Born in Russia in 1891, Aaron Kotler had by the 1930s developed a reputation as one of Eastern Europe’s leading talmudic scholars. After World War II began, he managed to escape both the Nazis and the Soviets, arriving in the U.S. in 1941. He thereupon devoted himself to the activities of the Vaad Hatzalah, an Orthodox organization founded to help Jews, especially those affiliated with religious institutions, flee Nazi-occupied Europe. In 1943, he founded a yeshivah in Lakewood, New Jersey, now a leading institution of American ultra-Orthodoxy. Moshe Rackove writes:
No matter was too large or too small for Rabbi Kotler. He worked in the Vaad Hatzalah offices urging rescue efforts, and marshaled Treasury Secretary Henry Morgenthau’s assistance in sending refugees money. His West Side apartment in New York City became the address for letters from all corners of the globe with individual requests. The letters reflected their belief in his concern for them, and his ability to tend to their plight. He corresponded with his students trapped in Samarkand, Uzebekistan after being shipped to Siberia by the Soviets in 1941, sending them care packages, with letters signed, “Your friend who will not forget you.” . . .
[Ultimately], the individual was paramount in Kotler’s mind. . . .
Kotler fully understood the enormity of the Holocaust on a personal level. He lost family members. . . . Yet he understood that [his] main focus [ought to be on rebuilding].
More about: American Jewry, History & Ideas, Holocaust, Orthodoxy, Soviet Union, Yeshiva
