BRISZK

BRISZK , family of Transylvanian rabbis.

mordecai ben joshua briszk (1884–1944), founder and head of the yeshivah at Tasnad. He was educated in the home of his father who was born at Brest-Litovsk (Brisk), Lithuania, whence he took his family name, but later moved to Hungary, where he became rabbi of Tiszadada. Briszk subsequently studied at the bet midrash of Mordecai Loeb Winkler, the rabbi of Mad. In 1908 he was appointed dayyan at Marghita, Transylvania, where he had already laid the groundwork for a yeshivah. After he became rabbi of Tasnad in 1919, he expanded his yeshivah, which in 1935 had 450 pupils, making it the largest in Hungary and Transylvania. In his teaching he pursued two basic aims: to equip his pupils with an extensive knowledge of the Talmud and its commentaries, and to prepare them to arrive at halakhic decisions based on a clear understanding of the principles contained in the authorities. Accordingly, he did not limit himself to teaching talmudic themes (sugyot) alone, but provided a thorough grounding in the literature of the earlier and the most outstanding later authorities. In 1937 he erected a large building for his yeshivah. Seven years later he and his family were taken to the ghetto at Simleul-Silvaniei. From there he was transported to Auschwitz where he died. Briszk published the work of his father-in-law, Joshua Aaron Ẓevi Weinberger, the rabbi of Marghita, with important addenda of his own, in 1913. He himself was the author of responsa in three parts (Tasnad, 1939), but the printing of the third part was interrupted in the middle and completed in New York in 1963. nathan Ẓevi ben joshua (1883–1944), rabbi and author. The brother of Mordecai and the son-in-law of Naphtali ha-Kohen Schwarz, he too perished in Auschwitz. From 1909 he was rabbi of Magyarcseke (Ceica), and later of the Orthodox community of Nagyszalonta (Salonta), both in Transylvania. He was the author of several works: Naḥalat Ẓevi, on Avot (1916); Naḥalat Avot, a commentary on the Passover Haggadah (1919); Naḥal Dimah (1923); Naḥalat Shivah (1932), on the festivals and on talmudic themes; and Ma'amar Esther (1937), homilies on the Book of Genesis.

bibliography:

Z. Schwarz, Shem ha-Gedolim me-Ereẓ Hagar, 2 (1914), 17a; Elleh Ezkerah, 2 (1957), 73–80; S.N. Gottlieb, Sefer Oholei Shem (1912), 247; N. Ben-Menahem, Mi-Sifrut Yisrael be-Ungaryah (1958), 336.

[Naphtali Ben-Menahem]