Memory Lane: Rabbi (Yeshayahu) Simon Glazer

We have noted that Congregation Beth El of Boro Park moved into their grand temple in the year 1922. While it is unknown who led the congregation during those early years, from 1927-1930, it its spiritual leader was Rabbi Simon Glazer, a brilliant and accomplished writer and leader in America (and Canada) of yore. Through the large archive of papers that he left behind, we learn much about his activities and about Jewish life in America during this time. 

Kovno

Rav Yeshayahu was born in 1878 in the Lithuanian town of Erzvillig (Eržvilkas in Lithuanian), a hamlet about 100 km from Kovno. His father was Reb Avrohom Eliyahu and his mother was Rivka. Of his eight siblings, all of them would eventually come to America, and settle in cities like Dallas, Louisville, Des Moines, St. Louis, Boston, and elsewhere, while their brother would move around the country as a rabbi. 

“Mt father dedicated all his years to educating his children in Torah and Yiras Shomayim,” Rabbi Glazer later wrote. “His home was a talmud Torah in the literal sense; the largest room in our home was the cheder… On Isru Chag Pesach of 1882, I was enrolled in the cheder, and the melamed was Reb Meir Rosenfeld, who would be among the first in our town to immigrate to America.” 

As he grew older, the shiurim advanced. “Every Thursday we underwent an exam on no less than five dapim of Gemoro with Rashi and Tosafos,” he recalled. “For two years straight, I learned Gemoro in my hometown… IN those days, there was established a yeshiva in nearby Yurburg under the leadership of Rav Volf Pollack, and my father enrolled me there in 1887. In 1889, I entered the yeshiva of Rav Sholom Yaakov in Tavrig, which was then a famed yeshiva throughout the Kovno region. In 1890, my father sent me to the yeshiva of the great amkan, Rav Moshe Sadovsky, in Rogala, and to learn under the ga’onim of the town. A warm feeling envelopes me to this day when I think about the ga’onim of Rogala. In those days I learned no less than eighteen hours a day,” he recalled. 

America 

Throughout the early 1890’s, he spent time in a number of cities, immersed completely in learning, and being guided by great ga’onim in Lita. In 1894, his draft came for him, and was forced to escape across the border, into Germany. But then, the German government gave him an ultimatum to either travel on, or return home to Russia. After a series of stops, he made it into Palestine, and in 1897, he landed in New York. “From here, my travails are documented in the newspapers in and in the communities that honored me to serve them,” he writes. 

Arriving in the goldene medinah, he called upon the famed Yiddish newspaper editor, Kasriel Sarahson, who advised him to study English, because America needed Rabbonim who were fluent in English. Rabbi Glazer took his advice, and spent his winters studying secular subjects, while serving as a cantor and Hebrew teacher in the summers. Looking at his extensive writings in later years, it is evident that he was indeed a good student of the English language. 

He married Ms. Ida Cantor who was born in America. 

Rabbi Glazer wrote prolifically, and translated works into English, so they would appeal to the younger generations. In total, he wrote and translated 26 volumes. He was called to the West Side of Manhattan in the fall of 1930, and retired at some point before his passing in 1938, having served the American Jewish community for forty years.