Iconic Williamsburg: Reb Yitzchok Spivak

A fascinating personality in Williamsburg of yore was the Aleksansder chossid Reb Yitzchok Spivak who hailed from Lodz and merited to be in the courts of the Polish Admorim of yesteryear. He was a wealthy man, and was involved in communal affairs and supporting his brethren. 

We tell his story here as told in his autobiography “Sefer Hazichronos” which was published in honor of his 75th birthday. 

Lodz 

Reb Yitzchok was born in Lodz in the year 1855, and got married in Lodz in 1879. Soon after his wedding, he went into business and became phenomenally successful—having connections with in the big cities in Poland. 

“When the old Rebbe of Aleksander, the Yismach Yisroel, was niftar, they dragged me over the heads of thousands of Yidden to merit clothing him in his tachrichim,” Reb Yitzchok writes in his autobiography. 

Testimony to his prominence in Lodz comes from his landsman, Reb Chaim Yechezkel Moseson (a mechanech who stood at the helm of institutions in Williamsburg, and was featured in this column in the spring of 2022), who recalled: 

“My parents lived in Lodz, and I learned in the Lodzer Rov’s Talmud Torah, near the Aleksander shtiebel which was in the same courtyard. There I met Reb Yitzchok Spivak, a tall chassidishe Yid, a great philanthropist, a generous donor, and a leading figure, not only among the chassidim, but in the entire city of Lodz. His home was open to all the poor and the needy. With the greatest mesirus nefesh he came to the aid of all those who turned to him in dire financial straits.  

Another Williamsburg personality who recalled Reb Yitzchok from his days in Lodz was the illustrious Rav Avrohom Yitzchok Zelmanowitz (featured in this column in the spring of 2021), who wrote: “I have known this man and his work, his literal mesirus nefesh on behalf of his brethren, both physically and materially, which can be found among a select few in a generation. 

“I remember Reb Yitzchok from Lodz, when I was a young lad, and even then, his voice was heard in all communal matters of the large community that was in Lodz, second only in size to Warsaw. Though he was indeed a wealthy man, he lowered himself to all the needy of the city with incredible hachnosas orchim. This is how he conducted himself all his years…” 

Patron of his People 

“Rav Elya Chaim Meisel, the rov of Lodz, would often saddle me with communal responsibilities,” he recalls. “One Friday morning, I exited my home to find a group of dozens of women—all wives of melamdim—standing at my door, having broken out in sobs. It turned out that they were all arrested by the authorities overnight for teaching children without the proper documentation. ‘Have you been to Rav Eliyahu Chaim,’ I asked them. ‘Yes, they replied. He said that you’re the only one who can help get our husbands out of prison.” 

“Not a bad amount of work for a Friday...I mused.” 

“I sent the women off and got to work… one by one I obtained papers for the melamdim. By the time I got them all released, the Yidden of Lodz were already eating the tzimmes on Friday night. When I reported to Rav Elya Chaim that I had been mechalel Shabbos due to this story, he said: “Chillul Shabbos is indeed an aveirah, but such an aveirah can’t be bought for any money in the world.” 

Reb Yitzchok continues on writing about other episodes in which he came to the aid and rescue of his fellow Yidden in Lodz. 

“Once, I rode in on my horse to the Rebbe, the Yismach Yisroel of Aleksander, and I invited him to join me on a ride for some fresh air. Together with the Rebbe rode his brother, the “Tiferes Shmuel,” later the Aleksander Rebbe. I took the reins in my hand, and drove them away to a small town, two miles away, as the Rebbe’s shared stories in the back of the wagon. 

Williamsburg

“And then I began planning to come to America,” Reb Yitzchok writes. 

“I chanced upon him in Yeshiva Torah Vodaas, in Williamsburg, where he came to enroll his grandson” continues the narrative of Rabbi Moseson, “I was overjoyed to see how, here too, he conducts himself in the same manner as he did back home. Although he may not be as wealthy as he once was, he has not forsaken his ways of kindness and openheartedness.”

In the 1920’s, Reb Yitzchok expended many efforts on behalf of his Polish brethren to be able to obtain visas to America, writing to President Calvin Coolidge: “As the Rabbi of Congregation Ohel Yitzchok, I wish to call to your attention of your excellency the sufferings of my fellow men who seek to obtain visas at Warsaw, Poland, in order to enter the United States.” His efforts were answered by the authorities in Washington who launched an investigation into the matter. 

Reb Yitzchok also recalls sponsoring Rebbe Menachem Mendel Landau of Biala to come to America, and the Rebbe resided right next doors to the Spivaks in Williamsburg. Indeed, in the Rebbe’s immigration papers, he gives the address of the “Congregation Ohel Yitzchok, president Mr. Izaak Spivak,” as his destination. 

Featured here is a photograph of Reb Yitzchok sitting outside his beautiful sukkah in New York—a beautiful sukkah that he brought over from Lodz. “Rav Selmanowitz from Rodney Street, and Rav Moseson, visited me in this Sukkah back home in Lodz and recall that I had a private telephone in it. 

Thus, Reb Yitzchok continued serving his fellow Yidden, even owning a special home where he housed recent immigrants. 

Even back his Lodz days, Reb Yitzchok harbored a dream of alighting to Eretz Yisroel. He eventually did fulfill that dream, and was niftar there in 1946.