Memory Lane: Rav Shmuel Alter

The author of the legendary 20-volume Likutei Basar Likutei in which he painstakingly gathered gems and vignettes from throughout the entire Torah, a rov in Vienna, Cuba, and East New York, Rav Shmuel Alter came to Boro Park in his golden years following a lifetime of learning and teaching his fellow Yidden. 

Here, he was a respected and revered presence—a true vestige from a lost world who would inspire audiences with his Torah oratory and through his living example. In honor of his yohrtzeit the 17th of Kislev, we take a glimpse into his life. 

Rav Shmuel was born to his father Rav Avrohom Yehuda in the great city of Lemberg (today Lvov) in the year 1883. His maternal grandfather and namesake was Reb Shmuel Klein, a noted chossid of the Divrei Chaim of Sanz who was very close to the tzaddik.

He married the daughter of Reb Chaim Reich, a wealthy businessman who was a mechutan of Rav Meir Arik. When WWI broke out, he escaped with his family to Vienna, and supported his family members who were struggling back in Lemberg and Galicia. 

Following the war, he accepted the rabbonus of the Ezras Yisroel Shul in Vienna’s 9th ward. There he became acquainted with many of the Admorim and Rabbonim who inhabited the great city during those years. 

When WWII broke out, he was exiled once again, finally arriving in Cuba, where he threw himself into the work of caring for the refugees. In 1946, he resettled in East New York, where he became the rov of the Sadigerer Shul on Herzl Street.

Volumes of Vignettes 

The volumes of Likutei Basar Likutei have become well-known throughout the Torah world, and were extremely well-received at the time that he published them. 

In the introduction to the fifth volume, he wrote: “This is the second edition of this sefer, and this alone (the fact that it went to a second printing in mere years after its publication) attests to the popularity of these seforim. 

“In 1945, I published the first volume, and in 1950, I was already up to the fifth volume. In these few years, the seforim have spread far and wide and completely sold out.” 

Steadily, throughout the years, Rav Shmuel published twenty volumes on the entire Torah, Tanach, Agados hashas, and Midrashim. Upon the publication of the tenth volume, Dos Yiddishe Vort, wrote: “this is one of the most interesting compilations of drush, culled from hundreds of sources from throughout the ages.”  

In recent years, a group of individuals came together to found Machon Likutei Shmuel, dedicated to commemorate the illustrious author and his seforim. To date, they have republished a number of the volumes of the seforim in a breathtakingly beautiful format, completely reworked. 

Boro Park 

In Boro Park, Rav Shmuel settled at 1625 52nd Street, and joined the main Belzer Shtiebel on 16th Avenue, and was regarded as one of the most prominent mispalelim in the shul. He became known as “ish ha’agodoh,” a man who was thoroughly versed in the agodos of Torah and Shas—because he would always darshen on those topics with great fluency. 

There was a l’cho dodi niggun from his brother Reb Volfche, which he would sing every time he would daven before the amud. At the end of his life, he made a request of Reb Moshe Biegeleisen that since he had not been blessed with children, would he please sing this niggun and thus perpetuate his memory. Since that time, Reb Moshe, sheyichye, has been singing this niggun for l’cho dodi and it is known in the shtiebel as “Reb Shmuel’s niggun.” 

Thus, Rav Shmuel may have passed on in the winter of 1970, but his ‘song’ lives on through the Torah that he spread and taught throughout his life.