Profile of a Chassid from the generation of founders of Tomchei T’mimim in Lubavitch, the Gaon and Chassid, Rabbi Yisroel Noach Blinitzky, the mashpia who served as an outstanding role model for the T’mimim.
The Chassid, R’ Yisroel Noach Blinitzky, was born at the end of Nissan 5643/1883 to R’ Efraim Ber and Mrs. Chana Blinitzky, in the town of Kurin in the Konotop district of Russia (now Ukraine). His parents were Chassidim of the Tzemach Tzedek and the Maharash, and they named their son for a son of the Tzemach Tzedek, R’ Yisroel Noach of Niezhin, who passed away on the first day of Chol HaMoed Pesach that year.
R’ Yisroel Noach and his brothers were considered geniuses in learning. In their youth they were already knowledgeable in all of Shas. R’ Yisroel Noach himself would say that he and his brothers would go home for the Pesach break, and in their free time they would sit and learn Gemara together as their mother stood off to the side and listened with great enjoyment.
When he was fourteen, he attended the wedding of the Rebbe Rayatz. Many years later when the Rebbe asked him to print the hemshech “Sameiach Tisamach 5657,” a series of maamarim that were said for the Rebbe Rayatz’s wedding, he asked him to write details of what he saw at the wedding.
In Cheshvan 5661, when he was seventeen, he was accepted into Yeshivas Tomchei T’mimim in Lubavitch. He learned there and basked in the rays of the Rebbe Rashab for two years. The first maamer that he heard was on Shabbos, Parshas VaYeira, “V’Hu Omeid Aleihem,” and he lived with this maamer his entire life.
In Lubavitch he acquired the nickname, “Yisroel Noach HaGadol,” since in yeshiva there was another bachur named Yisroel Noach (Chatzkavitz, may Hashem avenge his blood) who was nicknamed Yisroel Noach HaKattan. The nickname “HaGadol” was given to him because he was tall and some say it was because of his greatness in Torah and Chassidus.
R’ Yisroel Noach was possessed of a warm heart and was a very emotional person. His bedtime Shma was so emotional that sometimes he fainted. A short while later he would rouse himself and continue reading with great sobbing. And yet, he would daven Shacharis with a minyan the next day.
The great effort required to recite the Shma for hours affected his health. The Rebbe Rashab found out and told him that from then on, his personal avoda did not need to focus on the avoda of t’filla but on learning. He did so and was extremely diligent in both Nigleh and Chassidus. His diligence and knowledge were legendary to the point that the Rebbe Rashab said about him that you could rely on his first impressions on a given topic.
As for his genius, the story is told that one time Rashbatz tested him. Rashbatz was the mashpia in the yeshiva and a distinguished Chassid. During the exam, R’ Yisroel Noach explained something said by the Maharsha and when he finished, Rashbatz asked him, “What does it mean at the end where the Maharsha writes ‘v’dochek k’tzas’?” R’ Yisroel Noach immediately launched into seven questions on this explanation of the Maharsha, which is why the Maharsha ended as he did. Rashbatz was amazed by R’ Yisroel Noach’s genius and he rose and kissed him on the forehead.
His grandson, R’ Yosef Yitzchok Gansburg, relates that his grandfather received a number of horaos from the Rebbe Rashab about learning Chassidus. He once asked whether he could learn the works of other Chassidic schools and the Rebbe replied that Likkutei Torah contains everything. The Rebbe also told him not to learn Chassidus according to topics as is done in Nigleh, but to learn it in the order it appears in the sifrei maamarim.
The Rebbe Rashab referred to R’ Yisroel Noach as “outstanding among his fellow T’mimim.” It is told that one time, before Sukkos, R’ Yisroel Noach was covering the sukka with s’chach together with friends. The Rebbe Rashab and Rebbetzin were watching from the window. The Rebbe said to the Rebbetzin while pointing at R’ Yisroel Noach, “You see? He covers it differently than the others.”
R’ Yechiel Kalmanson writes in his book that one time the Rebbe Rashab said to R’ Yisroel Noach, “At times you are a beinoni.”
