Rare historic letter, important and interesting, from ten of the leading tzaddikim and zealots of Jerusalem, in which the Bada”tz Perushim call the Edah HaChareidit to din “Because they have made improper changes to the Edah regulations.” Jerusalem, Av, 1937.
The first signatory is the sacred gaon Rabbi David Bahara”n, followed by the geonim and tzaddikim: Rabbi Amram B’Rash”i Blau, Rabbi Aharon Shlomo Katzenellenbogen, Rabbi Yitzchak Isaac Gelb, Rabbi Ya’akov Rotman, Rabbi Chaim Asher Buchwald, Rabbi Yehoshua Yonatan Rubinstein, Rabbi Avraham Chaim Bernstein and others. It is important to note that just a few months after the date on this letter, the signatories on this letter officially split off from the Edah HaChareidit and established Neturei Karta.
Background to the letter: In 1924, Rabbi Moshe Blau was appointed leader of Va’ad HaIr HaAshkenazi. In the following years, as a result of the immigration from Poland and Eastern Europe, the immigrants began to take a more moderate stance than that of the members of the Yishuv HaYashan. The differences between the two groups within Agudat Yisrael grew stronger. The deep rift between the streams was the attitude of the Edah Chareidit itself to the Zionist institutions. It was primarily the question of participating in the 1926 municipal elections. This question arose again in 1935. In both cases, the leader of the Edah HaChareidit supported voting, and the zealots and rabbis from Hungary were opposed. Due to the sharp differences of opinion between the Agudists and the people of the Old Yishuv, Rabbi Amram Blau, Rabbi Moshe Blau’s brother, established a new group within the Edah HaChareidit in 1938, called Neturei Karta.
[1] leaf paper, written on one side. 20×16 cm.
Fine condition. Filing perforations. Aging stains. Fold marks.