Page 29 - HaMizrachi #27 Purim USA 2021

ZIONIST LEADERS THE PEOPLE AND THE LAND

OUR SERIES ON LEADERS WHO HAVE SHAPED ZIONISM
CONTINUES WITH SOME OF ZIONISM’S EARLIEST INFLUENCERS
Rabbi Levi Ibn Chaviv

Defender of Yerushalayim

orn in Spain in 1483, Rabbi Levi Israel. Most of them settled in Tzfat, claiming semicha needed to come first
Ibn Chaviv (also known as the away from the Muslim and Christian and foremost from Yerushalayim. The
BMaharal Chaviv or by his acro- threat in Yerushalayim. The Jews of project was halted.
nym, the Maharlbach) was the son of Yerushalayim were few and impov- Rabbi Levi also wrote extensively on the
Rabbi Ya’akov Ibn Chaviv, author of the erished, while Tzfat was flourishing rejuvenated Mitzvot HaTluyot BaAretz,
aggadic commentary Ein Ya’akov. spiritually and financially in the height mitzvot which were not kept in exile but
From the age of nine, Rabbi Levi led of its “Golden Era.” Although he could were suddenly relevant in Israel. His
a rather nomadic life. His family was have stayed in Tzfat, a breeding ground halachic responsa were compiled into
expelled from Spain in 1492 and they for the greatest rabbis and leaders of the Maharlbach Responsa, a fundamen-
fled to Portugal, from where they were the time, Rabbi Levi chose to move to tal source in Mitzvot HaTluyot BaAretz.
expelled once more in 1498. They then Yerushalayim, despite the difficult con- Another famous responsa of his
moved to Saloniki, where Rabbi Levi ditions, decrying the abandonment of addresses the halachot of Purim Meshu-
studied under his father’s auspices and the Holy City. lash, a rare occurrence when Shushan
learned to become a sofer stam. It was He wrote at length encouraging Jews Purim falls out on Shabbat (like this
there that Rabbi Ya’akov passed away to live there and criticizing the Jews of year). Such a Purim occurred when
and Rabbi Levi completed his father’s Tzfat for forgetting the holy city. When Rabbi Levi served as Chief Rabbi of
unfinished manuscript of the Ein a plague broke out in Yerushalayim, Yerushalayim. At the time, the Jews
Ya’akov.
spreading quickly because of cramped didn’t know what to do. Having returned
In 1513, Rabbi Levi moved to Israel for conditions, Rabbi Levi remained in the from exile, they had no tradition regard-
a short period. Unable to earn a living, city while many families fled. ing when the mitzvot of Purim should
he returned to Saloniki, then moved to be performed in such a circumstance.
Damascus, and Aleppo, all the while One of his most famous rulings is his Rabbi Levi taught them the answers.
determined to return to the Holy Land. opposition to renewing semicha, hala-
chic rabbinic ordination. According He also wrote a commentary on the
In 1525, Rabbi Levi moved to Tzfat, to the Rambam, if all of the rabbis and Rambam’s laws of Kiddush HaChodesh.
where he spent a short amount of time leaders of Israel agree to it, semicha as Rabbi Levi Ibn Chaviv passed away in
before finally settling in Yerushalayim, was performed in the times of the Mik- Yerushalayim in 1545. After his passing,
where it didn’t take long before he was dash can be renewed. In 1538, when the the Jewish community in Yerushalayim,
appointed chief rabbi of the city. He had rabbis of Tzfat got together to renew which he had worked so hard to culti-
a burning passion for Yerushalayim and the semicha, Rabbi Levi was not con- vate, dwindled, and many moved away.
spent his life building and defending the sulted. Outraged they could consider Nevertheless, his legacy as a defender
holy city. such a thing without taking counsel with of Yerushalayim as the center of Torah

After the Spanish expulsion, many Jews the Rabbi of Yerushalayim, Rabbi Levi and Jewish life, and his mesirut toward
came directly or indirectly to settle in wrote to them to declare his objection, the holy city, remains. 

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