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R’ Yisroel Noach learned in Tomchei T’mimim from 5661 to 5663. Then he became engaged to Shterna, the daughter of the Chassid, R’ Yitzchok Yaffe, who was known by Chassidim as R’ Itche Dissner for his hometown.
Before the shidduch was finalized, the parents of the chassan and kalla met. The meeting took place in Lubavitch. His future father-in-law had yechidus and told the Rebbe Rashab about the suggestion to take R’ Yisroel Noach as his son-in-law. The Rebbe Rashab approved the suggestion. R’ Itche asked the Rebbe about R’ Yisroel Noach and the Rebbe said, “When he sits alone in a room he also has fear of G-d.”
After this praise that was said about the bachur in the Rebbe’s room, the shidduch was immediately finalized. The couple married not long afterward.
The young couple wanted to settle in Dissna where the kalla’s parents lived but they had no money to rent a house there. The Chassid R’ Boruch Yosef Kozliner came to their aid. He was a close friend of the kalla’s father and he arranged living quarters in his courtyard where the couple lived for a long time.
The couple had a store that sold legumes which his wife had started before she married. After Shacharis, which took several hours, R’ Yisroel Noach would go to the store to help his wife. Many of the customers would wait for him because he was exceedingly careful with the weight and always added extra.
After he married, he still went to the Rebbe Rashab every Tishrei. He would leave home on Rosh Chodesh Elul and would make the long trip, arriving by Rosh HaShana.
A few years after their wedding, they moved to Kremenchug in the Ukraine where many Chassidim lived.
They had six children: Aharon Yosef, Mendel, Yitzchok, Chaya (Majeski), and Rivka (Gansburg) and another daughter who died in childhood.
R’ Yisroel Noach excelled in mathematics and he made a living from being a bookkeeper. For a long time he worked as a treasurer and accountant for a tobacco factory belonging to the Chassid, R’ Tzvi Gurary. They say that one day R’ Yisroel Noach left the factory carrying a large sum of money. Robbers, who apparently knew his routine, pounced upon him and demanded the money but he felt a great responsibility for the money, which wasn’t his, and he ignored their threats. They began to beat him but he fought them off. When they realized that he wasn’t going to give in easily, they ran away.
This event generated much respect among the factory workers. It also became known to the local authorities who esteemed him greatly for this. When the communists confiscated R’ Tzvi Gurary’s factory and turned it into government property, they left R’ Yisroel Noach in his position of accountant as a sign of their esteem for his courage and responsibility.
Despite all the work he did, it did not diminish his learning of Chassidus. He himself once said, “There is not a stone on the road from my house to the factory that I did not think Chassidus as I walked over it.”
After the communist revolution, all yeshivos throughout Russia were closed down. Yeshivas Tomchei T’mimim had to go underground. The yeshiva was divided into many divisions that were scattered throughout many cities. The bachurim learned in hiding places and in small groups. The persecution and surveillance of underground yeshivos caused some of the yeshivos to move constantly from place to place. If someone who taught Torah was caught, he was exiled and some were even killed.
Although R’ Yisroel Noach had an official position and made a good living, he continued to run the yeshiva in Kremenchug with great sacrifice for a number of years. As the menahel, he had to find hiding places for the bachurim, pay for clothing, food, and places to sleep. He also made time to test the bachurim every Shabbos. The division in Kremenchug at that time had about a hundred talmidim.
His good friend from the time they learned together in Lubavitch, the Chassid R’ Meir Gurkow, describes this work in his memoirs:
“At that time, he was burdened with work at the tobacco factory belonging to the wealthy, R’ Tzvi Gurary, and he stayed in this job even after the factory was confiscated by the communists. But R’ Yisroel Noach, despite being preoccupied with his work, used his remaining strength to maintain this yeshiva. The other T’mimim also supported him. Every Shabbos, I would go to another shul to speak on behalf of the yeshiva, but the small amount we collected was never enough for all the yeshiva’s needs.”
R’ Gurkow goes on to write how R’ Yisroel Noach sent him to collect money for the yeshiva in different towns throughout the Soviet Union.
