brought to Israel, where he was finally laid to rest.

Words of the Week

In the past, during religious persecution, we were required by the law ‘to give up our lives even for the least essential practice.’ In the present, however, when we are faced with an arch-enemy whose unparalleled ruthlessness and program of total annihilation know no bounds, Halakha [Jewish law] demands that we fight and resist to the very end with unequaled determination and valor for the sake of Sanctification of the Divine Name.
– Rabbi Menachem Ziemba