Person · 5646–5708 AM · 1886 CE — 1948 CE

Imrei Shaul—Rabbi Shaul Yedidya Elazar Taub of Modzitz אמרי שאול — רבי שאול ידידיה אלעזר טאוב ממודזיץ

the second rebbe of Modzitz; composer of hundreds of melodies

The son of Rabbi Yisrael Taub of Modzitz. He took the court in 1921 and kept it at Otwock near Warsaw.

Melodies. Modzitz is the court of the melody. The father composed; he composed more: hundreds of nigunim, from short table songs to long ones of dozens of parts. His melodies spread through all the courts and the yeshivot, and many sing them without knowing the composer’s name.

The war. In 1940 he fled Poland for Vilna, and from there through Japan to America—by the route of the Mir yeshiva. In 1947 he moved to Eretz Yisrael.

The Mount of Olives. He died in Tel Aviv on 16 Kislev 5708 (29 November 1947)—the very day the United Nations voted on partition. He was buried on the Mount of Olives—the last burial there before the mount passed to Jordan for nineteen years.

On the timeline

5537 · 1777 CEThe courts of Polish Hasidism: Lizhensk, Lublin, Przysucha, Ger 5699 · 1939 CEThe Shoah: the Destruction of European Jewry 5700 · 1940 CEThe Rescue of the Mir Yeshiva: Vilna, Kobe, Shanghai 5708 · 1948 CEThe UN Partition Resolution

Places

Warsaw Tel Aviv

Rabbi Yisrael Taub of Modzitz—the Divrei Yisrael Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu Taub of Modzitz—the Imrei Eish

Sources

Acharonim and later rabbinic literature

The collections of Modzitz melodies — what he is remembered for
The traditions of the Modzitz court — the road through Vilna and Japan; the burial

Scholarship

Reference works on the chasidic courts — the dates

Basis: documents and evidence.