Another fundraiser that he appointed was the Chassid, R’ Chaim Nisselevitz. His travels weakened him and he returned home sick and he had to stop. His wife gave birth to a daughter and during the birth she fell sick and was in critical condition. R’ Yisroel Noach went to visit them and he said to Mrs. Nisselevitz, “If you allow your husband to continue raising money, I bless you that you will recover.” She gave her consent and her husband took to the road again to collect money for the yeshiva. A short while later she had a full recovery which was miraculous.
R’ Sholom Ber Labkowski, rosh kollel in Kfar Chabad, relates:
“The yeshiva’s financial state was precarious and R’ Yisroel Noach borrowed money from the factory account where he worked. One day, the factory workers found out that in a short time a government committee would be coming to inspect the financial running of the factory. R’ Yisroel Noach was afraid that during the inspection they would discover that the coffers were empty. The factory workers, gentiles, who loved him because of his warm treatment of them, quickly took out whatever money they had with them. They filled up the coffers again until the inspection was over.”
One of the talmidim of the yeshiva at the time was the Chassid, R’ Michel Rappaport. He later related how the talmidim of the yeshiva found out about the arrest and release of the Rebbe Rayatz:
“On Rosh Chodesh Tammuz 1927, I was about thirteen and I went to the yeshiva in Kremenchug … the learning was done in secret so the Yevsektzia wouldn’t know about it. They came a number of times to check.
“When I arrived at yeshiva, the Rebbe was in prison but we talmidim were not informed of this fact … until one Friday, R’ Yisroel Noach, the menahel, came at eleven in the morning and we saw him enter the shul and kiss R’ Shmuel Leib Levin and only then did we all find out that the Rebbe had been freed. The next day there was a big kiddush.”
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By request of the Rebbe Rayatz, the Chassidim in the Soviet Union were asked to write about the mikvaos in their cities. On 17 Av 1928, R’ Yisroel Noach wrote a coded letter to the Rebbe in which he described the mikva in Kremenchug:
“There is no mikva at all and in order to form a group to learn this tractate [of mikvaos, i.e. to build one] we need to learn with them at least thirty days [i.e. a sum of money equaling thirty is needed] and then the rest will build on their own.” In that letter he also wrote about the mikvaos in two neighboring towns.
Even during those crazy times, he continued writing to the Rebbe Rayatz and he received replies with wondrous content, which express a very deep and heartfelt connection. Some of the answers are printed in the Rebbe Rayatz’s Igros Kodesh.
In recalling those days in Kremenchug, R’ Hershel Abramov related:
“When I was a boy, there were eleven shuls in Kremenchug, two of which were Chabad. One was called the ‘small Chabad,’ and the other was called the ‘big Chabad.’ The yeshiva was located in the big Chabad.
“Every Motzaei Shabbos there was a Melaveh Malka in the home of one of the Chassidim, with nearly forty Chassidim in attendance. These meals had a special atmosphere since they were attended by all the great Chassidim who lived in the city and in nearby Korokiv. Among the regular participants were: the brothers R’ Berke, R’ Dovid Leib, and R’ Avrohom Aharon Chein, R’ Dovid Gurchaber, R’ Shimon Levin, and others. The main speaker was R’ Yisroel Noach.
“In 5690, the government closed down Yeshivas Tomchei T’mimim and during the years that followed they closed many shuls, including the two Chabad shuls. The Chassidim were undeterred and they procured a room in the ‘Yurovsky’ shul where the Chabad minyan took place.
“My internal ‘image’ of Kremenchug is definitely Simchas Torah in the Yurovsky shul. The night of Simchas Torah, after Maariv, everyone went to R’ Yisroel Noach’s home where they farbrenged. R’ Yisroel Noach Blinitzky spoke on topics of Chassidus until midnight and then hakafos began.
“R’ Yisroel Noach suffered greatly from pains in his feet. One year, his family decided to prevent him from dancing hakafos so his pain would not get worse. When it came time for hakafos, his sons took hold of him and said, ‘Father, don’t go to dance since you suffer so much.’ They held him forcibly by his gartel and did not let him go and dance. He suddenly flung off the gartel, slipped out of their hands and joined the dancers with great joy. He said, ‘On Simchas Torah, Hashem provides other kochos.’ He danced and danced energetically like a young bachur until the end of hakafos.”
