Schneersohn, Shlomo Zalman, of Kopyst. Ma’amarim [Discourses]

(CHASSIDISM)

Wilkomir

1863

Aschkenazic cursive script. Colophon on f.97r.: “Salik be-yom b’ Bo shenath tarla”g poh Wilkomir” [Completed Monday of portion “Bo” in the year 5633 / 1873, here Wilkomir]. On final blank, inscription: “”Ha-bikhel ha-zeh shayach le-ha-R. Y.M. Luria mi-Wilkomir” [This manuscript belongs to R. Y.M. Luria of Wilkomir]

MANUSCRIPT OF KOPYSTER CHASSIDISM Upon the death of R. Menachem Mendel Schneersohn of Lubavitch, author of “Responsa Tzemach Tzedek,” in 1866, his second eldest son R. Judah Leib (Mahari”l) (1811-1866), assumed leadership of the Chabad movement in the city of Kopyst. Tragically, R. Judah Leib died within the year and was succeeded by his son, R. Shlomo Zalman (1830-1900). A collection of the latter’s Chassidic discourses were published posthumously by his son under the title Magen Avoth (Berdichev, 1902). All sixteen of the discourses in our “bikhel” or manuscript, appear in the two printed volumes of Magen Avoth. Many of Russia’s greatest rabbinical authorities were counted among the Kopyster Chassidim, including R. Joseph Rosen of Rogatchov and Dvinsk, and R. Judah Leib Tzirelsohn of Kishinev. With the death of R. Shlomo Zalman’s younger brother, R. Shemariah Noah of Bobroisk in 1923, Kopyster Chassidism became extinct, nevertheless, among Chabad Chassidim today, there are certain families whose ancestors were affiliated in the past with the Kopyst sect. See Tzvi M. Rabinowicz, The Encyclopedia of Hasidism (1996), p. 430; Y. Alfasi, Ha-Chassiduth (1977), p. 80; EJ, Vol. XIV, cols. 981-2