Auction 95 Early Printed Books, Chassidut and Kabbalah, Letters and Manuscripts, Engravings and Jewish Ceremonial Objects

Letter of Rabbi Eliyahu of Kretinga (Disciple and Associate of Rabbi Yisrael Salanter) – Memel, 1863

Opening: $500
Sold for: $938
Including buyer's premium

Letter handwritten and signed by R. Eliyahu Levinson. Memel (Prussia; today: Klaipėda, Lithuania), Tevet 1863.
Sent to Jerusalem, to his friend R. Shmuel Salant and member of his court R. Binyamin David of Vilna. Letter regarding sending funds to Jerusalem, to public institutions and private individuals.
In the margins of the leaf is an additional letter, also handwritten and signed by R. Eliyahu, to his uncle R. Yechiel Ichel who lived in Jerusalem.


R. Eliyahu (Elinke) of Kretinga (1822-1888), studied in his youth in Salant under R. Yosef Zundel of Salant, during which time he became the close friend and disciple of R. Yisrael Salanter and R. Shmuel Salant. He remained the close disciple of R. Yisrael his whole life, was his close attendant in public activism and a staunch proponent of the Musar movement founded by R. Yisrael Salanter. Though he was one of the prominent Torah scholars of his generation, he refused to serve as rabbi and dealt in trade and banking. R. Elinke was a foremost leader of Russian Jewry and a leading lobbyist in the upper echelons of the government. He was an administrator and trustee of the Eretz Israel funds for over forty years.


[1] leaf. 28 cm. Thin, bluish stationery. Good condition. Stains. Folds.

PLEASE NOTE: Item descriptions were shortened in translation. For further information, please refer to Hebrew text.

Letters – Yeshivah Deans and Rabbis of Lithuania and Russia
Letters – Yeshivah Deans and Rabbis of Lithuania and Russia