R’ Yaakov Krichevsky adds:
“I learned in the public school in Kremenchug. During recess, they gave out sandwiches with broiled meat to the children. Of course I did not eat the treif food and in order not to starve I would slip out of the schoolyard and go to R’ Yisroel Noach Blinitzky’s house, for he lived nearby. There I would eat a slice of bread and had a cup of milk that was watered own due to the poverty in his home. Thanks to R’ Yisroel Noach and his wife Shterna, I wasn’t hungry during the day.”
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World War II. The Germans conquered more and more parts of the Ukraine. R’ Yisroel Noach and many other Chassidim fled Kremenchug. After much wearying travel they arrived in Samarkand in Uzbekistan which was far from the hostilities.
R’ Yisroel Noach’s impressive spiritual stature won the hearts of the Chassidim in Samarkand and he became one of the main speakers at farbrengens. R’ Meir Gurkow describes this in his book:
“All the young married men strengthened themselves in having set times to learn Nigleh and Chassidus; nobody was absent. At certain times they farbrenged with brotherly love and they strengthened one another to be involved in Torah and avoda. They were all happy with their lot. The brachos that were wished when drinking l’chaim were always the same – that Hashem should help us see the Rebbe again. Leading them was the famous R’ Yisroel Noach Blinitzky. Although he was old and weak, his heart was always aroused and they treated him with respect.”
R’ Sholom Dovber Butman of Tel Aviv also remembered him from Samarkand:
“In Samarkand, R’ Yisroel Noach was considered a special personality. Until today I remember the time I brought him shalach manos when I was a child. The table in the foyer was full of mishloach manos that everyone sent him since he was considered one of the great Chassidim.
“When the Chassidim arrived in Samarkand, secret minyanim were arranged in different homes of Chassidim. The Minyan, with capital letters, was in R’ Yisroel Noach’s house and was called, Yisroel Noach’s Minyan. R’ Nissan Nemanov, the mashpia, davened there, as did R’ Yehuda Chitrik. R’ Yisroel Noach’s house was small with just two rooms. In one room was a weaving machine which supported the family and the minyanim took place in the other room.
“In Samarkand, R’ Yisroel Noach also started secret yeshivos and he was an active member of the chevra kadisha and the bikkur cholim that were started for the many refugees.
“During the war years there were tremendous shortages and sickness spread. Aside from that, rumors of the atrocities against the Jews began to circulate. This was on the mind of every Chassid, but R’ Yisroel Noach, who was every inch a Chassid, had entirely different thoughts. As the mashpia, R’ Mendel Futerfas, related, ‘During one of the war years the Chassidim in Samarkand farbrenged in honor of 12 Tammuz. It was a particularly warm farbrengen and everyone drank a lot of mashke.
“‘I saw the Chassid R’ Yisroel Noach was exhausted. He lay down in a corner to rest. When I looked at him, I noticed that he was deep in contemplative thought. He was usually very quiet and a p’nimi who did not speak about himself at all, but since I saw that he had taken a lot of mashke, I realized this was an opportunity to penetrate the world of this p’nimius’dike Chassid. I went over to him and asked, ‘Yisroel Noach, what are you thinking about now? What’s on your mind?’ He looked at me with his wise eyes and brokenheartedly said, ‘I am thinking about my life and trying to find even one time that I had a genuine thought of repentance.’”
At the end of the war, like many other Chassidim, R’ Yisroel Noach wanted to cross the border out of the Soviet Union. On his way to Lvov he passed through Tashkent which also had many refugees. For many there wasn’t anywhere to stay. R’ Yisroel Noach and his family were hosted by R’ Shmuel Galperin, a friend from the yeshiva in Lubavitch.
After a long journey they arrived in Lvov where they waited until they could join one of the groups smuggling over the border. The entire family had false documents stating they were Polish citizens. Each of them had to study and review their new names as written on their passports so that the border control inspection would go smoothly.
