Rabbi Yisrael of Ruzhin רבי ישראל מרוז'ין
great-grandson of the Maggid, founder of the Ruzhin house and its branches
Rabbi Yisrael was a great-grandson of the Maggid of Mezritch. His court at Ruzhin was famous for its wealth: carriages, a palace, silver. He explained it by saying that the honour of Israel must be seen, and that the royal dignity of the tzaddik raises the dignity of the whole people; his opponents saw a departure from the simplicity of the first Hasidim.
After two Jewish informers were killed in Ruzhin the authorities accused him of complicity; he spent two years in prison and then fled to the Austrian empire, founding a court at Sadigura. His sons spread into courts of their own—Sadigura, Chortkov, Boyan, Ştefăneşti—and the Ruzhin branch became one of the most prominent in Galicia and Bukovina.
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Sources
Documents of the period
- chronicles of the Ruzhin court — the running of the court and the branches of the dynasty
- the investigation file of the Ruzhin affair — the accusation, the imprisonment, and the flight to Austria
Basis: documents and evidence.