, Rabbi Levi Yitzchak Schneerson
In Honor of Chof Av

Meet the Man Who Raised the Rebbe

Rabbi Levi Yitzchak Schneerson

A brilliant Torah scholar, fearless communal leader and devoted father whose life embodied absolute dedication to Hashem, Torah and the Jewish people.

▶ Watch: Giving of Oneself
Imagine...
 

Imagine living in a country where teaching Torah could send you to prison. Where arranging a bris, building a mikvah or helping a Jewish couple marry according to halachah could be treated as a crime.

Now imagine refusing to stop anyway.

That was Rabbi Levi Yitzchak Schneerson. Long before his son, the Lubavitcher Rebbe, would inspire Jewish life across the world, Rabbi Levi Yitzchak stood at the center of Jewish resistance to the Soviet attempt to uproot Torah and mitzvos.

He was a towering scholar, a beloved Rav and a man whose responsibility for another Jew outweighed concern for his own safety. On the twentieth of Menachem Av, Jews around the world remember his life, study his Torah and draw strength from his example.

Begin With the Rebbe's Words

Giving of Oneself

The Rebbe explains the lesson of his father's self-sacrifice: not only responding when another Jew asks for help, but actively seeking out those who need access to authentic Judaism.

Watch the Video
The synagogue in Yekaterinoslav where Rabbi Levi Yitzchak served as rabbi
The synagogue in Yekaterinoslav where Rabbi Levi Yitzchak served as Rav.
Chapter One

A Rabbi for an Entire City

Rabbi Levi Yitzchak Schneerson was born in 1878 into a distinguished rabbinic family. From an early age, he became known for an extraordinary mind that embraced every dimension of Torah, from Talmud and halachah to Chassidus and the deepest teachings of Kabbalah.

In 1909, he became the Rav of Yekaterinoslav, a major Ukrainian city known today as Dnipro. Together with his wife, Rebbetzin Chana, he led a vast Jewish community through years of war, revolution, poverty and growing religious persecution.

His position was not merely ceremonial. Jews turned to him for halachic decisions, personal guidance, encouragement and practical help. He accepted responsibility for the religious life of an entire region, and he would not abandon that responsibility when it became dangerous.
“In the end, my father sacrificed his very life for upholding this spiritual mission.”
The Rebbe, speaking about his father
Chapter Two

When Judaism Became a Crime

Under Soviet rule, Jewish schools were closed, synagogues were watched, religious leaders were threatened and basic mitzvos were forced underground. Many people were frightened into silence. Rabbi Levi Yitzchak could not be silenced.

He supervised kosher food production, arranged hidden weddings and circumcisions, supported underground Torah education and worked to ensure that Jewish women could use a proper mikvah. He knew that every act placed him under greater suspicion, but he also knew that thousands of Jews depended upon him.

He did not wait for Jews to find him.
The Rebbe emphasized that his father proactively sought out Jews who needed to learn even the most basic foundations of Judaism. His concern was not only for his own spiritual survival, but for the survival of every Jew around him.

In the early hours of 9 Nissan 5699, Soviet secret-police agents entered his home. They searched his library, confiscated materials and arrested him for the “crime” of strengthening Judaism.

After more than a year of imprisonment and brutal interrogation, he was sentenced to five years of exile in the remote village of Chi’ili, Kazakhstan.

A Life of Leadership and Sacrifice

A Brief Timeline

1878
Born into a distinguished rabbinic family.
1909
Becomes Rav of Yekaterinoslav.
1939
Arrested by the Soviet secret police.
1940
Sentenced to five years of exile in Kazakhstan.
1944
Passes away in Alma-Ata on Chof Av.
Chapter Three

Torah Written Without Ink

Exile was designed to break him. He lived in extreme poverty, without privacy and often without adequate food. Yet his mind remained immersed in Torah.

Rebbetzin Chana joined him in Kazakhstan and helped make it possible for him to continue learning and writing. There was little paper and no ordinary ink, so she gathered local grasses and herbs and produced homemade ink.

Rabbi Levi Yitzchak wrote dense Torah insights in the margins of the few seforim available to him. Because the homemade ink was prepared from different plants, the surviving pages contain writing in several distinct colors.

These pages are more than manuscripts. They are testimony: even a regime that could take away his home, freedom, health and books could not take away his Torah.

 A handwritten manuscript by Rabbi Levi Yitzchak Schneerson
Handwritten manuscript, later published by the Rebbe. Courtesy of Kehot Publication Society.
Look Closely
The varied colors visible in Rabbi Levi Yitzchak's notes came from the different plants Rebbetzin Chana used to make ink.
A Firsthand Memory

Unbroken Spirit

Reb Gedaliah Mazal recalls Rabbi Levi Yitzchak's arrival in Alma-Ata, Kazakhstan. His father became close to Rabbi Levi Yitzchak and was present at his passing.

▶ Watch Unbroken Spirit
The Rebbe at a farbrengen
The Rebbe at a farbrengen.
Chapter Four

The Father of the Rebbe

To know Rabbi Levi Yitzchak is also to understand more deeply the home in which the Rebbe was raised: a home of vast Torah scholarship, uncompromising truth and total responsibility for another Jew.

The Rebbe spoke of his father with profound reverence. Each year on Chof Av, the Rebbe held a farbrengen marking the yahrtzeit, drawing practical lessons from his father's life and calling upon Jews to strengthen Torah, mitzvos and concern for others.

The Rebbe also devoted extraordinary effort to preserving, publishing and explaining his father's Torah. The surviving writings became the volumes known as Likkutei Levi Yitzchak, and the Rebbe frequently illuminated their intricate teachings for a wider audience.

Torah first written in isolation, in the margins of worn seforim with ink made from plants, is now studied throughout the world.
Chapter Five

Why Chof Av Matters Today

Rabbi Levi Yitzchak's story is not only about how a great rabbi lived under Soviet persecution. It asks each of us what Judaism means when keeping it requires commitment.

Torah Is Priceless
When he had almost no seforim, paper or writing supplies, he still found a way to learn and write.
Every Jew Matters
He accepted personal danger so that another Jew could have access to a mitzvah.
The Jewish Spirit Endures
The Soviet regime tried to silence him. Today, his Torah is learned around the world.
The resting place of Rabbi Levi Yitzchak Schneerson in Almaty, Kazakhstan
Rabbi Levi Yitzchak's resting place in Almaty, Kazakhstan.

His Life Was Cut Short.
His Influence Was Not.

Rabbi Levi Yitzchak passed away in Alma-Ata on the twentieth of Menachem Av, 5704 - August 9, 1944 at the age of sixty-six. The suffering of imprisonment and exile had taken a devastating toll on his health.

Yet the Torah he taught, the Jews he strengthened and the son he raised continue to illuminate Jewish life everywhere.
Experience Chof Av With the Rebbe

Chof Av Farbrengen With the Rebbe

Watch a scene from a farbrengen marking the yahrtzeit of the Rebbe's father, as the Rebbe receives pledges for a tzedakah fund established in Rabbi Levi Yitzchak's name.

▶ Watch the Chof Av Farbrengen
Continue Exploring

Learn More About Rabbi Levi Yitzchak

Explore a more detailed account of Rabbi Levi Yitzchak’s life, his Torah scholarship, his courageous leadership under Soviet oppression and the extraordinary story of his imprisonment and exile.

Read the Full Biography →
May Rabbi Levi Yitzchak's life inspire us to learn Torah, strengthen another Jew and carry out the Rebbe's shlichus with courage, until the immediate revelation of Moshiach and the complete Redemption.