R’ Yechezkel Brod relates:
“A problem cropped up during the inspection when the soldier read the Polish name of the Chassid, R’ Yisroel Noach Blinitzky, and he forgot the new Polish name. But he knew to keep quiet. When the border guard asked him angrily why he didn’t answer, one of Anash explained, while circling his finger near his forehead, that he was not normal. He miraculously passed the inspection.”
He arrived in Paris together with other Chassidim and lived there for a few years.
A Tomchei T’mimim yeshiva was founded in Brunoy, near Paris, at the end of 5707. In addition to the staff that ran the yeshiva, the Rebbe Rayatz appointed a Vaad Ruchni and a Vaad Gashmi. R’ Yisroel Noach was given an important job in each.
In a letter, the Rebbe Rayatz wrote, “ … I hereby appoint as the spiritual administrative committee to Yeshivas Tomchei T’mimim in Paris my esteemed friends … R’ Avrohom Eliyahu Plotkin - director, R’ Nachum Shemaryahu Sasonkin, R’ Yisroel Noach Blinitzky, R’ Shlomo Chaim Kesselman, R’ Betzalel Wilschansky - deputies.
“As to an administrative committee to oversee financial and material matters, I hereby appoint my esteemed friends … R’ Yisroel Noach Blinitzky – director, R’ Peretz Mochkin, R’ Isser Kluvgant, R’ Chaikel Chanin, R’ Yisroel Leibov, R’ Chaim Minkowitz, R’ Shmuel Betzalel Altheus, R’ Bundevitz – deputies.”
The yeshiva actually had an organized administration and the two committees that were formed were supposed to help the hanhala with its work. In his role on the vaad ruchni, R’ Yisroel Noach would go from Paris (where he continued to live at first) in order to test the talmidim. In his role on the vaad gashmi, he would take care of the yeshiva’s bookkeeping and he did so even when he reached a ripe old age.
Many talmidim of the yeshiva remember how every day, R’ Nissan Nemanov, the mashpia and menahel of the yeshiva, would go to R’ Yisroel Noach’s house and talk to him for a long time. Many did not know that during this time they would calculate all the expenses and income of the yeshiva. Despite their spiritual greatness, they were involved in material matters with the utmost bittul since this is what the Rebbe wanted.
Years later, he moved from Paris to Brunoy and then the talmidim saw him every day, such that his unique persona served as a role model of a true Chassid.
His many talmidim attest that his davening inspired them tremendously:
“He davened with a niggun and with such sweetness,” they say. When davening was over in the yeshiva zal, he went to his room where he continued learning Chassidus. His davening was interspersed with a special tune, the well-known Pilpul Niggun, and now and then he would stop and sing, continue and cry. He did this for a long time every morning, and his davening became a byword among the talmidim to the point that they recorded it.
One of his grandsons, R’ Chaim Blinitzky of Kfar Chabad, said that he once recorded his grandfather’s davening. The recording was copied and distributed among the family and talmidim who say that every time they listen to his davening, they feel a special inner inspiration.
We can learn about R’ Yisroel Noach’s character from what the Chassid, R’ Tzvi Hirsch Katz, a talmid in Brunoy, said:
“This is what the perfect person looks like: He has the head of R’ Avrohom Eliyahu Plotkin, the heart of R’ Yisroel Noach Blinitzky, and the bittul of R’ Nissan Nemanov.”
Although R’ Yisroel Noach was one of the leading speakers at farbrengens in Kremenchug and Samarkand for years, he did not farbreng for the talmidim in Brunoy. He would sit next to R’ Nissan Nemanov with utter bittul and did not speak, even though he was older than R’ Nissan.
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He had a busy daily schedule. His Shacharis took several hours and then he sat and learned Gemara and Mishnayos and sifrei Chassidus.
Whoever knew R’ Yisroel Noach said he learned Shas and Mishnayos assiduously. He finished Shas more than ten times and as far as how many times he completed Mishnayos, his talmidim and relatives have different numbers, but all agree it was dozens of times.
