Menachem Mendel Schneerson

Menachem Mendel Schneerson (Yiddish: מנחם מענדל שניאורסאהן; Modern Hebrew: מנחם מנדל שניאורסון; April 5, 1902 OS – June 12, 1994; AM 11 Nissan 5662 – 3 Tammuz 5754), known to adherents of the Chabad-Lubavitch movement as the Lubavitcher Rebbe or simply the Rebbe, was an Orthodox rabbi and the most recent Rebbe of the Lubavitch Hasidic dynasty.

He is considered one of the most influential Jewish leaders of the 20th century.

As leader of the Chabad-Lubavitch movement, he took an insular Hasidic group that almost came to an end with the Holocaust and transformed it into one of the most influential movements in religious Jewry, with an international network of over 5,000 educational and social centers.

The institutions he established include kindergartens, schools, drug-rehabilitation centers, care-homes for the disabled, and synagogues.

Schneerson's published teachings fill more than 400 volumes, and he is noted for his contributions to Jewish continuity and religious thought, as well as his wide-ranging contributions to traditional Torah scholarship.

He is recognized as the pioneer of Jewish outreach.

During his lifetime, many of his adherents believed that he was the Messiah.

His own attitude to the subject, and whether he openly encouraged this, is hotly debated among academics.

During Schneerson's lifetime, the messianic controversy and other issues elicited fierce criticism from many quarters in the Orthodox world, especially earning him the enmity of Rabbi Elazar Shach.

Menachem Mendel Schneerson was born on April 5, 1902 (OS) (11 Nissan, 5662) in the Black Sea port of Nikolaev in the Russian Empire (now Mykolaiv in Ukraine).

His father was rabbi Levi Yitzchak Schneerson, a renowned Talmudic scholar and authority on Kabbalah and Jewish law.

His mother was Rebbetzin Chana Schneerson.

He was named after the third Chabad rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneersohn, the Tzemach Tzedek, from whom he was a direct patrilineal descendant.

In 1907, when Schneerson was five years old, the family moved to Yekatrinoslav (today, Dnipro), where Rabbi Levi Yitzchak was appointed Chief Rabbi of the city.

During his youth, he received a private education and was tutored by Zalman Vilenkin from 1909 through 1913.

When Schneerson was 11 years old, Vilenkin informed his father that he had nothing more to teach his son.

At that point, Levi Yitzchak began teaching his son Talmud and rabbinic literature, as well as Kabbalah.

Schneerson proved gifted in both Talmudic and Kabbalistic study and also took exams as an external student of the local Soviet school.

He was considered an illui and genius, and by the time he was 17, he had mastered the entire Talmud, some 5,422 pages, as well as all its early commentaries.

Throughout his childhood Schneerson was involved in the affairs of his father's office.

He was also said to have acted as an interpreter between the Jewish community and the Russian authorities on a number of occasions.

Levi Yitzchak's courage and principles were a guide to his son for the rest of his life.

Many years later, when he once reminisced about his youth, Schneerson said "I have the education of the first-born son of the rabbi of Yekaterinoslav. When it comes to saving lives, I speak up whatever others may say."

Schneerson went on to receive separate rabbinical ordinations from the Rogatchover Gaon, Joseph Rosen, and Yechiel Yaakov Weinberg, author of Sridei Aish.

In 1923, Schneerson visited the sixth Chabad-Lubavitch Rebbe, Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn, for the first time.

He met the rabbi's middle daughter Chaya Mushka (Mousia) – they were distant cousins.

Sometime later they became engaged, but were not married until 1928 in Warsaw, Poland.

Taking great pride in his son-in-law's outstanding scholarship, Yosef Yitzchak asked him to engage in learned conversation with the great Torah scholars that were present at the wedding, such as Meir Shapiro and Menachem Ziemba.

Menachem Mendel and Chaya Mushka were married for 60 years, and were childless.

Menachem Mendel Schneerson and Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn were both descendants of Menachem Mendel Schneersohn, known as the Tzemach Tzedek, the third Rebbe of Chabad Lubavitch.

Schneerson later commented that the day of his marriage bound the community to him and him to the community.

He served until 1939, when he was exiled by the Soviets to Kazakhstan.

Schneerson had two younger brothers: Dov Ber, who was murdered in 1944 by Nazi collaborators, and Yisrael Aryeh Leib, who died in 1952 while completing doctoral studies at Liverpool University.

In 1947 Schneerson traveled to Paris, to take his mother, Chana Schneerson, back to New York City with him.

Schneerson would visit her every day and twice each Friday and prepare her a tea.

In 1964, Chana Schneerson died.

In 1978, the U.S. Congress asked President Jimmy Carter to designate Schneerson's birthday as the national Education Day U.S. It has been since commemorated as Education and Sharing Day.

On February 10, 1988, Schneerson's wife, Chaya Mushka Schneerson died.

In 1994, Schneerson was posthumously awarded the Congressional Gold Medal for his "outstanding and lasting contributions toward improvements in world education, morality, and acts of charity."

Schneerson's resting place attracts both Jews and non-Jews for prayer.