R’ Sholom Dovber Butman once dared to ask him how many times he completed Mishnayos and he answered, “Fifty times.” When R’ Butman repeated this to R’ Yisroel Noach’s son, R’ Aharon Yosef, he smiled and said, “My father doesn’t like to remember how many times he finished but it’s definitely more than fifty.” It’s important to note that R’ Butman left France about thirty years before R’ Yisroel Noach passed away so he must have completed it many more times.
When he would say T’hillim for a sick person or for some difficult situation, he would say it while sobbing. Sometimes he finished the book of T’hillim three times in a row. His son R’ Itche said that during the years that he learned in yeshivos out of town, he would return home only once every several months. One time, he returned home for Chol HaMoed Sukkos. The night of Hoshana Rabba he heard quiet sobbing in the middle of the night. He was very frightened for there were no little children in the house and he did not know who was crying. He got out of bed and walked in the direction of the sound until he saw his father saying T’hillim and crying.
R’ Yisroel Noach was a personal role model for the talmidim of the yeshiva. When his oldest son, R’ Aharon Yosef, once had yechidus with the Rebbe and asked, in his father’s name, for permission to move to Eretz Yisroel, the Rebbe said, “Why does it bother him to stay in the yeshiva? When he walks into the zal he adds yiras Shamayim to the T’mimim.”
A past talmid of the yeshiva in Brunoy, R’ Yosef Yitzchok Gurevitch, presently a mashpia in the yeshiva in Migdal HaEmek, spoke about this personal example for the talmidim:
“When I was a boy, there were times that we learned together with the bachurim in the yeshiva. R’ Yisroel Noach would always come in for a few minutes before Maariv and would learn at a table near where I sat. One time, he saw that some of the children began talking instead of learning in the final minutes of the session. He told them it was time to learn now. There was an impudent talmid who defended himself by saying that only one minute was left till the end of the learning session. R’ Yisroel Noach immediately said, ‘In one minute you can review in thought the entire order of the hishtalshlus.’”
Due to his old age and infirmity he did not travel to the Rebbe, but he was mekushar to the Rebbe in a unique fashion. We can learn what hiskashrus is from the conversations he would have with those who just came back from 770. These conversations were a source of tremendous excitement for him.
The Chassid R’ Bentzion Grossman often visited Brunoy for his work. He spoke about another important aspect of R’ Yisroel Noach’s conduct:
“He was very particular about all the daily mitzvos, to do them with enthusiasm and great feeling, as though he was doing them for the first time in his life. He was careful about davening with a minyan, the birchos ha’nehenin and answering amen. He did all this with great concentration.”
R’ Yitzchok Goldberg, rosh yeshiva of Tomchei T’mimim in Migdal HaEmek, said:
“Whoever heard his ‘amen yehei shmei rabba’ knew that each time it was special. Each time anew you could see on his face and hear in his voice a unique excitement. There is a well-known anecdote that the Rebbe Rashab said about him that his ‘amen yehei shmei rabba’ pierces all the heavens.”
As far as his exactitude in everything, especially halacha, his family tells that when his wife passed away, it was decided she would be buried in Eretz Yisroel. However, at that time, there was a strike at France’s international airline, Air France, and her burial was postponed. Everyone wanted to see R’ Yisroel Noach’s conduct on Shabbos during this difficult time when his deceased wife was in the next room. His grandson, R’ Chaim Blinitzky, says that the family was surprised to see how he ran the Shabbos table as usual, and sang niggunim as though nothing happened.
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In the final years of his life R’ Yisroel Noach needed assistance. His son, R’ Aharon Yosef, helped him a lot and for this he received the Rebbe’s blessing for a long life. He, the son, passed away at the age of 96.
One of the doctors who helped R’ Yisroel Noach, by the name of Ezriel, also merited to receive warm words from the Rebbe in a letter published in Igros Kodesh. R’ Yisroel Noach lived till the age of 99 and passed away on 10 Cheshvan 5743/1982 and was buried on the Mt. of Olives.
May this unique Chassid and mekushar continue to be a source of inspiration for us all until the complete revelation of Moshiach.